Until last week few people in India had heard of the existence of the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI). Suddenly in the newspapers on the 15 December 2012 the ASCI was prominently featured. The story was about an advertisement for rotavirus vaccine on TV channels in many parts of the country. Set up in […]
Tiago Villanueva: How does the financial crisis affect demand for health services?
The unemployment rate in Portugal is at an all time high of 16,3%, and 2013 is looking even bleaker, due to announced tax hikes that will see people’s net income squeezed even further. As a locum doctor, my hourly rates have dropped by about 20% compared to one year ago, and sadly, I am expecting […]
Domhnall MacAuley on being a GP on Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve. Its a Monday. It will be dark leaving home but, with no morning traffic, the drive to the surgery should take just a few minutes. Few people around—a few early shoppers collecting their turkeys or in a last minute panic to pick up a late gift. With businesses closed and no schoolchildren, it […]
Seye Abimbola on what Nigeria could learn from China’s healthcare system
The look of surprise, bordering on cynical incredulity, was still there on the face of my fellow Nigerian “emerging voice” as our Chinese counterpart finished up his presentation introducing the Chinese health system during the 2012 emerging voices training programme in Beijing. He raised his hand to ask a question and I knew what it […]
Paul Glasziou: Santa, could you take some things away instead?
Dear Santa, This year, instead of presents I wondered if instead you might take some things away? Maybe you could start with unnecessary tests, unhelpful diagnoses, and over treatment? These can be harmful to the individuals who receive them, but also results in patients with real medical needs having delayed or no services. If we […]
Richard Smith: Selling your personal data
“The government wants to sell our personal data to the highest bidder, and it stinks,” said somebody, making her position very clear, at a meeting at the House of Commons organised by the Industry and Parliament Trust on making anonymised NHS data widely available. (I can’t tell you who made the statement as the meeting […]
Gethin Morgan on being red green colour blind
It wasn’t until I was a 16 year old sixth former in school that I discovered my problem with colour vision. When I experienced difficulties in practical biology and chemistry my friends guessed what might be wrong. They placed the Ishihara Test for colour blindness in front of me, which had recently been published in […]
Lifebox Q and A: Togo—facing the facts and making a difference
When people talk about the crisis of unsafe anaesthesia worldwide, there’s one particular publication that is frequently referenced—it’s too shocking to ignore. “Deaths associated with anaesthesia in Togo, West Africa,” published in Tropical Doctor in 2005, demonstrated that anaesthesia mortality in Togo could be as high as 1:133 patients. Lifebox recently spoke to lead author […]
Kieran Walsh: “Fortunately…education produces no effect whatsoever”
One of the latest thoughts to emanate from authorities in medical education is that investments in education will produce a tangible return on investment. The theory goes a bit like this: you invest in educational provision, healthcare professionals learn and put their learning into action, and this results in a return on investment. This return […]
Richard Smith: The case for slow medicine
The characteristics of health systems are complexity, uncertainty, opacity, poor measurement, variability in decision making, asymmetry of information, conflict of interest, and corruption. They are thus largely a black box and uncontrollable, said Gianfranco Domenighetti of the Università della Svizzera Italiana at a meeting in Bologna on La Sanità tra Ragione e passione (Health through […]