I have been reading, thinking and consulting for a while about the occupational health syndrome commonly referred to as burnout. As initially defined back in the 1970s, burnout is a state of mental and physical exhaustion caused by one’s professi…
Category: Conditions
Undergoing an appendectomy in a pandemic
The world is paused. But is it? Just because the world is experiencing a pandemic does not mean that the rest of the world’s ailments all of a sudden go away. Their priority may fall in ranking, but they persist. Health and disease continue. I ate lun…
Undergoing an appendectomy in a pandemic
The world is paused. But is it? Just because the world is experiencing a pandemic does not mean that the rest of the world’s ailments all of a sudden go away. Their priority may fall in ranking, but they persist. Health and disease continue. I ate lun…
The gift COVID gave me
COVID-19 has given us many things, some of which we expected. Scarce resources, anxiety about keeping ourselves and our families safe, a sense of unparalleled vulnerability, and a solid helping of helplessness, knowing ultimately we may not be able to …
A physician’s predictions about COVID-19
It has been a month since the first case of SARS-CoV-2 presented in my hospital in South Jersey. The virus has been causing devastation around the globe since December 2019, and before the United States – China, Italy, and Spain suffered the greatest c…
The unintended consequences of isolating our dying COVID-19 patients
Lisa’s heart pauses every time her phone rings. She’s unsure if the call she is answering is going to be the final update she will ever receive from the intensive care doctor caring for her love, John. Her 55-year-old husband of 31 years wa…
A different perspective on PPE during the COVID-19 crisis
As a health care provider, husband, father, and friend, I felt compelled to share my perspective with colleagues, loved ones, and the community as we continue to manage COVID-19. These are unprecedented times we are facing, and there is a myriad of in…
The oath we took does not include compromising our own safety
The CDC’s overseas epidemic prevention activities, a veritable gift from America to the world, were effectively eviscerated in early 2018 by Trump and the then Republican-controlled Congress in alignment with the White House’s “America First” ideology….
An ethical approach for clinical trials during the COVID-19 pandemic
As researchers and physicians race to investigate innovative therapeutics against the novel SARS-CoV-2 virus, unanswered questions remain regarding the ethics and design of clinical trials. Namely, what is the most ethically and scientifically rigorous…
COVID-19 is a different world for our most vulnerable citizens
I have been a physician for almost twenty years. The AIDS pandemic has been the greatest public health calamity of my career. Global Health Observatory data estimates that approximately 32 million people have died from HIV-related illnesses since the d…
