Many years ago, rheumatologists would assemble with lunar regularity to discuss cases, journal articles or listen to a great visiting speaker or leader in rheumatology. While many of these meetings occurred at a local eatery, they were more about the meeting than the eating.
Good News! Your research submission has been accepted for presentation at a national congress (i.e., ACR or EULAR). This is often a first step in the lifetime of a project – Abstract, Presentation, Full Write-up and Publication. Instead of being enthralled or overwhelmed with the notion of doing your first abstract, review my approach to creating, presenting and reviewing abstracts for a major medical meeting.
Leadership positions in medicine are disproportionately filled by men. Although the enrollment of medical schools are equal male: female or even some have more women, 40% of American medical institutions lack programs for recruiting women, or for retention and promotion of female faculty.
This may also be true in rheumatology, which is now attracting more women than men as trainees. I recently wrote an article in the Lancet about mentoring women in medicine and suggested ideas for improving the gender gap in leadership.
Just because it’s busted, it doesn’t mean you have to fix it. At some point, it’s important to know when to leave “good-enough” alone. Such is the story of the "busted valise" and what to do about it.
Three years ago we published our first edition of RheumNow. We have something - and someone - to celebrate. Surprise, Dr. Jack Cush - this one’s for you!
Everyone wonders how he does it. Vision. Drive. Determination. Unwavering resolve. Strength of purpose. Commitment - day in, day out. Willing to take risks. Unwilling to settle. All these, yes, but also this: passion, heart and soul.
In celebration, we asked a few of his colleagues to share their remarks about this important milestone. Without further ado…
The introduction of a guest or speaker should be simple, functional and respectful. In the least, it should go something like, “I have the honor of introducing our speaker, Dr. John Brown, who comes to us from Brown University, where he is the Chief of Internal Medicine. Today he’s going to lecture on “the right way to lecture”.
However, no one does this. Instead most try to do more, usually with knowledge gaps, and end up delivering incomplete, awkward or bad introductions.
Introductions tend to either be awkward or great.
Cush and Dao are at it again. This time it's whether men or women are better patients. Cush says men are better patients; Dao says Er, not so fast bub! This is their light-hearted, gender biased debate on the best patients: Men vs. Women.
You see them from the corner of your eye, standing with a kyphosis in the waiting room. They are filling out their paperwork, standing up because sitting is just not pleasant. You are the rheumatologist with an interest in ankylosing spondylitis (AS) and spondyloarthritis, so more likely than not, the patient with the bent spine is going to be your next new patient. In the back of your mind you are hoping that they are not so far along so that the therapy you may prescribe can make a difference in their life.
Sasha D just doesn’t like me. I’ve seen her four times in the clinic, and each visit was a tense battle of misunderstandings, with both of us leaving dissatisfied or worse. The failing wasn’t in the diagnosis, but rather the malalignment of our goals and inability to listen. Despite my efforts, my words, the diagnoses and treatment suggestions haven’t been well received.
Recently, I was invited to apply for an open seat on the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM), the large organization that certifies physicians in the United States. Part of the process is to write a personal statement on my views of the ABIM mission and what I would like to accomplish.
I’m a firm believer that your desk space is a window to your soul, if not your neuroses.
My first year fellow and colleague kept his desk meticulously sterile. It was so sparsely decorated and clean, he could be the poster child for minimalism. This was in drastic contrast to our program director, who had papers and books strewn about and multiple half-filled coffee cups surrounding his desk. His chair was typically found in the middle of the room with his white coat thrown about like a kindergartener’s art project.
Here are my observations from the natural habitats and home-base of rheumatologists.
By downloading this material, I acknowledge that it may be used only for personal use and personal education and that I will accredit RheumNow.com as the source and owner of this material. Commercial use or mass reproduction of this material without permission from RheumNow (info@rheumnow.com) is prohibited.
