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Health reform everybody could love

Physicians must treat patients with the utmost respect with regards to their spiritual beliefs

Neha Sharma, DO

July 21, 2017Jul 21, 2017

Scientific evidence pointed to an extremely poor prognosis. Numbers and statistics emphatically declared her imminent demise. My 33-year-old patient was not going to survive. The physicians presented the data to the mother and recommended withdrawal of care, but she remained…

Scientific evidence pointed to an extremely poor prognosis. Numbers and statistics emphatically declared her imminent demise. My 33-year-old patient was not going to survive.

The physicians presented the data to the mother and recommended withdrawal of care, but she remained indecisive.

She struggled for two days with the possibility of her young daughter dying.

Her child was in the critical care unit in a vegetative state. It was a parent’s worst nightmare.

I took …

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Want a cure for physician burnout? Take care of yourself.

Jattu Senesie, MD

July 20, 2017Jul 20, 2017

The recent celebration of Employee Well-being Month got me thinking a lot about how physicians are treated as employees with regard to well-being. There is a general consensus that the issue of physician well-being needs to be addressed at both…

Unfortunately, this insight has thus far failed to lead to significant improvement in the overall …

Patient

We need a more comprehensive approach to investigating medical mistakes

Vania Silva

July 20, 2017Jul 20, 2017

From the wrong diagnosis to the incorrect medication, medical mistakes kill as many as 250,000 people annually in the United States — and injure thousands more. This figure could be much higher, considering there’s never been an actual count of how many patients experience preventable harm. We only have an approximate figure, which may indeed be very far off from the truth, considering the inaccuracies in …

Having a baby in a hospital? Here are 10 things you must know.

Valerie A. Jones, MD

July 20, 2017Jul 20, 2017

1. You might get sent home. If you show up pregnant with your first baby, and it turns out you aren’t 4 cm dilated yet, you will get sent home because you aren’t in active labor. Please don’t cuss out…

1. You might get sent home. If you show up pregnant with your first baby, and it turns out you aren’t 4 cm dilated yet, you will get sent home because you aren’t in active labor. Please don’t cuss out the charge nurse. Yes, you are in pain — we aren’t denying that. But, there are limited numbers of beds on labor suites, and we need to keep some open for …

Patient

Are patients really the problem?

Suzanne Fiscella, PA-C

July 20, 2017Jul 20, 2017

"Doctors are not the problem. Patients are." Anyone who has ever thought the above statement is true has not tapped into the vast well of knowledge and intellect found in their own patients. Training patients to be better patients brings…

“Doctors are not the problem. Patients are.”

Anyone who has ever thought the above statement is true has not tapped into the vast well of knowledge and intellect found in their own patients. Training patients to be better patients brings the joy of medicine back into your practice.

All of us, at one time or another, sat in a classroom. The teacher spent the first day going over the rules of the …

Are patients really the problem?

Senator McCain has brain cancer. Here’s what that means.

Brian C. Joondeph, MD

July 20, 2017Jul 20, 2017

By now, most readers already know that Senator John McCain has been diagnosed with a brain tumor -- specifically, a glioblastoma. I take no pleasure is suspecting such a diagnosis, as I wrote a few days ago, based on a…

By now, most readers already know that Senator John McCain has been diagnosed with a brain tumor — specifically, a glioblastoma. I take no pleasure is suspecting such a diagnosis, as I wrote a few days ago, based on a bit of medical logic and observation rather than what the media reported.

This is a devastating diagnosis for the senator and his family, not the blood clot initially …

A biker’s heartbreaking story

Ben Gold, MD

July 20, 2017Jul 20, 2017

A lone figure stood at the entrance to bed 14, intensive care unit 2, floor 15-North. Though it was 2:30 a.m., he stood with rapt attention. He looked out over the hallway, eyes scanning. He looked like a gargoyle brooding…

He looked unlike anyone I’d ever seen in an ICU. He was a slightly pudgy yet wholly muscular 5′ 10” or so, with a few days …

A biker’s heartbreaking story

A part of patient care that I was not taught in medical school

Yul Ejnes, MD

July 20, 2017Jul 20, 2017

A guest column by the American College of Physicians, exclusive to KevinMD.com. Recently, I’ve been thinking about how physicians express condolences. This weekend, I attended calling hours to visit with the family of a recently deceased patient. As I drove…

A guest column by the American College of Physicians, exclusive to KevinMD.com.

Recently, I’ve been thinking about how physicians express condolences. This weekend, I attended calling hours to visit with the family of a recently deceased patient. As I drove back from the funeral home, I tried to recall when I started to attend my …

Cheaper health care isn’t hard

Edwin Leap, MD

July 20, 2017Jul 20, 2017

I have never wanted to be the medical advice columnist. “Dear Dr. Leap: My feet sweat all the time. I’ve tried everything! What should I do?” Nope, I’m not your guy. Nor do I want to opine on study after study about statin drugs for cholesterol or discuss whether women should take estrogen. There are physicians who love those questions! And I think they’re fantastic. But I’m an emergency medicine …

Cheaper health care isn’t hard

A physician’s journey about the complexities of gender

Andrea Eisenberg, MD

July 19, 2017Jul 19, 2017

Entering the dimly light room, I could hear soft music playing in the background. The laboring room was so peaceful, it was hard to believe the patient in the bed was in active labor. But once up close, you could hear her breathing become deeper and louder every three or four minutes as she rode the wave of another contraction. Her husband was by her side, breathing with her, toweling …

What it’s like to be a doctor in the heroin capitol of the U.S.

Jenny Hartsock, MD

July 19, 2017Jul 19, 2017

I am a practicing hospitalist physician in Dayton, Ohio. Dayton has emerged in the last year as the city with the highest per capita death rate from opioid overdoses. When we measure the number of deaths here we talk about how many there are per day, not per week or month. We have been inundated with heroin and other products laced with fentanyl or carfentanil. Every other drug, including marijuana, …

Physician Finance

In this world of burnout, doctors have to remember why they do this

Cory Fawcett, MD

July 19, 2017Jul 19, 2017

Recently, I had the privilege of presenting the Clinical Specialty Award for General Surgery at the 2017 Graduate Awards Celebration at Western University of Health Sciences College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific (COMP-NW). It was amazing to hear all the accomplishments and meet so many wonderful new doctors in this year’s class. I also got the opportunity to meet a few proud parents and professors.

The list of accomplishments of …

5 ways to make dealing with death easier

Shannon Tapia, MD

July 19, 2017Jul 19, 2017

My husband, the anesthesiologist, came home one evening, he was solemn, affected, not himself. His patient died in the recovery room. It was sudden and unexpected for my husband. Despite the team’s swift efforts and perfectly executed code, the patient died anyway. It’s relevant to note that his patient was an almost 90-year-old man with significant congestive heart failure, probably chronic kidney disease, and complete occlusion of one of his …

What patients can teach doctors about rare diseases

Aamir Hussain, MD

July 19, 2017Jul 19, 2017

Having a chronic disease can be frustrating, especially when the patient seems to know more than the doctor. Unfortunately, this situation may be familiar to the millions of Americans suffering from a rare disease. In June, I had the unique experience of attending a convention for patients and health care providers to learn about one such rare disease category, vasculitis.

Vasculitides (plural of vasculitis) are a family of autoimmune diseases characterized …