As a GP, having my heart surgery cancelled gave me a new perspective on NHS underfunding

Dave Triff, who has worked in the NHS for decades, recently had his operation postponed at the last minute, one of many cancelled to stave off a winter crisis

I am a GP partner in Oxford. I have worked in the NHS in Oxford for 20 years, barring two years in a post in rural Canada. In July 2017, we returned to the UK and a friend of mine, who’s a cardiothoracic anaesthetist, commented on my bounding neck pulses as we were chatting over a beer. A little later that day, I had a listen to my heart and even I, a GP, could hear a loud murmur. I asked one of my colleagues to have a listen, just to check I wasn’t being paranoid. I think he was trying to make me feel better and reassured me: “It’s probably just a flow murmur.”

Nevertheless, I saw my GP that day. With detached, mildly mounting alarm I registered the abnormal findings she discovered. High blood pressure, wide pulse pressure, mild tachycardia and, of course, The Murmur. Her worried expression made me more alarmed than the findings, and I found myself trying to reassure her that everything would be OK.

It’s quite difficult to describe the strangled sense of anger as I watched Jeremy Hunt on the news that night.

A combination of factors are at play. Hospitals have fewer beds than last year, so they are less able to deal with the recent, ongoing surge in illness. Last week, for example, the bed occupancy rate at 17 of England’s 153 acute hospital trusts was 98% or more, with the fullest – Walsall healthcare trust – 99.9% occupied.

Continue reading... January 15, 2018 at 03:04AM