Helen Laird
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helenlaird.bsky.social
Helen Laird
@helenlaird.bsky.social
EM A&E consultant (ER attending). NHS. Leadership. Bit political. Anti-racist. Screenwriter. Medical script consultant. She/her 🏳️‍🌈 Trans ally 🏳️‍⚧️ #scriptsky
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Hi I’m Helen, I’m an emergency consultant (attending) doctor. I’ve been working in the NHS for 17 years. I’m learning the craft of screenwriting and I am a medical consultant for screenplays.

I was torn between writing a post about lollipops or hitler, so I wrote this into instead.
Reposted by Helen Laird
I'd love a nomination to The Grey List by anyone who read BLOOD DRIVE:
After a domestic abuse survivor marries a small-town doctor, she suspects her stepson is a vampire preying on children, including her hemophiliac daughter.

THE LOST BOYS meets THE STEPFATHER.
December 3, 2025 at 9:35 AM
Reposted by Helen Laird
This is true. It is the best email I got this year.
November 26, 2025 at 9:50 PM
Now watching Passengers. I was enjoying until Aurora’s “what do we do now?” line. Reminds me of this Reese Witherspoon Speech and now I can’t enjoy the rest of the movie ‘cause I’m cross. #scriptsky
Reece Witherspoon Woman of the Year full speech - Ambition is not a dirty word!
YouTube video by Cat K
www.youtube.com
November 20, 2025 at 9:20 AM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Blue lemons. My print shop is now open for the next 72 hours with 3 limited edition prints. I only open my print shop once a year. #oilpainting #art
November 14, 2025 at 9:11 PM
Reposted by Helen Laird
I think @scarlettmcnally.bsky.social is absolutely right in this piece from the @bmj.com last month.

Some bits of healthcare can be simple and transactional, but a lot is much more nuanced, and there’s an important role for senior wise clinicians.

Link:
www.bmj.com/content/391/...

#MedSky
November 15, 2025 at 1:12 PM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Let’s try a little #MedSky game. When I finished med school:
-gastric lavage had been scrapped for ODs
- Doxapram was still used for T2 resp failure in COPD
- co-danthrusate was widely used,
- Quinolones were magic and only consultants were allowed to prescribe them.

What year did I qualify?
November 14, 2025 at 9:31 PM
It’s 2025 and solicitors are still addressing their letters to hospitals with “Dear Sirs”.
Really???!!! Shall i wait until a man is available to action your request?
November 14, 2025 at 1:19 PM
Reposted by Helen Laird
November 12, 2025 at 5:15 AM
Reposted by Helen Laird
First book of the day, the indomitable Kathy Burke's memoir, "A Mind of My Own"! - Michael
November 10, 2025 at 8:59 AM
This is why I have never subscribed to the “too many managers” narrative.

NHS managers do an important and undervalued job and we need more of them.

They’re not in it for the glory or the money are they. These are good people who work hard to help front line staff provide the best care.
November 10, 2025 at 8:48 AM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Just finished the proof of The Golden Monkey Mystery by @piudg.bsky.social, out 15th Jan - now that's an adventure story as adventure stories are meant to be! Death! Monkeys! Jewels! Danger! A subtle deconstruction of colonial childhood narratives! #KidLitUK #UKKidlit
November 10, 2025 at 6:40 AM
I was reading that Bluesky!
November 9, 2025 at 1:44 PM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Chef’s kiss, humans
A new four-lane highway cutting through tens of thousands of acres of protected Amazon rainforest is being built for the COP30 climate summit in the Brazilian city of Belém.

www.bbc.com/news/article... @paulisci.bsky.social
Amazon rainforest cut down to build highway for COP climate summit
The infrastructure required to host COP30 in Belém is undermining the cause, campaigners say.
www.bbc.com
November 8, 2025 at 8:33 PM
Reposted by Helen Laird
There are obvious parallels, to me at least, between seeing working-class and more diverse characters on screen alongside the number of w/c & diverse screenwriters seeing their scripts produced and actors playing those roles. Talent is everywhere, equal opportunities aren’t. #ScriptSkyUK #ScriptSky
Actor Eddie Marsan makes brilliant points in relation to ‘posh’ actors being promoted over actors from working-class and more diverse backgrounds. Likewise, it doesn’t help when w/c & diverse screenwriters aren’t having their ‘voices’ heard on screen. news.sky.com/story/posh-b...

#ScriptSkyUK
November 6, 2025 at 3:53 PM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Anyone fancy a lovely weekend in Newcastle meeting Russell T Davies, other high profile screenwriters, industry professionals and production companies?

Would love to go with someone. Make a great weekend of it.

newwritingnorth.com/event/screen...

#ScriptSkyUK #ScriptSky #WritingCommunity.
Screenwriting Weekender - New Writing North
newwritingnorth.com
November 6, 2025 at 7:35 PM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Just requested ax “Xray penis” rather than “Xray pelvis” and don’t know whether to blame my varifocals, the screen size, or the multiple interruptions I had whilst trying to place the blasted order 🤦🏼‍♀️😳 #humanfactors
November 6, 2025 at 1:00 PM
#scriptskyuk

Wrong hashtag
My mum took me to see Shirley Valentine at the Brixton Ritzy (pre-refurb) when I was 10. As it was a 15 it was a bit naughty. I loved it. “Boat is boat…”

Anyone know where I can watch it right now?

#ukscriptsky
November 7, 2025 at 9:21 AM
My mum took me to see Shirley Valentine at the Brixton Ritzy (pre-refurb) when I was 10. As it was a 15 it was a bit naughty. I loved it. “Boat is boat…”

Anyone know where I can watch it right now?

#ukscriptsky
November 7, 2025 at 9:20 AM
Let’s step up & vaccinate more people in the UK. This is the first year since it was available that I couldn’t get a Covid vaccine as a front line medic. I caught it in September & have been getting back to back viruses since no doubt due to Covid dampening my immune response.
#covid #nhs #vaccine
Covid jab less harmful than the virus itself, study reveals
It comes amid previous concerns about potential harm from the jab
www.independent.co.uk
November 7, 2025 at 9:11 AM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Hey, hey, this premiered tonight on Apple TV. My husband and a whole lotta friends of mine spent the last few years making it. It’s very good. You should check it out.
November 7, 2025 at 6:48 AM
Watching Back to the future with my kid and boy they don’t make PGs like that anymore.

Swearing, voyeurism, incestuous attraction and an attempted rape.

I still enjoyed it though so did the kid.
November 6, 2025 at 10:09 PM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Today's Work in Progress
November 6, 2025 at 2:43 AM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Discussion of lots of people being on long term sick leave since 2019 without mentioning covid is like talking about wwii without mentioning bombs or guns. And yet....
November 5, 2025 at 8:41 AM
Reposted by Helen Laird
Such a mystery, what MASS DISABLING EVENT could have happened after 2019 to cause this?
November 5, 2025 at 9:14 AM
Just watched Riot Women. I can’t think of an actress other than Joanna Scanlan who could perform that rope scene with such grace and depth and get that laugh when the phone rings. Humour from the depths of grief. Such talent. #RiotWomen. #scriptsky
November 4, 2025 at 12:23 AM