It is taken for granted in this country that all the best medical colleges are Royal. That they have the royal seal of approval from on high and therefore must be the best. I have been somewhat confused for a...
Referrals between the many and varied branches of ophthalmology sometimes underline how sub-specialised we have all become nowadays. The old era when everyone was an ophthalmic jack of all trades is gone, for better or for worse, and instead of...
A trainee shortly to rotate to my firm was unhappy at the fact that she had only one phaco list in her timetable. She was a final year trainee with more than five hundred cataract extractions to her name so...
After a week on call grading what feels like 13 billion referrals I decided it might be useful to come up with a glossary that might help other people in some way to decipher the true meaning behind every repetitive...
The clinics at Ystradgynlais Community Hospital are a little different of late. The nurses are still there, I still get tea with custard creams and the letters I dictate are still all written up by the next day. But there...
One of the side-effects of the coronavirus pandemic is that suddenly everything is now done on Zoom. In case anyone is fortunate enough to have no idea what this is, Zoom is an app that allows virtual meetings to take...
Adele sings a song called Hello, which is about a mythical phonecall she makes to an ex-boyfriend about how different life is now compared to when they used to date. The chorus line repeated many times is “Hello from the...
5 February 2020
| Gwyn Samuel Williams
|
Ophthalmology
Over the past two years I have attended quite a number of medical educational seminars and ‘workshops’ and have been a bit shocked at how out of kilter with reality the world of education seems to be now. It seems...
2 December 2019
| Gwyn Samuel Williams
|
Ophthalmology
One of the most fascinating aspects of being a consultant is seeing the workings of the machine that is medical training from the other side. For two years now I have taken part in the specialty recruitment interviews and it...
1 August 2019
| Gwyn Samuel Williams
|
Ophthalmology
Who are the reps? Every one of us knows the friendly face of the local randomprost eye drop representative or the nice man from that eye lubricant company. These company representatives travel up and down the region with a smile,...
As I was travelling along a deserted road on a Sunday last month I saw in my peripheral vision a disconcerting flash of light behind me. Much as I tried to convince myself that the flash was due to the...
Swansea University invited me to an Away Day. There was a whole day of lectures planned at a hotel conference suite just outside Swansea but due to clinic commitments I only caught the afternoon session; a ‘workshop’, on how to...