I never expected to find myself in this position. Ironically, I, a family medicine physician, in a world grappling with a pandemic, became underemployed for the first time since high school. A unique set of circumstances led me to this situation, but …
We are more than a month into the shelter-in-place, and there are many thoughts that can come up for physicians. Our frontline workers, who are dealing with limited viral testing, inadequate treatments for ill patients, scarcity of PPE, and fear of th…
It’s Monday morning at 7:15 a.m. Our kids, ages 6 and 9, have just finished breakfast, and they know to get their shoes on to go for a walk. We are hand-in-hand, slowly waking up as we put one foot in front of the other. We ambled down our neighborhood…
Have you ever felt completely overwhelmed both at work and at home? Perhaps you’re thinking, my job as an anesthesiologist isn’t anxiety-provoking enough; I should probably homeschool my kids at the same time. When’s the last time you uttered the phras…
Do you remember those old cartoons with the angel or good guy on one shoulder and the little devil or bad guy on the other? Of course, the good guy was always trying to keep the character out of mischief, and certainly, the little devil was doing quite…
Prior to 2000, a practicing physician was almost guaranteed a prosperous economic livelihood. The guaranteed future meant that a physician could take on financial risks such as using student loans to finance their education, purchase a house during res…
COVID-19 has rapidly spread across the nation, leading to the implementation of stringent social distancing guidelines by local and regional authorities. In a desperate effort to limit infection rates, in-person social interactions have been reduced, a…
The Canadian federal government recently announced it would fund at least one million blood tests to track the novel coronavirus over the next two years. This is a step in the right direction. But is it enough? How do we know if we are testing the ri…
As someone trained in Brené Brown’s curriculum for helping professionals, vulnerability is my jam. As a physician? Not so much. The COVID-19 pandemic has thrown already burned-out healthcare providers into the arena with more than just a shortage…
Insurance companies require doctors to ask dozens of questions and click on carpal-tunnel inducing boxes during a yearly physical. However, none of those questions or boxes address one of the most important aspects of a person’s life, their death. So, …
