A Medic's Tale, page 1
First published in Great Britain in 2025 by
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Copyright © 2025 Paul Wilson
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ISBN 9781835744116
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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This book is dedicated to all the NHS staff who daily go above and beyond. God Bless.
Table of Contents
1
The Introduction
2
Medical School, Queen’s University Belfast
3
Doctor Wilson Begins His Journey – Domine, Dirigi Nos
4
SHO Posts
5
Whiteabbey
6
Craigavon
7
Anaesthetics
8
Liverpool
9
Luton and Dunstable
10
Canada
11
Consultancy
12
Teaching and Training
13
General
14
Reflection
15
Colleagues
16
Ambulance
17
Life After Medicine
18
Jottings Past, Present, Future
19
Retirement
20
Management
21
Finale
Appendix – Brief History
Glossary
1
The Introduction
This book is true in content and is entirely the work and thoughts of the author. It is a myriad of stories and a melange of anecdotes taken from a life in medicine. Added to which there will be little vignettes of related interest, hopefully appearing in a degree of chronological order. On reflection, this material has evolved over several time frames. There have been a few periods of hiatus, so when discovering any degree of repetition please excuse but the brain cells are not what they once were. It may quite possibly not have the professional touch of pastiche in composition but what it lacks in written literacy, I trust it will more than adequately compensate in the realms of effort and enthusiasm. I would imagine that the response to the transcript contained herein may well depend on a variety of human factors. This could, in some instances, relate to age, as parts of my deliberations may be considered or construed by a certain section of my fellow colleagues, especially those of the younger genre, to be the utterances of what can only be referred to politely as a dinosaur. I do not excuse myself or apologise for such, as to do so would be to refute what are my considered deliberations. I have not included all the possible stories, episodes and events that have accrued over the years. In doing so, the piece would have undoubtedly been longer and more than likely less interesting, even transcending to mediocrity and tedium. Any salacious, possible ungracious and unnecessary comments have been largely omitted. I have attempted to make the writings a résumé of my life in the medical world and the fraternity with whom I have been acquainted over a period of years. One has not ascended to the heights of the medical realm and, believe it or not, I am not unduly concerned; that is for another type of person, maybe one with greater ambition, ideology and motivation. Do not consider this in any way as a sarcastic or derisory comment. It is necessary, in any walk of life, to have people at various levels of the organisation. Not all can be at the pinnacle, it requires a good, sound foundation for the body to be maintained and sustainable. My story concerns an ordinary doctor and his time with the travails and enjoyable moments that were encountered at that period, as well as some commentary on the situation as perceived from a personal perspective.
My mind, of its own volition and not consciously spurred on by me, had obviously decided to formulate from my quiescent thinking, a new creation. Hardly of enormous magnitude but something that I felt compelled to put down on paper and that one day might be viewed in some manner by a wider audience than one. How did this tale start to evolve? Initially a subconscious concept that developed; as a matter of fact, it started its embryonic stage as I travelled home one day on the train from London. I had attended a meeting organised by the esteemed organisation we all know as the British Medical Association. This specific learning day was set aside to develop my skills in relation to management. But more of this intangible, unfathomable element of the NHS later.
This, dare I say, noble concept has taken a considerable, somewhat alien virtue, certainly on my part, of patience, to complete this task which I have set myself. As with many aspects of life, the amount of time and effort, and the incorporation of them, are initiated by small, humble beginnings, hopefully to blossom into a worthy and interesting completion.
What originally had made me decide to follow the intrepid path and become a doctor? As far as I am aware, there was no history or tradition of the medical profession in any shape or form within my family. Certainly, no evidence of any such inclination over many generations. It is rather interesting, as I have just been reviewing our family crest given to me as a present. The family motto is Non nobis sollum, which means ‘Not for ourselves alone’. The name Wilson means protection. I am aware there may be other heraldic interpretations. This could be construed a reasonable aptitude for my chosen profession. There may, therefore, be some genetic twist that inclined me to the study of medicine. I am reminded of a story related by my dear departed mater. This possible apocryphal narrative involved an act of misdemeanour on my part. Our highly respected and dearly loved GP – to be more precise and succinct, my mother’s personal physician, as she referred to him – was on one of his regular visits. We had moved to a new house but my mother refused to have any other human being on the planet as her attending doctor. Even to the extent that she steadfastly refused the caesarean necessary for the imminent birth of my elder brother, until he was physically present. This of course would not be contemplated today. One could quite literally hear the chorus of cries “Non possumus” (we cannot) emanating from health and safety, infection control and other sundry redoubtable groups. Anyhow, it transpires that I mischievously flushed his bowler hat down the lavatory; they dressed quintessentially traditional in those halcyon days. It was in the era when you really had your own GP. My GP was a generous and kind gentleman called Doctor Loughridge, of whose abiding memory was when he removed an ingrowing nail from my great toe, only for me to be overcome with an acute bout of extreme nausea.
