NHS urges parents to use pharmacies for children's illnesses

Stay Well Pharmacy campaign aims to relieve pressure on GPs and A&E for minor complaints

A health campaign is urging parents to treat their pharmacist as their first port of call for their children’s minor illnesses instead of visiting their GP or A&E.

NHS England said there were 18m GP appointments and 2.1m visits to A&E for self-treatable conditions every year, at a cost of £850m to the health service.

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The UK has fewer doctors and nurses than many other comparable countries both in Europe and worldwide. According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Britain comes 24th in a league table of 34 member countries in terms of the number of doctors they have relative to their populations. Greece, Austria and Norway have the most; the three countries with proportionately the fewest medics are Turkey, Chile and Mexico. Jeremy Hunt, the health secretary, regularly points out that the NHS in England has more doctors and nurses than when the Conservatives came to power in 2010. That is true, although there are now fewer district nurses, mental health nurses and other types of health professionals.

Continue reading... February 12, 2018 at 02:18PM