PPlog

Here is my letter to Phil Hope, Minister of Health, in response to the Livability findings this week about the lack of progress in local authorities and the NHS developing and implementing the Personalisation Agenda. The Livability report says: Chief executive of Livability Mary Bishop said: "The results of our research are extremely worrying. Personal Budgets have the potential to transform the lives of disabled people by giving them choice and control and yet awareness of them is woefully inadequate. With just over a year to go until they are rolled out across England, it is clear that central and local government are ill prepared. Hello Mr Hope. You should know that Norfolk is a little ahead with its Personalisation Agenda and Preparation for Personal Budgets. There is a joint strategy for disabled service users to build and monitor the delivery. This strategy has fully involved service users and the Norfolk Coalition of Disabled People led the joint board in planning and draw...

There is a change which measures 8 on the Richter scale coming to Health Services and Adult Social Care. Heading this change is the Care Quality Commission which has drawn up stringent standards and values that every health trust, local authority adult social services and commissioned independent or private organisations will have to meet to register their practice. Those not registered will NOT be able to practice. The Date for this change is just under ten weeks away - on April 1st 2010 . The Care Quality Commission says: “The regulation of health and adult social care is changing. Subject to legislation, all health and adult social care providers who provide regulated activities will be required by law to be registered with the Care Quality Commission. The new registration system comes into force on 1 April 2010 for NHS trusts (including primary care trusts as providers) and on 1 October 2010 for adult social care and independent healthcare providers (registration under the ...

This is to update my blog of 6th September 2009: “I'd like to offer you my time, skills, experience and goodwill free of charge.“ and to record some corrections the Care Quality Commission (CQC) have offered. I said in the Sept 6th entry: ” The first problem is that this is an indirect process: you have to do it through one of their selected charitable agencies...through seven pages of their website, and downloading a list of their selections.“ I am revisiting this because I recently had a telephone conversation with the CQC’s lead on their ”Experts by Experience“ project, Mandy Moore. Mandy told me my experience of being presented with a lengthy application form inappropriate for volunteering, was misleading as ”most Experts by Experience are employed and paid by the “...national and local organisations who recruit, train and support our expert by experience on our behalf to take part in our inspection work.” and the...

I'm a bit reluctant to do this. Somehow, using my own experiences as evidence brings with it a tinge of embarrassment and a feeling that it maybe is not sufficiently objective. However, as evidence of NHS Norfolk's poor commitment to personalisation and lousy professional standards by the commissioned body (Norfolk Community Health and Care) it's too stark to go unsaid. Copies of this entry will go to NHS Norfolk, Norfolk Community Health and Care, Our Norfolk Coalition of Disabled People Joint Strategy Programme, and the Care Quality Commission. The sequel to my PPlog post of 11th October , "Circuitous Circus " is I eventually got to see the alternative consultant on 24th November. That consultant was Dr Willie Nottcutt, a leader in the field of pain management and someone for whom I had full respect, having known his work for many years. At the end of an hour and a half's frank discussion, he told me the kind of disorder I had was the product of natural ...

Jill Anderson pointed me in the direction of this invaluable piece of work via the Mental Health in Higher Education internet group. In my opinion it deserves to be set alongside Peter Townsend's work as a hugely valuable reference. Published by the Young Foundation, their text says: "This is a study of who is sinking and who is swimming in Britain today. Based on new analysis of statistical data, case studies, surveys and hundreds of conversations with people across the country, the study shows where the most acute needs are and how they interrelate. It looks at why some people can cope with shocks and setbacks and others can't. And it draws on the implications for policy, philanthropy and public action." I've certainly ordered a hard copy which will be invaluable for reference beside the computer. Tremendous!

At worst, they lie; at best, they are incompetent or unconsciously defensive. Hospital boards of directors, executives and senior managers are prone to clutching at and caressing their vested interests. Their processes are immersed in the business model and that is notorious for deceit and wheeling and dealing. Basildon and Thurrock Hospitals were “inspected” by means of self-reporting: the hospital is asked a series of questions to which it provides answers. If those those answers are in the affirmative to the overall question “ is your hospital meeting all the standards it should?” then it passes the inspection - their word is taken that everything is all right. Since April 2008, in each local authority area, there has been a safeguard against this kind of naive gullibility. That safeguard is called Local Involvement Networks (LINks). LINks are set up by law to provide a service user, carer and general public voice to protect standards in health and socia...

I've always had a little quirk. The first time I saw the road sign "Ramp Ahead" my first thought was 'How do I ramp ahead?' Good verb though - I can see the instructor: "Right lads, get it right this time. Steady now - get prepared.....and.....RAMP." So it came to pass that when I saw the title of our Manchester conference I immediately thought it was an Alexander Armstrong catch-phrase resulting in the Sun headline: "Shoot All Service Users." Ironically, the use of understandable and unambiguous words and language was a consistent topic at the seminar. Ah well! All in the/my mind perhaps! But the seminar was a terrific success. People, a majority of mental health service users, from: Birmingham Manchester Oldham Berkshire Leeds London Anglesey Norfolk Durham Sandwell Merseyside Cumbria Stoke on Trent Bromley All warmly talking to each other, learning from each other, making links with each other, sharing experiences with each other. Organisati...