Episodes

"Unfortunately, when negotiating with hospitals I am frequently forced to deal with individuals who need to 'explain' the importance of maintaining flexibility in their workforce (a wonderful business school phrase that appropriately dehumanizes the...

"I thought of her with each miscarriage I saw in COVID+ mothers, and during each delivery of premature rupture of membranes due to infection. I thought of her every time I gave steroids, increased the oxygen flow for someone struggling to breathe, or...

"I failed my Step 1 medical school board exam by 1 point. This was very hard for me to process, and I consistently wondered if I would have passed if I had just waited an additional week. This new challenge led me to reach out to a new resource: the...

"What makes soldiers and doctors good at their jobs are also the very things that make it hard to leave work at work. My former husband was, and is, very good at his job, especially when it comes to compassion and care for his patients. At work, he...

"Life can feel full of uncertainty when battling cancer, with few guarantees. 'Is there still cancer in my body?' and 'Will it come back?' are common questions that have long been difficult to answer confidently until recently. Advances in...

"I understand what it feels like to be in the depths of depression and hopelessness. I have had a lifelong battle with stuttering, obsessive-compulsive tendencies, depression, and suicide. I continually fight these battles and have learned to heal and...

"I was diagnosed over 20 years ago, and looking back, I feel privileged that I did meet the stereotype for anorexia and be forced into treatment. However, along the way, I have gained insight that people of all bodies share my struggles. And the use...

Often, physicians only give minimal attention to their financial futures, but potential federal changes could make tax planning even more important. The proposed infrastructure bill would increase taxes, affecting those with an annual income higher...

"The business of health care delivery differs markedly from other consumer and service industries in many ways. First and foremost, the economics differ. Specifically, the payers of medical care are often different from the customers, the government...

"I see lamenting the Great Resignation. I celebrate it. It’s not so much about what people are leaving – but where are they going? What have they empowered themselves to become? The thought, 'There has to be something more,' has been pondered and...

"Digital mental health apps have increased access to mental health care for people around the world. You can find services that fit your specific needs, often on a 24/7/365 basis, so if you need support in the middle of the night, it’s there....

"The Tuskegee Syphilis Study is widely acknowledged as a violation of ethics today, but the social conditions of the time allowed the grave injustices to happen in plain sight. In the 1930s, social Darwinism emerged as justification for racist...

"Regulators should push health savings accounts (HSA) and businesses should offer them. While HSAs are growing, they are still only available to 30 percent of workers — more likely for larger companies than smaller ones. This, of course, is a way to...

"As the next COVID-19 variant hits our country, I feel a renewed sense of urgency. We need to move faster to invest in an infrastructure that protects our nation’s health care workforce before we lose more nurses, doctors, and other care team...

"As we know, diabetes is a comorbidity that can cause more severe symptoms in COVID-positive patients. This knowledge, along with the sense that diabetes is overwhelming the entire body, can quickly deplete a patient’s reserve of positive energy....

"Setting boundaries can look like setting a time limit for patient appointments, availability for email responses, the number of shifts worked this month. You can set boundaries by saying 'no' to low compensation, setting a time limit on conversations...

"Remember the things that we’ve discussed as the majority of people are broke. And just because your friends are showing off the 'stuff' things they buy doesn’t mean they can actually afford them. Once you realize that everybody in the world is...

"There’s a new best practice emerging, one that lets you deliver a high standard of care today but that well-prepares you for a shift to value. We’ve been talking about it throughout this article series in terms of doing more with less and making...

"It is hard to understand and communicate the uncertainty that comes with evolving science, the changing recommendations as we learn more, the vaccine that didn’t do all that was initially promised. It has become even harder with the erosion of...

"Have you ever been to a new city and realized you’d been pronouncing a street or a town name all wrong? Have you ever been from one of those cities and has it broken your heart to hear someone call Copley Square Cope-ly? Or pronounce the Schuylkill...

"Tears and sweat drown my face as I try to rip off my PPE and exit the room. I didn’t want to leave him, but I couldn’t bear another second in that reality. A whirlwind of emotions crash over me, and my knees weaken. I thought, “If I can just...

"The starting point is to do our best to approach discussing COVID and vaccination with the appropriate type of empathy and understanding. To understand that our patients don’t have access to the same level of data and research that we do, and even...

"Instead of trading up for a faster horse by drawing in the exam room, it felt like I’d just built a motor car. I created a new workflow around my digital assets. When patients checked in for a clinic visit, I scanned the chart for their visit...

"When my patients asked me about losing weight, I would say, 'Eat less and exercise more.' I know that it is more complicated than that. There are psychological and socioeconomic factors. There is bariatric surgery and there are medications. But 'eat...