I am a physician that was placed in a unique position. I was hired as a private contractor to work for three months in a remote medical setting on Wake Island. Wake Island is a remote island approximately 2000 miles west of Hawaii, with a population o…
Much has been written about the response of the governmental agencies in the foreseeability of COVID-19 spread and management in the United States. Travel restriction from mainland China seemed to be a very timely intervention. However, instead of cons…
Let me start by saying that I am a diplomate (i.e., “board-certified”) by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. I was completely in agreement that to display competence in my specialty after four years of residency, I should pass …
Primary care is at the heart of each and every health care system. Effective and efficient primary care leads to positive health outcomes across the board, most notably lower rates of mortality and hospitalization, and higher life expectancy. But to ac…
Coronavirus has overwhelmed hospitals, staff, and supply chains, stripped many Americans of health care coverage along with their jobs, and affected billions of people worldwide with mounting fatalities. Despite its massive human toll, the pandemic off…
An excerpt from When We Do Harm: A Doctor Confronts Medical Error. One of the selling points for the electronic medical record (EMR) was that it would be a boon for patient safety. Just having all the medical records in one place is a monumental improv…
COVID-19 essentially shut down my in-person primary care practice, and we immediately turned to telemedicine (“seeing” a patient virtually either through a phone or video-based visit). My primary care group did this out of necessity, but nobody predict…
An excerpt adapted from Being Authentic: A Memoir. Our existence is fragile. I learned that in many intricate ways, long before the COVID-19 pandemic, so I do not take today for granted. I do not know what tomorrow will bring. I do not even know if tom…
I rounded recently on a 100-year-old veteran of the Battle of the Bulge. It was a terrible and costly battle fought in Belgium during the winter of 1945, the coldest and snowiest in memory at that time. The German army made a desperate last stand again…
We have all heard that 90 percent of the time, a patient’s history provides the diagnosis before we even perform a physical exam or order any tests. At the same time, much of our reimbursement used to hinge on how many body systems we examined. Like so…
