This article is satire.
Dr. Donovan Trumble was not your average internist.
In fact, if you asked him, he wasn’t your average anything.
He called himself “the most successful physician-researcher in America—maybe ever,” and once declared during grand rounds, “If Sir William Osler were alive today, he’d be my opening act.”
To the faculty at the Ivy League medical school where Trumble had once chaired the Department of Clinical Egotism (officially “Translational Medicine,” but …
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An excerpt from Narrative Medicine: New and Selected Essays.
One of my adult daughters recently reminded me of a cherished memory. When she was about four years old, we spent a few hours together at a small, independently owned bookstore. I selected books straight off the shelves and read to her, and later we joined a circle of children and parents to …
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The term “core competency” was coined by management experts C.K. Prahalad and Gary Hamel in their influential 1990 article titled “The core competence of the corporation,” published in the Harvard Business Review. Prahalad and Hamel defined core competencies as the unique capabilities or advantages that a company possesses, which are critical to its ability to achieve competitive advantage and long-term success. These competencies are not just about the skills or …
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Federal downsizing, while touted as a means to streamline operations and eliminate bureaucratic waste, has significant and often detrimental consequences for the U.S. health care system. Two documents shed light on this issue from complementary perspectives. The first, a U.S. Office of Management and Budget-Office of Personnel Management (OMB-OPM) memorandum outlines an aggressive workforce optimization initiative designed to reduce federal staffing and cut costs. The …
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The recent decision by the University of Pennsylvania (Penn) to remove diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives from its website has sparked a significant debate within the academic community. This move, aimed at complying with an executive order from President Donald Trump, highlights the tension between institutional values and political mandates. This essay explores the implications of Penn’s actions, contrasting …
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The Hippocratic Oath does not require citizenship as a condition of treatment. The oath, which serves as a foundational ethical guideline for physicians, emphasizes principles such as doing no harm, maintaining patient confidentiality, and practicing medicine ethically and with integrity. It focuses on the physician’s responsibilities to patients and the ethical practice of medicine rather than any conditions related to a patient’s citizenship or nationality.
So, why did this issue surface …
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The peaceful transition of power to the 47th president of the U.S. occurred January 6, 2025. It was the loser of the presidential election who ensured an orderly process and ironically certified the results.
In medicine, transitions of care – whether from inpatient to skilled nursing facility, from hospital to home, or during the passing of responsibility from one practitioner to another – represent pivotal moments in the continuity of patient …
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Many songs and famous refrains flooded my mind as we transitioned into 2025. “Living on a thin line,” “It’s all over now, baby blue,” and “Can’t find my way home” were some of the notable downers. On the flip side (no pun intended), I was uplifted by “Land of hope and dreams” and “It’s gonna be a bright sun-shiny day,” and the thought that “Love [would] reign o’er me.”
Of all, …
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Frank Sinatra’s 1965 hit, “It was a very good year,” framed the benchmarks of a life well-lived through relationships at various ages: when he was 17, “small-town girls … on the village green”; at 21, “city girls who lived up the stair”; at 35, “blue-blooded girls of independent means.”
Fast forward 60 years. What are the ingredients that now constitute “a very good year?” Data from a survey of 2,000 …
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Around Christmas time every year, The BMJ publishes lighthearted feature articles and original, peer-reviewed research intended to ease physicians into the holiday season and help them escape the drudgery of practice. The 2024 collection of articles is no exception, with enticing papers like “How to transport a polar bear, and other idiosyncrasies in providing emergency medical services in the Arctic” and “Living happily ever after? The hidden health risks of Disney princesses.”
My favorite …
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A fellow writer and I were having an online exchange. She said her painting was being interrupted by bursts of writing. She texted, “I’m writing about how storytelling is liberating itself from commerce, politics, religion, and emerging as medicine and culture.”
I asked if I could use her quote as my biographical tagline. On my LinkedIn profile I could say: “I write about how storytelling liberates us from commerce, politics, and …
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Much has been written about Robert F Kennedy Jr.’s radical health plans to eliminate fluoride from the drinking water and suppress vaccines, among other lame-brain schemes. But relatively few people are aware of his anti-psychiatry views, possibly endangering the health of a large swath of the populace.
Kennedy is pitching the idea that users of illicit drugs be sent to the “wellness farms,” and users of antidepressants and ADHD medications should …
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Like him or not, Bruce Springsteen’s albums have served as the soundtrack to our lives, writing songs that are a reflection of ourselves, challenging our assumptions, and helping us make sense of our messy, chaotic lives. People from all walks of life and from all over the world have found meaning in his music. So, it was no surprise that several months prior to the 2024 presidential election, while on …
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Over the past several months, I’ve’ been busy assembling various essays into a book—essays I’ve written and published here on KevinMD and elsewhere. The manuscript is now complete. Here’s a brief pitch I’ve given to about two dozen publishers (I do not have an agent):
Dear Acquisitions Editor:
I am writing to ascertain your interest in publishing my manuscript tentatively titled Narrative Rx: A Quick Guide to Narrative Medicine for Students, Residents, …
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I had a dismal start to the second year of my psychiatric residency, and my subpar performance was noted by many faculty members. One professor approached me and told me to discuss the situation with my psychotherapy supervisor, adding, “Don’t let your supervisor sugarcoat it.” The professor knew that my advisor was an extremely kind and gentle person who would prefer to leave out the details of my performance so …
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This is a highly encapsulated but accurate portrayal of the emotional weight of the conversation and the tension between a physician’s personal challenges and the desire to heal, both for themselves and their patients.
Patient/Physician (P): I’m an old blues man, and I think you understand I’ve been singing the blues ever since the world began.
Psychiatrist (Me): I hear you. That timeless blues spirit runs deep, carrying the weight of lived …
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The fourth major concussion recently suffered by Miami Dolphins quarterback Tua Tagovailoa – his third in 24 months – brings into sharp focus the balance between patient/player autonomy and treatment decisions. The right to self-determination, even in sports, has become as much a moral as a medical issue. If Tagovailoa is not able to pass concussion protocols for a third time in his NFL career, he could be forced to …
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An excerpt from Story Treasures: Medical Essays and Insights in the Narrative Tradition.
The Gish gallop – named after American creationist Duane Gish, who challenged the science of evolution – is a rhetorical technique often used by a debater to throw out a fast string of lies, non-sequiturs, and specious arguments, so many that it is impossible to fact-check or rebut them in the amount of time it took to …
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