brainstrust

Now here's a thing! When we founded brainstrust I had no idea of the wild and wonderful things it would get me into. The latest was an invitation by Channel 4 to spend an evening at The Wellcome Trust in London to watch Paul Grundy, one of our Patrons, perform an awake craniotomy live on TV. It was actually OK - the only bit I couldn't watch was when the skull was lifted away from the dura. It was highly informative and the fact that the audience (live and TV) could interact with the process through twitter, facebook, email and phone, made it accessible for all. It was sensitively handled, the patient and his family had agreed to the filming and if things had gone pearshaped then filming would have stopped.

So I was surprised at the backlash. Criticisms ran rife about reality TV and how inappropriate this was. Surely the more you know about a situation the better prepared you are to deal with it? I know that when Meg and I were diagnosed with cancer we wanted to know what our options were so that we could make our own choices. And I am glad we did. Meg would be on her honeymoon now if we hadn't. I believe in looking the tiger in the eye; the more information we have the better.  You don't have to watch this stuff. There is an off button. It's about choice. I have a right to watch this; you have a right not to. But it isn't right to deny someone the option of being informed.