The Health News United Kingdom February 14 2018

• A new NHS England campaign says that parents of young children with minor illnesses should take them to pharmacies rather than GPs or A&E. It follows a survey which found just six percent of parents with under-5s would go to a pharmacist first. NHS England said visits to GPs and A&E for these “self-treatable” conditions, like stomach ache, cost cost £850m a year. A patients’ group said but parents should not be put off seeing a doctor. GPs’ leaders said parents of children with a very high temperature that doesn’t go away should still seek help from a medical expert.
• NHS figures show that the number of admissions to hospital for eating disorders has nearly doubled in six years.  Data from NHS Digital show admissions for conditions including anorexia and bulimia reached 13,885 between April 2016 and 2017 – the highest levels seen in six years. The figures show that this is almost double the 7,260 admissions seen in hospitals in England the year up to April 2011.
• The charity Age UK has said that more than one in three people in England diagnosed with dementia are not getting the follow-up care they are entitled to.  The NHS specifies that everyone diagnosed with the condition should have an individual care plan that is reviewed at least once a year. But Age UK found that as of November, out of the 458,461 people with a recorded diagnosis of dementia, only 282,573 had a new care plan or at least one care plan review on record in the previous 12 months.

News on Health Professional Radio. Today is the 14th of February 2018. Read by Tabetha Moreto.

http://www.bbc.com/news/health-43002740

A new NHS England campaign says that parents of young children with minor illnesses should take them to pharmacies rather than general practitioners or Accident and Emergency.
It follows a survey which found just six percent of parents with under-fives would go to a pharmacist first. NHS England said visits to GPs and A&E for these “self-treatable” conditions, like stomach ache, cost eight hundred fifty million pounds a year. A patients’ group said but parents should not be put off seeing a doctor. GPs’ leaders said parents of children with a very high temperature that doesn’t go away should still seek help from a medical expert.

NHS England’s Stay Well Pharmacy campaign is urging people to visit their local pharmacist first to help save the service money and free up time for the sickest patients. It said each year there were about eighteen million GP appointments and two point one million visits to A&E for so-called self-treatable conditions – costing the service the equivalent of more than two hundred twenty two thousand hip replacements or eight hundred eighty thousand cataract operations.

Its survey of more than two thousand people in England found thirty five percent of parents of children under five would go to a GP if their child had a minor illness, such as earache, diarrhoea or stomach ache, while five percent would go directly to A&E. The NHS survey also found that only sixteen percent of adults would go to a pharmacist first if they were similarly unwell.
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The Patients Association said it was important parents did not feel put off from seeing a doctor if they thought something more serious was wrong. The charity’s chief executive, Rachel Power, said: “For common childhood illnesses, a pharmacist will often be a sensible first port of call, so we welcome efforts to raise awareness of the support they can offer.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/02/13/eating-disorder-hospital-admissions-double-six-years-figures/

NHS figures show that the number of admissions to hospital for eating disorders has nearly doubled in six years.  Data from NHS Digital show admissions for conditions including anorexia and bulimia reached thirteen thousand eight hundred eighty five between April two thousand sixteen and two thousand seventeen – the highest levels seen in six years. The figures show that this is almost double the seven thousand two hundred sixty admissions seen in hospitals in England the year up to April two thousand eleven.

The number of under-eighteen female admissions for anorexia have also jumped dramatically in the six-year period, from nine hundred sixty one in two thousand ten and two thousand eleven, to almost one thousand nine hundred four in the latest figures. The Government said it is aiming to provide treatment within one week for ninety five percent of children and young people referred for urgent cases of an eating disorder by two thousand twenty.

Responding to the NHS figures, a Department of Health spokesman said: “We are committed to ensuring everyone with an eating disorder has access to timely treatment.”
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The spokesman added: “Inpatient treatment should be seen as a last resort, that’s why we have set out plans to expand community-based care for eating disorders – seventy dedicated community eating disorders services are being developed and recruitment to get the teams up to full capacity is under way.”

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/feb/13/a-third-of-people-with-dementia-in-england-not-receiving-full-care

A charity has said that more than one in three people in England diagnosed with dementia are not getting the follow-up care they are entitled to. The NHS specifies that everyone diagnosed with the condition should have an individual care plan that is reviewed at least once a year.
But Age UK found that as of November, out of the four hundred fifty eight thousand four hundred sixty one people with a recorded diagnosis of dementia, only two hundred eighty two thousand five hundred seventy three had a new care plan or at least one care plan review on record in the previous twelve months.

The charity describes the plans, which set out the tailored support someone should receive and should be updated in line with the progression of the disease in the individual, as “the gateway to follow-up support from the NHS”. With the number of people with dementia in the UK forecast to rise from eight hundred fifty thousand in two thousand fifteen to one million by two thousand twenty five, Age UK warned a failure to provide the plans will hamper the ability of the growing number of people with the disease to live in the community.

Caroline Abrahams, Age UK’s charity director, said: “Our analysis suggests that many people with dementia are losing out on the NHS follow-up support they need and are supposed always to be offered, once they have received their diagnosis.”
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She reminded the government of its commitment under the prime minister’s challenge on dementia two thousand twenty to improving the “quality of post-diagnosis treatment and support for people with dementia and their carers. Age UK said there are not enough good local support services for people with dementia but, in its Promising Approaches to Dementia report, published on Tuesday, it highlighted a number of “evidence[-based], cost-effective and scalable” interventions that could form part of care plans.They include counselling, specialist nurses providing advice and support, horticultural therapy and dance-based therapy.