The NHS doesn’t care
sir – I think the NHS executives writing in yesterday’s Letters should have gone to Specsavers. They are all wearing rose-tinted spectacles.
Visiting the doctor about a mole, I was referred to the hospital. I received an NHS acknowledgment dated August 2021. My doctor has confirmed it is likely to be well over a year before I will be looked at. The advice to over-50s to get moles checked (Health, May 2) seems like a bad joke.
Sylvia Smith
Great Moulton, Norfolk
sir – In yesterday’s letter, Chris Hopson of NHS Providers, Professor Martin Marshall of the Royal College of GPS and Matthew Taylor of the NHS Confederation defended the hardworking NHS, citing statistics that bear little relationship to many patients’ experience. What ivory tower do these NHS leaders live in?
If instead of defending what is clearly not a world-class service they explained strategies to improve things for waiting-list patients, as opposed to saying how hard NHS staff work, they might give greater confidence.
Peter Williman
Chatteris, Cambridgeshire
sir – If ever a letter showed how out of touch leaders are with their organisations, it was yesterday’s.
Endless waiting lists, 20-hour ambulance delays, increased attendance at A&E exacerbated by inability to see a GP – the NHS is broken. Pouring more and more money into it will not fix it.
Until there is root and branch reform we will not get the NHS we deserve. If the authors of the letter cannot see that, I suggest they make way for someone who can.
Trevor Joyce
Canterbury, Kent
sir – Some weeks ago, my dentist advised me to have a dermatologist look at a lesion she had observed on my nose. So I rang my GP, expecting her to look at it. But she told me to send a photo of the lesion to the appropriate address, which I did.
I expected the hospital to call me in. Instead, it sent a text telling me that in three weeks a dermatologist would look at the photo I had taken and advise me accordingly. At about the stated time, a form came from the hospital telling me my photo was not good enough to allow an opinion and I should submit a “dermoscopic image as per the NCL lesion dermatology guidance”.
Charles Lewis
London N2