This is part of Unite’s request for a large school nurse recruitment campaign. It estimated that there are now 6,900 children to every specialist school nurse in England, using NHS workforce statistics.

Due to the cervical cancer immunisation for teenage girls and the government push to have a specialist school nurse for every secondary school and its cluster of primary schools by 2010, there is also concern about the increasing Read more »

Is the cover-up becoming worse than the proverbial crime?

According to the WSJ Health Blog, Jonathan Leo, a professor of neuro-anatomy from a small university in Tennessee, critiqued a study published in JAMA, and pointed out an association between the study’s author and a pharmaceutical company. He posted his thoughts on the website of the British Medical Journal.

None too happy, Leo then received calls from JAMA’s executive Read more »

GP newspaper broke the story about GP concerns a year ago, warning that the guidance was forcing GPs in England to refer patients unnecessarily on to secondary care.

Fergus Macbeth, NICE’s director of the centre for clinical practice, said: ‘NICE has become aware of concerns, particularly from GPs, about some of the recommendations in the guidance around GP involvement in minor surgery and how it is being interpreted and implemented Read more »

The union is urging the DoH to double the workforce by immediately recruiting an extra 2,000 qualified school nurses.

The advice follows the data from the child measurement programme showing that one in five children aged 10-11 are obese.

There are more than 3,300 secondary schools in England, and the DoH has pledged to have a school nurse to cover each of these and their surrounding clusters of primary schools by 2010.
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Its report out today titled ‘Older …but wiser?’ reveals the challenges of the ageing nursing workforce and possible action.

Theresa Fyffe, RCN Scotland director, said: ‘If we are to prevent a skills shortage in the future, work must begin now to address this and help retain the skills of older nurses.

‘RCN Scotland is calling on the Scottish government to set up a national forum, which would Read more »