The intricacies of working as a doctor with a spinal cord injury

Here are the stories you missed on KevinMD. Thank you for your continuing readership. --------------------------------------------------------------- Here are the stories you missed on [KevinMD](. Thank you for your continuing readership. --------------------------------------------------------------- Sponsors There are no easy ways to eliminate alarm fatigue, protect health care workers from workplace violence events, or eradicate physician burnout. [COVID-19 complicates these issues](. Improved communications can be part of the solution. [Read this eBook to find out more](. [Since the start of COVID-19]( a majority of people are experiencing increased levels of stress and 42 percent report a decline in mental health. Physicians face [potential liability risks]( if warning signs of stress are missed. Did you know more than 80% of surveyed Americans who have used telehealth services said they [liked or loved it]( Download the Updox infographic on consumer preferences of telehealth both [now and post-COVID](. [Tax planning for physicians]( updated with recent COVID-19 changes. Learn how to save taxes and keep more of what you make by registering for [this month’s webinars]( Make the Most of Your S-Corp Deductions and Hiring your Children (Including Spouse and Parents) --------------------------------------------------------------- KevinMD Plus: Jun 15, 2020 [The intricacies of working as a doctor with a spinal cord injury]( I work as a resident in Australia’s busiest emergency department. Well, it was the busiest at a recent count anyway. The department is housed in the city of Gold Coast. The city sprawls across a beautiful stretch of beach. When I wake up, I turn my head to see the sun hanging out over the […] [A physician and her COVID-free island]( I am a physician that was placed in a unique position. I was hired as a private contractor to work for three months in a remote medical setting on Wake Island. Wake Island is a remote island approximately 2000 miles west of Hawaii, with a population of 150+ people. Wake Island is unique in that […] [How to make COVID-19 contact tracing work]( Imagine answering a call from an unknown number. A stranger announces you may have been exposed to coronavirus; you may or may not get seriously ill, and either way, you have to isolate yourself for two weeks while everyone else carries on. What goes through your mind? Are you scared? Who will take care of […] [COVID-19 will set female leaders in STEM back for years]( The scene is becoming far too familiar for so many of us. Hours and days in meetings, struggling to stay relevant in this new virtual workplace. Earphones anchored in, skillfully planning the “unmute” to avoid transmitting the sounds of screaming children. Simultaneously, trying to make meals and do dishes while having an iPad shoved in […] [An unintended consequence of COVID universal masking]( Spring 2020 has brought a disproportionate amount of grief for many of us. The losses include mortal ones, such as the death of a loved one, a colleague, or a patient. We’ve lost productivity, opportunities, and income. We’ve also lost freedoms, from the personal liberty to go where we please to our ability to spend […] [We need improved mental health care for physicians]( In 2014, an emergency medicine resident opened a personal email and was shocked to see it briefly mention the death of another resident physician from a different training program. Unofficial group chats ensued amongst her co-residents, discussing the vague email. Suspicion arose that the resident has died of suicide. His particular death was never addressed […] [Ethical dilemmas in the pandemic era [PODCAST]]( “The donation of hydroxychloroquine, in contrast to the accompanying donation of 1,000 ventilators, is unethical as either humanitarian aid or as a ‘research study.’ The United States has a moral responsibility for any human harm that results. We cannot simply send medications off to potentially vulnerable populations without regard for the lives that could be […] [Hospital-based preparedness in the post-COVID era]( COVID-19 has made the inadequacy of our public health and hospital-based health care system to identify, mitigate, and resolve pandemic disaster self-evident. Gaps in hospital-based preparedness capacity are abundant, including the inadequacy of stockpiles for personal protective equipment (PPE), ventilators, medications, lack of surge inpatient and ICU capacity, and an inability to rapidly scale testing […] [The Silver Linings Playbook for COVID-19]( In the film Silver Linings Playbook, the protagonist Pat struggles to control his bipolar disorder, which triggers violent outbursts leading to hospitalization in a locked psychiatric unit. Upon discharge, Pat commits to a new outlook on life, embodied by the Latin word “Excelsior”—”ever upward.” Emboldened by this new mantra, he endeavors to reframe crises as […] [Adapting medical safety standards to enhance police outcomes]( As a resident in the 1970s, I used to receive the AMA weekly newsletter. A squib of a few paragraphs noted that the Alabama Medical Board had issued a reprimand to a surgeon for suturing the hand of a young African-American man, then removing the sutures