Psychiatrist David Healy and biochemist Nick Lane debate the dangers of the medical industry - was specialisation created for profit rather than for health?

This exerpt is from the debate 'Life, death and specialisation,' filmed at the HowTheLightGetsIn festival in Hay-on-Wye, Wales in May of 2023.

Watch the full debate at https://iai.tv/video/life-death-and-specialisation?utm_source=YouTube&utm_medium=description&utm_medium=head-to-head

Once, the doctor would diagnose anything from a broken leg to bronchitis. Now students can choose from over 200 medical specialisations. In the past decade alone, referrals to specialists have doubled. Most see this revolution as a huge win. But is this a mistake? You are no more likely to survive in a specialist cardiac unit than you are at home. While medical errors have become the third biggest killer in the US and UK, and specialisation contributes through poor communication and incorrect diagnosis.

Do we need to give up the idea that the specialist is always the best answer and redirect funding elsewhere? Is it possible that the health of the body is not divisible into separate discrete units, but needs to be seen as a whole? Or is this to undermine the radical advances specialist medicine has contributed and which will drive the breakthroughs of the future?

#Medical #Specialisation #WhatIsKillingUs

David Healy is a psychiatrist, scientist, author and professor of psychiatry at Bangor University in the United Kingdom.

Nick Lane is a British biochemist and outstanding science communicator, asking the difficult question: what is the origin of life? He is a Professor of Evolutionary Biochemistry at University College London and a bestselling author.

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