There are five basic questions worth asking yourself when setting out to tackle a problem.

They are as follows:
1. Do I understand this problem and its root causes?
2. Is it a big problem?
3. Is it an important problem?
4. Is it a wicked problem?
5. Is it a real problem?

Step one is self-explanatory, although a lot of people (in health policy and politics and beyond) do tend to skip it.

First, the good news: the 2014 British Social Attitudes survey found that satisfaction with the NHS has resumed its upwards trend, and is back to its second-highest level ever. This is a remarkable testament to the hard work of NHS staff.

(It will be instructive to see whether those who criticised the BSA's methodology when it found the massive drop in public satisfaction in 2010-11 change their tune now that its findings may be more convenient.)

Here follows the short version of the text of NHS England West Midlands local area team's major incident guidance, which has made the news today.

Urgent Care Checklist/On–Call guidance
Purpose
The purpose of this checklist is primarily to assist both CCG and Area Team on-call managers and Directors when the system pressures across urgent care providers is significant.

* CCG On call

Simon Stevens interview – Health Policy Insight, January 2015

Interview by Andy Cowper

Health Policy Insight: No healthcare system has yet achieved the level of productivity gain required in the 2015-20 period - though Spain, Portugal, Ireland and Greece have all made big cuts. Why will the NHS be different?
Simon Stevens: There are three main zones where we have to unleash major efficiency improvements. Number one, where most efforts to date have focused, is in individual NHS organisations and providers.

To the enormous surprise of absolutely no-one with a hint of knowledge of what's happening in the NHS, Circle today anounced that they are handing back the management of Hinchingbrooke to the NHS Trust Development Authority.

Dear Sir Galahad,

Your noble intentions in pursuing the Holy Grail of increased productivity in the NHS have been noted. As you know, I am a ‘shape shifter’ (i.e. I can appear in a variety of forms). This has enabled me to attend covertly various meetings in Whitehall village and Quarry House, Leeds and listen to the often chaotic burblings and confused intentions of those in charge of NHS policymaking.

The cacophony (as you can imagine) has been considerable because the imminence of the election and the Stalinist efforts of the Coalition to curtail expressions of panic.

In 2006, I wrote up a conference report of an event on urgent and emergency care for my friend Rick Stern, now chief executive of NHS Alliance.

The hog-whimperingly unsurprising current demand pressures on A&E made me think it would possibly be useful to reopublish a couple of sections from that report, which appear below.

Integrating primary and secondary care
‘Cracked it?’ - Rick Strang, head of unscheduled care, Hammersmith and Fulham PCT

What are we trying to crack?

Health economist Professor Alan Maynard gives a masterclass in the taxonomy of knights and productivity ruses

Sir Galahad (also known as Simon Stevens) is continuing his search for a means to bridge the £30 billion funding gap in NHS finances in period 2015-20.

Denial is much more than a river running through Cairo. It's an understandable, if unhelpful, response to a fairly grim reality, such as the NHS's is currently.

A very smart friend recently observed that just now, the NHS is working to two planning strategies.

The NHS “is a triumphant example of the superiority of collective action and public initiative applied to a segment of society, where commercial principles are seen at their worst”
Aneurin Bevan, In Place of Fear, 1952, page 85