Abraar Karan, MD

Against medical advice: When patients and doctors defy expectations

Physician

July 31, 2017

Mr. B. was ready to leave. A short, stocky Boston construction worker with an even shorter temper and a tough attitude, he was not going to stay in the hospital one minute longer than needed.

Mr. B.’s life had taken a turn for the worse recently: He was going through a divorce, had lost his health insurance, and had become temporarily homeless at the time we met. He had brought himself …

A new medical intern begins. These 2 mottos will serve him well.

Abraar Karan, MD

Education

July 4, 2017

I will walk into the hospital with a clean, ironed white coat buttoned to the top, dress shoes polished, a tie neatly knotted under my collar, my maroon stethoscope rearing to go — and I will be largely unprepared for what lies ahead. Along with countless others across the country, I will begin my medical internship, a year considered by many to be the most important in a physician’s working …

We need to provide health insurance for undocumented people. Here’s why.

Abraar Karan, MD

Policy

October 22, 2015

The cost of medical service provision in the United States is one of the most palpable strains on the health care system, but we must not forget that cost is the sibling of quality and access — without considering the three as such, we will undoubtedly fail to navigate our country’s health care quandary. Low-quality care inevitably results in the need for more care in the form of readmissions, while …

To my patients: An apology and a thank you

Abraar Karan, MD

Education

April 9, 2015

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As a third-year medical student, I realized one particular morning on rounds that I had let the demands of the job overtake the joys of why I went into medicine at all. I found myself running behind my team, barely even able to say goodbye to the last patient we had seen. The human interaction had become an afterthought in the …

Marijuana and motor vehicle safety: An impending public health dilemma

Abraar Karan, MD

Meds

October 4, 2014

Since 1996, 21 states have approved the legalization of marijuana for medical use. More recently, Washington and Colorado have legalized the use of recreational marijuana, with California and Oregon not far behind. The health risks associated with marijuana have been well documented in a number of studies, but these are secondary to the much greater mortality risk associated with an increased prevalence of the drug: driving under the influence.

As is …

Should medical schools start teaching to USMLE Step 1?

Abraar Karan, MD

Education

May 3, 2014

In the 2012 National Residency Match Program survey, which is sent out to residency program directors around the country by the NRMP, the factor that was ranked highest with regards to criteria considered for receiving an interview — higher than honors in clinical clerkships, higher than extracurricular experiences or AOA election, and even higher than evidence of professionalism, interpersonal skills, and humanistic qualities — was the USMLE Step 1 score.

When …

Are medical school rankings threatening the future of health care?

Abraar Karan, MD

Education

January 18, 2014

One of the many important decisions a future physician will make in his or her career is the medical school they choose to attend. The highly competitive application process is supposedly designed to ensure that our matriculating medical students will be able and wanting to contribute transformative innovation to the communities and institutions in which they end up working. However, given the dynamic nature of our health care system, many …

What happens to patients after their doctors die?

Abraar Karan, MD

Patient

September 22, 2013

Several studies have explored the experience of grief that physicians feel when they lose a patient. But what about when the patient loses a physician — when the doctor dies?

Dr. K was a well-known child psychiatrist, a loving husband, a father of two, and an irreplaceable support and friend for a number of children suffering from trauma, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, autism and other challenging psychiatric conditions. Earlier this year, …

How to revolutionize health prevention efforts around the world

Abraar Karan, MD

Policy

July 30, 2013

Imagine your 7-year-old son’s face, abdomen, and legs begin to mysteriously swell one morning. Your initial reaction as a parent would likely be to worry first. However, your second instinct is probably to rush to your computer and search the Internet for what might be going on. This is easy enough for the roughly 72% of people in America who have a computer with Internet access in their homes.

Now, imagine …

The reality of medicine’s inherently unequal power dynamic

Abraar Karan, MD

Education

June 20, 2013

As part of the first-year curriculum, medical students at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA are required to attend chaplain rounds at local hospitals during which they accompany chaplains to offer spiritual care to patients. This is designed to encourage students to empathize with patients who are enduring difficult end-of-life issues and is part of a ubiquitous and important theme that inundates almost every medical student across the …

Abraar Karan, MD

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