LaurenceLewinMD

Summary

• Now, (since 6/2022), fully retired from a part-time nephrology consultative position at Marin Community Clinic, after 49 years and 3 months in the foxholes (Orange County, CA) Semi-retired 10/2016, to paradise, Marin County! In December 2018, I went to work for Marin Nephrology, rounding on ~ 100 patients, twice monthly, at 3 dialysis clinics in San Rafael and in Greenbrae. After teaching a nurse practitioner how to do my job, I was no longer an asset to the practice, and left it, after about one year.
  
  I am a rather old-fashioned physician, a fossil who is an old-time professional, a patient advocate, and an advocate for health care reform. I believe that in the 21st century, in an industrialized nation, that health care is a human right, and I am proud and grateful to the state of California for never turning away a patient from life-saving dialysis, even while private insurance companies deemed hemodialysis an "experimental therapy." I am proud to have been out of step with mainstream medicine for the majority of my career, and I lament the decay of professional standards and independence, as physicians, are transformed into providers, and very well trained technicians. I lament the industrialization of medicine and the loss of its claim to be a profession. I'm proud to say that I have never turned away a patient with kidney disease because they can not pay for my services.
  
  I no longer feel that it is my responsibility to seek a balance of justice in healthcare. I’m enjoying 4.5 hours of CME at UCSF, Stanford and UCI, weekly, and am in awe of how my profession has evolved into a component in the health care sector. In a word, I’m enjoying obsolescence. (1/25/23)