Category: Psychiatry

The powerful, surreal scene in an El Paso hair salon

I am a psychiatrist living in El Paso. My husband was the orthopedic traumatologist on call at the academic center last weekend when 22 El Pasoans were murdered and 26 wounded in a mass shooting at a busy Walmart in town. The rest of this week has been…

The lingering effects of a mass shooting

Veronica Kelley was working at an office building across the street from the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, Calif., in December 2015 when a county employee and his wife entered with semiautomatic rifles and opened fire, killing 14 and woundi…

The deadly silence of physician depression and suicide

“It is high time for us to recognize that the physicians who spend so much of their lives caring for us are often suffering in silence, and effective interventions would be good medicine for all of us.” – Joan M. Anzia, MD On February 4, 2007, I …

Dear emergency department clinicians: a letter from administration

Dear emergency department clinicians: We at the top of the administrative and regulatory chain understand that you deal with enormously complicated mental health and substance abuse patients all the time. Your resources are limited, and the demands pla…

Dear emergency department clinicians: a letter from administration

Dear emergency department clinicians: We at the top of the administrative and regulatory chain understand that you deal with enormously complicated mental health and substance abuse patients all the time. Your resources are limited, and the demands pla…

Elon Musk’s girlfriend had eye surgery for depression. Is there science behind that?

Claire Elise Boucher, 31, known professionally as Grimes, is a Canadian singer, songwriter, record producer, and visual artist. Her music incorporates elements of varied styles, including dream pop, R&B, electronic music, and hip hop. Since 2018, B…

Physician burnout is as much a legal problem as it is a medical one

A career as a physician has traditionally been considered to be among the best vocations that talented students can pursue. That may no longer be the case. All too many doctors report that they are unhappy, frustrated, and even prepared to leave the pr…

Physician burnout is as much a legal problem as it is a medical one

A career as a physician has traditionally been considered to be among the best vocations that talented students can pursue. That may no longer be the case. All too many doctors report that they are unhappy, frustrated, and even prepared to leave the pr…

The entire medical education system needs sweeping change

In May 2019, headlines of a study out of University of Michigan hit the lay media: “New Doctors’ DNA Ages 6 Times Faster Than Normal in First Year.”  Using DNA samples submitted by medical residents across the country, the Intern Health Study measured …

Moral injury in health care: What have we learned?

When we began exploring the concept of moral injury to explain the deep distress that U.S. health care professionals feel today, it was something of a thought experiment aimed at erasing the preconceived notions of what was driving the disillusionment …