NHS and private healthcare.

[WildGoose]

Want your views please.

Over the past week of not being in the best of health, i've been getting the "wish i'd bought a health insurance policy" thing, that you only get when you are feeling like crap and cursing the NHS for taking so long about everything, and getting it wrong again.

How many of you have private health plans?

If you get them through your job, you are lucky, i'm unlikely to ever work in a job that will provide it as a benefit, so that will leave me to choose to pay per month or not, and I assume its pricey? £100 minimum I imagine.

Or are you are a supporter of our valiant NHS, seemingly always underfunded, fighting the good fight, our good leaders will provide for us etc. It may leave you waiting 6 months out of work, losing your job in the process, but it will sort you out eventually, right?

I'll give you the daily mail outlook of it, you can see the figures invested in it improving, and you can quote reduced waiting times all you like, but when I need help i'm waiting, and when my next door neighbour needs a self esteem boob job or else she will kill herself, she is in next day. Same goes for the unregistered polish people clogging up A&E because they feel 'poorly'.

Hope thats alarmist enough for you

Personally I don't think that private healthcare should exist at all because it doesn't seem fair to the naive side of me that flashing the cash should get you to a doctor quickly, are rich people better people? No.

But I don't think the NHS will ever work properly unless maybe you halve the population, end of story.

People moaning about how crap it is, isnt a new thing, my parents had similar problems trying to get things done, and my dad has had to go mostly private over the last 10 years to try and get him the freedom back to walk around again unaided.

Got a healthcare plan? Think its a good idea?

What do you think of the NHS?

Rant away.
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So in other words, he stopped you for being flagrantly in posession of a motorcycle in direct contravention of the Hippies, Darkies and People Whose Face I Don't Like The Look of (Police Powers) Act. 1976

[Mister James]

I've only really had to deal with the NHS for myself after my big crash 3 years ago. The ambo was there in minutes, A&E were business-like but thorough, and the hospital I ended up in were good too. (Avoid Hillingdon Hospital like the plague though - for a start, you're likely to catch a plague while you're there!)

I have free private H/C insurance for 2 years with special offer in my current employment, after that I get a fairly substantial discount if I wish to continue. I suppose I'll have to see how much I use the service in the next 18 months, and see if it's worthwhile me paying to keep it in place.

I can identify with your comments re Mr Polski taking up space at A&E, I used to escort detainees to hospital, and they invariably jumped to the front of the queue - both on the day(fair enough I suppose, noone likes the ambience of people sitting in your waiting room in cuffs) and in their subsequent appointments.

[G]

Private health insurance may be cheaper than you think, depending on the plan you go for.

At my old gym it was cheaper for me to get pru-health insurance and gym membership through that (£25 on top) than to pay the £52 a month gym fee. This scheme actually knocked money off if you did 'healthy' things such as going to the gym and the like too.

Some will only pay out to certain limits and most may have some issue with pre-existing conditions and limits around that. A lot of them will also pay out if you have a stay in a NHS hospital (mine from pru and ppp through work both paid out if you were in an NHS hospital bed for over two nights, so I just missed out on cash for that).

I've had some issues with the NHS:
I probably got MRSA from my first stay, they did my leg up too tight, they didn't tell me until I was in the ward for the next operation that I had MRSA, reasonable times waiting in queues for X-rays/to see doctors, differing advice from different GPs and so on.
However, all-in, I'm actually fairly happy with the service received.

[MarJay]

I've actually never had an issue with the NHS, and I suspect that private healthcare is no better in terms of correct diagnoses and making mistakes.

Its just the NHS with better food and better service. Possibly lower waiting lists too, but in the end you get treated by nominally the same doctors.

I have private healthcare through my work, and they aren't exactly the last of the big spenders. I seriously doubt that it costs them any more than my company mobile phone bill every month. At one stage they were paying £50 per month for my Blackberry bill which I never ever use.

