NHS Blog Doctor: The BritMeds 2007 (7)

It has been a busy week, and a busier weekend, so I am publishing the BritMeds a bit early. Sorry if you have a recommendation in the pipe-line, but do please still send it for next week.

A huge number of submissions, but for me the best post of the week is “A love letter to the NHS”. How it used to be. How it should be. How it still can be. A letter that all working in the NHS should read when they are feeling down. This is what it is all about. This is why we do it. Shame there is still a bit of New Labour post code lottery in it, but even cynical old Crippen was moved.

I used to believe all the hype about how bad Britain’s National Health Service was. That was until I went to an American hospital and saw what top dollar bought you. Not a lot as it turned out. Anthony Wilson is currently fighting cancer. He is the guy who set up Factory Records (Joy Division, New Order, Happy Mondays etc). I was sorry to hear about his cancer and moved by this tribute to the NHS.

The full article is here. Remember when it was always like this?

An excellent post from Menke's Kinky Hair:

I was going to do a funny post today but then I read this in the Guardian and got spitting-mad so you'll have to put up with a rant instead. If you are a completely healthy person and you pay an outrageous amount of money for a full body scan you are a total twat.

See “The New hypochondriasis-induction service"

Dr K discovers that “Doctor”…well, sort of doctor not a medical doctor you know a real doctor because mine is a PhD which I got from a non-accredited correspondence school in America and I have never published any properly evaluated scientific research but I will stop calling myself “doctor” if you are confused…where was I, Oh Yes, “Dr” Gillian McKeith does not know where her kidneys are.

Hilarious.

Take a look here

The excellent Bad Science is taking a look at “Dr” McKeith as well.

Call her the Awful Poo Lady, call her “Dr” Gillian McKeith PhD: she is an empire, a multi-millionaire, a phenomenon, a prime-time TV celebrity……

Another moving post from SHP, looking at the lottery of life. Whatever problems she may have, and she has had problems, there are but nothing compared to some…

Where were you when you were 21? I was at university. The short bursts of normality between long periods of illness were good……

….my illness is a cross to bear, but it is nothing, nothing, compared to the thousands of Sammys in this world. It is a dose of flu compared to a festering, inoperable malignancy.

Essential reading from SHP – and look at the comments too.

We are all looking for a cure for MS and, beware, there are quacks around. What about stem-cell infusions? Not available on the NHS. Is it worth doing? A report from the MS Resource Centre written by Trevor Waddilove recounts his experience. He is a sensible guy. He went to Belgium and paid £3000 for the treatment.

“The treatment is in two stages. First your own stem cells are ‘harvested’ from both hips. This is not pleasant but bearable as 10 syringes of bone marrow are taken from each hip.”

Find out how Trevor got on here, and, if you want to follow it up, Trevor says :

I will be happy to accept e-mails or telephone calls if anyone wants to know more.

Mark Struthers is a General Practitioner in Bedfordshire UK. He writes “Is your doctor an executioner” .

Jeff Broadbent had a cure for autistic children. Exorcism. Really. Find out what happened to Jeff here.

The psychiatrist takes a look at ravages of distorted body perception and eating disorders and the the extremes of BMI in “I cannot see the clothes for the illness”

A number of Consultant Anaesthetists have drawn my attention to this announcement from the Royal College of Anaesthetists:

The Rise of the Nurse Quacktitioners : doctors fight back

Dr Rant has a secure job and still he is getting stressed by MMC:

Choose MMC. Choose MTAS. Choose a region. Choose a career. Choose a fucking big lottery. Choose portfolios, on-line application forms and years of uncertainty. Choose a cut in training posts, career choice and job security. Choose FTSTA’s no one knows anything about, middle grade rotas being run by juniors who’ve never worked in the specialty before, foundation programmes you have no control over, and hospitals you don’t want to work in.

Front Point Systems is looking at the NHS :

Following on from my previous posts regarding the plunge in morale amongst NHS staff, The Times is reporting on the recruitment drive being carried out in the UK by other countries. Recruiters from Australia & New Zealand are focussing their efforts on disillusioned NHS staff with nurses being the prime target but other professions are not far behind.

What do mental health nurses really get up to?

I’m not saying there aren’t hardworking, decent RMNs on acute wards. Of course there are. You can see them doing all they can to snatch a bit of quality time between the paperwork and the phone calls to spend a while with patients, getting to know them, working out their hopes and fears. Sadly, you can also meet a lot of nurses who have stopped caring. Burnt-out, cynical, institutionalised Nurse Ratchet types, only interacting with patients to let them on and off the ward, or to prise them apart when an argument brews.

Read it all in the news from the Brain Police

Is Dr Crippen getting paranoid with old age, or is paranoia affecting younger doctors too? This from the implausibly named Ferret Fancier

He put a question to the Department of Health and received this reply:

“While the Department appreciates that there is a general public interest in the availability of information about public sector activity, this must be weighed against the public interest in officials being able to provide frank advice to Ministers in an environment that is as free as possible from public controversy on issues about which opinions may be strongly held. In this case, we have determined that the balance of public interest favours withholding the information."

