The operating framework for the NHS has now been published. Reading through the detail I was struck by the tasks laid at the door of PCT clusters. These transitional organisations […]
Martin McShane
Martin McShane: Integrated reflections concluded
Here is my third and final blog on the USA trip: After Seattle’s integrated care organisations, we visited CalPERS. They fund $6.7bn worth of healthcare for 1.3 million people (roughly twice […]
Martin McShane: Integrated reflections continued
Following our visit to Kaiser Permanente, we travelled north to Seattle and visited the Virginia Mason hospital and Group Health. Linked but distinct, the relationship between the two provided a […]
Martin McShane: Integrated reflections
Sir William Osler advocated the concept of a “quinquennial brain dusting“: which was my justification for taking a week out to visit some integrated care organisations on the West Coast […]
Martin McShane: A day at the Mid Staffordshire foundation trust enquiry
I was privileged to be invited to the patient experience seminar being held as part of the Mid Staffordshire enquiry. I felt as though I was participating in one of […]
Martin McShane: Little and large
While I was a partner in general practice, we started to receive information about how we were performing compared to other practices. Whatever the data, we always looked at how we […]
Martin McShane: Care and cure
We are coming up to the annual contracting round. This year it will be led by Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs). Last year GPs were involved in the difficult, detailed negotiations […]
Martin McShane: Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
There are about 38,000 primary care contracts. They are worth over £12 billion. All of them are going to be the responsibility of the National Commissioning Board. By 2013 every PCT cluster […]
Martin McShane: Why?
A frequent refrain is “we mustn’t recreate PCTs.” Increasingly, when I hear or see it said I want to ask five why’s. Let me give you an example. “We don’t […]
Martin McShane: Integration
I was recently asked to give a brief talk on the role of a commissioner in integrated care. Chris Ham, Judith Smith, and Elizabeth Eastmure’s paper on this issue highlights […]