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Why we need a National Doctors’ Day

Along with the honor of being a physician,  comes the problem of burnout. Leaders in the medical community recognize the high and increasing rate of burnout in physicians. In burnout, physicians feel exhausted,  lack enthusiasm about work, lose motivation, and feel cynical about the value of the medical profession.

Updated March 27, 2023

Did you know there is a national day to honor physicians? In 1990, the U.S. Congress established a National Doctors’ Day,first celebrated on March 30, 1991.

Along with the honor of being a physician,  comes the problem of burnout. Leaders in the medical community recognize the high and increasing rate of burnout in physicians.

National Doctors’ Burnout

In burnout, physicians feel exhausted,  lack enthusiasm about work, lose motivation, and feel cynical about the value of the medical profession.

Statistics suggest that a majority of physicians experience feelings of burnout and compassion fatigue at least sometime during their career. At any given time, that could be your doctor.

Physician burnout can arise from the technological and bureaucratic hassles in medical practice that hinder doctors from spending adequate and quality time with patients and interfere with our ability to care for patients in the way we believe is best.

a medical person holding a stethoscope

Studies suggest that burnout causes physicians to spend less time providing direct care to patients, and that care may be less efficient and effective. 

Doctors are less likely to experience burnout when they have rewarding relationships with their patients.

Most of us went into medicine because we wanted to help people, and that still brings us the most satisfaction. A successful doctor-patient relationship depends on both persons showing mutual respect.

(And by the way, physicians aren’t the only professionals who can burn out. If you recognize any of the symptoms in yourself, talk to your doctor or a mental health professional.)

March 30 is Doctors' Day

The first Doctors’ Day observance was March 30, 1933, in Winder, Georgia. The idea came from a doctor’s wife, Eudora Brown Almond,  and the date was the presumed anniversary of the first use of general anesthetic in surgery.

The Barrow County (Georgia) Medical Society Auxiliary proclaimed the day “Doctors’ Day,” which was celebrated by mailing cards to physicians and their wives and by placing flowers on the graves of deceased doctors.

You may not have a chance to honor your doctor in person, but I suggest you commit to doing your part to establish a trusting, respectful relationship with your doctors. It will be good for both of you.

To enhance communication with your doctors-

Be open and honest about your medical history,lifestyle, and concerns. 

Sometimes patients leave out important information due to forgetting, thinking it’s not important, embarrassment, or fear. But that may be the very piece of data I need to pinpoint what’s wrong.

So tell the doctor

  • If you can’t do something you’re asked  to do,
  • if you can’t afford the medication,
  • if your insurance doesn’t cover something,
  • if you are afraid to go for the test
  • if you are seeing other doctors for anything,
  • how much you smoke,drink, or other habits

Learn more tips on talking with your doctor here-

How to talk to your doctor to improve your medical care a male doctor holding a tablet

Give details about your problem, explain what you feel

I find that patients often have difficulty describing how they feel. They may say they hurt, cough, itch or get short of breath, but give few details. Maybe because we use  text messaging with its brevity, abbreviations and emoticons. We have forgotten how to use descriptive words.

I don’t think we doctors expect our patients to always recite a rehearsed narrative  about “why I came to the doctor today.” But it does help if you come prepared to answer questions as specifically as possible. You might try thinking about your problem using the PQRST mnemonic. It will help your doctor identify possible causes for your symptoms, and may also help you understand your problem and even suggest ways you can help yourself.

Find out what PQRST means at this post-

How to tell your doctor what’s wrong with you.

Female doctor looking at an xray

Recognize your doctors are people first

As physicians, our patients’ “social histories” help us understand factors in your life that impact your health -where you live, your job, your family, your hobbies . Besides that, we enjoy getting to know you, especially the things that make you and your life unique and interesting. That feeling can go both ways.

a woman in white coat with mask over mouth

Exchanging a few social words can make the encounter more satisfying for you and your doctor. Some of us will be more open about sharing our personal lives, and some subjects may be off limits. But I don’t think any of us will object to polite,  caring interest in our lives outside of medicine.  

You may cry when you read about a unique doctor-patient relationship in this post-

A simple way to help your doctor beat burnout

Finally, in honor of Doctors’ Day, meet some physicians with unique experiences to share, just a few of the many doctors who work tirelessly to provide us all with the HEART of health.

Doctors in international healthcare

Dr. Kent Brantly awoke feeling ill- muscle aches, fever, sore throat, headache and nausea. As his condition progressively worsened to include difficulty breathing, he learned the cause of his illness- the Ebola virus. Having spent the past few weeks caring for patients caught up in the Ebola epidemic that swept Liberia in the spring of 2014, Dr. Brantly had contracted the disease himself, and would likely die, as almost all victims do.

