Doctors must learn to let others treat them and their families

doi:10.1136/bmj.323.7303.47

BMJ 2001;323:47 ( 7 July )

Letters

Doctors must learn to let others treat them and their families

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR $---$ My parents, who are 92 and 86 and otherwise in excellent health, are both virtually blind as a result of glaucoma detectedtoo late. It is not their having the condition that saddens me,as they still manage to maintain their independence and constantlypush the boundaries of their impairment in order to enjoy lifeto the full. What is sad is that neither of them can attributelate diagnosis and the attendant complications to social deprivation,poor access to medical care, or any of the factors identifiedby Fraser et al.¹

Quite the opposite, in fact. My father is a retired general practitioner, a prominent member of the community in which I grewup. The best ophthalmologists in town would have readily investigatedand treated him or any of his immediate family free of charge $---$ ifthey had been asked to doso.

The problem is that too many . . . [Full text of this article]

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Deprivation and late presentation of glaucoma: case-control study: Scott Fraser, Catey Bunce, Richard Wormald, and Eric Brunner
BMJ 2001 322: 639-643. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

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Chalmers, I., Hey, E. (2001). Open letter to the chief medical officer. BMJ 323: 280-280 [Full text]

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