This Historic Day

Our nation is, today a more perfect Union. It does not matter if the vote be close, it  only matters that we pause to collect the enormous energy to come from  BOTH houses of congress having passed Healthcare reform legislation. Today is the day, we reach out in compassion to the suffering, and the weak.

All we must sacrifice is our own unnecessary worry.  Today America is a prouder place to be. Today, in your lifetime.

Today I was in the room with the President of the American Association of Medical Colleges and listened to him speak for an hour on the grandeur of this day. That a great moral wrong has been corrected.

Our Hour to reach Greatness again in America: Nearing Universal Coverage

With Nine Months in office, the President and the Current congress have gone farther towards universal healthcare coverage than at any other time in the History of America. Not since Medicare was voted into being in 1965, against the same objections of the Republican party that it would bankrupt America, that we would get ‘Socialized Medicine” have we seen such a leap forward. i was on a panel discussion today at the University of Missouri and I saw GoodWill in action. With little care for how it would affect us personally in Medicine, I witnessed a total committment to reach out an fulfill the “Idea” that is America.

Remember, ‘America” is an idea, not geography.  My America does not torture. My America protects the weak and the vulnerable. My America is packed with a tulmultuous energy that welcomes everyone, from every land and distills the best drops of the Species on these shores and creates a fragrance of Hope and Heroism.

The Senate and House bills both put us at either 94 or 96% coverage of Americans. Both prevent denial of coverage to those who are the most ill, with pre-existing conditions and those are catastrophically ill. Both increase re-imbursement for primary care to balance the scales.

Let us pause for a moment and rest, and revel in the marvel of change. Let us absorb the energy of this tremendous HOPE and use it to finish the job. A strong public option. Control of the runaway greed of private health insurance. Expansion of the Med schools and the residencies, and let us pause, look at the closing of Guantanamo bay, the re-engagement of the rest of the world as a partner, not a tyrant, and let us feel the bliss, if only for a moment, that the idea of America, our Heroic and best America, our generous and noble America is. today, a more perfect union.

I am DELIGHTED that ‘Organized Medicine’ is 100% behind healthcare reform.

As a grown up ‘Class Clown’ I have rarely been on the same side as organized medicine. I have rarely seen them act with dignity,  courage and honor. I have seen cowardice, safe-keeping and reticence. I am delighted, thrilled, and happy to say that EVERY organized medicine group, all of them, have repeatedly, with decency, intelligence and guts, take on the ’status Quo’. I have never been prouder to be a physician. It is NOT only that 77% of doctors support a public option, it is that the American College of Phyicians, the AmericanAcademy of Family Practive, the American College of Surgeons and MANY MANY MANY others are ALL doing the right thing. They are standing up for the good, the right, and the just.

I have never particularly felt ‘Proud’ to be part of the collegiality of physicians. But I am now. They are voting their hopes, and not their fears. They are acting as GOOD stewards of the public good and are acting from nobility

Limited Time from school to make interviews

QUESTION:

Is there a way to learn more about how happy people are at a given residency program without going on the interview? My school strictly limits the amount of time I can take off for interviews during each rotation. As a result, I need to make some choices about which interviews are more worthy than others and am unsure how to proceed.

Thank you for all of your guidance! Your personal statement series helped me to make a statement that truly reflects me!

ANSWER

Your interviews are the MOST important thing you can do! I do care if they ‘Only give you a certain amount of time.”  You MUST make the time. this is MUCH more imporantant than any arbitrary limit of time on your interviews from schools. As such. to hell with their rules. Protect yourself.

You are the one who is going to have to live, for a  long time, with the outcome of you interviews’

1. Explain it to the local clerkship director

2. Generally he/She will agree.

3. IF they do NOT agree, then YOU must take the situation into your own hands and do as many interviews as you see fit.

Seriously, what a bunch of assholes@!

It is not at if you were going to the movies or something

Contemplating the number of Interviews you have

It is a weird time in the interview process. Even for the people who have many interviews, there has been a strange level of dissatatisfaction. You think you should be happier. I understand.

You will have to start from where you are. You can grow and learn enough medicine ANYWHERE. I am fully convinced of this.  Now, there is a difference in where you can get to later based on the name of where you are, but name only makes it easier. Not automatic. Not impossible.

When you are looking at your programs that you are going to for interview it comes down to two things:

-WHat is the location?

-Do people seem happy?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlfKdbWwruY

Stream of Life

The same stream of life that runs through my veins night and day

runs through the world and dances in rhythmic measures.

It is the same life that shoots in joy through the dust of the earth

in numberless blades of grass

and breaks into tumultuous waves of leaves and flowers.

It is the same life that is rocked in the ocean-cradle of birth

and of death, in ebb and in flow.

I feel my limbs are made glorious by the touch of this world of life.

And my pride is from the life-throb of ages dancing in my blood this moment.

Bankruptcy Secondary to Medical Costs

1981: 8% filing for bankruptcy did so secondary to serious medical problem

2001: 46% filed bankruptcy secondary to medical costs

2007: 62% filed bankruptcy secondary to medical costs

Radio in Detroit, Wayne State and a Kaplan center

I will be on local NPR in Detroit on wednesday at 125pm to 150 pm (WDET-FM)

At 330, I will be at Wayne State Medical School in Detroit and at 6pm, I will be in the Kaplan Center in Detroit.

Thursday,  I will be on TV in Detroit on WJBK, the Local Fox affiliate at 815 am, eastern time

“Routine Miracles”

Today’s Vote is HISTORIC!

It may not be perfect, but the Union today, in this American Civilization is MORE perfect. Over the objections of a Republican Party that is enthusiastic ONLY for military spending, a bill came out of the finance committee that has A LOT right! Millions more will be covered. You Can keep you own insurance if you like it. It will EXPAND residency positions. It will PREVENT insurance companies from throwing you off your plan because of a pre-existing condition or…. BECAUSE you are sick! It will expand coverage for many people

 

Let’s try to feel good for a minute. the country is moving in the right direction.

In the meantime, the Republican Party circulated  a petition to INCREASE troops in Afghanistan and to RE-open Guantanamo bay and to allow ANYONE to carry a gun on AMTRAK!

Seriously, that is their priority!

A med-advisor came to me today. He supports his ill 70 year old father. the Father’s Medicare coverage for his inhaler for his COPD just ran out. He is in the ‘Doughnut Hole”. Now the Med-advisor has to pay $300 a MONTH just for inhalers for his father.

Is that right?

Regulation is GOOD!

You may often hear retards on television talking about the evils of government regulation. those people are just plain STUPID! I hope they eat in a restaurant with no regulation of the kitchen and they all get food poisoning!

In terms of industry, drug companies and insurance companies they are FOR PROFIT! That means their job is to TAKE YOUR MONEY and give you as little as possible. that is why it is called a business!

I have just been reviewing new medications and I am nauseated to find NO original entities, jus drug companies having the audacity to dangle the promise of a few weeks of life in front of a cancer patient just to swipe $10,000 from them, or an new anti-anginal drug that on the reason for approval is…. get this!!! An ‘expert’s opinion”!!!!

We NEED regulation and HIGH standards to make the food and drug supply safe and we NEED a public healthcare insurance option. One NOT based on a CEO with a 32 million dollar salary.