Quality of joint replacements not so bad?

doi:10.1136/bmj.b4401

Published 28 October 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b4401
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;339:b4401

Letters

Independent sector treatment centres

Quality of joint replacements not so bad?

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Some of the facts in Nick Clarke’s review of Panorama’srecent programme on independent sector treatment centres (ISTCs)cannot go unchallenged.¹

He refers to a recent study about poor clinical results of jointreplacement operations at the Weston NHS Treatment Centre inSomerset.² Patients who had hip and knee replacements therehad a significantly higher early reoperation rate than wouldbe anticipated. He fails to mention that this centre was notan ISTC unit. It was an NHS initiative, run by the NHS. Theonly non-NHS aspect was the use of visiting surgeons from abroad.

Clarke blames ISTCs for reducing training opportunities forjunior staff. ISTCs perform 5% of joint replacements in Englandand Wales, but traditional private hospitals perform 30%, andit is mainly these hospitals that take cases from the NHS. Healso says that ISTCs do not have to submit data to the NationalJoint Register, but . . . [Full text of this article]

Paul E L Evans, consultant orthopaedic surgeon

¹ Peninsula ISTC, Plymouth PL6 5XP

evans.orthopaedics@gmail.com