I have been fortunate in my forty-five-year medical career never to have been sued for the care I delivered to a patient. I attribute this, in part, to being a family physician and having ongoing relationships with my patients and, in part, to being willing to admit to my mistakes if I make them and things turn out badly. I see how gut-wrenching going to court is for doctors so …
Our modern existence is a state of perpetual disconnection.
Earbuds in. Staring down at our screens. Avoiding eye contact.
Disconnected from each other and ourselves, we go about our lives in adult parallel play.
Numbing any hint of uncomfortable feelings with more Netflix or scrolling.
The social, political, and health consequences of this existence have accelerated over the last three years. As a result, the physician-patient relationship is more fractured than ever. Physicians are …
It used to be easy. You didn’t worry about your health care or how to pay for it. You had a family physician who cared for you in the office and the hospital. They coordinated every aspect of your care, including working with consultants. And after discharge, they would resume caring for you knowing what had occurred firsthand. That was then.
This is now.
Patients rarely see their primary care physician in …
This article is sponsored by Sandoz, a Novartis division, and global leader in generic pharmaceuticals and biosimilars.
When I started working in the health care industry over 25 years ago, I was compelled by a passion to make a difference and improve the lives of those around me. Ultimately, that mission …
It’s the day of my last case presentation for my neurology rotation. Hearing the subway doors shut, I run up the stairs just in time to see them close. Breathless, I walk to the center of the platform. Noting the next train isn’t coming for another seven minutes, I groan in frustration and pull out my notes to spend the time to prepare.
I see a woman approaching me from the …
The new American Academy of Pediatrics guidelines for childhood obesity have shifted from a “watchful waiting” method to “early and aggressive treatment.” Coverage of the guidelines in the Washington Post, the New York Times, and other reputable news outlets have readily accepted this new depiction of childhood obesity as a disorder in need of immediate, aggressive intervention and has given little or no attention to what …
Repeated media articles continue to inform the public that we don’t have enough physicians to handle our health care, and it’s worsening. We have at least 174 accredited medical schools in our nation that are still producing medical doctors and about 22,000 annually from all medical schools who enter a medical practice of some kind.
That must be a satisfactory number because they aren’t building medical schools much anymore. The existing …
During the COVID pandemic health care workers needed to work tirelessly to correct the false information that politicians easily spread through the country. The President made claims that the virus was not real, that physicians were getting financial kickbacks from using COVID on death certificates, and that health care workers were benefiting from the pandemic. Physicians, nurses, and staff needed to talk to patients about COVID, and it really took …
When I finished my pediatric residency almost 20 years ago, I embarked upon a career in general pediatrics because I didn’t enjoy any particular subspecialty enough to commit my career to it. After spending several years in a mostly outpatient setting (peppered with child abuse consults, circumcisions, and an unsatisfyingly small number of hospitalized patients), I knew I had to change and move across the country to pursue pediatric hospital …
The recent decision by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter to transition to hospice brings much-needed attention to this crucial part of health care. Hospice care is an essential and compassionate component of modern medicine, providing support and care to patients and families during the most challenging time of their lives. Historically, hospice care has been long stigmatized as giving up on treatment. However, the truth is the opposite. Hospice provides …
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In this episode, we welcome clinical research assistant professor, Maranda C. Ward, to discuss the importance of routine screening for both HIV and COVID-19 in primary care. During the COVID pandemic, we became familiar with answering questions …
Until recently, mainstream science has not recognized the field of spiritual science because the consensus has been that science and spirit (soul) are like oil and vinegar — they do not mix. Science is all about facts and evidence relative to the hypothesis, theory, and actual proof. At the same time, it is said that the spirit and the soul cannot be proven and are solely based on faith.
However, thanks …
With the recent news of ChatGPT artificial intelligence successfully passing the United States Medical Licensure Exam (USMLE), we have been catapulted into a new era in medicine and medical education. What has always been regarded exclusively as a human skill and profession has now been demonstrated to be technically mastered by artificial intelligence. Rightfully, the detractors today will say that passing a board exam does not make …
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According to a study published in Pediatrics, it is estimated that between 2010 and 2019, more than 70,000 emergency department (ED) visits in the United States were related to battery ingestion, mouth exposure, and ear or nasal insertion among children under 18 years old. ED visits occurred more frequently among children ages five years and younger. Button-type and …
Canadian physicians, like many other Canadians, generally support the country’s publicly funded health care system, which is designed to provide universal access to medical care.
However, despite its strengths, there are some areas where the public system falls short, and there is growing evidence that a combination of public and private health care could help address some of these shortcomings.
One of the main benefits of a mixed system, as seen in …
I was surprised when I began receiving gift cards to a national chain of coffee shops in recognition of positive patient satisfaction comments from my emergency department patients.
Reviewing them in my provider report card genuinely felt good, especially when someone remembered my name in a follow-up phone call while saying something positive. Still, the token incentive met with disapproval for several reasons.
In particular, the most meaningful comments expressed gratitude for …
I once knew a lady who eventually died of pancreatic cancer. She must have been by then in her early seventies. Her name was Marilyn, and I went to grade school with her son Tom. we went back a long way. I guess I was in my early thirties by the time what happened, happened.
Marilyn’s husband, Forrest, had died a few months earlier. I knew him, too. She missed him …
“It’s all in your head.”
When my friends, family, and mentors said these five words to me in the days leading up to the pre-pass/fail USMLE Step 1 exam, they meant it literally: everything you need to know to succeed is already in your head. When my internal dialogue repeated those words, they took on a different meaning. The question banks had been answered, and the …
I have to write a “perfect medical school personal statement.” I have to write about learning and growth. I want to show empathy and grit. Most of all, I must resonate with the medical school admissions committee reading my story.
The overwhelming consensus around Student Doctor Network, the forum of terrible but successful premeds, is: don’t make waves. Adcoms can be radical feminists or religious fundamentalists, born from wealth or recently …
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