Women’s health

Physicians looking for a new job should beware these 4 red flags

Eve Shvidler, MD

November 26, 2015Nov 26, 201521

Recruitment season is my favorite time of year. The CVs pile into the database, and we sift through the resumes, searching for candidates that would make a great fit for our organization. Next, I get on the phone and assess their level of interest and try to sell them on everything we have to offer. We fly them out for a live interview, and the negotiations begin.

Last year was a …

Don’t make yourself look like Barbie to fit into yoga pants. Please.

November 15, 2015Nov 15, 201520

The New York Post is reporting that women in New York are getting labiaplasties to look and feel better in tight athletic wear. They quote a patient, Veronica R., as wanting to “look like Barbie.” According to the Post, on…

According to the Post, on the Upper East Side in New York there are apparently “a large number” of women who want to look “sleeker in so-called athleisure wear, made from Lycra-like fabrics that …

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Archana Reddy Shrestha, MD

You have no idea what it’s like working in the ER as a pregnant physician

November 9, 2015Nov 9, 20154

When I was pregnant with my first child, I worked full time as a physician in the emergency department. I worked mostly 9-hour shifts, but some 12-hour shifts as well. Days, evenings, nights, holidays and weekends were divided up amongst…

I have worked in the ER while pregnant twice now, and while I am proud to be …

Why male physicians should care about maternity leave

Jamie Coleman, MD

November 9, 2015Nov 9, 201513

You all have prostates. Seriously. But let me explain further to those people who simply can not fathom as to how a woman could dare ask for maternity leave and expect her other team members to “pick up her slack,…

You all have prostates.

Seriously. But let me explain further to those people who simply can not fathom as to how a woman could dare ask for maternity leave and expect her other team members to “pick up her slack, because she chose to get pregnant.” (Yep, check the comments section on my last post. Pretty entertaining, in fact!)

Life happens to everyone.

If my profession as a trauma surgeon has taught me …

Medical education

If you don’t advocate for women, I don’t trust you with patients

Anonymous

November 1, 2015Nov 1, 201519

I started medical school recently. Before it started, I told myself (and everybody else) that I would feel like a kid in a candy shop when I was here. I'd get to try different specialties and figure out which one…

I started medical school recently. Before it started, I told myself (and everybody else) that I would feel like a kid in a candy shop when I was here. I’d get to try different specialties and figure out which one I want to do out of everything that excited me. It really is kind of like that, don’t get me wrong. But I’m also confused and disheartened.

I had a different …

Maternity leave for physicians is a disgrace. It’s time to fix that.

Anonymous

October 22, 2015Oct 22, 201521

Netflix listens to doctors. Google, Facebook, and Apple listen to doctors. The United States Navy and Marine Corps listen. The above companies have updated their maternity leave policies -- lengthening them all past 12 weeks. And all paid. But yet,…

Netflix listens to doctors. Google, Facebook, and Apple listen to doctors. The United States Navy and Marine Corps listen.

The above companies have updated their maternity leave policies — lengthening them all past 12 weeks. And all paid.

But yet, health care doesn’t listen to doctors. And let me tell you how.

I am pregnant. Which is a blessing in of itself. In fact, this is my 4th pregnancy, but I only have one child living. …

Vincent DeGennaro, Jr., MD, MPH

Defunding Planned Parenthood will deny poor women access to basic health care

October 17, 2015Oct 17, 201520

Micheline came to Project Medishare’s women’s health center in Port-au-Prince as many of my patients do -- with advanced cancer. At only 46 years old, she still had two young daughters and a family that needed her income selling clothing…

Micheline came to Project Medishare’s women’s health center in Port-au-Prince as many of my patients do — with advanced cancer. At only 46 years old, she still had two young daughters and a family that needed her income selling clothing on the street. Micheline has cervical cancer, a disease that literally takes years to form and grow, is easily detected with simple tests, and is entirely preventable.

We initially launched the …

Our training, ourselves: The impact of defunding Planned Parenthood

Jennifer Tsai & Kira Neel

October 15, 2015Oct 15, 201551

Approximately one in three women under the age of 45 have had an abortion. Approximately one in three women under the age of 45 have a tattoo. Think about your community. How many tattoo parlors can you think of? How…

Approximately one in three women under the age of 45 have had an abortion.

Approximately one in three women under the age of 45 have a tattoo.

Think about your community. How many tattoo parlors can you think of? How many can you easily access?

How many abortion clinics can you think of? How many can you easily access?

A cursory, ten-second search for “tattoo” yielded more than 40 results within a 5-mile …

Marissa Mayer sends a mixed message to working women with high-risk pregnancies

Sarah Poggi, MD

October 8, 2015Oct 8, 201514

Marissa Mayer, the CEO of Yahoo, recently announced that at age forty she is pregnant with identical twins. Much of the current media attention has focused on how Ms. Mayer will run a $35 billion multinational technology company and care…

Marissa Mayer, the CEO of Yahoo, recently announced that at age forty she is pregnant with identical twins.

