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Fertility specialist Oluyemisi Famuyiwa discusses her article “Uterine aging in IVF: Why the ‘soil’ matters as much as the seed.” Oluyemisi explains that while clinicians often focus on egg quality, the aging …
Uterine aging plays a critical hidden role in IVF outcomes [PODCAST]
Yesterday morning, I learned that one of my teachers had passed away. He was only 63, a devoted, tireless oncologist who spent his life teaching and training many oncologists across Pakistan. Many of his students went on to work abroad as senior oncologists and professors, carrying his legacy far beyond borders.
He was not my direct teacher, but rather the teacher of my supervisor, a teacher of a teacher. Yet distance …
A tribute to an oncologist: the power of mentorship in medicine
By presidential order, marijuana has been rescheduled from Schedule I to Schedule III. This is not a subtle bureaucratic shift. It is a historic decision with major medical, regulatory, and cultural implications. Yet, astonishingly, much of the medical community has responded with near silence. There has been little serious discussion, no broad professional debate, and minimal effort to educate clinicians or the public about what this change does, and does …
Marijuana rescheduling: Why the medical community’s silence is dangerous
I recently wrote a four-part series examining AI and the future of medicine. The response confirmed something important. Physicians are not merely curious about artificial intelligence. They are unsettled. The headlines are loud. Automation. Disruption. Replacement. It is reasonable to ask whether doctors will lose jobs, whether surgeons will be replaced, whether this is the beginning of a profession fundamentally reshaped.
The answers are neither triumphalist nor catastrophic. AI replaces tasks. …
Future of AI in medicine: Will algorithms replace doctors?
As my first rotation in surgery draws to a close, I’ve been reflecting not only on anatomy and technique, but on the structure of medicine itself. Surgery teaches hierarchy not as an obstacle but as a rhythm, one that protects patients and preserves excellence. In that rhythm, I found clarity about my role as a PA student: to learn medicine deeply while honoring the lineage of those who have mastered …
Why PAs are masters in medicine, not competitors to MDs
Reflection has become one of the core virtues of contemporary health professional education. From journaling assignments to mindfulness prompts to competency-based portfolios, students are repeatedly asked to look inward. Reflection is framed as the doorway to insight, empathy, and professional identity formation. But an uncomfortable question is beginning to surface in hallway conversations and faculty retreats: Can too much reflection, or reflection done poorly, actually harm our learners?
At first glance, …
Reflection vs. rumination: Is medical education harming students?
Close your eyes and imagine a health care system that truly prioritizes patients above all else, one that is free from political interference, financial incentives, or secondary gains that distort decision-making. In this ideal framework, regulatory bodies such as the Medical Board, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) would enforce guidelines uniformly and based on evidence, without inadvertently inflating costs or compromising care quality …
The hidden cost of medical board regulation and prosecutorial overreach
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Pediatrician and certified coach Jessie Mahoney discusses her article “Leading with love: a physician’s guide to clarity and compassion.” Jessie shares how a personal crisis involving her husband’s severe depression forced her …
Asking what love would do transforms leadership [PODCAST]
I have so many patients struggling with horrible arthritis pain! All the treatments we have either really don’t work well or have side effects, and many times cause more harm than good. I found myself having a risk-benefit discussion with every single patient with chronic pain, and at times, feeling like I was doing more harm than good when trying to help treat the pain.
Patients are taking NSAIDs, and I …
Peptides for chronic pain: Navigating safety and regulations
She arrived exhausted, a shadow of the lively 31-year-old she once was.
She was diagnosed with leukemia in January 2023, underwent intensive IV chemotherapy, and was now on maintenance oral therapy. When I met her in July 2025, survival was no longer a question. It was about quality of life.
