Articles by Dr. Erik Steele
ERIK STEELE
How the 19-year-old brain can both awe and appall us
Among the most mysterious things on the planet is the brain of a male in his late teens. It has been designed by evolution for purpose without much perspective, passion without much reason, reproduction without much responsibility and performance without caution. If it was a car, it would be a ...
Maine needs a rockstar physician leader
If there is a Mick Jagger of medicine, it is Don Berwick, M.D., America’s health care safety and reform rockstar. More than any other American physician, he has led us to improve safety in health care and led the debate about transforming the American health-care system into something that is ...
ERIK STEELE
We are being damned: Americans losing faith in failed health care system
We who lead in the American health care system — primarily physicians and hospitals — are slowly having our credibility with the public eroded. The main reason for this is our collective failure to credibly lead this country in its journey to a health care system that safely and affordably ...
ERIK STEELE
Dr. Steele’s great adventure
Last week two of my favorite patients — young sisters — stopped by my office to say goodbye, then got in their car and hit the westbound road to Nevada, and a new life. They were scared witless, thrilled, excited, and hoping the open road would lead them to the ...
ERIK STEELE
Mandatory motorcycle helmets — again
A lobster in a boiling pot has more of a chance than a mandatory helmet proposal in Maine, so I was going to keep my mouth shut in the debate in the Maine Legislature about whether to require motorcyclists here to wear helmets. What’s the point? Then I read some ...
ERIK STEELE
Is it nothing, or could it kill you?
If patient symptoms were bees, a typical day as a family doctor would produce an entire hive swarming around my head. Bleeding, bloating, belly pain, back pain, chest pain, chunks of something coughed up, discomfort, fatigue, fever, limp, lump, ringing, tingling, weird smell, weird taste, weakness and wonkiness are but ...
ERIK STEELE
What’s best care — now available to all
The power of knowledge in the practice medicine used to be given only to us physician wizards of the medical Land of Oz. You novices had to stay on your ignorant side of the green curtain with Dorothy and her witless sidekicks. Those days are gone; any Dorothy, Toto, or ...
ERIK STEELE
When should I stop trying to live?
He fought in a war, jumped out of planes, ran the CIA and the U.S. government, but I bet former President George H.W. Bush would tell you one of the hardest things he has ever done is what he just did: spend seven weeks in the hospital seriously ill. The ...
ERIK STEELE
Getting counseling a sign of courage, not weakness
Many experts looking for answers to the question of how to prevent events such as the Newtown school shootings have pointed to the need for better access to mental health services such as counseling. If we want people to use such services, however, we will need to stop stigmatizing the ...
Honoring the teachers of Newtown
The Newtown school massacre is an example of the writer’s curse; I don’t want to write about it but I cannot stop thinking about it until I do. I think of our daughters going off to elementary school with My Little Pony lunch boxes clutched firmly in hand, confident we ...
ERIK STEELE
A doctor’s bucket list — just in case the world ends soon
Optimists and pessimists both have had good choices about the future lately. Optimists could plan to win the $540 million Powerball lottery, and then retire to play golf and buy presidential elections. Pessimists could plan on the end of the world on Dec. 21, 2012, when some people believe that ...
A deadly house fire reminds us that our best intentions aren’t enough to avoid tragedy
One tragedy of tragedies is that we often don’t learn from them, which means we waste those lessons others died “teaching” us. Our lives and deaths are replete with evidence of this, with thousands of Americans dying avoidably each year because we have trouble following through on the lessons of ...
ERIK STEELE
My bum knee: Part II
A few weeks ago, I let some people I don’t know very well put me to sleep, cut open my bum right knee, stick in some metal tools, and whack out some torn cartilage. I trusted them so completely to take good care of me that my heart rate just ...
ERIK STEELE
Motivating behavior change — it’s time to give up nagging
I spend so much of my time nagging patients to take better care of themselves that they probably think my specialty is bitchingologist. When I’m on a roll listing the litany of health horrors that will befall those who fail to do as I tell them I am scarier than ...
ERIK STEELE
What will be the legacy of our abuse?
In a few weeks it will have been 12 months since my community learned that one of its favorite ministers had allegedly been molesting some of our children for many years. I will not be surprised if the one year anniversary of his exposure and subsequent suicide passes quietly, because ...
ERIK STEELE
Health care reform — what do physicians think?
Physicians agree on — maybe — two things. First, they agree they don’t agree on anything. Actually, some probably disagree about that. Second, they usually agree that everyone who disagrees with them is wrong. It should therefore come as no surprise that physician opinions about health care reform cover more ...
My big mouth is my own and nobody else’s
The big, fat mouth I open in this column is my own. When I write stuff that’s so bad my dog would not even dare to roll in it, that’s all mine. When brilliant ideas light up the page, I get all the credit. The $40 bucks I get paid ...
ERIK STEELE
Cutting quit-smoking benefits — a business 101 review
Maine is a place where the state government has committed itself to run as though it was a good business. So when it announced it was proposing to cut funds that help Maine Medicaid patients to quit smoking in order to save state Medicaid dollars, I thought I would set ...
ERIK STEELE
Physician-assisted suicide — time to reconsider
One night several years ago, my terminally ill patient David chose the time of his own death by shooting himself in the chest. I believe he picked that method because he knew I would be angry if he chose to end his life more peacefully by simply taking an overdose ...
ERIK STEELE
Teaching the brain to respect others
Having once completely shaved a buck-naked ex-governor in preparation for his surgery, I can tell you politicians are not much different from the rest of us. That’s why I generally respect them. I also respect most government workers, Medicaid moms, lawyers, drug addicts, alcoholics and my critics (who are often ...
Police seeking tips about pickup truck possibly connected to Glenburn teen’s disappearance
Since 1971, seven Maine children reported missing have not been found
Authorities ask for volunteers in search for missing Glenburn teen Nichole Cable
Company seeks $200,000 for retrieving lost lobster boat
Scandals, real and imagined
IRS targeting
Houlton council, community still concerned about costly Millar Civic Center
Gomes’ sacrifice fly in 10th lifts Red Sox past Twins
For those who are too fat for Abercrombie and Fitch
Kitchen Nightmares meltdown or: How to lose an argument online
Market Basket in Biddeford starts hiring 300 workers