Minerva

How do people who’ve been admitted to hospital involuntarily come to terms with this experience, and integrate it into their life stories? In a small qualitative study, 15 patients who were interviewed about their admissions used terms such as “necessary emergency brake,” or “unnecessary over-reaction” to describe their experiences, and “over, and not to be recalled” or “a life changing experience” to indicate how they’d integrated the incidents. The diversity of their perspectives suggests that they came to terms with coercive measures when confronted with danger to self or others (British Journal of Psychiatry 2011;199:239-44, doi:10.1192/bjp.bp.110.087841).

Over 2100 UK trainee doctors completed scales rating their confidence in dealing with diabetes mellitus and how often they contributed to the management of diabetic patients (QJM 2011;104:761-66, doi:10.1093/qjmed/hcr046). Of these, 27% were “fully confident” about diagnosing diabetes, 55% about managing hypoglycaemia, 43% about managing diabetic ketoacidosis, 27% …