Although it was midwinter, the air coming in through the front windows of the Nissan Versa was balmy. The radio was tuned to a local station. It was playing Air Supply’s “Out of Nothing at All.” This is one of those songs you turn the volume up and allow yourself the one brief moment of karaoke stardom as you belt out your lungs. As the high notes hit, I’m feeling …
Years ago, I watched an interview on TV with nurses who cared for a man dying of Ebola. Their words and actions continue to ring as true today during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic as they did then.
Their compassion deeply moved me for this man dying a horrible death. They did all they could for him, not only medically but also emotionally. They spoke of the fear that gripped them, knowing …
The times we need to be reminded why we went into this profession
Over 100,000 medical and surgical resident physicians and fellows (combined, “house staff”) are the first-line physicians for most patients in the nation’s 1,100+ teaching hospitals. Maximum weekly work hours regulated by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) are colloquially cited to be 80 per week. Notably, however, they are 80 hours averaged over 4 weeks (88 with “sound educational rationale”), without maximum weekly hour limits, and with maximum …
The impact of current work hour restrictions and OSHA misclassification on house staff health
Of all the unsung heroes of this plague-time, perhaps those who have endured the most are resident physicians. After graduation from medical school, resident doctors spend three to seven years in intensive specialty training before they can practice independently. Residency is a vestige of apprenticeships from a bleaker past. It is chapter in life when one’s time and energy are mostly spent in hospitals or clinics, when 80-hour …
In gratitude to our nation’s residents
I am tired. I am tired of you telling me how to respond to racism. I’ve experienced racism and microaggressions as a brown woman my entire life. You have been trying to control my response for just as long. Stop.
In high school, when another student told me to “go back to Africa” and I responded that those comments were not acceptable, you – my classmate – told me to sit …
Experiences in racism of a female resident physician
Here’s a controversial phrase for a doctor to say that needs to be normalized: “I am tired.”
As a physician, working oneself to exhaustion for our patients is often seen as a sign of strength and even heroic. As a rare Black male in medicine in the midst of a pandemic that is ravaging patients who look like me, I am especially battle fatigued. In fact, I …
Black physicians are tired of paying the minority tax
The roads are dark and empty at 6:15. Passing through downtown, animated reindeer “fly” through the air in lights on the side of a skyscraper. At the end of the truncated commute, I snag a spot on the second floor of the parking garage—typically rare but plentiful today. In the hospital’s lobby, I pass the 20-foot tree—topped with a massive star more like a spiky sea creature—that has been up …
A physician’s lonely New Year’s eve
With this third surge and our ICUs at zero capacity in Los Angeles, I spent New Year’s Eve alone at my apartment, recovering from a wards rotation I had completed the night before. No revelry or celebration for me this year. For months, this virus has been wreaking havoc on our lives and slowly, then rapidly chipping away at our health care systems. I’ve seen the …
Vince Hamilton has no legs.
For that matter, he has lost the tips to most of his fingers as well. It made opening soda cans almost impossible. So when I saw him for the first time, my immediate reaction was one of sympathy.
He had been admitted from a nursing home with a swollen red finger nubbin. It wasn’t hard to figure out it wasn’t his first time around this rodeo from …
As a young and optimistic business school graduate, I recall when the consulting firm I worked for was retained to evaluate “USA Hospital and Medical Clinics” (pseudonym). “USA” had grown quickly and was struggling to manage the recent expansion.
We interviewed doctors, nurses, and medical assistants, and they told us about the problems they faced every day: They were pressured to get patients in and out quickly to keep average visit …
This looks a lot different from the trenches: from consulting to the COVID ward
I have never felt so alone. I was lying in bed with severe abdominal pain. Pain I never had before. Well, at least not for a reason.
As I lay there, I kept thinking, what if I die while I wait until morning. It was the middle of the night. I had not felt well since earlier the week before with a severe diarrheal illness. One that only babies have with …
Alone in the hospital in the midst of a global pandemic
“Grief never ends … but it changes. It’s a passage, not a place to stay. Grief is not a sign of weakness, nor a lack of faith … It is the price of love.”
– Anonymous
The “price of love”: We are now paying that price with the passing of Debbie this weekend. I grieve as I write this. The entire hospital and everyone who knew Debbie grieve. We have a right …
To be in medicine is to know grief, pain, and heartbreak in a personal way
Forty-two years ago, when I had finally finished the seven revisions of my first novel, The House of God, my editor said, “Why don’t you add a glossary and a list of The Laws of the House of God.” Writing the Laws, I hardly needed to refer to the text; they just flowed out. The Laws became common parlance, not only tacked up in on-call rooms but even, recently, listed …
The laws of The House of God and Man’s 4th Best Hospital
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I saw a tweet recently from a medical resident training at another hospital that really hit home for me: “In response to a rumor that health care workers who treat COVID patients will be prioritized for vaccination in our health system, one of my co-residents asked unironically, ‘Does that include us?’”
“Resident” is a word coined in the twentieth century when physicians in training often physically lived (“resided”) at the hospital. …
Medical residents signed up to live in the hospital, not to die there
Throughout my time in medical school, residency, and now as a practicing physician, I have noticed physicians’ changing face. When applying for medical school, I remember choosing a medium-grey pantsuit to match my medium-brown hair to wear for my interview, paired with a simple necklace and conservative makeup. Nothing too flashy, as even choosing grey instead of black and a pantsuit instead of a skirt would stand out and be …
More physicians have tattoos, and how that makes them more genuine at the bedside
I turned into the hospital parking lot, placed my car into park, and looked up at the time. 5:44 a.m. I’d spent the previous night researching COVID-19 symptoms and treatment options, preparing to field questions from my patients, family, and friends. Attempting to understand this disease process, which seemed to present a new wrinkle every few days, felt like trying to spot a chameleon. While the number of COVID cases …
Reflecting on the advice of a revered physician counsellor
I recently represented a physician in a noteworthy peer review case at an academic medical center. The medical staff president initiated a complaint against a surgeon, who would later become my client. The complaint was that the surgeon inappropriately collected cash payment from an uninsured patient at the hospital’s point of service instead of having his office invoice and collect payment from the patient. The medical staff felt this was …
How this surgeon beat a medical staff disciplinary action
There were recently many news articles and coverage exalting a physician for working 250 straight days during COVID. 250 days, that’s nearly 8 1/2 months without a day off.
While this physician displays dedication and caring, I don’t think we should celebrate this as an achievement. The truth is he’s working every day all day for one of two reasons. Either there is no one else, and he’s a victim of …
Physicians who work themselves into the ground have nothing to be proud of
Medicine causes just as much disease as it solves. We must adopt the lifestyle to get through college, medical school, residency, and fellowship is nothing close to a healthy lifestyle. Previously, we discussed the long hours and the lack of exercise, but our food inhibits our desire for health.
This begins with what the hospital cafeteria sells. Despite promoting healthful eating, hospitals instead profit from diabetes-inducing food …
We keep our sleep-deprived physicians in hospitals full of calorie-dense food
An excerpt from Why We Revolt: A Patient Revolution for Careful and Kind Care.
It was late at the premier teaching hospital in the country, and we were overworked and overwhelmed. Those patients in most trouble had made it in, but many waited outside, a domino line …
A patient revolution for careful and kind care
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