All new cases of indigestion in patients over 55 should be investigated. Of course they should. No place for “white medicine” here. Straight off for an endoscopy. That’s what the protocol says. It is wrong. There is still a place for a short course of white medicine. Trouble is, get it wrong one way and you are the Page 3 pin-up in the Daily Mail under the headline “Doctor treats stomach cancer patient with indigestion medicine”. Get it wrong the other way, and the queues out of the endoscopy clinic are round the corner and down the road. By the time the patient gets to the end of the queue his stomach cancer has spread and has become inoperable.