On the 8 December the European Medicines Agency (EMA) and the EU Commission hosted a workshop to discuss Adaptive Pathways, formerly known as Adaptive Licensing. The 180 physical and 155 remote attendees included regulators, representatives of patients’ organisations, payers, academics, industry, and health technology assessment bodies. The aim of the meeting was ostensibly to discuss […]
Sophie Yelland: In praise of primary care physicians
If someone told you the world was ending and gave you ten minutes to fix it, you’d probably express some mild expletives. This is a complete exaggeration to vent my frustrations at the expectations we have of primary care physicians. My point is primary care physicians are amazing. They can deal with almost every situation from […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Ḥanukkah at Christmas
This year the first day of the Jewish festival Ḥanukkah falls on the first day of Christmas. Call it “Chrismukkah”, if you like. [The letter Ḥ is pronounced like the ch in loch.] This occurs only once every 30 years on average, and this is only the eighth time they have coincided since 1777. The […]
News review 2016: Corruption, Polish trainees, Zika, and dementia top the news hit parade in 2016
News items about fraud and corruption in healthcare always attract a lot of attention, and 2016 was no exception. The most popular story on bmj.com this year concerned scientists at the top US public health agency, who were unhappy about a slew of what they saw as unethical practices that compromised their employer’s independence and […]
Sally Browning: Acts of kindness
Five days after starting chemotherapy for lymphoma, I knew, in the night, that I had an acute abdomen and needed to go to hospital. The two paramedics who arrived were professional and efficient. As they quickly asked me sensible questions, I vomited copiously all over the tiled hallway. “You won’t want to come home to […]
Jan Filochowski: No room at the inn—the NHS today?
The NHS’s critical problem today is not that things are bad, it is that they are getting much worse at a very fast rate across the board. In 40 years involvement in managing NHS services I have never known a time when they haven’t been under pressure from rising demand or when governments haven’t said they […]
Neville Goodman’s Metaphor Watch: Explosion? Usually barely a puff
There are about 10000 explosions in PubMed®. There are dust explosions, gas explosions, explosion injuries. In the last year, there have been 11 reports of electronic cigarette explosions. As I write, the media are getting a bit “dangerous dog” about it, without mentioning the number of people who burned themselves and their relatives to death […]
Nick Hopkinson on Steve Biko, the NHS, and the mind of the oppressed
It would have been Steve Biko’s seventieth birthday this weekend. The anti-apartheid leader was beaten to death by the South African Police in a jail cell in 1977. His death was a medical scandal too—doctors acquiesced in his being driven, semi-conscious and chained, the 700 miles from Port Elizabeth to Pretoria. Developing his program of […]
Kushal Patel: Pay inequity spells a winter of discontent for junior doctors
This past year has been particularly turbulent for junior doctors nationwide. Mired in a public standoff with the government and with lacklustre stop-start plans for industrial action, it has rendered them a workforce that feels at best confused and at worst abandoned by its union. It is safe to say that morale has sunk to […]
Tessa Richards: Patients combat corruption in healthcare
Corruption in health systems has been described as “one of the biggest open sores in medicine.” It occurs in many guises and all countries. Patients may be unaware of the price they pay for corrupt procurement processes, manipulation of drug trial data, and conflicts of interest, but they are well aware if they need to make “informal” […]