About Me
Hello!
I’m Kate. When I was growing up I wanted to be a cutting edge scientist, a barrister, an airline pilot, and Egyptologist or a Blue Peter presenter. To be honest, I’ve not got much better at making up my mind since then, but having fallen in love with doing radio stuff when I was at uni, I did my best to make that carry on.
Now I’m a freelancing radio-producer/broadcast journalist type thing that seems to be doing an increasing about of social media stuff.
Things that I love: Travel, Adventure, Radio, Thoughtfulness, Comedy, Photography, Cheese, Chocolate and Mad-cap schemes (of which I’ve plenty)
Things I hate: Celery, Ignorance, Arrogance, Self-service check-out tills, Goats Cheese and Fish (not when they’re in the sea, just when people expect me to eat them)
So there you go. I doubt you were that interested to start with, although if you’ve got this far then maybe you are, and are just left feeling disappointed with this flimsy nonsense. If that’s the case, ask me what you wanted to know and I’ll probably answer it next time I’m prompted to update this section.
:)
I have a thousand questions – they can wait. This is such a lovely profile – so concrete, clear & crisp.
This is the first time I’ve come to your website & I’m immediately captivated – no time to browse more now (I’m committed to listening to 10 new Audioboo voices before 8am).
Thanks a million for all you’re doing.
I think I could help you with some info about how (I see) GP and hospitals work – a window into how doctors think, what drives them etc. For starters no-one seems to appreciate that GPs already work as private providers; their sole aim (it seems!) is to maximise their profit. DoH knows this and sets targets the GPs always meet and often exceed (look at the 2005 GP contract which brought GPs loads of money). GPs contract soley to the NHS but work as if they’re NHS employees. That all sounds like boring stuff about the minituiae of my work but if we are going to let GPs run consortiums we ought to understand what drives them. There’s lots more. I’m trying to run a project aimed at I increasing awareness of illness so patients and health professionals speak/understand the same language……Hugh
Hi Kate
Are you based in England? –
I have done a few film interviews with a friend and plan to do more.
The NHS is a tangle of a subject. I started researching it a while ago. And I am still researching!
The NHS is a Jigsaw puzzle. I have (occassional)moments where I feel disheartened, to be honest.
On London Health Emergency website there is a good breakdown of the effects of so called ‘reforms’ contained in the Bill. It is a letter from Hackney based GP’s to Andrew Lansley.
A great book to read is Julian Tudor Harts book ‘the Political Economy of Healthcare’ (2010 2nd Ed). Absolutely brilliant.
In it he talked about different concepts of ‘ownership’.
GP’s tend to understand ownership in terms of ownership of property/capital. A narrow conception.
In contrast to this, ‘ownership’ in its wider and truer
sense, that of ownership of their profession. This means autonomy, power to research, understand and serve the needs of their populations.
Thank you for creating this website
Just a reply to my own post!
I should say that I am sure there are many great GP’s who are not driven by money…
On being disheartened.
I think there is cause for optimism.
While perhaps neo lib free market economics is appropriate to some areas of production, all the evidence points clearly to the fact that it is not appropriate for health.
Since the ‘internal market’ was established in 1991, the administration costs 1991-97 were already doubled, representing an increase in admin costs, from 6% to 12%. That is roughly a £6 billion increase, going not towards patient care but to company profits. Now the Admin costs I believe are 18%, and rising.
A great myth about free maket economics is its ‘efficiency’. Sprinkle the magic of market forces all over the world like gold dust and watch everything transform.
I think freemarket economics is a theology like… creationism
Hi Kate, how are you? I was thinking about you and then found that picture of me at Kate and Williams wedding day when you were booing . I made it my profile on facebook. I hope you are ok and it would be nice to know what your up too. Take care and hope to hear from you. Delores xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx