Here it is … an epic post about EHRs.
I’ve been waiting for years to write this. Literally, years.
Ever since 2014, when I was required to attend 30+ hours of unpaid training for this new EHR, I knew this post would be written. I did have the option of 10 additional unpaid training hours to become a “gold star super user.” That status would have allowed me to teach every confused …
“In this short Life
That only lasts an hour
How much – how little – is
Within our power.”
—Emily Dickinson
Health care around the world faces an existential crisis. While the quality of medicine continues to improve, its cost remains unbridled and out of control. Better means more expensive, be it a drug or an imaging modality. The whole world is aware of this impending financial crisis, and heads are hunched together to find …
The latest term hitting the health care benefit, insurance company, and point solution ecosystem is “whole person care.” This term is beginning to be used as a marketing buzzword and is losing its meaning.
What is the definition of whole person care? The DHHS/NIH National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health defines it as “looking at the whole person—not just separate organs or body systems—and considering multiple factors that promote …
I have a confession to make: I have blood on my hands. My actions have led to the death of children. Now, that sounds extreme, and in reality, it is. Not in the course of everyday life, of course. But as a pediatric otolaryngologist (ENT) and airway surgeon, I have had to make near-instantaneous decisions with life-or-death consequences for the patient. Fortunately, the vast majority of the time, things go …
“Thank God for the food truck,” said the charge nurse to no one in particular.
It hadn’t been a great morning at the no-name hospital in Upstate New York. They were short-staffed to begin with, and a nurse had called in sick. Her staff was used to working with bad ratios, but today was worse than usual. Everyone and their mother had decided to come to the ER. She knew not …
The world is benefited by a variety of human beings. Almost everyone can contribute greatly to our societies, no matter what their personal drives. Even the selfish and hate-filled can give us people like Henry Ford, the antisemitic supporter of Hitler who had union organizers beaten, but also doubled the standard wage for his workers and gave us the assembly line, standardized production, and vertical integration. His closest parallel today …
The nickname bestowed on us residents by our internal medicine residency program director was “city savages.” There was a tremendous amount of pride amongst the residency programs in Boston back in the late 1980s, and it was no different in my program.
I recall exploring residencies in Boston. While interviewing at another highly regarded Boston Hospital, I asked the …
1. Accept that your life is never going to be “normal.” What type of people decide to be surgeons? The type who have something a bit “wrong” with them, that’s who. The type who are OK with having their career occupy most of their identity. If you’re considering surgical residency, this is probably you. Accept it. Each person’s path is different, and there is no absolute correct one. A work-life …
The term “organ harvesting,” once a misnomer for organ procurement after organ donation, echoes in the phrase “procedure harvesting,” which could be an inadvertent misnomer for procedure procurement following procedure donation. Who knows if some may even suggest preemptive extracorporeal membrane oxygenation when cardiac arrest seems imminent during an elective non-cardiac procedure? Regardless, while pre-procedure optimization is always a goal for elective procedure procurement—and may even be achievable in emergent …
The student I worked with quietly said, “Dr. Reinking, I think you multiplied wrong.” My shoulders tensed slightly, and my stomach dropped. We had just spent the better part of an hour working through a feeding and fluid plan with a patient’s family. The child had recently undergone open heart surgery. Feeding intolerance is relatively common after surgery and in children with congenital heart disease. Fluid management is also important …
This is a highly encapsulated but accurate portrayal of the emotional weight of the conversation and the tension between a physician’s personal challenges and the desire to heal, both for themselves and their patients.
Patient/Physician (P): I’m an old blues man, and I think you understand I’ve been singing the blues ever since the world began.
Psychiatrist (Me): I hear you. That timeless blues spirit runs deep, carrying the weight of lived …
“Every person is the hero of their own story.”
– Aaron Saguil, MD
Problem:
The demands of medical training continue to put trainees and faculty at a high risk of burnout and mental health issues. Initial responses to this crisis centered around educational approaches. For these approaches, the unit of analysis is the individual. The unstated assumption of educational approaches is that the problem of burnout stems …
Medical providers play a crucial role in your health and well-being, so expecting them to perform their duties with care and competence is natural. However, if they fall short and make errors, you can file a medical malpractice claim to seek accountability for any harm they cause.
Medical malpractice occurs when a health care professional provides care that falls below the accepted standard expected in their field.
When studying medical malpractice, it …
Artificial intelligence (AI) is a virtual construct that uses algorithms, data, and computational power to simulate human intelligence in machines. Physicians and health care professionals often imagine AI as a futuristic, benevolent, childlike humanoid with the unique ability to love, as depicted in the 2001 Steven Spielberg movie A.I. Artificial Intelligence. However, the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) disagrees. In 2022, the DOJ announced the widespread deployment of AI, …
Doctors in most medical specialties spend a significant amount of their time interacting with people, yet medicine is considered one of the loneliest professions. I’ve heard this at several surprising points in the past few years from physicians I would not have suspected felt isolated. Over these last years, there have been increasing opportunities to find meaningful connections with other physicians through online communities, some of which have in-person gatherings …
Let’s play a little game of “What if?” Tune into your creative side for a few minutes—imagine, just for a second, if we billed like lawyers. I know, I know… I’m not saying we should, but imagine. Please let that sink in for a moment.
How often have we been casually approached at a party, a family gathering, or even in line at the grocery store with, “Hey, Doc, I have …
James Haliczer, an erstwhile defense attorney turned plaintiff attorney, audaciously claims in a YouTube video that “there is no such thing as a frivolous lawsuit.”
There are ten species of stakeholders in medical malpractice litigation: claimants, plaintiff attorneys, defendants, defense attorneys, medical experts, medical expert directories, mentors, malpractice insurance carriers, and jurors. They are part of the medical liability litigation industry.
With the exception of defendants and jurors, each prospers from $55.6 …
Working as a pediatrician offers a unique and unparalleled joy—a privilege shared among those who dedicate their lives to caring for children and supporting families. This summer, while working on a U.S. military base in Germany, I experienced this joy in its fullest form. Rather than my usual role of just seeing sick kids in an ER, I’ve had the incredible opportunity to serve as a primary care pediatrician. Whether …
February 2017: Second day on service in months, and already I feel wiped. It’s exhausting. I feel that it is meaningful but so draining. And still, I’m not sure that I am even doing a good job.
A month later, I came home from a multi-level marketing (MLM) party at a colleague’s house, announcing my excited plans to embark on a new venture. I was going to start selling MLM skin …
I was fortunate enough to attend the Paris 2024 Olympics with my family. There were several reasons why I wanted to attend this sporting event. Growing up, I sailed and participated in other sports, which taught me many lessons that continue to benefit me today. I wanted to remind myself of these lessons and experience the athletes’ excitement at a sporting event, this time as a spectator. I wanted to …
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