- Physician's Weekly

Semper Fidelis, Again

Mar 12, 2016

When he was 23 years old, he’d wanted to die. It was 2005. He was a Marine, a Corporal, and was...

Do Video Recordings Help or Hurt Doctors?

Jan 11, 2016

A recent event at the trauma center where I work raised some serious questions regarding the use...

Recertification Blues: A Useless Exam

Dec 16, 2015

I recently took the American Board of Surgery MOC exam. This will make the third time in my career...

Surgery: Things Left Behind

Sep 18, 2015

I got the call from the radiologist at midday, just as I was about to start my third case in the...

EMR Alerts: Crying Wolf

Aug 28, 2015

Anyone who has spent time on the Internet has seen those annoying pop-up ads that contaminate...

Too Old to Operate?

Aug 5, 2015

He was 94 years old and was in my office because his gallstones were becoming a problem. They had...

It Ain’t What You Don’t Know…

Jul 24, 2015

A while back, I was on call on a Saturday night when we got a notification of an incoming trauma,...

High Expectations & Physician Suicide

Jun 22, 2015

A friend on Facebook recently forwarded a news article and a link to a physician blog about the...

Just Culture? Just Kidding.

May 26, 2015

The big health system that owns the hospital where I do much of my elective scheduled surgery has...

Even though Phoenix is a big city (sixth largest in the U.S.) the surgical community is a relatively small. We all know most of the other general surgeons in the Valley, if not personally, then by reputation or at one degree of...

Reconnecting With Those Who Inspired You

Apr 27, 2015

I got an e-mail recently from a Dr. Tim Race, MD, FACS. I didn’t remember knowing a Dr. Race and almost deleted it. I’m all over Social Media these days and have gotten some increased notice because of some columns I’ve written...

Trauma Surgeons: Lifeguards at the Shallow End?

Apr 13, 2015

There was a time, during my training and early in my career when the trauma surgeon was the...

Age and the Trauma Surgeon

Apr 2, 2015

I’m on day 5 of an 8-day run of Port-and-Starboard trauma call (Navy talk for every other night)...

Hello Darkness My Old Friend

Mar 26, 2015

My friend Nick, the ER doctor, called me the other day to tell me that one of my patients had died...

Contracts

Mar 19, 2015

The hospital where I do much of my elective surgery recently terminated the contract it had with a large Hospitalist group and announced plans to hire Hospitalists directly as hospital employees. A less publicized part of that...

Dancing in the OR

Mar 9, 2015

I was not having a good morning. I had just come off Trauma call—a difficult 24hr shift that was finally behind me. I had finished a long week of rounding on the Trauma Service and had turned the patients over to Sid, who would...

Sphincter Blues

Feb 27, 2015

“One of life’s underappreciated pleasures is the filling and emptying of one’s hollow viscus.” —attributed to Samuel Johnson, but maybe not. Admit it, we all love filling our tummies, that much is obvious. But isn’t a good bowel...