My 75-year-old father has recently had a coronary angiogram and been referred for bypass graft surgery. When I was a cardiology senior house officer in the Jurassic period, he would never have been referred for such surgery at this age.
The right sort of competition in healthcare is a prescription for huge gains in quality and efficiency. But while this can be encouraged partly through attractive incentives, have we been too lenient in pursuing more punitive measures?
An old friend has just been in touch, having found one of my HSJ columns through Google.
Looking back, 2007 was an odd year for me. Making a career change has been inspiring and invigorating. The fact that it coincided with moving back to London, putting a year of treatment behind me and the clunky dawn of my sense of mortality and ordinariness has added to my feeling of displacement.
