Rheumatology Advance Access originally published online on January 31, 2006
Rheumatology 2006 45(3):353; doi:10.1093/rheumatology/kei131
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LETTER TO THE EDITOR |
Too many decades or too little joined up thinking?
MRC Health Services Research Collaboration, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK
Correspondence to: p.dieppe{at}bristol.ac.uk
SIR, Most rheumatologists know—or should know—that this is the Bone and Joint Decade. Those who are leading this initiative have rightly made claims for the importance of improving bone and joint disease awareness and research worldwide. They have also implied some uniqueness of ‘their decade’, and its WHO support, following on from the Decade of the Brain.
I recently became aware of the fact that it was also the Decade of Pain Control and Research. This led me to do a brief Google search to see how many other decades we might be in the middle of. There are a lot. Here is a list of some of the health-related decades we are currently in:
- First UN Decade for Eradication of Poverty (1997–2006): a United Nations initiative
- The Decade of Pain Control and Research (2001–2010): launched by ex-President Clinton
- The Bone and Joint Decade (2000–2010): WHO-sponsored
- Decade for Health in Aging (2000–2010): sponsored by a large coalition of US and other agencies
- The Decade of Behaviour (2000–2010): ‘rooted in the behavioural and social science community’
- Decade of Health Information Technology (2004–2013): launched by the US Department of Health and Human Services
- The Decade of Pain Control and Research (2001–2010): launched by ex-President Clinton
As shown, some of these ‘decades’ last for 10 yr, others for 11. A brief, non-systematic, informal survey of some colleagues suggests that rheumatologists do not know about the pain or behaviour decades, and, similarly, that pain physicians know about ‘their’ decade but are unaware of the fact that it is the Bone and Joint Decade or the Decade of Behaviour. And yet pain, behaviour and bone and joint conditions are all inextricably linked. Furthermore, they are linked to ageing and to poverty, and could be aided by better health information technology. So we are in the midst of at least six different decades, each of them relevant to musculoskeletal problems, but each of which appears to be working in isolation. Imagine the benefits that might accrue if we actually worked together on this. Perhaps it is not too late. Can we have some joined up thinking please?
Accepted 16 August 2005
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