InnovAiT: Education and inspiration for general practice

Puberty is defined as the time when the onset of sexual maturity occurs and the reproductive organs become functional, and it is therefore the time when a child becomes an adult capable of reproduction. Although the terms puberty and adolescence are commonly used interchangeably, the term puberty tends to be used for the physical, and adolescence for the psychological and social changes.

The UK has the highest teenage birth and abortion rates in Europe. Although the teenage birth rate is falling, there is an upward trend in teenage abortion. The conception statistics of the Office of National Statistics are used for monitoring progress towards the teenage pregnancy strategy's target, which is to halve England's under-18 conception rate by 2010, from a 1998 baseline.

Chlamydia is the most common sexually transmitted infection (STI) in the UK. It is asymptomatic in 70% of infected women and 50% of infected men and so often goes undiagnosed. Between 2000 and 2004, the rate of new diagnoses of chlamydia among people who attended Genito-urinary medicine clinics greatly increased from 116 to 175/100 000 (Fig. 1), with the largest increases in chlamydia rates occurring in the under 16 age group. However, the highest rates of chlamydia infection are seen in females aged between 16 and 19 years (1339/100 000) and males aged 20–24 years (1034/100 000). The National Chlamydia Screening Programme (NCSP) in England was established in 2003 with the objective of controlling chlamydia through the early detection and treatment of asymptomatic infection, thus preventing the development of sequelae and reducing onward disease transmission. Similar programmes are underway in the rest of the UK.

Adolescence is a time of physical, emotional and social change, marking the transition from child to adult. This usually begins at the age of 11 in girls and 13 years in boys and typically concludes by the age of 17.

Self-harm is a common yet frequently concealed activity among adolescents. GP trainees are likely to encounter young people who self-harm, not only in primary care, but also during placements in Accident and Emergency or general medicine. The type of self-harm seen in each situation is likely to vary and the approach to it may need to change accordingly. However, some themes remain constant and as self-harm is a prevalent phenomenon among adolescents, it is an area with which GPs should be familiar.

Although classification of eating disorders is relatively recent, cases of female anorexia have been recorded since the eleventh century. Then, the intentional self-starvation of women was thought to result from religious yearnings resulting in these women being termed ‘fasting saints’. Freud recorded a case of bulimia nervosa in a female patient in the nineteenth century. There are currently three recognized eating disorders: anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa and binge eating disorder. Many more people have disordered eating patterns that show features of these conditions but do not meet the criteria for diagnosis.

Valid consent to treatment is vitally important in medical practice both in the protection of patients and, for those providing treatment, as a defence against criminal charges of assault or battery or civil claims of trespass against the person.

When your children are small, you cannot help but have aspirations for them. Dreams couched in success of some sort, often academic, sport or careers based or even a combination. I did: I had visions of my sons following the conventional academic route leaving with a fistful of qualifications and then embarking on a professional careers whether doctor, solicitor or whatever, while being successful at whatever sport they played. However, one day when my eldest son was 14, I watched those dreams go up in smoke literally—cannabis smoke.

This issue of Crammer's Corner considers how to quickly evaluate the quality of an educational resource being used to support GP training.