I was randomly listening to the radio the other night only to find another talk show being dedicated to the problems of the NHS and the usual host of ideas as to how we should save it.

I think, for me, this subject has just about reached saturation point. It is not only on the radio regularly, but also in the news and in the paper. The reason the subject has reached saturation point is because I do not think there will be any headway with the problem given the ideas that have come up. If this is the case, then it makes such shows, headlines and reports of little interest or value. Leave this subject now.....and come back to us when you have something new to report. Continually crying wolf starts to lose its effect in the end.

After engaging with these reports again and again, it became evident that a pattern was forming. Essentially, it seems, the main solution to the problem seems to be to throw the pack of cards, that is the NHS, into the air and then rebuild it using the same materials. This is not working. Every time a new government gets into power they have a crack at the NHS (as well as schools, which is another festering sore). What has become obviously evident is to achieve anything lasting the very cards themselves need to be changed. It is time to think outside the box, or pack as it were.

During the show in question, the main concern was how little time doctors spent with patients and if that did not put patients at risk. In contrast to the 10 minutes the doctors offer I find 2 hours for a patient's initial consultation. It is the only way to take a full holistic history and to understand the person with the condition rather than just the disease. Believe me, I am not having a go at the doctors. They are the victims of the system of expectations they belong to.

In response to this problem one doctor phoned in and felt the only solution to resolve this problem would be to have more doctors. I agree with this whole heartedly. In my series Patient First Medicine, I made this very point that I feared about the quality of treatment from stressed doctors and overworked nurses.

To resolve this problem the doctor suggested there be more funding available for these doctors. There is one massive problem with this......there is no more funding! This is what we are constantly being told. There is no funding for this and no funding for that. This means that the money needed to hire more doctors and nurses to take some of the strain off the existing workload has to come out of some of the funding already in circulation. I can see this working if, for example, two doctors were willing to take a third cut in pay each to create the resources to fund a third doctor. However, for some strange reason, I just don't feel that is likely to gain acceptance in certain corners.

However, the area I see as the most likely source to reclaim money is the massive drug bill.

Just as an example, how often have we seen or heard reports telling us that antibiotics are being given out too freely to the point that they are no longer potent against some strains of bacteria and thus putting people having operations at risk?

In my own practice alone I have facilitated a complete cure or greatly reduced the dependence on drugs in the bulk of my patients, often after they have been on them for years or even decades. These conditions included people with Asthma, Skin Disease, Hypertension, Depression, Gout, Menstrual Irregularities....and on, all of which were offered a drug solution as the only answer to their problem.....And I am not the only one out there doing this. I am only one practitioner of many holistic practitioners who are achieving these results up and down the countryside. We represent a valuable resource and a potent solution to the problems of the NHS because, in the long run, we offer a cheaper and longer lasting solution to many conditions.

One of the excuses as to why we are not embraced as a part solution to the NHS' problems is it is claimed that our methods are not substantiated by science. Certainly, it is true that we cannot substantiate our methods as readily when the test is disease oriented, but that is because our very methods are not disease oriented. We are, however substantiated by the law of probability that says, given the success so many of us have had with so many patients up and down the country, there must be more at work here than mere chance.

At the end of the day, patients are interested in results not theory. If we can't have more money to save the NHS, then let us start shifting what resources we have to where they will do some real good.

In any negotiation there comes a point when we must concede, in part, to the oppositions position, even if we don't understand it, as the only way forward. The alternative is to continue going in circles for ever, which is what we seem to be doing.