I want to see a doctor, too!

I have a confession to make. I haven't seen my primary care doctor in almost two years. I'm relatively young and healthy, but I'm a believer in the annual visit. Those visits are not just for Pap smears, colonoscopies, and mammograms. It's just plain healthy to spend 30 minutes talking about your health with a doctor at least once a year. My primary care clinic is in a community health center, and I see a large percentage of young African American men. I usually don't run any tests, but we spend the majority of the time talking about safe sex, wearing seat belts, guns in the home, and developing good eating habits. (You won't believe how often young single guys eat fried chicken! Learn how to make a sandwich, guys!)

Anyway, so I haven't seen my doctor in a while. I actually made two appointments to see him last year. Making an appointment is half the battle since I have to remember to call during office hours and then find a day when both he and I are free. Sadly, I forgot to go to both appointments! I know I'm a bad patient. That's what happens when I schedule them on my one day off a week and then get so excited about sleeping in that I forget.

Instead, I try to monitor my health myself. I know what I'm supposed to be doing, but sometimes people, including doctors, need an authoritative voice to push them in the right direction. For the past two years without my doctor pushing me to take care of myself, I've turned to Oprah. I'm an avid Oprah watcher, and I really enjoy her medical shows. I'm sure I'm not the only American getting my health information from her gurus Drs. Mehmet Oz and Christiane Northrup. I even took Dr. Oz's Real Age Quiz. Despite my lack of exercise, I'm surprisingly one year younger than my real age, but I took the tips the website had to offer to heart. I went to a yoga class on my day off, and I've started flossing again as it was one of those habits that went by the wayside during intern year. I'm still working on the fruits and vegetables. Getting in five servings a day is hard work!

I'm a big fan of Dr. Oz although part of me feels strange about getting my medical information from a cardiac surgeon on television. So, I called my doctor's office today. His first appointment ins October 15th, but my first weekday off after that isn't until November. See you in three months, doc!

trying to practice what i preach

as a future primary care doctor, i feel that i should try to follow the advice i dole out to patients, but these things are a lot easier to say than actually follow.

eat right. i have a particular interest in nutrition, so this one should be easy, right? WRONG!!! i love white rice, fried foods, red meat! i don't really understand the new food pyramid that's customizeable. i'm supposed to eat 2 cups of orange veggies and 3 cups of dried beans or peas a week? that doesn't sound very appealing to me. the only diet education that's worked at all for me is the new american plate concept--visualize the plate as 1/3 protein, 2/3 whole grains and veggies. my plate isn't there yet, but it's easy to visualize my goal.

exercise more. i went to the gym five times a week for my first two years of medical school, and i haven't been back since. how did that happen? i made the gym part of my schedule back then. after class, i would go to the gym with my study partner and then hit a coffee shop to study afterwards. if i wanted to be lazy, there was someone counting on me to be at the gym. since my schedule is much more erratic, the gym seems all but impossible for me. truthfully, i don't like the gym that much to begin with. so, i took a page out of the patient education materials i received during family medicine and started the 10,000 steps program. i bought a $10 pedometer and wore it around the hospital. it turned out that some days i was over 10,000 steps and some days i wasn't. what made the difference? strangely, it was all the things i've been trained to tell my patients--take the stairs, take more public transportation, or get off a bus stop early. if i did these things, i was consistently over 10,000 steps. i've been trying to add some pilates to that, but i was only able to do my 20-minute video three times a week for one week. that's right. i stuck with my new exercise program for one whole week, but i'll try again ... next week.

see my doctor annually. this one is definitely easier than it sounds. there was a two-year period during medical school when i didn't go to the doctor. why not? it felt like i didn't have enough time. plus, the wait for a regular appointment with my doctor is six weeks, and with the travel time to and from the office and the unpredictable amount of time in the waiting room, the doctor's appointment will take at least half my day. if i knew i had half a day free in six weeks, would i really want to spend it getting a pap smear? during my ob/gyn rotation, i did pap smears all day long on other women, and i finally worked up the courage to tell my attending i needed to take a morning off to get mine done. going to a doctor is a pain in the butt. why do i make time to go see my doctor? honestly, it's mostly because i don't want to be a hypocrite, but i'm never sorry that i took half a day to go.