I feel privileged to have received both of my COVID-19 vaccine doses. Although, despite the COVID-19 pandemic killing over 562,000 Americans, 37% are hesitant about receiving this vaccine themselves. The World Health Organization defines vaccine hesitancy as a “delay in acceptance or refusal of vaccines despite availability of vaccine services” and in 2019, named vaccine hesitancy as one of the top 10 …
Doctor Barbie has a laptop. She comes with other accessories, like a white lab coat and stethoscope of course, but one of her largest and most prominent medical tools is her laptop. As a pediatrician’s daughter, my child selected doctor Barbie from the aisle of infinite Barbie options because she knew I was most likely to purchase this one when otherwise walking the store repeating the mantra “no more toys.” …
When I had my first baby, one of my friends coordinated a meal train where coworkers could sign up to bring our new family a dinner every other night. Those first few weeks of motherhood were such a chaotic blur that I do not even remember how many weeks this meal delivery went on for except to say that it was both long enough and over too quickly. There was …
While lying on a hard metal table with my legs spread open and a clamp on my cervix, I was instructed to “relax.” My audience included a nurse, two radiologists, and my OB/GYN’s partner, who I met minutes earlier when she rushed in apologizing that my OB/GYN was called away to a delivery.
A delivery: the culmination of those nine months of a pregnancy that I so eagerly desired. I got …
An intern pushed open the call room door so that twelve medical students could crowd their eager faces together to see where we might sleep for the next three years. Only a few months away from medical school herself, the intern acted as if sleeping in such quarters were second nature. She gestured to the fluffy quilts the residents had brought from home to adorn their beds and giggled about …
At a recent block party, neighbors asked me questions about the life of a resident. It amazed me how little the general public still knows about the hours a resident works. Over the years, TV shows have shed some light on what the experience of a resident is like, although none are quite realistic, but it is hard to appreciate from …
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