I hate going to the doctor. Don’t you? My statement is unsurprising as I’m a man and a doctor (of sorts), two groups who are known to dislike going to the doctor. Like most Londoners, I don’t have a doctor. I belong to a practice, but take pot luck on whom I see. Last time […]
The ICARE4EU project wants to improve the care of people who are suffering from multiple chronic conditions. It will describe, analyse, and identify innovative integrated care models for people with multimorbidity in 31 European countries, and aims to contribute to the more effective implementation of such models. During the project (which runs from 2013 to […]
Late last year, the American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association (ACC/AHA) published joint guidance, which recommended lowering the risk threshold at which statins are offered for primary prevention of cardiovascular disease. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) later issued similar guidance in the UK. In October 2013, The BMJ […]
NEJM 31 July 2014 Vol 371 397 Set aside half an hour to enjoy this week’s New England Journal. The key articles are all about malaria, and they are free. You might expect an account of The Origins of Anti-Malarial Drug Resistance to be both boring and depressing, but this one by Randall Packard is […]
Some people keep going, and going, and going . . . and some don’t. What makes the difference? I’m not sure we know, but I think it has something to do with resilience, obstreperousness, and grit. This week there has been a bit of a debate going on in our department over appropriate blood pressure […]
To all the newly qualified doctors about to inaugurate their careers in junior house officer posts across the UK next week, I bestow upon you the secrets to a happy and fulfilling start as a junior doctor. Namely, do not do some of the things that my colleagues and I did (which is a way of […]
As a science and health journalist, I have written a number of stories highlighting how lifestyle ailments, like diabetes and heart disease, have emerged as major health issue in India—including in rural areas. Scientists and doctors are pretty much unanimous on what we need to do to prevent the rising tide of cardiovascular diseases: eat […]
Today an Analysis article questions the quality of applications to the World Health Organization’s essential medicines list. The WHO essential medicines list is a skeletal formulary of medicines that all countries should consider making available. Although the list just covers the basics, the medicines included such as amoxicillin and haloperidol are taken seriously—to be a […]
Blind faith that the publication of medical research in peer reviewed journals elevates a study to the status of “the evidence,” and therefore “the truth,” may be on the wane among those in the know. But for the public, and a vast number of doctors, this “naïve and misplaced” credulousness persists. According to Dr Jigisha Patel, medical […]
“All problems are ultimately linguistic problems,” says Muir Gray, once NHS chief knowledge officer, misquoting the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. But I don’t think that he misquoted him badly, and that Wittgenstein did say something along those lines. I thought of Muir and Wittgenstein, a powerful couple, as I read a piece in the Guardian about […]