Post partum haemorrhage (PPH) is one of the leading causes of maternal deaths. According to WHO estimates, in 2010 there were 287,000 maternal deaths, 25% of which were associated with PPH. The risk of PPH is greatest in anaemic women and the risk of PPH resulting in death is greatest in settings where there is […]
David Payne: Listening to our readers and authors
A year ago today the BMJ’s new website went live. We launched with an explanatory video and a dedicated email address for you, our readers, to provide feedback. This blog is a summary of the many changes—some big, some small—that we’ve made over the last 12 months. […]
Edward Davies: The American Heart Association and why the world needs journals
You would sometimes be forgiven for thinking that we are now living in the last days of the traditional medical journal. Everything from payment models, to access, and even peer review is up for grabs. Editors are a needless middleman, messing with the researchers’ genius and peer reviewers merely inflict their own bias on the […]
Jennifer McAughey, Sarah Walpole, and Merav Kliner: When generics are more expensive than trade name drugs
Over the last few decades we have become used to the questionable practices of drug companies when profits are at stake. Recent reports on the actions of two companies still have the potential to shock. Genzyme (part of Sanofi) is applying for a licence for their drug alemtuzumab for the treatment […]
Kasia Malinowska-Sempruch: An opportunity for EU member states to save money and lives
In the coming months, officials will sign the next EU drugs strategy providing a drug policy framework for EU institutions and member states. Past drug strategies have called for a careful evaluation of “best practices”—something the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) does admirably well. But when it comes to reducing HIV, […]
Muir Gray: Choosing criteria for systems of care
Read the rest of this series of blogs about designing and planning population based systems of care here. Step 4: Choosing criteria Choosing criteria is a more time consuming process and may need to be addressed separately. For example it is important to reach an agreed definition by what is meant by “diagnose quickly” and […]
Gabriel Scally: Sweet black angel
Back in my early days as a radical medical student (a small, select group in the Belfast of the early 1970s) one of the international figures I admired greatly was Angela Davis. I was amazed and delighted to find her billed as the main speaker at the closing session of the American Public Health Association’s […]
Paul Glasziou: Should we abandon the term “hypertension?”
Disease labels have an aura of authority and permanence. But definitions can drift considerably over time changing who is and is not classified as “diseased.” For hypertension, Greene [1] has nicely documented the steady lowering of the threshold over the past five decades, but we have kept the same label and same attitudes. It might […]
Richard Lehman’s journal review—5 November 2012
NEJM 1 Nov 2012 Vol 367 1677 Cancer screening campaigns—getting past uninformative persuasion is a topical subject on both sides of the Atlantic. Nobody writes better about it than Steven Woloshin and Lisa Schwarz, and in this Perspective piece they join forces with two colleagues to point the way forward. All past and many present […]
Khalid Ali: Amour—an award winning film talks candidly about life after a stroke
A new film, Amour, which deservedly won the Palme d’Or at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival, throws a new light into the harsh realities of the lives of stroke patients and their carers once they leave hospital. Georges (Jean-Louis Trintignant) and Anne (Emmanuelle Riva) are retired music teachers in their late eighties leading an independent […]