Medical

On March 6, 2020, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) provided a temporary waiver to expand telemedicine services, whose use was previously limited to specific circumstances. However, as the United States grapples with the unprecedented impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our nation’s health care system, CMS should permanently eliminate barriers limiting the…

I am a cardiology fellow at a large hospital. I plan to keep anonymity even though I don’t think there would be repercussions from my story, but in this day and age, you never know.  I was on call recently and was paged by our ED about a teenager with chest pain. OK, teenager with…

“It is a happy talent to know how to play.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson Have you ever been to a trampoline park and watched the faces of the parents there? It’s quite interesting as we regress almost instantly after the first jump. Faces of joy, sweat and smiles ear to ear. You can’t help but…

If one of your patients told you he is going to go spend a few hours hanging out in the cold this week with a bunch of people who might have coronavirus, what would your advice be?  That is exactly the situation thousands of people in Wisconsin faced on April 7, as the state decided…

I hope that this letter finds you (and myself) alive and well after all this COVID-19 craziness ends. I never really got the chance to explain everything when I was taking care of you. It wasn’t your fault you ended up at the hospital when you did, and you deserved so much better. First of…

As a medical student now in the time of COVID-19, many friends and family have turned to me seeking advice and guidance in an uncertain time. I’ve appreciated how my different experiences in medical school have prepared me for this responsibility. My immunology and pathophysiology classes can explain how COVID-19 spreads, how it attacks the…

In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, experts and officials largely cautioned Americans against wearing face masks in public. Surgeon General Jerome Adams had tweeted, “Seriously people- STOP BUYING MASKS!” to encourage basic hygiene measures and social distancing instead. The CDC dissuaded healthy people from wearing masks as well, recommending they don facial coverings…

A few weeks ago, I wondered aloud whether people grieve the same in the middle of a pandemic. A pandemic or other tragedies like earthquakes or tsunamis, when there are hundreds or thousands of people grieving for their lost family members and friends, is their individual grief felt less acutely? Does it help to know…

Correna is full of simplistic Henny Youngman-type one-liners (many of you readers, I understand, may never have heard of the comic, Henny Youngman, but no matter). But her one-liners are not particularly funny. She might say as we drive along, “I am SOB,” (Stuck or broke) or “CRS,” (can’t remember shit), or “SOS,” Stuck on…