What was he asking about, one wonders? The Duchess of Cornwall’s nether regions maybe? No far more mundane than that. He was asking about MMC. Read the full story here at the Ferret Fancier

In case some of you missed it, Patricia Hewitt went onto the internet to explain to us all how good the NHS has become under her stewardship

Just click on the photograph and enjoy! A prize to anyone who manages to read it all.

Life with leukaemia is not going to be any easier now Patricia has decided to close down the blood transfusion service. Angus is furious, as is Lucia

Hi! My name is Lucia Pasqualino, I'm 17 years old and I live in Blackpool. I was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia on the 29th March 2005 when I was just 15. I'm at Sixth Form College at the moment doing my first year of A-levels. For more about me click here

Lucia is making a major impression on the medical blogosphere. We saw two days ago how a small piece of characteristic NHS maladministration is going to interfere with Lucia's weekend with the excellent Find your sense of Tumour.

Lucia is not looking for pity. Far from it. She says:

I really didn't realise what an impact last nights post may have had. While at the time of blogging I was still caught in the moment and in the midst of steroid-fuelled anger, I still feel the same way today.

Obviously, people will come on here expecting to read a heart rending tale of a "sufferer battling through chemotherapy". I'm not a sufferer, a victim, and neither am I "plucky". Sorry if I don't match your requirements. What I aim to do through my blog and my website is say "Yes, us teenagers do get cancer, so lets face the facts and deal with it". Until now, my blog has been a way of letting off steam. Now it's time to make a difference.

Take a look at Lucia's blog. Read it through. A UK medical student found it a few days ago and says:

"I'm a medical student and your blog has given me an insight into what a teenager having chemo goes through - the practical, physical and emotional effects of it all. Thank you so much for writing it, even though your intention wasn't to educate others, you have certainly taught me something. Thank you. :-)

Best wishes with everything."

Inversions and deceptions. In Mediocracy, Fabian Tssano writes about absurdity of the modern NHS :

the principle of having a state medical monopoly, supposedly dispensing free health care to all who need it — while in practice severely rationing it.

On a lighter note, Emily is struggling. “I finally used the word vagina”. What on earth is she talking about? She is trying to teach a toddler the correct words for various parts of her body without lapsing into "front and back bottom". Any parent will want to take a look at her post on Naming the naughty bits

A reader reminds me of Rant’s relics; even in the early days he struggled to find subtle nuance of meaning and imagery as he warned of the dangers of the NHS super computer:

The only defence against your HIV scare from your shagfest with the transexual prostitute living upstairs from your half-brother being centerfolded in the News of The World is the fact that due to the incompetent implementation of all things computer by the government, the entire system will probably by down 98% of the time.

See Dr Rant’s “Date Rape of 50 million people”

Gay needs not being met:

IT’S MEANT to be a caring profession, but the health service is not always so caring to gay or transgender patients.

We think we have problems with NHS Direct. What have the done to the police? It seems, if they want to prosecute a villain, they have to call CPS Direct. Really. It gets sillier and sillier. Take a look at this

The media have given British children a dressing down this week; but Shinga finds grounds for optimism in A Miserable Day for Child Wellbeing in the UK But I Discover Hope for Their Creativity

We are running on empty:

Wasted nurses With 20,000 deficit driven NHS job cuts, many newly (and expensively) trained medical staff are leaving to work abroad. (Full report here)

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***I edited and then finally removed a reference to an article which caused upset to a number of readers (see the comments, and I have had some emails) because the writer of the article was a member of the BNP and also because the way I plugged the article made it seem that I was endorsing its content. I did not mean to do that.

I have not removed the article because of the political alignment of the author, much as I dislike it, but because he also writes another blog, prominently displayed on the main one, which is racist, and I certainly do not want to give that any publicity.

I have therefore printed the opinions that the author has on the British NHS in the comment column without referring specifically to his site.

This is a difficult area. I have been arguing it backwards and forwards for most of the afternoon. I received four recommendations for the article (an unusually high number) and there is a suggestion that there may have been a deliberate attempt to get publicity. I do not know if that is correct. I also find it difficult to know what to print, and what not to print in a "round up" like the BritMeds. I do not like censorship. I print many articles with which I proudly disagree. It would be very boring if I did not.

Anthony Cox, the writer of the excellent Black Triangle beleives these political views should not be given the oxygen of publicity. I understand that but do not agree. The BNP is with us and is not going to go away. It's arguments must not be ignored, they must be rebutted.

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Something for the weekend sir? Mr Hunnybun, the pharmacist, has the perfect drug for all.

Another medical blogger, Guy St Thomas of Carry on Doctors disappeared without warning last week. Even the Google cache has been emptied. So all gone without trace. Medical and other work bloggers might be interested in this:

A Technical Guide to Anonymous Blogging
Security measures for hiding your identity online

iPod Insanity Grips Wannabe-Groovy GMC
By James Landon

Recently, however, my pontifications on that very subject were cut off in mid invective by news of a concept so bizarre, so utterly daft, that I simply couldn’t find the words to express my disbelief.

