I was left mortified after reading about the long awaited national childhood obesity strategy. “Underwhelming” would be the single best adjective to describe it. On reading the newspaper headlines, however, it is all too tempting to pass the buck to Public Health England and Dame Sally Davies et al. However, there is a sense of […]
Nora Hellman: Responding to an outbreak of yellow fever
Responding to an outbreak of yellow fever is not as exotic as you may imagine. What kind of exciting and interesting things do you do as an emergency response nurse with Save the Children’s emergency health unit in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) the day before one of the largest ever vaccination campaigns in […]
Rachel Thomas: The final frontier
Six weeks without gravity. Cushioned in a single white space for the duration. Air tanks, tubes, and pressure gauges surrounding me, the calendar days marking off a gentle, indistinct blur. And now, finally, here I am, learning to walk again. My body shakes under the exertion. The simple act of straightening a leg, of now bearing […]
Richard Smith: In search of scandal in Scotland
I’m on my way to Dumfries to investigate the state of the NHS in that region, and the thought of the town is making me remember when I travelled there in 1974, 42 years ago, to investigate what I and a friend believed to be a scandal, a scandal of those times. I was a […]
Christopher Martyn: Research round-up
Annals of Internal Medicine Mistreatment of residents in nursing homes Conditioned by reports in the media about mistreatment of residents in nursing homes, one leaps to the conclusion that it must be the staff who are doing the mistreating. This study suggests that it’s more likely that the other residents are to blame. Two thousand […]
Sara Martin on emotional labour
I work at a great place in the UK. We have gorgeous facilities, friendly staff, great benefits, and—most important to this American doctor—unlimited free coffee (and tea if you’re British). But this summer, I will be heading back to clinical medicine. In preparation, I have been thinking a lot about what I have mentally termed […]
Mary Higgins: The second victim in modern healthcare
First do no harm. It’s one of the fundamental rules, but what experienced clinician has not, at least once, done some harm? Medicine is intricate, and imperfect, with increasing number of diseases and disease processes occurring in complex people within a multifaceted world. The tests we use are not perfect and the decisions we make […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Cupping
Many celebrities, including Olympic athletes, such as US swimmer Michael Phelps, and actors, such as Gwyneth Paltrow and Jennifer Aniston, are fashionably subjecting themselves to cupping. So, is “the silliest celebrity health fad ever” effective for treating anything? Well, despite all the attendant gobbledegook, or more likely reflected by it, the answer is clear: no. Today […]
Neville Goodman’s Metaphor Watch: Cast iron
The BMJ’s columnist, Margaret McCartney, wrote that we need, “cast iron divisions between healthcare and industry” because their priorities are different. (Being The BMJ, there was no hyphen; but dictionaries give the substance cast iron as two words and the adjective cast-iron as hyphenated.) Margaret used the metaphorical cast iron instead of the literal clear, […]
Bayad Nozad: Rio, cupping, and public health risks
The Olympic Games are a major inspiration for people from all backgrounds and ages to participate in sport and lead more healthy lifestyles. We noticed great public engagement in all forms of sports following the London 2012 Olympics. This year, Public Health England and other organisations made use of the Rio Olympic Games to launch […]