A guest column by the American College of Physicians, exclusive to KevinMD.com.
I’m writing this as both an observation and confession.
The observation is that my professional colleagues are increasingly unwilling or unable to disengage from work-related technology in what would otherwise be considered “personal” time.
It is increasingly common to receive work-related emails or see non-urgent …
We are losing our ability to unplug
It’s been said that 80 percent of success is showing up, but that’s simply not true. Showing up is not enough. Showing up reliably and giving your best is not enough. You’ve got to be seen showing up. So, how do you raise your professional visibility? Here are five tips for the modern physician leader. If you are a traditionalist, please keep an open mind. The strategies below aren’t that …
5 simple steps to amplify a physician’s professional visibility
“Good morning, Mr. S! How are you feeling today?” I ask as I step into his hospital room. Yesterday, Mr. S was admitted for infective endocarditis and has been tolerating antibiotic treatment well. I am a medical student on my acute cardiology rotation taking care of him.
“I’m feeling fine,” he says, and I proceed to ask about how he slept, if he’s experiencing any chest pain, palpitations, shortness of breath, …
Music is creating beauty in the most surprising of places
A guest column by the American Society of Anesthesiologists, exclusive to KevinMD.com.
Every physician takes the Hippocratic oath and promises to “do no harm.” In the face of the current opioid epidemic, this includes protecting our patients from dependence and addiction, including those who are suffering from debilitating acute and chronic pain. Sometimes this involves …
A young mother’s close call with opioid dependence
As a third-generation physician, I grew up thinking and dreaming of a being a physician, and 33 years later, I am still living the dream. I dreamt of saving people’s lives. I dreamt of a day like today when I received a LinkedIn request from a young lady on whom, 21 years ago, I performed a living donor liver transplant from her mother.
Today she is graduating from college and hopes …
A life moment you dare not dream of
A number of major cities have seen shared e-scooters, or electrical scooters, take over their streets. It’s certainly popular with the riders, but it is creating waves with a lot of critics as well. In Portland, Oregon, there are four companies trialing the scooters over a several-month period. Driving around my city, I find that we are being inundated with scooters being used on the sidewalk, on the streets, in …
An orthopedic surgeon’s take on the e-scooter craze
The supervising resident’s Voalte phone dinged: “Dr. Mel: Please meet Dr. Rosemond at room 514 for Cardiology rounds.”
She scrolled up a few texts and saw that her male counterpart who had rounded the previous day had been addressed as “Dr. Stearnes.”
When Mel mentioned the discrepancy to Jacob Stearnes, he just shrugged and said, “The cardiology nurse probably doesn’t even know my first name.”
When Mel mentioned the discrepancy to her husband, …
Moving beyond National Women Physicians Day
Test your medicine knowledge with the MKSAP challenge, in partnership with the American College of Physicians.
A 48-year-old man is evaluated for a 4-week history of heartburn that awakens him at night. The symptoms occur about three times per week. He has been taking over-the-counter antacids with incomplete relief. Food triggers include coffee and spicy foods. He has not had unintentional weight loss or difficulty swallowing.
Physical examination and laboratory …
MKSAP: 48-year-old man with a 4-week history of heartburn
He was the go-to sports guy in Washington, DC. A masterful surgeon with countless academic publications, he trained orthopaedic surgeons across the world and was the top physician for professional sports teams and Olympians.
Dr. Benjamin Shaffer had it all.
Yet Ben was more than a stellar surgeon. He was a kind, sweet, brilliant, and sensitive soul who could relate to anyone—from inner-city children …
Why “happy” doctors commit suicide
I have two hours until I’m due to breastfeed my seventh-month-old baby again, so I’ll make this quick: Breastfeeding is really hard for many and our environment and current policy context makes it even harder.
The month of August has been declared “National Breastfeeding Month” by the United States Breastfeeding Committee — an organization committed to “creating a landscape of breastfeeding support” by advocating for policy changes …
3 ways we’ve failed woman who breastfeed
Watching patients suffer and die is not an easy thing to do. Left unchecked, I don’t think most front-line doctors would last too long immersed in that kind of setting. First, the emotional toll would be too high to maintain over a long period of time. Second, working at the extremes of emotion doesn’t allow a physician to competently and objectively apply medical knowledge to heal disease and alleviate suffering. …
The price of being a compassionate doctor is often worth it
What do you think of when you hear the word medicine?
Perhaps it includes doctors, nurses, pills, prescriptions, operations, surgery, wounds, illness and disease, curing and healing, science, study, university?
But whatever your picture of medicine — does it include love?
I’m not a betting person, but I reckon for most who work within the profession that love is not top of the list, or even near the top. In fact, it probably …
The foundation of medicine is love
Fresh out of residency and having just turned 29 years old, I started my first job as a general pediatrician in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. One of the first official tasks of my new position involved picking out brand new office furniture for my private windowed office which was housed along the perimeter of the multi-specialty clinic I had joined. I went with a blond L-shaped desk and shelf unit …
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In 2002, when I began my first hospitalist job, I was a dyed-in-the-wool hospital medicine convert, convinced that the transfer of inpatient care to true specialists in hospital medicine (hospitalists) would dramatically improve the quality and efficiency of inpatient care, increase patient satisfaction and decrease costs.
By 2008, I had developed serious doubts, which prompted me to publish an editorial in the Journal of Hospital Medicine, entitled “The Expanding or Shrinking …
6 things wrong with hospital medicine
I started internship July 1, 2008, as a terrified 25-year-old blank slate. Most days started with a combination of nausea and dread as I pumped myself up in the resident parking lot — conveniently located a mere 1/2 mile from the entrance to the ivory tower I called home.
The days were long. The nights were longer. Every month I had the chance to be a brand new idiot as a …
A physician’s return to the ivory tower
One of the aspects of depression that’s particularly difficult is the sleep disturbance which accompanies it and often continues after the traditional symptoms of depression have finally gotten better. When studied in the laboratory, the sleep of depressed person is short, shallow (with less deep slow-wave sleep), and frequently interrupted by awakenings. Additionally, there are abnormalities of the timing of rapid eye movement sleep and intensity of eye movements during …
How and why to treat sleep disturbance from depression
We all have that one patient. That one patient who can always find a way to turn a good day bad, who just knows how to push your buttons in all the wrong ways.
Who’s that patient for me? Let’s just call him Elton Reed.
Oh, Mr. Reed … where to begin with him?
When we first met, I remember being so excited and energized by him. He just had this fresh feeling …
The one patient that drives physicians to burnout
My name is Dr. Uchenna Umeh, and I am an immigrant (physician).
As far back as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to be an architect. My journey to becoming a physician started somewhat as a dare. I was born in Nigeria, the first child of six children from middle-class parents. My father served in the Nigerian air force; my mother was a banker.
Towards the end of my secondary education (I …
An immigrant physician’s journey
In the living room of the house where I grew up hangs a framed copy of a 17th-century map of Pennsylvania. The land is divided into tiny plots, each painstakingly labeled with a family name.
When I was little, I’d stand in front of the map and search for the little squares labeled “Sharples” — the original version of my last name. I’d imagine my distant ancestors, John and Jane Sharples …
A physician’s immigrant patients
I understand why J35, the killer whale, carried her dead calf. A member of an Orca pod in the Pacific Northwest, Tahlequah (J35 as she is known to researchers) gave birth to a calf who died a few hours later. For an unprecedented 17 days this summer, J35 carried out an exhausting ritual of pushing it repeatedly to the ocean’s surface. For 17 days, and over 1,000 miles she kept …
Many women carry their losses in their hearts for a lifetime
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