Further seeds were sown at my Alma Mater after numerous vocations had entered and passed through my mind. I attended, in my informative years, the venerable establishment known as the Royal Belfast Academical Institution, often referred to as ‘Inst’. Four generations of my family attended – all male (it was an all-boys’ school). It had, and I trust, still maintains, a healthy, well-earned respect for being known for its honest pride and success, in reference to its excellent rugby union heritage. Winning on numerous occasions the ‘Schools’ Cup’, the prestigious knock-out tournament held yearly between the participating academies in the province. It appears it has been victorious, once more beating our arch-rivals Methodist College to regain this much sought-after prize.
I remember with nostalgia the games played and the friendship enjoyed in those bygone days. Like most playing rugby, some minor injuries were inevitably sustained. The stud marks that, in time, slowly disappeared but at the time represented almost a badge of honour. We played the other schools from the province. One memorable trip involved a game at Pretora Grammar School, in the west of Northern Ireland, being a reasonable distance from Belfast. This was a trip by bus on a wintry day. The weather was not conducive to playing but having made the journey it
Other teams regularly entertained, included Campbell College, Coleraine Institution, Belfast Royal Academy and Portadown College, when a good, hard but fair game of rugby was enjoyed. It was somewhat different when the opposition was Methody, as previously stated, our main rivals. I may go so far as to note that the addition of a rugby ball as an integral part of the game seemed, on occasions, superfluous.
You may have noticed the name of one of our regular sparring partners as Belfast Royal Academy, known as BRA. We always enjoyed a degree of friendly banter between the schools. One reason was related to our respective titles. We had been bestowed the title ‘Royal’ at the beginning of our name as part of Royal patronage from Queen Victoria. The school is not that old, having been established in 1810. You can imagine, hence appreciate, a degree of, dare I say, envy, as this did not pertain to BRA as it was not distinguished with such a prestigious prefix. I am just being a little priggish.
Mr P Wilson MB, BCh, BAO, Cert Mgt, Cert Med Ed, DipIMC (Ed), Dip H/C& Ethics, LLM, FRCS.
(Please understand, this is the only time they have all been displayed together. As passing some of these certificates on the wall, I am under no illusion: Vanity of vanities!
All is vanity. Ref Ecclesiastes 1:2.)
2
Medical School,
Queen’s University Belfast
I first entered through its hallowed portals in August 1973, therein to continue my studies for the next six years. My first year was to be remarkably boring, as it turned out to be basically a repeat of my recent A levels, with wasted periods spent on physics-orientated studies and tedious writing up of experiments. I recall a large white building that we entered on a regular basis. Doubtless it was of notable architectural significance, which was totally lost on a ‘fresher student’. In retrospect, and on reviewing a couple of similar drawings, it appears to have been of a Greek derivation from an Ionic order and a volute headstone. This, I may say, is to be interpreted with a considerable degree of speculation, both by myself and on the reader’s part, but it does sound rather grand.
