I am grateful to two readers for drawing my attention to two news stories, both published today, which sadly epitomise the state of the NHS after nearly twelve years of Labour micro-management.

"A dying 101-year-old war hero was sent home from hospital by taxi wearing only a nappy and a set of ill-fitting pyjamas. Brigadier John Platt, who won the Distinguished Service Order for his bravery in battle, was left ‘degraded and humiliated’ by his treatment by Salisbury District Hospital, his family say. Brigadier Platt had speny five days on a mixed-sex ward during which his hearing aid was stepped on and crushed, his false teeth went missing and his soiled pyjamas were piled up in a locker by his bed for the duration."

Do read the comments under the article.

source

As Dr Crippen keeps saying, we need to get our nurses back to nursing. But you cannot inculcate common-sense like that into a control obsessed government. They pour the money they “save” by skimping on hands-on nursing care into the creation of meaningless managerial posts which have pompous titles but no practical value. Let us leave Salisbury and take a short trip to Kent, where Caroline Davis earns over £50,000 a year as the “assistant director of strategic partnerships” at Eastern and Coastal Kent Primary Care Trust. We might have had to pause awhile to consider what an "assistant director of strategic partnerships” does but fortunately we are told that she

“works with local authorities and other public bodies to ensure patients' interests are best represented.”

Sounds good. Shame her job does not encompass washing the shit out of an old man’s pyjamas. Her job does involve shit, though. Bullshit. She has just been purging her soul on Friends United where she says:

“I now live in Dover, where I work for the NHS, bullshitting for a living, no change there then."

Caroline Davis
Assistant Director of Strategic Partnerships
Eastern and Coastal Kent Primary Care

source

Rest assured, Caroline will not be in post much longer. She will be off to the Gulag. A spokesman for the trust said:

"We take our reputation very seriously and disapprove of anything which brings the NHS into disrepute."

And that includes the truth. [NHS Blog Doctor]