Mr Jones comes to see me. He is only 62, but has high blood pressure, had a stroke two years ago and still has a noticeable limp as he walks […]
Guest writers
Jennifer Hislop: Florence Nightingale and Mae West – the unsung pioneers of health policy?
The second part of the session “Investing in health. From health to wealth” at the European Health Forum Gastein was devoted to “Resolving the efficiency and quality dilemma.” Olivia Wigzell, […]
Georgios Lyratzopoulos reports from the diagnostic error in medicine conference
Amidst justified concerns about the potential for overdiagnosis it is easy to forget the great challenges associated with establishing a timely and accurate diagnosis in the first place. Many thousands […]
Jennifer Hislop: Running healthcare systems in an age of austerity—riding the “rodeo bull”
This was the analogy put to delegates by Hungarian Minister of State for Health, Miklos Szocska, during the first session of the European Health Forum panel on “Investing for health. […]
Roberto Debono: “We must not speak about crisis, we must speak about a new reality”
The title is a quote from a discussion between Vytenis Povilas Andriukaitis, the Minister of Health, Lithuania, and Spyridon-Adonis Georgiades, the Minister of Health, Greece, and it set the tone […]
Simon Williams: What the ASDA and Tesco “mental patient” costume tell us about misassumptions of mental health
Recently, the British supermarket chain ASDA hit the headlines for selling a controversial “mental patient” Halloween costume. Although the costume was quickly withdrawn following complaints by notable mental health charities, […]
Gerry Stimson: A life or death moment for tobacco policy
European Union politics occasionally produces a humiliating own goal, but few are likely to be as deadly and unethical as a proposed new approach to tobacco policy. On 8 October, […]
Anna Smajdor: Should we incentivise compassion in the NHS?
In response to the details of catastrophic failures in Mid Staffordshire NHS trust, David Cameron recently suggested that nurses’ pay should be dependent on their compassion. The idea that we […]
Saleyha Ahsan: No child is safe in Syria today
Away from my comfort zone working as an emergency medicine doctor in London, I have been working in a hospital in northern Syria with the charity Hand in Hand for […]
Kavin Andi: Pioneering the use of 3-D computer imagery to rebuild patients’ faces
Some of us are driven by personal conviction about our career choice while others succumb to the subtle and not to subtle influence of peer pressure or well meaning parents. […]