It is hard to envision that this is an election year. With a paucity of campaign ads and the presidential nominees locked up for quite a while, I didn’t even know that the Democratic convention was going on until I saw a report about it after the fact.
With election day now on the horizon, I reflect on the common mantra used almost every time an incumbent …
The path to a healthy nation starts with the you, the voter
We all know by now that the COVID-19 pandemic has changed our world altogether. There is no question that stressors in our lives are more than ever before. This year’s Fall will be the most dangerous of Falls. So what does it mean for the physicians? How do we keep ourselves going when all we feel is a sense of isolation and burn out? And what about childcare? Who gets …
To better take care of patients, we need to take care of ourselves
The FDA plays a critical role in our nation’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It helps decide which medicines are safe and effective to treat the disease. It evaluates the accuracy and reliability of laboratory tests. And it will play a central role in assessing potential vaccines.
But will the FDA bureaucracy move with the kind of speed necessary to deal with such a crisis? Some critics are concerned it will …
Is the FDA too slow to handle the pandemic?
In 2019, the Premier Lacrosse League (PLL) entered the world’s stage, taking with it more than 100 of the greatest pro lacrosse players in the world from the Major League Lacrosse. The new league launched a tour-based model, offered higher player compensation, player equity, health insurance, and a major media rights deal with NBC Sports Group.
In the months prior to the inaugural game at Gillette Stadium, I was brought on as the …
How a professional lacrosse league created a COVID-free tournament
Seven weeks before President Trump declared COVID-19 a federal emergency heralding the economic lockdown, Jesse’s customers began cutting their orders. Jesse sells garments and cotton, imported predominantly from India, to wholesalers and retailers, big and small, in malls across the North East corridor. His business had a good January. December was like any December. But February was different. His customers, reassuring him that it wasn’t personal, were predicting …
Masks are an effigy of American technocratic incompetence
1. Both masks and underwear exist to contain badness. Neither works 100 percent, but they’ll curb the worst of the spill.
2. Don’t borrow someone else’s, no matter how cool they look.
3. Keep them on around strangers, unless you’ve both been tested.
4. Cotton breathes better than polyester.
5. If they don’t fit well, you’ll be chaffing.
6. Wear them both when you visit grandma.
7. They stink at the end of the day. They …
How masks are like your underwear
According to Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, a coronavirus vaccine could be ready for distribution within months.
“We feel cautiously optimistic that we will have a vaccine by the end of this year, and as we go into 2021,” he told lawmakers on July 31, adding, “the plans …
A COVID-19 vaccine: 5 things that could go wrong
As the world becomes more interconnected, one of the upsides is the ability to share our journey as medical students with other medical students across the world. The International Medical School Conference on COVID-19 held by the International Medical Association of Keio University School of Medicine was attended by medical students from the United States, Japan, Brazil, China, Italy, Korea, and Thailand. Through presentations by representatives from each country and …
COVID-19, medical education, and the role of medical students around the world
Julian (his real name) has been extremely careful for many months, working from home, foregoing seeing friends, and avoiding stores. But his new puppy Rufus requires “socialization,” so by his own admission, he is being less careful as he/the dog interact with humans and other canines.
In a completely anecdotal and unscientific manner (and in definitive contrast to the methodology of my training), I have been polling friends, family members, and …
Incremental risk amid COVID-19 re-openings: What do we value most?
COVID-19 has wreaked havoc on every aspect of life. With over 5 million cases and 167 thousand deaths in the United States, COVID-19 has caused the nation to shut down. During the pandemic, social distancing and masks have been crucial in controlling the spread of virus. However, with the reopening of the states, social distancing and masks are not the only factors to consider, especially with talks about children going …
Could antigen testing be the key to safely reopening the nation?
The last thing Jessica said to John, her fiancé of 10 years, was, “I love you” before he drove to work. Hours later, after suddenly experiencing a cardiac arrest at the office, he was in an ICU bed attached to a ventilator. He was pale and unresponsive, on multiple medications to artificially augment his blood pressure, hooked up to a machine that did the work of his kidneys, and cooled …
The COVID-19 pandemic is changing end-of-life care. We’re not ready.
One of the most harrowing challenges of COVID-19 has been the “no visitors” policy virtually all institutions were forced to implement. In order to protect our patients, our staff, our communities, we’ve had to put these visitor limitations into place until the tide turns.
Not too long ago, I woke to my husband lying stiffly on his back, declaring, “I think I need to go to the emergency room.” He’d mentioned …
A no visitors policy at your facility? Here are 4 crucial tips.
It started mid-March with the sensation that I had cut one of my knuckles. Within two weeks, several fingers were swollen like sausages, and my fingertips had developed painful, burning spots. Soon thereafter, my husband noted one red, swollen toe. We are both emergency physicians, but we could not understand what was causing the symptoms, and it was not until a month later that we started to see Read more…
Why are COVID antibody tests of questionable relevance being marketed to the public?
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A tale of two pandemics: Around the time of the coronavirus outbreak, 2019 also marked a full century since the death of Sir William Osler, who revolutionized medical training. Despite some lingering debate over whether Dr. Osler’s pneumonia-related death should be counted among the 50 million lost to the 1918 influenza pandemic, his notes suggest that he believed the flu precipitated his demise.
As a chaplain who teaches medical humanities and …
Why spiritual health is so important for medical students
An excerpt from Parenting in a Pandemic: How to help your family through COVID-19.
When my husband and I made the decision to purchase a house outside of New York City, the prior owners left behind a trampoline. The trampoline is big, above ground, and in fair …
Parenting in a pandemic: Making the best decisions for your family
Amidst the crushing human and economic carnage inflicted by the COVID-19 pandemic, one innocent bystander has been cowering in the dark corner of medicine’s past, clinging to its final breaths of iconicity: the beloved stethoscope.
For over two centuries, there has been no better physician archetype than the quintessential rubber tube donned confidently over a crisp white coat. This recognizable image has been with us in part since 1816, …
In the COVID-19 era, point of care ultrasound has proven invaluable
One commonality amongst all reporting associated with the COVID-19 pandemic: “unprecedented.” Unprecedented circumstances, unprecedented symptomatology, unprecedented prevalence, and now, unprecedented velocity. “300 million doses of a safe, effective vaccine for COVID-19 by January 2021”—the project: Operation Warp Speed.
On January 20, 2020, the first case of COVID-19 was reported in the United States; fast forward to July 2020 and the National Institutes of Health …
The success of a COVID-19 vaccine depends on effective scientific communication
Imagine a future where you wake up, go to the bathroom, pick up a small strip of paper, and put it in a tube with your saliva and saline. By the time you are done with part of your morning routine, within 15 minutes or so, the paper will tell you if that morning, you are positive for the novel coronavirus or not.
And you can do that randomly on any occasion. …
We need rapid tests for a fast virus
There is absolutely no playbook for what we are all experiencing today. The changes coming at us have been swift, mercurial, and frightening. Governments, businesses, nonprofits, and individuals have scrambled to cope with relentless waves of chaos in the wake of COVID-19 and civil unrest.
I have continued to keep my solo psychiatry practice in Eldorado open and have moved to a telemedicine platform, which definitely has its trade-offs! In the …
10 COVID-coping tips from the trenches
It was April 5, 2020. In the months prior, I imagined, she had been grappling with the isolation of her newfound unemployment. The pandemic’s solidarity was possibly a relief: the rare solace of the permission to take a pause. Her new days were partly spent with long walks near Baker Beach, saluted by the loyal, majestic Golden Gate, the cool San Francisco sun embracing her and her high-spirited two-year-old son. …
A family physician’s COVID story
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