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NHS England dementia director prescribes rugby for mental health and dementia patients

23.09.19: Reason to celebrate as NHS says watching rugby can be good for your mental health and wellbeing. As the best rugby players in the world represent their nations in Japan, you no longer have to feel bad about sitting on the couch, glued to th...

Peter Kyle MP: It’s time to say thank you this Public Service Day

21.06.19: Taking time to say thank you is one of the hidden pillars of a society. Being on the receiving end of some “thanks” can make communities feel respected, needed, and empowered. And of course, happy! But do we say it often enough? ...

Nurses named as least-appreciated public sector workers

13.06.19: Nurses have been named as the most under-appreciated public sector professionals as new research reveals how shockingly under-vauled our NHS, education, policing and civil service servants are. Almost 5.4 million people are employed in the...

Creating the Cardigan integrated care centre

10.06.19: Peter Skitt, county director and commissioner for Ceredigion Hywel Dda University Health Board, looks ahead to the new integrated care centre being built for the district. This September we will open the doors to our first ever Integrated C...

Helpforce to launch training programmes for NHS volunteers

10.06.19: Kay Fawcett OBE, clinical advisor and education lead at Helpforce, and Lynn Twinn, talent development consultant, outline the new national training programmes for NHS volunteers and volunteer leaders. Helpforce, a charity set up by Sir Thom...

Pay and reward in the NHS needs to be taken seriously

10.06.19: Ben Gershlick, senior economics analyst at the Health Foundation, examines the new pay deal for NHS staff.  More than £50bn is spent on the pay bill for the NHS’s 1.2 million staff, more than is spent in many government dep...

Supporting healthcare professionals to boost prevention impact

10.06.19: Professor Jamie Waterall, deputy chief nurse and national lead for cardiovascular disease prevention at Public Health England (PHE), introduces us to the ‘All Our Health’ prevention framework. All health and care professionals s...

The NHS Assembly: Ensuring diverse views are heard

10.06.19: Policy officer at NHS Providers, Leanora Volpe, outlines how the new NHS Assembly will inform the NHS Long-Term Plan. In October 2018 we welcomed the announcement of the new NHS Assembly and identified the four core features essential to se...

Getting it right for Personal Health Budgets

04.06.19: Claudia Martínez, research manager at Reform, recently co-authored a report on personal budgets in public services. Here, she outlines the things commissioners must consider when implementing Personal Health Budgets (PHBs). The NHS e...

Independent sector and NHS must meet the same standards of care

04.06.19: Professor Derek Alderson, president of the Royal College of Surgeons (RCS), outlines how and why the independent sector must meet the same standards of care as the National Health Service. Like so many of my colleagues, I was deeply shocked...

Watching over workforce wellbeing in the NHS

04.06.19: Professor Lisa Bayliss-Pratt, chief nurse at Health Education England (HEE) and lead on HEE’s mental health programme of work, believes HEE’s new framework will help to raise awareness of stress and resilience in the workplace and en...

Confed19 Preview: The challenge we face

03.06.19: Niall Dickson, chief executive of NHS Confederation, shares a preview of what to expect at this year’s Confed19 conference, which will be taking place in Manchester on 19-20 June. The NHS is always at a cross roads, is it not? There i...

NHS Counter Fraud: Who cares about ISO 17025:2005?

03.06.19: We do, writes Nikki Crook, technical lead of the NHS Counter Fraud Authority’s (NHSCFA) Forensic Computing Unit (FCU). I work for the NHSCFA, which is leading the fight against NHS fraud at the national level. Our dedicated FCU suppor...

Cannabis on trial

30.05.19: How will the NHS conduct accurate trials of cannabis-based medicinal products when everyone has already tried cannabis? Dr David Horn, medical director at the Centre for Medicinal Cannabis, reports. Until November 2018, cannabis was a Sched...

Perfect storm brewing over NHS pensions and tax rules

28.05.19: Dr Phil de Warren-Penny, deputy co-chair for negotiations on the BMA consultant committee, discusses the perfect storm brewing in light of changes made to healthcare professionals’ pension rules. Separate changes to the current system...