Healthcare - NICE - it's not!

I am struggling with the issue of healthcare and that wonderfully contrary, and apparently ridiculous, organisation NICE (National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence). The reason for this is twofold in that I am amazed at the various pronouncements that come from this body and secondly because of the comments, and pain, from some that I encounter.

It wasn't that long ago that NICE was supporting elective caesarians, something which might "Enable people to mange their diaries and their lives," but is advocating the use of major surgery to support lifestyles and consumerism (in the main - I know there are some for whom this is a necessary choice for reason other than physiological, but they are not the major group of potential users).

The latest issue to cause me concern is the raising of the age limit for IVF and making IVF available for same-sex couples. The only ray of sunlight is the recommendation of the extension to allow women with cancer to perhaps become mothers before surgery, radiation or other means remove the potential for this. Now whilst some might be clapping about this there are more than a few who are asking why certain drugs for cancer and other ills are refused to their loved ones and yet shedloads of money are potentially put on the table for non-life threatening stuff.

Now I know of the tales of those for whom the not having children renders the mother mentally damaged and there are always exceptions to the rule but there seems to little balance here if the discussions I have been part of, or overheard are anything to go by.

Having a child is not a right, it is a biological function, and sometimes this goes pear-shaped. Where possible I think it is right to offer IVF to couples who have difficulties but as I walk wards and discuss stuff with over-worked, staff-depleted and stressed nurses, I do have to ask how comes NICE can issue advice to spend money, especially for those who were never going to biologically have children, when the sharp end is so vulnerable and underfunded.

I said nothing yesterday but couldn't help feeling that the voices of those around me regarding NICE and their many outcomes were probably right.

Still, that's what the world is about isn't it, rights?

And it gives the Christians an opportunity to think and develop answers (I'm still thinking but you have the 'Start' on the board of Monopoly that is my life here for you to get you thinking too). There are many considerations and issues - back to this later.

Pax

C-Section - Customer's Right to Choose?

In what has to be one of the more bizarre stories I have come across lately I understand that the NHS watchdog is looking at giving women the option to have a Caesarean regardless of whether or not medical need exists. At last all women will have the opportunity to undergo major surgery so that they might keep their nether regions tight and their diaries managed!

This will apparently appear in new guidelines to be published by NICE (National Institute for Clinical Excellence - the same people who refuse drugs to terminally and seriously ill people on the grounds of cost). This is what I find to be the cherry (if you'll excuse the expression in this context) on the cake when you consider that a 'normal' birth costs around £1,500 and an elective C-section costs around £2.500 - so how comes terminally ill patients can be denied drugs that would extend life and money can be wasted on consumer baby deliveries?

One of the reasons appears to be because it will legitimise (sorry, they use the word 'formalise') those hospitals that offer C-Section on demand and this is, as I understand it, consumerism gone mad!

Listening to a radio programme for women (essential listening to and from the Crem') a couple of year's back I found myself railing at the radio as some high-powered executive woman explained that she had decided on a C-section to enable her to fit the birth in between meetings and social events. The baby's birth date (and time) was set to fit her work and social calendar with the added benefits that she'd still be 'like a teenager' (as long as she didn't look in the mirror at her face I guess) down below and could return to work within a 'matter of days'.

The fact is that all surgery is dangerous (even the 'safe' stuff) and a C-section is (unless things have changed recently) regarded as major surgery which therefore ramps up the risk. Not just that but when we take into account the fact that the current C-section rate is about 25% of all births in the UK (the World Health Organisation's recommendation is that it should be less than 15%) this is a totally off the wall move.

I understand that for some people there is a medical (physical or psychological) reason and necessity for such a procedure but this doesn't seem to be the situation generally with regard to this issue when it is billed as a matter of choice. It is just another part of the consumer 'our right to choose' culture (just like the social engineering that is abortion perhaps - the other side of the marketplace?). Oddly, I've not met many women who wanted an emergency C-section (but were truly grateful for it) - what a strange world but; Hey Ho - the world takes another step towards madness I guess.

Pax