Get Cancer. Lose Your Job?
The harsh reality is that people who have had cancer treatment are sometimes perceived as a burden on a working group
Why Not Tweet When You Are In the Hospital and Not Feeling Well?
Being isolated in a hospital room leaves you vulnerable to doctors who may be inappropriate, rude and even abusive. You might consider that having the capacity to call for help – to Tweet – is empowering. Health care #911, and very public! But…
More on Mammography, Breast Cancer, Misleading Arguments, Emotion and Women’s Health
While therapy has improved quite a bit since 1985, the greatest benefit derives from most women avoiding the need for life-long treatment by having small tumors found and removed before they’ve spread.
“The Dallas Buyers Club” Takes on AIDS, Peer Patients, and Not Taking “No” for An Answer
Published trials can be flawed. Even if they’re well-analyzed, the findings can be hard to interpret when it comes to a single patient’s course and well-being. What’s a dying man to do?
Why I Like the (Absurd) Dancing in the OR Video
What Deb did, and I thank her for this, is offer an extreme example of patient-centered care. Among other things, she did everything possible to assure that the people caring for her perceive her as a human being who loves dancing.
A Theoretical Note to My Students, On a Breast Cancer Case and Future Learning
Keep thinking, constantly – how the data applies to the person, an individual, the real patient you’re trying to help.
A Case for Slower Medicine
Anger is an understandable reaction to a system that dehumanizes patients, that treats bodies as containers of billable ailments and broken parts. But most doctors go about their daily work with good intention – to heal.
Seeing ZocDoc, And Listening To A Panel On Improving Health Care
No word cloud is needed; we were in one. It’s hard not to be charmed by the brightness of delightful, eager tech-workers who want to make it easier for people to get to doctors they might need. In theory. The ZocDoc space bore no semblance to any hospital or office where I’ve been a doctor or a patient.
Summer Reading: Island Practice, About A Rare Physician on Nantucket
This book probes the relationships formed when a doctor is immersed in his community. There are few secrets.
Questions for ASCO – on Tamoxifen, ATLAS and aTTom
The problem with Tamoxifen is that it has anti-estrogen effects that many young (and older) women consider undesirable. Already our breasts have been cut. Feeling “feminine” is not trivial.