Doctors’ Firm Makes Millions Cutting NHS Waiting Lists — But Critics Warn of Safety Risks and Conflicts of Interest

Key Takeaways:

The NHS’s battle to reduce record waiting lists has opened the door to a fast-growing private medical model — one that operates inside NHS hospitals, uses NHS facilities, and pays consultants substantial extra income to work out of hours. Now, a Bristol-based firm run by two NHS clinicians is facing questions over patient safety, staff burnout and potential conflicts of interest, despite helping thousands of patients receive care more quickly.

Glanso UK, founded by anaesthetists Dr Matthew Molyneux and Dr Neil Rasburn, has spent several years delivering weekend and evening surgical lists across NHS hospitals. The company’s insourcing model — bringing private teams into NHS hospitals outside normal hours — has been promoted as a cheaper alternative to outsourcing patients to private hospitals.

But with Glanso reporting £2.6 million in profit last year, and unions accusing the firm of exploiting a system under enormous strain, the debate around private-sector involvement in clearing backlogs is intensifying.

How the Model Works: Insourcing, Not Outsourcing

Glanso UK operates on a simple premise: NHS theatres often sit unused during evenings and weekends. Instead of sending patients to private hospitals — a process known as outsourcing — Glanso keeps treatment inside the NHS by renting NHS theatre time out of hours and staffing it with clinicians.

In practice, Glanso:

Pays a fee to use NHS theatres outside standard hours
 

Brings in its own senior surgeons and anaesthetists
 

Frequently relies on NHS-employed support staff working overtime
 

Runs faster surgical lists than the NHS typically achieves during weekdays
 

The company argues this setup cuts waiting times efficiently while keeping money inside the NHS system, because host hospitals receive a portion of the contract payments.

Critics say the arrangement blurs the line between public service and private profit.

Consultants Running a Private Enterprise in Their Own NHS Hospitals

Dr Molyneux and Dr Rasburn are both NHS consultant anaesthetists at University Hospitals Bristol and Weston (UHBW). Their company, Glanso UK, also contracts directly with UHBW.

This dual role has raised eyebrows among unions, NHS staff, and patient advocates, who have questioned whether a conflict of interest exists when NHS consultants earn additional private income by managing the very backlogs their NHS employer struggles to clear.

Unison, the UK’s largest health union, voiced the strongest concerns.
 Union policy officer Guy Collis said staff often feel financially or professionally pressured to take on extra hours, particularly when NHS pay has stagnated and many workers rely on overtime to make ends meet.

“We know there is a real issue around burnout amongst NHS staff at the moment,” he said.
 “We would want to be very certain that trusts weren’t making this worse.”

Collis warned of a situation where exhausted staff feel compelled to work extra shifts for private firms — creating a cycle where the NHS becomes dependent on overtime work to maintain safe patient care.

‘We Work Faster’: Glanso Defends Its Results

Dr Rasburn, who cofounded Glanso during the pandemic, insists the model is not only safe but significantly more efficient than typical NHS theatre lists.

He offered an example comparing gallbladder operations:

Typical NHS weekday list: 2.7 cases a day
 

Typical Glanso Saturday list: 7 cases
 

The difference, he said, comes down to the composition of the team.

Glanso lists are staffed exclusively by senior clinicians who are not simultaneously teaching junior doctors or navigating the training requirements that slow down standard NHS lists.

“What we found in working this way is that we got through more cases for any given time,” Rasburn told the BBC.
 He added that staff work in familiar surroundings — their own hospitals — with their own colleagues, which he said boosts both safety and efficiency.

Glanso says more than 1,000 children have been treated under its lists since 2019 and that working in NHS hospitals allows them to operate on higher-risk patients who might otherwise be excluded by private hospitals.

Patient Safety: Faster — But Is It Safer?

Insourcing raises key safety questions:

1. Are staff working beyond safe limits?

NHS staff shortages are chronic, and many hospitals are already heavily reliant on overtime. Critics fear that the lure of private shift pay may lead staff to work beyond safe weekly limits.

2. Can out-of-hours surgery maintain the same safeguards?

Operating at night or on weekends may mean fewer support services are available — for example, imaging, lab testing, and critical care teams.

3. Is there a risk of consultants prioritising lucrative private lists over NHS duties?

If consultants earn significantly more per hour on Glanso shifts than through NHS work, concerns arise about where their incentives lie.

