Why doctors are from Mars and patients are from Venus
Doctors are from Mars, patients are from Venus. It sounds like a play on Dr John Gray’s brilliant book from 1992, but from our medical…
Tag: Emergency medicine
‘Being an aged care doctor is not about being a saint — the rewards are there in front of you’
GP Dr Fiona Wallace, who trained in the Hebridean islands of Scotland, became disillusioned with her work at an Australian rural ED after seeing so…
Dog food, valium and a V8: My night shift in the ‘badlands’ of Adelaide
As part of AusDoc’s 40th anniversary, we have been publishing stories by readers about their most memorable day as a doctor. This account, by Dr Ralph…
‘Losing my balance, I rolled into the bed to join the new baby between the mother’s legs’
As part of AusDoc’s 40th anniversary, we have been asking readers to describe their most memorable day as a doctor. Here, you can read about…
Scoping out an unsettled child
Caleb, a three-year-old boy, is brought in by his parents with a four-day history of intermittent fever and soft stool. He has vomited twice over…
‘Mental health emergency work is not pretty — it’s a hybrid of Dante’s Inferno, Narcos and The Golden Girls’
Psychiatrist and TV presenter Dr Mark Cross knows the mental health system from both sides, as a clinician and a patient. In his book Mental…
Surgery on wrong site and retained dressings among ‘record’ number of medical errors
Lack of recognition of clinical deterioration made up one third of all sentinel events and half of paediatric events over 12 months, a Victorian report…
‘Health policy failure’: Coroner says baby who was ineligible for Medicare fell through the cracks
A newborn who died from malnutrition complications was ineligible for a Medicare-funded domiciliary review through the hospital where she was born and fell through the…
ED chaos, men in suits and car washes: Longstanding emergency doctor on where it’s all gone wrong
Dr Phillip Kay has spent decades trying to resolve the ever-growing “chaos and blockages” that have beset EDs and hospitals across Australia. He is now…
$2.7 million urgent care clinic ‘paused’ six weeks after opening
This story has been updated with details from the Hunter New England and Central Coast Primary Health Network about the clinic’s future. An urgent care…
