You never know what you've got til it's gone. As one Mark Smith of Newtown, south Wales, has found out after being banned under an Asbo from entering any NHS premises in the UK. Singularly capable of wrecking any trust's attemtps to meet the four hour A&E target, Mr Smith has received the ban after repeatedly faking drug overdoses and heart attacks to get overnight stays in hosptial - he was admitted to hospitals 320 times between 1993 and 2007. He has also been served with an 18 month community order after faking travle expenses, even though he was entitled to free travel. Mr Smith is now only allowed in an NHS building with written permission or at a pre-arranged appointment, other than in an emergency. How ironic if he were to actually have one.

The seating plan is both the blessing and bind of many a social occasion. But at the recent NHS Employers conference black tie gala dinner tie guests were a little bemused to find that they were being asked to seat themselves. Did this, we ponder, result in a table of the most beautiful and/or interesting people as well as the unloved and unpopular being left to seat themselves near the kitchen?

Binge drinking is in the headlines again as researchers discover - shock horror - that the middle classes are just as capable of drinking to excess as teenagers. So we were heartened to learn that large amounts of alcohol can occasionally have some benefits. When an Italian tourist poisoned himself by drinking ethylene glycol, pure alcohol was needed as the antidote. But doctors in the hospital in theQueenslandtown ofMackayran out of medicinal alcohol, so resorted to instead putting the patient on a drip of vodka; about three standard drinks an hour for three days during his stay in the intensive care unit. Medics said his hangover had worn off by the time he woke up.