Doctors’ Association UK (DAUK) committee members contributed to winning and highly commended articles at this year’s Medical Journalists’ Association (MJA) Awards.
Dr Ellen Welch spoke to the BMJ for a piece on the postcode lottery in access to weight loss medicines on the NHS.
The article by Elisabeth Mahese titled Mounjaro: Less than half of England has NHS access to jab months after roll-out, distressing patients and GPs won the News Story, Specialist Audience.
BMJ senior features editor Jennifer Richardson was highly commended for the Editor award category.
Domestic abuse
Her submissions included a powerful article by Adele Waters on Why doctors are uniquely vulnerable to domestic abuse
The article helped launch the first NHS Domestic Abuse Awareness Day (NHSDAAD).
It included contributions from Dr Welch and Dr Sarah Jacques, DAUK GP co-lead, who are also campaigns co-leads for the Medical Women’s Federation and co-ordinators of NHSDAAD.
Dr David Nicholl, DAUK committee member, and Trish Greenhalgh, professor of primary care health sciences, wrote an opinion article in the BMJ on the subject of doctors speaking of their concerns about the mental health of Donald Trump.
Mental health
The article is linked to Donald Trump’s mental health: are health professionals’ media speculations ethical or dangerous?, which won Tom Moberly of the BMJ the Mental Health story award.
Sky News specialist health producer Mark Thompson, who will speak at the joint DAUK and Doctors for the NHS (DFNHS) conference next month, was part of the team that won the Case Study Award for The Gift: A hand transplant journey risking life and limb.
The conference takes place on Saturday 10 October at Bedern Hall in York. Book your in-person place now. Or book your online place.
Conference
In his presentation The NHS in crisis – and how the media responds, Mark will share his experiences of reporting on the NHS and how the media responds when the health service is in crisis.
Find out more about the conference.
A full list of the MJA Awards winners is available on the MJA website.
Find out more about working with journalists in the webinar Doctor, meet the press: how to work with journalists, which was kindly recorded for DAUK members by Shaun Lintern, health editor of the Sunday Times and MJA chair, and Emma Wilkinson, freelance journalist specialising in health and MJA vice chair.
DAUK committee members are all volunteers and speak to the media about issues facing frontline doctors in their own time. Please support our work by joining DAUK or donating to our GoFundMe.