Anonymous diary of an opinionated medic (MBBS, not MSc). Retweets are not endorsements. Tweets may contain 'spices'. ⚠️ Supporter for #PayRestoration
Joined January 2020
- Tweets 6,763
- Following 462
- Followers 280
- Likes 11,935
258 Photos and videos
Person Pikin retweeted
Jun 14
This is a complete, shameful lie.
Most women go through their pregnancy in this country not even seeing a doctor, instead being managed by midwives who miss major medical issues.
De-medicalisation of maternity care is why we’re in this mess of poor maternal outcomes.
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Person Pikin retweeted
Jun 9
This one hits hard.
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thetimes.com/article/73f7df4…
Bookmark this for when the two-tier healthcare system wins.
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Person Pikin retweeted
- make sure the order is clear that only a medical doctor with the requisite medical degree and postgraduate training can have a CCT
- the GMC board must have a majority of doctor members that are elected not appointed 4/n
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Common sense but suggest this to patients, outrage!
“You want me to make my child have an allergic reaction?!”
After the drastic change in guidance to no longer keep allergenic foods away from babies until 1 to 3 years of age and instead introduce them by 6 months of age, the prevalence of egg allergy among children fell by more than 17% in a new study published Monday in the journal JAMA Pediatrics. cnn.it/4v50rM0
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Big GOW fan, but I’m not sure how I feel about the Jell’O cube in Laufey. Maybe it will grow on me. Maybe? 🤔
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Person Pikin retweeted
Jun 2
The speed at which the far-right has mobilized around this tragedy exposes a staggering empathy deficit.
For yrs, when Black communities in the UK called for inquiries into deaths in custody or the disproportionate use of force, the Far right's response was often to scrutinize the victim's past, defend the difficult job of the police, & demand unquestioning respect for law & order.
Now, when faced with a catastrophic police failure affecting a young white man, the immediate response from the right is anti-establishment fury & demands for RADICAL overhaul.
It forces the question: if experiencing just a fraction of the institutional dismissiveness minorities face is this unbearable, why was there such fierce resistance to understanding the minority experience for all these years?
Jun 2
🚨 WATCH: Nigel Farage says the bodycam footage of Henry Nowak is “proof of two tier policing”
“The rights and privileges of white people matter less than those of ethnic minorities”
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So IGN really rated this James Bond game as a 9/10 and gave Crimson Desert a 6/10?
What are they smoking?
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Person Pikin retweeted
May 29
Absolutely this in respect of PSA
May 28
When I first looked into the UK debate on a national prostate cancer screening programme, especially with the advent of gamechangers like mpMRI, had to ask, does any Western country actually do mass screening?
It turns out Lithuania does & it’s the ultimate cautionary tale.
It was launced in 06 with routine PSA blood tests for men aged 50–74 & if the PSA was elevated it triggered a direct referral for a TRUS biopsy.
Within a year, prostate Ca incidence rates skyrocketed to the highest in the world (peaking at over 182/100,000) with mostly indolent cancers being found that would've never caused symptoms or affected their lives. —Overdiagnosis.
With it they also recorded massive rates of unnecessary radical prostatectomies leaving healthy men with lifelong incontinence & erectile dysfunction (as high as 50% in some areas)—Overtreatment.
It is like a living example of everything the NSC is worried about could happen if the UK blindly deploys a programme and fails to follow available evidence.
They are not shutting the door on prostate cancer screening, for now, the committee has taken a cautious but responsible position, pledging to review new evidence as it becomes available & to revisit its recommendations when the science supports doing so.
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Person Pikin retweeted
Sir William Osler, 1849-1919, renowned as the father of modern medicine, famously instructed medical students to: "Listen to your patient, he is telling you the diagnosis." It's a simple dictum, but the foundation of the way Osler revolutionised healthcare by insisting that doctors step away from their desks and focus on their patients.
