Medical Misadventures

Alistair Fraser-Moodie

Description

* A memoir looking at the ups and downs of a doctor's life. A 'warts and all' examination of the NHS through the last 50 years. The book also looks at the looming crisis in the NHS when the number of doctors will dramatically fall. Alistair Fraser-Moodie believes he was probably born into medicine. His mother was a general practitioner working from home, his father was a surgeon & also a dentist. Following his 'destiny' he started training as a doctor. He recalls 5 years at medical school learning very little about medicine, but a lot about girls, alcohol and sport. Now after 54 years as a doctor, and having recently retired, Alistair has written about his personal journey through the highs and lows of the medical profession.Alistair had many different jobs within the NHS and for a while was a plastic surgeon. But in 1978 he was appointed a single-handed emergency casualty consultant in Derby, a position that is now shared between 16 people. He remained there until 2007. During this time he became an expert in 'Road Traffic Accidents' and made many court appearances as an Expert Witness. He writes about many of medical misadventures, dilemmas and curious cases that occurred while in the A&E.Alistair also lays bare the medical problems attributable to, and suffered by, the doctors themselves. He looks at the incredible stress that doctors have to suffer. And many of the problems of the health system which have been made worse by government policies. How sick is the NHS? Well read this uncensored account of a lifetime in the NHS which is both true and for adults only. If you read this book cover to cover then you will see why the NHS is in the mess it is in.Only then, he would maintain, can drastic action be taken.

Sujets

• Médecine
• Medicine

Informations

• Publié par: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 28 mars 2018
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781789010954
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

MEDICAL MISADVENTURES
The Author
Medical Student, St Thomas’ Hospital 1960-65,
MRCS, LRCP (1965), MBBS (London 1967),
FRCS Eng, FRCS Edin, FRCS A&E, DCH, D Obst, RCOG, ATLS.
Serving Brother Officer, St Johns Ambulance Brigade,
Appointed Casualty Consultant, Derbyshire Royal Infirmary (1978), later renamed Emergency Consultant.
Retired 2007.
Clinical Teacher 2007-2015.

