The same clinician, for six years

Tobias Renn saw nine different clinicians in one year and told the ninth a story he had already told the other eight.

The list grows because every appointment can add and almost none are structured to remove. Nobody is at fault; the mechanism simply only runs one way.

Fear as the obstacle

Home assessment finds things clinic assessment cannot: the rug, the third step, the light switch at the wrong end of the hall, the chair that is four inches too low.

Every retelling loses something. We were making patients do our handovers for us.

Dr. Priya Ramanathan, general practice

Strength at eighty

The fortnight after discharge is where things come apart, and the interventions that help are unglamorous: a phone call, a medicines check, one visit.

Eleven of his last twelve appointments were with the same clinician. “She knows what I’m like when I’m well.”