Dr. Hassaballa Chosen As One of the Top 50 Most Influential Voices…

It has been great to just “live and let live” with respect to masking in public. — Covid cases are rising across the country, across my state, and across my county. We have had a slight uptick in hospitalizations since our low back in late March, when we had zero Covid cases in the hospital. I have not had a Covid patient in my ICU for weeks…

RaDonda Vaught, the former Tennessee nurse convicted of two felonies related to a drug error, was sentenced to three years probation on May 13, 2022 (during Nurses Week, in fact). …

The medical logic is perfect: the patient has suffered a catastrophic brain injury, and it is unlikely that she will ever wake up again; my other patient will likely need the ventilator for many more days and will need a surgery to connect the airway to his neck, called a…

Faith allows us to connect an another, deeper level with our patients and their loved ones — I am a man of deep faith. I am not even close to the standards to which I aspire every day, and at the same time, I will die trying to be the best believer I can be. …

What makes it so fun is that all of us are doing it together — “Did you do the Wordle?” “Wait!! Don’t tell me! I haven’t done it yet!” Almost every day, these words are likely repeated all across our country, if not the world. Every day, I look forward to the next crack at guessing the five-letter word within six tries, and I look…

The devastation goes far beyond the number of dead — The U.S. Centers for Disease Control published a report on the number excess deaths related to COVID-19. “Excess deaths” are those deaths that occurred above and beyond what is typical in a time period. The numbers are staggering, as reported by the Washington Post: “ The excess-deaths figure surpassed the…

We must always remember that, unlike Sisyphus, we are not alone. — There is character from Greek mythology named Sisyphus. This man was condemned to push a large boulder up a hill, only to have that boulder fall back down the bottom right as he reached the top. Sisyphus is then forced to go back to the bottom of the hill and…

Throughout this pandemic, many have thanked me for my service. It is now my turn to thank those who have contributed to my success. — Throughout this pandemic, but most especially in the very beginning, so many people expressed their gratitude for my colleagues and me on the front lines fighting COVID. My pastor called us “COVID Fighters,” and I have always loved that title. New Yorkers, all on lockdown, would go out their windows…

This is the worst wave we have seen yet. — I keep reading that the Omicron variant is much milder: “ The details of the Omicron variant are becoming clearer, and they are encouraging,” writes the NY Times. I keep reading that hospitalizations are way less; cases are milder; and the disease is not as bad as that with previous…