“While the rise in substance use disorders during COVID will become more apparent as the pandemic eventually ebbs, the silver lining is that this is not a novel problem. We understand substance use disorders far better than we understand COVID-19…
Category: Infectious disease
In honor of Benjamin Franklin: Choose prevention
When I was a high school student, my calculus teacher stood eager to use her new electronic board. She admitted to doing derivatives for fun on the weekends. I admired the way she looked at a complex math problem and solved it with ease. Even more not…
A tale of two epidemics: COVID and obesity
Millions worldwide have had COVID-19. The largest obstacle to reining in this virus’s spread is that the range of symptoms is unpredictable, from minimal to severe respiratory compromise with diffuse lung damage and death. As COVID-19 initially m…
Positive growth from the COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected almost everyone, whether directly, through the loss of loved ones, or its impact on job security. Business has slowed down in many sectors and has been put into a standstill. It became clear that things we thought wer…
Will women in medicine survive COVID-19?
How are two-career households with children — let alone single-parent households — going to manage with daycare centers and schools closed, perhaps for a long time to come? What damage will this do to career progression and earning potential if one par…
Bridging the gap between the bedside and the bench in the fight against COVID-19
On March 16 — the same day that the nation’s first shelter-in-place orders were announced in the San Francisco Bay Area — a Seattle woman rolled up her sleeve to take the first experimental dose of a possible COVID-19 vaccine. “We all feel so helpless,…
The COVID winter is coming. The time to prepare is now.
The motto of the House of Stark from Game of Thrones is “winter is coming.” The meaning is a warning to remain vigilant as there are troubling times ahead. This motto applies to both mental illness and the COVID pandemic. There was a brief time where …
How to balance family and professional needs during the pandemic [PODCAST]
“The reality of being a medical practice owner is that we are small business owners and very vulnerable to the impact of COVID. Having previously worked in the telemedicine industry and because I am a psychiatrist, I initially felt that I was in …
It is overwhelming hopelessness that crushes caregivers’ collective souls
I started my medical training in the late 1990s. This was after the AIDS epidemic; that is to say, by that time, the human immunodeficiency virus was known, and there were already proven treatments. So, for doctors of a certain age, this is the first t…
The need for on-demand access to medical technologies when treating COVID-19 patients
It’s well known that New York City was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic in the spring, having been the epicenter of U.S. cases for several weeks. As I write this, more than 245,000 of my fellow New Yorkers have been stricken, and an estimated one in t…
