Physician

Having a great CV is not enough: Start building your portfolio

Physician
January 8, 2023

Many physicians believe the curriculum vitae (CV) represents the most integral aspect of applying for new opportunities. Post-pandemic, more physicians than ever are exploring ways to leave their current positions in clinical medicine. Some are looking to practice medicine differently, while others are looking to escape the practice of medicine with part-time and full-time non-clinical roles.

As the applicant pool of physicians looking to make career changes has grown, applying for …

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What can hospitals learn from luxury hotels?

Physician
January 7, 2023

Hospitality in health care refers to providing high-quality, compassionate care and support to patients, focusing on meeting their individual needs and preferences.

This can involve a variety of strategies, such as providing clear and accurate information to patients, involving them in decision-making about their care and offering support and resources to help them manage their health and well-being.

The goal of incorporating hospitality into health care is to improve the overall patient …

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How you can thrive despite the looming physician shortage

Physician
January 7, 2023

A perfect storm is brewing in the U.S. health care system, and we must prepare to counter the rushing waves. America is facing a potentially catastrophic physician shortfall. All indicators point toward unprecedented times ahead. If I were an attorney, I would state my case something like this.

Exhibit A

According to the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), the United States is facing a projected shortage of between 37,800 and 124,000 …

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Understanding patients’ religious and spiritual beliefs promotes healing

Physician
January 6, 2023

Religious and spiritual experiences have shaped my worldview since I was a teenager. At age 13, I celebrated my bar mitzvah. Later that year, I underwent an appendectomy. A priest asked my mother if he could pray for me prior to the operation. My mother did not hesitate to accept the priest’s blessing. I learned at an early age that prayers for one’s well-being should be welcomed regardless of …

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How to deal with challenging patients

Physician
January 6, 2023

Dealing with challenging patients can be difficult and stressful for doctors and health care professionals.

It can be helpful to remember that they can be difficult for a variety of reasons, such as pain, fear, confusion, or unmet expectations that were expressed or not — reasonable or not. To effectively handle challenging patients, a few key points must be kept in mind.

Remain calm and professional. This will help keep the situation …

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Learn to earn end-of-life respect

Physician
January 6, 2023

Pele, the famous Brazilian soccer star, reportedly stopped medical treatment for colon cancer. Media outlets stated he was receiving various iterations of comfort, hospice, and palliative care which were perceived as criminal and disrespectful. His daughter denied these allegations on Instagram.

How often are those with serious illnesses treated like criminals for wrongdoing?

When medical treatment is withdrawn or withheld, it seems the person has lost the battle or chose not …

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How to prevent a frivolous medical malpractice lawsuit

Physician
January 5, 2023

There are 50,000 medical malpractice lawsuits filed per year. Each doctor has a 5 percent chance of being sued each year, and every doctor will be sued at least once in 20 years. 70 percent of medical malpractice lawsuits are non-meritorious and are dropped. These represent 35,000 frivolous lawsuits. Until now, there is no way to prevent a frivolous medical malpractice lawsuit.

America is a litigious society. The medical liability …

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Why perfectionists in medicine need to practice compassion

Physician
January 3, 2023

I recently read the article, “Perfectionism will kill you.”

Our perfectionism is often worn like a badge of honor. It signifies our complete commitment, at times at the expense of others. Wanting to do your best job is what drives “good” perfectionism. Woody Allen quipped, “80 percent of life is just showing up.” And the other 20 percent is reserved for perfectionists.

Success often comes from attention to detail, something perfectionists …

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Reflections from a (former) self-compassion and boundary setting skeptic

Physician
January 2, 2023

Self-compassion does not make you soft. Boundaries do not make you closed off or selfish.

I had to repeat this many times before I started to understand how true and how essential self-compassion and boundaries are in our lives.

I did not realize how much I maintained my resistance to these ideas until Dr. Brené Brown provided her research findings at a conference held in Houston this year. Dr. Brown shared her …

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Are pediatricians too nice?

