How motherhood reshaped my identity as a scientist and teacher

Conditions
May 20, 2025

Mother scholar.

The phrase rolls off the tongue with the force and ferocity of a curse word—blunt, unsparing, weighty. I didn’t coin the term, but I inhabit it. A vessel for the seeming contradictions of tenderness and skepticism, integration and dissection. Of being simultaneously maternal and cerebral in institutions that reward detachment, autonomy, and efficiency.

As I sit in reflection this May—a month of devotion to motherhood and due dates for faculty …

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Jumpstarting African health care with the beats of innovation

Conditions
May 20, 2025

The heart, often overlooked in its relentless duty, only garners attention when it falters. For centuries, the notion that life is impossible without this vital organ has been unchallenged. However, recent advancements have shattered this belief. The groundbreaking implantation of a fully artificial heart by BiVOCAR, led by the visionary Dr. Daniel Timm, heralds a new era in cardiothoracic surgery. This achievement is not just a medical milestone; it is …

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Empowering IBD patients: tools for managing symptoms between doctor visits [PODCAST]

Podcast
May 19, 2025
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Gastroenterologist Shamita B. Shah discusses her article, “How doctors can help IBD patients manage symptoms between visits.” Addressing the rising prevalence of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) in the U.S., Shamita highlights the …

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Voices from the inside: 35 years as a nurse in health care

Conditions
May 19, 2025

After 35 years in health care, I thought I’d seen it all—until it happened to me.

We talk about burnout, compassion fatigue, and systemic issues in medicine. But there’s something more silent, more painful, and far more personal happening in hospitals and clinics across the country: Generational warfare.

The young eat the old. And the old? We’re expected to disappear quietly.

In my early years, experience was respected. Elders were mentors. Wisdom mattered.

Now, …

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“Think twice, heal once”: Why medical decision-making needs a second opinion from your slower brain (and AI)

Tech
May 19, 2025

Medicine demands fast decisions.

Chest pain in triage. A vague complaint from an elderly patient. A scan with subtle shadows.

But the speed that saves lives can also lead to predictable, systematic errors, especially when we trust our gut too much.

Psychologist Daniel Kahneman taught us that we do not have one mind. We have two.

System 1 is fast, intuitive, and automatic. It makes snap …

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The invisible weight carried by Black female physicians

Physician
May 19, 2025

When I read Didi’s story, my heart recognized every detail—the subtle disrespect, the overt hostility, the isolation. I felt seen. Not just because I understood her pain but because I lived it, too.

In 1998, I began medical school in Oklahoma. Young, hopeful, and profoundly aware of the honor medicine held, I imagined a career built on compassion and respect. Instead, what greeted me was bias, microaggressions, and disrespect—from seniors, nurses, …

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A female doctor’s day: exhaustion, sacrifice, and a single moment of joy

Physician
May 19, 2025

When I was unemployed, I applied for countless positions. For months, I have been waiting for a call letter regarding a test or an interview. Now that I have accepted a job at a hospital located far away, I receive call letters in the mail almost every day. This makes me uncomfortable because I know that, being new in my position, I cannot take time off for any test or …

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Addressing America’s reliance on psychotropic medication [PODCAST]

Podcast
May 18, 2025
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Practicing internist and psychiatrist Muhamad Aly Rifai discusses his article, “How America became overmedicated—and what we can do about it.” He raises concerns about the high rate of psychotropic medication use in …

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The hidden cost of malpractice: Why doctors are losing control

Physician
May 18, 2025

In ancient times, there were oracles and soothsayers. Risk management was not a science until the 1950s. However, a medical malpractice lawsuit is still a problem in need of a skilled risk manager, not an oracle or a soothsayer.

