I remember being a kid, maybe nine or ten years old, rushing to my best friend’s house after school to play Mario Kart on his Nintendo. We would spend hours racing around 16-bit rainbow tracks, smashing blocks, and throwing bananas. I didn’t realize then that gaming could be more than entertainment, or that for some people it could one day become a healthy way to cope with stress.
Have you ever felt anxious because you weren’t confident with how to treat a specific patient? Join the club! This anxiety with new professionals, though, seems to lead to low confidence as a professional overall. So how do you gain professional confidence? Is it in knowing how to treat each patient you encounter or something else? This week I explore this question and content that professional confidence doesn’t lie in “knowing what to do” but knowing how to figure it out.
Parts I and II explored how opioids act on the brain and how American history — particularly its wars — helped fuel cycles of addiction. Now, we turn to the present. This final installment of “Who Can? We Can, Narcan!” focuses on the lifesaving tools that can interrupt that cycle, from medication-assisted treatment to emergency overdose reversal. In the military and veteran communities, where resilience is both a strength and a barrier to care, these interventions are transforming how we talk about and respond to overdose risk.
Hopefully, the title hooked you. Now what am I talking about? And who is “us”? The “what” is conversations about firearm safety and suicide prevention. The “who” is healthcare providers. Let’s take a few steps back…
Any parent would tell you the “why” questions start when we are young, usually around two- or three-years-old. The constant need to know the reason behind function, choices, and existence is inherent in us. We want to understand, and maybe if we can understand something, we feel more comfortable with it. The question of “why” helps us understand our surroundings, and this curiosity keeps us learning and growing.