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Your dilemma with Dr Cardigan and Prof Candid

Georgina: I qualified three years ago, and locum at a practice in quite a deprived area of North London.

I work regular sessions for them, and get on well with all of the staff.

Recently, one of the senior partners took me aside and said that I was ordering far too many thyroid function tests. What should I do?

 

Dr Cardigan: Georgina, this is an excellent opportunity to learn.

Your senior colleague is taking his pastoral role seriously, and has taken time out from his busy partnership to highlight his concerns.

You should ask him for guidance on how to improve your practice, and could start by auditing the number of thyroid function tests you have ordered over the past three years.

Alternatively, you could attend a workshop or endocrinology update, or better still, an international week-long conference on thyroid disease.

Thank your senior partner for raising this with you, and use it as a springboard to becoming a better GP.

 

Prof. Candid: What is this prick on about?

This is a thyroid function test we’re talking about, not brain surgery!

One word describes your senior colleague and that word is ‘asshole’.

I’ve always said that the best form of defence is attack, so tell him he has shit hair and threaten to punch him in the thyroid next time he comes over all ‘concerned’ like this.

Oh and by the way, he probably spends his alcohol-soaked evenings sobbing in front of a mirror whilst composing hapless texts to his ex-wife, before deleting them over and over again.

What a prick! I hope this helps. Prof.

 

Dr Kevin Hinkley is a GP in Australia who previously practised in Glasgow and Aberdeen