COVID lockdowns are fortunately behind us, and vacations are making a huge comeback. But how safe is it to holiday, especially on a ship? Cruise carriers bear a duty to keep their passengers safe. Despite the decrease in the number and severity of COVID cases, there are of course still risks in everyday life. Masks are no […]
Category: Healthcare
The World Health Organisation has outlined what it considers the top issues on the health care horizon for the next decade and beyond. As usual with any large consensus organization, the issues outlined are like spent stars – they were shining brightly once but are probably dead already. Let’s redesign, rename, revamp and reinvest. So , rather […]
To keep working healthily and in health care of course. But what doctor would want to work in any health care institution these days? Especially when at least 25% of our practicing time is spent on administrative and quality issues. Sure, some administrative activities, such as patient scheduling or staff hiring, are part of the core activities […]
The monosodium glutamate job is still around. The kind of job that satiates when you are in it …. but half an hour after leaving for the day, you feel empty and wonder, “Why I am still doing that job?” Then the next day you come back for more of the same. Most of these jobs are […]
The first commandment of health information disclosure dictates that data shalt not be disclosed to any third party beyond what the patient has consented to. An awards program for health data would be a good start. Unfortunately, organizations create, store and have access to our health data. Big data is big business and there are a variety […]
In the acute phase, men with COVID experience more severe symptoms and higher mortality than women. In that way COVID is no different from many of the viruses that have attacked humans over the last century. The health of women is not just women’s health Men are more attractive to viral infections than women. For example, […]
As a public health physician, and as a family physician, I am ashamed. In response to COVID, my colleagues in public health officialdom are losing credibility as they search for politically driven quick fixes and remain silent when individual freedoms are restricted without clear evidence of an enduring relationship to positive outcomes. COVID is here […]
Hospitals are full of people sick with CoVID but not all of them are patients. More and more staff in our hospitals are turning up for work that they are unable to do. They are present, but not working at their best, either due to their own health problems, increased CoVID-related workload, or CoVID anxiety. […]
CoVID is no longer just a health concern. As clinicians we now understand the disease a little better, are comforted that most cases are mild and self-limiting, and relieved that the intensive care resources are becoming equipped to manage the increase in patient numbers. Even the danger to health care workers of too much exposure […]
What will happen to our healthcare services once the acute phase of CoVID-19 has passed is anyone’s guess. The backlog of non-urgent surgery and medical treatment grows daily as physicians not involved in acute life-threatening care are furloughed and patients are reticent to see clinicians for fear of catching CoVID-19, if their offices are even […]
CoVID-19 is all about lungs and breathing. As the infection increases in seriousness so the need for breathing assistance becomes greater. Critical and intensive care units (ICUs) provide the optimal support for these life-threatening breathing problems. But are they ready for the expected surge in cases? There will never be enough ICU beds. Overall, critical […]
Doctors, nurses, and other health care professionals have a long history of wearing face masks in clinical environments, but I’ve never seen a person in scrubs walking down the street in a face mask. That look is generally reserved to tourists, particularly from Japan and China, who wear masks as they see the sights. Surgical […]
My stethoscope is more than half my age and every year it gets proportionally closer to my age. It doesn’t have an expiration date and works just fine. In fact, not everything in medicine has a short expiration date or is consumable. Despite that, the traditional economy of healthcare is largely disposable. Healthcare materials are taken […]
What should a clinician wear when consulting with a patient? For many years the answer was simple: a white coat. A long one, if you were qualified, and a short one if you were in training. The white coat symbolized the clinician’s authority; until authority became a non-starter for some clinicians, such as psychiatrists and […]
Worldwide, the health of refugee women is in jeopardy. Conflict and dislocation disproportionately affect women, who already experience proportionately greater challenges in accessing health services for themselves. Refugee women’s health care is still focussed on an antiquated view of women as child bearers and rearers. Most of the health problems of displaced women are intertwined with […]
Whatever the political divides, citizens worldwide agree that responsible government should provide adequate healthcare for the whole population. Unfortunately, both patients and clinicians often get too subsumed in the weight of immediate crises to agitate beyond their own current concerns. Healthy children can help inject our anemic healthcare systems with new blood. We need to […]
Modern healthcare is undemocratic, antisocial and thus largely unresponsive to its patients’ needs. Never before has healthcare been so far removed from the people it services. It is time to bring democracy to health care. Our fragmented systems of silos of clinicians, administrators, funders, policy makers and governments make it almost impossible for voters to […]
As individuals we have little control over how we “insure” our future. As pension funds gain more and more control of our individual finances, it will become increasingly important to ensure that the investments they make relate to our needs and not just provide short-term financial returns on investment. Socially responsible investments help our ageing planet but […]
Two decades into our new century and the pieces of the medical puzzle still don’t fit together. Administrators, algorithm developers and funders each form a rigid static piece, promoting standardization of services, while physicians and patients desire developing more customized pieces. The prospect of any union is poor – unless the pieces can fit organically […]
Creating a corpus of effective women leaders is the holy grail of health care. Everyone wants it, thinks it is a panacea, and reveres it almost as much as motherhood these days. Despite a plethora of strategies, the critical mass of women leaders required to ignite enduring change is elusive. In part, this is due […]
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