{"id":135414,"date":"2023-02-22T10:48:02","date_gmt":"2023-02-22T15:48:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/?p=135414"},"modified":"2023-02-22T10:48:03","modified_gmt":"2023-02-22T15:48:03","slug":"wright-state-medical-resident-examines-medical-traditions-in-new-book","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/2023\/02\/22\/wright-state-medical-resident-examines-medical-traditions-in-new-book\/","title":{"rendered":"Wright State medical resident examines medical traditions in new book"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Brian Elliott, an Air Force captain and internal medicine chief resident, examines the history and effectiveness of medical traditions in \u201cWhite Coat Ways: A History of Medical Traditions and Their Battle with Progress.\u201d<\/p><\/div>\n

Think of physicians and others in the medical profession and white lab coats come to mind. But why do they wear white coats? And should they?<\/p>\n

Those are the questions addressed by Brian Elliott, M.D., in his recently released book, \u201cWhite Coat Ways: A History of Medical Traditions and Their Battle with Progress<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elliott is an Air Force captain who is internal medicine<\/a> chief resident at Wright-Patterson Medical Center, affiliated with the Wright State University Boonshoft School of Medicine<\/a>. He also is a clinical instructor and assistant professor of medicine at the Boonshoft School of Medicine.<\/p>\n

\u201cMedicine is filled with tradition,\u201d Elliott said. \u201cThis book is about why, and whether they should continue.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elliott started research into what became the book in 2018, when he was in medical school at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, near where he was born and raised in southern New Jersey. He originally had intended to write an article for a professional journal, but his interest in the subject grew and, he said, \u201cI found I had a lot more to say.\u201d<\/p>\n

How did he as a medical student also manage to do book research? \u201dWhen you care about something that much, you carve out time here and there,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Elliott wrote the book \u2014 quickly crediting his wife, Laura, for her help \u2014 and employed a professional firm to do the editing. He self-published the book in paperback through Med Media Publishing LLC available through a variety of online retailers.<\/p>\n

The book goes into detail about seven traditions, the most recognizable, he said, is the title subject, the white coat. \u201cIt\u2019s a tradition that\u2019s so ingrained. When we think of a doctor, you think of a man or woman in a white coat,\u201d he said. \u201cThe irony is that we\u2019ve forgotten how it started.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elliott said in the early days of medicine, there was little attention to cleanliness. As medicine advanced, it became common for doctors to wear a white coat, which was thought to be antiseptic and showed that the wearer was keeping clean.<\/p>\n

But white lab coats carry bacteria picked up in health care settings and aren\u2019t as pristine as people think, Elliott said, and can cause patients to be infected. Still, the tradition endures. He said he instead tends to wear scrubs without sleeves, so he can wash his hand and arms regularly.<\/p>\n

Another tradition related to the initial donning of the white coat is medical students taking the Hippocratic Oath during their official ceremony bestowing the title of doctor. \u201cHippocrates likely didn\u2019t write it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

And while it\u2019s thought to have been handed down for more than 2,000 years, Elliott said it didn\u2019t catch on popularly until the 20th century. The wording of the oath \u2014 generally for the physician to do no harm to a patient and to set down ethical concepts \u2014 varies from medical school to medical school, he said.<\/p>\n

While he questions these and other traditions, Elliott is not against all of them.<\/p>\n

In particular, he believes in the cadaver lab, where students dissect the recently deceased to learn the inner anatomy. Such labs were commonplace but fell out of favor in place of technology that allows seeing inside the body without being invasive. Elliott said there\u2019s a benefit for medical students to study cadavers.<\/p>\n

And despite his questioning the wisdom of the white coat, he sees the positive in that tradition.<\/p>\n

\u201cPatients find that that coat symbolizes professionalism\u201d and can put their minds at ease, he said.<\/p>\n

Still, his book is \u201cnot about whether to get rid of all these traditions, but do we do them because we\u2019ve always done them or because they make sense.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reactions have been positive in an early release of his book to the medical community. The book is aimed not only at those in the medical field.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wrote it in a way that it\u2019s easily understandable to the general public \u2014 to anyone interested in the topic,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

For now, Elliott is wrapping up his time at Wright-Patterson Medical Center. This summer he will move to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Maryland where he will be stationed for three years.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ll likely come back here, but it\u2019s up to the Air Force,\u201d he said. \u201cI very much enjoyed my time here in residency. I\u2019ve had phenomenal mentorship, which allowed me to do things like this book in addition to clinical duties.\u201d<\/p>\n

Will there be a follow-up book? \u201cFor now, I\u2019m focused on this launch,\u201d Elliott said. \u201cBut I have an idea for book number two if things go well.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Brian Elliott, an Air Force captain and internal medicine chief resident, examines the history and effectiveness of medical traditions in \u201cWhite Coat Ways.\u201d Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":66,"featured_media":135426,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[722,725,2146,2016,2039,715],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-135414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academics","category-home-news-sidebar","category-residency","category-medicine","category-military-veterans","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/66"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=135414"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":135434,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135414\/revisions\/135434"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/135426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=135414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=135414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/webapp2.wright.edu\/web1\/newsroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=135414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}