Dr. Samantha Shapiro recounts her enthusiastic and ambitious early career in rheumatology—a path that culminated in burnout and a brave choice with new opportunities.
My Six Cents: How to Help a Patient Feel Seen & Heard
Compassion, clear communication, empathy and more—Samantha C. Shapiro, MD, provides practical advice on how to connect with your patients during appointments.
Benefits & Challenges of, & Potential Solutions for, Hybrid Conferences
Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, scientific and medical conferences began to be canceled or postponed. Later, once the pandemic endured beyond the scope of weeks to months, many organizations shifted conferences to a virtual format. Now, as the federal government has ended the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency, effective mitigation measures, including vaccination, rapid testing, masking…
Letter to the Editor: Weathering Storms
We read the article, “Rheumatologists Share Lessons Learned in the Wake of Hurricane Ida” (July 2022, The Rheumatologist), with great interest. This poignant account of the impacted patients and rheumatologists provides invaluable planning tips regarding medication loss, access to pharmacies and medical records, and strategies to avoid practice losses. The critical lessons presented in this…
Table Stakes: The Right to Healthcare
Table stakes. It took me a moment to register what they were talking about. I was listening to Pod Save America, a wildly popular podcast put together by some of Barack Obama’s former speechwriters. It is, I imagine, what an MSNBC podcast might sound like if Rachel Maddow and Chris Hayes were allowed to swear….
Why & How Our Biologic Drug Discussion with Patients Should Evolve
As we turn the corner on the second decade of biologic use for rheumatic disorders, a reappraisal of approach in our communication with patients is due. In practice, the impact these agents have on patients’ lives justifies the friction rheumatologists face when connecting patients to them. You can understand why older rheumatologists who apprenticed on…
Do Not Get Us Started on Acthar
As rheumatologists, we have a love-hate relationship with the corticosteroid prednisone, a feeling many of our patients share. It’s our most effective medication to quickly shut down an overactive immune system. When we have a patient with life- or organ-threatening autoimmune disease—severe lupus affecting the kidneys or vasculitis causing hemorrhage in the lungs, for example—large…