I have a career ambition I have rarely said out loud: I aspire to lead at the highest levels of the NHS. Not because I am attached to a particular title, but because I want to contribute to healthcare at scale, shaping strategy, influencing systems and helping to build a health service that works better […]
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Unlocking the Leader Within – A Book Review by Sabrina Hersi and Alice Deasy
This concise textbook seeks to introduce medical students to leadership concepts and support the development of leadership and teamwork skills. Its international authorship seeks to make the book relevant to a global audience. Divided into three sections – Self Mastery, Teamwork and Residency Applications, the book introduces key leadership concepts before taking a more targeted […]
Clinicians already reason like designers – they were never given the instruments. By Daniel Steenstra
There is a sentence most clinical leaders have heard in some form: “You have excellent clinical skills, but you’ll need to develop your management thinking.” It is delivered kindly, usually with a course recommendation attached. It is also, on the evidence, backwards. Consider what a clinician does with an undifferentiated presentation. She gathers symptoms and […]
Reclaiming the Human Dimension in Healthcare & Leadership. By Louise Younie and Anna Baverstock
‘Creative Enquiry helps us have safety nets for our own emotions and situations, which directly improves how we care for patients. Everyone I know in foundation training goes through all sorts of difficult experiences that we have next to no time to recover from – both physically and emotionally. [Creative Enquiry] supports us to stay […]
Inclusive leadership as a clinical imperative: from personal journey to system change. By Sarah Todd
A moment that changed how I saw leadership Early in my career, I witnessed a senior colleague use racially biased language about a patient, then deliver a lower standard of care. I felt shocked, angry and unsure how to respond. At the time, I didn’t have the language to describe what I had seen. But […]
“I can no longer keep patients safe” – Heatwaves and Health Workers: time for political action. By Matthew Lee
The UK has (so far) experienced five heatwaves in one summer. Record temperatures have been repeatedly broken and in the June heatwave records show that the London Ambulance Service responded to a record number of life-threatening emergencies, the highest in its history. (1,2) From the UKHSA’s Health Effects of Climate Change report, we know we […]
Ending with the Beginning in Mind: Reflections from the FMLM National Medical Director’s Clinical Fellowship. By Lynda Odoh
My favourite part of a run is not the run itself. It is the moment I stop my watch. The moment I look back. How many miles did I cover? Where did I find my rhythm? Where did I slow down? How does today compare with yesterday? Last week? Last month? There is something deeply […]
Continuity as a System Behaviour Across Care Boundaries. By Phil Whatling
Introduction Continuity of care is often discussed in terms of patients seeing their usual GP. For many patients in general practice long-term therapeutic relationships remain both one of the profession’s greatest strengths and central to how care is experienced. What clinicians across general practice, community services and hospitals see each day suggests a broader reality. […]
Is the NHS Ready for Sustainable Food Choices? By Jason Yun, Natasha Guildford, and Cat Pinho-Gomes
Food represents a substantial and yet often overlooked contributor to the carbon footprint of healthcare systems. In the National Health Service (NHS) in the United Kingdom, it is estimated to generate approximately 1.54 MtCO2e annually, which represents around 6% of total emissions. 1 Despite the significant role that food and catering can play in helping […]
The cult of AI in healthcare. By Shiva Pandey
I am a geriatrician, which means I spend my days with older people — usually polite, usually grateful — and a surprising amount of my work involves taking things away: the medications and interventions that no longer benefit the patient. It is good, fulfilling work. I would like to think my patients are fond of […]