You've seen it, somewhere.
Every city in America, and likely the world, has a local magazine. And once a year, that magazine publishes a "Best Docs" issue, usually listing 10 doctors from each specialty who they consider the best of the best.
Dr. Grumpy, for the record, is not biased against this. I've been named a "Best Doc" in my field several times.
And I know most of the other neurologists on the ...
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"You can't afford to be sick!"
I hate these ads.
You've seen them. They're in newspapers and regional magazines across the country. Some smiling mom and her cute kid. It's an ad for some local clinic, always with a tagline like "You can't afford to be sick!" or "You don't have time to be sick!"
And they list things they treat, like headache, sore throat, ankle sprain, runny nose, and skinned knees. They ...
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I'm a doctor. We get all the glory. And credit. And guess what? We only deserve part of it.
I started out in medicine in the mid-80's, volunteering at an ER. And the biggest shock to me was learning how much of what happens in a hospital is nurse territory. Doctors will see you anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes a day, depending on how sick you are. And the rest ...
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Generally, I find my practice works best when I get paid in dollars. They're convenient. They can be transmitted electronically between bank accounts. Mary and Annie like them. I can spend them by swiping a credit card.
But, in a remarkable effort to win the "Let's See How Stupid I Can Sound" award, a Nevada candidate for U.S. Senate has proposed ditching the idea of paying doctors in money, and going ...
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I haven't ever saved a life. No doctor has. We may prolong the inevitable, but we don't save anyone. We aren't immortal, and weren't meant to be. We die. All things do. Plants, animals, even stars. Death is as much a part of life as birth. And yet, at times people chase medical science as if we have immortality in all our gadgets and pills.
Why am I writing this?
A few ...
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Before telling this story, I’m going to have to lay some background for my non-medical readers.
The most obscene word in English, in my opinion, has three letters and is an acronym. It’s tPA (it stands for Tissue Plasminogen Activator).
This drug gets a lot of press as a "clotbuster." It has the potential to break down clots and reverse a stroke. That potential, however, has a dark side. By breaking down ...
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"A comprehensive and extremely useful roadmap for doctors."
-Eric Topol, MD, author of The Creative Destruction of Medicine
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