How Cancer Spreads.
Think of London as an overcrowded uncontrolled population of humans. Humans are like the cells that make up a cancer. Think of London as a primary cancer. I think of it as being an aggressive prostate...
View ArticleFeeling Like You Have No Control Over Your Destiny
This very short blog piece serves as some background information for the next piece.When I was a surgeon in training, there was obvious rivalry between two members of the unit. If one of the pair liked...
View ArticleClik here to view.
It Was All My Fault That a Patient Died.
Back in the late 1980’s, I was working as a junior general surgical registrar. In such a role, I was allowed to perform minor surgery, often unsupervised. Back then, general surgeons were commonly...
View ArticlePoaching staff is not the done thing. Or is it?
It takes a lot of effort to train up a surgical assistant, particularly with complex surgery. Surgeons who have been involved in this process will by virtue of human nature and tradition of self...
View ArticleClik here to view.
If something happens to me, will I have done enough to enable a colleague to...
As an academic surgeon, I probably get to see more second opinion cases than for most in my field. My university association and digital footprint probably tends to attract these cases although I make...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Robert H. Farnsworth - my hero in urology
At the Gala Dinner of the Urological Society of Australia and New Zealand (USANZ) Annual Scientific Meeting on 13 April 2015, a special man was the recipient of the Society Medal (USANZ Medal). Robert...
View ArticleBullying Culture in Surgery - Has Nothing Changed?
The airing of the Four Corners report on an entrenched culture of bullying of surgical trainees and medical students has for the very first time pushed this matter into the public spotlight. The...
View ArticleCardiac Surgeons Were Once Untouchable
About 30 years ago, coronary artery bypass graft surgery (CABG) was the mainstay of treating narrowed coronary arteries that supplied blood to the muscle of the heart. Such surgery was predominantly,...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Academic Dishonesty as a Medical Student - How Prevalent? What Does the...
Earlier this evening, a media ‘exclusive’ was published in the Sydney Morning Herald. The article is about my own institution, The University of Sydney. This was a huge shock. This is the place where...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Crowdfunding for Prostate Cancer Surgery - Just Shouldn't Be Necessary in...
It has always saddened me to see crowdfunding campaigns to raise money for individuals to undergo live saving surgery in the private hospital sector. Notoriously, we have seen campaigns for particular...
View ArticleMore on Crowd Funding
Let’s say you need to fly from Sydney to London. You are a member of the frequent flyer program with Qantas. If possible, you’d like to fly with Qantas because you feel loyal to the brand. The...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Action Must Speak Louder Than Words
Medical Oncologist, Dr Ranjana Srivastava wrote on the subject of “how doctors treat doctors may be medicine's secret shame“ in the Guardian newspaper back in February 2015. About a month later,...
View ArticleThe Royal Australasian College of Surgeons elections have commenced. Will it...
The Royal Australasian College of Surgeons has been rocked by the scandal of there being a culture of bullying, harassment and sexual discrimination in the Expert Advisory Group’s Draft Report that was...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Do patients contribute to God complex in surgeons?
The recent EAG Report commissioned by the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons suggests that there is a toxic culture of bullying, harrassment and sexual discrimination in surgery. There are...
View ArticleWhy I've Been Using Uber Instead of Taxis
Uber is under attack. That’s easy to understand. Taxi operators feel that their livelihood is at risk and state governments are losing out on tax revenue that they gouge out of the industry. To me,...
View ArticleDeceptive Surgical Billing Practices
Last year, the Royal Australian College of Surgeons issued a Press Release on the matter of excessive surgical fees. The then President states “Although government data shows that almost 90 per cent...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Congratulations to Fellows of the RACS Who Have Voted For Diversity on...
We have seen an amazing result for the 2015 Royal Australasian College of Surgeons Council elections. All six women candidates were elected out of a total of 8 vacancies and from a field of 38...
View ArticleClik here to view.
No Justice For Those Who Have Suffered Bullying, Discrimination and Sexual...
As Fellows of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons, we pay annual subscriptions. There is not a whole lot of practical choice but for us to pay these subscriptions if one wishes to be a...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Payment for Journal Citation? Possibly Academic Publishing at its Worst.
Many of you who have read my blog or are following me on Twitter, would be well aware of my thoughts about academic publishing. I have always done my best to be careful about which journals I would...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Payment for Citation Offer Withdrawn - but should never have been offered in...
This Blog post needs to read in conjunction with the earlier entry on the same subject matter."Payment for Journal Citation? Possibly Academic Publishing at its Worst."I wrote to the Editor in Chief to...
View ArticleHow I Almost Did Not Become a Urological Surgeon.
If anybody had suggested that I would become a urologist when I was a medical student or even as an intern, I would have told them that they were dreaming. My exposure to the field was fairly minimal...
View ArticleWhat do you do when a patient asks to speak to another patient who has...
Not infrequently, I am asked by my patients if they could speak with any other of my patients about their experience of having undergone radical prostatectomy surgery for prostate cancer. In the past,...
View ArticleInformed medical costs - Well intentioned actions failing in delivery
Dr Richard Zhu is reported to be on a mission to “expose” the out of pocket expenses associated with initial consultations to see specialists in Australia. He has created a website called SeekMedi in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Uber and Sydney Airport
When Uber arrived on the scene, it was like the travelling public’s revenge on the taxi industry. We had been subjected to a lifetime of micro-aggressive behaviour directed towards passengers. We...
View ArticleThose Two Tweets
It is now about 3 weeks since I posted two tweets that were to create a media storm. A week later I wrote an Opinion Editorial in the Sydney Morning Herald to clarify those two tweets. I have made...
View Article