Everyone longs for functioning, joined-up NHS IT, @jamesmurray_ldn (though not via Palantir) - but to suggest, as you have in this post, that history-taking is a tedious irrelevance is to completely misunderstand the nature of medicine. That first conversation between doctor and patient is a close, shrewd, vital therapeutic encounter. As we listen, we observe, appraise, distil. Invariably, the diagnosis can be made. But history-taking, like the rest of medicine, is the marriage of science with humanity. It treats patients as people, not as objects with disease. Through your time, care and attentiveness in history-taking, you communicate something vital to a patient - that they matter and that you care.
Please never forget that healthcare is not a production line of objects, it's an enterprise built on relationships, with humanity at its core. Medical history-taking is its bedrock.
Jun 1
I know how distressing it is for patients to repeat their medical history over and over.
And the effort it takes for NHS staff to get the information they need.
We'll join up this fragmented system, helping clinicians give safer, co-ordinated care.
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With all these media appearances to say nonsense, do you ever get the time to just sit down and think of what you’re doing or what you’ve been asked to say? Like critically think about it?
Jun 1
I know how distressing it is for patients to repeat their medical history over and over.
And the effort it takes for NHS staff to get the information they need.
We'll join up this fragmented system, helping clinicians give safer, co-ordinated care.
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Person Pikin retweeted
Taking a full medical history from the patient in front of you, regardless of what’s been done before, is 2/3 of the diagnostic process.
In medicine everything is mutable. Relying on what has been said or documented previously is dangerous.
Jun 1
I know how distressing it is for patients to repeat their medical history over and over.
And the effort it takes for NHS staff to get the information they need.
We'll join up this fragmented system, helping clinicians give safer, co-ordinated care.
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So the reason we should prescribe OTC medicines so that patients can buy themselves is because the NHS is paying £136 million per year on these medicines.
So rather than pay, transfer the additional cost to the taxpayer who is already paying for the NHS. Nice.
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Person Pikin retweeted
May 31
Yesterday’s refereeing was one of the best I’ve seen in a long time.
For the first 15 minutes, the ref fell for Arsenal’s shenanigans: blowing a foul for every slight fall and every little touch. Then, all of a sudden, he clocked their dirty antics and took complete control of the game.
He stopped buying their silly theatrics: Mosquera time wasting, Havertz falling at every slight touch, Saka wasting time for the corner, Arteta touchline tantrums, Madueke diving. I can go on and on
Arsenal have become so used to getting away with this cunning stuff from Premier League refs that they seemed genuinely shocked when it didn’t work.
I’m glad the referee refused to be intimidated and stood his ground. That’s how you referee a final.
You might con your way to a Premier League title, but you can’t do it in the UCL. Either you play like real men or go home
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Person Pikin retweeted
May 30
Primum non nocere.
Every doctor involved in the scandal of 'gender medicine', that slavishly followed the affirmation model with no circumspection and no evidence, betrayed their profession and patients.
May 29
I challenge every single person who believes minors should be enabled and even encouraged to transition to read this first person testimony to the end.
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via @IWF independentwomen.com/2026/05…
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May 31
On face value, the title “advanced nurse practitioner” should mean a nurse that “out-nurses” other nurses, not a Temu doctor, but we be wilding out here with terminology and oneupmanship.
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Person Pikin retweeted
May 30
Voltaire passed away today in 1778.
There are two quotes of his I always come back to:
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it."
and
“Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.”
Community note
The first quote is not by Voltaire. It was created by Evelyn Beatrice Hall in 1906 to summarize his philosophy. The second quote is a variation of Voltaire's 1765 words which referred to committing injustices rather than atrocities.
quoteinvestigator.com/2015/06/01/def… quoteinvestigator.com/2021/11/08/abs…
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May 30
“Could I have a nurse that speaks English” when the person in front of you clearly speaks English, but isn’t pallid.
Or “could I have a British nurse instead”?
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May 30
What’s the PSA’s job again? And what are they doing about this nonsense?
May 29
Remember the outcry when the GMC became the register for PAs / AAs?
Now the GMC wants to create a single unified register: zero distinction.
UK Medicine will not be destroyed in one go: it’ll be a catalogue of decisions towards professional annihilation
bma.org.uk/our-campaigns/all…
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