I’ve finally gotten to where I’ve wanted to be in working through Biological Effects of Ionising Radiation (BEIR) VII: capable of evaluating radiation doses at Fukushima in terms of health risk. I would have liked to have been able to evaluate the radiation readings at various places around Japan in terms of health risk, but […]
Magdalena Kincaid: Surgical training in Palestine
December 2009 heralded an unexpected start for a surgical course. Our family holiday in Jerusalem and the West Bank was predictable enough: visit the Old City, and to the children’s delight, Bethlehem. Who could have predicted that the antics of our three young children would became a magnet for an ad hoc conversation? Many Palestinians […]
Natalie Blencowe and Jane Blazeby: Core outcomes for surgical procedures
“Emergency surgery patients must have higher priority in NHS hospitals.” So say the new standards from the Royal College of Surgeons of England, which highlight the wide range of complication rates following emergency surgery across the NHS. Interpreting these data is not straightforward, not least because there are no accepted standards for measuring or defining […]
Tiago Villanueva: Spanish doctors and the revolution in the streets of Madrid
We’ve all seen the recent images on television in Spain, with tens of thousands of people taking to the streets of Madrid and occupying its main squares. After Tunis and Cairo, the Spanish capital has been seen some of the people’s momentum that toppled governments and dictators just across the other side of the Mediterranean. […]
Sandra Lako: coordination and clinical work
A lot of the work the Welbodi Partnership does is to coordinate and facilitate projects and training programs within the hospital. Our aim is capacity building – helping others to improve their skills rather than coming in to solely provide patient care. We believe that in the long run more patients will receive high-quality treatment […]
Ann McPherson: I should have been able to choose to die
The well known general practitioner and outstanding communicator Ann McPherson died on 28 May 2011 from pancreatic cancer. She is celebrated for her books for patients, including The Diary of a Teenage Health Freak (BMJ 2009;339:b3355); the DIPEx (Database of Individual Patient Experiences) charity and its websites (www.healthtalkonline.org and www.youthhealthtalk.org); and Healthcare Professionals for Assisted […]
Martin McShane: No rules
I read the King’s fund paper on management in the NHS. It should be read widely. Some politicians and professionals understand that successful organisations have good management. Some even understand that bureaucracy is a product of a set of rules. A bureaucrat can’t be a bureaucrat without those rules. The rules I have to work […]
Richard Smith: My boots – an obituary
My boots died last week as I walked the Cornish coastal path from St Just to St Ives. One comfort was that they died together. The sole of one boot detached five miles out of St Just, and the sole of the second detached just a few miles later. After taking me a thousand miles […]
Richard Lehman’s journal review – 31 May 2011
JAMA 25 May 2011 Vol 305 2071 Idiopathic sudden sensorineural hearing loss: now that’s the kind of medical label I can do business with – the kind that tells you what is happening and that we don’t know why. The “sudden” bit may be literally true or refer to a period of up to three […]
Research highlights – 27 May 2011
“Research highlights” is a weekly round-up of research papers appearing in the print BMJ. We start off with this week’s research questions, before providing more detail on some individual research papers and accompanying articles. […]