Flu Inoculations WTF!

[JohnB]

Pharmacy gave Mum flu jab with no fuss 2 months ago, and put me on a waiting list for the 50+ one. All went quiet until I enquired and was told I could queue jump a little because I was her carer. One form to complete, appointment for her but not me, no id, no charge, no waiting afterwards to see if I went blue.

Pharmacies seem much the best place to do it.

[absolutezero]

Pharmacies seem much the best place to do it.

That's because they are private companies and not run by "RNHS".

[Moosehoosenew]

Heresay

NHS is sacred.


Frequent trips to hospitals with ageing relatives, suggest to me, it might just be improved a wee bit.

Don't ask for examples please as I do not want to offend, but most hospitals remind me of poorly run cruise ships.

[1nvest]

Frequent trips to hospitals with ageing relatives, suggest to me, it might just be improved a wee bit.

Don't ask for examples please as I do not want to offend, but most hospitals remind me of poorly run cruise ships.

Given that the equivalent of every man, woman, child paying £2000 year for the NHS and that 'health insurance' cost provides pretty poor quality/value for money. No it wouldn't be better in private hands either, the problem is over-payments and poor management.

Remember for instance when in the year GP's had their wages doubled, many thereafter opted to halve their working week.

[absolutezero]

Heresay

NHS is sacred.


Frequent trips to hospitals with ageing relatives, suggest to me, it might just be improved a wee bit.

Don't ask for examples please as I do not want to offend, but most hospitals remind me of poorly run cruise ships.

I think you mean heresy!

But yes. My experiences with RNHS over the last 5 years have been horrific.

Rather like a well known airline.
'If it wasn't for all these passengers we would have a great airline.'

[UncleEbenezer]

Well, well, well. All change!

Two weeks ago[1], no vaccine, either at my quack or my pharmacy.

This morning a letter from NHS central: Get Your Flu Jab Before the End of November!

This afternoon I walked into Boots and asked about it. They gave me one after a wait of just a couple of minutes. What a contrast with the NHS!

16:30 this afternoon, a text from my GP: Book an appointment to get it!

Will wonders never cease?

[1] Approx. I remember the day I asked being just over three months from when I'd had the first "don't call us, we'll call you shortly" message on August 4th.

[Arborbridge]

My local surgery (in West Sussex) organised a bit jabathon very early on. I was quite amazed: it was organised like a military operation with lots of wrinklies like me being shepherded in and processed very efficiently.
As one approached along the road, there was a series of ushers in high-viz jackets making sure we knew where to go. Most impressed at the size of the operation.

Previously in LB of Croydon, it was no problem either. I just turned up at our local chemist's shop, family run, and they did it there and then.

As for the NHS hospitals I've visited in the past decade, I can only say they have all been without exception superb. Efficient, caring and friendly - what more can one want? - though I do observe some clinics in that time have run over by an hour sometimes. Not so much lately, I'd say.

Arb.

[XFool]

Well, well, well. All change!

Two weeks ago[1], no vaccine, either at my quack or my pharmacy.

This morning a letter from NHS central: Get Your Flu Jab Before the End of November!

This afternoon I walked into Boots and asked about it. They gave me one after a wait of just a couple of minutes. What a contrast with the NHS!

OTOH.

My visit to my NHS GP for flu vaccination this year proceeded smoothly and efficiently in every respect. All over in a jiffy!

Boots? Yeah, I am on continuous meds and originally tried this with Boots. Ye Gods and little fishes! After spending interminable times in queues, only to be told repeatedly to "come back later", this was repeated several occasions and times. Such that I cancelled the auto repeat and went back to picking up the repeat prescription myself from the surgery and taking it elsewhere.

Nowadays I reorder as needed via the Internet and it goes direct to the chemist, where I pick it up. Not from Boots!

[absolutezero]

As for the NHS hospitals I've visited in the past decade, I can only say they have all been without exception superb. Efficient, caring and friendly - what more can one want?

To be seen by a consultant, promptly, without having to fight the bureaucracy or waiting 10 months as happened to me (before the Covid excuse).
Since the 10 month wait I have been absolutely ruthless when dealing with 'RNHS'. I now get seen and refuse to be fobbed off.

Once you get through the bureaucracy then the clinical staff are very good.
The issue is the structure Not the clinical staff.

[swill453]

My GP surgery have just announced they have had a limited further supply of flu vaccination, and those aged 60-65 can sign up to get it.

This is in central Scotland.

Scott.

[Arborbridge]

As for the NHS hospitals I've visited in the past decade, I can only say they have all been without exception superb. Efficient, caring and friendly - what more can one want?

To be seen by a consultant, promptly, without having to fight the bureaucracy or waiting 10 months as happened to me (before the Covid excuse).
Since the 10 month wait I have been absolutely ruthless when dealing with 'RNHS'. I now get seen and refuse to be fobbed off.

