Zen Buddhism has a lot to teach us as physicians, as dermatologists. Consider these two quotes from respected roshi: The practice is the teacher. Your practice is your teacher. Maurine Stuart. Teaching is not difficult, Listening is not difficult either. What is truly difficult is to become conscious of what you have in yourself and be able to use it as your own. DT Suzuki, The Marvelous Cat
Dermatologists perform office surgery almost daily. Our awareness of the growing interest in, and literature on, music as an adjunct in the perioperative period led us to survey the use of music during 100 consecutive office procedures in a dermatology practice. We found that the effects of music were salutary for patients and the investigators. Music is a simple, inexpensive, safe and effective adjunct to office surgery. We hope that this report will be of help to physicians who wish to provide music to ease patients during office procedures. For full paper: Music and Surgery Appendix: Music Study Appendix Keywords: music, medicine, surgery, perioperative, playlists, dermatologist, dermatology
Keywords: pharmceutical prices, drug prices, generics, savings A funny thing happened on the way to the pharmacy… I was robbed. It’s a strange reality in these United States, that the price of a pharmaceutical varies wildly from one drugstore to another. Patients on Medicaid and, or, those with insurance drug coverage usually do pretty well, but individuals who do not have some form of a prescription plan get it in the neck. Over the past few years, the price of some common drugs has gone through the roof. Doxycycline is an example. It used to be that 60, 100 mg capsules could be bought for four dollars at a Target … Continue reading
We may not see them, but we need them. An estimated one hundred trillion microorganisms inhabit the human body. This includes bacteria, fungi, viruses, protozoa and mites. There are gut, skin, respiratory, bone and even nervous system microbiomes – and this may be an incomplete list. We are only beginning to understand how these microbial communities impact health and disease. Dr. Yoon Cohen has started a web site called Skin Microbiome that will serve as a repository for the emerging literature on this subject. Disorders such as acne, atopic dermatitis, perioral dermatitis, psoriasis, rosacea, seborrhea, seborrheic dermatitis, skin ulcers and many more appear to be caused or exacerbated by an … Continue reading
In 1991, I was asked to edit a section for the Archives of Dermatology on “social and political” issues in dermatology. This became a column called “The Art and the Calling” that addressed the medical humanities. It was short-lived since the editors were not particularly interested in the humanities. They preferred addressing the politics of medicine. “The Art and the Calling” received many positive comments and so, we will reprint the articles here and encourage our readers to submit new essays of their own. The International Journal of Dermatology has a section called “On A Human Scale” which publishes occasional pieces and I will help you to submit there as … Continue reading
A 54-year-old carpenter presented to the dermatology clinic for evaluation of a lesion on his right forehead that turned out to be benign. He also mentioned that his barber brought to his attention some thick furrows he has in his scalp. These had developed slowly over the past decade or so. Examination of his scalp shows deep furrows consistent with a diagnosis of cutis verticis gyrata . The patient, after searching the Web, had arrived at the same diagnosis. Since cutis verticis gyrata (CVG) can be associated with acromegaly, I asked the patient about changing hat size, hand size, etc. He says that over the past 10 or 15 years, … Continue reading
Rhoda, a 41 year-old professional woman, has had a facial eruption off and on for a number of years. It began with perioral dermatitis but evolved over time to the “red face syndrome.” What follows is her story and her dermatologist’s office notes. I had been diagnosed with perioral dermatitus many moons ago and was prescribed some wonderful topical steriod ointment to treat the red, ugly, pimply like eruptions. My dermatologist clearly warned me….”do not keep using this medicine, it will rebound and makes things even worse.” At the time I took it seriously; used the ointment for a few days and things cleared up nicely. Then the monster returned!!!!! … Continue reading
“The student begins with the patient, continues with the patient, and ends his studies with the patient, using books and lectures as tools, as means to an end.” — Sir William Osler, Aequanimitas, 1905 Keywords: grand rounds, incontenentia pigmenti, VGRD, academic medicine, continuing medical education, CME I recently attended a regional Dermatology Grand Rounds held at an academic medical center. The first such meeting I attended was over 45 years ago. The recent program featured live patient viewing of around 20 people with a variety of unusual skin disorders. Around 150 – 200 dermatologists were present. It started with a 1.5-hour patient-viewing during which we all trooped around the clinic … Continue reading
The human microbiome is the collection of microorganisms (such as bacteria viruses and fungi) which live on and inside humans (on the skin, in the saliva and mouth, in the eyes, and in the gut and the rest of the gastrointestinal tract). Foreign microbes outnumber human cells in the body a wide margin; humans have about 100 trillion cells, and carry ten times as many microorganisms in the intestines alone. We know that some of these organisms are useful for humans. However, most have no known effect; they are just symbionts and are referred to as the normal ‘flora.’ Studies in 2009 asked whether our health is damaged if we reduce this biota (collection of … Continue reading
Under My Skin: A dermatologist looks at his profession and his patients by Alan Rockoff, M.D. joins a small, but growing, collection of memoirs by dermatologists. Continue reading
