In the mountain resort of Bad Hofgastein in Austria, exercise is King. In early October the power walkers head for the mountains and noticeably less fit conference goers head for the European Health Forum Gastein. Attending conferences which start early, finish late, and include lunchtime workshops as well as a smorgasbord of parallel sessions, can […]
Category: Editors at large
Domhnall MacAuley: RCGP Annual Primary Care Conference 2010
Leadership. Today’s trendy word, endlessly abused, was back on stage at the 4th RCGP annual meeting in Harrogate. Tanni Grey-Thompson multiple Paralympic gold medallist told us of the pain and pleasure of achievement at the highest level, the grind of training, the setbacks, the importance of goal setting, the ecstasy of winning and the glory of victory. Both […]
Edward Davies: What is going on with workforce planning?
Our report this week on problems with specialty trainee year 3 (ST3) applications is merely the latest in a litany of mediocrity to afflict doctors at every single stage of their careers. In the past few months it has transpired that there may not be enough foundation places for medical students, then that a quarter […]
David Payne: Does London need the City?
A young woman started work in London this week and her starting salary is the same figure paid to her aunt when she first moved to the capital after college in 1985. A relative of mine was recently offered his first paid job in journalism in London. His salary – £16 000 – is around […]
Elizabeth Loder on the best thing about the Ig Nobel awards
It really was a dark and stormy night as I joined several hundred other geeks and nerds who ignored the remnants of tropical storm Nicole on September 30. We braved high wind gusts in order to attend the 20th First Annual Ig Nobel Awards in Memorial Hall on the Harvard campus. The BMJ hired a […]
Domhnall MacAuley on Sailing to Byzantium
Yeats’s poem (Sailing to Byzantium), written as he approached old age, looked to the wonders of Byzantium, and its immortal beauty. I would never have dreamt, sitting in that classroom long ago, that I would one day visit its modern day incarnation as Istanbul. (Even less that I would grow older too.) Visiting Istanbul, for […]
Domhnall Macauley: What is the BMJ?
What is the BMJ? When I ask people at outreach lectures and seminars, I get various answers ranging from the traditionalists who see still the BMJ as just another paper journal in their Friday morning letterbox, to others for whom it is multimedia medical communications opportunity. For one clinician lecturer, we are a podcast that […]
Edward Davies: Money, money, money
It’s a well known fact that all doctors leave work at 4:30 in a gold Bentley, dispersing £50 notes to the massed peasants. They unwind in the evening by sipping a glass of 1961 Dom Perignon in their bath of ass’ milk in the East Wing of their gated mansion, whilst watching private performances by […]
Wim Weber on independent clinical research in Europe
Earlier this month the workshop on the “Future of Independent Academic Clinical research in Europe” took place in the Académie royale de médecine de Belgique, housed in a palace neighbouring King Albert’s in Brussels. Greeting you at the entrance is a statue of the Belgian mathematician Adolphe Quetelet (he of the index), but entering is hampered by scaffolding, […]
Domhnall Macauley on a postgraduate study day at Trinity College, Dublin
Bright eyed students wandered though the ancient cobbled courtyards of Trinity in the September sunshine- bursting with anticipation of the new term. “On Raglan Road on an Autumn Day….” The poet Patrick Kavanagh’s words came to mind- an echo of timeless repetition. In contrast, we headed off to the PhD and MD students of the […]