Conditions and Diseases

Physicians writing on KevinMD about the diseases they treat and the people who have them: cancer and its screening arguments, pain and the drugs that treat it, diabetes and the obesity argument, mental illness and who gets treated for it, and the decisions at the end of a life. Five maintained records draw on this archive: Cancer: what physicians say, in their own words, Opioids: what physicians and pain patients say, in their own words, End of life: what physicians say, in their own words, Diabetes and obesity: what physicians say, in their own words, and Mental health: what psychiatrists and physicians say, in their own words.

Reflecting on the tragedy of physician suicide

Susan MacLellan-Tobert, MD

February 4, 2021

Recent events in our mid-west region prompted us to bring the topic of physician suicide forward with our residents and fellows. They received this information in a weekly mindfulness email they receive as part of our internal coaching program:

Losing a colleague or friend to suicide is a tragedy to those who survive and it can be devastating. With such tragedy can come feelings of sadness, grief and confusion. The feeling of loss that can …

Changes to radiation oncology offer hope when there was none

Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian

Conditions and Diseases

February 4, 2021

Radiation oncology has been around for a century, and, at first, advancements in the field came rapidly. The evolution of X-rays and CT scans to inform treatment. Intraoperative radiation therapy. Technology that allows for tailored dose distribution.

But for the past 20 years, the pace of innovations seemed to slow. We remained stymied, for instance, by organs in the abdomen that move with every breath a patient takes. We struggled to …

Caregiving for COVID at home: a physician story

Jen Baker-Porazinski, MD

Conditions and Diseases

February 3, 2021

The day after Christmas, my husband Paul developed a fever, chills, and cough. On Sunday, he tested positive. He probably got sick helping a family member, but we’ll never be certain how the virus invaded our home, rendering us hostage for weeks.

Since I wasn’t sick, I tried working from home. In between patients, I’d peek in on Paul, trying not to disturb him, piled under blankets. He groaned when changing …

COVID-19 vaccines are safe for people with severe allergies

Charles Feng, MD

Conditions and Diseases

February 3, 2021

The intensive care unit nurse was worried the COVID-19 vaccine would kill her.

In the past, just minutes after getting the influenza vaccine, she had hives, wheezing, and throat swelling. Her life-threatening reaction only resolved after an epinephrine injection and monitoring in the emergency room. She vowed never to get another vaccine.

With the arrival of the COVID-19 vaccine, she reconsidered her stance. Now she was in my clinic, …

The COVID-19 pandemic brought many new challenges in medicine. A novel tool may help to overcome some of them.

Avital O’Glasser, MD, Vineet Arora, MD, and Shikha Jain, MD

Conditions and Diseases

February 2, 2021

In December 2020, almost a year into the COVID-19 pandemic, the United States lost 140,000 jobs, and all of them were held by women. The COVID-19 pandemic has brought unrivaled and unprecedented challenges, and the damage done to gender equity in the workplace has been pervasive, and physicians and …

A child’s cry through haunting eyes

Debbie Moore-Black, RN

Conditions and Diseases

February 2, 2021

The emergency department.

A haven for cardiac arrests and gunshot wounds and respiratory distress and overdoses and auto accidents and children’s sniffles and fever and coughs that won’t go away. The ED was easy access to many. And at times, it was an easy fix not to pay the bill upfront or to be anonymous with your problem.

As much as I loved emergency nursing, it was always the children that left …

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A child’s cry through haunting eyes

The power sexuality has over our happiness

Moshe Kedan, MD

Conditions and Diseases

February 1, 2021

An excerpt from Breaking the Silence: Why Opening Up About Your Sex Life Is the Best Medicine for Your Health, Relationships, and Overall Happiness.

I have been practicing medicine for forty-five years, and it has become clear to me that many of the mental and physical problems …

It’s time to curb rising C-section rates in Canada

Margaret Morris, MD and George Carson, MD

Conditions and Diseases

January 30, 2021

Even during the pandemic, labor and delivery are the most frequent reasons for hospitalization in Canada, with over 350,000 births per year. That’s happy news. But of these births, nearly one third are by Caesarian section (C-sections). That rate is far too high – and rising.

C-section is the surgical procedure to deliver a baby that involves an incision in the mother’s …

Falling in love during a pandemic: a lesson in self-soothing

Fae Kayarian

Conditions and Diseases

January 30, 2021

The attending physician knelt next to the stretcher to repeat his opening line. “Hello, sir. What brings you to the emergency department today?”

The man looked around in a daze, his lips quivering as if he was on the verge of crying. “The demons! The demons, they’re everywhere! Help me. Please, help me. I can’t stand it …”

As the medical scribe, I stood next to the doctor and typed the note. …

Prostate cancer treatment: strategies for managing side effects

Miles J. Varn, MD

Conditions and Diseases

January 29, 2021

After skin cancer, prostate cancer is the most common cancer diagnosed in men in the U.S., with one in eight men at risk of being diagnosed with this cancer during his lifetime. If you or a man you care about is undergoing prostate cancer treatment, you may be living with treatment-related side effects. These can vary depending on the type of treatment, including hormone therapy, radiation, surgery, immunotherapy, cryotherapy, and …

Have crib deaths vanished?

