Julie Meyer: Meet an entrepreneur who wants to make the NHS great

EVERYBODY deserves great healthcare. The question is: how should this be achieved? The founders of the NHS felt that the government must deliver the healthcare in order to secure that basic human right; not all nations agree.

In Britain, despite the government’s best intentions, a terrible wall separates those who can afford good care privately with those who are treated by the NHS only.

There are pockets of outstanding care in the NHS, but daily we are faced with stories of bugs picked up in the hospital, the wrong patients being given abortion pills, and surgeons now being incentivised financially for having more of their patients survive – hardly reassuring.

Not surprisingly, an entrepreneur has come to the rescue of the rest of us who want great care. Dr Neil Bacon founded iWantGreatCare.org, having previously had an 18 year career as a kidney doctor.

Bacon revolutionised the UK medical community in 1998 when he founded Doctors.net.uk, leading it to become one of the world’s largest doctors’ networks, providing communications, collaboration and training to more than 150,000 doctors in the UK.

Bacon’s new site – www.iwantgreatcare.org – enables you to search for a great doctor, and to rate and review your doctor. It’s simple but powerful, and gaining momentum.

At the end of week one, more than 50,000 visits to the site had occurred with visitors spending nearly 5 minutes on the site. More than 2,000 reviews were added, and more than 90 per cent of them are highly positive.

While 300 doctors in the UK have complained, patient response has been uniformly positive to the idea. Some doctors are requesting cards to give to their patients saying that they think it’s a great idea.

There’s no question that being a doctor is more complex and sensitive than being a plumber.  But why should a doctor operate without a system where his insensitivities, chronic lateness, failure to diagnose correctly or rudeness goes unchecked?

WHAT ARE WE AFRAID OF?

iWantGreatCare, as a mirror to the service that patients receive, will do more to ensure that patients get looked after well than any government-operated scheme or more money into the NHS could do.

What are we afraid of? That some doctors will become very popular for their bedside manner? That outstanding care will be praised? In Britain, if you have money, you get market-driven health-care where doctors have to be responsive to patients. If you’re poor, you get the “take it or leave it” NHS.

A competent doctor is a basic human right. But if we can’t open the entire system to the best practices of the private world and enable great care in that manner, then at a minimum, we should allow patients to review their doctors and give them praise for doing great work.

True freedom doesn’t exist when people cannot speak to the pleasure or displeasure of the services provided by the state. Providing a rating system means that everyone steps up and thinks of patients as customers – who are paying through their taxes.

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