– Wait months (maybe over a year) on a waiting list
– Can only get monofocal lenses (lenses that are fixed for either far objects or near objects, but not both)
Private cataracts surgery:
– Don’t wait as long
– Can get multifocal lenses (lenses that can see both near and far objects).
No wonder people who can afford it are abandoning the NHS- It only provides the most basic treatments and it takes ages to actually get those treatments.
My MIL recently went private for a hip operation. Thankfully she could afford it but it was a case of going private and having the op within about a month, or waiting for the NHS for potentially 3 years or more.
It was a small price to pay for getting full mobility back and a huge quality of life improvement. I feel sorry for those who have to resort to long NHS delays.
Doubly sucks because the longer an issue goes untreated often it becomes more time and resource intensive to resolve.
This is planned and is the way the Tories will gradually privatise the NHS by stealth.
I rearly watch commercial stations because the adverts do my head in, but watched a football match a few months ago and was astonished at the amount of adverts for private health plans, there were more than for betting firms!
This raises a lot of different feelings for me.
On one hand people who can afford to pay and do, free up spaces for those who don’t on NHS waiting lists. I think we would all agree it would be perverse for millionaires to queue up at food banks when Waitrose exists, and no one thinks in that situation that we should shut down Waitrose. However, there is an ideological expectation that it is okay in healthcare and it should be one size fits all.
That said, private healthcare does undermine the NHS in more subtle ways. That we will resent paying National Insurance for a creaky service. We will end up paying more, as the NHS Agenda for Change does serve to deflate nursing and other allied health professionals wages, which sucks for clinicians but helps keep costs low for the general public. It monetises the goodwill that most services depend on to keep things running.
That said, currently working for the health service at the moment is dehumanising. Management is notoriously terrible, the media swings between clapping for the heroes to vilifying staff for not being able to be everywhere at once. It’s not great to be constantly told that the service you work for is terrible, and therefore by association you are as well.
If you look historically, there has never really been enough supply for the demand (which is why dentistry, opticians, mental health, IVF, Cosmetics and elective practices are at least semi private). However, I do think this constant negative feedback from the public is what is going to drive away clinicians to working independently more than any sinister Tory plot or healthcare company conspiracy. Most do the job because it is interpersonally rewarding and to be met with constant complaints and gripes erodes that, so they end up thinking “*Hell, I may as well just go for the cash*”.
Interesting my grandma got done privately by the NHS. Seems to be a bit if a postcode lottery, like most things.
This is the Tory way. Plenty of folk can’t afford to go private. Two tiered medical services.
Having said that, any pensioners who are wealthy enough to take the load off the NHS should do so. There are many elderly folk like me who don’t need their state pension or winter fuel allowance.
I would gladly give mine back to the treasury but there is no way to do this.
So the local food bank gets it.
That’s the price of not wearing masks and continuing to have gatherings and refusing vaccines for no reason. And many here consider it a price worth paying. I’m just glad my mum got her hip done before the crunch and doesn’t have to lie there in pain because someone else *needed* a pint and a train ride without a mask…
8 comments
Cataracts surgery on the NHS:
– Wait months (maybe over a year) on a waiting list
– Can only get monofocal lenses (lenses that are fixed for either far objects or near objects, but not both)
Private cataracts surgery:
– Don’t wait as long
– Can get multifocal lenses (lenses that can see both near and far objects).
No wonder people who can afford it are abandoning the NHS- It only provides the most basic treatments and it takes ages to actually get those treatments.
My MIL recently went private for a hip operation. Thankfully she could afford it but it was a case of going private and having the op within about a month, or waiting for the NHS for potentially 3 years or more.
It was a small price to pay for getting full mobility back and a huge quality of life improvement. I feel sorry for those who have to resort to long NHS delays.
Doubly sucks because the longer an issue goes untreated often it becomes more time and resource intensive to resolve.
This is planned and is the way the Tories will gradually privatise the NHS by stealth.
I rearly watch commercial stations because the adverts do my head in, but watched a football match a few months ago and was astonished at the amount of adverts for private health plans, there were more than for betting firms!
This raises a lot of different feelings for me.
On one hand people who can afford to pay and do, free up spaces for those who don’t on NHS waiting lists. I think we would all agree it would be perverse for millionaires to queue up at food banks when Waitrose exists, and no one thinks in that situation that we should shut down Waitrose. However, there is an ideological expectation that it is okay in healthcare and it should be one size fits all.
That said, private healthcare does undermine the NHS in more subtle ways. That we will resent paying National Insurance for a creaky service. We will end up paying more, as the NHS Agenda for Change does serve to deflate nursing and other allied health professionals wages, which sucks for clinicians but helps keep costs low for the general public. It monetises the goodwill that most services depend on to keep things running.
That said, currently working for the health service at the moment is dehumanising. Management is notoriously terrible, the media swings between clapping for the heroes to vilifying staff for not being able to be everywhere at once. It’s not great to be constantly told that the service you work for is terrible, and therefore by association you are as well.
If you look historically, there has never really been enough supply for the demand (which is why dentistry, opticians, mental health, IVF, Cosmetics and elective practices are at least semi private). However, I do think this constant negative feedback from the public is what is going to drive away clinicians to working independently more than any sinister Tory plot or healthcare company conspiracy. Most do the job because it is interpersonally rewarding and to be met with constant complaints and gripes erodes that, so they end up thinking “*Hell, I may as well just go for the cash*”.
Interesting my grandma got done privately by the NHS. Seems to be a bit if a postcode lottery, like most things.
This is the Tory way. Plenty of folk can’t afford to go private. Two tiered medical services.
Having said that, any pensioners who are wealthy enough to take the load off the NHS should do so. There are many elderly folk like me who don’t need their state pension or winter fuel allowance.
I would gladly give mine back to the treasury but there is no way to do this.
So the local food bank gets it.
That’s the price of not wearing masks and continuing to have gatherings and refusing vaccines for no reason. And many here consider it a price worth paying. I’m just glad my mum got her hip done before the crunch and doesn’t have to lie there in pain because someone else *needed* a pint and a train ride without a mask…