the truth about dialysis

I recently learned that my piece, “When Dialysis Is the Wrong Approach to End-Stage Kidney Disease,” published on the CHCF blog nearly 4 years ago has proven to be evergreen, a story that lives on rather than dying on the vine of whatever is hot at the moment. Last year it was viewed more than 25,000 times, making it a top blog post.

In the piece I argued that not every old person approaching end-stage kidney disease should start dialysis. But judging by some of the folks who have reached out to me, many eyes don’t register phrases like “elderly patients over 75” and “who have dementia or ischemic heart disease.”

first page next chapter

Today was the first day of a new chapter in my career. Yesterday was the last day in the job as I’ve known it for a decade. I quit my day job to devote the bulk of my time to my writing.

This decision comes after many months of self-reflection. I’ve been asking myself questions like: What do I really want to do? What does success look like to me? These questions as opposed to: What do I feel obligated to do? Or, am I meeting academia’s definition of success?

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14 years (and then some) and counting

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It’s been a long time since I’ve posted here. I’ve been struggling to find time to write, even though it’s the only thing I’m really sure I want to do. But writing is hard, so I tend to forget the joy it brings when I get the words so right it brings tears to my eyes and can only remember the times when the words won’t come.

Since my last post about the primary care doctor who sent me a note telling me how to prescribe dialysis someone asked, “So what ever happened with that?”

reflections of a victim of unconscious bias

A few weeks ago, a primary care physician colleague (white man)—who I’ve known for over a decade—sent me the note below by way of our mutual patient’s caregiver (white man) open, not in a secured envelope.  In the past nearly 4 years the patient has been under my care, the colleague has not once reached out to me by email, phone, text, tweet, telegraph, or carrier pigeon regarding our patient.

 

He did, however, reach out to my boss (white man) and a hospital executive (white man) a few months ago when the caregiver (reminder, white man) first complained no one in the dialysis unit was listening to him (though the caregiver has never spoken to me directly about his concerns because, I just learned, he found me “intimidating”).