I am Emmanuel Ndawula, a retired microbiologist who worked in the NHS  for thirty six years. I am also a singer/song writer. I have just written my autobiography in which I used a concept of descriptive diagnosis to ‘fine tune’ the diagnosis of infections and enable the formulation of definitive therapy. I define descriptive diagnosis as ‘aformalstatementthat includeswordsorphraseswithtreatmentandmanagement implications’.

I use the same concept to identify the problems in the valuable but dysfunctional NHS and propose definitive remedies. For the NHS, the diagnosis is ‘a bureaucratic (non-medical as well as medical), target-driven organisation with reduced direct patient care and weakened management at departmental level’. The proposed definitive remedy is the careful appointment of high quality executive heads of departments as the first step. The provision of more funds and recruitment of more doctors and nurses among other staff should be the next…