All about ImageOver lunch today, I remembered a disastrous trip to London some years ago [2000] I was asked to go to the BBC Filming studios in London. The researches for Robert Kilroy Silk's programme had invited me.
His show Kilroy started on 24 November 1986 as Day To Day and ran until 2004, when it was was cancelled by the BBC after an article entitled 'We owe Arabs nothing' by Kilroy-Silk[6] was published in the Sunday Express on 4 January of that year.
I recall travelling quite a way to the studios and making my way there in the pouring rain. I hate the rain, I hate being soaking wet and I often curse and swear because it is the only day I have forgotten an umbrella.
What I remember most about Kilroy was the paper cups. It was like the NHS all over again but with showbiz, they clearly treated mortals terribly. I went over and sat on a table with various so called patient campaigners. Each wallowed in their own arrogance and fame. I quietly sat listening to most of them. Their lives revolved around TV shows, media presentations etc.
Amongst them was the infamous Jill Baker. Jill Baker had to be there because she was Age Concern's mascot. Jill Baker had discovered a DNR in her notes and started to campaign about how unfortunate this was. In the land of the media, her story was more believable than any doctors' tales. This is a fact of life. The media consider doctors to be liars and patients to be the truthful ones. The number of times I have noted that stories have been published or featured without adequate fact checks has been numerous. The cases related to Southall is a classic example of believing the tales of fiction as opposed to evidence. As a doctor though [ as I found out], your evidence is verified to the nth degree. I am always happy to do that but it is often a bit unequal.
Jill Baker became tearful much later that month. She was distraught. I thought the world had come to an end and something terrible had happened. She blubbed down the phone to me and told me she was upset because the " media had stopped coming" and "she didn't feel important anymore". Errrm yes, I put down the phone and was shocked. This was unbelievable.
Unfortunately, I understood much later in life that BBC Breakfast and a number of BBC programmes needed me to be a supporting act to Jill. While I could support many patients, it killed me to be associated with someone who was clearly ruled by media attention. I had never seen this side of human character. I was a doctor, I had met many vulnerable people, I had spent night after night getting people better and improving their lives. What I wasn't ready for was this fake superficiality of those who revolve around the media. I suspect I just was not ready for the kind of people that wallowed around in the media circuit.
My reason for talking to the Sunday Times was to improve health policy. That was my only reason. I just didn't want to be a star of any sort. The burden of being in the media is phenomenal. People from all walks of life contact you and you feel obliged to help them. I was tireless in my efforts to assist because afterall I was a doctor. In the end, it was an impossible situation. Life became impossible because I simply was not used to so many people expecting so much for free. This is the patient population all over though - the doctor is expected to put their neck on the line for them while they do nothing. That is a fact.
As time has floated on, I remembered the campaigners at Robert Kilroy Silk's table and also remembered how negatively they insisted on portraying doctors. It is true there are bad doctors but these are few and far between. Kilroy was reluctant to criticise the system.
Robert Kilroy Silk pretended to care about patient safety but I found it largely amusing that he travelled in the same car as the Department of Health representative, chatted away with him, was wildly friendly towards him. Kilroy Silk played on both sides. The patients' side on camera and the Department of Health's side off camera. The Department of Health's spokesman was a fat balding man who really couldn't defend himself at all. I sat and watched him for quite a while as the camera rolled on. He was a prime example of a over paid, lazy Department of Health official.
There was a point where Kilroy Silk sat next to me on his show. I believe that must have been the worst experience for me. I physically felt ill probably because you could feel the oil dropping off him. I am sure many females found him attractive in a strange kind of way. I though wanted to get out of that studio, onto the train and back home. I kept looking at my watch and hoping I could go back home. In one morning, I had met enough fake people. I just couldn't cope with more.
I sat at the train station in London and phoned my friend. I told him what an awful time I had. I also told him it was time to end the media interest.
I think what frustrated me most is the lack of understanding evident in most journalists. I recall having to explain the basic issue of lack of basic observation by nursing staff may result in death. I think this concept was too much for Wendy the Panorama advisor who was more interested in other aspects. Journalists are not unintelligent, they simply have fixed ideas. Doctors and journalists simply don't think in the same lines at all.
The next issue that journalists understand is that whistleblowing = suspension from work. It stops there. There is no understanding of reprisals by the system or the impact of someone like the GMC - the GMC of course is the mothership, you run into problems with them, they have the power to simply assassinate your work. Try and explain this to the journalists, their brains will tweet and progressively shut down. The only ones who probably understands some of it is the Sunday Mercury and the Register but that is because they take the time to read and understand the material.
His show Kilroy started on 24 November 1986 as Day To Day and ran until 2004, when it was was cancelled by the BBC after an article entitled 'We owe Arabs nothing' by Kilroy-Silk[6] was published in the Sunday Express on 4 January of that year.
