Category: Oncology/Hematology

It’s time for AI-enabled solutions in health care to live up to their buzz

Artificial intelligence is incredibly buzzy in health care right now, and for a good reason. Other industries are already experiencing AI-enabled radical transformations, like real-time fraud monitoring and detection in banking and finance and instanta…

The unexpected people who’s listening to your conference speech

Do you ever wonder what the staff in hotel conference rooms think about what we talk about in presentations and lectures? I talk about sensitive stuff — sexuality, fertility, etc. — and I use words that many people have not said out loud in…

The randomness of cancer: bad luck or something else?

Randomness in life is inevitable because the universe is a pretty random place, although the extent to which you believe that depends upon your own value system. This notion comes into play almost every day of my practice in the PICU because many of th…

It’s time we get the technology working for the patients, and not make their lives more difficult

In a world where, in a moment, I can order from thousands of items and have them delivered to my doorstep the same or next day at the press of a button without having to re-enter my name, address, and billing information each time, it would seem that f…

A dermatologist mourns alone

Some may think that being a dermatologist means taking care of the “superficial.” I beg to defer. We spend a great deal of time performing procedures and talking to patients. During our visits, patients share their truth, and open up their hearts to us…

Clinical practice guidelines have problems, but they’re not broken

A Health Affairs blog post titled “Fixing Clinical Practice Guidelines” echoed several concerns I’ve discussed previously: practice guidelines are being produced in abundance but often have variable methodological quality, financial c…

After a spouse’s death, a physician is showered with gratitude

I saw Kaitlin (identifying information changed) and her husband Brandon seven days before she died. Kaitlin’s cancer had been in remission at our last visit, but this day she looked awful. I estimated she had less than three months to live. As I …

Clinical trials advance medicine in the future. And help patients right now.

If you’ve ever used a medication to treat an illness, you have a clinical trial to thank for it. Every standard therapy used in medicine today once started as a clinical trial. And it is commonly understood that today’s clinical trials are shaping trea…

Explaining Peter Fonda’s lung cancer

Actor Peter Fonda, son of Henry Fonda and younger brother of Jane Fonda, passed away August 16 at his Los Angeles home. Fonda, who was 79, is probably best known for his role as Wyatt in Easy Rider, a movie he co-wrote, produced, and starred in. Fonda …

The costly decision of delaying surgery

It was a common enough reason for someone to have a CT scan. The order read, “Abdominal pain, colon cancer resected in January.” It was now March, only two months post-surgery. Yet the patient’s CT scan showed a number of large masses in the liver, con…