Potter's Soapbox
Lies, damned lies and relative risk reduction
Chris Potter has a thing or two to say about the use of statistics and, in doing so, he takes us to a Friday night steak house that is prone to airway disasters and on a short tour of his...
When dinosaurs ruled the earth
Optimism is abundant in medical research, but frequently ends up being tempered with reality. In his inimitable style, Chris Potter looks back over his career – starting with his medical school memories of Bentley-driving ENT consultants, and moving forward through...
The barber-surgeon of Avebury
On a stroll through Neolithic Britain, Seville oranges on a quay in Dundee, marmalade and 14th century coins, Chris Potter unravels the story of a man (a surgeon?) seemingly crushed by a falling 13-tonne stone. But things are not quite...
Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise
Our irrepressible Features Editor, Chris Potter, explores the limits of ignorance. I’m not sure about you, but I seem to exist in a sea of incompetence and ignorance, constantly surrounded by amateurish chumps and feckless underachievers. Now, a lesser man...
“Oh Manchester is Wonderful”...And other chants you might hear from the football stands or at BACO
Chris Potter is a lad of the North West, and we see him here letting his bleach blond hair grow out to show us his Northern roots. When I was a lad, Manchester was a troubled city in apparent terminal...
The curse of Sports Illustrated
“Not a supernatural curse, but a basic statistical concept of blinding simplicity.” What is ‘regression to the mean’? I am reliably informed that our former North American colonies publish a periodical known as Sports Illustrated (note, incidentally, the characteristically incorrect...
Human factors, theatre ethnographics and Girls Aloud
The issue of ambient music in the operating theatre is frequently controversial and has been known to cause ‘Bluetooth wars’, as different team members vie for control of the speakers. Our own Chris Potter gives his personal slant on this...
An idiot’s guide to the Ministry of Health
Neville Chamberlain on an ill-judged charm offensive. Now I like to consider myself a well brought up sort of chap, and was always taught never to bring up religion, politics or (heaven forfend!) a lady’s name at the dinner table....
BACO 2015 – Liverpool
Team BACO 2015: Academic Secretary, Peter Andrews; Treasurer, Chris Potter; Master, Ian Mackay and Local Host and Programme Director, Andrew Swift. (Photo taken by Academic Chairman, Shakeel Saeed.) In the height of a glorious English summer, over 1200 of the...
The seven ages of BACO
Chris Potter is a man whose prose style needs no introduction. Here, he gives us a poetic discourse on the different generations of attendees at BACO. Alfred, Lord Tennyson has washed his hair and can’t do anything with it. It’s...
BACO – the early years
The origins of the British Academic Conference in Otolaryngology (BACO) are indelibly intertwined in the mists of time with the foundation of the British Association of Otolaryngology (BAO). For further information on the latter I can only refer the interested...
Armageddon and surgical outcomes
In the excitement of the festive season I am sure many of you will have omitted to commemorate the 60th anniversary of a highly significant world event. According to a small apocalyptic cult led by a Chicago housewife named Dorothy...
