Deb Verran

One of my collaborators Dr Chris Heisler, discussing our recently published manuscript in JACS, which focuses on how and when surgeons take action as a result of experiencing microaggressions in the workplace youtu.be/hCA3hcNS7EY?...

📣 Presented at #KidneyWk: Among women with postdonation #Pregnancy after living #KidneyDonation, infants were more likely to be born small for gestational age vs infants in matched pregnancies among nondonors. ja.ma/3U9kZW9 @asnkidney.bsky.social

This cell photographed through a microscope kind of looks like a person. DNA in the nucleus and mitochondria are shown. #CellBiology

I agree it has been horrifying to hear the news of this woman MP being attacked here in Australia. Helen Haines did not deserve this.

👇 #BookSky about the book Careless People

An echidna day is always a good day!

The lack of adequate governance and the requisite policy frameworks are a big factor in the results that were obtained from this study of deceased donor kidney transplants in Mexico. The accompanying Editorial sums up the situation particularly well. #NephSky

And many women described a second harm: reporting devaluation and having their institutions ignore it or make it worse.

I mean. They are just so cute. 13th trip to the ice starts in two weeks and I simply cannot wait to see these amazing creatures again. 🧪🦑🌎🦉 (Photo taken under 2025 NZ AMLR permit)

Agree this is worth reading - "we find that devaluation—defined as the experience of feeling excluded, disrespected, mistreated, or held to different standards—was the most distinctly gendered topic in our sample (38% of women vs. 16% of men reported experiencing devaluation)"

Sad to hear that @helenbranswell.bsky.social has died. Helen was one of the shining beacons of light when it came to the reporting of #publichealth #IDSky type matters via social media

So it seems that commercial refrigeration systems are vulnerable to being hacked if they are connected to the internet. This may become an issue for hospitals and scientific researchers if adequate protections are not in place.

So there currently a raging debate on X, Bluesky & other platforms where people are using a drop in Cloudflare's YandexBot traffic to claim that right-wing online engagement is falling. radar.cloudflare.com/bots/as13238... That conclusion doesn't follow from the data.

We are now in the era where the content of conference slides can be used by others for nefarious means

St Cwyfan's Church-in-the-Sea, Anglesey, north Wales, photo by Victoria Ashman.

Innovative Surgical Trends, the new peer-reviewed journal co-owned by SAGES and EAES, is seeking volunteers to join its editorial review board. For more information: www.sages.org/ist-call-for...

Exclusive: A new analysis refutes James Watson’s claim that he was the first to recognize the significance of the famed photograph 51. https://scim.ag/4rTKck8

Amputating the wrong limb is entirely preventable and is a harbinger for medicolegal type legal action to then ensue

I've talked to a few journal editors who are concerned about similar problems re: anonymous reviewers. If a peer reviewer wants a little help & feeds your unpublished submission into an AI system, they've just shared your proprietary work & broken confidentiality. A nightmare to think about

I cannot fathom the logic of the person who loads a Meta AI tool onto anything containing their personal data

So, if you hand over your hard-earned research data (in this case to an AI platform), it should not come as a surprise that the people behind the platform might actually use it themselves (and then push on to publish it)!

This is music to my ears ....... the increasing use of AI in healthcare will lead to secondary issues (and the burgeoning $$$ cost is just one of them).

one of the big skills in medicine (and probably everything) is knowing: 1- what I need to KNOW 2- what I need to know enough about to look up details 3- what I don't know and need to look up and/or talk to someone else

ABC's Australian Story tonight was excellent. It's about Australia's first Indigenous ophthalmologist. www.abc.net.au/news/2026-09...

Government regulators are accusing some of these telehealth companies of deceptive, unethical business practices, including disclosing their customers’ health data, signing them up for hard-to-cancel subscriptions and bypassing real-time consultations with doctors. apnews.com/article/tele...

So, the big question, I think, is what do we want our machines to do for us? Do we want machines that turn fossil fuels into the illusion of status and the illusion of dominion?

Sphagnum saves lives. Long used by Indigenous peoples, during WWI, it went from bog to battlefield, becoming a critical wound dressing because of its absorbency and antimicrobial properties. A moss that evolved to manage water in bogs ended up managing wounds on battlefields. 5/

September 16 is Plover Appreciation Day - so I'm offering this rare and special hooded plover for you all to appreciate. These nest on beaches and are very vulnerable to predators (including humans). They are the sweetest little birds. I love seeing them.

Happy Sundew Sunday! Want to learn 5 super cool facts about miniature-yet-so-complex sundew plants? Follow along to learn some unusual botany. 🧵 1/

Only 19% of kidney transplant referrals progress to the waitlist in the United States. 50% never even initiate formal evaluation. A new national study exposes… https://news.gmj.ge/briefs/key-finding-half-of-kidney-transplant-candidates-never-begin-evaluation-us-study-reveals/

Oversight, standards needed for ethical integration of AI into public health systems, physicians say Without proper vetting and governance, AI tools pose risks to patients, especially those from underserved communities, the authors write. Read more: https://bit.ly/4xpuzSt

We should talk more about what a travesty the bibliography of OpenAI is 16 measly citations for a 165-page paper, of which 5 are just the problem statement. Only 7 are from this century. They failed to cite the method they used. And the guy whom they offered single-authorship & the Millennium Prize

The Navier-Stokes fight is a perfect encapsulation of where AI development is right now: this should be really cool and exciting, and instead because of Silicon Valley egos it's become a fight over cheating, surveillance, and companies trying to get one up over the other

I believe you might know this flower as #willowherb or #fireweed In late summer, this is one of my favorite plants to #photograph. Fields and forests in #norway are full of them. #photography #fujifilm #xt5 #flower #plants #sunset

This is some read. This is about doctors in one very large New Zealand hospital mislabeling a young woman with a rare gastrointestinal disorder and attributing her condition to being self-inflicted. #Medicolegal

🚨Update: Our analysis of global APC expenditure has now been expanded to cover more publishers (7 -> 14) and more years (2019-2025). We estimate $15B in APCs paid over seven years, $3.7B in 2025 alone. Elsevier crosses the $1B threshold by itself in 2025. arxiv.org/abs/2608.16322 #ScholComm

And we debunked footage. As videos spread online, one widely shared clip claiming to show the Nepal floods turned out to be AI-generated. We helped explain to audiences how they can use visual clues to tell it’s not real. www.bbc.co.uk/news/videos/...

Information below on how to donate money to reliable organizations based within Nepal as the authorities deal with the aftermath of the catastrophic flood

Social media addiction is about to enter its tobacco crisis moment. And it’s about time! It’s also critically about #mentalhealth and the future of our youth, globally.  #medsky www.cbsnews.com/news/meta-se...

Here's the official announcement of Parton's passing from her reps, along with the request that in lieu of flowers, the family asks for donations to be made to Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library at www.imaginationlibrary.com

Mordor #sky Evening run (at last!) 1600s Tyresö Castle

I am glad to report that so far more students of Ghent signed a petition against Cofnas' coming to Ghent; than academics that have signed this somewhat ludicrous open letter. www.change.org/p/stop-the-h.... He was not sacked for whistleblowing - he is suspended because he's a racist, etc.