Not that there is any accountability to be got. I know from my communications with local Trust and the MP trying to get answers, in regards to care for my father, that it is all about blocking tactics.
But perhaps a way forward is for patients to record what is said at meetings...particulary when they are being messed about by their service providers. I am quite surprised that the Dr involved agreed to be recorded. Usually, anything that smacks of transparency is avoided by medical professionals.
Am putting this video up here because I think youtube is another route people can take to raise issues about the lack of appropriate care available in the NHS. More poignant because the Government's Choice Agenda for the NHS is hellbent on excluding MH patients.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
If NHS Trusts continue to shun professional standards and accountability - and the Healthcare Commission has repeatedly accused them of doing the latter - then service users will go outside the system to get their voices heard and issues addressed.
ReplyDeleteIts ironic that the South London and Maudsley NHS Trust used YouTube to boast that its services are driven by 21st century science during the exact same period the HCC found that SLaM was offering the worst community MH services in the country.
One thing is for sure, 21st century science has unleashed a whole raft of cheap recording devices into the public domain - most mobile phones now ship with video and audio recording as standard - and as the Metropolitan Police have just learned people can and will use their phones and other electronic devices to record things they regard as wrong as, where and when they think appropriate .
I think we will see more service users and carers using YouTube and other free web based apps to highlight systemic abuse and failure within the NHS and rather than cry foul about this its time for the NHS to fully embrace professional accountability and start putting patients first.
I'm not a great supporter of trial by media and still want to cling to the old fashioned idea that NHS institutions can be trusted to investigate themselves however after reading that a Birmingham NHS Trust's first response to a negative report from the Healthcare Commission was to spend tens of thousands of pounds on a PR team to manage the blowback I am not suprised patients are using the net in this way to get their concerns aired.
ReplyDelete