If I had to guess I'd say it was somewhere between £30 and £70 per month for it, and its with Norwich Union.
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[Skudd]

I've had no issues with the NHS when dealing with me or my family. Things have been done within a time scale I thought was ok, but perhaps I wasn't looking for faults to complain about at a later date.
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Petty Anarchists look at "1984".............. The Visionary looks at "Animal Farm".

[Marcg868]

I've never really had problems with the NHS, when i had renal problems due to Kidney stones it took 3 days to be admitted which was fine for me. It took 13 weeks for my operation which is the norm for routine stuff like that.

A&E i've always been seen within 2 hours and admitted onto a ward within 6 hours.

Good enough for me
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JACK, MISS YOU LOADS YOU LEGEND.

[JonB]

Never really had to deal with the NHS in the 21 years I have been on the planet, bar my GP. Luckily.

I've been informed that I get fully employer paid private healthcare in my new job, but not sure i'm overly fussed.
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[Robby]

NHS are good when it's an emergency, and reasonable when it's vaguely routine - for instance I'm going to have an op on my shoulder. It's not causing me significant pain, but it needs to get done.

However, they really fall down in two areas. The first is treating patients with non-emergency yet painful problems, like your suspect hernia. The other is very specialist work, for instance if you want to see a decent shrink you need to go private.

I don't have proper private healthcare, but I do have a plan with HSA for about 15 quid a month. It's a cashback jobby, where I sort out the private treatment and pay for it up front, then I can claim back 75% of it from HSA. You need to watch the maximum amounts in some areas though, I think you can only get £100 a year for dental. Consultancy, which is fairly catch-all, is about £400 a year max.

[MattHirst]

I have nothing but praise for the NHS, what they did for me was brilliant. The only complaint i have against them is that their communication is poor.

As robby said, in an emergancy they are really good. I attend the fracture clinic every 2 months or so and always get a letter through about 1 week after with my next appointment. Although i do end up aiting around 30 mins after my appointment. Never have to wait more than 5 mins for xrays.

When i've had Xrays, CTs and MRIs....Never had to wait weeks and weeks, i even had quite a few CTs cancelled to fit me in

Have no quarms with the Physio's either. Having gone for 8 months, they still gave me the same level of treatment from day 1, didn't get sick of me and even loved my humour

Not really had to deal with any part of the NHS in a non-emergancy other than my GP (and physios etc) and a ultrasound about 3 years ago but i can imagine them being perfectly adequete, just a little slow sometimes with poor communication.

When i say communication what i mean is information being passed between different departments and probably most importantly, between the quacks/consultants and the patient. A few times i came accross things that i didn't know, only from reading my notes or looking at my xrays (Yes, i am sad enough to buy them ). But with anything though, if you could sort out the poor communication, you'd be a millionaire.
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It's all fun and games until someone gets hurt, then it's bloody hilarious!!!

[G]

Oh and forgot that my initial surgeon told me not to take anti-inflammatories as they restrict bone growth. About three weeks later I find that they've given me anti-inflammatories in the big bag of drugs .

Oh and another amusing one was going in for an ultrasound for DVT. 'Oh no, you won't have that they say, but begrudgingly do the preliminary tests anyway, then send me home. Cue a rather embarrassed message on my answerphone later that night asking me to book an appointment for a proper ultrasound test because the ones they did came back positive.

[LeeR]

I was offered private cover at work but declined on the basis of cost.

I did think I'd made a mistake when I had my accident as I think I might have had better after care privately.

As said if you need emergency care then you'll more than likely end up at an NHS hospital anyway.

I had a private room on a female ward as all the male wards were full.

All my follow up consults have been via my insurance company, including a future gait and posture consultation in Harley St, which I won't pay for either.

So in the long run it wouldn't have made any difference, and I think I've saved a few hundred pounds.

I did however have a vasectomy privately as the NHS waiting list was too long for my liking.

That's another thing to consider because if you just want to have a routine op privately then you can just go and pay for it yourself, and I suspect most of these small ops don't cost as much as year's private health care contribution.
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