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The North East Strategic Health Authority was formed on 1 July 2006.
Where possible reports will continue to be shown under:
County Durham and Tees Valley Strategic Health Authority
Northumberland, Tyne and Wear Strategic Health Authority
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NHS plc: a dire diagnosis. Private Eye says: "No sooner had a
cross-party committee of MPs heavily criticised the government's use of
independent sector
treatment centres (ISTCs) than the Department of Health defiantly
announced that these private sector companies would be given £lbn worth of
contracts to run a series of "diagnostic centres". The identities of the lucky
firms show how commercial the business of healthcare has become. The
London and east England contract
goes to Amicus InHealth… owned by a consortium of South African private health
outfit Netcare, which botched a contract to provide cataract operations in
Oxfordshire; Apax, a private equity group set up by New Labour favourite
Sir Ronald Cohen; and Inhealth, a company chaired by serial private health
director Tim Chessells and owned by a mysterious Luxembourg fund called
Pegasus. Doubtless this bunch has nothing but the nation's health in mind as
it makes crucial diagnoses and won't be unduly inclined to push people to
independent treatment centres of the sort run by, er, Netcare. Meanwhile in
the South West the record of the (management)
consultants at Atos Origin in providing the over-priced and unpopular
choose-and-book system for hospital referrals was no bar to their success. Nor
in the South East were there too many concerns
about the conflicts of interest presented by handing the diagnosis deal to the
country's biggest private hospital operator, the taxdodging BUPA.
West Midlands patients will be able to
benefit from the services of Mercury Healthcare, the company that has already
been paid millions for work it hasn't done and whose "group strategy director"
is one Mark Smith, the former chief executive of
Portsmouth Hospitals NHS trust who resigned after the trust received zero
stars. From there he became head of health at PFI firm Amey working closely
with Ken Anderson... who now just happens to be doling out the diagnostic
centre contracts as "commercial director" of the NHS. Appropriately enough in
the North East the diagnostics contract has
gone to Alliance Medical, the company owned by yet another private equity
group, Bridgepoint - former employer of Geordie New Labour man and ex-Health
Secretary Alan Milburn. The company's previous forays into the health service
include a £95m contract to run MRI scans which were so poor they had to be
checked by the NHS anyway, leading the British Medical Association to describe
the firm's performance as "a complete disaster". So depending on where you
live, your next illness could well be diagnosed by an incompetent or a
profiteer - or more likely a combination of the two."
Summary by
Keep our NHS Public
of Private Eye 16 August 2006
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Netcare lead bidder for ICATS. The Department of Health has named
Netcare and Partnership Health Group - in partnership with Alliance Medical -
as preferred bidders for its controversial
integrated clinical
assessment and treatment services in
Manchester. The proposed contract has been dogged by criticism from local
stakeholders in recent months as concerns were raised that awarding Netcare
the contract would be anti-competitive. If Netcare wins the five-year deal to
provide ICATS it would be in a position to assess patients for surgery and
then refer them to its own Greater Manchester surgical centre for treatment.
The deal will see Netcare providing 220,000 outpatient, diagnostic and
surgical services in seven locations including
Carlisle, Preston, Fylde Coast, Ulverston, Pendle, Ormskirk and Workington.
In response to local concerns the DoH has decided to ensure that preferred
bidder status for the two parts of the contract are awarded to different
providers. The DoH has also named UK Specialist Hospitals - formerly part of
the New York Presbyterian Hospitals group - as preferred bidder for a
second-wave elective independent treatment centre in the South West. UKSH will
operate an ITC based in North
Bristol that will carry out 25,000 procedures a year over five years. Last
month Bupa was named preferred bidder for two elective ITC schemes in the
North East and
Cheshire and Merseyside.
Summary by
Keep our NHS Public
of Health
Service Journal 17 August 2006
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14 private firms win place on choice menu in £200m deal. The Department
of Health has signed a deal worth £200m with 14 independent healthcare
companies to carry out thousands of additional elective care procedures. The
contracts, signed last week, are intended to deliver an additional 150,000
procedures per year, on an 'ad hoc' basis, as part of the DoH's second wave of
elective care
private sector procurement. The 14 companies will be added immediately to
the central extended choice menu, which currently consists of all foundation
trusts and some independent treatment centres. Under the policy, patients
awaiting elective care can choose from this list, as well as from at least
four local providers. Seven of the big name private healthcare companies have
won a large chunk of the work. BMI Healthcare, part of the Netcare group, is
the biggest winner, securing 44 contracts across the country. Other contract
winners include Bupa, Nuffield, Capio, Centres for Clinical Excellence,
Mercury Health, and Nations Healthcare. Several small private companies are
also understood to have won small contracts to provide local services to NHS
patients. Each contract will run for five years and the private companies will
provide NHS patients with a range of elective care services including general
surgery, endoscopy, ophthalmology, plastic surgery and neurology. Unlike the
first-wave elective care contracts, where PCTs had to pay for the number of
procedures contracted - even if they did not use the capacity - the latest
deals will [not] operate under a 'take or pay' arrangement, which means PCTs
only pay for work carried out. Earlier this month, the DoH named Netcare and
Partnership Health Group, in partnership with Alliance Medical, as preferred
bidders for its controversial integrated assessment and treatment services in
Manchester. At the same time the DoH also signed a deal with UK Specialist
Hospitals, formerly part of the New York Presbyterian Hospitals group, to act
as preferred bidder for a second-wave elective independent treatment centre in
the South West. Last month Bupa was named
preferred bidder for two elective independent treatment centre schemes in the
North East and
Cheshire and Merseyside as part of its wave-two elective care procurement
programme.
