Kings Medical Practice News www.kingmedicalpractice.co.uk

If you have had a typhoid vaccination (Typhium Vi) at the surgery recently you may have read in the papers or seen on TV that there has been a manufacturing problem with some batches of the vaccine. Click here to read more about the news story. The manufacturer of Typhim VI has found that some batches of vaccine that patients have received since January 2011 are too weak and patients will not be fully immunised. The practice uses Typhim VI and we have looked through our records and identified nearly 250 patients who may have received the faulty vaccine. We are writing to everyone who has received the faulty vaccine to tell them that they may not be fully covered against typhoid. The current advise from the manufacturer is not to have re-vaccination but to follow the usual typhoid avoidance measures. These are to follow strict food and water precautions. Click here for further advice but remember BOIL IT, COOK IT, PEEL IT OR FORGET IT!

I am a GP Board member of NHS Wakefield Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and from April 2013 the CCG will be commissioning (ie buying) hospital services for patients across Wakefield District. Our biggest provider of specialist hospital services is Mid Yorks NHS Trust and they are currently going through a consultation exercise about changing the way they deliver services. On Wednesday evening this week I went to South Elmsall Town Council to explain these changes. It seems odd that I was their doing the talking but the CCG will have agreed these changes and will be leading on consultation with patients about these changes. I was talking about what the changes are, why their needs to change and some of the challenges these changes will bring. It seems perverse that only 18 months after two brand new hospitals at Pinderfields and Pontefract were opened we are talking about major changes but services cannot continue as they are currently configured for two main reasons. Firstly the