IOM DHSC & MANX CARE

[Banker]

And people complain about Nobles & say how great it is in Uk!

https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/mum-left-ae-floor-42-27277259

[John Wright]

10 minutes ago, Banker said:

And people complain about Nobles & say how great it is in Uk!

https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/mum-left-ae-floor-42-27277259

Yes. Today I’ve had the result of a formal complaint I made about Clatterbridge about some results and a remote consultation back in April. They’ve agreed the consultation was sub optimal, that they should have had a protocol in place for what happened, and apologised for the way the locum dealt with matters.

He hadn’t read my record or results before consultation.

Told me to pop in to Clatterbridge tomorrow.

When I told him what they were, and where to find them, he said he didn’t know how to interpret them and would have to speak to the lab as they were obviously running the tests at too sensitive a level.

Refused to run a retest or authorise new samples and a new test, with is standard. I’d just tested positive for relapse! Fortunately I spoke with someone else later and was retested. It took nearly 6 weeks, however. It proved to be a false positive.

[Zarley]

Good to hear about the false positive, John. 

Not so good about the incompetent/negligent locum, however. Glad you were able to sort it. 

[code99]

I have been told on good authority that last weekend some of IOM residents who travelled to London for private medical procedures ended up with an unexpected travel problem. ‘Their’ Island-based doctors got caught up in (another) flight cancellations to Gatwick and did not make it to the hospital(s) in time. Consequently, these operations were moved from Saturday to Sunday. Financially, things are clearly pretty tight for this Island, but apparently not quite as tight when it comes to entertaining Manx establishment. The ceremony to launch the new boat, the Manxman, went off in fine style (the plebs were invited to watch the pomp and ceremony on poorly pixelated TV screen specifically erected on Douglas Head for the occasion) - the cost of the evenings fireworks alone could probably have been better used to cover several NHS hip replacements.

By going to the UK to have their ‘ops done’, Manx residents relieve pressure on Manx Care waiting lists, which is where most of the less-financially-advantaged NHS patients are forced to languish, and indeed suffer. My point is that the daft decision to suspend private health procedures on the Island makes little ongoing economic sense when they could be ‘income generating’ for Manx Care - it is my understanding that the operating theatre(s) at Noble's are being underutilised, especially on weekends. Patients who are fed up with waiting for months, and in some cases years, to see a specialist are instead choosing to pay fees to hospitals in London, Manchester and Liverpool (given all of the uncertainties that currently plague air travel to and from the Island some private patients would much rather pay Manx Care and have their ops done at Noble's).

With the pension reforms for the wealthy and the promises of major reforms in NHS across (not that I trust this UK Tory government to tell the truth about what time of the day it is) it is very possible that without the incentive for doctors to be able to do some private work outside their NHS hours we will struggle to attract quality medical professionals to the Island. It seems to me that provisioning of the private health must be reinstated to the levels of how it worked prior to the political decision for closure in 2019. IMHO, failing to do so could potentially result in even worse healthcare for the IOM NHS patients than it is today.   

[Banker]

1 hour ago, code99 said:

I have been told on good authority that last weekend some of IOM residents who travelled to London for private medical procedures ended up with an unexpected travel problem. ‘Their’ Island-based doctors got caught up in (another) flight cancellations to Gatwick and did not make it to the hospital(s) in time. Consequently, these operations were moved from Saturday to Sunday. Financially, things are clearly pretty tight for this Island, but apparently not quite as tight when it comes to entertaining Manx establishment. The ceremony to launch the new boat, the Manxman, went off in fine style (the plebs were invited to watch the pomp and ceremony on poorly pixelated TV screen specifically erected on Douglas Head for the occasion) - the cost of the evenings fireworks alone could probably have been better used to cover several NHS hip replacements.

By going to the UK to have their ‘ops done’, Manx residents relieve pressure on Manx Care waiting lists, which is where most of the less-financially-advantaged NHS patients are forced to languish, and indeed suffer. My point is that the daft decision to suspend private health procedures on the Island makes little ongoing economic sense when they could be ‘income generating’ for Manx Care - it is my understanding that the operating theatre(s) at Noble's are being underutilised, especially on weekends. Patients who are fed up with waiting for months, and in some cases years, to see a specialist are instead choosing to pay fees to hospitals in London, Manchester and Liverpool (given all of the uncertainties that currently plague air travel to and from the Island some private patients would much rather pay Manx Care and have their ops done at Noble's).

