As civilians in both Gaza and Israel spend another day living and dying in fear and surrounded by hate, Ali Abbas, a young man who as a child lost 16 members of his family and both his arms in the Iraq conflict, tells reporter Hugh Sykes his story. Ali’s story reminds us of the human […]
Month: December 2008
Henderson’s Equation: embracing science, facilitating human flourishing
I’m fond of referring, in talks and in discussions about medical professionalism, to the midnight meal. It’s a metaphor that I borrow from Dr Jerome Lowenstein, a friend and colleague who wrote an essay of the same name. In that essay he recalls a time when the medical team would meet in the hospital restaurant, […]
House MD: just what the doctor ordered
http://www.fox.com/house/gallery/ Back in the mid-80s when, as a junior doctor, I went to work in the US, I caused a mini-panic amongst the nurses by refusing, at least for a short while, to sign “MD” after my orders. An order in this context being a written order to the nurses to do the myriad of […]
Can a comic a day keep the doctor away? GP Ian Williams thinks so
In these uncertain economic times there seems to be a growing nostalgia for the more simple things in life. Home baking and dressmaking is on the rise and many families are anticipating a less commercialised festive get together. Although some of this return to basics is undoubtedly driven by economic imperatives, anecdotal evidence seems to […]
Rubens and the art of observation: a dying clinical skill?
Peter Paul Rubens. Helene Fourment in a fur wrap (Het Pelsken). c.1635. Oil on panel, 176×83 cm. Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum. Do you ever really look at your patients? I mean really, really, look, so carefully that you’re in danger of making both of you feel uncomfortable? And if you do, do you look with the eye of […]
Understanding childhood obesity:the Wellcome Trust film and video archive goes digital
I’m grateful to Christy Henshaw for letting me know about an exciting new project from the Wellcome Trust. So far about 100 films from the Trust’s vast archive of film and video have been digitalised and can be viewed by anyone, free-of-charge, on-line. A brief glance at the titles led me to a fascinating insight […]
Mad, bad or simply sad: a medical humanities look at mental health legislation
Vincent Van Gogh. Self Portrait with Bandaged Ear, 1889. London, Courtauld Institute Gallery. http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/cgi-bin/WebObjects.dll/CollectionPublisher.woa/wa/artistBiography?artistID=301 This month the Mental Health Act (MHA) 2007 came into force in England and Wales. This Act, which amends the MHA 1983, is just the latest in a series of Acts of Parliament that form part of an on-going search for […]