Who really has answers on how to pay for NHS?

We enjoyed the change of scenery and amongst other things we had a good day at the Beaulieu National Motor Museum.

I hadn’t realised that the former manor house was used during the Second World War to train members of the Special Operations Executive (SOE) who completed their secret training at Beaulieu.

It was interesting to read about the exploits of these brave and selfless “unsung heroes”, many of whom took part in vital and dangerous missions behind enemy lines.

They operated in total secrecy, and sadly many didn’t return, having paid the ultimate sacrifice.

Before I went away I had yet more surgery for a further five brain tumours which were treated again by the excellent team at Sheffield with gamma knife surgery.

I owe them so much, as I have now survived some 39 brain tumours over the last four years, any one of which could have killed me.

As a taxpayer, I still find it difficult to accept that I had to cover the £30k cost of gamma knife surgery from my pension, as the former Oxfordshire Primary Care Trust refused to fund me. They thought the evidence did not support it, and yet it has been available in the private sector for years.

This decision seems little more than another example of rationing, when it is known to work and costs much the same as whole brain radiation when fully costed.

I guess there will be no hope of any reimbursement now as we are constantly being told that the NHS is running out of money.

I am not surprised by this when I read newspaper headlines about the amounts we are allegedly paying to many senior NHS managers.

This needs to be sorted out once and for all if the NHS is to survive.

Although gamma knife is a proven treatment for my type of metastatic brain cancer, I have read newspaper reports that this treatment is not always readily available or funded on a national basis.

I am still trying to determine the true facts which on the face of it seem to be totally unfair, and I count my blessings that I was lucky enough to be treated.

Many of us have had to fight for proper treatment which reminds me of the time when kidney cancer patients were first denied access to Sutent by the former Oxfordshire PCT.

Sutent was the drug we later won from NICE (The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) as a result of our campaign.

Sutent was then available in Buckinghamshire, but not here in Oxfordshire, as the former PCT made a decision not to recommend it.

We were told that this decision was made at a meeting held in the absence of a qualified oncologist, which I still find hard to believe in view of the possible life and death outcomes.

This is why I will continue to challenge decisions about our care.

This unsavoury experience demonstrates that patients must always be prepared to challenge treatment decisions where necessary, and ask to see available evidence including copies of hospital notes, which we are all entitled to see.

I do hope that financial/budgetary constraints have not replaced the need to achieve positive clinical outcomes in our NHS.

Hi-tech: Clive Stone has had to pay to get surgery using a gamma knife machine

Macmillan Cancer Support reported recently that statistics show an alarming and unacceptable variation in cancer survival rates across the country. This is costing lives.

I do hope that we are not returning to the vagaries of the postcode lottery, as our cancer survival rates still lag behind the rest of Europe.

I have been doing my best to keep up with the wide variety of promises being offered by each political party with regard to the future of our NHS, especially for any confirmation that cancer patients will continue to have free access to treatments.

However, I still remain to be convinced of this.

The main problem is that no one will come out and admit to just what is to be withdrawn in the race to cut costs to the bone.

We have no way of knowing just how our nurses and medical teams will be funded.

We desperately need a sustainable 10- or 20-year funding plan for such a critical and challenging budget as the NHS, which must be fully taken into consideration with the Social Care budget.

It is high time that the NHS budget was given a special and more protected status, with better sustainable long-term funding, so that incoming politicians are unable to keep changing things.

Many promises are being made by General Election candidates but no one seems to have the exact answer as to just how our NHS will be funded.

So who do we vote for now?