Day 1 & Premature Closure

The discussion of the Lewis Blackman film raised many issues, the first of which was the problem of understaffing/different staff on nights and weekends. It struck me that a problem of sheer logistics could have such an impact on someone’s health – how we know illness and disease strike to the beat of their own drum, but yet we try to impose our 9-5 schedule onto them. With so much of medicine still at the whim of chance and unforeseeable risks, why would we continue to allow this dangerous practice that is entirely under our control?

Helen’s comment that she was “the only constant” throughout Lewis’s care gets to the heart of the issue for me- when the sole duty of a health care team is to care for the wellbeing of their patients, how can we accept anything less than constant care?

“Premature closure” was introduced in the discussion… Continue reading →