Once you get through the bureaucracy then the clinical staff are very good.
The issue is the structure Not the clinical staff.

I will try not to rant. But in having treatment in a couple of overseas jurisdictions in the last few years, I have found for example having a CT Scan and seeing a consultant takes 20 minutes from referral to finish. Why in the UK does if take three weeks for the scan to be sent from hospital to a GP who then you have to remember to fight for an appointment with to find out what the results of the scan were? (Not to mention the several months it takes to get the scan and waiting 4 hours for the scan to happen). And you never get to see the consultant at all. The UK health service is a total disgrace. If I were to pretend otherwise when I have seen how it really can be done well overseas would be pathetic. I am very concerned that if I am ever unwell back in the UK, I may not be fit enough to be forceful enough to protect my interests and fight for proper treatment. It's not the fault of the staff. The whole NHS is unfit for purpose. It hasn't progressed since Florence Nightingale's time. It doesn't help that the UK health service is a sacred cow and cannot be properly reformed and modernised by any government fearful of the backlash that will result if any criticism at all is perceived. Sorry for the ranting.

RVF

You didn't try very hard That was as good rant as it gets.
You have some good points, but rather over-egged some of them. I think Florence Nightingale would be astonished at how the NHS has improved modern life compared with the Victorian times. It's not a disgrace, and it is fit for purpose: it's just that it sometimes does not work as well as you would want it to.
Yes, it can take ages to get a results letter, but conversely, I have been contacted promptly if those results have been lacking - which I how they jumped on my prostate cancer so quickly. After that, I was regularly monitored and had the problem aired in meetings, and eventually had an operation with the particular surgeon I requested in good time, who could not have been more attentive before and afterwards. Full marks, I'd say. Maybe I was just lucky, but so far I must always have been lucky.

Service is lumpy, and can definitely be improved - particularly as regards the GPs (I'm still trying to train mine!) appointments occasionally run late (though better than five years ago) but I couldn't describe the NHS as a disgrace, no way.

I confess these experiences are London centre, and it may well be that other parts of the country suffer in a way we do not.

Arb.

[absolutezero]

As for the NHS hospitals I've visited in the past decade, I can only say they have all been without exception superb. Efficient, caring and friendly - what more can one want?

To be seen by a consultant, promptly, without having to fight the bureaucracy or waiting 10 months as happened to me (before the Covid excuse).
Since the 10 month wait I have been absolutely ruthless when dealing with 'RNHS'. I now get seen and refuse to be fobbed off.

Once you get through the bureaucracy then the clinical staff are very good.
The issue is the structure Not the clinical staff.

I will try not to rant. But in having treatment in a couple of overseas jurisdictions in the last few years, I have found for example having a CT Scan and seeing a consultant takes 20 minutes from referral to finish. Why in the UK does if take three weeks for the scan to be sent from hospital to a GP who then you have to remember to fight for an appointment with to find out what the results of the scan were? (Not to mention the several months it takes to get the scan and waiting 4 hours for the scan to happen). And you never get to see the consultant at all. The UK health service is a total disgrace. If I were to pretend otherwise when I have seen how it really can be done well overseas would be pathetic. I am very concerned that if I am ever unwell back in the UK, I may not be fit enough to be forceful enough to protect my interests and fight for proper treatment. It's not the fault of the staff. The whole NHS is unfit for purpose. It hasn't progressed since Florence Nightingale's time. It doesn't help that the UK health service is a sacred cow and cannot be properly reformed and modernised by any government fearful of the backlash that will result if any criticism at all is perceived. Sorry for the ranting.

RVF

Despite Arb taking the opposite view above, I am afraid I agree with every word of this.
The NHS is a disgrace (not for lack of funding - it is awash with money) and Florence Nightingale would have seen it is not the NHS that has improved modern life, but actually modern medicine and modern healthcare (also available in other countries).

Stop treating the NHS like a wonderful thing. It isn't. It's a third rate health service at first rate cost.

[sunnyjoe]

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/vaccinati ... a-vaccine/

From 1 December, the NHS flu vaccination is available for everyone aged 50 and over. You can get vaccinated at your GP surgery or a pharmacy offering a flu vaccine service.

I qualify and I got a text yesterday from my GP surgery asking if I wanted a free flu vaccination.

Previously I had been unable to find somewhere with vaccine supplies to spend the flu vaccination voucher I was given by my employer

[Arborbridge]

I see this discussion as being part of the same game we play with any successful public institution. We love crucifying the BBC too - just because it's successful and a world beater. I also wonder how much this is an in-built right wing political bias amongst posters?

I'm not saying all in the garden is rosie - it clearly isn't - but to use words like "disgrace" is way off the mark and seem as more appropriate coming from an old fashioned colonel blimp.

