Dan died, and I became a writer. I didn’t know it, but I did. Back then, I wrote one story, almost by accident, trying to make sense of my personal chaos. That essay chronicled a small-town doctor losing a beloved middle-aged friend who was rapid…
Category: primary care
Be like Mike (Jordan) and build your personal doctor brand
Gatorade’s commercial featuring Michael Jordan from 1992 and its catchy song, “Like Mike,” is now part of pop culture history. The lyrics were likable. “I dream I move, I dream I groove, like Mike, if I could be like Mike, oh if…
A hands-off approach to medical exams is potentially deadly
My mother passed away in early December. She had been battling Alzheimer’s disease for several years. Her communication was poor due to the disease. The caregivers in the memory care unit where she was located stated that she had been vomiting th…
Patient empowerment: the key to solving the health care crisis
A sobering study by the American Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC) predicts an unthinkable shortage of between 37,800 and 124,000 doctors by 2034. If underserved populations had fewer barriers to medical care, that shortfall could reach over 180,0…
The addictive quest for achievement and its dangerous consequences
An excerpt from Lean Out: A Professional Woman’s Guide to Finding Authentic Work-Life Balance. In the third grade, my teacher identified me as a high achiever. Aside from recognition, he “rewarded” me with the opportunity to write an …
Become your own health advocate: Navigating the doctor shortage [PODCAST]
Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Catch up on old episodes! In this episode, Ann M. Hester, a board-certified internal medicine physician, dives into the perfect storm brewing in the U.S. health care system and what we can do to prepare for it. The …
Patients vs. customers: the ethics of health care as a business
Medicine is both a business and a profession, with the business aspect being the provision of health care services for a fee and the professional aspect being the delivery of medical care for the patient’s benefit. The business of medicine refers…
From patient-centered care to paperwork-centered practice: the decline of primary care
A lot has been written about physician burnout, often it is attributed to the administrative burden, with some estimates that U.S. physicians spend an average of 1.84 hours a day completing documentation outside work hours. I’ve felt for some tim…
Retiring from medicine: the good, the bad, and the ugly
I retired as a physician at age 70, when COVID-19 came to town and the clinic I was working closed. During these past three years, I have had the luxury of a long view of my career. Every now and then, I feel the urge to pick up my stethoscope again a…
Addressing disparities in gynecological care for women with physical disabilities
I recently read a story in which a woman named H. Lee, who has muscular dystrophy, details a decade-long struggle to receive adequate cervical cancer screening. Providers have been unable to find her cervix due to the curvature of her spine, examined h…
