Many drug ads in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) during the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s would offend today.
In an ad for Valium, we are told that the woman pictured (“Jan”) is “psychoneurotic” because she is unmarried at age 35. “You probably see many such Jans in your practice,” says the ad—“The unmarrieds with low self-esteem. Jan never found a man to measure up to her father.”
Valium was …
These journal ads could not run today
The orders from the state seemed to come suddenly, although we all knew we would have to adjust our methods of treating our clients, the news wasn’t good, and seeing anyone in person was treacherous since many still thought it was a hoax and they didn’t believe they needed to be cautious. Some would wear a hazmat suit if they could get their hands on one. As a psychiatric nurse …
Nothing prepared me for telehealth’s nightmare
Burnout among doctors is not something new. In fact, way before the pandemic, 69% of physicians reported they were somewhat or incredibly happy in 2020, before the pandemic started.
This number drastically fell to 49% when COVID-19 stepped in. This is a statistic that we need to be aware of.
For many of us, we embarked on our journey in medicine with naïve optimism. We stepped into medical school thinking about the …
The dark truth of physician burnout
July 1st is here, which means it’s the start of a new residency year. For interns, things can be nerve-wracking and scary. You may wonder if you remember enough information from medical school and hope you arrive at the right place at the right time this week. For the senior residents like me, we are elated to be almost done with training, but we are also starting to focus on …
5 financial truths every resident needs to know
First off, congratulations to the Class of 2025 for getting into medical school. With the pandemic restrictions lifting, enjoy the next few months doing the things you love because medical school will take an emotional and financial toll on you. According to AAMC, the median debt for medical students in 2019 was $200,000. Unfortunately, fundraising for scholarships was difficult for many organizations due to the pandemic despite more students seeking …
8 scholarship tips for medical school
“As a species, we have been an abject failure in dealing with a worldwide crisis. We politicize things for money, political reasons and some kind of weird power, even when it kills us in the process. We already have a World Health Organization (WHO). Would it be so difficult to staff it …
COVID vaccines’ tragic dance [PODCAST]
Have you ever been to one of those areas in the hospital called “the library” or “the educational/academic center”? No, I’m not talking about the athenaeum at the universities. The library we are talking about is the one at the teaching hospital specifically dedicated to the education of the trainee residents and fellows. Usually found on the first floor, it is a place where anyone can walk in and use …
Redefining what a hospital library should be
How sad when a PCP calls, saying, “My chief warned me that if I don’t dramatically improve my productivity, I’m going to be terminated.” Such doctors are often patient-centered listeners who cannot bear to shift from healer mode to assembly line mode.
Some of these docs learn how to better balance healing with task completion; others make a beeline for concierge or direct primary care practices; still others …
The joylessness of harried medical leaders
The current era of health care delivery has been aptly compared with going to war against an invisible enemy that can attack anywhere, at any time and with novel means.
This invisible enemy was attacking the civilians as well as the “front line” with vigor.
We have attempted to learn on the fly and use our intelligence to develop a defensive strategy against the enemy’s ever-changing tactics and learn from prior battlefronts.
This …
You need a break from the front lines of health care
“No offense to you, Doc, but I hate coming to the doctor.”
I hear these words at least once a week when I walk into a patient’s room.
In 15 years of practice, that means about a thousand times.
And that does not include my training years.
There will be variations of the theme, of course:
“I really don’t like coming to the doctor.”
I get anxious in the doctor’s office. That is why my blood …
Why do patients hate going to the doctor?
An installation to explore the impact of medications in daily life
Bob is a typical patient at the pharmacy with a chronic illness. Bob, along with 30 other random patients whom I followed in the year 2017, had been picked up to explore the number of medications they consumed in an average year. Bob took 4,280 prescription pills (no data on OTC consumption) …
4280: the number of pills Bob took last year
“The symptoms of EDS aren’t limited to the musculoskeletal system and commonly affect everything from hearing and vision to integumentary issues such as prolonged wound healing and easy bruising. It also became apparent that the specialists I had seen had contributed valuable information to the overall puzzle but were simply not able …
What you need to know about Ehlers-Danlos syndrome patients [PODCAST]
“We need to stop weight shaming people & not make them fearful of seeing a Dr., but we also need to find a supportive way to talk about obesity.”
– TikTok commenter
“You’ve got to get on TikTok,” everyone kept saying. Launching a web-based life and weight coaching platform for teens, I begrudgingly decided it was time to jump in. I felt like I was putting on an ill-fitting scuba mask and snorkel …
Medical gaslighting due to weight stigma and bias is harmful: a viral TikTok study
Digital health equity is a new crisis that connects urban and rural health and impacts unique and diverse populations. Based on the World Health Organization, “health equity is defined as the absence of unfair and avoidable or remediable differences in health among population groups defined socially, economically, demographically, or geographically.” As health systems begin to expand and refine their digital health systems, digital health equity should be a fundamental aspect …
Digital health equity is an emerging gap in health
Mentorship. We all do it; we all benefit from it. But we rarely talk about how the mentor-mentee relationship looks. We rarely talk about ways to improve a mentorship relationship or even have decent mentor-mentee relationships. In fact, many of us likely get into medicine because we want to help patients, but forget how important mentorship often is on our way to learning to achieve such a goal.
Here are 5 …
5 ways to have an outstanding mentorship relationship
I was first diagnosed with major depressive disorder as a preteen after my teenage sister died. I attempted suicide three years later. This would be the first of several attempts and the first of countless times I felt my life was not worth living. But I am not unique.
According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), 1 person dies by suicide every 11 minutes.
My depression is like …
Surviving medical school with depression
This is not a story about the before. It is about the after.
When I blew the whistle on the gender harassment I experienced and witnessed within my workplace, I naively thought doing so would help. I thought opportunities and experiences for women would get better. I thought it would be worth the risk.
And yet, two years into the after, I am still struggling. My experience taught me that I am …
Questions of a canceled whistle-blower
I was looking forward to March 2020. My boyfriend and I had a long-awaited vacation to Aruba we were looking forward to. Everything is packed, plans are finalized, and the world shuts down three days before our trip. Frustrated, we refuse to believe that a “virus” is worthy of shutting the world down. “What’s the difference between this and anything else?” “Who cares? It’s just a virus?!” “I am still …
Being the angel of death during a pandemic
The landscape of medical practice has changed dramatically over the many decades I have been in practice. Most of these changes are intensely discouraging and depressing and are negatively affecting the physicians of today. The government, hospitals, networks, even our own professional organizations are working to establish and enforce new regulations — new hoops for doctors to jump through, mainly in the furtherance of their profit and their power over …
Why I became a doctor: reflections on a calling
You’ve heard of the emotional impact of menopause on women, but did you know that it can also cause anxiety and depression? Mental health is a topic that many people don’t want to discuss due to concerns of stigma, fear, and perceived repercussions of the diagnosis. However, if this topic is raised with compassion and understanding, the patient will likely become more comfortable and open to the conversation. I found …
The emotional impact of menopause on women
Get free updates delivered free to your inbox.
