It began last week in our neighborhood, between the locals, who, out for a breath of fresh air, and dutifully in line with the new social distancing rules, began to shout back and forth through the crisp March air.
“Good morning! I hope you’re well!”
“Good morning! We’re well! I hope you are, too!”
Then goodwill took over the neighborhood email chain.
Who needs a casserole?
Just let us know! We’ll drop one off at …
The pandemic is bringing us home
In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, people across the country are grappling with the question, “What and who is essential?” Instructions to reduce non-essential activity hit differently in crisis compared to our normal mindset that our day-planners are scheduled with only crucial tasks. When suddenly gyms, churches, and restaurants close their doors, one must reflect on what is truly indispensable.
This hits home in my field …
Who are truly non-essential during the coronavirus pandemic?
For thousands of years, medicine was an in-person enterprise. Patients with mysterious symptoms or requiring complex interventions traveled days to obtain an expert opinion. At times, Medicine appears to be nostalgic for these days now past; as society braces for the advent of 5G, many of us in medicine communicate via pager and landline telephones. The potential of telemedicine – the use of technology to remotely deliver patient care – …
COVID-19 has urgently summoned telemedicine to the front lines
The conversations we’ve had with physicians this week confirmed that the primal fight-or-flight response has kicked in as physicians across the nation recognize the COVID-19 pandemic as an imminent threat to the survival of their practices. Some are reacting from a place of fear, while others are proactively evaluating options and making strategic moves.
In surgery, there exists a time-honored adage: all bleeding stops eventually. When a patient has unexpected severe …
Leading your medical practice through crisis
These days are getting harder.
Today I heard about physicians getting intubated. I heard about physicians having to make the decision to separate from their children indefinitely. I heard about health care workers who officially ran out of PPE. I heard of hospitals that are nearing capacity and many young patients who are intubated. The calls for help at the frontlines got more desperate.
Over the last few days, I’ve also heard …
In the midst of a pandemic, remember that physician practices are small businesses too
I roll in my bed, unable to sleep. I listen to BBC talk about the craziness that took over the world, preoccupied with this one question.
What question?
It’s not: “Why, Corona?” For that, I already have more answers than I want.
Scientists say that COVID-19 is an animal virus. It spread to humans from bats or pangolin due to close proximity in a seafood market, much like its older siblings SARS and …
Why toilet paper? A doctor tries to explain.
It took a 125-nanometer virus only a few weeks to move American health care from the twentieth to the twenty-first century.
This had nothing to do with science or technology, and only to a small degree was it due to public interest or demand, which had both been present for decades. It happened this month for one simple reason: Medicare and Medicaid started paying for managing patient care without a face …
It took a pandemic to realize the value of telemedicine
I am an anesthesiologist who practices in Omaha, Nebraska at a large university. Our institution is preparing around the clock to care for our community in the midst of the COVID-19 virus. We are all coming together – doctors, scientists, nurses, technicians, administrators, therapists, and staff to develop plans. Leaders are not sleeping; they are working. We are all preparing. Reading. Staying up to date. Trying to learn from our …
An anesthesiologist’s message to her community
Inside, as usual, patient beds are near capacity, and the emergency department is filled with not only the usual mix of patients with trauma, stroke, chest pain, and other concerns, but also dozens of people worried they might have COVID-19.
I am an emergency and critical care physician who cares for patients in the emergency department and intensive care units at Seattle’s Harborview Medical Center, a public hospital with 413 beds …
My first question every time I see a new patient now is: Could this be COVID-19?
I spent the last week working in a large community hospital in a state with a soaring number of coronavirus cases. I previously had a few days off while this whole situation was escalating, and heard from colleagues that our hospital was taking huge measures to prepare for the onslaught. New protocols were being put in place, there was a scramble for personal protective equipment (PPE), and the hospital had …
Health care workers are heroes
As an emergency physician on the frontlines of the battle against coronavirus, I have stood sentinel to see the transformations that are occurring in and out of the hospital. There are terms that now roll off our tongues that we didn’t know a month ago. “Social distancing” and “shelter-in-place” meant nothing to us as we rang in 2020. You know, the year that was going to be our year and …
What if our response to coronavirus is not about social distancing?
COVID-19 continues to require unprecedented disruptions to medical education. On March 17, the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) and Liaison Committee on Medical Education recommended that medical schools release all students from clinical duties for two weeks. This effort will both decrease the risk of exposure for students and relieve stretched-thin residents of teaching responsibilities. On the heels of this announcement, the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) informed medical …
Amid COVID-19, make USMLE Step 1 pass/fail now
As an anesthesiologist, the odds are I might get to work thirty minutes or an hour before you to prepare for the case or cases which you will perform that day. No matter what the procedure is, I am prepared for the worst possible scenario. This includes emergency drugs and an intubation plan, even if the procedure would not typically require intubation. As each patient is different and reacts differently …
To my surgical colleagues: Please do the right thing
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In the midst of a global pandemic, COVID-19 has forced all involved with patient care to be innovative and adaptive. Deployed as an emergency department (ED) physician, on the frontlines of medicine, my team and I work tirelessly to take care of and research the COVID-19 patient. I have seen COVID-19, and I have seen the fear instilled in the eyes of my patients that receive this diagnosis, akin to …
Life on the frontlines and surviving the emergency department (with the help of social media)
One of the many reasons I’m proud to be American is that we truly identify as being American. We aren’t Illinoisans or Californians. Our pride comes from being part of this nation. Why is it different in our careers?
As I watch the coronavirus multiply, both in number and as fear in people, I also watch it unravel the divide among physicians. Instead of bonding together, physicians are spending time and energy …
It’s time for physicians to unite, not tear each other down
During this time of social distancing, most of us are struggling to keep our social connections alive. I found that in this flurry of planning how to continue to care for my orthopaedic patients, making sure childcare is lined up, and setting up “decontamination zones” in my home for my critical care doc husband and me when we come home for the hospital – that I really missed connecting with …
In “Why doctors should get political,” I focused on the need for doctors to voice their opinions in order to rally patients and inspire them to take control of their own health, but what about the responsibility we have to ourselves, our families, and our colleagues? Who will advocate for us as health care providers and especially for those on the front lines putting themselves at …
Physician advocacy in the age of COVID-19
Since the coronavirus outbreak, reports of anxiety have increased, especially among physicians. Physicians face numerous stressors, including fears of contracting the coronavirus, concerns about potentially infecting loved ones, PPE shortages, testing delays, and frequently making quick decisions with limited information.
Common symptoms of anxiety are increased worrying about one’s self and/or loved ones, difficulty sleeping, difficulty eating, poor concentration, increased heart rate, hyperventilation, and struggling to control worrying.
Here are five ways …
5 ways to manage anxiety during the coronavirus pandemic
We are scared.
This virus threatens our lives. It threatens our families. It threatens our friends. We have physician friends crying between patients in fear that their partners who work in the emergency department (ED) may contract this virus, known to affect health care workers with greater severity than the average person. We see reports of hospitals and health care offices running out of personal protective equipment (PPE). What follows are …
Physicians are not “giving up”
Past experiences should inform, but not determine, future action. This has been much on my mind as we bolstered outpatient psychiatric services in response to the COVID-19 crisis. The effort has felt deeply personal, as well as professionally imperative. Waiting now for my own COVID-19 test results, keeping physical distance from my family, I suddenly lost focus and momentum. For a fortnight, it seemed to take more energy …
A psychiatric services response to the COVID-19 crisis
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