MD Whistleblower

I began this past Thanksgiving Day seeing patients at two local hospitals.  Yes, I was working on Thanksgiving, as I have done on many holidays over the past 25 years.  Many folks have the luxury of jobs that offer every weekend and holiday off automatically.  Many don’t.   For example, on Thanksgiving, the hospitals were staffed by nurses, secretaries, security personnel, housekeepers and cafeteria workers.  And, of course, every patient was seen by his attending physician and various specialists.  If any of us contemplated complaining that we had to work, a quick glance at any of the patients confined to their hospital beds would have quickly set us right. It’s not only medical care that must be available every day of the year.  Law enforcement, firefighters, utility companies, and national security institutions simply can’t clock out on Friday afternoons.  If you call 911 on a Sunday, you will not be greeted by a recorded message....

Physicians speak with patients every day on the phone for a variety of reasons.   Our practice now uses a portal system, giving patients access to some of their medical data and to us.  Although I was resistant to having e-mail communications with patients, I have come to appreciate the advantages. It relieves our ever congested phone lines It relieves patients from a state of suspended animation as they hope and pray that a living breathing human being will return to the line after being placed on hold It saves our staff time who no longer have to triage calls as the patient directly reaches the doctor While this streamlined cyber communication system is useful, it does have limitations.  It can’t solve every problem.  Indeed, some issues are not appropriate for either a phone call or an e-mail. Calling his doctor? Consider the following scenarios.  Which can be appropriately handled on the phone and which merit a face to face encounter with a ph...

Gluten is in the news again.  Gluten and probiotics are among the two dietary issues that most consume my patients.  I am asked for my opinion on them several times each week.  Although my opinion is solicited, these patients have largely already made up their own minds as they are often avoiding gluten and swallowing zillions of ‘good bacteria’ with zeal and enthusiasm. Why do they do this in the absence of corroborating medical evidence?  Why do millions of voters support Donald Trump’s mantra that he will ‘make America great again’?  Both of these groups do so on faith.  When our need to believe something is overpowering, our demand for proof recedes.  Many of us need to believe that gluten is the agent responsible for our vague medical complaints that have stymied our doctors.  Similarly, our frustration with so many aspects of our society and conventional candidates makes us believe that Trump will turn the nation into yellow brick roads ...

Lawyers and physicians have so much in common, despite some benign grievances that occasionally reach the level of homicidal rage.  Just kidding.  Calm down, juris doctors.  Consider the similarities.  Both professions serve a public who needs help.  Both wield professional advice and judgment that must be tailored to an individual’s unique circumstances.  Neither professional is ever 100% certain of anything, and an outcome cannot be guaranteed.  Both are charged to put their clients' and patients' interests above their own.  (Snickering permitted here.) Let's see what our legal brethren are up to.  Law schools in America are having a serious problem that they are struggling to remedy.   They need more students.  Of course, they could fill their classrooms by recruiting qualified candidates to apply to their institutions.  This strategy apparently couldn't fill the seats, assuming that it was even considered.  So,...

This afternoon, as I write this, a professional football player was ejected from a game for committing the transgression of unnecessary roughness.  This infraction should be taken seriously in a game where violence is not only legal, but desirable.  I’ll leave it to the reader to imagine how unnecessary the roughness was if it resulted in an ejection.  It is self-evident to any thinking person that the human body is not designed to withstand the punishment of this game.  Keep in mind that most of us are only seeing the actual games, and not the hundreds of hours of brutal practicing.  I take care of an octogenarian who played for the Cleveland Browns decades ago.  While this profession lifted him out of a Pennsylvania steel town, it is challenging for him to identify a part of his body that is working properly.   The National Football League (NFL), which showed us all last year how they fumbled their domestic violence issues, has belated admitted w...

A probiotic rep came to our office bearing lunch and billions of bacteria.  Who on their staff, I queried, counts the bacteria verifying that each packet has 3 billion disease-busting germs?  I suspect that these quantities are only estimates and that consumers may be unwittingly subjected to either an inadequate dosage or a toxic amount.   Caveat emptor! I surmise that plaintiff law firms are hiring germ counting experts hoping to establish with clear and convincing evidence that the product's label is false and misleading.  Soon, we can expect to see TV commercials when we will hear an authoritative announcer asks, "If you or someone you love took probiotics and developed fatigue, joint pains, weight loss, weight gain, nightmares, daydreaming, lack of energy, excess energy, loss of a sense of humor, extreme frivolity, lackluster performance reviews at work, basement flooding or any other adverse life outcome, then you may be entitled to compensation....

You don’t need to be an ear, nose & throat doctor to be conversant with the ‘smell test’.   We use this technique in everyday life.  This diagnostic test is used to determine if a situation is an egregious deviation from established norms.  The beauty of the smell test is that one need not be encumbered by facts and data.  It relies upon emotion and instinct, which greatly simplifies its use.  Let me illstrate. Situation When Smell Test Does Not Apply Grading the SAT Examination.  Sniffing and smelling just won’t work here. Situation When Smell Test Applies A city mayor hires his brother in a no-bid contract as a consultant.  Are you catching on here? The Mother of All Smell Testers I surmise that my erudite and insightful readers would sniff deeply through flared nostrils if they confronted the following situations. “A double dip ice cream cone, which yesterday cost $4.25 is now $57.85.  A severe shor...