Published 6 January 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b33
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;338:b33

Views & Reviews

Starting Out

'I’ll bet you a fiver it’s not'

Kinesh Patel, junior doctor, London

kinesh_patel@yahoo.co.uk

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

Post-take ward rounds are not usually an opportunity to earn some much needed cash, so you can imagine my surprise when the consultant playfully offered me a cash reward to make a diagnosis on a patient with a rare condition.

Why did the consultant bet money against my diagnosis? Because the condition in question was vanishingly rare, and with odds of nearly a million to one he believed (not unreasonably) that his money would be safe. Why did I admit the patient? Because the case struck a chord among my somewhat hazy recollections of the information I learnt for my postgraduate examinations.

Which is why it is so surprising to me that the medical establishment has become complicit in allowing medicine to be dumbed down. The entry criteria to be a medical registrar—according to the ubiquitous person specifications—no longer include a requirement to have passed the Member of the Royal . . . [Full text of this article]


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to StumbleUpon StumbleUpon   Add to Technorati Technorati    What's this?

Rapid Responses:

Read all Rapid Responses

And the correct answer is....
David J Haldane
bmj.com, 9 Jan 2009 [Full text]
Revealed
Kinesh Patel
bmj.com, 11 Jan 2009 [Full text]
Hens tooth?
Nicholas B Argent
bmj.com, 12 Jan 2009 [Full text]
Diagnosis, diatribes and dilemmas
Patrick K Plunkett
bmj.com, 15 Jan 2009 [Full text]
The answer
Kinesh Patel
bmj.com, 16 Jan 2009 [Full text]
Re: The answer
Dipak Mistry
bmj.com, 12 Mar 2009 [Full text]
Access jobs at BMJ Careers
Whats new online at Student BMJ