Blogs
Of Plumbers and Doctors
A water pipe in my house broke, and I had to call for emergency plumbing service. The next day I went to the hospital, where I was on my two weeks of General Medicine inpatient attending. An elderly man was admitted, cared for, and following this patient's successful hospital discharge several days later, something occurred to me.
Clinic Exorcisms
After a few clinic no-shows, our clinic partner discussions lapsed into a discussion of clinics, especially bad clinics. Amidst the cussing and discussing of clinic experience, my partner, Dr. Dao, threw out the phrase, “clinic exorcism”! What a great title for a different kind of blog. When clinic operations and operators are truly bad, who you gonna call? Not Clinic Busters. Think about clinic exorcisms designed to eradicate potentially hazardous patients, employees, partners or certain clinic practices.
FEAR: A Perception of Fact In Spite of the Fiction
How do you help your patients who are resistant to your medical recommendations when they are receiving biased information from friends, family, and the internet? I wanted to share with you two cases and my approach.
Millennial Medicine and Patient Care
While often seen as demanding, millennial patients have grown accustomed to having direct access to everything and everyone. They tend to be more involved in the clinical evaluation in the office, more concerned about the social aspects of the disease, and are more frustrated with the varying shades of gray in diagnoses and delayed treatment efficacy. What does this mean for you and your practice?
Remembering the Names of Drugs
Knowing the names of the agents in today’s armamentarium should be simple. But, the nomenclature is notoriously confusing. The names of monoclonal antibodies can stretch to five syllables which defy easy pronunciation beyond the “mab” at the end. Who comes up with these names anyway?
The House of God After 40 Years: A Rheumatologist's Reflection
The House of God is probably more known of than read, with over 3 million copies sold since its release when I was a Chief Medical Resident in the era of its writing. The book itself, according to the author Samuel Schem (aka Steven Bergman, MD, DPhil), a psychiatrist and currently Professor of Humanities at NYU, is a true account of his internship, albeit laden with some liberties of fiction - and it's been quoted for generations. The House of God is cruelly funny and portrays many uncomfortable and dehumanizing aspects of medicine, including substance abuse, bawdy sex (and lots of it), sleeplessness, depression, and suicide to name a few. Taken at face value, it would seem countercultural to our current aspirations of putting patients first, #MeToo and burnout concerns. Is this book merely a humorous anachronistic rant, or a serious work of reflection meritorious of being read and pondered upon?
When Your Patient Asks Why?
This is probably the most difficult question that a physician is confronted with. A patient is stricken with a new disease or problem and before it even sinks in or is fully comprehended, the patient wants to know “why” or “how” long before they want to know what are we can do about it.
Rheumatologist's Vacation Checklist
Nearly half of all available vacation days go unused and over 40% of Americans failed to use any vacation days in 2015. Common sense says that taking more time off (not less) is likely to lead to increased work productivity. Your next vacation is essential to building a better you. Here are some tips to insure you get the most from your time off.
Blueprints to the Clinical Research Underworld
“If you don't know what you want, you end up with a lot you don't.” ― Chuck Palahniuk, "Fight Club" 1999
When To Give Up
He would have died. About 4 weeks ago, my 74 year old father-in-law, “Pops” was admitted to a small community hospital for delirium and worsening congestive heart failure. He was seen by a caring hospitalist and a local cardiologist who was deemed good by all the locals, but they could not get him better.