This issue of JAMA is devoted to malaria, a disease which was banished from Europe and North America in the 1930s and would have been banished from the whole world in the 1950s and 60s had the superpowers not found better things to do, like stockpiling thermonuclear weapons and flying to the moon. (more…)
The trouble with medical research is that it involves so much boring hard work. First carry out 2,446,431 person-years of follow-up involving questionnaires on aspirin use every two years. (more…)
Primary care research in the UK is still largely a cottage industry, kept going as much by enthusiastic part-timers as by big-hit professors. That may change when the “big five” English medical schools set up their National School for Primary Care Research in England. (more…)
We all very much want to believe that aspirin can prevent pre-eclampsia, but since the first positive trial arguments have bounced back and forth. (more…)
To millions of Americans today, the name of Darwin is taboo, associated with disbelief in the Word of God and its teaching of Creation. Oddly enough, this was the case in England even before Charles Darwin had been born. (more…)
The Royal College of Surgeons has withdrawn from the MTAS review group, chaired by Professor Neil Douglas.
Bernard Ribeiro, the college’s president, announced his decision in an open letter to Professor Douglas in which he said that the DH had failed to make adequate transitional arrangements for “a large number of well-trained, experienced and committed senior house officers who are in danger of being lost to the NHS”. (more…)
Remedy UK’s legal fight against the Department of Health over the Medical Training Application Service (MTAS) came to an end today.
The judge hearing the case ruled against Remedy UK’s call for the interviews carried out so far only to count towards temporary appointments, not substantive posts.
In an unexpected move, the BMA’s chairman Jim Johnson has resigned after a storm of protest at a letter he wrote to The Times supporting the government’s reforms of medical education — and stating that continuing to use the flawed MTAS system for appointing round 1 candidates was the ‘best available solution’.
His letter, written with Carol Black, chairman of the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, caused a furore among BMA members over the weekend and led to Mr Johnson’s decision to stand down on Sunday (20 May). (more…)
There’s nothing quite like being interviewed in your pyjamas. Lots of people have emailed, asking for hints and advice about phone interviews. (more…)
Asthma is a common, variable condition which in the UK is treated largely in primary care. Most adults who suffer from it don’t want to be using continuous treatment, but those with persisting mild asthma are usually solemnly admonished to use a steroid inhaler twice daily. (more…)
