Bharat Kumar, MD, MME, FACP, FAAAAI, RhMSUS, is a clinical assistant professor of internal medicine in the Division of Immunology, University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, Iowa City. Before assuming the role of physician editor, he was a member of the ACR Board of Directors (beginning in 2020). After attending college at the University of Pennsylvania, he went to Saba University School of Medicine and completed his residency in internal medicine at the University of Kentucky. He arrived in Iowa in 2014 and completed fellowships in both rheumatology and allergy/immunology in 2017, as well as a master’s degree in medical education and certification in musculoskeletal ultrasonography. His clinical interests include the intersection of autoimmunity and immunodeficiency, musculoskeletal ultrasonography, and ocular inflammatory diseases. As the associate program director for the rheumatology fellowship training program, he is also driven by a desire to improve the quality of medical education as well as the value of clinical work for both patients and practitioners. Outside the clinic, Dr. Kumar has a keen interest in medical journalism, quality improvement and humanism, and is the Arnold P. Gold Foundation’s Humanism-in-Research Associate Editor.
1949 was a momentous year—astronomer Fred Hoyle coined the term Big Bang, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was formed, and Rodgers and Hammerstein’s classic musical South Pacific opened on Broadway.1 Much less recognized was the publication of an essay by Richard Asher, FRCP, titled the “Seven Sins of Medicine.”2 Although it’s over 75 years…
In this episode, Dr. Kumar tackles issues from the dual perspectives of a clinician who also happens to have inflammatory arthritis.
It was like a reverse Uno card had been thrown onto the table. My patient was now asking his rheumatologist, “Are you okay? You look like you’re in a lot of pain.” He was right. I was wincing trying to get up from my seat and limping trying to get a few steps over to…
There’s a Word file—somewhere—on one of the many flash drives jumbled in a drawer in my home office. That file is named something like “Overcoming_Procrastination_Column.docx” and was last accessed in the year 2018. I know I wrote about 500 words, and then, one day, I said I would finish it later. But I never did….
In this episode, Dr. Kumar rheuminates on why we procrastinate and how to use this human tendency to our advantage.
Hosted by Bharat Kumar, MD, MME, FACP, FAAAAI, RhMSUS, physician editor, The Rheumatologist Amidst mounting excitement over emerging artificial intelligence tools, Dr. Kumar cautions against the expectation that technology will offer a quick fix to complex, systemic healthcare problems. Go to current issue.
As I was aimlessly browsing the web one night, I noticed a strange ad on the side. It was for a bird feeder powered by artificial intelligence (AI). I don’t know exactly what prompted the Google ad algorithm to show me this particular advertisement, but I was nevertheless struck by it. Against my better judgment,…
In this episode, Dr. Kumar offers some advice for incoming rheumatology fellows: “Start constructing winner’s triangles.”
June is always a bittersweet month, at least in academic medicine. We get to look forward to a new fresh set of faces coming into our training programs, but we also have to say goodbye to those once-fresh faces that have progressed through their medical education journeys. These transitions are never easy, neither for the…
In this episode, Dr. Kumar reflects on the importance of championing patients and healthcare through advocacy, and systems thinking.