RECENT NEWS

The second National Audit of Schizophrenia has shown that there is still a significant shortfall in the quality of some aspects of care affecting the lives of people living with schizophrenia and also their carers.

The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has been praised by Oxford University for fast-tracking the authorisation of the clinical trial application for the new Ebola vaccine.

A new comparison website tool allows health and social care organisations to see how their services compare with those of others.

The results of a survey looking into the coordination of care, including discharge processes and re-admission for surgical patients in England and Wales, showed that discharge from hospital is an area of particular concern. Only one-quarter of those surveyed agreed that there is a thorough coordinated discharge process in place to enable effective transfer of care from the hospital environment.

Multiple sclerosis (MS) is the most common neurological condition in young adults in the UK, affecting around 100,000 people. According to new guidance from NICE, people with MS should be offered a rapid and accurate diagnosis of their condition and access to specialist advice and proven therapies.

In an open letter to the three main party political leaders, the British Medical Association (BMA) and other bodies have highlighted the fact that the health budget has kept the NHS in an ‘era of unprecedented austerity’.

ata from the first annual report of Public Health England’s (PHE’s) English Surveillance Programme for Antimicrobial Utilisation and Resistance (ESPAUR), found that, between 2010 and 2013, there was a 6% increase in the combined antibiotic prescribing of GPs and hospitals. There was also an increase of 12% in the number of bloodstream infections caused by E.coliwith varying levels of resistance to key antibiotics for this infection of between 10 to 19%.

A poll of Royal College of Nursing (RCN) student members found that the recent decision to deny NHS staff a small cost of living increase has left the country’s future nurses feeling anxious about their finances, and underappreciated by the Government.

The Functional Gut Clinic has become the first gastrointestinal organisation to be granted UKAS accreditation under the Improving Quality in Physiological Services (IQIPS) programme.

New figures show that diabetes patients aged under 40 receive fewer vital checks and less often hit treatment targets than older age groups.

The NHS in England is to invest a further £120 million over the next two years on improving mental health services. The investment comes as part of a five-year ambition that will see new waiting times, standards and early intervention services introduced, helping to put mental health on an equal footing with physical health services.

Acute heart failure is the leading cause of hospital admission in people over 65, and accounts for more than 67,000 people being admitted to hospital in England each year. All people admitted to hospital with suspected acute heart failure should receive treatment from a dedicated specialist heart failure team.

Treatment with xenon gas after a head injury reduces the extent of brain damage, according to a study in mice.

A candidate Ebola vaccine is being given to healthy volunteers in the UK, The Gambia and Mali, as part of a series of safety trials of potential vaccines aimed at preventing the disease that has killed more than 1,400 people in the current outbreak in West Africa.

The Royal College of Physicians is calling on Government and politicians to ‘stop reorganising the NHS from the top down’, to ‘increase funding to avoid a crisis in care’, and to ‘commit to an NHS free at the point of delivery’.

New guidelines on cardiovascular assessment and management in non-cardiac surgery were presented at the recent ESC Congress 2014 in Barcelona.

BMI The Blackheath Hospital has officially opened a new operating theatre department as part of phase one of a £3.8 million investment project that will modernise the hospital’s theatre and upgrade its critical care provision.

A new report by the Health Foundation is calling for more support for providers of NHS care in England to ensure quality of care for patients does not deteriorate.

A new toolkit from the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) and The UK Sepsis Trust has been developed to help doctors recognise and treat sepsis on acute care wards.

Manchester scientists are establishing how to safely increase the radiotherapy dose given to lung cancer patients – potentially offering improved local control and survival.