Tag: doctors

I can’t help myself. I have to ask. How is a 40-hour course going to be enough training to cover what is has taken me 16 years plus multiple decades to perfect?

I am seeing those ads again about women and menopause. I am seeing the adds that promise that anyone can become a certified menopause coach in just 40 hours and at their own pace. 40 hours and you know it all and charge women whatever you want for your help. Hmm. It sounds too good to be true. Was that all I needed to do? Just take some 40 hour course and I would have been all set years and years ago? No undergraduate.? No medical school? No years of residency specializing in Obgyn and women’s health? No decades of private practice with ongoing and continuous learning to continue to improve my quality of care and guidance that I offer women? It could have just been done with an online course so I could go on and charge women cash for what I offer?

I gotta tell ya, I’m not buying it. I have no regrets about all my extensive investment both monetarily and mentally in my training. It has taken me all this time and continues to take me more continuing time and more learning every day to continue to offer my full attention and concentration to devoting my life to caring for women of all ages. It is what I do. It is who I am. It is what I have spent my life creating. I feel that it requires much more time and devotion than just a 40 hour course.

I continue to be saddened and disappointed about our continuing efforts to diminish the role of physicians in the care of patients everywhere. I understand that there are a lot of you out there who may have been hurt or not gotten the results or attention that you have needed from physicians or health care professionals in the past. I also understand that this makes you resentful and you want to spread this resentment to the medical community in general. I urge you that this is a mistake. There are good, intelligent and well-meaning physicians out there. There are those of us who have the compassion to listen and have good intentions and have your best interests at heart. I urge all of you before you go spending money on these seemingly good short-cut options, please reconsider and seek healthcare and coaching from actual properly certified physicians and medical professionals.

Isn’t it strange that it’s ok that I’m human now, but it wasn’t ok before?

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Traditionally, it seems that most patients do not view their physicians as actual, potentially flawed human beings. It’s just too uncomfortable a concept. If patients viewed their doctors as humans, that would mean that they would have to acknowledge the fact that they can make mistakes, have emotions, have physical ailments, and emergencies as well. To most patients, that is an untenable thought. Their doctors need to be superhuman, infallible, and infinitely available at a moment’s notice. This kind of thinking allows patients to engage in demanding, unreasonable, and entitled behavior at times and puts a significant burden on the doctor patient relationship.

Interestingly, this seems to have turned around somewhat now in the time of COVID. Now it seems like patients are attaching themselves more to doctors who are showing their human side. The videos I post of myself at home in regular clothes or talking about how I finally figured out how to do my nails by myself get tons of views. Patients are listening with baited breath to see how I might be struggling with all of these changes. It’s as if listening to me is giving them tacit consent that it’s ok not to be ok right now. I feel like giving them a glimpse into me as a person is actually helpful right now. I can potentially help guide them through the proverbial tunnel to the other side of this thing. I get excited when I post my Facebook live daily video in the morning and all those people tune in. Knowing that I am able to reach all those people in a positive way helps me too. Personally I am loving it. If I can be myself with patients and still help them at the same time, I am all in! I would prefer to be that way all the time, within reason of course. I still stand by what I have said in previous blogs. Patients who are suffering or have just been given a terrible diagnosis do not necessarily care how I am feeling at the moment. Common sense still has to reign supreme here. I guess what I am really saying is that I hope the compassion doesn’t die out when the pandemic does. Have a great day everybody!

Dr. Katz