How many of us can expect a year after we die to have some 500 people attend a meeting to celebrate our life, discuss our work, and think about the […]
Columnists
James Raftery: QALYs and value based pricing
This blog reports on a workshop held by the Department of Health on 28 November 2012 under Chatham House rules, that is the discussion can be reported but not attributed. […]
Tiago Villanueva: How does the financial crisis affect demand for health services?
The unemployment rate in Portugal is at an all time high of 16,3%, and 2013 is looking even bleaker, due to announced tax hikes that will see people’s net income […]
Paul Glasziou: Santa, could you take some things away instead?
Dear Santa, This year, instead of presents I wondered if instead you might take some things away? Maybe you could start with unnecessary tests, unhelpful diagnoses, and over treatment? These […]
Richard Smith: Selling your personal data
“The government wants to sell our personal data to the highest bidder, and it stinks,” said somebody, making her position very clear, at a meeting at the House of Commons […]
Kieran Walsh: “Fortunately…education produces no effect whatsoever”
One of the latest thoughts to emanate from authorities in medical education is that investments in education will produce a tangible return on investment. The theory goes a bit like […]
Richard Smith: The case for slow medicine
The characteristics of health systems are complexity, uncertainty, opacity, poor measurement, variability in decision making, asymmetry of information, conflict of interest, and corruption. They are thus largely a black box […]
Martin McKee: How should the United States respond to gun crime?
A few days ago a disturbed young man in Newtown, Connecticut, shot his mother before going to the primary school where she worked to murder 20 children, aged between six […]
Liz Wager: Discussing research misconduct with Dr Hwang
In a country where over half the population is called Kim, Park, or Lee, it probably shouldn’t have come as such a surprise to find myself talking about research misconduct […]
Desmond O’Neill: Graphic insights into Alzheimer’s disease
In my practice as a geriatrician, no syndrome is as interesting, intellectually stimulating, and simultaneously frustrating and rewarding as dementia. Ethical sensitivity, integrative neurology, a critical approach to neurobiology, and […]