Is there more patient abuse in the NHS today than there was, say, thirty years ago, or are we just better at exposing it? Dr No does not know for certain. He chose a thirty year comparator because it was about that time ago that he was a medical student, and then a junior doctor, and so frequently exposed to different wards and hospitals. His recollections from that time are more of starched white sheets, and of course the starched but very beguiling nurses who smoothed them out, than of beds doubling up as commodes. He does recall once seeing a cockroach on the polished wooden floor of a ward, but it was a one-off sighting of a very lonely cockroach. Today, it seems, the cockroaches have grown in both size and number, many now standing on two legs as they mishandle and maltreat the patients on their ward. Has it come to pass that the once occasional failing has now become normal practice?
Category: Dodgy Practice
Would the Real GPs Please Stand Up
Monday’s Channel Four Dispatches programme featured Squeeze Esmail, a sharp professor of general practice, now turned part-time undercover Taliban operative. He lined up some stooges with a collection of red flag symptoms – so-called because they should indicate to any doctor the possibility of serious disease – and fitted them with spook-cams before sending them off to see dodgy GPs, most of whom had un-pronounceable names, and/or worked out of shady lock-up retail premises. The dodgy doctors duly obliged, failing to spot the suicide vests so visibly strapped to their patients chests. Jon Snow presented, with a mixture of knight’s move reporting and come-off-it interviews with Stilton, the chief pongo at the GMC. All in all, the programme raised some important questions, which Dr No may return to another day, but that didn’t stop the Jobbing Doctor from wailing, and hammering yet another nail into his already shattered foot on the cross.
Trust Me, I’m a Whistleblower
There has been something of a trumpet voluntary on the whistleblowing front over the last week. The King, Queen and Godfather of medical whistleblowers have co-authored a paper, which the JRSM has foolishly – it’s about whistleblowing, for Heaven’s sake – hidden behind a paywall – only to allow its publication, via Queen Blow’s own website. Radio Horlicks simmered away on Thursday, with a half hour Report featuring the shimmery voiced Dr Kim Holt. And the Eye (related website here) has produced a Shoot The Messenger NHS Whistleblowing ‘Special’, an eight page dossier of gagged and stuffed doctors hung out to dry, complete with red borders and menacing target images. Queen Blow, however, is conspicuous by her absence from this report – apparently following an iPal tiff – so leaving the Eye a Wonderbra short on the sex appeal front.
Medical Unemployment
The Daily Hail may constantly portray doctors, especially GPs, as lazy golfing fat-cats, and no doubt more than are few are, but there are other corners in the medical universe that are not so cosy, corners closer to the dark side of the moon than the sunny terrace of the nineteenth hole; and one of those corners is that of medical unemployment: doctors who are in a position to work, but for some reason cannot find work.
To those outside the profession, medical unemployment is inexplicable, bizarre, even disturbing and unsettling. Doctors are both committed and driven individuals, trained to the highest standards (at considerable tax-payers expense, some would add), with a ticket to work in a rewarding – both personally and financially – profession. And we are, so the story goes, always short of doctors. How, possibly, could medical unemployment be a reality?
Boob Swell or Bust
The libel wars are hotting up. Rodial, purveyors of High Class Snake Oils to the lunching classes, have fired the first libel shots across the bows of a Ms Dalia Nield FRCS (Ed), for daring to question Rodial’s claims that their revolutionary ‘Boob Job’ gel ‘plumps up the bust’ – by up to 8.4% in a couple of months – if you believe the spiel.
A number of commentators, including Dr Ben Goldacre of Bad Science, would have us believe that this battle is about science, and science alone. There is hot talk of transparency, replication, and open discussion; and of the crassness of using libel law to stifle scientific debate. All this is without doubt true, but the smoke generated in the heat of indignation has partially obscured a somewhat unfortunate fact. Ms Dalia Nield FRCS (Ed) is a Plastic, Reconstructive and Aesthetic (Cosmetic) Surgeon, who numbers amongst her procedures breast augmentation.
The War on Nutt
Faux Webb, the Today programme’s latest and duckiest presenter, this morning helpfully offered Professor Nutt, ex-Chief Pongo of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, the chance to put his case against the demon drink ‘in a Nuttshell’. By BBC fair-do rules Faux was obliged to give Nuttshell’s opponent, Mail on Sunday heavyweight Peter Hitchens, the opportunity to put his case, this time in a Hittshell. But there was no need. Hittshell was already engaged, in a heavy artillery sort of way, in The War on Nutt. The studio soon filled to the sound of high ordnance. Neither Nutt nor Faux stood a chance.
The Gene Genie
In an explosive display of attention deficit hyperbolicity disorder, the Mirror didn’t so much let the genie out of the bottle, as plaster it all over the ceiling. ‘Kids inherit ADHD from mum & dad’ screamed the recent headline, followed by:
‘Fizzy pop and bad parenting have been cleared of any blame for children being hyperactive and fidgety.
Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder is an inherited brain disorder, scientists at Cardiff University found.’
Dr No does not expect the sharpest Fleet Street pencils in the Mirror box, but this is misreporting on an epic scale. On even the most cursory examination, the research, reported in the Lancet, clears neither pop nor parent from blame.
MMR Killed My Hamster
The Daily Mail, truncheon bearer to the lunching classes, has once again been trying to hit the MMR-Autism nail on the head. Softened, perhaps, by the indolence of a quiet August Bank Holiday, The Truncheon last weekend let slip a dossier of drivel that managed to combine monumental insult to an honest story about a vaccine damage payout with a level of disingenuity that would have even the Prince of Darkness blush.
The bare facts of the story are straight-forward. Some years ago, a Master Robert Fletcher developed severe brain damage shortly after receiving the MMR vaccine. The family alleged causation, and now, after a 13 year appeal, a medico-legal panel has decided, by a two to one majority, to allow the claim, on the grounds of temporal association. Robert and his family have been awarded £90,000 compensation.
Keir Cooks Goose but No Burton For Barton
So – The Goose is to be roasted in the oven of the courts. The CPS has decided that Ray ‘I did it wiv t’pillah’ Gosling has led the police on one big, err, goose chase, and that he should be charged with, err, leading the police on a wild goose chase.
Meanwhile, the very same CPS has decided that Gosport’s Diamorphine Queen, Dr Jane Barton, should not go for a Burton, despite a sea of inquest findings suggesting Barton’s overzealous opiate prescribing contributed to a number of deaths.
The Gatekeeper and the Gotcha
Nobody, least of all doctors, seems to know whether doctors themselves have an addiction problem. Smart-arse wise-cracking punters may define an alcoholic as someone who drinks more than their doctor, but, as with most smart-arsed wise-cracks, real evidence is hard to come by. What is more certain is that most doctors have problems with crack heads and cotton shooters. Substance misuse – to give the subject its sanitised, politically correct name – remains very much a Cinderella specialty, while many GPs – despite touting themselves as generalists happy to take on all-comers – refuse to admit drug addicts to their lists.