The first time I heard the song “Truth Be Told” by Matthew West, tears welled up, and I cried. I was driving home after a long day at the clinic. The song resonated with me in more ways than I could soak in. Lie number one: You’re supposed to have it a…
“We’re encouraged to mentally rehearse life-saving procedures for conditions that occur so rarely we might go our entire career without performing them. And the reality is that I could spend every minute of my free time this way and still have an…
A guest column by the American Society of Anesthesiologists, exclusive to KevinMD. Recent data from the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has shown a sharp increase in drug-related overdoses attributed to fentanyl and other synthetic opioids, deepe…
Primary care is a field that is both highly rewarding and highly challenging. Those who enter into it quickly find that they are rewarded with the satisfaction of knowing they are playing a vital role in the lives of their patients. However, they also …
In 2017, I was medically discharged from the military due to an exacerbation of an eating disorder. At that time, anorexia nervosa (AN) provided relief from the depression that I had developed secondary to the multitude of stressors that came with bein…
I will tell you why health care professionals feel they need to be superhuman, without needs or vulnerabilities. Because that is who we want to be, why we got into the field, and then our training reinforces those very ideas. We exist to take care of o…
Our profession often sends the message that we are invincible heroes. Here’s my vulnerable and honest admission: I lapped that up. There was something so seductive about denying pesky human requirements, like sleep, regular exercise, and time to decomp…
Like many fellow Americans, I had my first psychedelic experience in the middle of the pandemic, in a place where the use of psychedelics is decriminalized. I grew up in a Communist country, and the ban and stigma against psychedelics were tremendous. …
We have probably heard this saying with different permutations many times about someone showing “their true colors.” As physician and best-selling author, Tess Gerritsen, shared: “There is no better test of character than when youR…
“The Great Resignation. I doubt there is a medical practice out there that has not been affected by it. And experts predict we are just at the beginning. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ early data from 2022 shows that health care is among th…
