Heartland parenting complicated by COVID

Physician
November 30, 2020

Shimmying in his blinding white high-top Converse, the latest addition to his increasingly fashion-conscious wardrobe, Calvin, my 17-year-old son, bursts out, “I’m a good boy! I’m a good boy! I’m a good boy!” Puzzled by this uncharacteristic child-like repetition, I set my banjo down and take in his 6’ 1” frame as he dances in my direction.

“What’s so hard?” I ask, wondering what temptation he’s averted this time and perhaps …

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Heartland parenting complicated by COVID

Clinical pearls: Addressing health care disparities for African Americans

Sponsored
November 30, 2020

This article is sponsored by Pri-Med.

Gregory L. Hall, MD, an expert on African American health care, continues to draw interest and accolades from primary care audiences nationwide for his new CME web series, Bridging the Gap: Conversations with Dr. Hall, on Pri-Med.com. In each monthly episode, Dr. Hall hosts important discussions on health equity and social determinants of …

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Clinical pearls: Addressing health care disparities for African Americans

How this physician’s first experience with death affected her [PODCAST]

Podcast
November 29, 2020
YouTube video

“My sister called me. I answered. And, then, I lost it: ‘He died. He died,’ I repeated. ‘Our patient died. I literally did CPR on this guy. We tried to save his life, and he died,’ I repeated over and over. The tears streaming down my cheeks were cathartic. More than signifying …

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How this physician’s first experience with death affected her [PODCAST]

Empty chairs at the table this holiday season

Physician
November 29, 2020

There’s nothing like the holidays and a new year around the corner to remind us that 2020 is almost over. This year let’s try to take nothing for granted. Especially since millions of Americans will soon sit down to a holiday meal with one or more loved ones missing. Those empty chairs are a reminder of what we have endured this year. Whether it be loved ones who are sick, …

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Empty chairs at the table this holiday season

Being an attending: What no one tells you in residency and medical school

Physician
November 29, 2020

For most of us, medical training through all the pains of medical school and residency is often bearable when we fantasize about life on the other side of all of this. Life as an attending physician, when the sky suddenly turns all rainbow, when the money starts to fall from those skies — we’re finally our own bosses, and then we’re supposed to live happily ever after. The reality, however, …

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Being an attending: What no one tells you in residency and medical school

What you need to know about cold and flu season in the time of COVID-19

Conditions and Diseases
November 29, 2020

The cold and flu season looks very different this year with the COVID-19 pandemic. When a person has a fever, sore throat, aches, and chills, they need to consider when to self isolate, when to be tested for COVID-19, when to be assessed in person and when antibiotics should be considered.

Is it a common cold, the flu, a bacterial infection, or the novel coronavirus (COVID-19)?

In a recent article in the British …

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What you need to know about cold and flu season in the time of COVID-19

A physician moves from the exam room to the C-suite [PODCAST]

Podcast
November 28, 2020
YouTube video

“The dictionary definition of learning is ‘the acquisition of knowledge or skills through experience, study, or by being taught.’ For leaders, the most crucial and common way of learning happens through experience, and as we often say, leadership is flying the plane while building it. Moreover, the onus of making the process …

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A physician moves from the exam room to the C-suite [PODCAST]

Managing through COVID-19: a virtual doctor’s story

Physician
November 28, 2020

It was early February when I first felt the tides changing. I remember it well. I was having lunch with a friend – another doctor – and the situation in China was bleak. We agreed it was only a matter of time before the novel coronavirus would erupt in the United States. As medical professionals, we knew that contagious diseases don’t just stay in a box, no matter how much …

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Managing through COVID-19: a virtual doctor’s story

A society that values evidence is more resilient in the face of health crises

Conditions and Diseases
November 28, 2020

In a world of unprecedented access to information and incredible connectedness, everyone is an expert. Public health has been one of the many victims of this phenomenon, yet it is the single most important strategy for managing the global crisis we are in.

The problem with public health is that it is not particularly likable. That has not always been so. Public health used to be really sexy. As the germ …

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A society that values evidence is more resilient in the face of health crises

Normalizing infertility conversations in the workplace

Conditions and Diseases
November 28, 2020

I am a medical doctor—a hospitalist working in an environment with many talented professionals.  We share our knowledge and our approach to medicine with one another in ways that profoundly affect our patients and other personnel in the hospital.

At our best, we are a community whose foundation is a willingness and openness to discuss hard facts and make difficult decisions.

So why is it that when I was first diagnosed with …

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Normalizing infertility conversations in the workplace

Essential tips for the physician-entrepreneur [PODCAST]

Podcast
November 27, 2020
YouTube video

“Being an entrepreneur can be a lonely road. Everyone dreams of life after a successful round of funds being raised, staff being hired, and plunging headfirst into the making and shipping of widgets. But there are many days which no one talks about, where a budding entrepreneur must find a way to …

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Essential tips for the physician-entrepreneur [PODCAST]

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Physicians have spoken. The Biden administration should listen.

Health Policy
November 27, 2020

The COVID-19 pandemic has upended life as we know it. Every aspect of our health care system is affected; in particular, our nation’s frontline workers are being stretched like never before. From managing the pandemic long term to physician well-being, social determinants of health (SDOH), and health care reform, the incoming Administration should heed doctors’ warnings to foster a health care system that works for everyone.

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Physicians have spoken. The Biden administration should listen.

I am a critical care physician. These are the patients in the ICU.

Conditions and Diseases
November 27, 2020

I am a critical care physician. I am at the frontlines of this pandemic, in a state of “war” against an unseen enemy that has brought unimaginable destruction in its path.

I arrive at work at 7 a.m. for my shift. I am in a state of hypervigilance. It is a chilly fall day, but in my hospital issue scrubs, I feel warm. I am ready for what is to come.

I …

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I am a critical care physician. These are the patients in the ICU.

What this doctor learned from cartooning other peoples’ stories

Physician
November 27, 2020

After three months as a newly minted doctor, I knew that any plan that I made for my first vacation week would be futile in the context of COVID-19, so I attempted an escape into the headspace of others. During my first day on vacation, I asked my Twitter community to share the following post widely:

“I’m on my vacation week w/ nothing to do, so I want to …

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What this doctor learned from cartooning other peoples’ stories

A physician waits in uncertainty

Conditions and Diseases
November 27, 2020

It started with diarrhea.  Then fever before the patient sought care.  The infiltrates were impressive.  A dry cough with paroxysms that were sometimes uncontrollable.   The rapid test came back negative, as did the send out PCR.  The patient returned from international travel two days before admission.  My index of suspicion was extremely high.  Yes, please keep the patient on enhanced respiratory droplet precautions because her viral load in the nasopharynx …

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A physician waits in uncertainty

COVID-19 is a war on two fronts [PODCAST]

Podcast
November 26, 2020
YouTube video

“I’m exhausted. As the pandemic rages on, the mental toll of dealing with COVID-19 has started to wear on me. As a practicing hospitalist in the Midwest impacted by one of the many hotspots caused by the meatpacking industry, I have spent a fair bit of time with this virus on the …

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COVID-19 is a war on two fronts [PODCAST]

Life in the emergency department during COVID: a rural physician’s perspective

Conditions and Diseases
November 26, 2020

“Do you think we should prepare a will?” I vividly remember saying these words to my wife, also a physician, as we drastically saw COVID cases rise in early March 2020. Just months ago, we heard about the novel coronavirus now known as SARS-CoV-2 but did not grasp the world-changing consequences it would have. Living in Western New York, we were not immediately hit with a surge of cases like …

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Life in the emergency department during COVID: a rural physician’s perspective

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