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Mental Health Week – a psychiatrist walks into a bar

You wouldn’t always associate grain silos with the national funding crisis facing Australia’s mental health sector. Mental Health Australia chief executive Frank Quinlan did just that, using the silo analogy to lament the distribution of funds that so often see alcohol and drug problems and mental health problems dealt with separately. He cited the 2016 Australian Institute of Health and Welfare report on alcohol and drug use which states that one in four people who…

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The dog ate my spectacles

Is it wrong to blame a dog, hours after said dog has done something to make you cross? They say dogs have no sense of time, and, clearly cannot distinguish a pair of spectacles from a chewing toy. Staffies get anxious when you leave them alone for a few hours and this one chews things. We have learned to behave as if there is a toddler in the house – every chewable object goes ‘up…

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Bedside manners

So I’m visiting John in hospital and it’s just as well I didn’t come the day before, he says, because he was in a world of pain. Knee operations are like that. Hospital rooms evoke all kinds of memories, most of them not very pleasant, even a private room with a TV, telephone and a view of the painless world. John was telling how his daughter phoned on his world of pain day to see…

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Retirement is for wimps

Now that we have your attention, perhaps you could advise us what to do about our modest portfolio of shares, the value of which, in line with the rest of the Australian share market, is down 20% from April last year. Retirees tend to be more jittery about share market gyrations than your high-earning 30-somethings who have another 30 or so years to remedy the situation. She Who Has Been Telling Me To Sell Since…

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