Health & Social Care

As councils take control of public health budgets and staff, the government’s chief medical officer Sally Davies tells Matt Ross why the reforms should enable all kinds of public officials to help take the pressure off the NHS

Una O'Brien

Permanent Secretary, Department of Health

In a bid to improve the operation of the NHS, the Department of Health is publishing reams of medical performance data and anonymised patient information. Tim Fish reports on a trailblazer in the government’s open data agenda.

The Department of Health has agreed a settlement with its former commercial director, Ken Anderson, after taking him to court.

The UK has the highest rate of depression-related sickness in Europe, according to a recent survey by the European Depression Alliance. And alarmingly, over a third of the 792 managers surveyed said they have no formal support in place to help them deal with depressed employees. We have a very long way to go before we can say we’re properly supporting employers and employees in recognising and managing depression in the workplace. And this is certainly true within the civil service.

A veteran voluntary sector worker for a Midlands health charity speaks out

An NHS hospital employee says that reforms are creating a culture of fear about jobs, affecting morale and increasing stress-related illnesses among staff

Health department permanent secretary Una O’Brien has written to other permanent secretaries asking them to sign up to public health campaigns designed to improve the health of their staff.

A paediatric epilepsy nurse reveals her worries about job cuts and the power of managers over clinicians.

Eleven NHS foundation trusts are in financial difficulty, and a further 13 are at risk of getting into difficulty, David Bennett, the chief executive of the NHS regulator Monitor, told the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) yesterday.

The Department of Health’s new information strategy sets out plans to standardise data collection in NHS bodies, and to share and use it more effectively. Colin Marrs examines a trailblazer for the open data agenda