MARK RAY MD Dermatology

10/04/2021

September 2021 --

08/11/2021

August 11, 2021 - A temporary setback in construction progress!

06/25/2021

June 24, 2021 - Progress!

06/19/2021

Lucky had to look high and low for plywood, but we finally got it!

06/01/2021

The office construction is moving right along. We're still seeing patients in our temporary suite, 1203, but we'll be in our permanent suite, 101 in 2-3 months!

05/12/2021

05/12/2021

Now fully credentialed and accepting these Blue Cross/ Blue Shield plans:
Blue Advantage HMO
Blue Essentials HMO
BlueChoice PPO
Dual Eligible Special Needs Plan
Health Select
Medicare Advantage HMO
Medicare Advantage PPO
WellMed MA HMO

03/05/2021

Websites. With just a little coding, a bit of designing, and some dragging and dropping, and you can tell a story, educate on any subject, or sell books (and then everything else). And you can get that message out to the entire world. It’s a far cry from the Town Crier (mmmmm…Chicken Fried Steak – old Abileneans know what I mean) or Gutenberg.
I’m working with a web designer to spiff up my website for my new practice. He asked me for some graphics and pictures to place in the site. Janet found a few photos of some of my mission trips to Guatemala. Some of you may see yourselves in a few of these pics!
Remember when we used to travel and sit closer than six feet from other people? And I only wore a mask when I operated!

03/01/2021

There are many incidents over the years that stick in my memory and have contributed to make me the skin specialist that I am today. I shall call these incidents:
STICKY SKIN BITS!!!!
As a fourth-year medical student at UTMB Galveston, we were given the latitude to study almost any medical subject in almost any setting that interested us. I chose to spend a month in rural Nigeria with a group of general surgeons and medical students from NYU to study general surgery and fix hernias. I was going to be the next Dr. Red Duke. There was no phone, no lights, no motor cars, not a single lux-u-ry. It was primitive as can be. Each night, just like Abraham Lincoln, we would read by candlelight because the power invariably failed. It was good practice for SNOVID-21. As we would read, large, buzzing, flying insects would crash into the candle flame and tumble to the ground in little fireballs like tiny Kamikazes. One night, one of these bugs (not on fire) made its way inside the mosquito netting covering the bed of my unwitting medical student friend Tom. After rolling around on the creature all night, his skin looked something like this photo. These blisters were the result of cantharidin, secreted by the blister beetle, of the family Meloidae. This is the very substance we use today to treat molluscum contagiosum, except today it’s synthesized and not made by squishing beetles. Dermatology had followed me all the way to remote Africa. It was destiny. Somebody else can fix hernias! Tom was OK in a couple of days.

03/01/2021

I’ve always enjoyed building things, and building a medical practice is one of the things that I’ve enjoyed the most. Starting a new practice is a very involved process. I’ve done it several times, but I have to say that there’s a little more to it in 2021 than in 1990! Facebook, Google, and websites were all just a gleam in Al Gore’s eye back in 1990. Phones? Landlines are passé. VOIP, mobile, virtual fax machines, PBXs in the cloud? An analytical person like me could get paralysis by analysis. It’s said that Domino’s is no longer a food company, but rather a technology company that sells pizza. A well run medical practice must also be a technology company. Pizza is optional. A doctor must emphasize the patient care part of the equation first and foremost, but without the proper technological backbone, that care could be compromised. We have so many tools today, that when utilized properly, the sky’s the limit. Bring it on!

02/21/2021