The Brits just love knocking anyone or anything successful: it has always been thus. We should admire the good things and work towards improving them not bring them down by carping. No instutution or person will improve if it feels it is constantly under attack. Constantly telling a child that he is stupid totally undermines self-esteem and becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy: I believe something similar happens in our national life, kicked off by right wing newspapers who just love undermining anything they see that smells even vaguely "socialist" as they would put it. Years of dripping such poison infects our national psychie.

Arb.

[absolutezero]

I see this discussion as being part of the same game we play with any successful public institution. We love crucifying the BBC too - just because it's successful and a world beater.

You have fallen at the first hurdle if you think either of those is a 'world beater'.
The NHS has middle ranking outcomes on cancer survival and waiting times. We are beaten by Belgium on 5 year liver and lung cancer survival rates. Belgium FGS!
This is a reasonable summary of where the NHS comes.
https://scienceblog.cancerresearchuk.org/2019/09/11/measuring-up-how-does-the-uk-compare-internationally-on-cancer-survival/

The BBC is a shadow of its former self. It's now just biased news and PC drama.

[XFool]

I can honestly say in my experience it is South Korea that has world beating health services. The UK doesn't begin to come close. It's not about money either.

So, in your experience, what would you judge it to be about?

[Arborbridge]

The BBC is a shadow of its former self. It's now just biased news and PC drama.

I really cannot agree about the BBC - it is an excellent institution giving unbiassed news. However, it constantly has to fight the prejudice against it from those who do not like an organisation which speaks truth unto power. It has been constantly undermined by various governments of both colours and has the Tory press on it's back, let alone the envy of commercial operators with their billions to spend. It is heart rending to see this underming every day, not only with wild claims here, but from outfits like Netflix who have money to burn buying up bribing some of our favourite actors.

BBC needs our support and we should give it wholeheartedly if only because they are a bulwark against US Trojan Horses. THe right winger would love to do away with the licence model, which is the only thing which protects us from being prey to commercial news bias. No organisation could be independent when it depends on a commercial model for its earnings: the profit motive would always come first.

Arb.

[absolutezero]

The BBC is a shadow of its former self. It's now just biased news and PC drama.

I really cannot agree about the BBC - it is an excellent institution giving unbiassed news. However, it constantly has to fight the prejudice against it from those who do not like an organisation which speaks truth unto power. It has been constantly undermined by various governments of both colours and has the Tory press on it's back, let alone the envy of commercial operators with their billions to spend. It is heart rending to see this underming every day, not only with wild claims here, but from outfits like Netflix who have money to burn buying up bribing some of our favourite actors.

BBC needs our support and we should give it wholeheartedly if only because they are a bulwark against US Trojan Horses. THe right winger would love to do away with the licence model, which is the only thing which protects us from being prey to commercial news bias. No organisation could be independent when it depends on a commercial model for its earnings: the profit motive would always come first.

Arb.

The BBC has an inbuilt Liberal bias - the modern meaning and not the old one.
Not necessarily a Labour bias, but definitely Liberal. It hates the Tories, hates Brexit, hates Trump.
The sooner the licence tax is decriminalised (or even better, scrapped) the better.

[Arborbridge]

The BBC has an inbuilt Liberal bias - the modern meaning and not the old one.
Not necessarily a Labour bias, but definitely Liberal. It hates the Tories, hates Brexit, hates Trump.
The sooner the licence tax is decriminalised (or even better, scrapped) the better.

I think we've been here before. This isn't a bias, it is the norm, that staus quo in this country. This is a liberal society and that is what the BBC represents, quite rightly. How can that be considered a "bias" - it's more of an anchor, a standard benchmark of normal decent British society.
If it criticises Trump or the Tories or Labour or Brexit, it is doing so from the middle ground which most people agree with. Can you imagine many British viewers seeing Trump's wilder proclamations and thinking he's a great fellow? come off it - most people are absolutely horrified at the way this man behaves. Similarly with Farage whom most people I know thought was a loud mouthed hypocrite and rabble rouser. The middle ground majority in the UK, does not do rabbles, whether of the Trump, Farage or Militant variety.

Arb.

[XFool]

Um. Better keep this short, or else!

The BBC is a shadow of its former self. It's now just biased news and PC drama.

I can never take this sort of thing seriously. One's first thought is "Evidence?".

Recently, and unusually, somebody on TLF did indeed carefully take down a sentence from a BBC News programme and post it as evidence of "BBC bias". Trouble is, as noted by myself and another, that sentence was a simple statement of several verifiable public facts! They still are verifiable, from the Internet, plus I could verify some of them myself as I had witnessed much of the reported event live on the net at the time. So, for this person at least, BBC News reporting verifiable facts was "evidence of BBC bias".

What can one say? What conclusion can one possibly come to?

I'm done.