“Alright, Alfie, spit in the cup then, lad.” Poppy was good at this, I could tell. The boy hocked up a rope of saliva, which she caught deftly in her tin. Then she took Alfie by the chin and turned his head about, shining her light in his eyes and ears and down his throat. […]
If you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then to me. – William Shakespeare, Macbeth, Act I, Scene iii For the first twenty minutes of your life, you exist only in my arms. You are a blank slate, a bundle of infinite […]
Medical students from around the world utter the Hippocratic Oath when graduating medical school as an age-old commitment to professionalism. Yet, much of what we are taught during medical school conflicts with the oath’s focus on communication and shared-decision making. There is a hidden curriculum in medicine that encourages trainees to do extensive workups to […]
Back in 2007 a diagnostic biopsy from a patient with lung cancer would frequently yield a one line diagnosis from the reporting pathologist; “This biopsy shows non-small cell carcinoma.” A decade on and a similar biopsy frequently generates a report several pages long including immunohistochemistry to subtype the tumour and molecular analysis to identify driver […]
I decided OPSNIZE was for me when Dad lost his trousers on the bus. He threw them out the window. Then he rolled around on the floor, screaming his own name, over and over, until some kid pushed a panic button. David David David That was his name. He wanted to hold on to it, […]
The nature of abortion provision is changing, and professionals must be alert to what any changes might mean for their conscience rights […]
Evidence generated from “real world” data (e.g. administrative claims and electronic health record databases), alongside clinical trials, is highly valuable for regulatory, coverage, and clinical decisions. While randomized clinical trials (RCTs) are considered a gold standard, they are typically conducted in highly restricted populations, limiting their generalizability. Furthermore, the expense of conducting trials limits their […]
I have been widowed. It seems surreal to be writing that sentence, and yet it is indisputably true. I was there; I know. My husband, a consultant anaesthetist and intensivist, took his own life on 23 October. He had been suffering from depression, and was three days away from his first appointment with a psychiatrist […]
Theodore Dalrymple describes in his new book The Knife Went In the Britain he witnessed as a prison and NHS doctor, psychiatrist, and expert witness in criminal cases around Britain. In this edited extract, he details how the prison service introduced a new handle on suicides by prescribing “complex forms” to its staff. Prison administrators, […]
The Scottish Government won a resounding victory on 15 November 2017 when the Supreme Court dismissed an appeal from the Scottish Whisky Association intended to block the introduction of a minimum unit price for alcohol (MUP). The decision, handed down by seven judges, was unanimous; MUP is a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim and […]