What psychiatry can teach all doctors

Physician
October 28, 2025

Psychiatrists know what it feels like to practice in a field questioned at every turn. From the earliest days of our specialty, we have faced doubts not only from the public but also from our own colleagues in medicine. The very existence of conditions such as schizophrenia, melancholic depression, bipolar disorder, or attention-deficit disorder has been challenged repeatedly. We have heard the claims: It’s just weakness. It’s a vitamin deficiency. …

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What psychiatry can teach all doctors

Why doctors need emotional skills to survive

Conditions
October 27, 2025

HBO’s The Pitt collected thirteen Primetime Emmy nominations this year, winning both Outstanding Drama Series and Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series for Noah Wyle. But the recognition was not just for great television. The series struck a cultural nerve because it captured something raw and real: the emotional side of medicine. Viewers saw the chaos of an emergency room after a mass casualty event, the head physician …

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Why doctors need emotional skills to survive

Stepping down in medicine: Why letting go can be an act of leadership [PODCAST]

Podcast
October 26, 2025
YouTube video

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Physician and coach Jessie Mahoney discusses her article “Stepping down in medicine is an evolution.” In this episode, Jessie challenges the cultural belief that stepping down from medical roles is a sign …

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Stepping down in medicine: Why letting go can be an act of leadership [PODCAST]

The making of a rested healer

Physician
October 25, 2025

I didn’t realize how exhausted I was until everything stopped. First came burnout, the quiet unraveling so many physicians know too well. Then grief followed. I lost my mother unexpectedly to an aggressive cancer and, three years later, my father after years of caregiving through advanced Parkinson’s disease. These losses shattered not only my heart but the way I viewed my life and work. For years, I practiced medicine within …

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The making of a rested healer

A psychiatrist’s scarlet letter of shame

Physician
October 25, 2025

I put it on one night among tears and grief. It slid onto my skin like butter, like it was meant for me. It hugged my torso and clung to all the wrong places. The truth is, I had worn it before. I am unsure exactly when I last stopped wearing it. Unlike the donning of the letter, the removal is much quieter. I probably did not realize exactly when …

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A psychiatrist’s scarlet letter of shame

Is mental illness the root of mass shootings?

Physician
October 24, 2025

(Author’s note: This article has been a year in the making. Each time another mass shooting makes headlines, I think, this is the moment to speak, and then life intervenes. The opportunity to contribute meaningfully feels missed. But the cruelest irony is this: Wait ten more days, and there will be another tragedy to make the conversation relevant again. That, in itself, is the most heartbreaking fact of all.)

“Study my …

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Is mental illness the root of mass shootings?

Why non-work stress fuels burnout

Conditions
October 23, 2025

While work-related stress continues to be a major cause of burnout, new research shows that non-work stressors like caregiving demands, financial instability, and personal life conflicts also greatly increase the risk. Yet, the dominant narrative has not caught up, and many still believe burnout is only a workplace problem, overlooking the deeper, life-wide imbalance it often reflects.

Recently, I spoke to a nurse on sick leave for the third time …

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Why non-work stress fuels burnout

Why wellness programs fail health care

Conditions
October 23, 2025

Jodie Green and I have been following each other on social media for a couple of years, and we finally had a conversation a few months ago. We discussed our appreciation for the work each of us is doing to support doctors and all other health care professionals, including my efforts and Jodie’s with her organization, the Clinician Burnout Foundation. We’re amplifying meaningful resources that are available for …

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Why wellness programs fail health care

Why burnout prevention starts with leadership

Conditions
October 22, 2025

Many people have become “burned out” on the word burnout. Many doctors do not resonate with the term, feeling it describes personal struggles, when systemic issues are the root cause of the challenges facing health care professionals. They offer “moral injury” as a more accurate description. Clinicians can experience either or both at any time during their career.

Recently speaking with Shari Morin-Degel, I appreciated her sharing that because she had …

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Why burnout prevention starts with leadership

How the internship shortage harms Black students

Conditions
October 21, 2025

An excerpt from How I Know White People Are Crazy and Other Stories. Copyright © 2025 Dr. Jonathan Lassiter. Published by Legacy Lit, a Hachette Book Group company. Reproduced by arrangement with the publisher. All rights reserved.

