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To: Board of Directors at University College Hospital (UCLH)
Don't let outsourcing to private contractors be the ruin of our hospitals
Stop outsourcing services at University College Hospital (UCLH) to private contractors.
Why is this important?
We don't think its healthy for hospital trusts to make major decisions about service delivery which favour the private sector through the back door at a potential cost to patient well-being and to efficiency.
If we let hospital trusts sell off services that are currently provided in-house, it's easy to see how the system could quietly be dismantled, piece by piece.
The effects are already tangible - delays in booking appointments, the risk of lower-quality diagnostic imaging being available to consultants and the ability of the private contractor to provide a service that only partially fulfils the outcome ordered by the consultant.
This may only be the beginning of a story in which services are progressively outsourced to private contractors, with possible to likely degradation in service quality.
It's absolutely clear that a private contractor has a conflict of interests, since the profit motive necessarily comes before the quality of service to a patient.
Let's spend the NHS budget wisely, by continuing to provide expert services in-house, so that highly-trained doctors have the information they need and patients get the best possible chance of diagnostic accuracy and the correct prognosis.
If we let hospital trusts sell off services that are currently provided in-house, it's easy to see how the system could quietly be dismantled, piece by piece.
The effects are already tangible - delays in booking appointments, the risk of lower-quality diagnostic imaging being available to consultants and the ability of the private contractor to provide a service that only partially fulfils the outcome ordered by the consultant.
This may only be the beginning of a story in which services are progressively outsourced to private contractors, with possible to likely degradation in service quality.
It's absolutely clear that a private contractor has a conflict of interests, since the profit motive necessarily comes before the quality of service to a patient.
Let's spend the NHS budget wisely, by continuing to provide expert services in-house, so that highly-trained doctors have the information they need and patients get the best possible chance of diagnostic accuracy and the correct prognosis.
