Last month I saw Joan, a woman who has had low back pain for years. She’d been through the ringer like every other person in severe pain: countless procedures and medications. She continued to have daily pain that stopped her from staying focused at wo…
There are roughly 15 percent of the nation’s children who suffer from a developmental-behavioral condition or about 1 in 6 children. Unfortunately, many of those children often do not get the help they need. Children with developmental and behavioral c…
There is no better place to watch science in action than in the world of medicine. It was discovered in the 1930s that blood, in the presence of a certain streptococcus bacteria, did not clot. The agent formed by the bacteria was isolated and eventuall…
“Please don’t tell my family,” Mary (identifying information changed) immediately asked me after I disclosed the results of her lymph node biopsy and diagnosis of metastatic non-small cell lung cancer. At the time, I was a first-year oncology fel…
“Please don’t tell my family,” Mary (identifying information changed) immediately asked me after I disclosed the results of her lymph node biopsy and diagnosis of metastatic non-small cell lung cancer. At the time, I was a first-year oncology fel…
I pause for a moment and close my eyes — to center myself in this country, where I am today. I am about to walk through the door and tell the parents what my assessment has shown. I nod to the interpreter waiting behind me and knock firmly befo…
Test your medicine knowledge with the MKSAP challenge, in partnership with the American College of Physicians. A 49-year-old woman is evaluated for recently worsening joint symptoms. She has a 13-year history of Crohn disease characterized by four to s…
A man in his fifties is wheeled into the emergency department on a gurney hoping he’ll still be around to cheer from the sidelines at his daughter’s next soccer game. A little girl on the pediatric floor upstairs simply hopes her tummy stops hurting. A…
Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder that affects movement, resulting most notably in tremor, slow movement, stiffness and balance issues. While Parkinson’s patients benefit from medicine that can alleviate some of these…
Some children present to me with complex problems or multiple problems that fail to resolve after the typical interventions. I recall a child with severe abdominal pain. He had tried numerous medicines and had had scopes and studies galore. It had reac…
