hoolet issue 45 

Summer 2005

Chris Johnstone Intro.
Kerr²
Read all about it...
Green Oranges on Lion Mountain
Cuthbert Flange Again
Somerled Fergusson - A Tribute
Thain on Eccentricity
So Long...
From The College
Truth Telling
Murchie is Enlightened
Ali Bodie is Positively Positive
Let Them Eat Prozac
The Knife Man
Blair Smith as a Role Model
QOF Topic April 2006

Role Models

By Blair Smith
Contact the author via Chris Johnstone by e-mail at christopher.johnstone@ntlworld.com

The end of the world is nigh (as apocalyptic Ulstermen say), and we're all going to die horribly. At least, if the end isn't exactly nigh, it's definitely nigher than it was before. Doom, gloom and destruction are preached from on high, and all we have to look forward to is fire, brimstone and Auntie Millie's scones.

One of the first manifestations of this bleakness will be a complete absence of GPs. Throughout Scotland GPs are retiring, even as I write. The current rate is one retirement every three minutes. In contrast, we are recruiting to the discipline at the rate of only one GP every two and a half weeks, and this rate is declining. At half past three on 25 October 2015 there will therefore be only one GP serving the whole of Scotland. And, although he will only be aged 28, he will have taken good financial advice and be planning to retire comfortably three years later. After that, we will all be left to the devices of NHS24 and Granny's failsafe remedies. There will, of course, still be several hospital consultants, but only in dermatology, otorhinolarynogology and family planning (which will, by then, all form a single specialty). Medical Schools will be increasing their intake, but the career plans of most students will not include general or hospital practice. (Most will seek glorious careers in television presenting or journal editorship).

Fortunately the College has developed a plan to prevent this devastation. It includes promoting the discipline's obvious glamour, identifying at an early stage students with an aptitude and sending them birthday cards, and stealing junior doctors from unguarded hospitals. Also, we who are left practising, who have not joined our more numerous colleagues in retirement land, are to be “role models” for medical students or anyone else with a vague possibility of ever becoming a GP (ie anybody under the age of 70). This might, for example, mean driving a Porsche pointedly, exuding an air of importance and contentedness, and definitely not moaning about our jobs in front of students visiting the practice. In this way, says the College, we can encourage people into following in our footsteps. Do you think it might work? It will certainly be a challenge, and there are difficult odds to overcome.

This week I saw two examples of role modelling that I was pleased to share with my children. On Tuesday, in common, it seemed, with most of my professional colleagues locally, I went to Pittodrie football stadium to watch, not Aberdeen FC (I wouldn't waste my money thus), but the Scottish rugby team. They were playing the Barbarians, an international invitational XV, for the tenth time, though it was the first time in 124 years Scottish international rugby had come to Aberdeen. Those who have been even vaguely aware of our national team's fortunes on the rugby pitch will have shared the crowd's pessimism at the chances of a decent performance, let alone one which might lead to our first victory over the Barbarians. Yet, on a beautiful sunny evening, before the largest crowd Pittodrie had seen all season, Scotland played rugby with a brilliance to match the weather, defied all expectations and ran in seven tries to the opposition's one, and delighted a cheering crowd. We left with smiles on our faces, recognizing that a challenge had been addressed successfully, despite low expectations.

Young Blair has now attended two Scotland games, in both of which we have been victorious, and is the only person in the country who thinks we win all the time. My other son, Louis, who lives and breathes rugby, had the privilege of training with the national team during the weekend before the Barbarians game. He was on the training ground with men whose pictures grace his bedroom walls and magazines, and has since indulged in hero worship incessantly. For him, if for nobody else, Chris Paterson and the team are role models of whom I approve. Bronagh also wanted to express her adulation, particularly for Sean Lamont whom she fancies, and planned to invade the pitch after the game. Unfortunately, we have brought her up too well, and, instead of running on spontaneously, she asked a policeman if he minded. She has to content herself with staring at the pictures on her brother's wall, wondering meanwhile where Barbaria is.

Then the following night, in a different sport, Liverpool were 3-0 down at half-time in the final of the Champions' League, the biggest football match of the year anywhere in Europe (and probably the world). “You might as well go to bed,” I said to the children who had watched with me. “This game's as good as over.” They went, but Liverpool, in a manner characteristic of their city, stole victory after extra time and penalties, in a match which will surely be one of the most memorable in footballing history, this time for the right reasons. It was excellent to see, and left us gasping with incredulity. I do not recall a greater demonstration of character strength than that which Liverpool showed when the rest of us thought they were doomed to ignominy.

We believed the game lost, just as we may believe the future of general practice hopeless. But expectation need not become reality. We too can defy predictions and overcome heavy odds, and I have just seen role models for the role models we are exhorted to become. It's cheesy, but true!

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