Palliative care globally lacks funding, professionals, and medicines (particularly morphine) and suffers from policy neglect, said David Praill, chief executive of Help the Hospices, opening a meeting in London on […]
Month: June 2012
Tom Nolan: Industrial action – winners and losers
The dust has settled following last week’s industrial action on pensions. Online forums, Twitter, and blogs have been alight with doctors giving their views—who do they feel have been the […]
Richard Lehman’s journal review – 25 June 2012
JAMA 20 June 2012 Vol 307 2491 Most clinicians assume that the agencies which license new drugs—the Food and Drug Administration in the USA, or the European Medicines Agency over […]
Seye Abimbola: How to improve the quality of primary health care in Nigeria
Health services in Nigeria mirror political organisation. The federal government is responsible for tertiary care, state governments are responsible for secondary care, and local government runs primary care. The financing […]
The unintended outcome of today’s industrial action
He said he was happy to pay extra for his pension. The country couldn’t afford the national projected pension costs and the economy was in crisis. But, as long as […]
Pritpal S Tamber: Soft-wiring knowledge
Knowing when and how to apply established knowledge into practice is difficult. A recent article in The Lancet shows why. The thickness of the inner walls of the carotid artery […]
Helen Jaques: Industrial action live blog
Welcome to the BMJ’s industrial action live blog. Today doctors across the UK will be taking industrial action for the first time in nearly 40 years to protest against changes […]
Julian Sheather: Autonomy and the anorexic patient
There was extensive media comment this weekend about the Court of Protection’s decision to authorise the force-feeding of a seriously anorexic former medical student with a critically low BMI. The […]
Birte Twisselmann: Last words
For me, one of the best things about working at the BMJ is the fact that my job has kept evolving over the years. In September 2011 I took over […]
Julian Sheather: Autonomy and the right to refuse life-sustaining treatment
The recent case of a young Jehovah’s Witness in a sickle cell crisis refusing essential blood products and being allowed to die confirms what should by now be widely known: […]