By Prof Mark Taubert, Consultant in Palliative Medicine, Cardiff, UK “Mostly it is loss which teaches us about the worth of things.” ― Arthur Schopenhauer, Parerga and Paralipomena This year, I lost a very dear friend called Yiannis. Only in his late forties, he had a rare form of bone marrow cancer. He was a successful […]
Category: Humanities
The ‘Grab and Go’ Guide
In this Forum article, the authors describe the ‘Small Steps, Big Vision Grab and Go Guide’ with its focus on children and young adults Authors: Holly Smith, Acting Matron – Children & Young Adults Service St Oswald’s Hospice Gosforth Newcastle upon Tyne, NE3 1EE UK, Diane Nicholson, Sister, Children and Young Adults St Oswald’s Hospice […]
‘I’m an Oncologist from India – here’s what I gleaned from a palliative care placement in the UK’
Professor Punita Lal is an oncologist from India. Here, she describes a palliative care placement in the United Kingdom. She spent a month at Velindre Cancer Centre in Wales, where she experienced inpatient, outpatient, community and hospice palliative/supportive care. Providing comprehensive acute palliative cancer care – many models exist! Donning different hats is […]
BODIES – A Medical Humanities Conference
Author: Dr Ishminder Mangat, Great Western Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, England Bodies was the first ever medical humanities conference to take place in Bristol: it was held on Monday 26th June 2023 in the grand and imposing neo-Gothic Wills Memorial Building. For this summary article, I have tried to capture an account of […]
People aren’t avocados.
By Dr Joseph Hawkins, Consultant in Palliative Medicine, Clinical lead for End of Life Care, Ashford and St Peter’s NHS Foundation Trust. Twitter: @JoeHawk75825077 I’m told that the problem with avocados is that they sit on the shelf for ages not quite ripe, then they ripen for a day and then they spend their remaining […]
The problem with predicting the future.
By Dr Joseph Hawkins, Consultant in Palliative Medicine, Clinical lead for End of Life Care, Ashford and St Peter’s NHS Foundation Trust. Twitter: @JoeHawk75825077 “we are entering a world in which we can’t expect easy prognostications of the future… we will see a rising number of sick survivors-frail individuals of all ages whose survival is […]
No longer in vogue
By Dr. Joseph Hawkins, Consultant in Palliative Medicine, Ashford and St Peter’s Clinical End of Life Lead, Ashford and St Peter’s NHS Foundation Trust. Twitter: @JoeHawk75825077 Pah! Dying, it’s hardly fashionable, is it? It’s like it is all the rage… (That was a Dylan Thomas reference, in case you missed it), But it’s hardly […]