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It does always make me laugh when people complain about having to pay more tax but then moan about public services/NHS. This is obviously aimed at middle
Class people who wouldn’t be affected in a negative way by any additional tax

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23 minutes ago, Aufc said:

It does always make me laugh when people complain about having to pay more tax but then moan about public services/NHS. This is obviously aimed at middle
Class people who wouldn’t be affected in a negative way by any additional tax

I kinda get where you're coming from but given who's in power and how much tax in this country is funnelled to mates and members of the Conservative Party I get why people grumble. 

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1 hour ago, ICTChris said:

I know a lot of people who have had terrible experiences with mental health care in the NHS.  There's obviously a difference between that and cancer treatment though, it's almost like a different discipline. 

Other people will know more about this than me but there's obviously a difference in something like treating heart disease and treating mental health problems.  From my experience of having relatives who have had treatment in cardiology departments, that's something the NHS are good at.  From my experience of having friends recieve mental health care, the standard is a lot lower.  I understand why, I understand the challanges of resourcing and the like, but the model seems to be - go to your GP, get referred and wait.  If the service you are referred to isn't for you then repeat.

 

Mental health services on the NHS are shite. The current wait for a psychiatrist is months, duty team line regularly goes unanswered.

I went into hospital at very end November and finally saw my consultant as an outpatient in the March (unfortunately his secretary is incompetent which doesn't help)

Last I heard waiting times for a psychologist was 18 months and CAMHS isn't much less.

Then there's the attitude of the staff, I went from voluntary admission to sectioning because the RMN was useless. At the apt with ward manager and psychiatrist the next morning I detailed her failings.

Then there was the time my now ex bf called an ambulance as my drink had been spiked. He was asked what medication and why. Once my diagnosis was revealed he said the ambulance staffs attitude was disgusting. Refused to treat it as anything other than attention seeking. He was really shocked at how they went from helpful and concerned to arseholes.

On Hogmanay there, there was no one in the RAH who could section a patient.

I could go on, but as I read in a book recently, we can raise awareness of mental health all we like but without significant funding and services it's a waste of time. 

 

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4 minutes ago, RH33 said:

Mental health services on the NHS are shite. The current wait for a psychiatrist is months, duty team line regularly goes unanswered.

I went into hospital at very end November and finally saw my consultant as an outpatient in the March (unfortunately his secretary is incompetent which doesn't help)

Last I heard waiting times for a psychologist was 18 months and CAMHS isn't much less.

Then there's the attitude of the staff, I went from voluntary admission to sectioning because the RMN was useless. At the apt with ward manager and psychiatrist the next morning I detailed her failings.

Then there was the time my now ex bf called an ambulance as my drink had been spiked. He was asked what medication and why. Once my diagnosis was revealed he said the ambulance staffs attitude was disgusting. Refused to treat it as anything other than attention seeking. He was really shocked at how they went from helpful and concerned to arseholes.

On Hogmanay there, there was no one in the RAH who could section a patient.

I could go on, but as I read in a book recently, we can raise awareness of mental health all we like but without significant funding and services it's a waste of time. 

 

Mental health services in Tayside have been shite for years. My cousin's young lad took an overdose in 2009, was hospitalised, was treated for the physical stuff and sent home without even seeing, or speaking to anyone in the mental health team, and no follow up. He hung himself 2 weeks later. The Carseview unit has a history of being particularly bad. We weren't too bad in Angus as we had the Unit at Stracathro which was generally quid good. Unfortunately NHS Tayside closed it and now everyone in Angus has to go to Carseview, or if there's no space there, Murray Royal in Perth, and in a recent case of mine, Edinburgh. 

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21 minutes ago, Day of the Lords said:

Mental health services in Tayside have been shite for years. My cousin's young lad took an overdose in 2009, was hospitalised, was treated for the physical stuff and sent home without even seeing, or speaking to anyone in the mental health team, and no follow up. He hung himself 2 weeks later. The Carseview unit has a history of being particularly bad. We weren't too bad in Angus as we had the Unit at Stracathro which was generally quid good. Unfortunately NHS Tayside closed it and now everyone in Angus has to go to Carseview, or if there's no space there, Murray Royal in Perth, and in a recent case of mine, Edinburgh. 

When I was admitted back in 2013 there were no beds in Scotland available......I sat at dykebar for almost 12hours and warned that I could be 'boarded out' to Aberdeen or Inverness.

There used to be a ward at the RAH, it's closed and the beds at dykebar and levrendale reduced.