Summary by
Keep our NHS Public
of Health
Service Journal 31 August 2006
- Anger as health
budget slashed. Angry hospital bosses have condemned the Department of
Health for forcing the North-East to pay for
health service deficits in the rest of the country. The region's health
service is in the black - but has still had £10m slashed from the budget it
uses to train junior doctors. Health chiefs say the move, imposed at short
notice in the middle of the financial year, has already caused recruitment
restrictions, and could lead to cuts in patient services along with further
NHS redundancies and the cancellation of training programmes. Sir Miles
Irving, speaking at his last meeting as chairman of Newcastle Hospitals NHS
Foundation Trust, accused the Government of attacking the "roots" of the NHS.
"If you want something to die, or really want to damage something, such as the
medical profession, you attack its roots and the roots in this case are
education," said Sir Miles. NHS organisations in the North-East have been told
to make savings in education and training totalling £9.8m - with Newcastle
Hospitals hardest hit at nearly £5m. The trust has asked Newcastle
University's postgraduate institute for medicine and dentistry not to make any
job offers without its approval. Sir Miles described the situation as
"horrifying, profound and serious" and said if frontline staff did not get
sufficient training, patient care would be threatened. "We've been assured
that this cut is just for one year, but I've been in the health service for 53
years and I've heard that one before." Summary by
Keep our NHS Public
of Newcastle Journal 28 September 2006
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PCTs delayed on audiology contract. An audiology contract has been delayed
indefinitely because the provider has not been able to sign off quality and
safety guarantees with the Department of Health. The DoH had awarded Mercury
Health preferred bidder status to provide diagnostics services to NHS patients
across the West Midlands, on behalf of the
region's 17 primary care trusts. However the delay in the audiology contract
has left PCTs fearful that they may miss next year's 18-week maximum wait
target. A DoH spokesman said Mercury Health had not yet shown that it could
'ensure patient safety and high-quality healthcare for NHS patients'. The
contract would only proceed when this had been guaranteed, he said. The DoH's
contract with Mercury Health to provide other types of diagnostics services to
patients in the West Midlands will start at the end of May, two months after
the government's original deadline. In February, HSJ revealed that BUPA had
pulled out of a contract with the DoH to provide diagnostic services across
the South East. Amicus InHealth, a joint
venture between Amicus Healthcare and InHealth Group, has won preferred bidder
status on two of the diagnostics contracts in
London and the East of England. Atos
Origin will provide diagnostic services to patients in the
South West, and Alliance Medical has won
preferred bidder status for the North East.
Summary by
Keep our NHS Public of Health
Service Journal 5 April 2007
- Health chiefs in the region have defended a £72m underspend – saying a
surplus was always planned. North East
Strategic Health Authority (SHA) said the money has not been lost to the
NHS, having been carried forward to the current financial year.
Care & Health 8 June 2007
- £84k doc trip
anger. Health bosses spent £84,000 sending a delegation on an overseas
mission to Japan - to find out how to "increase efficiency". The controversial
trip was made by 14 doctors and chief executives who studied Toyota's "lean
management". The North East Strategic Health
Authority said cash for the trip came from training funds and staff
learned how to improve efficiency.
Summary by Keep our NHS Public of Mirror
16 July 2007
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Dropping diagnostic
deals could scare away investors. Cancellations of diagnostic contracts
with the independent sector could damage confidence in future deals, investors
have warned. Graham Kendall, acting general manager of the NHS Partners
Network, which represents independent healthcare providers said, 'It is very
disappointing as and when contracts get cancelled but we still remain
optimistic that the government is going to press ahead [with private sector
work],' he said. Five of the seven diagnostic contracts are unlikely to go
ahead in their current form, although in some cases the firms involved have
not yet been formally told of a cancellation. Two contracts with Atos
Healthcare were cancelled because it could not deliver to the agreed
timetable. But three others have been reviewed by the Department of Health,
partly because the NHS needs less additional capacity than was initially
thought. In some areas primary care trusts will now place smaller contracts
with the firms. Clinicenta, which was due to provide a range of diagnostic
services across the South East, will carry out more than 4,000 audiology
assessments and fittings of hearing aids, starting in West
Kent and extending to
Surrey and Sussex. Clinicenta managing director David Highton said the
system was now going through a transition from national to local procurement.
A spokesperson for Alliance Medical/
Care UK said they were still waiting to hear what was going ahead in the
North East, where they had been chosen as
providers. Summary by
Keep our NHS Public of Health
Service Journal 1 November 2007
Heat Map North
East
SHA forecasts 2006 07
North East
Healthcare organisations weak for quality of services
None
Healthcare organisations weak for use of resources
Darlington Primary Care Trust
Derwentside Primary Care Trust
Durham and Chester-Le-Street Primary Care Trust
Gateshead Primary Care Trust
Hartlepool Primary Care Trust
Langbaurgh Primary Care Trust
North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Trust
Northumberland Care Trust
Sedgefield Primary Care Trust
South of Tyne and Wearside Mental Health NHS Trust
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