Tales of a Family Doctor
I arrived this morning in the office at 8:50 a.m. to find Glenda, my office manager, buried in charts. She had been there since 6:30, simultaneously arranging referrals that had been requested the day...
View ArticleTales of a Family Doctor: Let's Take them Seriously
No story today. I've got one in the works but taking care of family and patients is priority one for the next couple of days...But there is some time pressure to consider what we've been asked to do...
View ArticleTales of a Family Doctor-- care delayed is care denied
Shirley Crandall (her name and circumstances have been altered slightly in the interest of privacy) has been a patient in my office since late October last year. She’s a hard worker who’s held a...
View ArticleIs Change.gov a Sham?
Anyone who may have seen my previous diaries knows how frustrated this family physician is with the current health system. And yet I have advocated here and elsewhere that we take the incoming...
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Health Care: Of the People? By the People?
Last month over 4000 health care discussions were held around the country at the request of the Obama transition team.One of those discussions was held in my office in Burlingame, California. This...
View ArticleThis is what the right calls free speech
In December I posted an account of a day in the life of my work as a family doctor. It was well-received here, as it was when an earlier version was posted on Talking Points Memo.This weekend,...
View ArticleListen to your mother
It's one of the rules that makes a lot of intuitive sense.Mothers have been around. They know you. They love you. They want you to get it right.So I realize now that when I last forayed into foreign...
View ArticleNo Day is an Ordinary Day
Saturday was a short day in the office. I came in to handle some paperwork and to see a few patients whom I couldn't manage to work in over the course of a busy week. It was an ordinary day with a...
View ArticleReal Choice in Health Care: A Story and Cry for Help
Sione Alipate (name changed for privacy) has been a patient of mine since I started practice nearly twenty years ago. Before that he was a patient of my predecessor. His chart goes back to 1970, at...
View ArticleIt's (Alternative Minimum) Tax Time
Tax day is almost upon us and it is this time of year that the right wing begins to visit us with arguments about why the tax code should be amended to eliminate this unfair burden on the rich.Chief...
View ArticleHealth Care Series: Thoughts on Cost Control from the Life of a Family Doc
THURSDAY NIGHT IS HEALTH CARE CHANGE NIGHT, a weekly Health Care Series (cross-posted at ePluribus Media) Two weeks ago my associate, Dr. Michele Gomez, spent hours battling (as of today, still without...
View ArticleBIG UPDATE: You can save a life!!
Dr. Don McCanne is a tireless worker on behalf of fundamental health care reform.He is a retired physician who now devotes himself full time to fighting for change.Dr. McCanne is passionate in his...
View ArticleUpdate: I will be meeting with Senator Baucus!!!
Late last week I received an email (pardon the elipses and xxx's for now) with this invitation:Dear Aaron ,Please see below for information on an exciting opportunity to.... meet Senator Max...
View ArticleCan We Use DKos to Brainstorm on Health Care Reform?
After over a year of involvement with The Daily Kos I remain most impressed with the intellectual quality of the postings and the hard work and serious commitment to change exhibited by the...
View ArticleThe Elephant in the Room: My Meeting With Senator Baucus (Health Care Series)
THURSDAY NIGHT IS HEALTH CARE CHANGE NIGHT, a weekly Health Care Series (cross-posted at ePluribus Media, OpEdNews, and at Health Justice 1payer.net) Nursed by the debate on health care reform which...
View ArticleI'm Out of here: A physician's goodbye to the AMA (Edited)
I'm a joiner.For years I was a member of two synogogues.I can't count the pieces of mail I get reminding me pay my dues for any number of environmental and civic organizations.I never pay museum dues....
View ArticleStop the Media Blackout
In a shocking front page "analytical" article today, the San Francisco Chronicle published a nearly full-page story under the headline, "It's High Noon on the Hill for a Viable Reform Bill".In...
View ArticleThe state of health reform in California
Sheila Kuehl is an amazing an sensible voice in California politics:She is a termed-out State Senator who now sits on the California Integrated Waste Management Board.She was the first openly gay or...
View ArticleTales of a Family Doc.....a year later
My professional life is full of stories.There are some of remarkable bravery and happiness: Just last Friday I had the opportunity to trade emails with a patient who, finally, in his 60s (!) has...
View ArticleA Little Fun with the Right
One of my secret joys is reading the occasional mail I get from right wing organizations.You see, I am a doctor and a small business owner, so they assume I must share their values.For this reason, I...
View ArticleThe End of Single Payer Hopes
The manager's amendment to the House Health Care Reform Bill, H.R. 3962 has been presented and it brings with it the death knell to hopes for single payer health care reform this year.This is a sad...
View ArticleDrugs? Money? Taxes? I can't believe it.
But it's true. This is a story of youthful foolishness, drugs, the absence of drugs, the DEA, theft, and injustice. It is so offensive and sad that I am just not sure what to do. So I am writing to...
View ArticleDeath of a Family Doctor
It's been some time since I first posted on DK my "Tales of a Family Doctor". I hope this isn't the last time.
View ArticleMazel Tov!!
Yesterday the United Nations moved to complete the promise of November 29, 1947. My friend, Rabbi Hillel Levine, brought this message home in a letter to a Palestinian-American friend. I share it with...
View ArticleTales of a Family Doc in the Trump Era
It’s been a long time since I did any blogging. Work as a family doctor has been tough. Days are long, usually ten hours and then an hour or two at home. Last year I did okay financially, making...
View ArticleTales of a Family Doc, Wednesday
NH is a character. Eighty years old and disabled from arthritis, you still see so much of what he was when in full force. He is funny, sure of himself and self-deprecating at the same time. He used to...
View ArticleRes Ipsa Loquitur (The thing speaks for Itself)
As a family doctor I like to take care of my patients. I’d rather that they, and I, do not need to think of their insurance limitations. But I do. And they do. I have been keeping a little list in...
View ArticleAnother day, another reason for Medicare for All
Another in an occasional series, “Tales of a Family Doc”The following is copied, with trivial alterations for clarity and to protect patient confidentiality (and to add one snarky comment), directly...
View ArticleTales of a Family Doctor
Only edited to protect the confidentiality of this patient with advanced cancer. A typical interaction on an ordinary day:MHO communication:----- Message ----- From: Linda *** Sent: 7/22/2020 10:59...
View ArticleA moment in the life of a family doc: Is it the post office or the insurance...
Real Life Scenario; A rather typical interaction with a patient whose life has been messed up by illness, poverty, the inadequacy of the health care finance system, and, now, the failures of the postal...
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