I recently posted a graph of my net worth since I started tracking it in 2014 on Twitter. Despite becoming an attending in 2012, I did not track my net worth early on. As you can see, it has been a slow and steady climb to a positive net worth. I posted this, and the White Coat Investor stated this is a good case to discuss one house, one …
One house, one spouse, one job. How did this physician do?
Test your medicine knowledge with the MKSAP challenge, in partnership with the American College of Physicians.
A 75-year-old man is seen for routine follow-up for very severe COPD. He has constant dyspnea and air hunger and spends most of the day in a chair. He has had no change in baseline cough and sputum production. He has had multiple COPD exacerbations that required ICU admission and intubation. He …
MKSAP: 75-year-old man with very severe COPD
Early this month, it was reported that President Donald Trump, having grown frustrated from discussions regarding a bipartisan deal on immigration, asked why proposals continued to provide special protections for immigrants from the countries of El Salvador and Haiti, and the continent of Africa. He reportedly exclaimed, “Why are we having all these people from sh*thole countries come here?” The statement has been largely denounced both at home and abroad, and …
Immigrant health care workers serve a vital function within the American health care system
At my job as a primary care doctor in a federal safety net clinic, I was given a free T-shirt to wear the following day. It reads “Crucial Catch — Intercept Cancer” in between the logos of the National Football League (NFL) and the American Cancer Society (ACS). This celebrates the 8-year partnership of almost $18 million dollars donated to fund cancer screening and prevention. These philanthropic gestures of large donors …
Think critically about for-profit donor entities and their commitments to health
Some doctors choose medicine because of the medicine, and some doctors choose medicine because of the people. I veer towards the latter: Medicine is my tool to help the person sitting across from me.
However, I am finding more and more stuff getting in between me and my patients, primarily my computer. The increasing burden of gathering coded health data in the EMR, especially in light of the impending MACRA, MIPS …
Why medical scribes are accidental blessings
I spent considerable time after college working in academic labs being indoctrinated with the theory that publication is the currency of academic value and that researchers should always want to have their work printed in the journal most cited by other journals. You are supposed to be impressed when somebody claims that he or she is from a highly ranked university or institution, as these well-regarded institutions are synonymous with high achievement.
That all changed for me during residency when I met …
Let academic physicians recover more of their clinical revenue. Here’s why.
I feel the mountain in my bones. The methodical plodding of feet over uneven terrain, a meditation, the grace of a single forward path, with no decisions, no guilt or what-ifs, no fear. Just forward movement, forward momentum. I hear Mary Oliver’s words at my core: “I don’t know exactly what a prayer is. I do know how to pay attention … how to be idle and blessed.” It’s taken …
On mountains and miscarriage: a physician’s story of loss
I have been helping doctors with their personal finances for a long time. I recently realized that there is a single statement, if doctors would learn to use it, that would change their lives.
It is very common for me to encounter doctors who are in over their heads financially, struggling with debt, and living paycheck to paycheck. They have a high income, but never seem to have money left over …
The single most important phrase every doctor must learn
“So, will this mammogram save my life?” she asked.
I thought for a few seconds …
“I have no idea.”
“What?” she sounded perplexed.
“Well, if you have a cancer that’s aggressive enough to kill you before everything else, but not aggressive enough to have already had cells metastasize, and not so aggressive that it responds appropriately to chemo but it still needs to be rapidly dividing enough to respond to chemo, and we …
I don’t know if this test will save your life
I lightly knocked on the door of the next patient that I was set to obtain a history from. It was late in the morning in the middle of the week, and my mind was becoming increasingly preoccupied with deciding what to eat for lunch. My preceptor had allowed me to practice my history-taking skills with every patient that had an appointment with her that morning and had also given …
How a symbol influenced this patient encounter
The most profound health care legislation enacted since the Affordable Care Act, The Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA), is a huge mistake. It adds another vast layer of bureaucracy to a health care system already overburdened by such things, and penalizes physicians who take care of the most complicated patients. The head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), who administer the program, admits …
Doctors must take a stand and force the government to cancel MACRA
Technological advancement often outpaces society’s ability to understand how to use new advances. Direct-to-consumer genetic testing (DTC-GT) is one such technology whose true power far exceeds our collective mental bandwidth to comprehend.
Home testing kits have come into mainstream culture over a short period of time. In 2010, the direct to consumer testing market was valued at $15 million. It grew almost nine times to $130 million in just five years …
At-home genetic testing might revolutionize medicine. And not in the way you think.
My mother, the accountant, threw out 10 million. An I just took it. Accepted it. Calculated the number of years, and I was off. But it didn’t feel right. So I asked my financial advisor. A few weeks later and after much information was solicited, I was given 85% chance of my money lasting through retirement. He went on and on about Monte Carlo and all sorts of other rubbish, and …
A physician ponders early retirement and faces the wall of fear
ADVERTISEMENT
There I was, an awkward 13 year old sitting in the doctor’s office. For the past two weeks, I had been complaining to my mom about rib pain, and she had scheduled a visit to the pediatrician. I was very active — I played softball constantly — and she wanted to be sure I hadn’t broken a rib.
“Where does it hurt?” the nurse asked me.
“Right here,” I said, pointing to …
A #MeToo moment with a pediatrician
“Are you a left-sider or a right-sider?” my classmate asked with a puzzled look during an end-of-the-year dinner among first-year medical students. I was confused. He repeated himself then answered. “Do you sit on the left or the right side in class … that’s right; you sit on the right.” He then mentioned that everyone present was a “right-sider.” Nearly everyone was white.
For the past 18 months, we sat in …
Segregation in the medical school classroom
Physician training is an extremely high stakes business, not only for the patients that will be under the care of the eventual independent, fully-trained, board-certified doctor, but for the trainee herself. The financial and time costs of the entire training process are enormous. To become derailed from the board certification path can have significant and permanent career consequences. With so much at stake, what does a resident do when she …
It’s important to proactively manage your resident progress. Here’s how.
A few months ago, I hired a contractor for a home improvement project. He didn’t know that I was a physician at the time, and we came to a mutually agreeable price.
Fast forward a few weeks, when we realized that we needed an extra, seemingly small, addition to our project. By this point, we’d gotten to talking, and he’d learned that my husband and I were both physicians.
To my surprise, …
It’s time to debunk the myth that doctors’ dollars come easily
Have you ever come out of an interview feeling like you spent an hour (or more) talking about yourself but learning absolutely nothing about your potential employer? I certainly have.
Sure, interviews are a chance for potential employers to see if you are a good fit, but after way too many one-sided interviews, I came to a realization. Interviews are also the best way to find out if this medical institution …
Top 5 questions doctors should ask during a job interview
Recently, I made the announcement that I am financially independent from medicine. As a quick recap, I’ll just say that I no longer have to rely on my physician’s salary as my primary source of income thanks to my other ventures, and yes, passive sources of income. Since then, the number one question I’ve received is this: “So, when are you going to retire?”
Retirement as a way of life
Well, the fact is …
This physician loves being a doctor. He just wants to do it less.
“Of all forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.”
– Martin Luther King, Jr.
I am very strongly of the opinion that equal access to quality health care should not be regarded as a privilege but rather ought to be viewed as one of the most basic right afforded to all. Much of the industrialized world agrees with this notion based on the infrastructure of health …
Exploring 2 roads to universal health coverage
Get free updates delivered free to your inbox.
