Two hundred children in England have now received life-saving treatment for hepatitis C as part of a world-first NHS programme, according to latest figures. Thanks to a new national service, the children – aged three to 18 years – were identified for treatment over the past two years and became the first in the world […]
Patients with severe inherited blood disorders will be offered stem cell transplants on the NHS that could cure their condition and help avoid life-long blood transfusions. Thalassaemia is a rare disorder that affects the production of haemoglobin in the blood, leading to severe anaemia and debilitating tiredness, with patients needing to have blood transfusions every […]
Maternity services in England must become safer, more personalised, kinder, professional and more family-friendly. That’s the vision of the National Maternity Review, which today (Tuesday) publishes its recommendations for how services should change over the next five years. The NHS England commissioned review – led by independent experts and chaired by Baroness Julia Cumberlege – […]
Dr Jo Black is one of NHS England’s two Associate National Clinical Directors for perinatal mental health, working alongside Dr Giles Berrisford, the clinical lead at the Birmingham Perinatal Mental Health Service at BSMHFT. Here she discusses her reasons for taking the role, the challenges ahead, and the partnerships being formed to deliver this vital […]
Premature babies are to be routinely offered a “life-changing” treatment to prevent blindness on the NHS for the first time, the head of the health service has announced today. The drug, ranibizumab, could save the eyesight of babies born with a condition known as retinopathy of prematurity (ROP), which affects blood vessels in the retina, […]
Following the publication of the Next Steps on the Five Year Forward View, which detailed the work underway to expand perinatal mental health services with four new mother and baby units (MBU), mum Katy Chachou talks about her experience and the specialist support she received in a mother and baby unit in Birmingham. I first […]
Valentine’s Day romance leads to a jump in pregnancies, new figures from NHS England show. With love in the air, there was a 5 per cent rise in conceptions around the most romantic day of the year, according to the data gathered to help the NHS provide the best possible care for mums-to-be and their […]
Reflecting on Baby Loss Awareness Week, a member of NHS England’s Digital Communications team shares her heart-rending and intensely personal experience of bereavement: Hello, my name is Emma. I have three children, Evelyn, Ruben and Wren. Evelyn was born asleep in December 2015 and is my first born. She made me a mother. As a […]
The NHS website saw more than 18,000 hits in an hour on its spina bifida pages following Sunday night’s episode of Call the Midwife. Spina bifida is a rare condition that occurs when a baby’s spine and spinal cord does not develop properly in the womb, causing a gap in the spine. In the BBC One episode, […]
Thousands of patients with COVID-19 who are most likely to be admitted to hospital are receiving a cutting-edge NHS antiviral treatment at home that improves symptoms “within hours”. Game-changing COVID treatments, which cut the risk of serious illness from the virus and have been praised by at-risk patients as “brilliant”, have been provided to more […]