National Health Service
The National Health Service (NHS) is the national health system in force in the United Kingdom. Each of the four constituent parts of the Kingdom (England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland) have their own NHS, that although the guidelines have in common, maintains its own identity under the particular aspect of managerial, financial and operational.
The NHS provides medical care throughout the United Kingdom to all who reside there, without discrimination between parts geographical (those living in Wales can be cured in Scotland, as well as a resident in England can receive assistance in Northern Ireland, and so on , including first aid assistance, the hospital stay short and long term, specialized services such as dental and ophthalmological (the latter performed by dentists).
It comes into operation 5 July 1948 following the National Health Service Act of 1946; therefore become an integral part of British society, so much to be defined by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Nigel Lawson, the national religion (national religion).
The private medical care continues parallel to the NHS, paid largely by private insurance, but used by a small population of percetuale.
Most services are free of charge for patients: they (estimated at £ 104 billion in 2007-8) are recruited primarily through taxation.
The NHS is the world’s most comprehensive and centralized health service, third globally as the number of employees after the Chinese People’s Liberation Army and the Indian Railways.
Since its inception the NHS has been characterized by:
* Funding from the state budget
* Centrality of public ownership of health facilities
* Vertical integration of structures providing benefits of preventive medicine and primary with public hospitals
* High centralization, with executive powers placed with the central government
The NHS was reformed in 1989, in order to improve the efficient use of resources employed, the assumption of salvagurdia the principles of universal coverage and access to health care (in a manner independent from individual income). This reform, introducing competitive mechanisms, has introduced a separation between buyers and purchasers (the components that have the task of buying on behalf of their patients, medical services (typically local health authorities “Health Authorities” and the associations of general practitioners ) and the units instead provide specialized medical care and hospital care (such providers or providers).