Intended for healthcare professionals

News

Seven days in medicine: 22-28 February 2017

BMJ 2017; 356 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.j1057 (Published 02 March 2017) Cite this as: BMJ 2017;356:j1057

Organ donation

Most support “soft” opt-out in UK

Two thirds (65%) of people in the UK support “soft” opt-out organ donation, a BMA poll of more than 2000 people suggested. It also found that 66% wanted to donate their organs at death but only 39% were signed up to the organ donation register. England, Northern Ireland, and Scotland currently have an opt-in system, while Wales has already introduced a “soft” opt-out system, allowing family members to confirm whether the deceased had an unregistered objection before any procedure goes ahead.

NHS finances

Moving care out of hospital is unlikely to save money

A review of 27 initiatives in England designed to move care out of hospital found that the policy is unlikely to save the NHS money but could improve patient care. The concept underpins the NHS’s 44 sustainability and transformation plans, which aim to help the NHS make £22bn (€25.8bn; $27.2bn) of efficiency savings by 2020-21. But the Nuffield Trust concluded that some plans were working to “undeliverable expectations” about the economic benefits of shifting more care into the community and would struggle to reduce the number of patients requiring hospital treatment without additional money and staff. (Full story: doi:10.1136/bmj.j1046)

Emergency care

NHS 111 sends more callers to emergency departments

The number of people calling 111 who have been advised to go to their local emergency unit or had an ambulance sent …

View Full Text

Log in

Log in through your institution

Subscribe

* For online subscription