Many doctors will have had the frustration of dealing with health problems that are actually the result of much more deep-seated social inequalities, some with their roots going all the […]
Guest writers
Helen Wood: End of life care and intracranial haemorrhage
As a care of the elderly registrar currently working in a district general hospital, I am very familiar with the following story, and it is likely to be recognised by […]
Sarah Radcliffe: A future NHS that meets the needs of people living with HIV
What does it mean to describe HIV as a long-term condition (LTC)? It has become common terminology in policy and media discussions, but the use of this phrase within NHS […]
Amy Webster: Engaging trainees in quality improvement
NHS improvement has recently published a document entitled “Developing people—improving care.” [1] This outlines a framework to guide action on developing leadership in the NHS, with a focus on delivering […]
Niro Kumar: Doctors and dating apps
Shift patterns and long hours have detrimental effects on doctors’ social and romantic lives. While dating other medics solves this conundrum for some, many junior (and senior) doctors still prefer […]
Daniel Whitney: Mental health has still not achieved “parity of esteem”—even among some medical professionals
It’s late morning; little piles of lists and notes from assessments carried out in the past 24 hours are littered between me and the PC. The assorted paraphernalia that seems to […]
Lorraine Atkinson: Preventing prison suicides
2016 will be remembered for many reasons. I will remember it as the worst year on record for the number of prisoners who have taken their own lives in prisons […]
Valentina Lichtner: Incorrect patient record selection
Recently the Wall Street Journal alerted its readers to a report by the ECRI Institute in the US on the common problem of patient misidentification. [1,2] The study found 7613 “wrong patient” […]
Jamie Murdoch: Nurse or non-clinician in the delivery of telephone triage?
The question of who should triage patients over the phone is critical to delivering safe and effective care and has become a contentious issue for healthcare systems. Belgium is currently […]
Trevor Plunkett: Dementia is not a disease
Recently I read in at least three daily newspapers that dementia is now the leading cause of death in the UK. It appears that such statements arise from figures supplied […]