Today is my last day in Freetown. I’m heading back to London tonight. It seems hard to believe that the UK is a mere six hour flight away. Perhaps more […]
Month: June 2010
David Pencheon: Saving money can save lives and improve quality, if we know what quality is…
It’s easy to say that the NHS should do better, not more – but what does that actually mean? Well, it means investing resources (money, people, buildings…) in healthcare which […]
Desmond O’Neill: A bloomsday brush with brilliance
One of the challenges of teaching medical ethics is the need to continually connect with the wellsprings of philosophy and (whisper it) theology. Without these elements there is danger of […]
Mit Philips: No time to quit on HIV/AIDS funding
Here in Europe, HIV has virtually gone off the radar. It has been reduced to a chronic but eminently treatable disease that affects relatively small numbers of people, neither a […]
Anna Mead Robson: Psychiatry – a specialty for failures?
I once met a medical student who had failed his first year exams. “It’s ok,” he said, as I tried to console him. “I know I’m not very bright, but […]
Edward Davies: GP Commissioning. Again.
Here at Groundhog Day, I mean the NHS Confederation annual shindig, the talk of the conference floor is GP commissioning. Health Secretary Andrew Lansley’s speech last night was pretty low […]
Richard Smith: US health reform – good or bad?
Is US health reform a “monumental system transformation or a fatally flawed compromise?” This was the question addressed last night by Alan Gerber, doctor, economist, health policy expert, government adviser, […]
Kayte McCann: Standing up for science
Are we standing up for science, or have we all become so laid back about it that the very basis of medicine and research are now lost to us? Earlier […]
Nick Foreman on road safety
At midnight on 31 January 1983 legislation was introduced to make the wearing of seat belts compulsory. Only 40% of the population were wearing them at the point and the […]
Liz Wager warms to qualitative research
I’m just back from running a course in Kenya and, as usual, it was an eye-opening experience – but perhaps not in the way you might expect. I’ll admit that, […]