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Why I wrote a medical thriller about patients’ secrets

Renda K. Knapp, MD

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

The most important moment of a medical appointment usually happens at the very end, with a hand on the doorknob. Every physician knows the moment. The visit is over. The official reason for it (the refill, the checkup, the cough) has been handled. And then, as she reaches for the door, the patient pauses. “Actually, there’s one more thing.”

In thirty years as an OB/GYN, I have learned that the one …

Drugs and prescribing

The exercise pill is back, and history urges caution

Francisco M. Torres, MD

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

I was once the proud owner of a gadget from the early 2000s. A belt you wrapped around your midsection, switched on, and supposedly watched the vibrations melt the fat away. Predictably, it did not work. In fact, it never could have. Still, at the time I wanted it to work so much that, for a moment, I set aside everything I knew as a physician about how muscle and …

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Parental instincts caught what normal tests missed

Jayme Higgins, RN

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

As a nurse, I understand why medicine depends on objective data. We rely on lab results, imaging studies, vital signs, and physical examinations to help guide decisions. We are trained to avoid unnecessary testing, unnecessary radiation, and unnecessary interventions. I fully understand the risks of overdiagnosis, radiation exposure, and the reality that many childhood illnesses improve with time and supportive care.

But recently, I learned a lesson from the other side …

Narinder Singh Parhar, MD

Health care innovation is more than a new drug or device

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

For many people working in health care, the problems have become painfully familiar: the growing burden of chronic disease, physician and nurse burnout, shortages of adequately trained clinicians, rising costs, and dissatisfaction among patients and professionals alike. Together, these pressures can create a frustrating feeling that we have reached the end of the road. I believe we have reached a point that demands a change in direction.

We have extraordinary scientific …

Misdiagnosed with MS? Why losing the label feels like grief

Kara Wada, MD

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

"Congratulations, you don't have MS." That's what Christina Applegate's doctor told her, five years after she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS). Newer technology had ruled it out. On her podcast this week, she described how everyone around her was…

“Congratulations, you don’t have MS.”

That’s what Christina Applegate’s doctor told her, five years after she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS). Newer technology had ruled it out. On her podcast this week, she described how everyone around her was thrilled, and she wasn’t. She still needs a wheelchair to get from the car to the exam room. Nothing magical happened when she heard the news.

I’m not her doctor, and …

Why the news ignores injuries to slaughterhouse workers

Martha Rosenberg

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

The public did not hear about the worker walkouts at slaughterhouses in Greeley, Colorado, and Monmouth, Illinois, earlier this year for the same reason it does not hear about worker injuries in general in the plants. Heavy machinery combined with…

Heavy machinery combined with wet floors, sharp knives, and frenzied line speeds makes meat and poultry plants some of the most dangerous workplaces in the U.S. Across industries, an average of 27 …

Outdated medical information needs an expiration date

Dr. Aman Mishra

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

An article can be accurate the day it's published and misleading by the time you read it. Nothing about the text changes. The evidence underneath it does. That's the part search engines and social feeds don't tell you. A page…

An article can be accurate the day it’s published and misleading by the time you read it. Nothing about the text changes. The evidence underneath it does.

That’s the part search engines and social feeds don’t tell you. A page looks current (clean design, working links, top of the search results) while its core recommendation is stale, superseded by a trial, a safety alert, a new diagnostic cutoff, or an updated …

Physician finance

Who handles prior authorization when your biller is out?

Karan Kanwar

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

The payer's portal wants a six-digit code, and the code is on its way to the biller's phone. She's out until Wednesday. A patient stands at the front desk, waiting to hear whether a prior auth went through. A medical…

The payer’s portal wants a six-digit code, and the code is on its way to the biller’s phone. She’s out until Wednesday.

A patient stands at the front desk, waiting to hear whether a prior auth went through. A medical assistant works down the shared password sheet, two years old by now, until the login locks on the third try. The patient leaves without an answer, and the visit stays unbooked.

At …

Kseniia Zarubina, MD, PhD

What health care gets wrong about mid-career physicians

Ben Feldman, MD

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

I'll never forget the moment when I knew I was going to have to make a big transition. After more than a decade of navigating what had become an ongoing tension between work and life, I remember running the numbers…

I’ll never forget the moment when I knew I was going to have to make a big transition. After more than a decade of navigating what had become an ongoing tension between work and life, I remember running the numbers one evening and realizing something had to give. My overhead and schedule pressures became impossible to ignore.