Copyright © 2018 Alistair Fraser-Moodie
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.
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ISBN 978 1789010 954
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd
This book is dedicated to my five grandchildren – Angus, Rory, Louisa, Mirren and Thomas. (They all can be seen on page 597 .) Included in the dedication are any future grandchildren.
Contents
List of Figures
Preface
Acknowledgements
1 . Interviews for Medical School (1960)
2 . Who Influenced This Choice of Career?
3 . Medical School
4 . More Medical Student Days and Nights
5 . The Long Hot Summer and Cold Winter of 1963
6 . Queen Square and Finals
7 . Junior Posts
8 . Second Job: General Medicine House Physician, Barnet General Hospital
9 . The ECFMG Examination
10 . Third Job: Casualty, St Thomas’
11 . First-aiders
12 . Fourth Job: Gynaecology & Obstetrics
13 . Paediatrics
14 . The Primary FRCS (1971)
15 . Working for the Final FRCS
16 . My First Registrar Job
17 . More Snow and More Drinks
18 . Plastic Surgery
19 . Derby, 1978
20 . Charity
21 . The Derby Accident Flying Squad
22 . Road Traffic Accidents
23 . A Minor Disaster, 1970s
24 . Coloured Patients
25 . Accidents and the Wheeled Bin Refuse Collection
26 . No Fixed Abode
27 . History Repeats Itself
28 . Three Lucky Escapes
29 . Medico- legal
30 . Writing a Report
31 . More Law Courts
32 . Medical Administration
33 . My Experience of Interviews for Jobs
34 . The Birth of our National Health Service
35 . Health Service Planning in the 21st Century
36 . Is Working in a Hospital Dangerous Today?
37 . Practical Jokes and Other Funnies Over the Years
38 . Mistakes and Mismanagement: What Has Gone Wrong? What Can We Do About It?
39 . Mistakes of Communication – More Misadventures Than Ever (Some of them mine!)
40 . The General Medical Council
41 . Local Anaesthetic Minor Operations
42 . Surgical Rarities: Oh Gosh, this is rare, but true!
43 . Appendicitis
44 . Tropical Medicine
45 . Yet More Diseases From Abroad(?)
46 . Some Problems with Alcohol and Drugs
47 . Smoking
48 . Size Matters – Too Thin
49 . What is wrong with me, Doctor?
50 . How and Why did Mike Hawthorn Die?
51 . My Hereditary, and Other, Problems
52 . Medicine Today
53 . Today – Our National Health Service – The Cost
Postscript
Appendix A
List of Figures Fig 1 Me, pre-interview. Fig 2 Lord Lister. Fig 3 My parents dining at the Central Middlesex Hospital one evening. Fig 4 Sir Harold Gillies. Fig 5 Mike Hawthorn. Fig 6 My London University registration card. Fig 7 The Medical School at St Thomas’ Hospital, 1960. Fig 8 St Thomas’ Hospital 1960. Fig 9 My fellow students at St Thomas’ Hospital,1960. Fig 10 My two numbers from the walks that I did from London to Brighton. Fig 11 My first clinical year. Fig 12 A ward at St Thomas’ Hospital. Fig 13 Dave MacSweeney: novelist, poet and wit. Fig 14 Me playing a shot against Oxford University. Fig 15 London University Golf Team, 1964. Fig 16 Well, we did go skiing in ski school… Fig 17 A view of the Matterhorn. Fig 18 My skiing party. Fig 19 Lipoma in situ. Fig 20 Lipoma once it had been removed. Fig 21 Christmas 1965 at Queen Mary’s Hospital, Roehampton. Fig 22 The whole cast of the Christmas Revue at the Central Middlesex Hospital, 1967. Fig 23 Me with a student nurse on my right and a sister on my left. Fig 24 Here I am again, in a cable car this time. Fig 25 Yet another skiing party. Fig 26 Me on skis waiting for a ski school race. Fig 27 My skiing party. Fig 28 A student doctor, me, and a student nurse, Helen. Fig 29 Dr John Harvey and me. Fig 30 A poster for the doctors’ World Cup race with my skies, my number, and of course that cup. Fig 31 The Gillies Hooks. Fig 32 The Gillies needle-Holders and Scissors are combined as one instrument. Fig 32 The Gillies needleholder with a suture. Fig 34 The Derbyshire Royal Infirmary. Fig 35 The Kegworth plane crash. Fig 36 An invitation to meet the Queen, and a brochure about the hospital. Fig 37 My colleague Paul Pritty (back to the camera) talks to the Queen and shows her photographs of the plane crash. Fig 38 Two white-coated orthopaedic surgeons are on my left. On my right are an anaesthetist and the major incident officer. Fig 39 One coat covers all. Fig 40 Her finger was stuck in the plughole. Fig 41 Wheelie bin injuries were very common initially. Fig 42 A shop hopper collapses. Fig 43 Postman’s finger injury. Fig 44 Postman’s finger strikes yet again. Fig 45 Here is the crime scene. I pity the poor postman. Fig 46 Willie in the centre is our captain in 2012 on captain’s day at Chevin Golf Club. Fig 47 Burns to the feet like this can only be non-accidental. Fig 48 My first contract. Fig 49 Now here is a lorry upside down after an accident. Fig 50 If a person is trapped in a burning building then the smoke will kill that person long before they are burnt. Fig 51 An electrical burn to the foot. Fig 52 The two tattoos have been burnt off with acid to leave painful raw areas. Fig 53 External angular dermoid cyst. Fig 54 Keloid scar. Fig 55 Malignant melanoma with no pigment. Fig 56 A malignant melanoma of the toe. Fig 57 Chest moles. Fig 58 X-ray of that needle in this bottom. Fig 59 My father’s metal detector. Fig 60 This X-ray shows how easy it is to leave glass in a wound. Fig 61 This man wore a hat to my clinic. He kept it on, and was reluctant to remove it. Why, oh why? Fig 62 Oh, that is why! Once I removed this little cyst, he took off his hat. Fig 63 Here is that tiny cyst. Fig 64 I’ve got it nailed. Fig 65 Nailed it again. Fig 66 Just joined the chain gang. Fig 67 You’ve been framed! Fig 68 A stitch in time – saves? Fig 69 Chuck it to me. Fig 70 I’m into metalwork. Fig 71 How square can you get? Fig 72 Another view of this strange square wound. Fig 73 Artist’s impression of the X-ray. Fig 74 Mike Hawthorn, the World Champion driver. Fig 75 Mike Hawthorn’s car. What a mess! Fig 76 Mr Giffin the President. Fig 77 Me as Father Christmas with sister on my ward in 1965. Fig 78 A Burns Night at the hospital. Fig 79 Me dancing with my wife at a Burns Night. Fig 80 My prize-winning squash that weighed over 22 kilograms. Fig 81 I won the Lindsey Cup for golf in 2014 . Fig 82 Fishing off Lord Howe Island. Fig 83 More fishing at Lord Howe. Fig 84 My grandchildren.
PREFACE
Health is not everything, but without health everything is nothing.
A wise man ought to realise that health is his most valued possession.
Hippocrates
At practically the end of my medical career I came to realise that I did not want to stop. My ageing brain still buzzed. A few neurones still synapsed. I was impatient, but for what, I thought? I recalled that in my medical life I had met a lot of patients, and witnessed a lot of changes. This book is of a 54-year medical journey that I have found fascinating.
Things did not always work out. I have failed more than my share of examinations. I have been forced into a change of career specialty. I ended up idyllically happy working as an emergency consultant for over 30 years. I had the best job in the world. In view of my patchy academic record some people might say I was lucky to become a consultant. Several of my medical colleagues failed to progress up the ladder.
Finally I came to realise that, nearly retired, I did not have to stop. This was because I was spurred on. This book was inside me. It wanted to escape and spread itself over page after page after page.
So I got out a blank piece of lined paper and a biro. Hey presto – this book exploded into life. I did not write it. This book wrote itself. All of it is true, though admittedly there are a few stories and facts included that I have been told by others. Names have occasionally been changed, and sometimes a patient or doctor may recognise himself or herself, so pseudonyms disguise identity. Nobody else will know who you are – unless you have given me permission to use your name or, in a few instances, I didn’t think a friend would mind. Apologies to one and all. Most patients are entirely anonymous and I defy anybody to be able to trace them through this narrative.
The reader may be amazed that occasionally patient confidentiality has been breached. This is because a few patients wanted to be identified. Some edited my script and others wrote it for me. Thank you, patients, one and all. I have worked in 30 district general hospitals and so my patients written up here come from all over the country.
I have quoted extensively, and definitely not consciously plagiarised, as I have referenced each quote. Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but I have tried hard to avoid this pitfall. Apologies if, in error, I have strayed in this d