Conditions

The impact of CDC’s new childhood immunization guidance

Conditions

February 10, 2026

For most of my life, preventable infectious diseases existed at the margins of medicine. Influenza was seasonal but manageable. Hepatitis outbreaks were contained. Childhood hospitalizations from rotavirus or meningococcal disease were rare enough to be notable. COVID-19 may have shattered predictability, but even then, many of us believed the lessons we learned would be followed by renewed investment in prevention.

Instead, we now stand at a crossroads.

A crossroads in prevention

Recent guideline …

Remote nursing for burnout: How changing environments saved my career

Michele Abbott, RN

Conditions

February 10, 2026

For most of my nursing career, my instinct when work felt overwhelming was always the same: Look inward, fix myself, and try harder.

If a shift felt chaotic, I assumed I needed to manage my time better. If an interaction went poorly, I replayed it in my mind, wondering what I could have said differently. If I came home exhausted and irritable, I told myself I needed thicker skin. I believed …

AI-assisted therapy: Why supervision makes the difference

Farid Sabet-Sharghi, MD

Conditions

February 9, 2026

Artificial intelligence in mental health has become an easy target. Headlines warn of hallucinating chatbots, reckless advice, and sensational claims that AI therapy is pushing vulnerable patients toward self-harm or suicide. The implication is clear: AI is dangerous, irresponsible, and incompatible with serious clinical care.

That conclusion is too simple and, in many cases, wrong.

The uncomfortable truth is that many patients are already receiving something far riskier than supervised AI therapy. …

When language becomes the barrier: IMGs and autism diagnoses

Ronald L. Lindsay, MD

Conditions

February 9, 2026

I once left grand rounds with a donut and a fake pager buzz because I couldn’t understand the speaker, who often was a natural Mandarin or Arabic speaker. Humor aside, this was not just my problem; it was a systemic failure.

I have spent decades in developmental-behavioral pediatrics, and one truth has never changed: Communication is the currency of medicine. Without it, trust collapses.

International medical graduates (IMGs) are vital to our …

Charles Bonnet syndrome: Why the blind see hallucinations

Ceres Alhelí Otero Peniche

Conditions

February 8, 2026

Today I awoke feeling hopeless, disconnected from my body and my thoughts. All I could sense was the void that my vision loss represented. I kept thinking how beautiful it would be to see clearly, as I opened my eyes to a world submerged in gray fog. Suddenly, the room began to distort. The shadows slowly transformed into figures, men and women trying to pull off my legs were manifesting …

Geriatric diabetes management: Why strict A1c targets can harm seniors

George James

Conditions

February 7, 2026

According to the CDC, nearly 1 in 3 Americans over age 65 live with diabetes. However, our health care system treats diabetes as if all adults are metabolically and functionally the same. In their attempt to maximize glycemic control, it’s not uncommon for elderly patients to experience hypoglycemic episodes, resulting in falls and confusion among other issues, exacerbating other health conditions while taking a mental and emotional toll on …

Why progression independent of relapse activity is the silent driver of disability in multiple sclerosis

Andreas Muehler, MD, MBA

Conditions

February 7, 2026

For too long, multiple sclerosis (MS) has been described with an air of quiet fatalism, a chronic, debilitating disease managed primarily by reducing relapses, but not fully addressed in terms of its continuous, underlying disability progression. This smoldering process often is not easily visible because of its progressive nature. Patients are told to manage expectations, while clinicians are taught to define success by the absence of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) …

A physician’s quiet reflection on January 1, 2026

Dr. Damane Zehra

Conditions

February 7, 2026

Over the past few days, I have read numerous articles reflecting on 2025: what people achieved, what they lost, how many books they read, and how they touched the lives around them. I found myself lingering on them, thinking, reflecting. But today, I want to pause on something closer to home: my first day of this new year, January 1, 2026.

I am sitting in the library, one of my favorite …

When the doctor becomes the patient: a breast cancer diagnosis

Sue Hwang, MD

Conditions

February 6, 2026

An excerpt from From Both Sides of the Curtain: Lessons and Reflections from an Oncologist’s Personal Breast Cancer Journey.

The mammography waiting room always played HGTV. I had been in this space countless times before, having started routine screening at the age of 40. I always booked the first appointment of the day because I knew all too well how easily schedules could get backed up. Like clockwork, the tech …

My journey with fibroids and hysterectomy: a patient’s perspective

Sonya Linda Bynum

Conditions

February 6, 2026

I am a 45-year-old Black woman. I learned in early 2025 I was going through perimenopause. As I experienced what was my new norm of mood changes, anxiety, migraines, and once again heavier periods, I found vitamins to help with some of my perimenopause symptoms, but not all. I decided to make an appointment with a gynecologist.

