01/12/2026
Right before Thanksgiving, our practice took in a new patient with a list of concerns and a story that didn’t add up. His symptoms had been dismissed and mislabeled as cholecystitis by a local hospital. What we found was very different: a complicated respiratory infection spiraling into pneumonia with pleurisy, referring pain into the right upper quadrant and masquerading as gallbladder disease.
Instead of heading straight to surgery, the recommendation he’d been given, he came seeking a second opinion. We diagnosed the pneumonia and began treatment. Before finishing therapy, he developed new abdominal symptoms/ Left lower quadrant pain. After evaluation, we monitored him after-hours and pushed for urgent imaging, concerned over na extensive list of differential diagnosis . That referral to the ER and diagnostics requested led to an ICU admission, where he was found to have multiple pulmonary and extremity clots.
I share this because medicine is not linear. It’s pattern recognition, vigilance, and listening when something feels off. Today, that same patient walked through our doors with a kind gift and said, “I am only alive because of you.”
There are moments in this work that cut straight through the noise. I’m humbled by the trust placed in us and reminded why I’m here. My emergency medicine background continues to carry weight in primary care, because it demands that we pay attention, that we question, that we don’t settle for the easy answer.
