The BJGP is the world-leading primary care journal. At BJGP Life we add multi-media comment and opinion for the primary care community.
Hana MO Elhassan argues we should minimise health disparities through cultural competence. A good starting point is developing better awareness of common skin and hair care practices within various ethnic minority populations, and appreciating their clinical significance.
Sophy Wollaston offers a lyrical journey from doctor to patient and from community to hospital... and back again
We're on a summer break until 3 September 2024.
Newly-qualified GP John McCullough seeks wisdom from established GP and rural medicine lecturer Tim Sanders. It feels like a tough time to enter General Practice – has it always been this way?
The Appleby review is ostensibly a response to claims made on social media that there has been a substantial increase in suicide rates in current and recent patients of the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) at the Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust.
"I asked ChatGPT to write me 100 words on the potential uses of AI in UK general practice, and it instantaneously churned out the above. I am simultaneously amazed and terrified!" Paul McNamara ponders the role of AI in his professional lifetime.
The inappropriate transfer of work from secondary care in particular is a well-recognised problem which seems difficult to address. Ben Hoban wonders if this reflects a broadly political change in the goals of British healthcare.
In this episode, we talk to Professor Clare Turnbull about HRT risk and a family history of breast cancer.
Yonder looks at prescribing cascades, teacher wait time, online services for mental health conditions, community DVT pathways
Carter Singh reflects that we need to address the underlying cause of the racism, hatred, polarisation and intolerance that is now brimming over the edges into everyday life.
The 60th Venice Biennale hidden among the palazzi, churches, and gardens of this beautiful city reflects what is means to be ‘Foreign’. With a global backdrop of multifarious crises concerning movement across countries, nations, territories, and borders, this would seem a pertinent
"Non-medically qualified practitioners of medicine are not new. One may look at two spectacular examples of the contribution by these colleagues, Hamilton Naki and Mamitu Gashe ..."
In this episode, we talk to Dr Joe Hutchinson about how the problems with defining a GP's work in sessional terms.
Peter Toon and colleagues call on the new UK government to re-evaluate the market-driven ethos in which the NHS has been managed. Is a new GP Charter overdue?
Hannah Ritchie takes a clear-eyed view to understand how we got where we are, what the real problems are, and what we should be doing to build a truly sustainable world. Throughout Ritchie supports her arguments with evidence and data. Terry Kemple
Here, Rodney Jones looks at the allocation formulae that distribute money and resources to England’s Integrated Care Boards. He examines the hidden assumptions behind the formulae and asks why nearness to death has never been incorporated into the calculations.
The National Confidential Enquiry into Patient Outcome and Death (NCEPOD) review has recently published a review of the quality of care provided to people diagnosed with endometriosis. What can we learn from this report, and what can GPs do differently to improve
The whole of modern general practice in the UK rests on both the electronic healthcare record and networked services for requests and results. Brendan Delaney reflects on the Crowdstrike outage of July 19th 2024
In this episode, we talk to Anna Wilding about how the social prescribing link worker scheme is being rolled out.
Paul McNamara and Yoosuf Ibrahim argue that is imperative for GPs to highlight the increased risk of overdose associated with street valium use, given its unpredictable composition, to individuals struggling with drug dependency. Additionally, efforts should be made on disseminating knowledge about
If all we have to offer are platitudes and cures, we will be stuck forever trying to eat the elephant in the room, a possibility in theory, but rarely in practice. If we can understand and engage with our patient’s point of
How has increasing workload impacted on GPs, and our sense of providing safe care to our patients? Nada Khan finds that research into workload and safety suggests an association between wellbeing, burnout and patient safety.
Effective public health campaigns need more than posters and TV ads about going to see your GP. We need to get key community influencers in the team if we are going to have any impact whatsoever. John Havard argues that barbers have
In this episode, we talk to Lisa Davies about how to frame discussions in practice around opioid prescribing.
Yonder: a diverse selection of primary care relevant research stories from beyond the mainstream biomedical literature
The intervention takes less than a minute every day - and done at scale would be safe and as cheap as chips. Imagine that existing good quality evidence showed that it is 10 times more effective than the current NHS Health Check
"Health is whatever helps me to travel hopefully within and between my story-strands." Paul Thomas describes this as Community-Oriented Integrated Practice (COIP) – a way of thinking & acting that facilitates local collaboration for health and care.
"In the dynamic landscape of healthcare delivery, South Asia stands at the forefront of transformative change, particularly in the realm of family medicine. This article explores and elucidates the diverse models of family practice emerging across the region ... "
In this episode, we talk about the association between new onset anxiety and risk of developing Parkinson's.
I don’t need to tell a GP audience this, but it’s always worth a reminder. For us GPs the relationship is everything. Outside GPs this doesn’t seem widely understood. Everyone will agree that relationships are crucial, but usually in a way that
In 'Good Reasons for Bad Feelings', Randolph M. Nesse offers a fresh perspective on anxiety and depression in modern day living – that of evolutionary medicine, specifically evolutionary psychiatry.
Plans to include PAs in general practice have been recently challenged with a recent Royal College of General Practitioners’ (RCGP) call to halt additional recruitment and deployment of physician associates. The RCGP position is based on results from a recent survey of
As AI tools become increasingly sophisticated and accessible, it is important for GPs to engage with this technology, argues Marcus Lewis
Avoidant restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID) is classified as an eating disorder diagnosis. Clare Ellison and colleagues outline the potential signs of ARFID, detail an initial primary care assessment, and present resources for signposting and further CPD.
In this episode, we talk to Dr Meena Rafiq about diagnosis of sarcoma in general practice.
In Japan, there is a saying that deities disguise themselves as difficulties and offer trials to those who have true courage and strength. My supervisors taught me that when we are overwhelmed and troubled by complex problems, we should respond with sincerity
This book would resonate with parents of neurodiverse children and help them feel less alone, but I also think it is a funny and kind explanation for people who don’t have experience living with SEN or neurodiversity. With the increase in general
Competence expansion alone is not a viable solution to intolerable GP workloads in the UK or anywhere else. Richard Armitage has a simple message for policymakers on the mathematics of practitioner burnout.
Stories entertain us, but on a deeper level, they also help us make sense of our experience; they are cultural vectors, transmitting the values and wisdom of one generation to the next. The proper use of power is a common theme in
The recruitment and retention ‘crisis’ in general practice is far from being resolved, and it risks being seriously exacerbated by a lack of jobs in general practice.
