…the shape of hills, the movement of water, muscles and the eye, the mechanism of the woodpecker’s tongue, the development of the foetus, creation, innovation, perspective and momentum.
Tag Archives: Healthcare
Bob Ross, Happy and Unhappy accidents (healthcare and filler-TV)
I brought-up Bob when explaining to my colleagues the meaning of ‘happy accident’ – I was being flippant although the context was not.
If I told you I’m good, you would probably say I’m boasting & Teamworking
We want to be associated with the best – the best team, country, organisation.
Others don’t really care.
Some see the whole of the moon.
Others Brigadoon.
How long until I die? (Locked down and out in 2020)
Often old men and women will seek human contact, particularly when feeling isolated – and when I reciprocate with my gloved hand (that they don’t appear to notice as being anomalously purple or blue) we are able to make contact, to connect.
Jean Bishop (*warning – graphic images!)
Hard work, when translated into a vision that makes a significant difference is itself transformed, it becomes meaning, its return on investment is not necessarily financial, it is something more profound and longer-lasting.
Blogs, Poems, etc 2017
Rod’s Blogs, Poems, etc. Table of Contents I search for meaning. 6 ‘Behavioural’ 8 10 Years. 10 10 years. 11 99+. 13 1559 days. 15 A response to Henry. 17 A tale of two times?. 18 Acute. 20 Advance Care Plan, Human Rights & I want what I want 23 alea iacta est 25 AllContinue reading “Blogs, Poems, etc 2017”
School / Hospital
Do you learn in a hospital, do you get better in school?
The pain of homecoming…
Yes, it is a topsy-turvy world, one of contradictions, complications, improvement and innovation.
Visiting times
I am sure I have written about this before, in relation to my thoughts about the whole visiting times situation in the UK. Thanks to the work of John’s Campaign, the status quo is being eroded and the wards are being unlocked. For me, I return to questioning where my passion for this came-from; IContinue reading “Visiting times”
Unlearning and dying
We need to unlearn some of what we have taken-on, those of us who have moved through the profession and we need to support those who have just arrived to hold-on to their beginner’s mind
There is so much happening
People for whom caring is so inherent, so part of the job-description that it needn’t be said – like breathing, moving, loving – imperatives of existence.
Night at the hospital
There is an assumption that when the lights go down and the night-staff appear on the scene that things become quiet and still – a little like a scene from Bambi.
Person-centred
Could you Facetime your doctor when you are on holiday in Greece rather than having to wade through the complexities of health insurance (yes, Brexiters) and a foreign health system?
Just what are we doing?
Snap – your left hip.
Stop!
She survived. She could have died – I never asked the question.
1328 and some
‘Did my dad die because someone didn’t follow policy, didn’t pay attention or, was the outcome inevitable?’ ‘Might my mum have survived the operation if she had a different surgeon or she was at a different hospital?’
Revealing, honesty and openness
Thank goodness for those who push the boundaries, who are open and transparent, showing the world that we aren’t infallible, perfect beings. That we are all human.
Unnatural selection
You are unconscious, the focus for the doctors and nurses is maintaining your physiology with particular attention to your brain and heart.
Evolution two ways & Rio
As modern humans we are the best of the best – most of us are perhaps not as perfect as the Olympians strutting their stuff at Rio, but, pretty damn good.
Medicines, etc.
Nevertheless, within the dark underbelly of medicine, where geriatricians live, there are some quite stunning effects often, from stopping and sometimes starting medicines.
1328
They aren’t diseases or malfunctioning organs, they aren’t flow or machinations of the system; they are universes unto themselves and those who love them.
Isomers, CRP and diet
The concept of a ‘reassurance scan’ is particularly treacherous, for often, odd abnormalities are discovered – with such frequency in medicine that they even have their own name… ‘Incidentalomas’
Gut microbiome, antibiotics and older people
We, the homeostatic organisms that have evolved over the past four billion years, exist in a state of serenity when well, but things can be thrown out of kilter by disease.
More than one path
What could be better – working within science and the metaphysical, the harmonious synchronicity of mindful being and state-of-the-art clinical science?
Teacups
In other words, intravenous saline although a fundamental part of modern medicine is nowhere near as good as a cup of tea.
The Interceptors
The point, as is often the case, is my aversion to patients. Or rather, the existential construct that relates to the ‘patient state’ = they who suffer; with the principal goal of my life being to obviate suffering, my objective is to really stop people turning into patients.
And that is the role of the interceptors.
Dementia awareness week #DAW2016
Slow down, be mindful, respect your elders, respect your knees & don’t mess too much with your hair!
Medically fit
So long as you are still able to participate, join-in with the conversation, your perception of self is just as valid as that of the doctor or nurse.
Things could have been different…
How to change the system?
