The gravy train departing from platform two…

Let’s look on the bright side, shall we? My time in traction isn’t going to last forever. At some point I shall be untied and prepared for a return to normal life. Although that may still be some time away, I’ve decided to prepare for when the day finally arrives.

I could return to my previous life as a freelance journalist. After all, writing is in my blood. However, jobs in publishing are expanding about as quickly as Northern Rock’s mortgage book at the moment. So, I thought it might be a good time to consider a career change. Fortunately, I’ve found a career that will enable me to carry on writing complete nonsense and make obscene amounts of money.

I've decided to set myself up as an NHS management consultant. As a long-term NHS user I believe I’m uniquely qualified to offer strategic advice to Primary Care Trusts. I’ve already asked Mrs Traction to buy me a grey suit from Marks & Spencer, along with a nice white shirt and a colourful tie from the Jon Snow Designer Range at TieRack. I’ve ordered a laptop preloaded with Excel and PowerPoint... and I’m pretty sure of where I can lay my hands on a good flipchart. I’m good to go. What’s more, I’ve already secured my first contract.

A large hospital trust has agreed to retain my services to drive forward its ‘Better Utilisation of Lower Limits in Strategic Hospital Information Technology’ project… or B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T for short. The trust management also wants me to create a ‘Pathway to Efficiency Savings Target’ that will slash front-line nursing staff by 50%. This impressive PEST level will be achieved by assigning most nursing functions to unskilled staff employed at minimum wage levels.

In fact, I’ve done a few sums on the back of an envelope and worked out that this move will yield savings of around 75%. The savings from losing of such a large number of non-essential staff will enable the trust to invest in vital new services to help strengthen the local management structure.

This new scheme will be called the ‘Additional Regional Senior Employment Strategy’. ARSES will boost the trust’s management team very effectively. Research shows there simply aren’t enough managers in the NHS at the moment and a ratio of one per patient isn’t sufficiently high enough to deliver the outcomes one would expect from a world-class health service. I’m going to suggest that the ratio be doubled.

If we do this then every NHS patient could be given guaranteed access to their own named manager. With two managers per patient there should be sufficient slack in the system to enable staff to undertake vital training such as stress counselling, career development planning and a spot of diversity awareness, while still ensuring patients receive the essential management care they so desperately need.

As you can probably tell, I’m really looking forward to this career change and can’t wait to publish my first report: ‘Waste Administration Notes for Keyworker Evaluations in Regional Scenarios’. I’ve got a feeling that I’m really going to enjoy working as the trust’s new Total Waste Administration Tsar.

Now if you’ll excuse me I’ve got a train to catch.