Posts

  • WHAT I LEARNED

      I am writing my memoir because of what I learned when I ran a clinic on the tenth floor of a Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) high-rise twenty years ago. All my patients were over sixty years of age. I was an inexperienced nurse practitioner and new to working with older people. I learned that… Read more

  • TIME TO MAKE SOUP—AGAIN

    I resort to making soup when I’m facing a deadline with my book. I’ve documented what has become a ritual in a post I wrote exactly two years ago. I’m planning to start a total review of my manuscript before I hand it off to the line-by-line editor. (Yes, the end is in sight!) But,… Read more

  • FEAR OF GETTING OLDER (FOGO)

        It isn’t often that I applaud a drug company. In fact, I can’t remember if I ever have. Here’s to Pfizer for creating an initiative to stimulate dialogue about getting older, which was described in the New York Times business section this past Wednesday (Elliott, Stuart. Pfizer to Inject Youth Into the Aging… Read more

  • I HAD A DREAM

      In preparation for moving I discover the darndest things as I unpack dusty boxes stored in the attic untouched for years. This time it’s a mercury sphygmomanometer, packed in its original carton along with a “limited warranty” card that should have been filled out within ten days of purchase. Looks like I didn’t even… Read more

  • Do You Ever Hold Your Patient’s Hand?

    Originally posted on Amanda Joy Anderson: At work the other day, I witnessed something small that has taken up a big part of my thoughts since. Some point in the shift, the phone rang, and I answered to a voice asking for the dialysis nurse. Common occurrence, as nurses come to the unit to dialyze… Read more

  • THE HEALTH WAGON

    In the last post I wrote about Sandeep Jauhar’s essay in the New York Times, Nurses Are Not Doctors. Dr. Jauhar doesn’t condone independent nurse practitioner practice and he suggests that in order to expand the number of primary care physicians their salaries should be increased. Somehow that last statement has hounded me. Not so… Read more