According to Dr. James M. Stedman, a white male clinical psychologist from the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, there was a shortage of [doctoral] internships as early as 1976. …

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How the internship shortage harms Black students

Aligning psychiatric care and hospital costs

Conditions
October 21, 2025

In inpatient psychiatry, teams often face a familiar problem: The clinicians at the bedside see ongoing risk that warrants hospital-level care, while the payer’s reviewer concludes the stay is no longer “medically necessary.” The result can be frustration, rushed discharges, or days spent on the phone. Behind the scenes, costs mount; measured not just in dollars, but in readmissions, emergency department boarding, and clinician burnout. Physician advisors help resolve this …

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Aligning psychiatric care and hospital costs

Why physician wellness must be treated as a core business strategy [PODCAST]

Podcast
October 19, 2025
YouTube video

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Psychiatrist, internist, and addiction medicine specialist Muhamad Aly Rifai discusses his article “It’s time to operationalize physician wellness.” Muhamad explains why wellness cannot remain a slogan or a poster …

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Why physician wellness must be treated as a core business strategy [PODCAST]

How retraining the physician mindset can boost resilience and joy in medicine [PODCAST]

Podcast
October 18, 2025
YouTube video

Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes!

Licensed counselor and coach Mary Remón discusses her article “A mindset shift for physicians: Retrain your brain to see what’s going well.” Mary explains how physicians are trained to scan constantly for …

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How retraining the physician mindset can boost resilience and joy in medicine [PODCAST]

What psychiatry teaches us about professionalism, loss, and becoming human

Education
October 18, 2025

There is an old parable about a farmer whose horse runs away.

The neighbors cry, “Such bad luck!”

The farmer only replies, “Maybe so, maybe not. We will see.”

The next day, the horse returns with two wild horses. “Such good fortune!” they cheer.

Again, the farmer answers, “Maybe so, maybe not. We will see.”

Soon after, the farmer’s son breaks his leg taming one of the horses. “Such misfortune!”

The farmer answers, “Maybe so, maybe …

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What psychiatry teaches us about professionalism, loss, and becoming human

Pain control failures in fertility clinics

Conditions
October 16, 2025

“The Retrievals” is a podcast series hosted and written by Susan Burton and presented in cooperation with the New York Times that focuses on the failure of a Yale fertility clinic to address uncontrolled pain during procedures. As it turns out this was the result of a nurse surreptitiously replacing the pain medication fentanyl with saline to support her addiction. This apparently unfolded over the course of a year or …

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Pain control failures in fertility clinics

The burden of the eldest daughter

Physician
October 15, 2025

Were you the one who always held it together? The responsible one? The one who made sure everyone else was OK, sometimes at the cost of your own well-being?

For most eldest daughters, this role is inevitable. We don’t choose it. We are handed it, early and often, because we are so “capable.” We accept this role and excel at it. That’s what most eldest daughters do with whatever is handed …

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The burden of the eldest daughter

A doctor’s letter from a federal prison

Physician
October 15, 2025

Understanding the legal process in America is not easy, and I do not envy the attorneys who try to defend doctors in court. I do envy them for their protections. Lawyers, for the most part, as elected members of Congress, create our laws. Others, also for the most part lawyers, are selected to be U.S. Attorneys, and they enforce those laws. Lawyers called judges control our courtrooms. Almost all of …

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A doctor’s letter from a federal prison

Teaching medical students what it is really like to be a physician

Physician
October 12, 2025

Physician burnout and physician suicide continue to plague the medical profession. Everyone knows the tragic statistic: one U.S. physician commits suicide each day. While some statistics report a decrease in the problem over time, the accuracy of these reports is questionable. The reality is that it is far too common.

The term burnout, while a necessary label, implies that a single factor causes it. In reality, each burned-out physician is different. …

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Teaching medical students what it is really like to be a physician

A new framework for depression recovery

Conditions
October 12, 2025

What if recovery from depression was not only about reducing symptoms, but about rekindling a person’s inner spark?

During my years as a Navy nurse in mental health, I witnessed countless people navigating the heavy fog of depression. Many were offered medication, therapy, or structured activity schedules. These approaches saved lives and improved outcomes. Yet sometimes, despite best efforts, patients still felt like they were going through the motions, managing symptoms …

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A new framework for depression recovery

Physician leadership in moments of crisis

Physician
October 10, 2025

There’s a common belief that leadership requires a title after your name, an office on the top floor, and people looking to you for direction. But in medicine, leadership happens at every level.

Take me, for example. I’m an attending physician, whose role on the team is as a hospitalist. In the hierarchy of medicine, it’s easy to dismiss this role as “just a physician.”

Yet there’s nothing “just” about it when …

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Physician leadership in moments of crisis

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