Another socialized medicine triumph..coming here any day now .

Lives are being risked by five-hour delays on NHS helpline, say GPs

Patients in the capital are facing five-hour waits for medical help from a flagship NHS phoneline.

The delays are being blamed on the inability of the new NHS111 service to cope with a high volume of calls. The 24-hour freephone number was set up for non-emergency inquiries and to relieve pressure on 999 operators as well as A&E departments.

But it was revealed today that some patients in London needing medical advice are waiting hours for a call back. Others are facing long delays before their call is answered then a 12-minute wait for handlers to process their details.

Doctors’ leaders described the freephone system as a “disaster” and said it was increasing the workload for GPs. The British Medical Association warned the service put lives at risk. They blamed inadequate staffing for glitches and the fact call-handlers are finding the software time-consuming to use.

Dr Laurence Buckman, who chairs the BMA’s GP committee, revealed he referred a patient to NHS111 when she called out of hours only for her to discover she could not get through. In the end, Dr Buckman, who is a GP in north London, advised her to go to casualty.

He said: “This has been a disaster in the making. The concept of a single non-emergency number is a good idea: 111 could be perfectly okay. But the implementation has been poor and rushed through. I’m sadly waiting for the arrival of the first body. It’s going to be dangerous for patients.”

The phoneline has been piloted across six parts of the capital and countrywide. It is staffed by trained operators, who refer patients to the most appropriate service such as a GP or A&E. Out-of-hours calls that were once made to GPs are to be routed instead to NHS111, which was set for national launch next month.

However, health bosses have delayed this launch in parts of the capital. In south London, doctors have been drafted back in to cover while the helpline problems are sorted out. Dr Stewart Kay, the BMA’s GP representative for south London, said: “No one knows when 111 will be able to take over because they’ve not got enough call handlers. It’s taking 12 minutes for them to go through people’s details, meanwhile they’ve got more calls waiting. They’ve replaced a system which wasn’t perfect but it was safe — now they’ve got a system which isn’t safe.”

A spokesman for NHS London said it wasn’t aware of any problems with NHS111 and everything was proceeding as planned.

Hospitals fined £4.8m over bugs

A south London NHS trust is facing a £4.8 million fine for failing to hit infection reduction targets at two of its hospitals.

Since last April, 61 patients at Epsom and St Helier Hospitals, 29 and 32 respectively, have developed Clostridium Difficile, which is transmitted by contaminated surfaces.

This breached the target of 52 set for this financial year by the Department of Health. In January, the fine was £1.4 million to reflect the 55 cases recorded, but six more since then have pushed it up.

Chris Grayling, MP for Epsom and Ewell, urged the trust to treat the problem as a “priority”. Health campaigner Bob Mackison, from Epsom, said: “It is very sad that they are facing any fine at all when both hospitals are under threat. It’s much more important that they sort the problem.”

A spokesman for the trust described the target of 52 as “incredibly challenging”, but added: “Despite that, we recognise that one infection is one too many and we will continue to work hard to keep infections to an absolute minimum.” He said the trust had reduced the number of cases from 268 in 2008 to 67 last year.

A DoH spokesman said primary care trusts were responsible for enforcing fines, which are “non-negotiable”, although the way the money is spent is.