Category: primary care

Dear patients: Please show up on time

There is constant tension to remain on-time working in a primary care clinic, seeing patients every twenty minutes back-to-back.  It takes an incredible ability for the front desk staff, medical assistants, and the physician to be able to keep this flo…

What makes health care workers superhuman

“So, the next step in the history taking process is to define the pain. You start this by asking for site, with questions like, “Where are you experiencing the pain? Can you pinpoint the site or is it more general? Does the pain radiate (spread anywher…

What’s the future of the physician assistant?

Currently, in America, there are only three legal groups of prescribers, the physicians (which include MDs, DOs, DPMs), the nurse practitioner (NPs), and the physician assistant (PAs). The first class of physician assistants, in 1965, was also the year…

A dam about the burst: The job of “doctor” places too much stress on one person

“I wish this were not the case, but I am concerned that your disease is getting worse, and your time may be very short.” “I know you are angry and upset at how you were treated — I will do my best to make sure that does not happen again.” “I am s…

System failure: We need a reboot to better handle intersectionality

In medical school, physicians learn how to diagnose and treat medical conditions. We learn about all the different presentations and revel in catching a complex or rare diagnosis. In essence, we learn to categorize disorders based on a cluster of sympt…

Doctor, how do you define your days?

During a particularly long stretch of being on call, of spending my days caring for patients, documenting in the EMR, and sleeping – I was spent. I felt like a horrible doctor. The blooper reel of my medical misadventures ran through my mind – th…

Working as a digital nomad physician practicing telemedicine while travelling the world

This is not the career path I set out to practice when I left medical school; in fact, it’s a career path that didn’t even exist. But after making a number of lifestyle choices this is where I find myself today. I am sitting writing this ar…

Welcome to prior-authorization hell

“What diagnosis do you want to use for those ear drops you sent on Mr. Johnson,” Jenn texted me. “ICD-L21.8 for seborrheic dermatitis?” Sigh. Welcome to prior-authorization hell. These are generic ear drops I ordered for presumed fungal infection of th…

Healer: Heal thyself; forgive thyself

It is a special group, a mish-mash of medical professionals all with a common purpose: Honing the ability to practice medicine in a more empathetic and compassionate manner, which will benefit both the patient and the professional alike. All meet to sh…

If we don’t support doctors, they will go away

Family medicine — something I devoted my life to and believe in — is being undermined by local doctors and hospital administrators. And I would move, but it seems to be a national trend as well. It’s more cost-effective to hire NPs and turn a bli…