Medical

There is a strong push for health care to move towards greater value-based care (VBC) arrangements. The prospect of VBC holds the opportunity to re-create partnerships designed to increase health care sustainability by strategically improving processes, care delivery, and patient outcomes to achieve higher quality output at a decreased cost. Furthermore, the held potential will…

As a foreign medical graduate and a multiple-time career changer — from being a doctor to a hospital process improvement and leadership coach to a business professor to a transformational career coach for female physicians — I have closely examined the U.S. health care industry from various lenses. The one thing that stands out for…

“I can do better. We can do better. Please partner with me and advocate for the ability for doctors and residents in our profession to receive medical and psychiatric care without fear of losing our licenses or having to face stigma and judgment. It can save lives. Please, we are more stressed than ever, and…

Medicine is an art. One can learn about symptoms, diagnostics, and treatment plans for various diseases, from textbooks and journal articles. It is harder to study empathy, compassion, and human connection from conventional academic resources. The art of medicine is discovered, acquired, and absorbed on the job by interacting and connecting with patients and their…

I had very difficult experiences breastfeeding both of my children.  I had constant pain, recurrent plugged ducts, and a lot of latch problems.  There were many times when I considered quitting, but I persevered because it meant a lot to me, and I would have felt like I was failing had I stopped.  Does this…

We have dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic, and its disruptions to our lives, for a year. And all the news reports, the dire warnings, and the messages of doom and gloom reinforce a feeling of despair as we face yet another week of virtual school, along with time away from the activities and the people…

There is such beauty that arises when we simply smile at our children’s faces. Their roaring belly laughs, their absolute delight in catching snowflakes on their tongues on an early February afternoon, and their joyful playground adventures just a few days prior when the weather graced us with sunshine and a peek into the hopeful…

“Wrong! The most important part of your job is to make money.” I will never forget those words from an attending in residency – though I did not know it at the time, it was a pivotal moment in my decision to pursue a nontraditional route in medicine. I loved my patients; I loved the…

An excerpt from 50 Years in the OR: True Stories of Life, Loss, and Laughter While Giving Anesthesia. Chronic long-term alcoholism causes many health problems, not the least of which is cirrhosis of the liver. In advanced cases of cirrhosis, the liver becomes full of scar tissue and its many functions are then impaired, causing…