Monday Melange: Medicine

I have been saving links to posts by other people for over a year. Some of these posts just struck my fancy at the time, others I find myself thinking about for weeks or months afterwards. I would like to share them with others, rather than hoarding them on my list of saved posts. I hope some of them speak to you as well.

It’s almost September, and another year has started at the medical school. In honor of those eager, earnest students I see (and in memory of the eager, earnest student I once was), here are some articles I have saved about…Medicine. With some segues into health, finance, the business of medicine, and the meaning of life.

High Plains MD doesn’t write prolifically, but when he does, his posts are usually thought provoking and touching. I saved this piece, Rugged Individualism Dies a Slow Death on the High Plains, because of the way it spoke to me about medicine. How we can work hard and do our best for our patients, but the fact is, their lives are not truly spent in our offices or our hospitals. It is the rest of their lives that is so important in maintaining their health. Or unhealth. What will happen to those small towns whose young people leave for greener pastures?

Luckily for those in CT, Chief Mom Officer’s husband is willing and able to take care of the vulnerable. Despite having been very ill himself several years ago, he went to work in a nursing home and stayed on even after the novel coronavirus changed everything. She wrote about this in My Husband Was On A Ventilator, and Used to Entertain the Elderly. Now He Cleans a COVID Nursing Home.

Investing Doc wrote an amazing tribute to his medical school roommate in How The Passing Of A Young Doctor Changed My Outlook on Life. I think there is a lot of wisdom to be learned here.

I write sometimes about wanting to retire, but I really am not quite ready to quit medicine altogether. I should review Wealthy MD’s article periodically for reminders on how to Love Being A Doctor: 35 Practical Changes.

Crispy Doc has a lot of fun with innuendos in It’s Time To Rekindle Your Love For Medicine. He offers some more practical pathways (interviews and posts) with his page on Docs Who Cut Back.

I was super interested in reading about health insurance in Switzerland. I will likely never need to use Swiss health care, but it is so interesting to hear how other places manage these things.

Lastly, for a bit of fun, I loved this discussion about medicine and Greek mythology by DocWife: Details Of An Argument With My Husband About A Symbol Of Medicine.

I hope that you found some of these articles interesting, or touching, or amusing. Possibly even all three.