The true service your doctor is providing is thinking

Physician
February 19, 2014

Ms. Smith (name changed) is 82-years-old, but currently looks about a hundred. I met her, intubated, in the ICU two weeks ago. She lived alone, hadn’t told family she wasn’t feeling well, but had called 911.

In the emergency department, she was struggling to breath, and was intubated, having gone into respiratory failure. She was found to have a severe pneumonia affecting the majority of both her lungs. She also went …

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The true service your doctor is providing is thinking

Why graduate medical education is failing

Education
December 19, 2013

When a doctor finishes medical school, he or she then faces what is truly the most difficult part of their journey into becoming a physician: graduate medical education.  The goal of internship, residency, and fellowship training programs — what is collectively called graduate medical education, or GME — is to take newly minted doctors, just out of medical school, and turn them into competent physicians, able to practice in their specialty independently.   And …

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Why graduate medical education is failing

You can’t legislate doctor-patient relationships

Physician
December 8, 2013

I was on call this past weekend, rounding at about 8am on the cardiology floors, and a woman I didn’t recognize approached me.  She asked if I remembered who she was, and was quick to tell me that if I didn’t it was ok.   She had had bariatric surgery about 6 months previously, and I had seen her in the office for a pre-surgical consultation.

She went on to tell …

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You can’t legislate doctor-patient relationships

We really need 3 health care systems

Policy
November 24, 2013

I was reading a blog about health policy and the failings of the ACA rollout posted on CNN.  The author spends time talking about how much we want to change our health care system.  And how, since change is hard, no one should be surprised by the pains accompanying this change, particularly in terms of individuals loosing their current insurance policies due to the rollout of the ACA …

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We really need 3 health care systems