Physician
January 1, 2023

One summer a few years ago, I went to pick my son up from camp. He was attending a week-long specialty day camp where the kids spent a week with an expert in some area of interest. The camp offered everything from basketball, soccer, and tennis to acting, magic, and chess. It was the first time I was going to pick him up, and I wasn’t exactly sure where to …

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Is there a third pathway of resilience?

Physician
December 30, 2022

My social media feed has increasingly included stories of friends “quiet quitting.” A term popularized through TikTok, quiet quitting is a reaction to the exploitation of employee labor without providing additional compensation. Simultaneously, my IRL conversations have been filled with stories of the Great Resignation, in which employees have voluntarily resigned, often without other employment secured. A recent report by the U.S. Surgeon General recognized the problem of workplace …

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The transformation of doctors into “Dr. Widgets”

Physician
December 29, 2022

It has finally happened, I have transitioned to viewing myself as a widget, a depersonalized interface between the EMR and the patient. I am the unnamed device that collects the patient data and subsequently transcribes it into prose for billing purposes and maybe the occasional colleague review. There is a bit of curious comfort in identifying myself as a mere cog. I’m imagining I will now fly below the radar, …

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Ode to the paper chart

Physician
December 29, 2022

Oh how I miss the feel of your thick spine, so wide I could barely grasp you with my oddly small hands. Wrist cocked, an awkward drag ensued from rack to desk, your heft landing with a thump under fluorescent lights on the laminate desk. I scooted into the low chair and dove in with aplomb. I was ready.

I started just beneath your mauve plastic cover. There, just under the …

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I used OpenAI to generate art on health care burnout. The images were startlingly moving.

Physician
December 29, 2022

After seeing recent images from OpenAI’s DALL-E-2 art generator, I decided to give it a try. I thought about a topic that I am interested in, others I know are interested in, and I was curious to see an AI’s ability to interpret. I decided on health care burnout.

In the prompt field for the art generator, I entered the words “healthcare burnout doctors nurses exhausted hope love disease …

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Think you aren’t a part of the destruction of the medical profession? Think again.

Physician
December 27, 2022

As apparent as it may be to the predators of the medical profession, physicians themselves, thinking about the future of what the medical profession will be like by 2040, have yet to understand how they continue to be astonishingly complicit in the upcoming radical changes in health care and the medical profession.

You and I know that all physicians in our nation, especially those in clinical medical practice, have been brainwashed …

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Working through a pandemic and watching the health care system crumble around me

Physician
December 27, 2022

The first dying patient I saw as a medical student was a man newly diagnosed with lung cancer, a chronic smoker with now oxygen-dependent COPD. In rounds, our medical team stopped outside his room, and the learned men and women pontificated about what to do next with the man. Chemo? Radiation? Both? I pretended to listen and rubbed my chin with feigned discernment, trying to understand the conversation like any …

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The key to reversing the aging process

Physician
December 26, 2022

There is no escape from our ultimate decline and death. The sooner we accept and embrace that reality, the freer we are to live life to the fullest now. So when I speak of reversing the aging process, I’m really referring to reversing the acceleration. If you recall the Newtonian physics from your high school physics class, acceleration is the velocity …

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Can Medicare advance directives be simple?

Physician
December 25, 2022

Consider Medicare enrollment with the end in mind. In case of emergency, do seniors prefer medical care or holistic care? Might they designate a medical power of attorney or a merciful power of attorney? Do they oblige CPR or sign a DNR order?

The JAMA Network just published Death and End-of-Life Care in Emergency Departments in the U.S. This retrospective cohort study concludes that,

Robust systems of emergency care …

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The solution to America’s primary care shortage is direct primary care 

Physician
December 24, 2022

Primary care in the United States is on the brink of collapse. Primary care providers suffer existential burnout, are the lowest compensated among all medical specialties, and there is a crisis-level shortage of primary care physicians, especially in health professional shortage areas. Despite strong evidence linking primary care (unlike any other medical specialty) to a better quality of life, longer life expectancy, better patient experience, and lower total …

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