Doctor's Day Gifts

From the hospital

From my nurse

Which would you want? - (Photos taken by iPhone this morning!)

Happy Doctors' Day & Show 28 wrap-up

It's so great being back to doing the show. (Don't forget to rate the show here) Check out my video post above for more details. I did want to thank Ramona from Suture for a Living for calling into the show. Also, thanks to sarebear from Pie-Bolar Served w/ 3 Flavors of Anksia Tea. And, thanks to Brandice for calling into the show. In addition to her blog, she is co-host of a video podcast called STeaP (super tea people). Definitely check those blogs out.

Finally, Sunday March 30th is National Doctors' Day. Thanks to all the docs out there. You're doing a great job and don't let anyone tell you anything different. Also, I'll be remembering those docs who are no longer with us - especially friends and mentors who have helped guide me to where I am today. So, if you haven't already, just tell a doc - "Thanks for what you do." That'll definitely bring a smile to her or his face. Have a great weekend, everybody!

FatDoctor.org: Erased?

You think you're having a bad day? Here is what Fat Doctor twittered about half an hour ago.... (Don't you just love twitter?)

FatDoctor Accidentally erased my whole blog. And I don't have a backup. No sense crying - it's not like a family member dying...or is it? 28 minutes ago from web

So, I'm putting the call out to all our friends in the medical blogger community and beyond. We simply cannot let this happen to one of our blog friends. I wish that I knew more about this stuff to help. But, alas, I do not. (I did know that google saves a cache of blog. For example, hers is here.)

I don't even know if I have an e-mail address for her. Anyway, if anyone has any suggestions to try to help, leave a comment here and I/We will find a way to try to get them to her.

Of course, we'll be talking about this on the show tonight. If you have an idea, please call in and hopefully, we'll be able to bring FatDoctor.org back from wherever it's at! Let's join together and help out!

Update: FD has restarted her Blogger blog. Stop by and say hello!

Dr. A Show 28 tomorrow night!

Thursday, March 27th, 2008 at 9pm Eastern Time

Join us tomorrow night for the triumphant return of The Doctor Anonymous Show on Blog Talk Radio! Yes, I've had enough of Talkshoe. I have so much to talk about that I didn't even schedule a guest for the show. I hope that doesn't prevent you from tuning in. Check out the preview here.

I'm not afraid of trying (and failing at) new and different ways to do the show. So, here are some topics that I'm going to be talking about:
*The Blog Break: Why it happened and where have I been?
*New ideas for the show and future guests
*National Doctors' Day: Did you know it's coming up next week? What's your hospital doing (if anything)? Rita Schwab has a good background post on Doctors' Day
*Match Day: For the docs out there, do you remember match day? Ah, those memories...
*Spring Break: Are you away from work or school this week? What are you doing? Call in and let me know. And, remember those carefree days of spring break? Call in and reminisce those memories.
*April Fools' Day: It's coming up on Tuesday! Call in with your best AFD jokes
*Where am I going in May for a "conference?"

Here are some news stories that I may mention:
*Andy Rooney from 60 Minutes talks about doctors.
*Complications associated with plastic surgery kill future pre-med student
*Long ER waits associated with elderly going to nursing home not home
*World's tallest man struggles to fit in.

Of course, I can talk about any of this stuff, or none of this stuff. Plus, I'll be taking your phone calls! Take part in the chat room, or what I affectionately call, "The MedBloggers Lounge." A great opportunity to interact with medbloggers you've only read about. You can even call into the show to talk and/or ask a question. See you for the show!

For first time Blog Talk Radio listeners:
*Although it is not required to listen to the show, I encourage you to register on the BlogTalkRadio site prior to the show. I think it will make the process easier.

*To get to my show site, click here. As show time gets closer, keep hitting "refresh" on your browser until you see the "Click to Listen" button. Then, of course, press the "Click to Listen" button.

*You can also participate in the live chat room before, during, and after the show. Look for the "Chat Available" button in the upper right hand corner of the page. If you are registered with the BTR site, your registered name and picture will appear in the chat room.

*You can also call into the show. The number is on my show site. I'll be taking calls beginning at around the bottom of the hour. Hope these tips are helpful!

Show 28 preview

Above is a video promo for Show 28 of The Doctor Anonymous Show. I thought the knight rider theme music was kind of funny. I recently purchased a used video camera and going to be trying out more video blog posts. We'll see.

But, have a great weekend, everybody. I'll be with the family for Easter lunch on Sunday. Hopefully, I'll be back text posting next week, but the office will be busy. We have people taking Easter week off. So, work will definitely be busy for me next week. Have a good one. Peace!

