The December 2025 issue of Future Healthcare Journal (FHJ) brings together new research, opinion and lived experience to examine some of the most pressing challenges facing patients and clinicians across the UK – from long waits for care and training bottlenecks, to how medicine must adapt to increasing complexity, multiple health conditions and persistent symptoms.
This themed issue places a strong focus on conditions characterised by ongoing, distressing symptoms, often experienced without a clear or single diagnosis. These include fibromyalgia, persistent physical symptoms, functional neurological disorders and post-COVID syndromes.
Writing in the editorial, Dr Andrew Duncombe, FHJ editor-in-chief, notes that many of these conditions are united not just by clinical uncertainty, but by prolonged delay:
‘Waiting for a diagnosis, waiting for explanations, waiting for recognition, waiting for support and treatment, and waiting in hope for recovery.’
Dr Duncombe reflects on the human cost of this waiting, as well as its wider impact on society, highlighting that many people affected are of working age and that the economic consequences of lost productivity are substantial. He also points to the long-standing underinvestment in research in this area, despite the scale of need.
Alongside this, the issue highlights system pressures that continue to shape patient experience. New modelling shows that the NHS waiting list in England would need to more than halve to meet the 18-week constitutional standard. As Dr Duncombe reminds us:
‘Behind every one of these vast numbers is a patient in need.’
Several articles showcase practical innovation within services, including redesigned one-stop cancer pathways that significantly reduce delays and improve outcomes. Reflecting on these examples of local transformation, Dr Duncombe comments:
‘We see so many examples in FHJ of such clear evidence-based local transformational change that I find it exasperating that we are still so poor at rolling out such improved care models to the wider service for the benefit of all.’
The issue also looks to the future of the medical workforce. Other articles explore rising competition ratios for specialty training places, the importance of generalist skills and improvements to acute medical care at the front door of the hospital.
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Future Healthcare Journal is a peer-reviewed forum for multidisciplinary debate on how healthcare is delivered, with a focus on improving patient care through system and process change. FHJ has editorial independence from the RCP and decisions regarding the commissioning, selection and dissemination of content are the responsibility of the editor, taking into account peer review and guidance from the editorial board.