Tag: healthcare

Part II, The next five years

Let me start by describing an average episode of care in 2017. John is in his mid-50’s, a smoker (average 10 cigarettes a day), drinks regularly (around 2 pints of beer or 2 medium glasses of wine on his heaviest drinking day) and does not exercise frequently. He is overweight and has a family history of heart disease. John booked an appointment with his local GP because he had been having worsening chest pains over the previous five weeks. His GP referred him to the local rapid access chest pain clinic, where he had tests such as an ECG. The tests did not show any abnormalities and John was sent back to his GP with a note asking his doctors to continue monitoring him in case his symptoms worsened. His GP received the summary but did not schedule a follow-up appointment with John because the practice was short-staffed that day. (more…)

Typical advice about how to critically think about and appraise papers/literature

by Nisha Shah

As a junior researcher in a well-known academic centre, I often have to review the literature to: familiarise myself with a topic area; search the literature to support the writing of a paper; and, critically evaluate previous literature for quality and find gaps in a research area.

The latter is often the most difficult: critiquing others’ work, especially if it’s a prominent academician from a big academic institution, can be daunting as I am still trying to develop my analytical abilities. So where do you begin to know where to start critically evaluating literature?

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Protocol for a Systematic Review of Patient Safety in Mental Health Published

by Beth Thibaut

Despite the growing international interest in patient safety as a discipline, there has been a lack of exploration of its application to mental health. It cannot be assumed that findings based upon physical health in acute care hospitals can be applied to mental health patients, disorders and settings.

A team of researchers within the Imperial College Patient Safety Translational Research Centre (PSTRC) recently published a systematic review protocol (D’Lima, D., Archer, S., Thibaut, B. I., Ramtale, S. C., Dewa, L. H., & Darzi, A. (2016). A systematic review of patient safety in mental health: a protocol based on the inpatient setting. Systematic Reviews, 5(1), 203). (more…)