Report 'A crisis of compassion: Who cares?': Battle of Ideas, 20-21 October 2012, London

摘要

This is a summary of a conference session that was conceived in recognition of the fact that real problems have been identified in regard to the poor quality of health and social care that vulnerable people - sick, elderly and disabled people - receive in the United Kingdom. It is an issue that has been in the news pretty much constantly over the past year. This crisis began very publicly in 2009 when Margaret Haywood was struck off the UK Nursing Register for secretly filming neglect and mistreatment of elderly patients in a Brighton Hospital. She had resorted to this underhand approach because she had not had a positive response when she tried to draw attention to the poor care she was witnessing (see debate between Paul Wainwright and Chris Belshaw in Nursing Ethics 2009; 16(5)).