when the fellow did not have $25 on him […] [That was me: a millennial physician’s experience with racism]( A black girl was called the N-word on the playground in elementary school in the ’90s. That black girl was me. A black girl was called ugly because of her dark black skin in elementary school in the ’90s. That black girl was me. A black girl created and independently executed a project for the […] [The black physician’s burden]( I remember clearly the first lecture in which I began to feel the painful knot of despair clenched in my chest. We were being taught about piebaldism, a disease that impacts the pigment-producing cells of the body. It was not the description of the condition that alarmed me, but rather the picture that was chosen […] [Extending lessons learned to a post pandemic world]( Since COVID-19, the way that we practice medicine has changed. Every patient we see, test we order, and treatment we prescribe is under closer scrutiny. Direct patient interaction has been cut to the bare minimum. This has proved to be a challenge in many ways, forcing us to adapt to a new model of medicine. […] [Immigrant and minority physicians at the frontline of pandemics [PODCAST]]( “It is no secret that we started off combating COVID-19 with disadvantages. Lately, news is rampant with coverage of the paucity of ventilators, hospital beds, and N95 masks. But it is important not to forget the deficits in our workforce. Last year, the American Medical Association estimated that our nation faces a projected shortage of […] [About your salary: We value you]( Doctors across America are getting strikingly similar messages from their hospital administrators—that we are highly valued, but that they will reduce our salaries due to the pandemic. Whether you are working on the frontline and risking your life (and your family’s health) with limited PPE available (and indeed locked up and rationed), or whether you […] [Protect and serve. Do no harm. Both are failing.]( Protect and serve. Do no harm. These are covenants our public servants promise to us. Police officers and clinicians are both entrusted with attending to our health and safety. Both are failing. We must be able to trust clinicians and police with the intricate details of our living and dying. When they deliberately lapse in […] [I can’t stay home. I am a health care worker.]( We have all seen the memes and picture frames on social media. I can’t stay home – I am a health care worker. I am a health care worker. But I have been mostly home the past eight weeks, and the thought of returning to the office full-time has left me grappling with anxiety and […] [What about the mental health of clinical trial participants?]( “Why is my disease less important than COVID?” Donna asked me toward the end of our phone call. Two years ago, after celebrating her 65th birthday, she was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia—an aggressive type of blood cancer—which turned out to be refractory to conventional chemotherapy. After spending hundreds of hours with doctors and social workers, she […] [We are not trying to be conservative or liberal. We are human.]( My mother has a tattoo. Really. She does. There is a small blue crucifix on the inner aspect of her right wrist. Let me pause here to point out a few things. First of all, my mother is not a “tattoo” person. Secondly, the inner aspect of the wrist is one of the most sensitive […] [Body-shaming in the time of COVID]( The severity of COVID appears to be increased in people with obesity. This may represent an opportunity to discuss the benefits of lifestyle change with overweight patients. However, if not done appropriately, the opportunity becomes transformed into just one more damaging, body-shaming experience for the patient. There has been much written and little done about […] [Coronavirus through a storytelling lens [PODCAST]]( “Come with me on this journey, this very ancient journey. To experience the age-old story of a very modern foe. This foe is invisible; it is neither living nor dead. You cannot smell it, and you cannot taste it. While it is not alive, it can become alive, with a flick of the right kind […] [It’s time to flip the medical school classroom [PODCAST]]( “As a nearly graduated medical student, I have come to the conclusion that the focus of medical school is split between training and distinguishing medical students. Modern pedagogy has not found its way into the modern medical school classroom. Preclinical students spend mounds of time on impossible tasks, like memorizing First Aid for the USMLE […] [How the journey in medicine made me a better father]( When I left Wall Street to pursue a career in medicine, I had some understanding of the long and winding path ahead of me, but I never anticipated our current strange reality leveled by the destructive force of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. We now face surreal uncertainties, including the shutdown of large swaths of our health […] --------------------------------------------------------------- If a friend sent you this email and you want to subscribe, go to [KevinMD](. --------------------------------------------------------------- 345 Hudson Street New York NY 10014 USA [Unsubscribe]( | [Change Subscriber Options](