Category: KevinMD

The difference between learning medicine and doing medicine

Back when I was a third-year medical student, I would sometimes bike to the hospital campus early enough to catch the groundskeepers cleaning the promenade in front of the medical school before the foot traffic arrived. Discovery Walk, as it’s called, …

Is the physician financial independence community preaching to the choir?

Proof of concept is important because accountability is a tenuous thing. One can pretty much say whatever they want on the internet. They can boast. Spin half-truths. Tell a tale. The most deadly of these are the ones that are just a slight variation o…

Teaching medical professionalism through literature

A excerpt from From Reading to Healing: Teaching Medical Professionalism through Literature (Literature and Medicine). There are several traditional ways to teach about professionalism. Some training programs have didactic lectures on this issue. These…

Teaching medical professionalism through literature

A excerpt from From Reading to Healing: Teaching Medical Professionalism through Literature (Literature and Medicine). There are several traditional ways to teach about professionalism. Some training programs have didactic lectures on this issue. These…

The tide is turning: a pro-vaccine Facebook thread

People often say that they can die happy if … Well, I have no intention of dying, but one of my goals in life was achieved recently. Historically, Facebook moms groups have been the bane of existence for many physicians, particularly pediatricians. We …

Refuse to accept that burnout is a natural experience in health care

Burnout is a myth. Dedicated clinicians, working under circumstances that connect their skills and compassion with opportunities to impact patients, won’t experience burnout any more often than they might by doing other jobs. The story we tell — …

The story of an attending’s empathy

“Hey, you’re a med student. Right?” “Yes, I am. Do you need me to scrub in?” “That would be wonderful, yes! Everyone is either out on vacation or is sick. It’s just me and the resident.” “OK, I&#821…

America has seen medical marijuana before: This is what we learned (and forgot)

Very few things in the universe are 100 percent good or 100 percent bad. Cannabis is perfectly ordinary in having a mixture of good qualities (medical benefits) and bad qualities (medical risks). The people who want to make money – lots of money, by th…

“Doctor” or first name: Which do you prefer?

This article is sponsored by Careers by KevinMD.com. “Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name.” So go the famous lyrics from the theme song for “Cheers,” the iconic sitcom of the 1980s. The name thing can get re…

MKSAP: 79-year-old man with headaches, nausea, visual disturbance, and difficulty speaking

Test your medicine knowledge with the MKSAP challenge, in partnership with the American College of Physicians. A 79-year-old man is evaluated for a 2-month history of progressively worsening headaches, nausea, visual disturbance, and difficulty speakin…