Continuity (ii)
I try my best to ensure the continuity of care, of relationships, particularly on my ward, which is critical as so many of the patients themselves are lost – being lost within a system which is itself lost, must be terrifying.
Vindication
And so, back to the junior doctors –
How far can you walk into a forest?
If you take away our air, our water and our food, we will not survive, that is the situation being foisted on doctors and everyone else in the health service.
Complex Adaptive Systems, Steppenwolf & Siddhartha
The essence of this is not to not do nothing, but, when we act, whether that act is big – going to war, or small, deciding to smile, there is a likelihood that the effects will reverberate far into time and space.
Puberty, the NHS and Laloux
Here we have it, a system that needs to be changed, a system that is changing and a process that is threatening to kill that system – you might think of puberty with anabolic steroids or platform boots – wobbly, unsafe and unsightly.
Visiting time, or, what is 21st Century Medicine?
Our actions at times border on the holy, and we cannot allow the profane to defile the sanctity of the experience.
There is a balance
Balance is the essence of nature; winter and summer, hot and cold, dead or alive, we constantly fluctuate between these extremes.
Carers, care and caring
These are questions I will never be able to answer.
Attitudes, beliefs and limitations
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Today I had a go at being a patient…
I didn’t have to remove my shoes, thanks to new trainers.
Innocence and experience – sorry, I don’t know
Unless I am 100% sure that it is the left kidney, surely I should ask before I remove the wrong one, or prescribe the wrong medicine or convey the wrong information.
I don’t like pathways
To a box, the world is the world, is the world.
Hello, my name is Dr Kersh
Call me Rod and I’ll be happy;
Theory of attributions and me
Attribution is funny and not something I fully understand.
Team – the next step
There has been a silent revolution happening…
Habit, hospital & older people
Habits are our liberation, they are also a limitation
So here is the thing & it’s me
We are human, all too human.
Fear and Change
In healthcare, it seems, like dominoes, different parts of the NHS are falling-over, systems and organisations toppling, stumbling
What do you do?
I have recently been asked to show what I do, to demonstrate, I guess, how much value I am for the money spent on me.
What is dementia?
Whether we follow the Japanese and find a new name, or work to continue to change attitudes and behaviours, steering people away from the stigma currently associated with dementia is unclear – it is certainly the bogeyman that TB, cancer and HIV once were, we just need to work towards finding better solutions and ways to support people until we find a way out.
Advance Care… the future?
We can look at quantity of life – something we have very little influence over, or, we can address, quality – an area we can influence tremendously.
Planning ahead…
I’m sorry if this sounds a little dark, and that, is probably part of the reason most people don’t want to go-here.
Cannulas and Cannulae
I can’t imagine what modern medicine would be like without these colourful pieces of plastic.
You don’t have ‘x’
You don’t have ‘x’ – this can be good news for some, for others it doesn’t really help… Let me explain. If a person feels ill or has a specific symptom – (the easier ones tend to be breathlessness, chest pain or cough), there are a fairly standard set of tests or investigations whichContinue reading “You don’t have ‘x’”
Patients in pyjamas
Patients in pyjamas – it might sound a little flippant, but I think this is something that is very important. I cannot comment on the behaviours of other patients outside of the UK – we, in Britain, approach hospital attire in a special way; pyjamas. I don’t know when pyjamas began in hospital – whether backContinue reading “Patients in pyjamas”
Safety Culture
Safety, therefore, I believe is ensuring that what we want to happen, happens, with no surprises, no red-herrings, complications or unscheduled stops.
Some more thoughts on urine infections…
It is likely that a doctor, a nurse or carer admitting, ‘something is wrong, I don’t know what,’ is better than heading off down a therapeutic blind alley.
Human Factors, space-time and Yiddishkeit
On Friday I attended the Yorkshire and Humber Patient Safety Collaborative ‘One Year On’ conference. A number of speakers from the region discussed the work they are doing to make predominantly hospitals, but all care in the wider sense, safer, less likely to result in inadvertent harm. Primum non nocere – first, do no harm,Continue reading “Human Factors, space-time and Yiddishkeit”
There is a strange aesthetic associated with care
If you go to an art gallery, whether the National Portrait in London or your local museum, where paintings are displayed, there is something mesmerising about the human face; when an artist captures the moment of silence, of stillness or of movement, when the years are brought into focus and a person is seen as aContinue reading “There is a strange aesthetic associated with care”
Tigers, Scotsmen, and hospitals
Last night I watched a re-run of ‘Lost Land of the Tiger’ – this is a nature documentary with Steve Backshall, Scottish Wildlife Cameraman Gordon Buchanan, Scottish Entomologist George McGavin and others wandering about the highlands and lowlands of Bhutan in search of evidence of tigers. The programme focuses on the creation of a ‘tigerContinue reading “Tigers, Scotsmen, and hospitals”
Dr Rod’s Odd Blog (almondemotion) 