Medical model of care needs updating, say experts

The NHS should shift its focus away from the medical model of care and place more emphasis on tackling social determinants of health, a panel of experts has said.

An overemphasis on medical care would not defeat “the five giants” of want, disease, ignorance, squalor, and idleness that the NHS and the welfare state were founded to tackle, said speakers at the 2018 Nuffield Trust Health Policy Summit on 1 March.

The panel—consisting of Jonathon Tomlinson, a GP in inner city London, Nick Timmins, senior associate at …