It appears that the General Medical Council, that august body entrusted, however unwisely, with regulation of the medical profession, is running a poster competition. Oh, and they’re giving away free iPods to the winners, too.

Full report from NHS Exposed

“What kind of a crazy system have we created? Have we gone completely mad with political correctness? Why don't we focus more on things such as scores on standardised tests, medical school academic records, and letters of recommendation?”

The ever reliable Dr Grumble takes a look at Modernising Medical Careers.

Dr Jest is worried that he is turning into Dr Killjoy. How much and how often should you nag an elderly smoker COPD? Smoking may be her only pleasure in life.

It is not all bad in the NHS. Cheer yourself up with a short post by a hospital doctor who feels appreciated:

In the last couple of weeks I have been hugged three times: by one of my patients (who has terminal cancer), a relative of a different patient (who will almost certainly die this week) and a friend of another patient (who died last week)

It's all in Hugs & Kisses

News and Resources about Avian Flu reports that

If a true pandemic of bird flu hits these shores then our notions of what we can expect from the National Health Service will have to change. Some people will have to be denied potentially life-saving treatment: there simply will not be enough beds.

Check this out – interesting

Sisyphus’ Ledge explains why he is disillusioned with medicine (and provides some excellent music as well)

I felt disgusted at the so called reforms that were occurring in the NHS and medical education and training. I saw injustice, bad practice, incompetence and insane policy changes that made me feel wretched. The life that I had had as a doctor in the 1990’s and expected to continue, no longer existed.

The Vasectomy Blog (!*!? Yes, there really is one!) is getting excited about OTC Viagra from Boots.

Boots offers Viagra to men who are shy of the doctor. Is this a service, or is it rank profiteering; four Viagra tablets from the doctor for £20, or from Boots the Chemist for £50

The English Guy can’t get an appointment with his doctor at a time of his choosing and so is moaning about “The New NHS”

Are doctor’s really ageists?

The Doomed NHS hulk is heading for the rocks
Following Accenture's recent leap overboard, Andrew Rollerson, a senior healthcare consultant at Fujitsu, which has a £896m contract to deliver part of the NHS "supercomputer", savaged it during a conference speech last week:

"It isn't working, and it isn't going to work. There is a belief that the national programme is somehow going to propel transformation in the NHS simply by delivering an IT system. Nothing could be further from the truth. A vacuum, a chasm, is opening up."

Noting that the £30-50bn fiasco is likely to be a "camel" not a "racehorse", he illustrated his apocalyptic talk with slides depicting sinking ships, alligators, and mud-wrestling women (...que?). Full report here

Someone has been sending Nurse Quacktitioner Dolls to medical bloggers.

He should watch out. The Center For Nursing Advocacy will have their tanks on his lawn if he is not careful.

People with bad colds frequently request urgent appointments to see the doctor. But some of them do not like to bother their GP. So they dial 999 instead. Really! See how the ambulance service try to deal with them in Weeding out the Snifflers

Righteous indignation from a Paramedic, who writes:

Reading a few of the (predominantly) medical blogs recently I’ve noticed an annoying trend to class any form of nurse or paramedic who has aspired to either specialise in an area of interest, or increase their clinical scope as a ‘Quacktitioner’. Apparently Doctors can do no wrong and spend half their time picking up the pieces of lives shattered by those who have had to see a Practitioner of any flavour.

Just to put the record straight, here are a few of my recent experiences of my medical colleagues doing ‘a quack’.

1. AAA being treated with antacids
2. Apendicitis being treated with antacids
3. STEMI patients waiting in the GP reception with no O2, no GTN, no aspirin, no ECG and no bloody pain relief.

4. Patients with unfeasably skewed blood results being discharged with no follow up.

5. Patients being discharged from hospital (on a Saturday) with all their medications stopped and instructions to get their GP to review them on Monday. (Digoxin, Warfarin, Betablockers, ACE Inhibitors, Analgesia etc)

6. Patients being told by OOH Drs to take two paracetamol and a brufen and call an Ambulance if “it isn’t better in two hours.”

7. AAA being treated with NSAIDS.

8. Drs who can’t be bothered waiting to book an Urgent ambulance dialling 999 instead.

9. LVF being treated with antibiotics

More details in Who’s the Quack?

It’s not just doctors who have to chase targets. Apparently, the police have targets as well. Which is why the artist who did this was prosecuted.

Shame. It would have won the Turner Prize if it had been in the Tate Modern.

A commentator said:

Well after 10 years of micromanaging by this Labour government you have now got the Police Force they want you to have.

Happy now?.

Full story here (and click on the photo)

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The reference to this article has been edited in response to some of the comments. As originally written, it might have been taken as being an endorsement of the content of the article.