Items for category: Blog

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Most unfortunately, NICE has recently recommended that degarelix should no longer be approved for use in patients presenting acutely with metastatic prostate cancer (a group within its current licensed indication). As a clinician I have often been faced with patients presenting …

It’s worrying to hear that one in six people in the UK suffers from type 2 diabetes and even more worrying to know that one in three of us is prediabetic for type 2 diabetes. That means we are all likely to know someone in …

The NHS crisis experienced last winter is not a one-off, but marks the beginning of an extended period when the NHS is likely to be chronically short of finance. It is probable that in the very near future the Treasury will be either unable or …

A key message that is commonly heard with regard to men’s health issues is that suicide is the biggest single killer of young men. Indeed, this was the strap line from the recent Panorama programme on male suicide. However, it is not entirely true and …

Over the past 15 years I have often asked at the start of my lectures ‘What do you think are the main health risks facing men?’ If the audience consists of professionals delivering care, or policy makers planning services, or the lay public, it is …

To be a leader, it is important to be perceived as successful. That of course begs the question: how can ‘success’ in medicine’ be defined? Unlike the world of business, where success is largely gauged in financial terms, a successful doctor is arguably one who treats …

PSA testing – as controversial as ever, with views ranging from ‘every man should know his PSA’ to ‘PSA is a terrible test and men should be strongly discouraged from testing’. In this article, Jon Rees and members of the Education Advisory Team at Prostate …

The updated NICE guidelines on referral for suspected cancer have recently been put out for consultation amongst stakeholders (1). Whilst there is no doubt that the original guidelines (2) were a step in the right direction for urological cancers when they came out in 2005, …

Within the last week, the independent review Shape of Training has been published. The report has made 19 recommendations to change medical training, and some of these have raised concern amongst bodies such as the British Medical Association, as well as amongst individual clinicians. In …

Every survey asking people if they were to have a terminal illness, where would they like to die, provides the same answer – at home with dignity, surrounded by family and loved ones. So in these days of patient choice, why is it that the …