Article Archives – Christian Medical & Dental Associations® (CMDA)

Vaccines and Conscience Protection

It has been over a year since the first diagnosis of COVID-19 in the United States. Due to this pandemic’s effects, our society has experienced limitations in personal freedoms to a level we have never known. Social interactions and work environments have been changed by social distancing, masks, hospital and nursing home visitation restrictions and working from home. Freedom of movement about our communities and the nation has been limited by “stay-at-home orders” and mass travel restrictions. The availability of vaccines provides a sliver of hope but also raises many questions. Issues our society must address include prioritizing equitable vaccine distribution and the potential for coercive mandates on vaccine use.

Physician Support for Ethical Vaccines

Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, our society has had to adapt to unprecedented restrictions and limitations. During this trying time, it has been difficult to find points of optimism. The rapid development of vaccine candidates utilizing varied techniques remains encouraging.

Transgenderism | Gender Identity | Gender Dysphoria: Crosstalk

Despite the Authority of Scripture, there are those who are confused on this issue and from that confusion (combined with political correctness) there are professionals guiding individuals through the process of hormonal treatment (as normal) and very tragically, even surgical interventions.

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Christian Medical & Dental Associations® News Releases

Praying With Patients

Dr. Autumn Dawn Galbreath explores what a variety of secular physicians have to say about praying with patients in the exam room. It’s a topic that is vastly important to Christian healthcare professionals. Not surprisingly, there was a wide range of options among secular physicians.

A Lack of Self-care in Healthcare

How many times have you gone to clinic when you were sicker than the patients you were treating? Listened to other people’s woes and stresses when your own were weightier? Given your last emotional resources to a patient whose need was less than your family member’s? Forfeited sleep while advising a patient of how curative it is? Advised a patient about nutrition and exercise right after scarfing a quick lunch from the vending machine?

Sustaining Our Joy in Practice

My eldest child left for college this fall, having chosen to attend school in Scotland. Yes, that’s right. Scotland. It’s a long way away. It’s also a place I had never previously visited. We went on a family trip to Scotland in March—partly to visit the school he now attends, and partly to have one last bang-up family vacation before we became a family that no longer lives under one roof. On that trip, we had not one, but two, flat tires on our rental car. A consequence of our struggles driving on the left side of the road, perhaps?

Narcissism in Healthcare

I was looking up some information on the American Association for Physician Leadership website when an article caught my eye: “Are You a Narcissist?” I hadn’t decided what I was going to blog about this month; not surprisingly, narcissism was not on the list of things I was considering. But the article piqued my interest, so I clicked on the link and read the entire thing. There was even a quiz I could use to find out if I am a narcissist. You will be relieved to know I “passed” the quiz with a non-narcissist score! That was reassuring, but I was curious as to why this article interested me so much.

Facing the Rise of Suicides in Healthcare

As a second year medical student, a member of my medical school class committed suicide. I didn’t know him well, but his death impacted me. Made me ask a lot of questions. Why didn’t I know him better? Had I gotten to know him, could I have made a difference?

My Doctorate in Secret-Keeping

CMDA's The Point

Preparing to meet my next patient, I pick the next chart up off the counter. “Bob Smith,” married middle-aged patient, chief complaint: STD check. “Weird,” I think, “Mary Smith’s husband’s name is Bob, too. What a coincidence.” I open the exam room door, and Mary Smith’s husband, Bob Smith, is sitting inside.

Physician Substance Abuse

According to a 2009 article in Mayo Clinic Proceedings, “Approximately 10% to 12% of physicians will develop a substance use disorder during their careers, a rate similar to or exceeding that of the general population.” But while our addiction rate may be similar to the rest of the country, the characteristics and consequences of our addictions are not.

Healthy Healthcare Marriages

Doctors have had a bad rap on the marriage front for a number of years. We’ve long been accused of having a much higher divorce rate than the general public. For many years, there was not a lot of data on healthcare marriages, but strongly held popular opinion characterized a high percentage of us as overworked divorcees whose devotion to our patients cost us our marriages.

Women in Healthcare Still Earn Less than Men

And so begins a New York Times article about the recent JAMA Internal Medicine analysis of physician pay disparities. The central message of the analysis is that women in healthcare, on average, earn $20,000 less per year than their specialty-matched male colleagues.

Physician Burnout

It was a relatively slow evening at work when I got the text. My phone vibrated on the clinic countertop as I was looking over a chart. “Are you busy? Can you talk?” I figured those words couldn’t be good, coming as they did from a young intern I mentored when she was a medical student. I found myself wondering if she had lost a patient.

Negative Health Consequences of Same-Sex Sexual Behavior

Photo: Pixabay

The health effects of same-sex sexual behavior are many. The public, government, and judiciary are being lead to believe that same-sex sexuality is a normal variant with interactions and results equivalent to heterosexual sexuality. However, this position runs contrary to professional literature and the track record of history.

My Heart Attack and the Running Father

As a physician, I have taken the journey of life with many patients and have listened carefully. Bubbling under the surface of everyone’s life resides doubt, anxiety, and fear – like some primal three-headed beast. Even in lives that seem under control and doing well, it’s there – trust me.