With the pension reforms for the wealthy and the promises of major reforms in NHS across (not that I trust this UK Tory government to tell the truth about what time of the day it is) it is very possible that without the incentive for doctors to be able to do some private work outside their NHS hours we will struggle to attract quality medical professionals to the Island. It seems to me that provisioning of the private health must be reinstated to the levels of how it worked prior to the political decision for closure in 2019. IMHO, failing to do so could potentially result in even worse healthcare for the IOM NHS patients than it is today.   

The private patients wing has been getting used for the cataract & orthopaedic treatment as far as I know, certainly a relative of mine had cataract done & I they’ve cleared back logs.

Also renal community clinic is based there plus some offices as no room in nobles.

[Andy Onchan]

19 minutes ago, Banker said:

The private patients wing has been getting used for the cataract & orthopaedic treatment as far as I know, certainly a relative of mine had cataract done & I they’ve cleared back logs.

Also renal community clinic is based there plus some offices as no room in nobles.

Don't think so.

[Roger Mexico]

Well they've got to find space for all those offices somewhere.

There was an interesting Written Question from Wannenburgh earlier this year which drew attention because it showed the growth in the civil service overall, from 2,091.8 FTE[1] on 31 March 2016 to 2,412.8 on the same date in 2021 to 2,488.4 two years later in 2023.  But to see where the growth was coming from it's worth looking at the health sector:

2016:  DHSC  415.3

2021:  DHSC  446.9  (+ 31.6 ie 7.6%)

2023:  DHSC  32.0  + Manx Care  506.8  =  538.8  (+ 91.9 ie 20.6%)

Overall + 123.5, just under 30%.

Now there will be some reorganisation effect in these figures.  For example Public Health transferred to Cabinet Office in 2020 and I suspect some transformation people were nominally employed by Cabinet Office in the 2021 figures and moved over to Manx Care the next day.

To see the sort of places this expansion was happening, a follow up question by Wannenburgh gives a hint:

How many communications staff Manx Care has; what plans Manx Care has to recruit more; and how many such staff the Department of Health and Social Care had in 2020/21.

The Minister for Health and Social Care (Mr Hooper): Manx Care’s Communications Team has an establishment of six. Of these, there are three staff currently in post, with two vacancies and one colleague absent on maternity leave.

In 2020/21, the DHSC was supported by the Cabinet Office Communications Team, with access to a dedicated Communications Executive and support from other members of that Team when required. There were no communications staff in the DHSC in 2021. Comms has been centrally provided for DHSC since its inception on 1 April 2014, when the shared communication service in the Cabinet Office was also created, so there has never been a dedicated inhouse communications officer in the sense of the work they do.

So they've now got three people (to increase to six) doing the job that no one in particular did before.  From memory I think there was one person in Cabinet Office who mostly covered health matters, though DHSC will also still need this doing, so there may be people extra to those six.

It also illustrates that Manx Care will be increasing their civil service payroll even more.  And the same is true of DHSC - the last organogram I saw had a lot of vacancies, presumably because no one wanted to work in that snake pit.

 

[1]  Full time equivalent, so the actual number of people employed will higher because of part-timers.  This only those employed as civil servants, on their pay scales, so no doctors, teachers, nurses, manual workers etc.  The MUA and Post Office aren't included (nor presumably is the Steam Packet).  There will be some tiny discrepancies due to rounding.

[Moghrey Mie]

10 minutes ago, Roger Mexico said:

Well they've got to find space for all those offices somewhere.

There was an interesting Written Question from Wannenburgh earlier this year which drew attention because it showed the growth in the civil service overall, from 2,091.8 FTE[1] on 31 March 2016 to 2,412.8 on the same date in 2021 to 2,488.4 two years later in 2023.  But to see where the growth was coming from it's worth looking at the health sector:

2016:  DHSC  415.3

2021:  DHSC  446.9  (+ 31.6 ie 7.6%)

2023:  DHSC  32.0  + Manx Care  506.8  =  538.8  (+ 91.9 ie 20.6%)

Overall + 123.5, just under 30%.

