What a near-fatal near-miss taught me about trusting myself as a physician What’s worse than making a mistake? Knowing that you’re probably making one, and doing it anyway. I’m sure you’ve done this at some point in your life: Overrode your own instincts and made a …
This past week I was in an airport, returning from a fantastic family vacation. I was as relaxed as one can be whilst sitting and awaiting one’s boarding call. Then, from somewhere nearby, there was a beeping noise — a coffee shop’s electronic coffee maker, …
It’s been a crazy time, people, absolutely crazy, and I’ll have to tell you all about it NEXT month. Just now I was digging back in my blog archives for something interesting I can upcycle so that March 2024 doesn’t go by without a post. …
The surgeons are waiting in the ambulance bay. An ambulance screeches to a halt in front of them. A paramedic jumps out, and breathlessly gives report: “Speedboat accident! Nineteen year old female. Lost vitals twice but BP’s holding in the low 80’s. Both arms amputated …
I wrote this piece in 2002, and it was published in the medical school literary magazine where I did my residency. As I mentioned in my last post, I have hundreds of journal entries and essays like this one. Geez, I used a lot of …
Remember Tales from the Crypt, that cheesy HBO horror series based on the 1950’s E.C. comic books? Well, it’s the perfect title for this post. Here it is Halloween season, and I am right now transcribing the winter 2002 journal entries from my intern year, …
My friend’s husband asked me this question as we stood outside their house in the February cold chatting, while their pajama’d kids ran around inside. His tone was incredulous, his expression both baffled and angry, and his frustration well-justified. I was on my way to …
I’m writing a book, and as such, I’ve been combing through the archives. I just re-read my very first blog post ever, and realized it was from almost exactly twelve years ago. It’s a sweet little piece, full of details that I wouldn’t have remembered …
I’m surrounded. Our kitchen table is strewn with piles of my old journals, many years’ worth of writing workshop printouts, and copies of every academic literary magazine that ever published my stuff. It’s a lot of my old writing, including some fairly well-developed stories and …
“Sometimes, late at night, you can still hear the moans of the poor souls who died tortured deaths in the old ICU…” Dr. Gabaldi was a well-liked teaching attending who enjoyed entertaining us with his ghost stories. It wasn’t hard to come up with a …