The second year was more promising as we were introduced to anatomy. Firstly, this was indeed a useful, interesting and appropriate study. Trying to remember all the different muscles, tendons, ligaments, corresponding bones and their insertions was certainly not as enthralling. This dramatically paled into insignificance when we were introduced to the neuroanatomy part of the proceedings; excuse the medical pun, but it was mind-blowing. Certainly, many of you will try to recall the various pathways the third cranial nerve takes as it circumnavigates the brain! Our senior neuroanatomy lecturer had, literally, an encyclopaedic knowledge of the central nervous system. It was regularly his habit to wander around the anatomy tables in the dissecting room asking intimidating questions, often with muted response or total silence on our behalf. I recall he was a tall, distinguished gentleman with a kindly manner. As he walked about, he possessed a pair of the longest forceps I had ever seen. While brandishing this spectacular piece of equipment, he would gently point at various areas of the brain, inevitably providing the answer to his own inquisitorial questions in a benign way but at times with a slight feeling of despair. You could imagine his thoughts, why do you not know the obvious answer, you stupid boy? Of course, he never uttered such deliberations but smiled graciously. The reply, also not spoken, would be, “Sorry, sir, but I have not actually read that section yet and even if I had it would still remain foreign to my incumbent knowledge.” This was only the start of many an arduous session endeavouring to absorb and come to grips with the delightful chapters contained within Gray’s and Lumley’s texts, the bibles of anatomy for one and all. Indeed, we had many mnemonics designed to instil the fertile medical student’s brain with how to remember the order of the cranial nerves. Most, as we know, are not generally repeatable in polite conversation.
Secondly, there was the usual degree of medical humour and certain fooling around. For those not participants of this mysterious world, it could not be considered, certainly by an onlooker, anything other than silly, preposterous, facile and even disingenuous. But the gentle ribbing and banter was an integral instrument of the camaraderie, making us part of a special group – a team. Please, for non-medics, do not be cynical or contrive that we were being arrogant or aloof but we all, in some manner or another, tend to associate with our peers, possibly medics assimilate more than most. This may reflect the unusual stresses, strains, excitement and endeavours of the work. Certainly, many doctors are married to other doctors or people closely associated with the medical world. One episode is firmly imprinted in my memory banks: Harry, not Potter, a fellow traveller, was heard to be quite upset and avidly trawled around all the dissecting tables enquiring, in a terse manner, who exactly had his arm. Obviously, I do not mean (nor did Harry), his actual arm but the one that he had been assiduously dissecting. I fear he never did discover the culprit. You are left to speculate some of the other antics that transpired but not transcribed. Partly for fear of possible retribution from either any detractors of mine or readers alike. At this point I need to state sincerely that we did greatly respect the bodies that had been donated to the anatomy department to allow us to study and learn the essentials of the human body and its functioning – an important and inspirational process. Without these generous bequests we would not have been able to understand and appreciate the rudiments of basic anatomy and the importance it served to each one of us to the present day.
This is in distinct comparison to some of our medical forebears. An article in a BMJ (British Medical Journal) alluded to the practice in the eighteenth century of eminent ‘Founding Fathers’ who apparently had subjects procured by order. One shudders at the very thought that people were dispatched so that a particular person or group of surgeons could be revered for their pioneering work and the subsequent publication of anatomical atlases.
A degree of this original material may have been forgotten over the years. The never-ending lists of attachments, origins and anomalies of the human body are a mystery in themselves. Those early tutorials proved invaluable, both to me and my classmates, ever since and have regularly been used in a positive manner for the sake of our patients. So, we are immeasurably grateful and indebted to our tutors, some being doctors studying for their fellowship exams, and our lecturers for their experience and knowledge that they patiently endeavoured to impart to a youthful and sometimes less than enthusiastic group of medics. Many of those lecturers are, at least, now advanced in years and some will have ceased this mortal coil. For those who do remain, I trust they enjoy a pleasant retirement in the knowledge that they have helped train many students who have gone on to become doctors in various fields of medicine and in, their own way, contributed to the care and assistance of others. A quote from President Theodore Roosevelt (1882–1945, American Democratic statesman thirty-second President of the United States) springs to mind: “The best prize that life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing.”
On another occasion, almost inevitably, the session involved the male genitalia; members of the same gender were taken aback when P (full name not disclosed in the interest of propriety or probably what is termed today political correctness), with effortless gusto, grabbed this part of the body and, with a degree of surgical aplomb, detached it with what was considered by onlookers as excessive enthusiasm. Those observing felt quite queasy. We were never too sure if this was simply fervent enthusiasm on her part or related to some deep-rooted angst targeted at the male gender; no-one enquired but quietly returned to their own work area with diligent circumspection.
