As a faculty member of the Alaska Family Medicine Residency program, I had my share of teaching during our infamous Wilderness Medicine Weekend excursion. In January, it involved snow cave construction, and in May, it involved marine safety. The first spring, I participated with 2 other faculty m...

One time during a record snowfall winter, we ended up with a weekend alone. Our teenage daughter had been picked up by friends for the weekend. We decided to head downtown for a nice dinner. We took my car. As I was backing up our steep long drive, looking over my shoulder, the car jolted to a su...

It’s not infrequent that I’m in conversation with a faculty member who’s frustrated with one or two residents they see as lazy or disengaged. Those moments take me right back to how I sometimes felt a decade ago, when I was burned out in my core faculty role. I remember the intensity of that frus...

One fall, 17 years ago, as I was driving in my new state of Alaska, I was in a bit of a hurry (as was a natural state for me at the time). So you can imagine, I was a bit annoyed when the line of cars in front of me didn't move when the light turned green. The middle lane was empty, so I decided ...

Many of you know I recommend Brave Boundaries, a book by Dr. Sasha Shillcutt. After she co-hosted a group session for residents and faculty last year, I saw Aardvark (that's our pet-name for our older style Roomba vacuum) and his virtual barrier shown in the photo in a new light. That little cont...

Last June, the Titan submersive caught the attention of the world. When he described the Naval Submarine Priorities in all situations, Rear Admiral John Mauger caught my attention when he said: "Number 1 is Safety, Number 2 is maybe something along the lines of avoiding counter detection, Number ...