‘We May or May Not Ever Get Paid’: What We Heard This Week

“All we knew is that we may or may not ever get paid.” — Joel Hansford, MD, a partner at physician-owned staffing firm EM-Staff, on the 10 emergency physicians who went unpaid for three months by a regional hospital for shifts they worked in April.

“We haven’t figured out yet how to vaccinate people through the computer. You actually have to show up.” — William Schaffner, MD, medical director of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, on the worrying dip in childhood vaccinations due to the pandemic.

“I don’t think the FDA should approve on the basis of mitigation modeling.” — C. Noel Bairey Merz, MD, of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, explaining why she voted against recommending chronic kidney disease-related anemia drug roxadustat in any patient population due to a strong safety signal for thrombotic risk.

“That’s disrespectful of patients and clinicians’ experiences, burdens, and sacrifice.” — Brian J. Miller, MD, MBA, MPH, of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, on Banner Health giving clinicians a commemorative coin as a literal token of appreciation during the pandemic.

“This study provides further support for the concept of cognitive reserve, where genetic and life exposures allow some people to cope better than others with age- or disease-related brain changes.” — Yaakov Stern, PhD, of Columbia University in New York City, about research that suggested a cognitively active lifestyle in old age may delay the onset of dementia in Alzheimer’s disease by as much as 5 years.