Claire Unis is a pediatrician and author of Balance, Pedal, Breathe: A Journey Through Medical School.

Blogging for beginners: tips for success in any niche

Social media
March 6, 2023

There’s a blog for everyone! Whether you cannot get enough awkward family pictures, epidemiologist input, cat humor, vegetarian cooking recipes, menopause tips, or love to geek out on pie charts – there’s a blogger out there creating content for you.

What this means – aside from endless entertainment possibilities – is that no matter how obscure your niche may be, opportunity abounds for you to start blogging, too.

Why blog?

Blogging allows you …

Read more…

Blogging for beginners: tips for success in any niche

Lessons from a civil rights icon: How to lift as we climb

Physician
February 15, 2023

Mary Eliza Church Terrell famously wrote, “And so, lifting as we climb, onward and upward we go, struggling and striving, and hoping that the buds and blossoms of our desires will burst into glorious fruition ‘ere long.”

Lift as we climb.

Terrell lived her life by this motto, as an organizer in the women’s suffrage and civil rights movements, and as a founder of the National Association of Colored Women and the …

Read more…

Lessons from a civil rights icon: How to lift as we climb

How physicians can use writing to share their expertise and impact the lives of others

Physician
February 7, 2023

Oh, the stories we hold.

As physicians, we sit in the front row for many defining events in a person’s life. In our offices and hospitals, we bear witness: to whispered fears, hopeful moments, trauma unfolding, death, birth, and life events we could not make up. Whether that is a privilege or a burden depends on the instance or the telling.

And only one person can tell your story.

Many have …

Read more…

How physicians can use writing to share their expertise and impact the lives of others

Having a great CV is not enough: Start building your portfolio

Physician
January 8, 2023

Many physicians believe the curriculum vitae (CV) represents the most integral aspect of applying for new opportunities. Post-pandemic, more physicians than ever are exploring ways to leave their current positions in clinical medicine. Some are looking to practice medicine differently, while others are looking to escape the practice of medicine with part-time and full-time non-clinical roles.

As the applicant pool of physicians looking to make career changes has grown, applying for …

Read more…

Having a great CV is not enough: Start building your portfolio

When contentment falls short

Physician
December 24, 2022

Sliding toward another solstice, I feel myself yearning. I want the daylight to stay a little longer, soft like this, gentle warmth and lovely shadows, lazy breezes, the illusion of contentment.

But I am not content. Or perhaps I am, but whereas I once thought contentment was the goal, the sentiment makes me uneasy now.

“Nothing gold can stay,” Robert Frost wrote. To stay content would be to embrace the shift in …

Read more…

When contentment falls short

Aesthetics and the physician’s eye

Physician
December 5, 2022

The fall sunlight calls my eye to notice little things: the veins on a yellowing maple leaf. The askew feather on a chicken’s wing. The faintest breeze tricking the pond into patterned sin waves around a lone white duck.

What do we owe this world but our ability to parse and observe, to interpret, to be filled enough by moments of abject beauty to return to the ugliness and try to …

Read more…

Aesthetics and the physician’s eye

You’re not as smart as you think you are — and neither is your doctor

Physician
September 1, 2021

In a world rife with admonishments like “Do your own research” and “trust your intuition,” I don’t hear about anyone reading up on human fallibility.

Picture this scene: a lecture hall in a respected medical school. The students are early in their education, confident in their abilities to learn material and ace exams. After all, that’s how you gain admission. They’ve just watched a video about the placebo effect, learning for …

Read more…

You’re not as smart as you think you are — and neither is your doctor

We cannot control what people choose to believe, and we can’t deny what we know

Physician
December 18, 2020

A few months ago, I quit social media. It was absolutely the right decision for me – I needed my time back. So many little moments of beauty and consideration get skipped when my brain follows one feed after another and loses track of time.

But every now and then, when I have ten minutes to kill, I will check-in. Usually, I go right to a group of women physician equestrians …

Read more…

We cannot control what people choose to believe, and we can’t deny what we know