Dr. A Show returns 3/27

I think that I'm coming out of my fog now and starting to feel a little bit less overwhelmed. Thanks to everyone for your comments and e-mails of support during my blog break. I'm not completely back yet "regular" blogging. But, I am happy to announce that I will be returning to do The Doctor Anonymous Show on March 27th at 9pm eastern time.

Boy, will I have lots to talk about. So much so, that I'm not even scheduling a guest. It will be me talking about stuff and you calling in and telling me what's been happening with you. First of all, I'll kind of talk about what happened for me to take the blog break in the first place.

Then, we can talk about whatever you like. I've been reading articles this week about the annual Match Day even that is going to take place later today at medical schools across the country. For those who may not know, Match Day is when medical school seniors find out where they will be doing their residency. (The picture above is from a Match Day 2007 event.) It's definitely a life changing day. It's where you find out where the next chapter of your life will take you. I'll be talking about that a little bit on the show next week.

Also, at the end of March is National Doctors' Day. I'll be talking about this as well on the show. How does your hospital and your community observe this day (if they do). I'm kind of curious about that. Should doctors be celebrated in this type of manner? I'll be curious on your thoughts on this.

I'm already looking forward to April on the show. And, I have already booked Paul Levy to come on the show on April 3rd. He is the President and CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. He is also author of the very popular blog called Running A Hospital (winner of the 2007 Medgadget Medblog of the Year). So, I'm very excited about that.

Who knows what else we'll talk about? Of course, with the writers strike over, my show will be competing with returning television shows. Oh well, all I can say is this - please tivo the tv shows and tune in Thursday, March 27th at 9pm for a brand spankin new episode of The Doctor Anonymous Show!

Blog Break

I admit that it's been a while since I've felt like this. When I first started my blog more than a year and a half ago (has it been that long already?), I was like most people - full of energy - very excited about the project - writing really great posts, etc. At some point, people really start reading what you're writing and your blogroll starts to grow and things are going great.

It's kind of funny because that is the exact moment when I remember taking my first blog break. I was feeling overwhelmed. For some reason, I was putting pressure on myself to post every day and to try to "top" the last post with something more creating and/or entertaining. So, I had to step back for a little while and get some perspective.

And, as people who read here often know, I take blog breaks every so often when I'm feeling like that. Well, Monday, something happened at work to put a huge weight on my shoulders again. I mean, it's not life shattering and some people would think that it's mundane. I won't bore you with the details. Suffice to say that I have found the need to take a little break from blogging while I get things sorted out.

Unfortunately, that means that I'm also going to cancel my shows for the rest of this month. My apologies to Bongi and ScanMan for doing this. To be honest, trying to get the audio to work with a new site and worrying about whether it was going to work, just added to my stress this week - something I really didn't need.

I'll be back by the first of next month as I get things sorted out. I won't be totally gone. You can keep track of what I'm doing on Twitter and I may even do a video post every once in a while in the next few weeks. Back soon....

Epocrates & iPhone

Last week, Apple finally announced the iPhone software development kit. Many, including me, have been waiting for applications to place on my iPhone so I can finally get rid of my other PDA. While the demo for the gaming apps took most of the tech headlines, the medical community (especially those with iPhones) should take notice of an important application that was also "demoed" at last week's Apple event.

I have been using Epocrates ever since I was back in residency. And, I have been waiting for this application to be written on the iPhone. In the cnet video above, they show what one epocrates engineer could do in two weeks of programming. What was impressive to me was the use of the photo of pills, which I think will be helpful in my office setting. I cannot wait to see the full product when it is released. Hopefully, other medical software developers will follow suit and write more cool stuff for the iPhone.

Show 27 Wrap-up

Thanks so much to Berci from Science Roll for being on the show. (see video post above) We had a great conversation about his life as a medical student. We also discussed his first and only trip to the United States. We was asked to do presentations in Long Beach, California and at Yale. I mean, I have never been to Yale - let alone asked to do a presentation there. Very impressive.

We also talked about his opinions regarding Web 2.0 and Medicine. An interesting perspective. He has a passion for genetics and genomics. If you don't know what exactly they are, he does a good job at trying to define these complicated terms. He graduates from medical school in about a year and a half. He either wants to pursue a PhD or residency. (I think some places offer both of these tracks.)

I certainly wish him the best of luck. We also talked about his blog carnival called Medicine 2.0. I've read this and, I have to admit, that some of that stuff is right over my head. Don't get me wrong, genetics is very important. It's just that it's pretty complicated and the research in genetics is very complicated. Nevertheless, I volunteered to be a host for Medicine 2.0 in the future. Berci told me that he would definitely help me through the process.

