February 4, 2012

The future looks ugly but doctors still fight the good fight

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The final general motions session has just ended, and with it comes a rather subdued end to what had the potential to be the most important AGM in years. Perhaps it was the disastrous decision to separate doctors from journalists in two hotels. People talk about gathering at the bar after the meetings with an [...]

A thin line between love and hate

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The second day of the IMO AGM may have been dominated by Mary Harney, but she certainly didn’t seem to notice. To the Minister for Health, her session was probably just another filled time-slot — albeit a slightly more pressurised one, seeing as the two issues dominating the recent press — the new consultant posts [...]

Everything is better in Sweden

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The Minister for Health, Ms Mary Harney, got a stirring introduction from new IMO president Dr Paula Gilvarry. It went: “I would like to introduce the Minister for Health, Mary Harney, on this beautiful day in Killarney.” Dr Gilvarry was being true, I suppose, to that age-old credo of decorum: if you can’t say anything [...]

A year of dashed hopes

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The passing of the chain of office from consultant Dr Christine O’Malley to public health doc Dr Paula Gilvarry was the feature event of the first day of the IMO AGM. The news, according to the outgoing president, was not good. A crowd of about 30 people – the real IMO diehards who arrive on [...]

Another year, another AGM

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The Irish Medical Organisation’s 2007 AGM kicks off in Killarney this afternoon (in a new hotel, as the Hotel Europe, where I personally have been twice now, is being renovated, unfortunately. This could have meant a new county and not just a new hotel, but tradition rules, obviously. It’s a pity it’s not in Galway, [...]