Medical

“If we do not raise objections to this kind of comedy, we are teaching those around us that food allergies can be funny. It is no that surprise that data indicates kids and adults are anxious, embarrassed, and bullied due to food allergies. When we make light of anaphylaxis, we perpetuate the misleading stigma regarding…

There’s not a perfect financial planning vehicle in existence. Salary deferral plans, like many retirement plans and 457 plans, carry pros and cons. Many hospital systems have a combination of 401(k), 403(b), and 457 plans. The 401(k) is often designed for the employees who make under a certain amount, say less than $150,000 or so.…

Like most modern marriages with spouses in the same profession, ours is one based on an exquisite balance of willful one-upmanship and reluctant admiration. A pandemic with two physicians in critical care medicine, albeit in different disciplines, serves as ample cause for a seismic shift in that equilibrium. In January, while the balance was still…

The Lebanese-born former American oncologist Farid Fata committed one of the most malicious acts of greed by a medical professional in recorded history. Fata spent six years telling otherwise healthy people that they had cancer and needed immediate chemotherapy. He then fraudulently billed over $34 million in charges to Medicare and private insurance companies. Fata…

For you, the story is quite different. Away from the anxieties of the news, you were there, in the front row. You saw it all. You heard about it in January, and somehow it was impossible to fathom the horror that was to come. You agonized about the misses; vitals flashed in your dreams. You…

This year has been the blackest of nights for so many of our friends and neighbors. Daily, I still see the ravages of depression, made worse by the pandemic. It will be some time until we understand the repercussions of postponed cancer screenings. Even simple blood tests have become a perilous journey to the outside…

“Early in the pandemic, in thinking of and discussing possible solutions to help protect health care workers, two of my former colleagues and I recalled a device called the Surgical Smoke Evacuator (SSE), which we used extensively since the 1990s when we worked together at the University of Pittsburgh to collect and safely dispose of…

Keep it Simple is a bumper sticker slogan. Life during a pandemic has been anything but simple, and the holiday season presents (not the gift kind) its own special challenges. So does living alone and trying to stay humanized. In his book Together: The Healing Power of Human Connection in a Sometimes Lonely World, Surgeon…

If you’ve scrolled through social media lately, you’ve undoubtedly encountered a swirl of misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines. In one video, a young woman gets a COVID-19 vaccine, and within a few hours, begins climbing the walls of her room as if possessed by a demon. Another one shows a young man shaking uncontrollably in the…