As a freelance journalist for more than 20 years, Carol Patton has written more than 1,000 articles covering healthcare and other topics. She has earned several awards and recognitions for her articles, including the 2012 Health Care Journalism award from the National Institute for Health Care Management Foundation. She has profiled more than 100 healthcare professionals with unusual hobbies and is constantly amazed at their talent, commitment and innovations.
Some artists paint with oils or watercolors, others with acrylics. Shivani Garg, MD, MS, prefers Nescafé or Maxwell House coffee. A faculty member in the Division of Rheumatology in the Department of Medicine at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health (UWSMPH), Madison, Dr. Garg learned this technique—painting with instant coffee mixed… [Read More]
About 10 years ago, Stuart S. Kassan, MD, FACP, MACR, was playing in a local golf tournament at the Denver Country Club. Each player had to tee off over a water hole in front of roughly 100 club members. His ball was the only one that landed in the water—twice. He was introduced to golf… [Read More]
Fire truck. Those are among the favorite words of Jay Mehta, MD, a pediatric rheumatologist and rheumatology fellowship director at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. When he was in high school, Jay appeared on the TV game show, Wheel of Fortune, during My Favorite Teacher week. As a contestant, he competed against other teams comprising high… [Read More]
Every Christmas Eve, Angus Worthing, MD, FACP, FACR, his wife, Margaret, and two young children, engage in a sing-off over the phone, competing against a professional quartet comprising his best friend, Doug, Doug’s sister and their parents. Dr. Worthing, a partner at Arthritis & Rheumatism Associates in Washington, D.C., demonstrated his musical talent as a… [Read More]
Peter Grayson, MD, MSc, a tenure track investigator at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Intramural Research Program, Bethesda, Md., sometimes wonders how his life would have turned out if the band he was playing in during college had signed a recording contract with a major record label. Dr. Grayson has been playing the piano… [Read More]
After a busy day in rheumatology, Polly Ferguson, MD, gets creative at a local arts center, making beautiful pottery pieces, a skill she has wanted to develop for nearly 30 years.... [Read More]
George C. Tsokos, MD, professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and chief of the Division of Rheumatology, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, both in Boston, doesn’t recall the moment he first became infatuated with Little, a 12-year-old Siamese cat. Dr. Tsokos doesn’t even own Little. Not that anyone can truly own any living creature…. [Read More]
Over the past 20 years, Eric L. Matteson, MD, MPH, emeritus chair, Division of Rheumatology, and emeritus professor of medicine at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science, Rochester, Minn., as well as a past president of the Rheumatology Research Foundation, has authored or co-authored six books about the history of rheumatic disease and… [Read More]
As a young child growing up in Oxford, Ohio, Veena Patel, MD, demonstrated a talent for arts and crafts. At age 7, she painted a portrait of her father, now a retired mechanical engineer, which he still proudly admires. Dr. Patel, an assistant rheumatology professor at Dell Medical School—the graduate medical school of the University… [Read More]
In 2018, Gerson Bernhard, MD, FACP, MACR, received a call from a primary care physician at a rural clinic in Florida who was treating patients with varying degrees of arthritis. One patient’s case was more complex than the others. Dr. Bernhard guided the doctor through the patient’s history, reviewed lab results, referred related studies, expanded… [Read More]