I’ve “had my snorkel up” the last couple of months. My senior partner introduced me to the phrase after I started practice in Rooks County, so perhaps it is unique to our group. If you take a minute to reflect on the words, you’ll know what they mean: I was underwater and one big wave away from losing my lifeline to the surface.
Read MoreThings are different when you live half-way between Kansas City and Denver. You can’t pop down the street to a great Ethiopian restaurant or head to the mega-mall for a last minute Christmas gift, for example. And there is no anonymity; news in a small community travels quickly, and everyone is part of the community. The line between patient and friend rarely exists. My home address and phone number are in the phonebook; it wouldn’t matter if they were unlisted because everyone knows where I live anyway. And I’m good with that fact.
Read MoreThe first time I heard that computers would revolutionize the way we take care of patients, I was all in. As a family medicine resident, I served as the champion for our newly-installed electronic health record (EHR). I volunteered for any committee, task force or board that had the words “health” and “electronic” in the name or the mission. It took more than 15 years to disillusion me, but eventually, the shortcomings of electronic health records outweighed my enthusiasm. Should computers be a tool used in and by the house of medicine? Yes! Will we achieve success by iterating on today’s EHR options? Hmm. I have my doubts.
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