Category: Public Health & Policy

Instead of Medicare for all, how about Medicare for more?

Medicare for all is one of the leading campaign issues among the Democratic presidential candidates. Michigan Rep. John Conyers first introduced the idea in Congress in 2003. It went nowhere, but as the one-time party of JFK morphed into something much…

The reason so many physicians are retiring early

There has been a disturbing shift in how medical professionals feel about their career. I almost cringe every time I’m at a party or social gathering now and tell people I retired early from my medical practice. I try not to bring it up. I don’t cringe…

Millennials: This is our time in medicine

Let’s talk about that infamous transition to third year. This is a precarious time in your medical school career when your resolve faces its greatest challenge yet. After weeks of self-imposed exile to prepare for Step 1, you finally take that dreaded …

A new health care dawn is coming

At some point in my career, I had the crazy idea that if I could scale the patient-centric work I was doing in my community at a small rural hospital — then I could make more of an impact. This is why, when a technology company came calling, dangling a…

What physicians can learn from anthropologists

Since the passing of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act in 2009, it has been said that health tech would dramatically revolutionize health care and the patient experience. Advocates have claimed time and tim…

What physicians can learn from anthropologists

Since the passing of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act in 2009, it has been said that health tech would dramatically revolutionize health care and the patient experience. Advocates have claimed time and tim…

Refusing to walk past the old sexist standards in medicine

When I was a third-year medical student in 2006, I was assigned to spend the day at a well-known women’s health clinic in Toronto. I walked into the procedure room and introduced myself to the attending. His first words to me were: “Are you married?” I…

America’s inadequate LGBTQ medical education

As medical students, we are asked to learn in exquisite detail the ins and outs of rare diseases that we may never encounter in clinical practice. Yet the education we receive on caring for a population numbering in the millions is sorely lacking, and …

A student doctor says, “Time’s Up”

According to the NASEM report, half of women medical students experience sexual harassment before they start their careers as physicians. The numbers are even higher for people belonging to minority groups. This harassment is generally overlooked and t…

This residency interview season: Be the rebel

Ours is a chaotic and overburdened medical system. As a senior resident, there is every temptation to seek in our incoming classes more obedient interns and junior residents who would obey my orders as their senior without question. I challenge that we…