Clinical medicine (London, England)
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From senior school through to consultancy, a plethora of assessments shape medical careers. Multiple methods of assessment are used to discriminate between applicants. ⋯ We review the evidence for non-knowledge-based tests and discuss their perceived benefits. We raise the question: is the current use of non-knowledge-based tests within the UK at risk of undermining more robust measures of medical school and postgraduate performance?
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Viral haemorrhagic fevers (VHF) are a range of viral infections with potential to cause life-threatening illness in humans. Apart from Crimean-Congo haemorrhagic fever (CCHF), they are largely confined to Africa, distribution being dependent on the ecology of reservoir hosts. At present, the largest ever epidemic of Ebola virus disease (EVD or Ebola) is occurring in West Africa, raising the possibility that cases could be imported into non-endemic countries. Diagnosis and management is challenging due to the non-specificity of early symptoms, limited laboratory facilities in endemic areas, severity of disease, lack of effective therapy, strict infection control requirements and propensity to cause epidemics with secondary cases in healthcare workers.