Doctor's Log

Over the last month, as the United States has entered a seismic reckoning around racism, Esther Choo, M.D., has been reflecting on medicine—and has some blunt words. Racial inequity in health care is nothing new: Black people suffer higher rates of everything from maternal mortality to chronic disease. Now, she says, medical institutions “are scrambling to look like they know what they are doing [on race]…and I don't think they do.” In this passionate episode, she turns a critical lens on both the health-care establishment and herself, makes the case that protecting health for all people “is the defining issue of our age,” and tells listeners how they can help in the months and years ahead.

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Do we have enough tests? That’s a question Esther Choo, MD, has been hearing over and over—and here, she answers it clearly, along the way delivering a resounding, personal reminder that modifying our behavior, through social distancing and, yes, masks, will continue to be key to good health. This is the real deal on how an emergency room physician feels about reopening our cities. For transcripts, please visit our website (https://pineapple.fm/doctorslog).

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Months into the pandemic, Esther Choo, M.D., is trying to evaluate the new normal for medical staff. What will the summer bring? And the next year? Along the way, she ropes in a few of her colleagues for their own uncensored opinions—and lets the rest of us know what we can really do to support doctors and nurses. (Hint: The clapping is nice. But it’s not that.) For transcripts, please visit our website (https://pineapple.fm/doctorslog)

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As we enter another month of the COVID-19 crisis, emergency room physician Esther Choo, M.D., looks ahead in the unknown future of this pandemic. In Episode 7 of Doctor's Log, she offers advice on what people can do to support healthcare workers in their long, ongoing work—and asks what a race looks like when you don’t know where the finish line lies.For transcripts, please visit our website (https://pineapple.fm/doctorslog)

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Who do we turn to in a time of crisis? And why do those people always turn out to be so similar? Emergency-room physician Esther Choo, M.D. unpacks our cultural tendency to look to men—specifically, white men—as leaders, whether on TV, in medical institutions, and beyond. This is more than a fairness issue, she argues. It’s an issue of life and death. This is a must-listen episode with far-reaching implications for our current moment...and well beyond.

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The COVID-19 pandemic is an all-hands-on-deck situation, and medical residents—generally young doctors at lower levels of pay and responsibility—have been thrust onto the front lines. How fair is that? What are the risks? [And how do doctors in charge balance the needs of a pandemic against the welfare of their own staff?] In Episode 5 of Doctor’s Log, Esther Choo, M.D., considers this much-debated question, and interviews the people at the heart of the issue: the residents at her own Portland, Oregon, hospital. For transcripts, please visit pineapple.fm.

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The COVID-19 pandemic has stretched our medical system thin. But Esther Choo, M.D., poses an urgent new question: What will happen when America enters hurricane season this summer? Or wildfire season? Are we ready to handle two disasters at once? In Episode 4 of Doctor’s Log, Dr. Choo wrestles with this looming possibility, finding answers that both civilians and legislators should hear—and, along the way, celebrating Easter in the emergency room.

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What will the world on the other side of COVID-19 look like—and when will we get there? Those are some of the questions Esther Choo, M.D., gets asked the most, and in Episode 3 of Doctor’s Log, she shares some surprising answers. What will the implications be of Americans having put off “non-essential” doctors’ visits and surgeries for months? How will health-care providers themselves deal with built-up trauma and stress? And—to answer a burning parental concern—will there be summer camp? While no one knows what our new normal will look like, Dr. Choo’s honest, unvarnished diary provides clues, and perspective. For transcripts, please visit https://pineapple.fm/doctorslog.

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In Episode 2 of Doctor’s Log—a diary of one ER physician’s life on the COVID-19 front lines—Esther Choo, M.D., shares an update on a sick colleague. Plus, she reflects on what the public doesn’t understand about this country's much-publicized ventilator shortages, and goes deep on the topic of “collateral damage”: the unforeseen consequences of forcing victims of child abuse and domestic violence to sequester in homes that simply are not safe for them. This is a point of view only an insider could have: raw, emotional, and deeply informed.

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In Episode 1 of Doctor’s Log, Esther Choo—a Portland, Oregon, emergency-room physician—takes us inside her daily life on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic. This is a new world: where she contends with dangerous equipment shortages; where she watches colleagues fall sick and wonders who’s next; and where she comes out of the ER each night wanting to talk. That’s where these recorded diaries, named for Captain Kirk’s Captain’s Log on Star Trek, come in. 

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