The joys of new technologies are many and varied. There are now ways of communicating even within NHS hospitals which were apparently designed to block all mobile phone signals, to see veins where none appear to exist and to allow a child within a radiotherapy fixation mask to become a superhero. Technologies are brilliant; they […]
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Big events and the problems of predictions
We’d all like to know what will happen in the future. Well. In some circumstances. For some people. Sometimes. (I’d personally like to know where the Leeds Rhinos will finish next season, but less happy about knowing if and when I’ll become a Grandfather.) But this basic idea, knowing the answer to “If I do […]
Neonates are not tiny children
There’s a near-oath we clearly all have to sign to when we commit to paediatrics … “Children are not little adults” … and while this is definitely true … after all, how often have you seen someone smile whimsically at a grown-up asleep in their unicorn onsie being carried home … we know it has […]
Experts and evidence
Every now and then you read something and it chimes with you to illuminate niggle you’d not known was there – and the flash of understanding makes you delight. Really good qualitative research can do that, as can fiction, drama, an off-the cuff comment, and – rarest of all – the output of a Working […]
Cut once, measure twice
As every child health practitioner knows, children’s telly is awash with moral learnings, repetitive messages and ear-worms. It can be a superb tool for the education and distraction of poorly children, and irritating barrier to bedtimes and homework, and a torture-device … try humming “Baby Shark” when you next go for your team coffee/drink and […]
“Look away now if you don’t want to know the results”
Those of a certain age (“Very Old” according to my children) will remember the usual way of getting association football scores on a Saturday afternoon was watching the TV, and the sports section would show them on the screen. For people who were still tensley awaiting the catch up show on the box later that […]
GUEST BLOG: Designing and implementing early child development programmes
Back in 2015, a vision of the Sustainable Development Goals was a world in which every child could survive and thrive. Worldwide, over 250 million children worldwide are at risk of not achieving their full developmental potential. While improving survival rates is, of course, still very much on the global agenda for newborns and children, […]
Does PPI make things better?
Those of you in the UK may be struggling to work out exactly which PPI is in this title: is it payment protection insurance? (no); is it that old government/company hospital building thing? (no, and that was private finance initiative, PFI); is it ‘patient public involvement’? Yes! The active engagement of people who use the […]
GUEST POST: Is “sitting on your hands” an option these days for babies with bronchiolitis?
Paediatric doctors and nurses have long been dismayed that we have no useful interventions (other than supportive therapy) for babies with bronchiolitis. We have known for decades that using nebulisers, doing chest x-rays, and starting antibiotics are generally pointless for most infants with bronchiolitis – they are more likely to lead to overtreatment and harm […]
Looking under lamp-posts
There’s a tale told in the North of a man drunkenly scrabbling on the path at night, met by a neighbour also on the way home from the Hound Of The Roofers pub. “What’ye doin’ Arthur?” asks the upright man. “Loookin f’r mi key!” responds Arthur. “Did y’jus drop it?” asks his inquisitive pal. “Nay, […]