Dear Husband, MD
I see you. I hear you cough all night, knowing your flu vaccine has failed and you have it. I hear you wheeze with your post-flu pneumonia. I feel you shiver in the bed beside me while you sleep for 5 hours before you get back up and start getting ready for the next “shift.”
I put quotations around “shift” because we both know you will not work 8 …
Sleep deprivation and medical errors are not the only issues that arise from long shifts. Aside from being dangerous, working 28 hours straight can teach new doctors that their health and even their life is not a priority. With extremely high rates of depression and suicide in this field, increasing work hours is not the step we should be taking. When I was interviewed by Public …
An excerpt from Physician—Time to Invest in Yourself: Work-Life Balance, the Needs of the Patient, and Medical-Legal Risk Management.
What is an essentialist? What is an essentialist lifestyle? Essentialism focuses on identifying the important signals in life and eliminating the noise. The noises are the distractions that add no value to your life and frequently monopolize time and meaning. When you assume the role of an essentialist you will discover that you …
Sir William Osler wasn’t exactly wrong when he said, “Listen to your patient, he is telling you the diagnosis.” But he didn’t mean it literally. His patients did not offer up esoteric and complete medical diagnoses on a silver platter. They left him clues in plain language that he listened to carefully in order to make the correct diagnosis.
He penned his words in an era when medical information was scarce …
Someday, we may miss the quaint idea of going to see your doctor for your medical concerns.
I realize taking your children to see their doc is a pain. So is taking your car into the mechanic, waiting for the cable guy or going out for groceries. There are other things you’d rather be doing with your time. Can a quick phone call substitute for a doctor visit?
At least one huge …
It was recently pointed out that one of my partners had made an error in a patient’s electronic hospital chart. Did I want to correct the mistake? Curious, I looked at the computer screen. There in 12-point-black-on-white Cambria was the culprit documentation. The words were:
“Our therapy goal is palliative. Prognosis is good.”
Now, this was clearly not what the author had intended. In common practice when someone is so sick that …
I had a familiar conversation the other day with yet another female medical student.
“I really loved surgery!” she said, “but I was concerned about the lifestyle, so I decided on ______.”
Lifestyle — it turns out — almost always seems to be code for having a family.
Maybe it’s just the kind of students who seek me out. I have yet to encounter someone concerned that a surgical career will hamper their …
The medical assistant swabbed my nose and my throat multiple times. Pricked my finger too. Then, the phlebotomist (or vampire?) drew bottles and bottles of my blood. Along with the physical discomfort, there was emotional discomfort too. What would the test results show? If they were all negative, would I be satisfied without having an answer?
Being a patient can be extremely vulnerable. Not only do you often divulge to a …
As an internist and geriatrician, I deal with elderly patients all the time. We always end up talking about end-of-life issues:
“Should I be resuscitated if my heart stops and I stop breathing?”
“Do I want a feeding tube or gastrostomy tube if I stop eating and require nutrition?”
“Should I be kept alive on machines and for how long if there is no reasonable hope of recovery?”
“When should we refuse tests for …
For a century, the white coat has been the symbol of the medical doctor. Today, the vast majority of medical schools in the U.S. begin with a white coat ceremony. There, the fledgling, future doctors stand together and recite a modified version of the Hippocratic Oath before being called up one-by-one to receive the white coats that they will wear throughout the upcoming trials and adventures of medical school. The …
On November 1973, I had an epiphany. My first week on my internal medicine clerkship, I realized that I had found my specialty: internal medicine.
Prior to medical school, I had worked with emotionally disturbed children in an inpatient hospital. I really enjoyed the experience, and learned a great deal. During my first two miserable years in medical school (I disliked how they taught the basic sciences and even more how …
OSH, or “outside hospital,” is one of those abbreviations that has crept into the lexicon of hospital jargon that merits additional scrutiny.
What are the implications of calling another health care facility “outside”; does that make your hospital the “inside” hospital? I suspect that it is, as many patient-related conditions are described, multifactorial. Or, if you like the band Fort Minor, “Remember the Name” (apologies to the band):
This is ten percent …
Reading about the opening of the Noah’s Ark Theme Park in Kentucky brings to mind the days when I worked as a physician in that state. I had moved from an academic position in Colorado and joined a large group of private practice cardiologists in Louisville. I found that people in Kentucky were different from those in Colorado. They were much more overtly religious.
As an interventional electrophysiologist, I would meet …
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So, have you talked to your teenage daughter about sex?
Have you really talked to her about sex?
I’m not talking about the superficial birds and the bees conversation; I’m talking about using words like vagina, penis, and condom. Yes, those words!
As an obstetrician-gynecologist and a mother of girls, I know the challenges that our daughters face as they navigate their teenage years. I know how critical it is to have real …
“It’s strange how the worst day of your life often starts just like any other.”
– Joanna Cannon
I prepare for each clinic by reviewing the tests and scans of the patients who will be seen that day. Today, I am dismayed as I read a report for a longstanding patient. The news is not good; his scan shows that his cancer has returned.
Twenty years ago on a day like today, I …
Every day, millions of women across the United States find themselves in predicaments confronting the quality of their appearance. And their makeup. While this may seem a non-issue in the emergency medicine world, it is something that you, as a female professional, or that your female colleagues, have no doubt encountered. Before walking out the door, you have to consider not just what means of transport to take to …
While visiting a family member in the hospital recently, I noticed the unkempt attire of one of the lab people coming in to draw blood. As she knelt down to better reach my family member’s arm, I noticed her scrub pants were frayed and dirty from her walking on them.
Shortly after I made note of this, one of her co-workers came in the room to see …
Cheryl lost her son Sean to suicide in medical school. Just a few months ago. Her only child. Cheryl didn’t know that medical students were at high risk of suicide — until her son was dead. Nobody warned her.
Rhonda lost her daughter Kaitlyn to suicide in medical school. Unable to recuperate from the pain of her daughter’s suicide, Rhonda died by suicide …
In my home, we have two conversations: politics and medicine. The most vociferous discussions are around their product, health care. We know doctors on the right and left, Democrat and Republican, boisterous blues, rebellious reds and garrulous grays. Respecting opinions and debate, we love ‘em all. However, no matter on what side of the aisle they stand, which lever they pull, they share one trait. All physicians are deeply conservative. …
I recently had the privilege of speaking to a group of high school students who were interested in becoming doctors. A large number of them were volunteering in my hospital, and their coordinator asked me if I could spare some time to chat with them about life as a doctor and what they should be doing to get into medicine.
I remember as if it were yesterday when I was their …
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