October Greetings!
Fall is officially in the air. Welcome to October! I hope that your autumn is off to a pleasant start. I’ve recently enjoyed visiting my daughter Clare, a junior at Endicott College, and watching her play tennis for the Endicott Gulls.
The autumn months
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In the past month, I attended FemInEM’s #FIX19 in New York City and the Women in Medicine Summit in Chicago. Both events were powerful reminders of the importance of equity and inclusion, each calling for bravery and bold action. If you put two conferences on your personal development calendar next year, make it these two…
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One of the things I am most passionate about is working to find a better way for American healthcare professionals to practice medicine. Doctors, nurses, and other healthcare workers are suffering. A new study reveals that 79% of primary care physicians are struggling with symptoms of burnout. And we all know the statistic that, in the United States, we lose a doctor every day to suicide.
One of the ways I’m working to alleviate…
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In the middle of September, hundreds of physicians from around the world, women in emergency medicine, will gather in New York City for the third annual FemInEM Idea Exchange— FIX 19.
FIX is so much more than a conference. It is a chance to connect with a community…
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We recently celebrated Labor Day here in the United States. The first Labor Day took place in New York City in 1882 and was designed to bring workers from different sectors together to fight for their shared needs. Their main problem was simple: American workers were spending too much time, too many of the precious hours of the day, at work.
One of their rallying cries, in support of the eight-hour workday was…
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A few years ago, there was a slew of essays and opinion pieces that called the month of September the “new January”.
It is certainly a time for transition for many people in our communities. The summer is coming to a close. People are preparing their schedules and work and lives for the coming autumn months. School has begun again. Many people embrace this transition as a time to evaluate
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There is little more valuable than our time.
In the medical profession, we talk a lot about burnout, physical and emotional exhaustion caused my chronic stress. The symptoms of burnout can range from headaches to feelings of hopelessness, from low self-esteem to sleep difficulties. Left unchecked, burnout can…
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I’ve written before about connecting with your true self. But I’ve been wondering lately— how does this idea translate to social media? Roughly 70% of American adults use at least one social media site. This number is even higher for younger Americans. What’s more
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Of the many facets of my working life as a physician and educator, the thing I love most is speaking. I speak to all kinds of groups, to all kinds of people...
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Warm August greetings to all of you! It has been a celebratory summer so far. I’ve been able to travel with my incredible daughters, celebrate the wedding of my beautiful niece Corinne, and am still basking in the glow of the World Cup win by the United States Women’s National Soccer Team.
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You’re expecting a tidy, empowering list here, aren’t you? I’ve done this— gone searching for tips, ideas, inspiration on how to do more in my day— Be More Productive! Do Everything (and More)!
Memes float around reminding us that we have the same amount of hours in the day as Beyonce— and look at all that she is able to accomplish! The times is ours…
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Increasingly, medical schools are embracing the importance of narrative medicine, the ability for physicians to construct stories about the experiences of their patients in an attempt to be able to see and work with a more complete picture.
Physicians are scientists. We are also human beings, storytelling creatures. We must …
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This week, I’m sharing passages from beautiful books written by healthcare professionals, thoughts on medicine and mortality by Rana Awdish, Paul Kalanithi, Atul Gawande, and Lee Gutkind.
From In Shock: My Journey from Death to Recovery and the Redemptive Power of Hope by Rana Awdish
“We cannot define success as beating death because …
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It is difficult to understate the importance of self-confidence in our lives. It can motivate us to try new things, allow us to feel secure in our authentic selves, and help with responses to stress and anxiety.
Confidence lags in each of us, from time to time. There are a number of things we can do…
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Last month, I started summer the right way— with a road trip. I drove from southeastern Illinois through Ohio and Pennsylvania. I drove to have lunch with my daughter, Connor, in Massachusetts and, on my way to spend time with friends in Maine, decided to visit…
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When a patient and their family enter the Emergency Department, they want desperately to believe that the doctors they are placing their trust in will know exactly what to do and will execute any necessary medical care flawlessly. We want this, too. Our patients and their families want…
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Work harder on yourself than you do your job. I say it in so many of the talks and lectures that I give. Work harder on yourself than you do your job. While I think this principle is true for any line of work, it is especially difficult for many physicians to hear and internalize. We are hardwired to work diligently on whatever task is in front of us. And so often,
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Researchers estimate that, on average, we have 70,000 thoughts per day. 70,000! The bad news? Around 80% of those thoughts are negative. Many of those negative thoughts are ones we have about ourselves— thoughts that we aren’t good enough or smart enough or qualified enough. And the majority of those self-defeating thoughts are lies…
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June Greetings
It’s hard to believe that June is already here!
Last month, we celebrated two of my daughters graduating from college and my youngest completing her sophomore year. Now, my family is preparing for …
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