I recall travelling quite a way to the studios and making my way there in the pouring rain. I hate the rain, I hate being soaking wet and I often curse and swear because it is the only day I have forgotten an umbrella.
What I remember most about Kilroy was the paper cups. It was like the NHS all over again but with showbiz, they clearly treated mortals terribly. I went over and sat on a table with various so called patient campaigners. Each wallowed in their own arrogance and fame. I quietly sat listening to most of them. Their lives revolved around TV shows, media presentations etc.
Amongst them was the infamous Jill Baker. Jill Baker had to be there because she was Age Concern's mascot. Jill Baker had discovered a DNR in her notes and started to campaign about how unfortunate this was. In the land of the media, her story was more believable than any doctors' tales. This is a fact of life. The media consider doctors to be liars and patients to be the truthful ones. The number of times I have noted that stories have been published or featured without adequate fact checks has been numerous. The cases related to Southall is a classic example of believing the tales of fiction as opposed to evidence. As a doctor though [ as I found out], your evidence is verified to the nth degree. I am always happy to do that but it is often a bit unequal.
Jill Baker became tearful much later that month. She was distraught. I thought the world had come to an end and something terrible had happened. She blubbed down the phone to me and told me she was upset because the " media had stopped coming" and "she didn't feel important anymore". Errrm yes, I put down the phone and was shocked. This was unbelievable.
Unfortunately, I understood much later in life that BBC Breakfast and a number of BBC programmes needed me to be a supporting act to Jill. While I could support many patients, it killed me to be associated with someone who was clearly ruled by media attention. I had never seen this side of human character. I was a doctor, I had met many vulnerable people, I had spent night after night getting people better and improving their lives. What I wasn't ready for was this fake superficiality of those who revolve around the media. I suspect I just was not ready for the kind of people that wallowed around in the media circuit.
My reason for talking to the Sunday Times was to improve health policy. That was my only reason. I just didn't want to be a star of any sort. The burden of being in the media is phenomenal. People from all walks of life contact you and you feel obliged to help them. I was tireless in my efforts to assist because afterall I was a doctor. In the end, it was an impossible situation. Life became impossible because I simply was not used to so many people expecting so much for free. This is the patient population all over though - the doctor is expected to put their neck on the line for them while they do nothing. That is a fact.
As time has floated on, I remembered the campaigners at Robert Kilroy Silk's table and also remembered how negatively they insisted on portraying doctors. It is true there are bad doctors but these are few and far between. Kilroy was reluctant to criticise the system.
Robert Kilroy Silk pretended to care about patient safety but I found it largely amusing that he travelled in the same car as the Department of Health representative, chatted away with him, was wildly friendly towards him. Kilroy Silk played on both sides. The patients' side on camera and the Department of Health's side off camera. The Department of Health's spokesman was a fat balding man who really couldn't defend himself at all. I sat and watched him for quite a while as the camera rolled on. He was a prime example of a over paid, lazy Department of Health official.
There was a point where Kilroy Silk sat next to me on his show. I believe that must have been the worst experience for me. I physically felt ill probably because you could feel the oil dropping off him. I am sure many females found him attractive in a strange kind of way. I though wanted to get out of that studio, onto the train and back home. I kept looking at my watch and hoping I could go back home. In one morning, I had met enough fake people. I just couldn't cope with more.
I sat at the train station in London and phoned my friend. I told him what an awful time I had. I also told him it was time to end the media interest.
After that day, I refused many talk shows. I think I must have shocked Esther Ranzen by refusing her invitation point blank. I was fast being used and turned into a "lets bash the medics" show and while I was critical of the inaction by many doctors on Ward 87 and the Trust, my bug bear was the system failings by the government. I was also turning into the doctor who "supports patients" or the "doctor who campaigns for elderly care". These were annoying labels for me. I wasn't a elderly care physician although I cared about the elderly. I cared about all patients. I was a doctor in the front line, in acute medicine. I cared about junior doctors hours, junior doctors rights, good patient care and proper recording of death rates. Those were my interests. The problem was that didn't make good media features.
I think what frustrated me most is the lack of understanding evident in most journalists. I recall having to explain the basic issue of lack of basic observation by nursing staff may result in death. I think this concept was too much for Wendy the Panorama advisor who was more interested in other aspects. Journalists are not unintelligent, they simply have fixed ideas. Doctors and journalists simply don't think in the same lines at all.
The next issue that journalists understand is that whistleblowing = suspension from work. It stops there. There is no understanding of reprisals by the system or the impact of someone like the GMC - the GMC of course is the mothership, you run into problems with them, they have the power to simply assassinate your work. Try and explain this to the journalists, their brains will tweet and progressively shut down. The only ones who probably understands some of it is the Sunday Mercury and the Register but that is because they take the time to read and understand the material.
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