Much of the current media attention has focused on how Ms. Mayer will run a $35 billion multinational technology company and care for three young children. Such concern makes a major assumption: that she will deliver two healthy babies at full term. From my perspective as a specialist who cares for …

Health policy

Why the the cost of Planned Parenthood is worth it

Aaron Jen, MD

October 6, 2015Oct 6, 201513

Planned Parenthood is under attack, and certainly not for the first time. The organization, federally funded by the Family Planning Services and Population Research Act since 1970, provides a wide range of medical services to women (and men), including routine physical exams, STI screenings, contraception, and abortion. This latest movement against the organization gained traction following a series of heavily-edited videos from the so-called Center of Medical Progress, …

The time I was a 16-year-old standardized patient

Freida McFadden, MD

October 4, 2015Oct 4, 2015

An excerpt from 11 out of 10: A Collection of Humorous Medical Short Stories. When I was 16, I got a job as a “standardized patient." My neighbor worked for a medical school, and they needed standardized patients for their…

An excerpt from 11 out of 10: A Collection of Humorous Medical Short Stories.

When I was 16, I got a job as a “standardized patient.” My neighbor worked for a medical school, and they needed standardized patients for their medical students to practice talking to. Because apparently you can make it through four years of undergraduate, a rigorous medical school application process, and, you know, normal life experiences, but …

Much of the human spirit lies outside a physician’s power

Deborah Pierce, MD

September 22, 2015Sep 22, 2015

I first met Marie five years ago. A petite, soft-spoken woman in her thirties, she was the patient of one of the residents whom I supervise at our community hospital. Marie worked in housekeeping for a large corporation; she and her husband, a bus driver, had a six-year-old son. Now she was twenty-six weeks (six months) pregnant with their second child.

Marie’s blood pressure was markedly elevated (168/120), she had fairly …

You can easily become the physician that you judge

Vamsi Aribindi, MD

September 7, 2015Sep 7, 201525

A recent paper in the Annals of Internal Medicine has sparked a large media response. In it, two incidents are described: In one, a male OB/GYN is prepping a patient's vaginal area for surgery, which involves running a brush soaked…

A recent paper in the Annals of Internal Medicine has sparked a large media response.

In it, two incidents are described: In one, a male OB/GYN is prepping a patient’s vaginal area for surgery, which involves running a brush soaked in Betadine or ChloraPrep solution over the labia, mons pubis, perineum, and inner thighs when the patient is already put to sleep by anesthesia. He makes an appalling joke, “I …

Drugs and prescribing

Kim Kardashian’s first trimester nausea: The truth behind Diclegis

September 2, 2015Sep 2, 20154

It was only a matter of time before Kim Kardashian posted a picture on her Instagram account with a bottle of Diclegis, basically announcing her brand partnership with Duchesnay, the manufacturer of the prescription medication for nausea and vomiting in pregnancy. Duchesnay had been tweeting for ages that they were so relieved Kim had found help with Diclegis — so much so that I was wondering if Ms. …

Drugs and prescribing

The FDA approved Addyi. But was there a hidden agenda?

Shirie Leng, MD

September 1, 2015Sep 1, 20156

Ladies, the moment you have all been waiting for is here! No, not affordable childcare. Not equal pay for equal work. Not gun control. Not abortion rights or paid maternity leave or a female majority in Congress or a constitutional…

Flibanserin. Catchy name. Addyi for short. Approved by the FDA for hypoactive …

What happens when you can’t find a skilled doctor to do a D&E

August 26, 2015Aug 26, 201596

“Dr. Gunter, I think, uh, there’s a fetal skull in the abdomen,” my resident said with that hesitancy that says I want you to tell me I’m wrong. The first time you diagnose something that is very bad you actually hope you are mistaken and want someone more senior to reassure you that you are overreacting and tell you that this is just an odd presentation of something benign.

“I’ll be …

A fetal complication is an extension of a mother

Cia Bishop, MD

August 16, 2015Aug 16, 2015

While sitting in the study lounge of my med school, I had on my computer screen one of our three slides on anencephaly. I was trying to memorize the two key phrases framing the graphic photograph of a stillborn baby with bulging eyes and a cratered head — “anterior neural tube defect,” and “elevated alpha-fetoprotein.” A third year walked past me and sneaked a glance at my screen. Without faltering …

Please, don’t eat your placenta. Here’s why.

August 14, 2015Aug 14, 20156

Every few news cycles placenta-eating seems to make the rounds. I’ve already seen it a couple of times this year, so I figured the Internet is trying to tell me something. Some women, but mostly those who recommend and/or prepare…

Every few news cycles placenta-eating seems to make the rounds. I’ve already seen it a couple of times this year, so I figured the Internet is trying to tell me something.

Some women, but mostly those who recommend and/or prepare placenta for them, think that ingesting placenta can cure/help postpartum depression and possibly a host of other postpartum ills and issues. Some …