I have a favor to ask all of you out there in the medical blogosphere. I would really appreciate it if you could give me feedback on this week's show. In particular, I'm looking for your opinion of the sound quality of the show. Could you hear me ok? Could you hear Berci ok? For those of you who listened live, how easy or difficult was it to navigate the Talkshoe site?

I'd like this feedback to see what you think of Blog Talk Radio verses Talkshoe. I won't share my opinions yet, because I don't want to bias your feedback. But, any information and feedback is helpful to me as I decide where to do the majority of my shows. Have a great weekend, everybody!

Dr. A Show 27 on Talkshoe

Thursday, March 6th, 2008 at 9pm Eastern Time

Join us on Thursday night for Bertalan Mesko who is from the blog called Science Roll. This will be a unique show in that our guest will be live, but on an entirely different continent. I think that we have the technology working (hopefully). We will be broadcasting live on Talkshoe. For those interested, here is the Talkshoe FAQ.

For first time Talkshoe listeners:
*Although it is not required to listen to the show, I encourage you to register on the Talkshoe site prior to the show. I think it will make the process easier. To get to my show site, click here.

*Talkshoe has software called "ShoePhone" in which just by plugging in a headset, you can talk on the show without dialing a phone number. After registering your ID, I encourage you to click here and download and install the shoephone software.

*When the show goes live, make sure your headset is already connected and then log into the site. Then, click on the button below to activate the shoephone software.


*This will open a window called "Talkshoe Pro." Look for the shoephone button below and click on it.


*You will then see the Talkshoe interactive software window as below. There is a chat room in there. And, you will be able to see who else has a microphone. Who knows, I may unmute you to say hello!


*Now, of course, you don't have to download the software to listen to the show live or listen to the show later. And, if you want to dial in with your cell phone to talk on the show, you can do that as well. Click on my link above to get the phone number and ID number of the show. But, why would you want to do that when there is a free option? See you for the show!

The Bertalan Mesko Interview

For the first time ever on The Doctor Anonymous Show, we have a scheduled guest, for the entire show, who will be joining us from Europe (about 5,000 miles or 7,500 kilometers from where I'm sitting right now).

Bertalan Mesko who is the author of Science Roll will be joining the show on Thursday, March 6th, 2008 at 9pm Eastern Time. He will be joining us live when it will be 3am his time. So, you cannot miss this show. According to his blog, he is a medical student at the University of Debrecen, Hungary (5th year of the 6). Here is other information from his blog:

I plan to become a clinical geneticist specialized in personalized genomics. I believe that the future of medicine belongs to this field. On this blog, my aim is to make medicine, genetics more readable even for those who are not too interested in them. That’s why I mostly write about genetic testing, personalized genetics, the most important news of clinical genetics and, of course, popular medicine.

I also work on the relationship between web 2.0 and medicine. I try to provide useful content; tools and services that could ease the work of physicians, medical students, nurses or medical librarians. I have already given presentations at the University of Yale, the hospital of Greenwich or the Medicine Meets Virtual Reality conference in Long Beach, but I keep giving slideshows at Hungarian clinics and departments.

I maintain two blog carnivals:
Gene Genie: the carnival of genes and gene-related diseases
Medicine 2.0: the carnival of web 2.0 and medicine

My Hungarian medical blog can be found here: mediq.blog.hu I’ll never forget the works of Stanislaw Lem, I like listening to Ray Charles and consider Isaac Newton as an idol.

Now, I have to tell you that the technical aspect of this has been really challenging this week. Right now, this is scheduled to be The Talkshoe Doctor Anonymous Show.

I don't even know if the technology is going to work at this point - we're still trying to work that out. So, this may be on of my best shows ever, one of my last shows ever, or, I might even cancel the show at the last minute. So, you'll definitely have to tune in. I'll have some instructions tomorrow on how to utilize the Talkshoe site. Let's hope this works!

Get out and vote!

It's primary election day here in Ohio. If you have been following the news at at all, you know that the US presidential race believes that Ohio is a key state not only today but in November for the general election.

I've already asked some patients this morning and they have told me that they don't vote and will never vote. The reason? Well, they do not want to be called to jury duty. What kind of lame excuse is that? (Jury duty should be from the pool of people with a driver's licence and not registered voters, anyway.) I kind of went off on someone this morning, "Then, you are not allowed to complain how high the cost of health care is. And, you are not allowed to complain about what's going on, because you did not vote."

Now, people tell me that voting doesn't matter anyway. Doesn't matter? There are countries around the world whose only goal is to have a voice in how they are governed. We here in the US are definitely spoiled and don't know how good we have it. So, get out there and vote today! I'm Dr. A, and I approved this message...