Health-care guide

Health-care guide from
The Globe and Mail

195,000 U.S. deaths blamed on hospital error

MSNBC - 195,000 U.S. deaths blamed on hospital error

Statins

Life-saving heart drug now on sale - Evening Times

Science on show in Stockholm

Why do science’s messages so often get lost in the midst of media coverage of controversies such as genetically modified crops? If they didn’t, would a regulatory process that involved more public participation help or hinder technological development? How can we separate hype from reality in fields such as stem-cell research and robotics? What are the neural underpinnings
of our awareness of action? And, by the way, how can light be brought to a standstill?
The chances are that, as a Nature reader, you are interested in all of these questions. They and many others are being addressed in Stockholm, Sweden, on 25–28 August, at a meeting for scientists, policymakers, the media and the wider public: the EuroScience Open Forum
2004.For the conference programme,see www.esof2004.org.
Nature should declare its interest, having supported the forum since its conception (see Nature 423, 571; 2003).We are organizing two sessions: one on the prospects and challenges presented at the European level by infectious diseases; the other examining the predictability or otherwise of extreme climatic events in Europe.We are also organizing talks and workshops on careers themes, including one of universal interest,on how to negotiate your salary.
There are obvious parallels with the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). In a cynical age, some observers have questioned the need for such large gatherings.
And there are bound to be grumbles about holding the inaugural European meeting of this type at the tail-end of the holiday season.
But if nothing else, the AAAS meeting provides a valuable focus for mainstream media reatment of issues of scientific importance.
If the EuroScience forum can achieve a reasonable fraction of this coverage, and a measure of public participation, it will be a welcome addition to the annual meetings calendar.
As its name suggests, the meeting includes a specifically European agenda, with sessions that address both professional issues (such as the commercialization of Europe’s universities) and topics of broader topicality (for example, the continent’s transformation to a lowcarbon economy).But science is global, and so are most of the topics that will be discussed in Stockholm.We hope to see you there.

(NATUREVOL 430 15 JULY 2004 www.nature.com/nature)

Learning in practice

BMJ 2004;329:92-94 (10 July),
Learning in practiceReform of undergraduate medical teaching in the United Kingdom: a triumph of evangelism over common sense
Gareth Williams, dean1, Alice Lau, fourth year medical student1
1 Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry, University of Bristol, Bristol BS8 1TH
Correspondence to: G Williams Gareth.Williams@bris.ac.uk There is an urgent need to test whether the current reforms in training of doctors are the right answer to the shortcomings of traditional training
The past decade has seen concerted attempts to revolutionise undergraduate medical training in the United Kingdom. Advocates for change have claimed that traditional teaching is old fashioned and too detailed and produces doctors with poor interpersonal skills (box). Key reforms, endorsed by the UK General Medical Council (GMC), included the deliberate reduction of factual knowledge and the replacement of didactic teaching with problem based learning (PBL) directed by the students themselves.1 About a third of UK medical schools have now embraced these principles.
This strategy is entirely untested in UK medical students, and no evidence exists that it will produce better doctors. Here, we argue that the "new" ideology may actually damage medical training in this country and that educational reform is being driven by enthusiasm for change rather than by rational responses to the shortcomings of traditional curriculums.
By 2030, the number of deaths resulting from tobacco use will reach 7 million a year in the developing world, the authors of a review in Thorax have estimated (2004;59:623-30). (more in the hyperlink)

Critica Medicina

Crítica Medicina:
Dr.Alejandro Wajner ahwajner@intramed.net.ar
un espacio creativo con reflexiones críticas
para construir la Medicina Social.
http://www.geocities.com/critica_medicina

UNIVERSITE DE GENEVE-FACULTE DE MEDECINE

Bienvenue à l'UDREM
A Professora Margaret Gerbase-Weidenbach (Margaret.Gerbase@hcuge.ch) enviou o endereço da Faculdade de Medicina onde está trabalhando na reformulação curricular. Vale a pena visitar, e ela estaria disposta a trocar idéias.

INGENIOUS: Medicine

Although scientific medicine has been delivering more and more, in recent decades it has been trusted less and less. This paradox reflects worrying tales of medical misfortune as well as a decreasing trust in authority in general. Symbols of this paradox in the Science Museum collections include relics from both the development of penicillin, the original 'wonder-drug', and from the MMR vaccine, the subject of contemporary controversy. Antibiotics, vaccines and pills to treat mental torment were once all treated as wonder drugs. Today, despite their undoubted benefits, we often hear of side-effects, addiction and bacterial resistance. Patients worry that addiction, for instance, can result from drugs prescribed by doctors, so increasingly they select their own treatments. Ironically, while there has been an increase in self-treatment, there has also been an increase in cosmetic surgery, where healthy individuals have chosen to seek medical help to alter their appearance, not cure their ills.