The Frayed Bandage

  In September 2022, the Department of Health published the latest A&E performance figures, which at that time were the worst on record. The Health Secretary at the time, when confronted with these appalling statistics, proclaimed to the media that he “expects immediate improvement from A&E departments.” The implication being that it was A&E departments  themselves  who were to blame, and they just needed to work harder. It truly was a most egregious example of gaslighting. But what exactly is gaslighting? The term seems to have crept into everyday language in recent years. Indeed, Oxford University Press named it as the 2 nd  most useful new word of 2018. Its history can be traced back to the 1944 Ingrid Bergman film ‘Gaslight’. In the film, Bergman’s malevolent husband tries to convince her that she is losing her mind by repeatedly dimming and brightening the gas lights in the house while telling her she is imagining it. The trouble with words that ...

  Are you getting enough sleep each night and waking up feeling refreshed in the morning? If you work in the health service, I’m guessing the answer is a resounding NO! If you’re also a parent of young children, then I don’t even need to ask… In 1924, the average adult slept for 9 hours per night. Fast forward a century and the average number of hours sleep is just 7. So, what happened to those 2 hours? Have humans evolved so dramatically in that time that we now need less sleep? Or is something robbing us of that much needed rest and recovery in these modern times? I’m convinced that the truth lies with the latter… Perhaps the biggest influence here in the past century has been the advent of electricity, bringing artificial light and various bright screens into every home. Add in our present-day 24-hour culture, multiple sources of stress and shift work – now perhaps we’re starting to identify the thieves who are carrying out this great robbery. Unfortunately, the consequenc...