Feb 21, 2019 | Aging, Doctoring, Health Care, Patients
I have been fired by a patient – explicitly and to my face – just once. It happened during my first year after residency, and although I can no longer recall the patient’s name, I can still see her pretty face, carefully styled hair, and barely contained terror....
Apr 6, 2015 | Aging, Health Care, News and Updates
A few months ago, a photo of a dress went viral because people saw different things when they looked at it. Was it blue with black stripes, or white with gold stripes? Others disputed whether it mattered and wondered about human divisions and trivial obsessions. The...
Feb 7, 2015 | Aging, Doctoring, Health Care, News and Updates, Public Medical Communication, Social Media, Writing
Great writing comes in many shapes and sizes, from a single sentence of stunning lyricism or profound insight to an epic novel that captures a particular time and place in all its complexity, or an essay that succeeds as much because of its form as its content....
Aug 9, 2014 | Aging, Health Care, Patients, Writing
Recently, a pediatrician friend remarked that people – patients’ parents, friends, strangers she chats with briefly in airports and coffee lines – were always asking her for recommendations on the best books about childhood. I had to admit that I don’t get many...
Jul 31, 2014 | Aging, Health Care, Patients
My recent New York Times op-ed on robot caregivers for older adults has elicited curiosity, enthusiasm and controversy. I have to admit that my own first reaction to the topic was captured in the NYT letter from Sherry Turkle whom I mention in the piece. I was in a...
