News
Going green in the operating theatre
by Mark Hughes
Surgery can take a large toll on the environment. It is resource intense in many ways: infrastructure, personnel, and consumables. Operating the...
Surgical fulfilment, fatigue, and expectations
by Mark Hughes
Alain de Botton, philosopher and author, suggests:
“A firm belief in the necessary misery of life was for centuries one of mankind’s most import...
Surgeons, empathy, and Shakespeare
by Mark Hughes
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Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
King Lear Act III scene iii
Surgeons, amongst doctors in general, sometimes distance themselves f...
The power of gratitude in surgery
by Mark Hughes
Being a surgeon can be deeply rewarding. That reward is intimately connected with patient outcome: an operation completed without complication, ...
Surgery, art, and mediated matter
by Mark Hughes
As long as there have been surgeons, there has been an interface with art. Da Vinci applied artistic skills to the study of anatomy and dissected n...
Covid-19: leadership lessons applicable to surgery
by Mark Hughes
It remains difficult to blog without viewing a subject through the lens of the new COVID-19 world. The crisis has brought out some of the very b...
Surgical consent in the COVID era – navigating greater uncertainty
by Mark Hughes
The COVID pandemic continues to have a dreadful human impact, both through direct morbidity and mortality but also due to increasing economic st...
Miniaturising surgical robotics – building a model ship inside a very small bottle
by Mark Hughes
One reason that surgery is exciting is its interface with technology. Surgical robots, becoming more common in well-resourced healthcare settings,...
Patient safety and surgery
by Mark Hughes
Last week, the WHO marked World Patient Safety Day. At its core, healthcare is singularly motivated by a desire to improve patient health and wellb...
Looking versus seeing, surgery versus art
by Mark Hughes
Sculpting, painting, drawing and other artistic endeavours demand finely honed skills of observation combined with the ability to recapitulate (in ...
Is a surgical singularity coming? Will the ever-quickening pace of technological advancement make surgeons better? Or redundant?
by Mark Hughes
About 5000 years ago, the wheel was conceived and deployed as a new technology. A little more than 500 years ago, the printing press was invented. ...
Why we need more casual feminism in surgery
by Mark Hughes
Great surgeons come from all different backgrounds and genders. With still so few women surgeons, the profession is missing out on talent, narrowi...