Student BMJ Review: November 2007 issue

I reviewed the November 2007 edition of the Student BMJ. For some years I was the editor of the Australia and New Zealand Journal of Medicine, later the Internal Medicine Journal. The Student BMJ faces many of the problems that any broad ranging medical journal faces in today’s world where much of the information for both family physicians and consultants comes through the specialty literature and where a general journal must work harder to continue to engage a broad audience. I thought the Student BMJ did this very well in the November issue. The editorial was well written and informative and there were a series of interesting articles in most of the domains of interest to medical students and indeed training doctors. The issues covered in the news section were topical. I contributed to a head to head debate in the difficult area as to whether post graduate training places should be reserved for UK graduates and there was a very informative article from a former chair of the conference of post graduate medical deans outlining the workforce issues that relate to this issue. There were a number of excellent articles on important new information in the medical literature generally relevant to clinical practice.

If there was one failing in the Student BMJ it was something of a down playing of basic science information. The Nobel Prize was won very recently by the UK’s Sir Martin Evans for his work of identifying embryonic stem cells, one of the most exciting advances in medical science in recent times. It’s important that today’s doctors, if they are going to engage fully in the revolution in medical science currently under way, maintain some interest in basic medical science advances and it may be worthwhile that high profile papers from Nature, Science or Cell are also highlighted in the Student BMJ.

It is difficult to cover more than a few selected topics in any one issue but it may be worthwhile contracting a series of experts to do a highlight series relevant to their specialty that might appear perhaps once every twelve months. The expectation would be that all major advances in their area were covered in not more than one paragraph each.

I greatly enjoyed reading this issue of the Student BMJ and found it highly informative. It was well written, covered clinical scientific issues well and didn’t shirk away from difficult political issues. All in all an extremely good effort.

       

 Printable version    Download    E-mail this to a friend    Respond to this article