By John O’Doherty
Surging demand for healthcare boosted profits at Care UK, as it won 12 new contracts to run the polyclinics at the centre of Lord Darzi’s healthcare reforms and had contracts for primary care services extended.
“What we’re seeing is the healthcare market becoming established as an emerging market,” said Mike Parish, chief executive of Care UK.
Continue reading ‘Care UK boosted by NHS health centre reforms’
Squeamishness is relative. I am unfazed by childbirth, urinary catheters and vomit. I am less good with injuries to the ends of fingers or toes, which always make me want to look away. My biggest fear, however, is of eyes.
Operative ophthalmology, in particular, sets me on edge – the eyelid clamped back, the surrounds of the eye draped to keep the area clean and, all the while, the conscious eye watching the approach of the surgeon’s hand. But not everyone is troubled by this prospect. Indeed, a number of FT readers have asked me about laser eye surgery – whether it really works, and what, if any, are the complications?
The information about laser eye surgery on the Royal College of Ophthalmologists’ website gives a useful overview. Laser eye surgery is not suitable for all spectacle-wearers, and some may still have to wear glasses either post-op or at a later stage. Surgery is also expensive – the bill can run to many thousands of pounds.
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Pfizer offers a start in resolving US healthcare problems
Pfizer, the world’s largest pharmaceutical company, is to offer many of its medicines free of charge to Americans who have lost their jobs and health insurance during the financial crisis, in a pioneering move.The company stresses the social objectives of the programme, called Maintain, and cites it as an example of its ability to listen and rapidly respond to employees’ suggestions.
But it also comes at a time when the financial crisis has added urgency to US President Barack Obama’s calls for healthcare reform. Changes are likely to involve pain-sharing, including efforts from the pharmaceutical industry to cut the high and rising prices of medicines. Rising unemployment, and the resultant drop in those protected by health insurance , will only add to support for a shift towards universal cover in the US.
Needless to say, Pfizer executives also scrutinised the programme to ensure it would not prove too costly – and employees and Pfizer’s own foundation will ease the burden by contributing to the cost.
And there are some other catches. Beneficiaries of Maintain must have lost their jobs since the start of this year, be without insurance cover, show evidence of hardship, apply by the end of 2009, and will be eligible only for a year. And it only covers Pfizer’s primary care products, not its more expensive ones.
An excellent start, but hardly a solution to the current problems with US healthcare.
By Geoff Dyer and Jie Yang
China’s economy has turned the corner. Government banks have been lending at a rapid rate, factory output is rising again and the local stock market is blazing ahead. But just how quickly the world’s most populous country emerges from the global economic crisis will depend, in part, on places such as the cancer ward of Jingdong hospital in Sanhe, not far from Beijing, and how they treat patients like Cao Jun.Aged 13, Jun was diagnosed a few months ago with leukaemia. His parents managed to get him into the hospital, a Sino-US joint venture, and have been impressed with the level of care. “The doctors and nurses have been very helpful and are doing everything they can to assist us,” says his father, Cao Jirui.
By Andrew Ward in Washington
Healthcare groups want any government insurance plan limited in scope so it does not draw middle-class families away from the private system, while drug makers and doctors are concerned by the prospect of greater regulation and possible price controls.
Administration officials said the voluntary measures demonstrated industry’s willingness to co-operate with reform.
Private companies beef up UK GP presence
The private sector has established a small but significant bridgehead in general practice in England, but any “corporate takeover” of family doctor surgeries remains a long way off.Primary care trusts have been commissioning some 260 “GP-led health centres”, or “polyclinics”, open 8am to 8pm, seven days a week – one in each primary care trust and a further 110 or so in areas short of doctors.
By Jonathan Birchall in New York
Wal-Mart, the largest US retailer, has taken another small step that illustrates the grand scope of its ambitions in its US pharmacy business.
The retailer shook up the pharmacy business three years ago, when it announced an new low-cost programme for generic – ie non-branded – prescription drugs. Its $4 generic offering was subsequently mimiced both by rivals stores, and, after being initially dismissive, by CVS, Walgreens and Rite Aid, the big three US drug store chains. Wal-Mart argues that its move has reduced Americans’ overall spending on generics by $2bn.
By Ross Tieman
How is it that France manages to have the world’s best health care system (according to the World Health Organization) yet spends no more, as a percentage of national wealth, than the US?
Not only does France’s system rank higher on quality, but it covers all 62m residents, whereas the US census bureau reported in August last year that 45.7m Americans, 15.3 per cent of the population, had no health insurance.
One striking element of the French system is the extent to which it is built upon ‘commercial’ business models. Whereas in the UK, the flow of national insurance contributions into the National Health Service is indistinguishable from taxation, in France health insurance clearly buys treatment.
Information the key to improving UK health service
“Whenever we introduce this,” says Clare Dollery, a consultant cardiologist at the Heart Hospital in London, “lots of clinicians come up to me and say, ‘This is the sort of information we have been asking for for years.’ “The information is a set of data showing the clinician team’s activity, its broad costs, whether or not it is making a profit against the tariff – the price the National Health Service pays hospitals per procedure or treatment – plus, crucially, a lot of data on quality.
These are as diverse as infection and readmission rates, length of hospital stay, survival data and, for example, the time elapsed between a heart attack patient arriving and the coronary arteries being opened again, and how that compares with other hospitals both domestically and internationally.
Margaret McCartney is a Glasgow-based GP and FT Weekend columnist. She started writing for the Life and Arts section in 2005 and moved to the magazine in
2008. She also has her own blog: www.margaretmccartney.com/blog
Clive Cookson has been a science journalist for the whole of his working life. He joined the FT in 1987. Clive, the FT's science editor, picks out the research that everyone should know about. He also discusses key policy issues, from R&D funding to science education. 
Andrew Jack is pharmaceuticals correspondent, covering the industry and public health issues. He has been a journalist with the FT for 19 years, based in London, Paris and Moscow
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