The tale is told of a large realm, of 1.4 billion, the largest nation in the world. It has a culture that is old, rich and grounded. A citizen’s worth can be understood, determined, exalted or decried. In modern times said country has a visionary leade…
Category: Public Health & Policy
Nurses are striking. Where are the physicians?
The U.S. health care “system” is completely and utterly broken. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), the U.S. system ranks 37th in the world, all while spending dramatically more on health care than other wealthy countries. Ten…
The systemic poverty in Navajo Nation is a national travesty
“I have the CPAP machine. I’ve had it for a year, but I don’t have electricity in my house. I stayed with my aunt who has electricity but things didn’t work out,” said the young Navajo man, his massive belly protruding out…
In a single-payer system, who will be doing the rationing?
One of the arguments made against adopting single-payer health care in this country is that it would “lead to rationing.” This assumes that we lucky people in the U.S. have unlimited access to whatever health care we need and are at risk of losing it. …
Medicare for all doesn’t look like single payer in the rest of the world
Recent polls show a majority of Americans support Medicare for all, but few seem to realize that no other system in the world operates like the current single payer proposals in Congress. Recently, I addressed the concept of single-payer health care, w…
What do organized crime and health care have in common?
During college and medical school, my summer employment acquainted me with members of organized crime families. Now, reflecting on my full career as a primary care clinician, geriatrician, and researcher on health care delivery improvement, I have disc…
What volunteering during a crisis taught this medical student
“Were you on the hurricane emails this weekend?” This was not the question I expected to start the week. I came to Raleigh, North Carolina to spend part of my fourth year of medical school as special assistant to Dr. Mandy Cohen, the secret…
Physicians and patients must work together to improve health care
According to Wikipedia, a livestock guardian dog is a type of pastoral dog bred for the purpose of protecting livestock from predators. If only our doctors had these noble creatures to protect them from the predators of the world, to alert them when th…
Political games are destroying our national state of health
Lately, I have been contemplating the growing political divide in this country. We seem perpetually locked in a state of partisan gridlock. Our nation is stuck in a continuous news cycle dominated by party politics. This perpetuates party divisions and…
Why doctors crash planes
Physicians actually make good pilots. But, in 1966 they received a bad rap due to a report published by the FAA’s Chief of Aviation Medicine, Dr. Stanley Mohler. Mohler had a point. Physicians were crashing planes at a higher rate as opposed to the gen…