I made an appointment with the first available GYN since I hadn’t seen my …

Social work accountability: the danger of hindsight bias

Gerald Kuo

Conditions

February 5, 2026

When a child dies under the supervision of the care system, the public response is often immediate and visceral. Media headlines demand answers. Prosecutors search for accountability. And very quickly, attention narrows to a single figure: the frontline social worker.

In recent child protection cases, the dominant questions have sounded strikingly similar. Why did they not notice earlier? Why did they not visit more often? Why did they not intervene?

These questions …

Celiac disease psychiatric symptoms: When anxiety is autoimmune

Carrie Friedman, NP

Conditions

February 5, 2026

In functional and integrative psychiatry, patterns start to announce themselves long before they show up in guidelines.

Over the past several months in my clinical practice, I have diagnosed celiac disease in multiple young adult men who presented not with diarrhea, abdominal pain, or weight loss, but with psychiatric and cognitive symptoms: chronic low mood, brain fog, fatigue, poor motivation, memory issues, and anxiety. Neither had prominent gastrointestinal complaints. Both had …

Prostate cancer screening limitations: Why PSA isn’t enough

Francisco M. Torres, MD

Conditions

February 5, 2026

As physicians, we spend our careers believing that if we gather enough data, follow the guidelines, and monitor closely, we can stay one step ahead of disease. We reassure patients that early detection saves lives. We quote statistics, interpret lab values, and project confidence. Nothing dismantles that illusion of control quite like becoming a patient.

I have written before about my prostate cancer journey, before the surgery, after the surgery, and …

Why perimenopause feels like losing yourself

Claudine Holt, MD

Conditions

February 5, 2026

Many women entering perimenopause struggle to put words to what they are experiencing. They often say, “I don’t feel like myself anymore,” even when they can’t identify a single symptom that feels concrete or diagnosable. Emotionally, something feels different. Physically, their bodies feel unfamiliar, more aches, more pains, weight changes, or a sense that it’s harder to “get back on track.” Cognitively, many notice brain fog or a lack of …

High-protein diet risks: Why more isn’t always better

Farid Sabet-Sharghi, MD

Conditions

February 4, 2026

Over the past decade, nutrition culture has increasingly revolved around a single macronutrient: protein. Popular media, fitness culture, and everyday health conversations often frame higher protein intake as a universal good, synonymous with strength, longevity, and metabolic health. In the process, many foods that once formed the foundation of balanced eating (whole grains, legumes, vegetables, and healthy fats) are quietly sidelined or dismissed.

Protein is essential. That point is not in …

My wife’s story: How DEA and CDC guidelines destroyed our golden years

Monty Goddard & Richard A. Lawhern, PhD

Conditions

February 4, 2026

As health care writers and patient advocates, the authors are engaged in multiple projects intended to encourage major policy changes by highly resistant U.S. and state public health agencies. Misdirected policies and disinformation from these agencies are literally killing patients every day by denying them safe and effective management of agonizing pain, destroying the field of pain medicine, and criminalizing its practitioners.

This is institutionalized madness. It needs to stop. Now, …

Breast cancer and the daughter who gave everything

Dr. Damane Zehra

Conditions

February 3, 2026

I had been trying to write this story for a long time. The topic is so heavy that it took a great deal of courage and emotional strength to finally put it into words. This story is not about a patient; rather, it is about a caregiver.

I met Mrs. N. in 2020. She travelled from Gujranwala to Islamabad (a distance of 223 kilometers) to begin her treatment. Mrs. N. was …

Visual language in health care: Why words aren’t enough

Hamid Moghimi, RPN

Conditions

February 3, 2026

Picture a “No Entry” sign or a speed limit. A simple red circle needs no translation for a driver in Tokyo, Tehran, or Toronto. That’s more than just convenience; it’s a global safety net.

But in health care, where a misunderstanding can be deadly, our communication hasn’t kept up. We still rely overwhelmingly on words, pages of dense text handed to patients who are stressed, exhausted, older, or struggling with a …

Why dietary advice changes: It is not the food, it is the world

Gerald Kuo

Conditions

February 2, 2026

We owe patients a better explanation about food.

The food didn’t change. The world did, and our guidelines followed.

For many patients, dietary advice feels less like science and more like whiplash.

Their breakfast looks the same. Their milk is the same. Their daily habits are exactly where they left them. What shifts, sometimes violently, is the label we attach to it: healthy, unhealthy, recommended, discouraged.

Consider milk

For decades, we told patients to switch …

Blood in urine after a child’s injury: When to worry

Martina Ambardjieva, MD

Conditions

February 2, 2026

Few things scare parents faster than seeing blood where it doesn’t belong.

Maybe your child took a hard fall off a bike. Maybe there was a rough sports collision. Maybe it was a car accident, and everyone is still shaking. Then a nurse asks for a urine sample, or your child goes to the bathroom and you notice pink or red in the toilet.

Your mind immediately goes to the worst place.

As …

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