Computer Weekly: Health trust proposed offshoring mental care through Skype

More coverage of the Skype proposal from NSFT. Norfolk & Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust’s innovative proposals have now even made it into the computer industry trade press. Click on the image below to read the full article:  

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Guardian: NHS mental health care ‘pushed to breaking point by lack of beds’

The lack of acute beds available to mental health patients has left the system at breaking point, the Royal College of Psychiatrists has said. Illustrating the scale of the problem, the college said it understood that on one occasion last year there were no beds available for adults in England. It called for action to

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Mirror: NHS crisis: Teen mental health patients put on ADULT wards in bed shortage

NHS England, a leaked email reveals, have told regional health bosses the shortage of beds is so bad that older teenagers are set to be admitted to adult wards The NHS beds crisis plumbed new depths as hospitals were advised to put teenage mental health patients onto adult wards. NHS England, a leaked email reveals,

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Observer: Beds crisis hits NHS care for mentally ill children

In the email seen by the Observer, which was sent on Friday on the instruction of national officials working for NHS England, the medical director for East Anglia, says: “I have just been asked to inform you all by the national specialist commissioning team of the current national lack of child and adolescent mental health

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EDP: A half-way house to privatisation?

Care minister Norman Lamb denied yesterday that mutuals were a step to privatisation, after campaigners claimed the NSFT could leave the NHS. But a spokesman for the Campaign to Save Mental Health Services in Norfolk and Suffolk, which put in the Freedom of Information request, said: “Staff are up in arms about this. It is

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EDP: Move to improve staff morale causes an upset

Tom Bristow of the EDP reports: But in a move which has done nothing for staff morale the trust suggested employing workers in low wage countries to talk to mental health patients over Skype, in its application to secure government funding to research the project. The NSFT’s full application for government money to explore becoming

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BBC News: Norfolk and Suffolk mental health Skype ‘outsourcing’ causes concern

 Emma Corlett, spokeswoman for Unison at the trust, said: “Our view of the report is that it shows whoever did the application did not have a very clear understanding of the work frontline staff do or the way face-to-face therapy works. “We want a skilled and well-paid workforce here and we should not be looking

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Kept in the dark: Some of NSFT’s ideas to improve staff engagement

Here are some of the ideas that the Board of Norfolk & Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) has told the Cabinet Office and the Department of Health it has planned to improve staff morale and engagement in its mutualisation proposals: “[NSFT] is now developing radical new plans to again reduce costs. These include a root-and-branch

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Kept in the dark: NSFT’s Board fails to share its intention to leave the NHS with its own Board of Governors, service users, carers and staff

Our initial consideration is converting the entire trust into a typical CIC. This would involve governance changes such as; refining our existing membership model (possibly reducing numbers to include only genuinely active members), a members board (replacing Governors) which will feed input into the main board, elected representatives of both members and of staff on the

Kept in the dark: NSFT’s Board fails to share its intention to leave the NHS with its own Board of Governors, service users, carers and staff Read More »

Daily Mail: EXCLUSIVE: NHS more than DOUBLES spending on private beds for mental health patients after slashing hundreds of its own beds – to save money

“In some areas, bed cuts were drastic. One trust alone, Norfolk and Suffolk, axed 74 mental health beds from its stock of 322 in just two years – a cut of almost a quarter.” Local MP Norman Lamb must be so proud of Norfolk & Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) and his legacy as the

Daily Mail: EXCLUSIVE: NHS more than DOUBLES spending on private beds for mental health patients after slashing hundreds of its own beds – to save money Read More »

Report: Lobbying South Norfolk Clinical Commissioning Group is a Trial…

“Someone must have had it in for Joseph K., for without having done anything wrong, he ended up representing the Campaign to Save Mental Health Services in Norfolk & Suffolk at South Norfolk Clinical Commissioning Group’s (CCG) Public Meeting on 13th January. Or rather he should say its meeting in public, for as he was

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URGENT: A rare opportunity to directly question Norman Lamb, local MP and the Minister directly responsible for mental health at the Department of Health at a PUBLIC MEETING on health and care issues on Thursday, 15 January 2015 at 7.30 p.m. Protest from 7 p.m.