Today, there are 1 million physicians practicing in the U.S. A doctor’s chance of being sued for medical malpractice is 8.5 percent per year, and the chance that this lawsuit has no …

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How scales of justice saved a doctor-patient relationship

Physician
May 18, 2025

I was scheduled to see a prominent federal judge in my office at 9:00 a.m. The judge requested the first appointment of the day and expected to be seen promptly at 9:00 a.m. I had an emergency providing care for a patient in clot retention. As a result, I was not able to see him at the designated time. At 9:15 a.m., he approached the desk and asked when he …

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Rediscovering the soul of medicine in the quiet of a Sunday morning

Physician
May 18, 2025

It is early Sunday morning—there’s the rare kind of quiet today that feels borrowed. My daughter is still asleep beside my wife, and the house is hushed in that golden stillness. I find myself flipping through the paper copy of The Rheumatologist’s “Best of 2024” supplement that had arrived earlier in the week—I just wanted a brief escape from medical records (and even more so, from studying).

Half-skimming, half-unwinding, I …

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An introduction to occupational and environmental medicine [PODCAST]

Podcast
May 17, 2025
YouTube video

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Occupational medicine physician Robert Nathan Clapp discusses his article, “Why you should take a closer look at occupational and environmental medicine.” Addressing the pervasive issue of physician burnout, Robert introduces occupational and …

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Does silence as a faculty retention strategy in academic medicine and health sciences work?

Conditions
May 17, 2025

Faculty retention remains an ongoing concern for colleges and universities, especially at a time when there is a clear misalignment between the socio-political environment, the mission of higher education, and the values held by most faculty. If you’ve been paying attention, you know: higher education is experiencing waves of faculty disengagement.

However, some institutions respond to crises not with dialogue, but with silence. They avoid confronting faculty concerns …

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Why personal responsibility is not enough in the fight against nicotine addiction

Conditions
May 17, 2025

In an interview, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. addressed whether society should bear the cost of health care for individuals whose health problems are largely self-inflicted, citing smoking as an example. He questioned the fairness of providing the same level of care to people who, in his words, “predictably get sick” from behaviors like smoking as to those born with congenital illnesses.

While emphasizing personal responsibility is important, this …

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How dismantling DEI endangers the future of medical care

Education
May 17, 2025

Shortly after taking the oath of office on January 20, 2025, President-elect Donald Trump issued two Executive Orders: One halted diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives within the federal government, and another mandated the use of “sex,” rather than “gender,” in official federal documents while simultaneously terminating federal funding for gender-affirming care. In the days that followed, institutions …

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Alzheimer’s and the family: Opening the conversation with children [PODCAST]

Podcast
May 16, 2025
YouTube video

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Journalist and patient advocate Carol Steinberg discusses her article, “Alzheimer’s impact on the young should be an open book.” She argues that while Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD) …

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AI in mental health: a new frontier for therapy and support

Conditions
May 16, 2025

The mental health crisis in America continues to intensify. With therapist shortages, high costs, and long waitlists, there are millions of people without access to therapy. As a cognitive scientist who analyzed therapy transcripts in grad school and now develops AI mental health applications, I’ve observed artificial intelligence emerging as a complementary solution to these accessibility challenges.

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What prostate cancer taught this physician about being a patient

Conditions
May 16, 2025

I recently wrote about my experience of becoming a patient and how that change in role transformed my perspective as a doctor. But, in that article, I did not share that the reason I had become a patient was that I was undergoing a biopsy for potential prostate cancer.

In preparation for the procedure, the doctor reassured me that the outlook was good and that he did not expect to …

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Why fearing AI is really about fearing ourselves

Tech
May 16, 2025

I was at a conference of physician executives and physician founders recently, and there were many stimulating conversations. The idea that AI could see us as a threat and eventually destroy us came up in various forms, often as a half-serious joke. Half-serious jokes are serious concerns. Indeed, astrophysicist Martin Rees predicted that humanity had a 50 percent chance of destroying itself this century due to technological advances and threats, …

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The broken health care system doesn’t have to break you

Physician
May 16, 2025

Practicing medicine today is not what most of us envisioned when we chose it as a profession. We still love science. We still love health. We still love helping patients and being healers.

But the practice of medicine has changed—and continues to evolve at an unprecedented pace. Navigating this shifting landscape requires a new mindset—one rooted in adaptability, self-awareness, and resilience. The way we were trained to practice medicine twenty or …

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