Continue this story at-

Surviving Ebola, “Called for Life”– Dr. Kent Brantly

 Doctors in disaster healthcare

When she applied for a position in New York City at the NYC Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (OCME), Dr. Judy Melinek never imagined that decision would plunge her into the nightmare of September 11, 2001. She was at the ME office that day when the Twin Towers were attacked and fell, killing thousands of people.

She and the other staff collaborated with the team of investigators who worked night and day identifying remains of the victims, a task she vividly describes in the book. This was basically their only job, since the cause of death was for the most part irrelevant, and impossible to determine. Sometimes they had only a small body part, as little as a finger, to extract DNA to identity a victim. Such identification was critical to bring closure to the families who lost loved ones, people who left for work that day, and never came home.

Read more about Dr. Melinek at this review of her book-

Working Stiff: Two Years, 262 Bodies, and The Making of a Medical Examiner- a review of words worth sharing

Doctors in Primary Care

Melissa Freeman, M.D.- the 91-Year-Old Doctor Who’s the Granddaughter of Slaves

Photos in this post are from the LIGHTSTOCK.COM collection, an affiliate link. Consider Lightstock for your photo and graphic needs. You will get quality media and help support the mission of this blog-to inform and inspire us all to discover the HEART of health.

exploring the HEART of health and those who care for it

Medical stethoscope and heart on a textured background

Dr Aletha

Why March is Women’s History Month

In February 1980, President Jimmy Carter issued the first Presidential Proclamation declaring the Week of March 8th, 1980 as National Women’s History Week. Eventually Congress passed resolutions calling for an annual Women’s History Month and Presidents now issue an annual proclamation.

Every year, March is designated Women’s History Month by presidential proclamation. The month is set aside to reflect on and honor the often-overlooked contributions of women to United States history.

Women’s History Month started as Women’s History Week . . .

The Education Task Force of the Sonoma County (California) Commission on the Status of Women planned and executed a “Women’s History Week” celebration in 1978. The organizers selected the week of March 8 to correspond with International Women’s Day. The movement spread across the country as other communities initiated their own Women’s History Week celebrations the following year.

In 1980, an assortment of women’s groups and historians—led by the National Women’s History Project (now Alliance)—successfully lobbied for national recognition.

In February 1980, President Jimmy Carter issued the first Presidential Proclamation declaring the Week of March 8th, 1980 as National Women’s History Week. Eventually Congress passed resolutions calling for an annual Women’s History Month for which the President issues an annual proclamation.

Women’s History on Watercress Words

In this post I’ve created links to posts on this blog about women who made those contributions and sacrifices. If you don’t have time to read all of them in one sitting, bookmark this page to come back to. Better yet, share it on your social media feed so your friends can find it too.

How Women Changed and are Changing Healthcare

The first woman graduate of a United States medical school was born in Bristol England in 1821. Elizabeth Blackwell came to this country as a child and originally had no interest in medicine. But when a dying friend told her, “I would have been spared suffering if a woman had been my doctor”, she found…

Keep reading

Dr Jane Goodall-messenger of hope

Dr. Goodall recommends buying locally grown, organic foods exclusively. She advocates a meat free diet. She urges us to waste less. She believes we need to “take back food productions from large corporations.”  By doing so, we will be healthier and so will our planet.

Keep reading

sharing the HEART of Women’s History Month

Please follow me on Facebook and Instagram where I’ll talk more about women past, present, and future.

I took this post’s Featured Image in Washington, DC last summer. The statue is the Vietnam Women’s Memorial.

Medical stethoscope and heart on a textured background

Dr Aletha

The uniquely remarkable life of Helen Keller

Keller is remembered for her advocacy for persons with blindness and other physical disabilities. But her social and political advocacy may not be so well known, it wasn’t to me. In politics, she could be considered an early progressive, having joined the Socialist Party of America. She was a founding member of the American Civil Liberties Union.

Helen Keller

by Maria Isabel Sanchez Vegara

illustrated by Sam Rudd
a Little People, BIG DREAMS book

We all began life as children, often with a dream we hoped to achieve.  Some people overcome monumental challenges to achieve their dream and Helen Keller was one of them.

This children’s book from Quarto Publishing Group-Frances Lincoln Children’s Books tells her story differently from what you have heard before.

I reviewed a complimentary advance digital copy of this book from the publisher and NetGalley. I’m using affiliate links in this post to help fund this blog.

Helen Keller, the disabled child

Maria Isabel Sanchez Vegara begins Helen’s story with her childhood in Alabama, raised by loving parents, facing the challenge of raising a child rendered deaf and blind from a serious illness as an infant. Despite their attention and her own innate resourcefulness to cope with this devastating disability, she remained isolated and frustrated-that is until Annie Sullivan, a teacher for the blind, came into her life.