Fatigue consumed her days. Digestive discomfort disrupted her nights. Recurrent infections kept her in constant vigilance. Her laboratory values reflected a body …
Integrative oncology nutrition: a case study in leukemia recovery
As physicians, we pride ourselves on following the evidence. We weigh risks and benefits, assess data, and trust science to guide decisions about patient care. Yet, when it comes to reproductive health, lawmakers and courts too often override scientific consensus. Nowhere is that clearer than in the debate over mifepristone.
Patients deserve care rooted in evidence and science, not ideology. To provide safe and best-practice medical care, physicians need the ability …
Mifepristone safety: Comparing the data to Viagra and penicillin
Annual preventive exams have been a staple of American medicine for decades. Yet despite their importance, preventive visits remain underutilized in American health care, which is no surprise in a system that centers sick care and incentivizes churning out services instead of improving outcomes.
In fact, only 60% of Medicare beneficiaries complete their annual well visits, and less than 65% of children under 19 complete their well-child check-ups. When …
Agentic AI: the key to saving annual preventive exams
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Vascular surgeon Paula Muto discusses her article “Give the health care dollar back to patients.” Paula argues that the government shutdown over health care funding misses the real issue of administrative bloat …
Bureaucracy now consumes most of your health care spending [PODCAST]
Between 2005 and the present, 195 rural hospitals have closed, with a 50-hospital net reduction occurring just between 2017 and 2023. These closures, compounded by significantly worse measures of social determinants of health (SDOH), high prevalence of Medicaid or Medicare patients, and longer commute times, have created a crisis of access for rural Americans.
The disproportionate impact on rural residents
Compared to their urban and suburban counterparts, …
Rural health care crisis: Can telemedicine close the gap?
I was halfway through reviewing what looked like an excellent locums opportunity when I realized the hourly rate was the least important number in the agreement. The compensation was strong. The schedule was flexible. Travel was covered. On the surface, it seemed straightforward.
But what ultimately determined whether the opportunity made sense had very little to do with pay. It had to do with clarity.
The difference between conversations and contracts
Locums conversations …
Reviewing locum tenens agreements: Look beyond the hourly rate
As an integrative and functional medicine physician, I prescribe hormone therapy. I also see its misuse daily.
Hormone replacement therapy (HRT), including bioidentical hormone therapy (BHRT), has re-entered menopause care with force, correcting decades of dismissal and undertreatment. That correction was necessary, but the pendulum has swung too far.
What I am seeing clinically is not thoughtful, physiology-based care. It is hormone-first medicine that bypasses stress physiology, nervous system dysregulation, trauma, metabolic …
The misuse of hormone therapy in menopause care
Among the people exiting the hospital, I could easily pick out the medical staff leaving their shifts. It wasn’t by their clothing or the time of day, but by the unspoken language of relief on their faces: a calm twinkle in the eyes or a gentle softness around the forehead and jaw. Dawn or dusk, the look was always there. I hoped I’d have it too when I left later …
Physician burnout: Finding peace in a broken health care system
Clinicians often notice a frustrating pattern: Women in midlife follow standard weight-loss advice, eat less and move more, yet see little progress. Calories are reduced, exercise increases, and still the scale barely moves. This is often blamed on motivation, discipline, or compliance. But in many cases, the real issue is not behavior. It’s physiology.
Perimenopause and menopause are not simply estrogen-deficient states; they are states of altered signaling, altered tissue responsiveness, …
Why “eat less, move more” fails for midlife weight loss
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Pediatrician Trevor Cabrera discusses his article “Locum tenens: Reclaiming purpose, autonomy, and financial freedom in medicine.” Trevor explains how choosing the path of an independent contractor allowed him to pay off massive …
Locum tenens offers physicians a path to freedom [PODCAST]
During my first two years as a medical student, I have often been struck not only by how much medicine has advanced, but by how frequently the foundations of health are overlooked. This perspective was shaped early in my career through my first postgraduate role, where I spent three years collecting patient data for a multisite study evaluating a lifestyle-based intervention to reverse metabolic syndrome.
At a data analysis meeting with …
Lifestyle medicine vs. medication: Why prevention is the future
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