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2 hours ago, welshbairn said:

It's a few years ago and while Blair was running things, but there was a table of best performing EU countries in terms of waiting lists, and France came top and the UK well down the list. Turned out France had twice the number of doctors but paid them half as much. (very roughly) Maybe we could afford more doctors if we didn't make them work ridiculous hours and have to pay more to attract and keep them.

I agree with this, some of the hours they are having to work is ridiculous. Anything I know about training & associated costs is purely anecdotal but my girlfriend was telling me when she was doing part of her training at a GP, the practice was getting some mental sum like £500 a day to ‘train’ her, even though she was doing quite a bit of the work in terms of prescribing etc. This kind of thing should surely be written in as a requirement of owning a GP practice?

Furthermore, the lack of doctors and nurses seems to mean that more ‘locum’ shifts are required, which appear to be incredibly expensive (on the other hand very lucrative to healthcare staff). Some of my bird’s mates do these shifts and absolutely rake it in. 

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17 minutes ago, Bonksy+HisChristianParade said:

I agree with this, some of the hours they are having to work is ridiculous. Anything I know about training & associated costs is purely anecdotal but my girlfriend was telling me when she was doing part of her training at a GP, the practice was getting some mental sum like £500 a day to ‘train’ her, even though she was doing quite a bit of the work in terms of prescribing etc. This kind of thing should surely be written in as a requirement of owning a GP practice?

Furthermore, the lack of doctors and nurses seems to mean that more ‘locum’ shifts are required, which appear to be incredibly expensive (on the other hand very lucrative to healthcare staff). Some of my bird’s mates do these shifts and absolutely rake it in. 

Probably because it's not guaranteed income, so attracts a premium rate. Although I suppose it's maybe common to jump from one locum post to another.

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4 minutes ago, Jacksgranda said:

Probably because it's not guaranteed income, so attracts a premium rate. Although I suppose it's maybe common to jump from one locum post to another.

Absolutely, I understand why they’re so expensive. But if there wasn’t such a shortage then they wouldn’t be as necessary surely?

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2 minutes ago, Bonksy+HisChristianParade said:

Absolutely, I understand why they’re so expensive. But if there wasn’t such a shortage then they wouldn’t be as necessary surely?

Oh aye, but maybe it's more cost effective to pay locums rather than train doctors/nurses and pay locums, until said trainees are qualified.

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1 hour ago, Jacksgranda said:

Oh aye, but maybe it's more cost effective to pay locums rather than train doctors/nurses and pay locums, until said trainees are qualified.

I suspect that probably is the case in the short term, but by making that investment now and having more full time staff going forward, you are less reliant on expensive locum/agency staff in the long term. The problem there though is that, certainly in this country, governments are not that into long-term planning, tending to focus on doing enough in the next five years to get re-elected, and then worrying about the next five years then.

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I kinda get where you're coming from but given who's in power and how much tax in this country is funnelled to mates and members of the Conservative Party I get why people grumble. 


Well aye. But that can only be solved by scotland being independent or the tories being voted out. Not sure what one is more likely
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4 hours ago, RH33 said:

When I was admitted back in 2013 there were no beds in Scotland available......I sat at dykebar for almost 12hours and warned that I could be 'boarded out' to Aberdeen or Inverness.

There used to be a ward at the RAH, it's closed and the beds at dykebar and levrendale reduced.

Ive see it quite regularly people with profound mental health problems, begging for help, seen people saved from suicide and taken to hospital for assessment and then the staff refusing to section them because they had a drink 23hrs ago or because they said something that may constitute ‘forward planning’ which apparently means they wont do anything (unfortunately not as reliable an indicator as CPN’s make out). 
Seen people begging for help turfed out and taken their lives within days of being knocked back for help. Its horrible. 

4 hours ago, Bonksy+HisChristianParade said:

I agree with this, some of the hours they are having to work is ridiculous. Anything I know about training & associated costs is purely anecdotal but my girlfriend was telling me when she was doing part of her training at a GP, the practice was getting some mental sum like £500 a day to ‘train’ her, even though she was doing quite a bit of the work in terms of prescribing etc. This kind of thing should surely be written in as a requirement of owning a GP practice?

Furthermore, the lack of doctors and nurses seems to mean that more ‘locum’ shifts are required, which appear to be incredibly expensive (on the other hand very lucrative to healthcare staff). Some of my bird’s mates do these shifts and absolutely rake it in. 

