The BGS and the BAD - some good cross-pollination
The British Association of Dermatologists (the BAD) invites other specialist societies to provide a ‘guest parallel session’ at the BAD annual scientific meeting and the BGS was invited to do this at the July 2018 BAD meeting in Edinburgh. Our President Eileen Burns suggested that, since the event was being held in Scotland, it would be good for the Scots provided the speakers so I became the organiser.
It was a fascinating experience. The dermatologists were keen to hear about capacity (since a huge part of their work now is in skin cancer management, and assessing whether an older patient has capacity to make decisions about treatment is a frequent challenge). They were also interested in frailty and multimorbidity in their older patients whose skin problems may be just part of a wide range of issues to be addressed.
So, to an audience of around 200, Dr Cesar Rodriguez, a Tayside consultant in old age psychiatry and national clinical lead for Healthcare Improvement Scotland Focus on Dementia, provided a very useful summary of ‘(In)capacity and consent to treatment’ and Dr Graeme Hoyle, a consultant geriatrician in Aberdeen known to many of you as Aberdeen Geriatrics on Twitter (@AbdnGeriatrics), spoke on ‘Adapting to a frail and multimorbid world’.
The dermatologists provided the third speaker, Dr Tabi Leslie from London, talking on the subject of, ‘Pruritus in the elderly’. She asked me, ‘do you ask all your older patients if they itch’ and when I confessed that I didn't, she was most unimpressed, given the vast majority of them would answer 'yes'!
The dermatologists enjoyed hearing from experts in another field and we enjoyed the interface with another specialty. The 'guest society' idea might be one worth copying from time to time, for a national or regional BGS meeting!
Christine McAlpine
Outgoing Chair of BGS Scotland