英国“护士荒”

在去年护士就被列入了英国紧缺岗位的名单，据英国《每日电讯报》12的调查数据显示，2015年每5名英国NHS医院新增护士中就有4人是“外援”。近日，NHS称仍需要15,000以上的护士来应对这一资源严重短缺问题。

测试中可能遇到的词汇和知识：

Inquiry 质询[?n'kwa?r?]

lapses 流逝[læps]

acute 严重的[?'kju?t]

collapse 倒塌，暴跌[k?'læps]

inevitably 不可避免地[?n'?v?t?bli]

locum 临时代理['l?uk?m]

workforce planning 人力规划

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England’s hospitals need 15,000 more nurses, says NHS （409words）

By Sarah Neville, Public Policy Editor

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Demand for nurses has grown so rapidly that England’s hospitals are now 15,000 short of the number they need, according to an official NHS assessment.

NHS Improvement, the health regulator, also identified significant shortages of consultants in emergency medicine and general medicine.

The report says the findings of the Francis inquiry into serious care failings at Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust have driven the recruitment of more nurses. Some of the lapses at the hospitals, where it is thought patients died needlessly, were blamed on too few nurses.

The report says hospitals’ demand for nurses caring for adult acute patients in 2014 was 189,000, about 7,000 more than hospitals had been forecasting just a year earlier and 24,000 more than had been forecast two years before.

NHS Improvement says a significant factor in the shortfall in supply is the collapse in the number of nurses from outside Europe joining the health service owing to restrictions on international recruitment.

The number of nurses joining through this route has fallen by over 95 per cent from its peak of more than 15,000 in the early 2000s.

The NHS submitted evidence to the Migration Advisory Committee in September 2015 calling for nurses to be exempted from the restrictions and pointing to wider evidence of nurse shortages across the NHS. Last October, restrictions were temporarily relaxed and the committee is due to publish a fuller review this month.

NHS Improvement says the supply shortfall has inevitably driven up the cost of agency nurses. The bill for these temporary staff increased by about 30 per cent from 2012 to 2015.

Shortages of consultants are also highlighted in the report, with 73 per cent of providers’ total spending on locum staff concentrated in these two areas, it says.

However, NHS Improvement notes that reductions in the average length of hospital stay have helped to offset a sharp increase in hospital admissions during the past two years.

“Without this improvement, there would likely be a need for around 5,000 extra nurses at a cost to the NHS of about £250m at agency rates,” it adds.

NHS Improvement says it is now working to help hospitals reduce the amount they are spending on agency staff through better workforce planning.

It is also implementing recommendations from a review into NHS productivity by Lord Carter of Coles, which called for a range of actions including using the central buying power of the NHS to save money on procurement.

请根据你所读到的文章内容，完成以下自测题目：

1.Which one is not included as the significant shortage from NHS?

a. consultants in emergency medicine

b. consultants in general medicine

c. loss weight experts

d. nurses

2.Why patients died needlessly as Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation thought?

a. unprofessional nurses

b. shortages of nurses

c. poor sanitation condition

d. too few consultants in emergency medicine

3.When restrictions were temporarily relaxed in UK?

a. last September

b. January

c. February

d. last October

4. Which one is not included as NHS Improvement’s measure?

a. optimizing workforce planning

b. implementing recommendations from a review

c. reducing hospitals’ spending on agency staff

d. forbidding the central buying power

[1] 答案 c. loss weight experts

解释： 除了护士的紧缺，英国健康监管机构NHS指出还有药品顾问的紧缺。

[2] 答案 b. shortages of nurses

解释：这些不必要的死亡被归因于护士短缺。

[3] 答案 d. last October

解释：去年十月暂时放松了一些限制。

[4] 答案 d. forbidding the central buying power

解释：定位在文章后两段