Locum stuff seems to be quite attractive to doctors with young kids etc. I know the wifes practice is looking at becoming a training practice but its nothing like £500 a day or anything. Places outside Glasgow/Edinburgh also have no chance of getting locum cover. 
Out of hours is a disaster because the government changed the way the tax and pension works meaning for a GP working 9 sessions a week or similar working out of hours can in some cases mean they get taxed on about 50-80% of the fee for the shift meaning its not worth it to work it. I dont think id volunteer to work xmas instead of being with the family and basically earn nothing for it. 

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The issues with locum medics, bank shifts and agency nurses are the same as the issues with private provision of healthcare. It's all the same fucking docs and nurses. There aren't two sets, some who do locums and some who do normal shifts. The vast majority of locum, bank and agency shifts are the same fecking staff doing additional hours. The vast majority of locum/bank arrangements are pretty short term too, shifts here or there. 

Consultant and GP locums are different to be fair in that they might be 3 or 6 month posts rather than ad hoc shifts. But ask yourself why, when we are gasping for staff, these docs need to bounce about every 6 months. 

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12 hours ago, RH33 said:

I could go on, but as I read in a book recently, we can raise awareness of mental health all we like but without significant funding and services it's a waste of time. 

 

Saw a random tweet the other day that summed this up succinctly. I'm paraphrasing, but it was along the lines of -

Yeah, here comes all the 'men need to open up about their feelings', feel comfortable talking, people need to be supportive etc, but what is the fucking point when actual mental health services are practically non-existent?'

It's spot on. I mean, if you go to your GP complaining about feeling depressed, you'll get offered SSRI's and told to come back in a month or six weeks for a review, possibly placed on an 18 month to 2 year waiting list for an assessment. What I don't think is ever really acknowledged, is most men won't even go to a GP about mental health unless they're at total crisis point. In a lot of cases "I'm feeling a bit down" is actually "I'm completely dysfunctional and having suicidal ideation" but such is mens' habit of downplaying things that they don't get a response commensurate with their actual needs.

In reality, they should be going to A&E for an immediate MHAS assessment, but again, that's never explained anywhere and people will inevitably think they'd be wasting doctors' time because they don't have an arm hanging off.

I have lost count of the number of people I know of who have had a complete and utter breakdown, killed themselves, or descended into a completely chaotic lifestyle, so drugs, alcohol, homelessness etc while awaiting a referral. The equivalent for Oncology would be giving someone an initial diagnosis of a malignant tumour, then telling them they are just going to have to wait two years before the NHS bothers it's arse to do anything about it. That would result in a national scandal and the public simply wouldn't tolerate it, but with mental health crisis, nope, meh... you'll just have to wait, and here's some SSRI's that will likely not even touch the sides of what you are experiencing. It's an outrage.

 

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7 hours ago, Boo Khaki said:

Saw a random tweet the other day that summed this up succinctly. I'm paraphrasing, but it was along the lines of -

Yeah, here comes all the 'men need to open up about their feelings', feel comfortable talking, people need to be supportive etc, but what is the fucking point when actual mental health services are practically non-existent?'

It's spot on. I mean, if you go to your GP complaining about feeling depressed, you'll get offered SSRI's and told to come back in a month or six weeks for a review, possibly placed on an 18 month to 2 year waiting list for an assessment. What I don't think is ever really acknowledged, is most men won't even go to a GP about mental health unless they're at total crisis point. In a lot of cases "I'm feeling a bit down" is actually "I'm completely dysfunctional and having suicidal ideation" but such is mens' habit of downplaying things that they don't get a response commensurate with their actual needs.

In reality, they should be going to A&E for an immediate MHAS assessment, but again, that's never explained anywhere and people will inevitably think they'd be wasting doctors' time because they don't have an arm hanging off.

I have lost count of the number of people I know of who have had a complete and utter breakdown, killed themselves, or descended into a completely chaotic lifestyle, so drugs, alcohol, homelessness etc while awaiting a referral. The equivalent for Oncology would be giving someone an initial diagnosis of a malignant tumour, then telling them they are just going to have to wait two years before the NHS bothers it's arse to do anything about it. That would result in a national scandal and the public simply wouldn't tolerate it, but with mental health crisis, nope, meh... you'll just have to wait, and here's some SSRI's that will likely not even touch the sides of what you are experiencing. It's an outrage.

 

My friend was suffering from low level anxiety and put on low dose medication. She called GP after six months and was told here's some more, we'll review it in two years!

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