Archived Blog
Just read a BBC article with some scarey scarey stats on smoking in China:
Between that and the birth rate going through the floor thanks to the gender imbalance (see, told you one child policy was a dumb idea) it’s a wonder there are any of them left.
I was watching Sunrise this morning and they referred to a speech made by the Australian federal health minister Tony Abbott about the federal government’s preparations for a potential influenza pandemic.
The speach itself makes a really interesting read, but the bit I found most curious was the minister’s prediction of the impact of a pandemic:
“A Commonwealth Government report published last year estimated that a major flu pandemic could lead to 2.6 million Australians seeking medical attention, 58,000 hospitalisations and 13,000 deaths.”
When you consider that the 1918 spanish flu pandemic infected at least 25% of people within the USA, and had a 2.5% mortality rate, these numbers seem a little low. (Admittedly any new pandemic probably won’t be as virulent as the 1918 one, but it does provides us with an upper limit for how virulent we know any new flu strain reasonably could be).
Doing the rough math and applying it to today’s Australian population you get something like 5 million infected (25% of 20 million), with something like 125,000 dying. This is a bit more than the government estimates (although of course I don’t know the method that they used to reach their figures).
Addendum: I have subsequently found the above quoted report, and so when I get around to reading it I can tell you what it says about their method of estimation…
These numbers would of course be influenced both positively and negatively by factors that are present in modern society which were not present in 1918, such as:
Of course what would actually happen is very hard to reliably predict, but it’s interesting to have a think about it anyway.
Earlier today I ran into a story on BBC about a 13 year old from florida who was denied the right to an abortion by a court.
On the face of it it seems like a simple Woman’s right to choice debate (something which I must say at this point I wholeheartedly support), which seemed to be unfortunately how most of the usual suspects in these arguments were taking it. The ACLU was going to appeal the decision, and no doubt the christian right was going to praise the judge, and everyone was going to go on missing the point that the judge had made the right legal choice, since the case has nothing to do with right to life.
Instead, it was all to do with the girl’s ability to provide valid consent for the termination proceedure, seeing as she was only 13.
For those of you who are medically educated this will not be new, however for others of you out there this may be unfamilar, and thus I felt it was worth educating you on.
Most countries and states define an age at which adolescents can make medical decisions independant of their parents (often 16), and below that age the parents or legal guardians are responsible for providing consent for medical interventions for the child which are necessary and in the child’s best intersts.
The exception to this arises in the situation where the child is considered to posess Gillick Competence. This is where a child is not yet at the age of consent, but is able to demonstrate that they understand the nature of the proposed medical proceedure, and more importantly, that they understand the abstract implications of deciding for or against undertaking the proceedure. If they can do this, then many juristictions will allow children to provied consent without parental input.
In the florida case, the 13 year old girl was not denied an abortion on “right to life” moral grounds, but rather on the basis that her legal guardian (in this case the state) was able to convince the judge that the girl was not old enough or mature enough to make the decision herself, and as such her guardian (the state) was still responsible to making decisions as to what it thought was in the girl’s best intersts.
Of course the intesting thing is that only 4 years ago I wouldn’t have know anything about gillick competence, and would have probably been ranting from the other perspective of how the girl’s rights had been trampled by a conservative judiciary. It’s interesting how education modifies morality by opening your eyes to previously unseen options and perspectives.
On March 31 the New Zealand Medical Association, in conjunction with the New Zealand Medical Students’ Association, the New Zealand University Students’ Association realeased a publication entitled “Doctors and Debt: The Effect of Student Debt on Doctors“. It was a cohort study of first year house officers (interns) in New Zealand, and outlined the impact that high university fees and correspondingly high student loans have had on the members of the cohort, both individually and on a statistical level within the entire cohort.
For New Zealand Students (medical or otherwise) it serves as a depressingly predictable validation of the claims that have been made since the begining of the student loan scheme about the detrimental effects of such debt on young graduates, and the subsequently the economy and infrastructure of the country as a whole.
For my australian readers it’s worth a read, as it is a stern warning of the effects of allowing such policies to be implemented, because while Australia is currently benefiting from the immigration of NZ doctors into higher paying locum positions within Australia, the current push by the federal government to allow full fee paying medical school positions, to increase the fees attached to government subsidised HECS medical school places, and the failure of certain states to maintain competitive (ie market driven and realistic) award pay rates for junior doctors could combine quite rapidly to leave Australia in the same medical staffing crisis that New Zealand is increasingly experiencing.
Saw my first brain surgery today. Not nearly as exciting as I had been led to believe. Hard to see anything, and it all looks the same, and everything bleeds lots (which contributes considerably to the previous problems of not being able to see anything and it all looking the same).
Suppose I can scratch neurosurgeon from the list too. It’d be OK at a push as a career (they do get to play with some really pretty cool technology) but I wasn’t sufficiently inspired by the procedural stuff, and many the outcomes for the patients I’ve seen on the wards would require you to have either a really thick skin or a huge daily dose of Zoloft.
Haven’t added anything to the blog in a while, at least it feels that way. The cardiology rotation, while not getting any more interesting (scratch another career option – Cardiology – too boring) has gotten a bit more busy, with the registrar and resident finally realising (two days before the end of the rotation) that med students aren’t only useful for their wit, charm and good looks, but can also be put (generally quite happily) to work admitting patients, putting in canulas, and doing any number of other menial tasks. Pity for both parties that it took them so long to figure this out, but the overall outcome has been that I have actually been spending full days at the hospital (vs. 1-2 hours per day average in the first week and a half) and so haven’t been being so proactive at adding stuff to this page.