Assume the Position: Memoirs of an Obstetrician Gynecologist

“Assume the Position: Memoirs of an Obstetrician” will place the reader in the shoes of an Obstetrician and Gynecologist with years of clinical experience and training. It will also place the reader in the same stirrups as patients in my office, listening to the trials, tribulations, joys, and fears expressed to me. Most people would assume that sitting on the stool where I have sat for many years has given me a unique view of life. However, I would argue that it is walking in my once white wooden clogs that have taken me through thousands of childbirth experiences, countless patients who have been seen in some of their most vulnerable stages of life, a multitude of surgical procedures – that it has been these steps, one by one, that have afforded me the privilege of learning everything that I have had occasion to learn over the years about the human condition. They are indeed well worn clogs, stained with all kinds of humanity, that have carried me for years from one patient to the next, one human story after another, and have allowed me the opportunity to play a small but at times significant part in the life of many women. It is to all these women, many of whose stories are recounted herein through vignettes, that I am indebted for the trust that they have placed in me over the years.
 
All women wonder what other women experience when they see their OB GYN physician. All men wonder what his girlfriend or wife will be subjected to when exposed in front of their ‘Gyno’. The stresses and strains of a busy professional life on an Obstetrician Gynecologist are revealed in intimate, true detail.

The story begins after early retirement from one of the busiest group practices in Phoenix, Arizona and a move to the beautiful high alpine ski town of Telluride, Colorado, after an ultimatum from my wife. From there the story continues to the depths of Africa to explore women’s health care in a small country with some of the worst obstetrical and neonatal outcomes in the world. Timely topics subsequently discussed include office life, operating room experiences, the medical malpractice crisis, abortion, the family life of an obstetrician, labor and delivery, night life, the business of medicine, Obamacare, managed care, and life after private practice. Each chapter is punctuated with true, unfiltered vignettes, laughable, joyful, fearful, and tearful, that can only be found in the life of an OB-GYN physician as he goes throughout his day.

I am an actively licensed, American Board Certified Obstetrician Gynecologist. A graduate of Princeton University, I was trained at two of the top medical institutions in Philadelphia, after which my wife and I picked up our East Coast roots and moved to begin anew in the desert of Arizona. After 21 years of private practice, involved in all aspects of practice management and women’s health care and research, I chose to leave it all behind and begin a second career in expert witness medical malpractice testimony, and then a third career as a medical director. Travel with me as you walk through my life in my shoes. It has been an interesting journey, indeed!