I’m sorry you are sick. I’m sorry you had to wait a long time in the waiting room. I’m sorry you haven’t gotten your pain medications. I’m sorry I don’t have an answer. I’m sorry the department is busy. I’m sorry it’s loud. I’m sorry I don’t know why it smells in here. I’m sorry your neighbor is screaming. I’m sorry you are in pain. I’m sorry you are uncomfortable. …
It is no secret that health care providers shoulder a lot of responsibility. As a whole, they take this on with both competence and kindness. Sacrificially, they go above and beyond in order to provide patients with the highest of quality care. They juggle a multitude of professional and personal responsibilities in creative and admirable ways. Meanwhile, each health care provider learns to adopt a unique combination of coping mechanisms …
You’re a clinician. You had a patient die under your care, and now your hospital is being sued. You are not named in the lawsuit, but you are being asked to give a deposition. How much of your time is this going to take? If some lawyer sends you thousands of pages to review before scheduling multiple phone calls …
Yesterday, I got just about the strangest version of “MD aware” I have ever had.
We all know what this is, the person who is relaying some critical clinical information (positive blood cultures, Mr. Smith in Room 402 is having chest pain, etc.), and then they ask for your name so they can write it down somewhere in the chart.
In this case, …
Our job as health care professionals is not just to diagnose our patients by applying our scientific knowledge and clinical skills, but also to be the “communicator-in-chief,” “listener-in-chief,” and “reassurer-in-chief.”
Any doctor who doesn’t fully grasp this, is not doing the best job they can or being the best doctor they can be. I truly believe that over 90 percent of our everyday job as a physician involves being a good …
Though the news at first stayed local in Philadelphia and the northeast, it’s gaining traction nationwide. ZDoggMD is on it. Bernie Sanders held a rally.
What happened? The venerable Hahnemann University Hospital, the main teaching hospital for Drexel University College of Medicine in Philadelphia, is bankrupt and will soon close its doors after more than 170 years as a safety-net hospital serving inner-city patients.
Why should we care? After all, there …
Hitting a roadblock in your life and career? Don’t get frustrated. Use the resources that are readily available to you.
Not sure what they are? Think about it. You have had access to them all the time.
The moment you decided to become a doctor, you became unstoppable. You may have followed the traditional path and went from college into medical school and then residency. Maybe your path took a few turns before medical …
Physicians and health care providers across the world are trained to treat disease processes and disease states. Often, this approach becomes technical. And while directed towards the patient, it paradoxically distances itself from the patient. The distance created between the patient and the physician through diagnostic and therapeutic approaches is related to the patient’s dissatisfaction with their medical journey.
Being sick and ill, whether it is a major or minor illness, …
A guest column by the American College of Physicians, exclusive to KevinMD.com.
In the late 1800s, William Osler stated, “… if you want a profession in which everything is certain, you had better give up medicine.” He made this observation at a time when the science underlying health care was nascent, and little was understood …
Thirty-six years ago, I arrived an hour early for my first medical school patient care rotation at the East Orange, NJ, VA hospital. Over the years, ‘I’ve seen and learned (and unfortunately also forgotten) a lot about medicine and life. I have been writing down wise nuggets since that first year and keep reviewing and adding at times.
Here are 36 random reflections in honor of these 36 years that I …
Being a first-generation college student is hard. Being a first-generation college student and being pre-med is even harder. And since education and income are closely linked in the U.S., it’s no surprise that many first-generation college students also come from a low-income background.
I fell into this category.
My parents did not finish high school, and money was always tight. I had never heard of pre-med until I got to college. I …
To fill an assignment in an undergraduate medical sociology class, my friend and I made an appointment with the assistant administrator in a local hospital. After the interview, we proceeded towards the exit by cutting through the obstetrical wards. We passed an exhausted young doctor with a stethoscope draped over his neck and hunched over a stack of charts. He glanced up as we passed, and we introduced ourselves as …
I am one of those lucky souls who actually likes their job. Since I completed my pediatrics residency two years ago, I have been working in urgent care settings. What’s not to like? I get to see a wide variety of patients, I’m always learning something new, and I get to finish my encounters with a high-five from an overeager toddler. If you’re a general pediatrician like me, that’s the …
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I am a small-town family physician, and I am blessed enough to be living my dream.
You see, I have always wanted to be a doctor. I cannot think of one other occupation choice that has ever entered my brain. I have wanted this since I was four-years-old, and I can remember in vivid detail telling the world this was what I was destined to be.
So what happens when your dream …
When I decided to become a doctor, little did I know that medical school and residency would be like a hazing for future physicians. We are broken down mentally and physically and then remade in the image of the “strong” doctor and to admit to being sick is equivalent to being weak. We are publicly shamed for admitting we don’t know the answer to daily pimping on morning rounds. We …
Health care providers may have one of the most dangerous jobs out there — and it is only getting worse. Nearly 74 percent of workplace assaults occur in the health care setting, and health care accounts for almost as many serious violent injuries as all other industries combined. The statistics are alarming. Seventy-eight percent of emergency physicians report being targets of workplace violence in the …
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I’m a physician married to a physician. Initially, I did not think I would face obstacles because of our dual career paths. I would soon learn; however, professional and personal sacrifices would be necessary for us to achieve our goals. This is my story as a training physician and a “single” mom, including some of the challenges I experienced being married to a physician.
I met my husband in the first …
Health care is a tough job to work in — whether you are a doctor, nurse or any other professional. We are dealing with matters of life and death, our patients expect (and deserve) the best from us, and we always have a hundred-and-one things to do at the frontlines of medicine. I remember reading somewhere when I was a teenager that a career in medicine would be a “mentally, …
I, like many physicians, am the only doctor in my extended family. To say that they are proud is probably an understatement. I’ve been a practicing physician for seven years now and yet my grandmother each time I see her greets me with, “There’s my doctor grandson.” I have worked quite hard to get to where I am, and I enjoy what I do. I, too, am proud to be the …
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If you’re a young doctor reading this, chances are you are employed by someone else. Your paycheck may come from a hospital system or a group of other doctors, but you’re not your own boss. This may be working out just fine for you: I hope you are happy and have a well-balanced work and personal life, and are getting a fair paycheck. I hope you have a sense of …
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