As a private-practice otolaryngologist, I lived and worked in the same community where my …

Medical education

CME credits measure time, not how physicians decide

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

I trained as a physician and spent the first part of my career moving between clinical practice and research, much of it in hematology. The cases that stayed with me were rarely the ones where knowledge was missing. They were the ones where reasoning had to hold up across a sequence of decisions made under uncertainty: what to ask first, what to test, what to rule out, and when to …

Preventable birth injuries happen at great hospitals too

Frank S. Gaudio, JD

October 22, 2026Oct 22, 2026

One of the first things parents tell me is where their baby was born. Almost instinctively, they add something like, "It's one of the best hospitals in the area." I believe them. Many of the birth injury cases I've handled…

One of the first things parents tell me is where their baby was born. Almost instinctively, they add something like, “It’s one of the best hospitals in the area.” I believe them.

Many of the birth injury cases I’ve handled over the years have come from hospitals with outstanding reputations. Hospitals people drive hours to reach. Hospitals with nationally recognized physicians, advanced neonatal units, impressive research programs and walls lined with …

The Podcast by KevinMD

Your living will could get you too much care, or too little [PODCAST]

The Podcast by KevinMD

October 21, 2026Oct 21, 2026

When you can't speak for yourself, a living will is supposed to speak for you. Too often, it doesn't. Seventy percent of U.S. adults don't have one, and those who do often keep it in a drawer at home. Emergency…

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When you can’t speak for yourself, a living will is supposed to speak for you. Too often, it doesn’t. Seventy percent of U.S. adults don’t have one, and those who do often keep it in a drawer at home. Emergency physician and MIDEO Health Technologies CEO Ferdinando Mirarchi and attorney …

Is teen anxiety normal or a disorder? Both answers can fail.

Timothy Lesaca, MD

October 21, 2026Oct 21, 2026

Teenage anxiety is real, but if we treat every feeling as a medical issue, we might overlook what is truly important. When a teen says, "I'm anxious," we shouldn't have to choose between saying, "You have a disorder," or "That's…

Teenage anxiety is real, but if we treat every feeling as a medical issue, we might overlook what is truly important. When a teen says, “I’m anxious,” we shouldn’t have to choose between saying, “You have a disorder,” or “That’s just adolescence.” Both responses can shut down a conversation before it even starts.

A 2026 study in JAMA Pediatrics reveals this distinction. Analyzing 2024 National Survey on Drug Use and Health …

Medical education

Did I fail my first code as a medical student?

Afshine Ash Emrani, MD

October 21, 2026Oct 21, 2026

An excerpt from Beyond the White Coat: A Novel. Before I ever ran toward a code, I ran away from one. I was a fourth-year medical student at U.C. San Diego shadowing in the trauma bay when a man arrived…

An excerpt from Beyond the White Coat: A Novel.

Before I ever ran toward a code, I ran away from one.

I was a fourth-year medical student at U.C. San Diego shadowing in the trauma bay when a man arrived from a freeway accident, young, beautiful, golden even in blood. They called for compressions. I stood back, pressed against the wall, my hands gripping my clipboard like it might protect me …

Patient voices

Learning to walk again after injury is not just physical

Anna Estrin

October 21, 2026Oct 21, 2026

Before my injury, my life revolved around fashion: runway shows, camera flashes, social events, and, almost always, high heels. I wrote about the fashion industry and treated walking as something the body simply did. Then a severe ankle fracture-dislocation and surgery changed the scale of an ordinary day. The heels gave way to a wheelchair. Success became taking a few steps.

I spent about three months in a wheelchair. I expected …

Losing health insurance should not mean losing dignity

Katie Abbott, MHA

October 21, 2026Oct 21, 2026

At a recent health care conference, a panel of leaders gathered to talk about financial resilience. The framing was intentionally designed. The question wasn't "How do we save money?" It was "how to deliver the right care, at the right…

At a recent health care conference, a panel of leaders gathered to talk about financial resilience. The framing was intentionally designed. The question wasn’t “How do we save money?” It was “how to deliver the right care, at the right time, in the way that is most meaningful, so that outcomes change, health improves, and the total cost of care comes down.”

When the audience asked how social and structural drivers …

Physician finance

A medical license scam nearly took my life savings

Lynn R. Webster, MD

October 21, 2026Oct 21, 2026

As a physician, I spent decades training to manage medical crises, yet I nearly lost my life savings to a calculated deception. The caller offered me two ways to protect my assets: convert everything to gold and take it to…

As a physician, I spent decades training to manage medical crises, yet I nearly lost my life savings to a calculated deception.

The caller offered me two ways to protect my assets: convert everything to gold and take it to Washington, D.C., for deposit with the Department of the Treasury, or convert everything to digital currency.

By then, I had spent nearly three weeks communicating with people I believed might be investigating …

Why medical malpractice reform keeps dying in Congress

Howard Smith, MD

October 21, 2026Oct 21, 2026

I intend to prove four things: (1) The nation is at the tipping point of socialized medicine. (2) Medical malpractice lawsuits tip the scale. (3) Lawyers have their fingers on the scale and are to blame. (4) The American people…

The consequence of these four things is exemplified in 2017 with HR 1215, the Protecting Access …