There is a rare opportunity to question Norman Lamb this Thursday, 15 January, 1930 at the Market Hall, Saxmundham, IP17 1AF. We will be protesting beforehand from 1900 and then attending the meeting. It is vital that we challenge Norman Lamb over his government’s cuts to mental health, the disastrous reorganisation of the NHS which means

URGENT: A rare opportunity to directly question Norman Lamb, local MP and the Minister directly responsible for mental health at the Department of Health at a PUBLIC MEETING on health and care issues on Thursday, 15 January 2015 at 7.30 p.m. Protest from 7 p.m. Read More »

Lobby NSFT Board of Governors Meeting: Thursday 8th January 2015, 1230, City Hall, Norwich NR2 1NH

We will be lobbying the Norfolk & Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) Board of Governors meeting tomorrow. Meet at 1230 on the City Hall steps. Some of us will also be attending the meeting which runs from 1300-1700 in the Council Chamber. Please join us. Despite mountains of paperwork, detailed terms of reference and long meetings,

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Financial Crisis: An apology to NSFT from the Campaign to Save Mental Health Services in Norfolk & Suffolk

“Last year, the Campaign to Save Mental Health Services in Norfolk & Suffolk accused Norfolk & Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) of having spent £7.3 million on redundancies in 2013/4 in the midst of a recruitment crisis which placed mental health services at severe risk. At the time, NSFT said our claims were ‘inaccurate’. It

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BBC News: Norfolk and Suffolk mental health trust spent £600,000 on out-of-area beds IN ONE MONTH

The BBC reports: Money spent on sending Norfolk and Suffolk mental health patients to other parts of England almost tripled last month to £600,000, new figures show. A spokesman for the Campaign to Save Mental Health Services in Norfolk and Suffolk said: “NSFT and the local clinical commissioning groups need to properly fund both inpatient

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EDP Editorial: This practice is terrible, so why is it still happening?

This practice is terrible, so why is it still happening? Doctors, patients and politicians all agree that sending people with mental health problems hundreds of miles away to get a bed is an awful idea. These patients are travelling to other parts of the country not for specialist treatment but simply because there is no space for them in Norfolk and

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Sheringham Independent: Skyrme vs. Lamb

Terry Skyrme of the Campaign, who lives in Norman Lamb’s North Norfolk constituency, gives Lamb a roasting: We in the Campaign to save Mental Health Services in Norfolk and Suffolk find it hard to stomach Norman Lamb’s continuous efforts to present himself as the champion of the mentally ill. He has been a Health Minister

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EDP: ‘I feel like I’ve been kidnapped’ – mental health patient who should’ve been released speaks out about ordeal

Almost four months on from the tribunal, his parents – Richard and Maxine, who run the post office in Thorpe End – are doubtful their son could be with them for Christmas. “I feel like I’ve been kidnapped,” Oliver Lang said. “It’s making me depressed.” ‘The mental health system is like a castle’ In Franz

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EDP: Mental-health patients left in cells and secure unit, people deprived of their liberty, NSFT finances are appalling

This is absolutely shocking: A Norwich man with mental-health problems was kept in a police cell for more than 24 hours and then sent to a private hospital 175 miles away for two weeks because there were not any beds for him in East Anglia. This is appalling: A 25-year-old man is being kept in

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EDP: Cash-strapped Norfolk and Suffolk mental health trust spends £307,500 on one redundancy

This is an incredible story of hubris and incompetence which has placed the safety of mental health services at risk due to the subsequent recruitment crisis as well as wasting millions of pounds. However, it is vital that people who depend on mental health services do not pay the price of the NHS bureaucracy’s repeated mistakes.

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