Category: primary care

3 reasons why patients are unhappy

When I’m working in the hospital, I always find it interesting talking to patients about their medical history and experiences with outpatient physicians. I recently wrote about our broken primary care system. In fact, I’ll be stronger than that: Our p…

What if this physician had access to real solutions?

What if I had access to real solutions? What if I had resources to provide to a person to help them overcome their problem?  As a primary care provider with over 20 years of experience, I know viscerally that I will never “fix” anyone. I can teach, I c…

Here’s the secret to establishing a great physician reputation

Summer marks a flood of young new attendings hitting hospitals all over the country. There will also be many doctors whose first contract is coming to an end, and they are moving to a new position. Both of these scenarios create an opportunity to make …

When words mislead in the exam room

Words can be misleading. Medical terms work really well when shared between clinicians. But we can’t assume our patients speak the same language we do. If we “run with” whatever keywords we pick up from our patient’s chief complaint, we can easily get …

What to consider when recommending yoga to patients [PODCAST]

“Yoga therapy differs from contemporary yoga in that the profession has a defined scope of practice based on educational standards and accreditation requirements for training schools and yoga therapists. In dealing with pain conditions, certified…

A family physician shares her inspiration [PODCAST]

“Why else should a person become a doctor? Because there is always something to learn. Because holding someone’s hand when they’re scared is a profound gift that feels as good to give as it does to receive. Because your job will call on you to be…

Why doctors can’t rest

“How beautiful it is to do nothing and then rest afterward.” – Spanish Proverb. I saw this on a bookmark in a beautiful inn on the coast of South Carolina called the Sanctuary.  This is a place I go to vacation, but I find I rarely escape.  You see, th…

The dissin’ physician: How does one become this way?

Patients mutter words like these under their breath as they leave the office or sound off when they get home.  At the nurses’ station, feelings of resignation and exasperation are in the air. When is he ever going to stop acting that way? Dr. Diss (a f…

Evaluating technology tools for clinical use

It will not come as a surprise to my fellow clinicians that the pandemic has spurred a boom in digital health and health technology innovation, evidenced by the increasing sales pitches we receive for these new solutions. Our practice has experienced b…

A Black physician’s perfectionism

Since I was a child, I have been plagued by words and thoughts (spoken and unspoken) that said, “You are not good enough.” I remember this very vividly as I walked into my new school as a fourth-grader in rural Ohio. I was so excited to sta…