Category: KevinMD

A possibly fishy complication of an Alaskan cruise

A 69-year-old man with a medical history of hypertension, diabetes, and obesity with a body mass index of 33 was admitted with altered mental status. He and his wife were returning from a 14-day Alaskan cruise. On their return, the wife started noticin…

Here’s why you need to find compassion for yourself

Self-compassion. Perhaps this sounds like a contradiction in terms. Compassion is expressed for others, not oneself. Compassion, as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary, is the “sympathetic consciousness of others’ distress with a desire to allevi…

Should speed-eating contests be banned?

This eating contest season, there was only one death this year, as far as I can determine. A 41-year-old California man died in August while participating in a taco eating contest at a minor league baseball game. The coroner said he choked to death. In…

What a cardiologist wants you to know about loneliness

What is the unspoken fatal epidemic of our time? And the greatest predictor of overall health, happiness, job satisfaction, and resiliency? Loneliness. As a clinical cardiologist, I am committed to the health and well-being of my patients. As a recover…

What it really means to support your female colleagues in medicine

I always knew there were disparities regarding men and women in the field of medicine. However, at the beginning of my training, these inequalities seemed so fictional to me, I could only compare them to dragons and unicorns. The fact that this topic w…

Healing and heart when recovering from cancer

As people, we often have multiple stories to tell, from different perspectives. Multiple stories and perspectives can be wed or braided together around the same themes. Here we braid together two separate perspectives of a patient author and a physicia…

The biggest addiction problem in the U.S.? Health insurance.

Whenever I give a talk about health care, I ask the audience, “What is the worst addiction problem we have in the United States?” The answers are typically the same, and all are good guesses — alcohol, tobacco, opiates, and sugar are most frequently ci…

It’s time to stop being skeptical of hospital chaplains

What is your gut reaction when you hear the words “hospital chaplain?” Maybe it’s an eye roll or confused stare about what you believe to be an incoming attempt at religious conversion. As a family member anxious about a loved one in …

What’s the X-factor in life or death medical situations?

I was a brand-new intern in the intensive care unit, and Cassandra was the very first patient I saw there. A petite, slender woman, she was rolled in on a stretcher, accompanied by her tall, athletic husband, Jack. Cassandra was in her 20s, like me — b…

Debunking the myth that life gets easier once you finish medical training

Residents and fellows around the country have bought into the “medical training myth.” The myth states: “Life will get so much better when I finish residency/fellowship.” Sadly, too many house staff buy into this false belief an…