This month I present a potpourri of concepts and Quixotic explorations of ideas mostly brought on by travel, cocktail parties and my obsessive study of obscure topics. Hold onto your hats. My first topic is the current struggle which the country seems to be having over marriage.

As I sit here listening to the endless debates on why the sequester will destroy/help us and whose fault it is and why things are so bad, I am forced to contemplate fundamental changes in the American culture which got us to this point. It is not simply a red state/ blue state thing. It is not just the rich being demonized by the poor. There is a fundamental shift – a splintering – taking place in both culture and tradition in the once united America.

If government is the answer, just imagine how stupid the question is. George Orwell was correct when he commented: “In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” Disinformation – or non-information – is everywhere. Most 24-hour news is 24 hours of crap.

When last I put pen to paper, we discussed the vexing problems of the complex code breaking we are obligated to teach our young colleagues. These codes of statistical mathematics, definitional precision, and societal interaction are still the core of what we give to residents, and are lessons that stay with them long after data about antibiotics and SSRIs have been forgotten. But there are also the specific truths (lest I say aphorisms) of the practice of emergency medicine they must also master if they are to long survive this most grueling of careers.

Real conversation in America is almost gone. Social interaction has become so terse as to be essentially nonexistent. We have been hoodwinked into believing that we are so much better “connected” than any other generation has ever been. Hogwash! Never has a country had more but enjoyed it less.

By embracing appropriate mid-career shifts, we can re-infuse maturing EPs with the excitement that once drew them to the specialty

Greg Henry sat down with EMP co-founder David Packo to discuss staffing models, Press Ganey and other workforce quagmires.  

I have fallen into my usual melancholy funk, having recently finished watching the conventions of the two major political parties. Let’s get this out of the way forthwith: I’m an equal opportunity despiser. I hate all the two-faced lying and the useless intellectual crap. Generosity to this upper echelon is not my forté. One group tells us we are in Xanadu while the other tells us we are in hell.

From the Higgs boson to light-bending galaxies, a physics lesson on scale, and how our vantage point can make all the difference.

"The bottom line is the person came for care. The degree that you put judgement into that is the degree to which you are not keeping up with the intent of what medicine really is." -Greg Henry, MD