Michael Hefferon, MD

Conditions and Diseases

January 28, 2021

An excerpt from Medical Myths: A Sceptic’s Journey.

It may be a long while since you’ve heard of a very small infant being found dead in the crib.

As a young doctor, I recall the encounters on cold February nights with devastated …

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Have crib deaths vanished?

How COVID accelerates change: Bridging business principles with emergency medicine

Josh Schwarzbaum, MD, MBA

Conditions and Diseases

January 27, 2021

Over the past year, we have experienced massive organizational change at an unprecedented pace. Traditionally, we could spend weeks planning how to best make a change in our workplaces, but COVID-19 was anything but traditional. Our emergency department at Saint Barnabas Health System in Bronx, NY, needed to pivot on a daily and even hourly basis, and to do so took planning and effort. In general, change is difficult, and …

Are we underestimating the danger of prions and prion based diseases?

Robert Trent

Conditions and Diseases

January 27, 2021

Assessment without definition: a flat tire on the road of progress

Even though we have known about prions for decades, very little progress has been made in defining what a prion is vs. what a prion is not, how they get into the brain, and how prion diseases are different from other neurodegenerative diseases. Phenomenologically these definitions can vary widely. To some, a prion causes a deadly, …

Marijuana legalization: an unpopular view

Garrett Rossi, MD

Conditions and Diseases

January 26, 2021

In the mid-1990s, a few pharmaceutical companies made broad claims regarding the safety and efficacy of opioid medications for pain management. These claims were based on limited research that did not fully account for these drugs’ potentially harmful effects. As a result, we are now facing an opioid epidemic across the United States.

Now, New Jersey joined several other states by legalizing marijuana for recreational use. While there are clear differences …

Is my headache coming from my soul?

Chirag Patil, MD

Conditions and Diseases

January 26, 2021

Serious soul searching can give anybody a headache, but when a young woman asked me that, I was taken aback in my neurosurgery clinic. Huh? I said. Do you know René Descartes? The pineal gland is the “seat of the soul.” Well, my pineal gland has a cyst and is more like the “seat of my misery.” It turns out this eloquent young woman in her early 20s was a …

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Is my headache coming from my soul?

Physicians are an underserved population about their own mental health care

Christine N. Runyan, PhD

Conditions and Diseases

January 24, 2021

COVID-19 has shed light on a pre-existing condition in medicine – our health care system has failed to tend to its workforce’s well-being. While generally privileged, physicians are an underserved population about their own mental health care.

Numerous articles and countless interviews have focused on the pandemic’s deleterious impact on physicians’ mental health and well-being. But this is not a new problem, nor is it caused by a lack of resilience. …

Trauma is ever-present in the practice of medicine

Maire Daugharty, MD

Conditions and Diseases

January 24, 2021

Some forms of trauma are obvious: natural disasters like earthquakes, floods, fires, being physically assaulted, wrongfully terminated, becoming suddenly very ill. Trauma is divided into so-called big T and little t experiences, but the distinction is misleading.

While physical assault (big T trauma) can lead to serious sequelae such as loss of a sense of safety, chronic hypervigilance, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); a dissolved intimate relationship, being bullied, being emotionally or …

Extreme athleticism and the risk of atrial fibrillation

Aseem Desai, MD

Conditions and Diseases

January 23, 2021

Consider the following sports icons: tennis legend Billie Jean King, basketball veteran Larry Bird, triathlete Karsten Madsen, baseball pitcher Kenley Jansen, and cyclist champion Haimar Zubeldia.

What do all of these well-known professional athlete heroes have in common? They are athletes with atrial fibrillation, also called AFib. AFib is the most common heart rhythm disorder worldwide, accounting for 750,000 hospitalizations per year in the US alone. It is estimated that 6 …

Getting the COVID vaccine: a behind the scenes look

Nesrin Abu Ata, MD

Conditions and Diseases

January 22, 2021

Don’t let images deceive you. You may think you see everything in my picture after getting the vaccine, but you don’t. Let me take you behind the scenes of my life this past year. As I can only imagine what being behind the scenes of your life has been like for you.

What you don’t see in the picture is my yearlong of agony, tears, hard decisions, and losses, like all …

COVID vaccines: side effects, myths, and madness

Allison Edwards, MD

Conditions and Diseases

January 22, 2021

I received my COVID vaccine on December 21st before starting an ER shift; sitting in the cold, plastic chair in a hallway-turned-vaccine-clinic, I tipped my head back to blink tears into submission as I reflected on making it this far in the pandemic without contracting COVID. Four days later, after three twelve-hour shifts, I tested positive for COVID.

The COVID vaccine did not cause my positive result; getting exposed …