Unison notes that “underpaid” NHS employees may feel unable to refuse extra shifts, potentially leading to exhaustion, mistakes, or burnout.

The Money Question: Is It Right to Profit from NHS Backlogs?

The firm declared £2.6 million in profit last year. For critics, that number is emblematic of a wider problem: the rise of companies whose business model depends on NHS waiting lists continuing.

“There’s something wrong generally here if people are seeking to use waiting lists to make millions,” Collis said.

Private sector involvement in the NHS always carries political sensitivity. Opponents warn that for-profit firms may “cherry-pick” the simplest operations, leaving the most complex cases — and greatest costs — to the NHS.

But Dr Rasburn rejects the claim outright, arguing the opposite is true because Glanso works inside NHS hospitals:

“Because we are in the NHS hospital, and we can access other facilities, we don’t necessarily have to cherry-pick. Patients are in there for very good reason, because they've got lots of other complications. Because we have all the facilities, we can deal with those.”

Expansion Across Multiple Hospitals

Glanso’s presence extends beyond Bristol. The firm has delivered lists in:

Barnstaple
 

Exeter
 

Gloucestershire Royal
 

Nottingham
 

University Hospitals Bristol and Weston (UHBW), its largest partner
 

Across those services, Glanso says it has employed 450 staff — many of them NHS employees working overtime.

The company expanded rapidly during the Covid pandemic, when routine elective operations came to a halt and the NHS faced unprecedented backlogs. Glanso filled a gap by using shuttered theatres to complete dozens of surgeries that would otherwise have been delayed.

The Tendering Problem: Lack of Competition Raises Concerns

One of the most significant issues raised is the lack of competitive tendering.

Glanso UK has operated in nearly all its specialty areas without competition from other private companies except in ophthalmology. That lack of competition has raised concerns about fairness, cost-effectiveness, and transparency.

Maria Kane, joint chief executive for North Bristol NHS Trust and UHBW, acknowledged that the existing model may not meet modern procurement standards.

She told the BBC that competitive tendering “probably should have happened years ago.”

Following questions raised by the BBC, the trust has now decided to invite tenders for future contracts — a move likely to reshape Glanso’s hold over out-of-hours surgical work in the region.

Why the Government Supports Insourcing Despite Controversies

The government has repeatedly expressed support for greater private-sector involvement to help reduce waiting lists, partly because:

Many NHS theatres are underused
 

Outsourcing to private hospitals can cost more
 

Backlog clearance requires short-term capacity boosts
 

Insourcing keeps patients within NHS governance structures
 

However, ministers are aware of the risks. NHS England guidance stresses that all insourcing arrangements must:

Protect patient safety
 

Monitor staff working hours
 

Demonstrate value for money
 

Avoid conflicts of interest
 

Undergo proper procurement
 

The question is whether current arrangements meet that bar.

A System Under Pressure and a Debate Far from Over

Glanso UK sits at the centre of a much larger national debate: how far should private firms be used to deliver NHS services when the public system is overwhelmed?

Supporters argue that insourcing:

Reduces waiting times
 

Keeps money within NHS trusts
 

Makes efficient use of unused theatre time
 

Avoids the higher cost of outsourcing to private hospitals
 

Critics counter that:

Consultants can profit from NHS shortfalls they are part of
 

Staff burnout is worsened
 

Conflicts of interest are inevitable
 

Private firms profit from a publicly funded crisis
 

Procurement processes have not caught up
 

As waiting lists remain historically high, demand for such services is unlikely to disappear soon.

The Future for Glanso and the NHS

The introduction of competitive tendering could reshape Glanso’s role, especially if rival companies enter the market offering lower prices or different models.

For now, the company continues to defend its approach as efficient, safe, and beneficial to the NHS. Its leaders say they are simply providing extra capacity in a struggling system.

Unison, meanwhile, is calling for reforms that guarantee:

Limits on staff overtime
 

Protection against conflicts of interest
 

Clearer procurement rules
 

Greater transparency
 

Monitoring of patient outcomes
 

The NHS finds itself caught between two imperatives: reducing waiting times quickly and protecting its workforce from exhaustion while maintaining public trust.

As long as these pressures persist, firms like Glanso will remain both useful and controversial — a symptom of a health system stretched to its limits and forced to rely on private innovation to plug the gaps.

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