I have found applying for registration with the New Zealand Medical Council to be a bit like the Generation Game. It looks fairly uncomplicated, but quickly turned into a farce. […]
Month: January 2007
New Year. New Hope. New Zealand
Last Summer I was sitting at my desk with a tongue like a husband in a lingerie shop. A dozen pictures of New Zealand changed my career path in a […]
JAMA 3 Jan 2007
Myocardial infarction should, as we know, be treated by immediate percutaneous coronary intervention, but even this doesn’t always restore an adequate circulation to the ischaemic area, so we can expect […]
NEJM 4 Jan 2007
Gene signatures in cancer cells are beginning to tell us which patients are most likely to survive. This sophisticated Taiwanese laboratory study identifies a five-gene signature which predicts good outcome […]
BMJ 6 Jan 2007
When Fiona Godlee first offered to take these reviews as a BMJ blog, I was given an assurance that I could be as beastly about her journal as I liked. […]
Lancet 6 Jan 2007
This study shows that when given early after adjuvant chemotherapy for HER-2 positive breast cancer, trastuzumab provides significant mortality benefit in as little as two years. But the Herceptin debate […]
Ann Intern Med 2 Jan 2007
This study looked at a cohort of 782 elderly men and women in the Netherlands with raised homocysteine and, amongst many outcomes, looked for an effect of folic acid on […]
Proverb of the Week: Physician heal thyself
This is more a taunt than a proverb, and reminds us that throughout history, patients have taken comfort in the physical misfortunes of their doctors. Sayings of this kind are […]
JAMA 27 Dec 2006
While you are reading this, amoeba-like cells are crawling over your bones and eating them away. Unless, that is, you are taking a bisphosphonate to paralyze your osteoclasts and leave […]
NEJM 28 Dec 2006
Your Christmas Day came to a blurry end with quantities of port wine and Stilton cheese. You don’t really remember going to bed, but soon afterwards you are aware that […]