Francis report first thoughts.

Today has been one of fragmentation in terms of communication regarding the release of the long awaited and much delayed Francis report. We drove to work in the dark to do a Gordon (system needed) as opposed to a patient needed worthless exercise. 

We caught a bit of news before work, were at work where we were teaching medical students who knew nothing of Francis and then doctors in training whom we instructed in how to care for patients properly (as individuals) as opposed to local healthcare services (system medicine). 

At lunchtime in the usual 2-hour 2 bottles of wine business lunches that we as GPs normally enjoy 15 minutes of munching a corned beef sandwich, double deep-fried of course, in the mess we downloaded the report and did 2 searches of the document. 

One was for the word Bower and the other for the word Nicholson and found 2 and 6 matches in the 455 pages. 

When we got home we watched the more intelligent and in depth news whose summary was it was a "system failure" and that was why no individuals were named in the report (whitewash?).

 

As we drove home we caught a bit of bleating, actually a lot of bleating by some bloke called Nicholson who with others missed 1200 excess deaths and was saying sorry so many times it became boring. Later news had Marshall DC saying sorry and add the two lots of sorrys together and it makes the Nick Clegg video spoof seem like a joke that wasn't very funny. 

Presumably if this is the case the "system" was to blame for a few million mass deaths in world war 2 and the Nuremberg trials were a travesty of justice for they singled out a few individual for a system failure for which they should not have been held accountable? 

No doubt if this line continues the Party's response will be to single out the "system" which will have no impact on any individuals who make up and indeed ran the system. The system that ran under Za Nu Labour at the time is at fault but at present will continue unabated and will be financially rewarded by the Parties. Does that mean patient care will get better or that there will be more sorrys to come for sorrys are cheap high quality patient care is not? 

Praise be to the Party for telling us that NHS stands for the National Health System and not a Service and as such a System cannot be blamed or be accountable for the failures of the individuals that make the System up. 

Stalin is quoted as saying that one death is a tragedy a million is a statistic. Is the modern day equivalent that one mid Staffs is a tragedy while a nation of Mid Staffs is a System success due to political interference reform? 

We have to wait 3 weeks to find out how the Parties will play this one. Continue with a failed system or reinvent it? Once again the victims have been failed and at present it looks like the perpetrators will not be blamed or accountable they just have to say sorry.