Courses Don’t Make Experts, Practice Does
There is a quiet but persistent myth in modern professional life: attend a course, receive a certificate, and emerge somehow transformed into a competent practitioner. … Read more
ReadThe blog
Notes from both theatres.
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Trauma education, medical school guidance, and reflections from twenty-five years at the sharp end — written the way he teaches: plainly, and from experience.
What Future Conflict Will Really Look Like
We tend to imagine the next war using the language of the last one. Frontlines. Forward operating bases. Evacuation corridors. Protected rear areas. Helicopters lifting … Read more
ReadExpertise Is Earned With Your Hands
There is a particular confidence that comes from having done the thing yourself. Not read about it. Not watched someone else do it. Not quoted a … Read more
ReadThe Resource We Keep Forgetting
There is a great deal of conversation at the moment about prolonged field care, about evacuation denial, about scarce skill sets, high-value clinicians, and the … Read more
ReadWhy the Four-Person Expeditionary Surgical Team Is No Longer Optional
For decades, military medicine has been built around a comforting assumption: that there will always be a place behind the fight where casualties can be … Read more
ReadNever Become the Monday Morning Quarterback
There is a particular kind of behaviour that appears after every conflict, every kinetic deployment, every traumatic event where clinicians and medics have intervened under … Read more
ReadBlue-Sky Fantasies and Battlefield Realities: Why Drone Evacuation Will Not Save Us
Every few years, a new generation of technology arrives with great fanfare and an even greater promise: this time, finally, war will become cleaner, safer, … Read more
ReadThe Most Important Resource: The People Beside You
There comes a moment in every career, sometimes early, sometimes far too late, when you realise that the most vital resource you will ever possess … Read more
ReadFrom Frontline to Killzone: How Modern Warfare Has Erased the Middle Ground
Because the battlefield has changed, and pretending otherwise gets people killed. The Frontline We Used to Know There was a time, and it’s not ancient … Read more
ReadThe Calm in the Storm: What Trauma Really Demands of You
Because when everything is falling apart, someone has to hold the centre. Trauma Is Noise – Deafening, Unforgiving Noise Alarms blaring. Monitors screaming. People rushing. … Read more
ReadKeeping a Level Head: Lessons I Learnt the Long, Hard Way
If I’m honest, controlling my temper was never something that came naturally. Not at the beginning. Not even halfway through my career. It has taken … Read more
ReadDoing the Right Thing vs Doing Things Right
Because perfection without purpose is just noise. The Subtle Difference That Changes Everything It sounds like wordplay, doesn’t it?Doing things right versus doing the right thing.But in trauma, … Read more
ReadIs a Career in Medicine Still Worth It?
My balanced perspective for prospective applicants This is a question I get asked more and more: “Would you recommend medicine as a career today?” It’s a … Read more
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