The government plans for private hospitals to provide NHS patients in England with as many as a million extra appointments, scans and operations a year in a drive to cut … Read more
waiting lists
It’s another autumn, and the private healthcare sector is again attempting to convince journalists and the public that it is booming. The publicists for the private hospitals are keen to take the stigma … Read more
The business press and private sector spin doctors are doing their best to talk up the growth of the private hospital sector despite increasing signs that the prices of private … Read more
An investigation by HSJ has found that up to 20 per cent of NHS elective patients are now being treated by private hospitals in some areas. There has been an … Read more
Hundreds of thousands of cancer patients in the UK are being forced to pay for private treatment amid record NHS waiting times, according to data obtained by the Guardian. The proportion of … Read more
The latest figures from the Private Healthcare Information Network (PHIN) make worrying reading for private hospital bosses, with no sign of the long-expected boost in numbers of patients dipping in to savings … Read more
More evidence is emerging on the failure of the private hospital sector to make the expected gains from the chronic crisis of the NHS and its lengthening waiting lists. Far … Read more
HSJ reports that experts have warned that the drive to cut NHS waiting lists is becoming ‘disproportionately reliant’ on the private sector, as new data suggests rapid growth in the … Read more
In the face of rising waiting lists government policy has aimed to increase the role of the independent sector in tackling these record delays, but as a Lowdown analysis of … Read more
The (£ paywalled) Times has reported that one of the outcomes of Rishi Sunak’s controversial taskforce on boosting NHS contracts with private hospitals will be a new push to persuade patients to … Read more
Sky News has reported on a report in The Times that patients will soon be able to use the NHS app to opt for private hospital treatment in an effort … Read more
The Guardian reports that patients are paying up to £550 an hour to see private GPs amid frustration at the delays many face getting an appointment with an NHS family doctor. Growing … Read more
Two weeks ago, the Lowdown took a detailed look at the situation of the private healthcare sector. We were seeking to understand why – after 13 years of policies promoting privatisation and … Read more
OpenDemocracy reports that the private hospital sector saw 6.6% fewer people in 2022 than 2019, despite lucrative contracts to fix wait lists. The government handed almost half a billion pounds … Read more
HSJ has reported that Royal United Hospitals Bath Foundation Trust has been accused of promoting its private hospital by highlighting the long NHS waiting times which it is supposed to … Read more
“Dental deserts” are emerging across England after more than 2,000 dentists quit the NHS last year, leaving millions of people struggling to get checkups or have toothaches fixed, a new report from … Read more
An increasing number of people in the UK are paying for private medical treatment because of the record delays people are facing trying to access NHS care, a report from Laing & … Read more
The NHS England ‘Delivery Plan’ to tackle the growing backlog of waiting list treatment, announced on February 8, is not a plan at all. It lacks sufficient investment and – … Read more
Since the pandemic began early last year, NHS waiting lists – currently sitting at 5.6m, and growing by 150,000 a month, up by 20 per cent since the start of the pandemic and … Read more
Spire Healthcare, Britain’s second-largest private hospital operator, as seen its profits rise as a result of a surge in patients choosing to pay for hip and knee operations, as the … Read more
