Taking bites from health care

Watchdog received so many health related letters and calls that its producers decided to give health its own programme. Watchdog HealthCheck is the result. Hosted live by Judith Hann and charged with “investigating with the same style and force” as its sister programme, it combined news and radio items with three short documentary reports, each lasting about seven minutes.

First up for hard hitting analysis was the private practice of NHS consultants. Can it be right, the programme asked, that for the payment of pounds sterling70, patients should be able to shorten their wait for the same consultant from eight months to three days? Posing as prospective patients, the reporters telephoned some 40 consultants and found that two thirds offered more than one half day …