The heads of NHS quangos have seen their salaries increase by up to 77 per cent in three years - more than seven times the rise in nurses' pay.

NHS quango bosses enjoy pay boosts of up to 77 per cent
article in the Sunday Telegraph

Extract:

"Six chief executives of health service organisations now earn more than Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, while pay for bosses at more than 300 hospital and primary care trusts has increased by an average of 10 per cent in one year.

The rises were attacked last night for being “an insult” to taxpayers.

An investigation by The Sunday Telegraph shows that 19 chiefs of NHS quangos are paid six-figure salaries, including 12 who received double-digit rises in the past three years. Between 2005 and last year, Andrew Dillon, the chief executive of the rationing body, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice), was given a salary rise of 44 per cent, taking his pay to £202,000.

Prof Kent Woods, of the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency, received an increase of 36 per cent, bringing his pay to £218,000.

Alan Doran, appointed in 2007 to run IVF regulators the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority earned £160,000 last year, 51 per cent more than his predecessor did in 2005.

Lynda Hamlyn, the chief executive of NHS Blood and Transplant earns £168,630, 77 per cent more than the boss of the organisation it replaced. All the salaries were agreed by non-executives from their own boards within limits set by the Government.

During the same period, pay for nurses rose by an average of 8.2 per cent."

Obviously, this is unfair. - And personally, I reckon we'd be better off without the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency - the MHRA - altogether. See http://aboutsalt.blogspot.com/2007/04/is-mhra-medicines-and-healthcare.html

Aricept is to be available on the NHS

Alzheimer's drugs to be available on NHS - Telegraph

Extract:

"Victims of a mild form of Alzheimer's disease are to be given access to anti-dementia drugs on the NHS.

Campaigners yesterday hailed the "dramatic concession", which came after a five-day legal hearing.

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) triggered a High Court action when it decided the drugs were not cost effective in relation to the benefits they offered to sufferers in the early stages of the disease.

Yesterday a QC for Nice, which is responsible for providing national guidance on treatments available on the NHS, clarified the official position of the watchdog.

Nigel Giffin QC said doctors did have discretion, in certain circumstances, to prescribe the drugs to patients with mild symptoms. The statement came after Mrs Justice Dobbs, sitting in London, had closely questioned Mr Giffin on the issue before she reserved judgment on the case.

Mr Giffin said there were circumstances in which doctors, provided they took into account the Nice guidance, could exercise clinical judgment and decide that an individual patient was entitled to the drugs."

Obesity is the biggest avoidable factor in developing Alzheimer's disease, and obesity is caused by fluid retention/salt sensitivity, so you can reduce your risk of developing Alzeimer's disease by eating less salt/sodium and salty food.

Lose weight and benefit your health in countless other ways by eating less salt! - Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better! - How to Lose weight!

See my website http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/ (The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See Sodium in foods

Oh dear! - More risk of being prescribed statins...

GPs to screen every patient for heart risk - Telegraph

Extract:

"Millions of people could be prescribed cholesterol-reducing statins under guidelines published today by the Government's drug-rationing watchdog.

GPs will be told to draw up a "systematic strategy" to identify which patients on their books are most at risk of developing heart disease.

These patients will then be called to their local clinic or health centre for blood tests to measure their cholesterol levels, the guidance from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) will say.

People who are found to have a 20 per cent or greater chance of developing cardiovascular disease over the next decade will be prescribed statins to try to reduce their cholesterol."

The usefulness and safety of statins is debatable. - Click on the statins tab at the end of this entry and read the evidence.

High cholesterol is caused by salt sensitivity and can be lowered by eating less salt and salty food. - This costs nothing and is completely safe, unlike taking statins...

Heart disease is also best treated or avoided by cutting out salt and salty food.

Lose weight, lower your high cholesterol level, reduce your risk of heart disease and heart attack, and benefit your health in countless other ways by eating less salt! - Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better! -
How to Lose weight!
See my website http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/
Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection
See http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/conditions.html
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

Smokers should be prescribed a drug that triples their chances of giving up, the Government's rationing watchdog, Nice, said yesterday.

NHS to pay for £163 drug to help smokers quit - Telegraph

Extract:

"Smokers should be prescribed a drug that triples their chances of giving up, the Government's rationing watchdog said yesterday.

The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) said the NHS should pay for twice daily doses of varenicline, sold as Champix, for those who want to quit.

The draft guidelines follow controversy over Nice's decision to reject the drugs Aricept, Exelon and Reminyl for those in the early stages of Alzheimer's. The institute ruled that at £2.50 per day per patient they were not cost-effective.

Champix costs £1.95 per patient per day. Anti-smoking campaigners welcomed Nice's provisional ruling, saying the £163.80 cost to the NHS for each 12-week course would be more than recouped from the NHS's £1.5 billion annual bill for treating diseases caused by smoking.

Others questioned why people who chose to take up smoking should receive help from the public purse to give up when Nice has turned down funding for a number of Alzheimer's and cancer drugs."

I think it would be better to make the drug available to purchase over the counter, rather than have it as a free prescription-only drug.

People who give up smoking often complain that they then gain weight. - Here is help for them. - Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

Warning about higher risks from home births

Health watchdog gives warning on higher risks of home births

Extract:

"Women should be warned that babies born at home have a higher risk of dying, the health watchdog warns today. But prospective mothers should still be offered the choice of a home birth, as well as going to a midwife unit or hospital.

Final draft guidance from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) suggests that women should be reassured that the risk of their baby dying during childbirth is low wherever they are born - 5.1 deaths per 1,000 births - although risks are higher if serious complications occur at home, rather than in hospital. The draft guidance, in a move that is likely to confuse some expectant mothers, also stresses that they should be told that the research into the various risks is variable and that the evidence is uncertain.

A Canadian study in 1999 found three perinatal deaths among 860 home births, one among 733 births in consultant-led units and no deaths among 563 born in midwife-led units. The new guidance recommends that more research and monitoring of the relative risks is needed, something the Department of Health is about to commission. The government's planned maternity strategy will aim to guarantee that by 2009 every woman will have a choice of whether she gives birth at home, in a birthing centre, or in a hospital."