Now there will be some reorganisation effect in these figures.  For example Public Health transferred to Cabinet Office in 2020 and I suspect some transformation people were nominally employed by Cabinet Office in the 2021 figures and moved over to Manx Care the next day.

To see the sort of places this expansion was happening, a follow up question by Wannenburgh gives a hint:

How many communications staff Manx Care has; what plans Manx Care has to recruit more; and how many such staff the Department of Health and Social Care had in 2020/21.

The Minister for Health and Social Care (Mr Hooper): Manx Care’s Communications Team has an establishment of six. Of these, there are three staff currently in post, with two vacancies and one colleague absent on maternity leave.

In 2020/21, the DHSC was supported by the Cabinet Office Communications Team, with access to a dedicated Communications Executive and support from other members of that Team when required. There were no communications staff in the DHSC in 2021. Comms has been centrally provided for DHSC since its inception on 1 April 2014, when the shared communication service in the Cabinet Office was also created, so there has never been a dedicated inhouse communications officer in the sense of the work they do.

So they've now got three people (to increase to six) doing the job that no one in particular did before.  From memory I think there was one person in Cabinet Office who mostly covered health matters, though DHSC will also still need this doing, so there may be people extra to those six.

It also illustrates that Manx Care will be increasing their civil service payroll even more.  And the same is true of DHSC - the last organogram I saw had a lot of vacancies, presumably because no one wanted to work in that snake pit.

 

[1]  Full time equivalent, so the actual number of people employed will higher because of part-timers.  This only those employed as civil servants, on their pay scales, so no doctors, teachers, nurses, manual workers etc.  The MUA and Post Office aren't included (nor presumably is the Steam Packet).  There will be some tiny discrepancies due to rounding.

I'd like to see a diagram to show how many people work in each department.

https://www.gov.im/media/1379838/government-departments-poster-15-06-2023_compressed.pdf

 

[Banker]

2 hours ago, Andy Onchan said:

Don't think so.

Well my relative was offered operation to do other eye as soon as she wanted as backlog cleared according to the specialist she saw

[Dirty Buggane]

So Manx care overspend, 17% of that will be the cost of the management team of manx care. Another useless wankfest of managerial positions that is fast becoming not only an upside down triangle but soon to rival the pyramid of king tut. I can only guess at the ponzi schemes running that salivate when they see ours 

[Ham_N_Eggs]

17 hours ago, Banker said:

The private patients wing has been getting used for the cataract & orthopaedic treatment as far as I know, certainly a relative of mine had cataract done & I they’ve cleared back logs.

Also renal community clinic is based there plus some offices as no room in nobles.

Shame they can't do that for ENT. A relative has been waiting 6 month's for an urgent "6 week" appointment.

[De nada]

1 hour ago, Dirty Buggane said:

 upside down triangle but soon to rival the pyramid of king tut.

? Really ?

🙄

[The Phantom]

3 hours ago, Ham_N_Eggs said:

Shame they can't do that for ENT. A relative has been waiting 6 month's for an urgent "6 week" appointment.

Yes, ENT is particularly bad.  Some waits quoted are now running into years. 

[Dirty Buggane]

Do not worry manx care will draft in another friend, (whoops I mean logistics expert) to head up a crack team of people to shuffle paper around make nice noises and demand a shitload of extra money to send people to private clinics to get numbers down. Come to think of it the money manx care cost we could of spent that money doing precisely that, whilst also not having the incumbency of another layer of burocrocy. I would keep on pushing for your relative to get that ENT appointment, get your MHK involved. Oh sorry nothing to do with us, we have washed our hands of that so not our fault. But seriously get on their backs about the appointment it may be nothing but sooner checked always the best. Good luck.

Edited July 12, 2023 by Dirty Buggane

[Jarndyce]

23 minutes ago, Dirty Buggane said:

Come to think of it the money manx care cost we could have spent that money doing precisely that, whilst also not having the incumbency of another layer of burocrocy.

Indeed: at the risk of repeating myself on this thread, we ended up with Manx Care by following an English model on Sir Jon Millionaire's advice, after said model had already been discredited across.   All Tynwald needed to do was a little due diligence - ideally before they all voted it through on the nod.   Their problem now is how to fix/reverse it without ever admitting the error that they made.  (Why are these letters so big?)