I
recently had a go a cutting my throat. Needless to say, it wasn’t a clean
sweep, otherwise I would not now be writing this column. Either that or I would
be making a small post-mortem fortune in describing the true goings on from the
‘other side’. My wife immediately suspected that I had been listening to
Mahler’s 5th Symphony; for me, a wonderful work with an unfathomable
depth of emotion to it. For my wife, it represents a morose person about to
commit suicide. It is interesting how music affects people in different ways.
However, the truth is that I was not listening to Mahler.
Neither
was I contemplating whether to interview the young doctor who put in his
curriculum vitae that his hobby was listening to ‘vintage rock’. It was the
word ‘vintage’ that stopped me in my tracks (sorry; for those who still have
LPs stored in the loft, I couldn’t resist that pun); as he then went on to
explain that the term ‘vintage’ meant music from the 60s. As I was born in
1960, it was a new experience to be considered by implication as ‘vintage’.
No,
the truth of the matter was that my razor head fell apart; giving the blade a
new found freedom that heretofore it had only dreamt of. The result was a one
inch gash a little too close to my left carotid artery for comfort.
Fortunately, I survived the auto-mutilation and can now devote some time to
contemplating how I wish to continue keeping well and live an independent life
in North Lincolnshire. Which is all a very long-winded way of bringing me to
the point of this week’s subject.
North
Lincolnshire’s Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) is, since April 2013, the
organisation responsible for buying health services. The CCG is now keen to
know your views; views that will help to inform how services are developed within
our county. The question being asked is ‘what needs to happen so that you and
yours feel confident about keeping well and living an independent life to the
full?’ The CCG is keen for people of all ages to contribute to this learning
process. What would make a difference for you and your family? How do we need
to develop health and social services to help and support your aims and needs?
There
are two ways in which you can become involved with this important survey. The
first is to simply go on-line and complete a survey here, giving us the
opportunity to see how you see life. The second is to attend a public meeting
on Thursday 27 June 2013 between 9.30 – 14.30 at the Wortley House Hotel,
Rowland Road, Scunthorpe, North Lincolnshire DN16 1SU. The organisers say that
the event will be ‘fun, inspiring and you will learn a lot’.
Finally,
if you want to learn more about public health inequalities and what people die
of in your area, enter your postcode into the Longer Lives website and see how
we compare to other areas: http://longerlives.phe.org.uk/. Fortunately,
self-beheadings do not seem to feature for my street, so I may be okay for a
while longer.
First published
in the Scunthorpe Telegraph, 20 June 2013
© Copyright
Robert M Jaggs-Fowler 2013
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