People often say health care professionals are often the worst patients. As health care professionals, we are well versed with what is needed to be healthy, but we struggle, like many other people, to consistently apply these principles. Some reports i…
At the very start of the pandemic last year, I met with a couple of patients in the office while we wore masks. Based on that limited experience, I quickly concluded that seeing each other’s faces was of paramount importance, even if over video. That…
“As a mother, a physician, and an educator, I refuse to accept this as normal. It is not! What should we tell the parents of these young physicians? How do we explain to them that their dream of being a doctor became a nightmare with a tragic end…
Since the first documented COVID death in the U.S. in February 2020, over 726,000 Americans have died. The number of deaths eclipses the death toll of any other American tragedy, whether war or the Spanish influenza epidemic of 1918, and health care pr…
“I believe there is an art to medicine, a psychological connection to your patients through a hands-on patient encounter. There are nuances AI may take decades to compete with. For now, in my lifetime, I hope that people examine patients and when…
“We can’t expect those with a business school mindset to solve physician burnout. What is needed is leadership throughout health care organizations by those with expertise in the core business, deep commitment to health care workers and patients,…
My youngest daughter just got married to a fine young man. She was beautiful and radiant. As I gave my daughter away when the minister told me to, I sat down next to a picture of my deceased husband. He passed away four years ago. Lisa was our last chi…
Anniversaries are usually joyous occasions to celebrate – a wedding date or a date of independence, for example. Other anniversaries invoke solemn occasions, such as the end of a war or 9/11 after the bombing of New York. But there is another type of a…
Recently, one of my coaching clients came to our Zoom session looking exhausted. I wasn’t surprised. She’s a physician, a leader at her hospital, and the past two years have been a lot for her. COVID takes its toll in many ways, and it has changed her …
An excerpt from The Empathy Effect: Seven Neuroscience-Based Keys for Transforming the Way We Live, Love, Work, and Connect Across Differences. “Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty.” What picture do you see when yo…
