Getting to Rwanda takes ages. I don’t know why there isn’t a direct flight to Kigali from the UK but there just isn’t—which meant that my journey there took close to 24 hours (via Kenya and Burundi). I have travelled through East Africa plenty before, but this was my first trip to Rwanda. I went […]
Tag: surgery
Magdalena Kincaid: Teaching basic surgical skills in Palestine – hopes for the future
The basic surgical skills course (BSS) for Palestinian surgical trainees finished today. Throughout the two days of practical sessions it seemed that time acquired an extensile quality: the tasks completed in 48 hours on the Mount of Olives would usually fill a week. The intensity is not only due to the rigour of an arduous […]
Magdalena Kincaid: Surgical Teaching on the Mount of Olives – part 2
This morning we left the peaceful lutheran guesthouse in the grounds of the Augusta Victoria Hospital (AVH) to start set-up for the first day of the basic surgical skills course (BSS) for Palestinian surgical trainees in the hospital. The morning sun was glaring and a haze lingered over distant views of the Dead Sea as […]
Magdalena Kincaid: surgical teaching on the Mount of Olives – part 1
The car journey from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem lasts about an hour. There is an enveloping warmth in the air even at 2 am and it is eerily quiet. The UN car is veering into East Jerusalem, up the Mount of Olives, and finally to our destination: Augusta Victoria Hospital (AVH). Next week this hospital […]
Peter Lapsley: Temporary disabled badges
Now that I no longer have an axe to grind (recovery from the revision surgery on last year’s failed whole hip replacement appears to be going well), I would be interested in doctors’ reactions to the argument for the introduction of temporary disabled badges. During the six months I waited for surgery, I was in […]
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 […]
Sally Carter: Films, fistula, and an illiterate surgeon
One of the world’s most experienced fistula surgeons is illiterate. I found that out when I went to a screening of a short film called Fistula Hospital: Healing and Hope at the Frontline Club in Paddington. Her name is Mamitu Gashe, and she was a patient at the Addis Ababa Fistula hospital. After her operation […]
Helen Carnaghan on the cost of becoming a surgeon
So you want to be a surgeon? As a new medical graduate do you really know what this entails? I thought I did, but quickly learnt otherwise. […]
Tessa Richards: Postoperative posting
Sarah Palin may have raised the profile of female politicians, but I’m lifting my glass to the girls who saw me through surgery last week. I did spot the odd male among the panoply of health professionals who looked after me, but they were thin on the ground. From the consultant surgeon and anaesthetist to […]