With the doom-mongers of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) claiming its early demise after morethan 40 years of use, it'll be interesting to see what happens to the HRT market. In 2001, it was worth over £43.3bn and was still growing. Now that HRT isn't considered as safe as was first thought, pharmaceutical companies' revenues have been dropping. A report from visiongain (www.epharmaceuticalnews.com) entitled “Is this the end of HRT?” says that although the risks to health are very small, the HRT market will continue to decline, but the extent will depend on how well the pharmaceutical industry communicates with women and doctors.

Being unable to stand upright, otherwise known as “orthostatic intolerance,” is common after a general anaesthetic and is associated with an increased risk of postoperative morbidity. Is it related to the failure to maintain normal blood pressure, and to age and sex? A head-up tilt test conducted on 104 patients just after they had minor surgery under general anaesthetic found that the incidence of orthostatic hypotension was 76% among women over 40, 72% among men over 40, 46% among younger women, and 63% among younger men (Anaesthetics and Analgesia 2004;98: 40-5).

Neonatal jaundice, caused by an accumulation of bilirubin, is usually treated with phototherapy, but drug treatment …