John Quin worked for thirty-three years as a physician for the NHS in both Scotland and England, specialising in endocrinology. Days on the wards were uproariously funny one minute, infinitely tragic the next. Starting with a stern lesson from the president of the British Society of Gastroenterologists that the younger doctor was not 'a f****** comedian', Dr Quin, Medicine Man is packed with vividly told tales of the joy and reward of getting the diagnosis right, the disaster of getting it wrong. Darkly amusing and with a keen eye for the absurd, this sharply observed memoir is not only an acute insight into the farcical frustrations and tensions of working in a chronically underfunded system but also a timely reminder of the humanity of the NHS staff who care for us.

Video is everywhere. But what is video art and how does it differ from cinema? What connections has it made with healthcare and medicine? And what implications might these connections have for how we approach our physical and mental health? Breaking new ground, Video acts as an accessible introduction to the potential value of this medium within medical practice, patient care and everyday creative expression. Pairing examples with specific health conditions and themes, author John Quin presents a series of video artworks and their potential benefit for patients, clinicians and carers. Heeding the rise of ‘amateur’ forms of video-making, shared through platforms such as YouTube, TikTok and Instagram, Quin also considers how the wide reach and convenience of social media is impacting health and wellbeing as popular interest in the medium continues to evolve. Featuring suggestions for both further reading and further viewing, Video navigates uncharted territory on behalf of artists, medical professionals and anyone interested in how video deals with health.

Surgeons cut, but physicians... what do physicians actually do? And is it true that other doctors really call them 'the magicians'? John Quin worked for thirty-three years as a physician for the NHS in both Scotland and England, specialising in endocrinology. He was told the subject was easy because 'hormones - well, they just go up and down'. This, it turned out, was something of an over-simplification. Days on the wards were uproariously funny one minute, infinitely tragic the next. From tackling fraudulent medical students to trying and failing to induce hypoglycaemia in Glaswegian alcoholics (all in the name of research), Dr Quin, Medicine Man is packed with vividly told tales of the joy and reward of getting the diagnosis right, the disaster of getting it wrong. Chasing Chekhov's two rabbits of medicine and writing, meanwhile, Quin sought solace in literature, art and music, applying the lessons of Bulgakov's country doctor to 1980s Glasgow, where none of the patients seemed to have a full complement of fingers, and to 21st-century Brighton, dealing with the consequences of a decade of austerity measures. Darkly amusing and with a keen eye for the absurd, this sharply observed memoir is not only an acute insight into the farcical frustrations and tensions of working in a chronically underfunded system but also a timely reminder of the humanity of the NHS staff who care for us.