I pinch my patient’s abdomen with toothed forceps to check his spinal anaesthesia has worked and I feel I should pinch myself. I am about to start an inguinal hernia repair using a sterilised mosquito net. After completing my foundation training, I was keen to work abroad. I had a simple set of criteria: a […]
Dan Smyth: The European Lung Foundation’s patient organisation day
This year the European Lung Foundation (ELF) decided to do things a bit differently for the patient organisations attending the European Respiratory Society (ERS) International Congress in London in early September. We have invited patient organisations to the congress for several years, and patient representatives have been involved in many activities during the congress, such […]
Richard Smith: Death and the inescapable logic of greed
Martin Shkreli is the man who became infamous through buying the rights to Darapim (pyrethamine) and raising the price by 5000% from $13.50 to $750 per pill. There is, I suggest, an inescapable logic to his move that Hillary Clinton described as “outrageous.” Pyrethamine has been around since 1959 and used, usually in combination, to […]
Seema Biswas: Conflict is a global health challenge
“The first principle of health is life. War is a direct threat to life. For millions of people worldwide, surviving war is the predominant objective in their daily existence. Ending war would be the first step toward health and wellbeing in any sense of these ideal conditions.” At the recent World Health Summit in Berlin, leaders […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Presidential rhetoric
The main current meaning of rhetoric is “the art of using language effectively so as to persuade or influence others” (OED). But in ancient Greece and Rome rhetoric was an important component of education, part of the curriculum known as the trivium—grammar, rhetoric, and dialectic (logic). In this sense it was elegantly defined by Margaret […]
Mary Higgins: Improving maternity care in partnership
When you start working in maternity care, whatever your job, people often think how happy it must be. Compared to other specialties, we are very privileged to have the joy of working with women who will normally have a good outcome. The majority of women who begin pregnancy fit and healthy will have a physiological […]
Ceinwen Giles: Self-management? I need a PA!
Patient activation, self-management, shared decision-making….all of these sound great in practice. I, personally, would be very happy to self-manage myself. If I could figure out how. I never set out to be “a patient” when I grew up but life takes turns you don’t see coming. Seven years ago I was diagnosed with Stage 4 […]
Claire Copeland: Opening ourselves up to Patient Opinion
On 25 October Patient Opinion invited me to a “learning and sharing event for clinicians” in Edinburgh. It was an opportunity to hear from those who have made this feedback service for UK care what it is today. However, this was no ordinary talking shop. No, more than that it was an opportunity to get […]
Pauline Castres: A coal free future on the horizon
UK Government pledge to end coal use by 2025 With the media abuzz with e-cigarettes and sugary drinks it is easy to overlook the health risks of coal plants. The black smoke from coal-fired power stations may not be as visible as it used to be but that does not mean that coal fumes’ impact […]
William Seligman and Mataroria Lyndon: Making American healthcare great again?
After eighteen months of breakneck campaigning, there are few who would have predicted the results we saw in the United States presidential election last night. Donald J. Trump, described by President Barack Obama as the “single least qualified candidate for the presidency in the history of the United States,” swept to victory winning traditional conservative […]