“Good news! You have antibodies, so you’re immune to COVID-19.” How relieved would we be to hear that? I could move throughout my place of work, or my grocery store, with added security. I would muse about a vetted cohort of immune providers to car…
Category: Infectious disease
Should we stress about stress? Protecting ourselves during the pandemic.
COVID-19 has exposed us to a wide variety of different stressors. In the short term, our stress response is useful as it helps us respond quickly and effectively. But when the stress lasts longer, we have to identify and acknowledge the “downside” risk…
After COVID-19, there’s no turning back from a digital clinical workforce
Novel coronavirus (COVID-19) has challenged our health care industry in profound and irreversible ways, creating massive pressure that has exposed system-wide inefficiencies and inequalities. It has also fundamentally shifted the way first responders, …
The hidden wounds of COVID-19
By the time we started to have a significant number of COVID-19 patients in our hospital, I was working as the attending on the inpatient infectious disease service. Along with the rest of my infectious disease colleagues, we had all been tracking the…
Responding to medical students’ concerns and anxieties during these unprecedented times
Everyone is in the same situation across the country in these unprecedented times. What a statement. A statement that every medical student has undoubtedly heard in utter multitude during these times of virtual medical curricula in place of clinical cu…
My living will during COVID-19
I am not afraid of being dead. Our four grown children are thriving, each in their own way making the world better. If I am wrong in my faith that Jesus is preparing a wonderful place for me, I will never know it. I do dread the process of dying, and C…
A reasoned response to the PPE debacle
The lack of adequate supplies of PPE is deplorable, inconceivable. This has been made abundantly clear through both social media and traditional media. Post after post on various social media outlets have exposed the appalling shortages and, at times…
How to liberate doctors from EMRs
We talk a lot in critical care medicine about liberating patients from ventilators. Vents are getting a lot of deserved attention for saving lives in the COVID-19 era. But the machine has downsides that get worse the longer the patient needs it. Becaus…
Addressing medical school needs for our frontline responders and health care providers
Coronavirus. Doctors. Nurses. PPE. Social distancing. Sound familiar? Our entire conversation about the COVID-19 pandemic surrounds those words and phrases. We see celebrities, companies, coworkers, family members, and friends donating PPE and money to…
Learning to cope with the pandemic from palliative care patients
I’m a palliative care chaplain who provides spiritual support to patients with serious, life-changing, and for some, life-threatening, illnesses. A common story they tell is an illness, like a storm, blew them off their life’s map. They fi…
