The latest release of the Atlas of Variation has once again highlighted worrying differences in the quality of care around the English NHS. The information shows a 25-fold variation in the prescribing of anti-dementia drugs, differences in diabetes care and other anomalies. It also provides advice to commissioners and providers to reduce variation. This will, of course, prove invaluable to pharma and medtech companies, as will publication by the NHS Information Centre of GP practice prescribing data.
PCT allocations for 2012/13 will not thrill too many. They are pitched just 0.1 per cent above a forecast inflation figure for the year in question and forecasts are notoriously poor and could be subject to all kinds of effects in a times of economic confusion. A mere 0.2 per cent out and finance directors will be tearing their hair out.
The Public Accounts Committee has a gloomy assessment for the prospects of those hospitals yet to attain foundation trust status. Many of the 113 outstanding will probably not make it, according to a report. London is in a particularly bad way. Time is running out for trusts to get their plans and finances in order. Patients are set to lose out most if this does not happen with mergers or reconfigurations devastating access to local services and disrupting people's lives. Linked to this is a report from the King's Fund think-tank that claims the planned abolition of NHS London in 2013 will leave a 'strategic vacuum' in the capital.
In other news the Office of Fair Trading has decided to refer the private healthcare market to the Competition Commission to investigate whether or not their practices distort competition.
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