I’ve been doing some work recently with a GP trainer. I’m not a good judge of these things, but I would put him in his mid-fifties. He strikes me as […]
Columnists
Richard Smith: Is the New England Journal of Medicine anti-science?
About once a year a furious researcher writes to me complaining that the New England Journal of Medicine won’t publish a letter that strongly criticises, even demolishes, an article the […]
Desmond O’Neill: A tale of three cities—geriatric medicine in Australia
Some minds improve by travel, wrote the nineteenth century poet and humorist, Thomas Hood: others, rather, resemble copper wire, or brass, which get the narrower by going farther. And so […]
Richard Smith: Menstrual regulation and the sacra rosa—escaping religious rigidity
Countries that are strongly Muslim or Roman Catholic find abortion unacceptable, but Bangladesh, a Muslim country, has found a clever way of helping women who might be pregnant and don’t […]
Liz Wager: Trouble with retractions
Retracting unreliable publications can cause headaches for journal editors and a recent case illustrates why they can be so tricky. According to reports in the BMJ and Nature, the drug […]
James Raftery: Value based pricing—terms of reference given by the Department of Health to NICE
On 20 June the Department of Health announced that: “Expert body given responsibility to look at the benefits medicines bring to wider society.” The terms of reference are not on […]
David Lock: Suicide, refusing treatment, and consent in the dying process
This is an anonymised story about how a doctor’s misunderstanding of the law around managing the death of a patient with capacity appears to have caused unnecessary suffering. It is […]
Tiago Villanueva: Why does Brazil want to recruit doctors from Spain and Portugal?
I recently met up with a Portuguese friend who works as a researcher and doctor in New York. She has an immense passion for Brazil and told me she would […]
Richard Smith: The BMA and homosexuality
I was once responsible for Family Doctor Publications, which were a series of booklets owned by the BMA, had titles like You and Your Bowels, and sold in huge numbers […]
Richard Smith: Health and social care: lots of activity, little value
My mother is a wonderful woman but has no short term memory and drinks too much alcohol. When she’s sober her language is complex and her sense of humour magnificent. […]