Recent headlines confirm what many Americans have sensed for the past few years: the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is in crisis. A sweeping wave of layoffs is reshaping federal health agencies at every level—from the NIH to the CDC to the FDA. Some dismiss this as a political maneuver or an act of chaos. Others see it as an attack on career civil servants. I see …
It is a routine Saturday morning—I am sitting in my office, looking at the snowflakes dropping outside my window. As I sip on my cup of Earl Grey tea preparing my psyche for a busy day of managing an on-call shift on an acute care psychiatry floor, I am suddenly washed over by grief. A very similar Saturday a year ago, I was saying goodbye to my father as he …
“Some doctors type notes with their backs turned while I say things. I have aphasia. I need to be able to see people’s mouths and their eyes to help me understand.”
As a certified speech-language pathologist (SLP), I have spent most of my career working across the continuum of health care with people who have communication disabilities, such as aphasia. My patients have also included people with other …
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Cardiologist Stanley Liu discusses his article, “5 steps to ride out a non-compete without uprooting your family.” He shares his personal experience of being bound by an 18-month, 20-mile non-compete clause after …
The erosion of physician mentorship is not just a quiet tragedy; it is an accelerating crisis with rippling effects across the health care system. While much has been written about physician burnout and workforce shortages, far less attention has been paid to the vacuum this leaves in clinical mentorship, particularly in primary care. The implications for physician associates/assistants (PAs) are especially profound.
PAs were historically trained in the postgraduate space under …
After I was medically discharged from the military for seeking mental health treatment and transitioned out of surgery residency to recover, I isolated in guilt, shame, and exhaustion.
Despite my surgery program director telling me repeatedly that he was not disappointed in me and supporting me fully in my decision to transition into a different specialty where I could better take care of my health, I felt worthless …
If you are working as an independent or locum tenens physician, there’s a good chance you’ve found yourself wondering: Am I being paid fairly for my time and expertise? Unlike employed physicians, whose compensation is often shaped by established benchmarks and internal HR formulas, independent and locum tenens doctors are frequently left to navigate negotiations on their own—often with limited information.
Understanding what constitutes “fair market value” in this context is …
As health care embraces digital transformation, one truth is clear: AI’s success depends on data quality. No matter how advanced the algorithms, poor clinical data limits their effectiveness.
AI in health care: Promise meets reality
The health care technology landscape is abuzz with large language models (LLMs) and conversational AI applications that show remarkable capabilities in synthesizing patient information and streamlining clinical workflows. Clinicians …
When Sam Altman recently said ChatGPT had become “too sycophantic,” the comment landed like a small UX confession—an admission that the model had gotten a little too flattering, a little too eager to please. Most coverage treated it as a byproduct of reinforcement learning. A bug to fix. A tone issue.
But that framing isn’t neutral.
Calling AI “too nice” is a values-based judgment. And it reflects something deeper than model …
So what exactly does collaborative health care mean? When we break this down into categories, there are three main approaches, each with a different benefit but ideally sharing the same end goal: to better improve patient outcomes. First, doctor to alternative practitioner. Secondly, patient to doctor. Lastly, patient to patient.
Years ago, I went through one of the biggest health battles of my life after being diagnosed with granulomatous mastitis (GM). …
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Pediatrician and certified coach Jessie Mahoney discusses her article, “Why physicians find negotiating challenging—and what they can do to negotiate better.” She explores why negotiation often feels stressful for physicians, linking it …
“What did you have for breakfast today?”
This phrase is a crucial part of my morning rounds.
While interacting with the patient, the greeting is very important. I believe doctors who approach the bedside without introducing themselves and who immediately ask about the patient’s active complaint tend to come across as less compassionate (whatever their actual intentions might be). This can hinder the development of the bond necessary for obtaining a complete …
In his book Ways of Attending, McGilchrist (2016) discusses a difference in attention—one that seeks organization and one that any attempt at organizing subverts. A bit like Schrödinger’s cat, just by looking, it is disturbed. In differing translations of Tranströmer’s poem Prelude from 17 Dikter (1954), about the moment upon wakening from a dream, he captures the infinite possibility that slides one fully awake into a new day, and which …
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Monochorionic diamniotic (MCDA) twin pregnancies come with more scans, more risk, and more decisions to make in very little time. Parents are expected to absorb complex medical information, navigate unfamiliar terminology, and act quickly, often under pressure. When care teams do not meet that need for clarity and support, parents do what any reasonable person would do.
They go looking for answers.
In 2024, we published a study in Midwifery that explored …
As we near the end of Nurses Week, I can’t help but express my gratitude for our true health care heroes: nurses. Throughout my 20 years in medicine, I have worked with nurses on a daily basis. As an innocent, bumbling medical student, they would teach me how to place an IV or how to supplement potassium. In residency, they would teach the ins and outs of ICU care even …
Admiral William McRaven is a Navy SEAL and was the president of the University of Texas. In 2014, he gave a commencement speech that has been viewed over 10 million times. It is considered one of the greatest contemporary graduation speeches of all time.* Although the speech was directed at 8,000 graduates at the University of Texas, his message certainly applies to the health care profession.
So, here …
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Anesthesiologist and psychotherapist Maire Daugharty discusses her article, “Why real therapy isn’t just about crisis.” She challenges the common misconception that therapy is only necessary or effective during acute crises (“crisis-hopping”), explaining …
Kim Downey:
A friend shared with me how she told someone their mutual physician was on medical leave. She heard it was serious. That person’s immediate response was concern over how it would affect their upcoming appointment. My friend said she thought of my advocacy work, initiating a conversation fostering empathy for the struggling physician.
I read a post by a surgeon, with fellow doctors commenting …
Imagine waking up one morning to a bold headline screaming: “New Global Law: All Antidepressants Abolished!” Just like that, no more Prozac, no more Zoloft—no more of those little pills that have helped millions keep their balance while navigating life’s emotional tightrope. Pharmacy shelves are wiped clean overnight, and suddenly, one of the pillars of modern mental health care is gone.
Before you clutch your chest and start breathing into a …
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For years, weight loss has been sold as a simple math problem: eat less, move more, and the pounds will melt away. But if that were true, we wouldn’t have an obesity epidemic affecting over 40 percent of adults in the U.S.
Now, a new class of medications—GLP-1 receptor agonists like semaglutide (Ozempic, Wegovy) and tirzepatide (Mounjaro, Zepbound)—are changing the game. People who have struggled with their weight for …
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