As our surge approaches many more lives lost and overcrowded critically ill in the hospitals, I can see the pain in their eyes. No matter where you go on social media or who you run into, I can see the pain. I can see the helplessness. I can see the tears being held back. How can one be trained to save lives and not be able to? Not …
COVID: I can see the suffering in your eyes
We all think we know what a bruise looks like. Black and blue, brownish around the edges. But depending on the circumstances, the same bruise can look different from one person to another.
To a well-loved child who skinned her knee, a bruise might look like a bad memory of an epic tree-climb attempt. To a patient with diabetes, a similar bruise might look like the onset of a life-threatening emergency. …
Changing the national conversation on wound care
According to a newly released study, by the end of 2020, the United States experienced its sharpest rise in poverty rates in 50 years, leaving eight million more people nationwide in a state of poverty. As we usher in a new Congressional session, perhaps America needs an anti-poverty czar who can serve as a key resource for addressing the growing poverty rates in …
With poverty rates now highest in 50 years, America needs a poverty czar
COVID-19 has affected us all, but a great deal of the impact has been on older adults, and especially those living in long-term care homes. Eight in 10 deaths from COVID-19 in the first wave of the pandemic in Canada came from long-term care residences. Spread of COVID-19 in these settings has proven challenging to control. Vaccines offer hope for the future and are beginning …
Beyond vaccines: Rethinking testing in long-term care
This is all about death.
In early January 2021, my hospital was overwhelmed with COVID-19 cases as the second wave of infections hit our coastal holiday town with devastating force.
The senior emergency doctor contracted the disease and was unwell. The remaining doctors were stretched to cover the extra load. Our infrastructure was stretched. My measure of how we were coping was based on a few rough gauges:
How many people were lined …
The “rest in peace team” during the latest wave of COVID
The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated and highlighted many health issues, particularly those suffering from chronic pain.
An estimated 50 million people in the U.S. live with chronic pain, of which approximately 19.6 million experience high-impact chronic pain that interferes with life, social, and occupational activities. Regardless of the pathology of pain, chronic pain may involve Read more…
Recommending yoga to your patients? Consider this first.
“The practice of medicine is an art, not a trade; a calling, not a business; a calling in which your heart will be exercised equally with your head.”
– Sir William Osler
One of the most sacred and intimate relationships is that which exists between patient and physician. A patient shares feelings and fears as he traverses the path of illness or chronic disease. As roadblocks in health emerge, a patient looks …
The art of medicine: a patient’s perspective
Physicians are overwhelmed and burned out. We have an epidemic of “too busy.” Many of us think we could get so much more accomplished if we had more time. Why aren’t we taking the time? Doctors need to start taking growth days. These aren’t sick days, mental health days or vacation days. Growth days are days strategically taken during the month that are specifically meant for personal growth. This could …
On Inaugural Day, January 20th, 2021, Amanda Gorman eloquently recited her poem “The Hill We Climb.”. Instantaneously, she electrified a nation that resonated deeply with her words. For many, she became the highlight of the Inauguration as she revived an appreciation for poetry and the meaning it can create. Through the nuanced phrases and occasional rhymes, she portrayed her own feelings and passions regarding the state of our nation. …
What medicine can learn from a poem
It seemed unthinkable, but I decided to think about it anyhow. Would it be possible to have a hospital birth without maternity coverage? I had time and I had options, so I decided to figure it out. I have to start by being transparent. As the title implies, I am a physician, specifically an OB/GYN. I know many people will think that affords me a significant advantage over the general …
I paid less for my hospital birth than most of my patients with insurance
Decades of job loss, the opioid crisis, and the current pandemic have all shaken the already tenuous health care system of rural America. This is happening in the wealthiest nation on Earth, with a GDP of over 20 trillion dollars. Why is this happening? And how can the medical education system better prepare future physicians to meet rural patients’ needs?
Despite our country’s …
The rural health care crisis and medical education
As a pediatric emergency physician in Chicago, I am no stranger to the effects of gun violence in our patient population and society. But what do we do when gun violence is turned on our own community as physicians?
Recently a beloved pediatrician in Austin, Texas, Dr. Lindley Dodson, was held hostage and killed in a murder-suicide carried out by another pediatrician with whom she had no relationship. This senseless tragedy has …
Gun and health care workplace violence: Dr. Lindley Dodson’s tragic death
We were only a few miles away from the hospital, but we might as well have been in another galaxy. Normally I wouldn’t have minded that feeling since I’ve spent most of my adult life in hospitals going through the different larval stages a medical trainee must on their way to their final form of an attending physician. But this current feeling of disconnect from the local hospital was …
It’s time to end draconian hospital visitation policies during COVID-19
ADVERTISEMENT
It’s no surprise that the PlayStation 5 (PS5) has been extremely popular since its launch in November, with over four million consoles sold since launch. However, what is surprising is that the PS5 has broken all launch month gaming hardware sales records ever, despite its steep prices at $500 for the full console and $400 for the digital edition, not to mention its launch in the …
What the PlayStation 5 can teach the vaccine rollout
You might be next.
I began my career as a family physician in Buffalo, MN in 2002. I have been an extremely productive doctor for 20 years. For context, I can assure the reader that my ratings and reviews are excellent, and I speak to the common primary care experience. I was a very green attending when I showed up in Buffalo for my first attending job. …
The attack in Buffalo, Minnesota: a primary care physician’s perspective
I knew this day would come, when my survival would depend on my ability to reframe a covenant once made. Medicine, the knight in shining armor that has given me livelihood and legacy has taken so much. I willingly surrendered for the title of physician and the responsibility and privilege of being a healer. But relentlessly, Western medicine has tried to strip me of me so I would robotically serve …
When medicine is the virus that ails you
2020 is the year that brought many of us to our knees. The COVID-19 pandemic ravaged the entire world, leading to death, job loss, isolation, fear, and stress.
Children were all of a sudden learning from home. Women were leaving the workplace. Stay at home orders were in place. Preventative health care was prevented. Everything shut down.
Here I was a mother of three, a physician, a wife, and CEO of a Read more…
How I lost sight of my own health care while creating a women’s health care company
At its core, medicine is about a relationship between patients and health care workers. This bond between the sick and those who care for them transcends conventional boundaries and restrictions. Health care workers often witness the most profoundly intimate moments of complete strangers’ lives. We see patients in their most raw and vulnerable states. Patients, in turn, allow us into their lives and put their health and welfare in our …
How COVID-19 strained the relationship between patients and health care workers
The United States has, so far, earned a solid D+ on the vaccine effort. The high mark is not an F because people are actually being vaccinated. There are a multitude of factors that are making this already incredibly complex situation unnecessarily convoluted. From my research, which has been motivated by my company’s development of a digital tool that prioritizes and schedules vaccinations in multiple states, it has become apparent …
The United States earns a D+ on the vaccine effort
“I think I’m having a stroke.”
The words struggled to leave my mouth as I spoke to the 9-1-1 operator. Emotionally in disbelief, the words seemed so unusual to say in the first person. Ten minutes earlier, overwhelming nausea and drenching sweats woke me abruptly from sleep. Thinking it was something I ate, I immediately regretted the preceding meal that must have been responsible. My attempt to get to the bathroom …
After a stroke, a physician experiences true vulnerability
Get free updates delivered free to your inbox.