With Annie’s help, and eventual friendship, Helen learned to understand words and to read Braille. She also learned to speak from a teacher of deaf persons. With these skills, she went to college, becoming the first deafblind person to earn a college degree and wrote a book about her life.

Helen Keller, the advocate

But Helen’s remarkable life did not stop there and neither does this story. Ms. Vegara chronicles Helen’s life as an activist and advocate for other people with disabilities, for women’s right to vote, and for African Americans’ civil rights. She travelled the world giving speeches, met United States presidents and other famous people. 

The pictures are attractive to children without looking childish. Mr. Rudd’s colorful illustrations capture Helen’s personality and interactions with various people who played important roles in her life- her Black childhood playmate who was the daughter of the family’s  cook, and adult friends Mark Twain and Alexander Graham Bell.

Parents will find this book a valuable resource to introduce this remarkable woman to their children. The author tells Helen’s story tastefully, never minimizing the severity of her condition but not emphasizing it over her achievements.

Helen Keller’s complex life

Reading this children’s book prompted me to reflect on what I already knew about Helen Keller. I was in high school when Keller died in 1968 and despite the lack of streaming television, internet, and social media I was familiar with her as a famous living person.

Even if you’re younger, you may know of Helen Keller from the movie, The Miracle Worker. The 1962 original version starred Patty Duke as Helen and Anne Bancroft as Annie Sullivan, both won Academy Awards for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress.

Ms. Duke also acted in a TV movie version in 1979; in it she played Annie and Helen was portrayed by Melissa Gilbert. (Depending on your age, you may remember her from the TV show Little House on the Prairie; she later portrayed Anne in The Diary of Anne Frank.)

But still some things in the book surprised me. I didn’t know that Helen, born in 1880,  grew up in the American south, Alabama. This was barely 20 years after the Civil War and the abolition of slavery, which supported the Southern economy. Her father, a newspaper editor, was a captain in the Confederate Army. Her mother’s father was a Confederate general. “The family lost most of its wealth during the Civil War and lived modestly.”

Keller is remembered for her advocacy for persons with blindness and other physical disabilities. But her social and political advocacy may not be so well known. In politics, she could be considered an early progressive, having joined the Socialist Party of America. She was a founding member of the American Civil Liberties Union.

On social issues, she favored women, African Americans, workers, and the poor. She was a suffragist and pacifist, and supported civil rights and the NAACP.

From an early age, she championed the rights of the underdog and used her skills as a writer to speak truth to power. 

AFB website

Helen Keller wrote her own life story as well as other books, essays, and magazine articles. Her autobiography, The Story of My Life, was published in 1903. It has been translated into 50 languages..

Helen’s other published works include Optimism, an essay; The World I Live In; The Song of the Stone Wall; Out of the Dark; My Religion; Midstream—My Later Life; Peace at Eventide; Helen Keller in Scotland; Helen Keller’s Journal; Let Us Have Faith; Teacher, Anne Sullivan Macy; and The Open Door. In addition, she was a frequent contributor to magazines and newspapers.

“The Helen Keller Archives contain over 475 speeches and essays that she wrote on topics such as faith, blindness prevention, birth control, the rise of fascism in Europe, and atomic energy. Helen used a braille typewriter to prepare her manuscripts and then copied them on a regular typewriter.”

Helen Keller’s legacy shines through her work with the blind; she worked for the American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) from 1924 until 1968. During this time, she toured the United States and traveled to 35 countries around the globe advocating for those with vision loss and raising funds for the organization.

source: Helen Keller archives

For this post I used information from The Helen Keller Archival Collection at the American Foundation for the Blind (AFB), the world’s largest collection of writings, letters, speeches, photographs, artifacts, audio-video, and other materials relating to Helen Keller.

Little People, BIG DREAMS

Little People, BIG DREAMS is a best-selling series of books and educational games that explore the lives of outstanding people-designers, artists,scientists and activists. They all achieved incredible things, yet each began life as a child with a dream.

This empowering series of 101 books offers inspiring messages to children of all ages, in a range of formats. The board books use simple sentences, perfect for reading aloud to babies and toddlers. The hardback versions present expanded stories for beginning readers.

Parents and grandparents can create a collection of the books by theme. Matching games and other fun learning tools provide other ways to make the lives of these role models accessible to children​.

Inspire the next generation of outstanding people who will change the world with Little People, BIG DREAMS!

exploring the HEART of health through inspiring people

Thank you for reading this post about Helen Keller’s challenging life, information that can inspire you to turn your health challenges into health opportunities. If you are a parent or grandparent, introduce your kids to her and other people like her. Who knows, they may be the next world changers.

Please follow Watercress Words for more information and inspiration to nourish your HEART of health.

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I appreciate your time and hope you’ll visit regularly.

Dr Aletha

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