I was a young internist in 1980 and I broke my leg playing soccer and I got put on pain meds and liked them too much.

You know, it went too far. I started taking samples which were more readily available back then and finally got

confronted by colleagues.

I was scared to death at the time and I went to a treatment program and started my own personal recovery.

The story we just heard comes from Dr. Greg Skipper. personal recovery.

The story we just heard comes from Dr. Greg Skipper.

His journey may have started with his own sobriety, but because of his experiences,

he was called on to help other colleagues who also struggled with substance use. His career quickly became

one of advocacy, research, and direct clinical work with impaired physicians,

not just with substance issues, but all kinds of health conditions. Along the

road he's worked with medical boards

and insurance companies, hospitals, treatment centers, lawyers, even politicians and

he's currently medical director for the Center of Professional Recovery in

Malibu, California.

And so he knows firsthand all the complexities

that go into evaluating the health of those who care

for the health of others.

Today we're going to cover what physician impairment really means.

We'll start off by talking about how illness relates to impairment

and then explore some of the systems in place for physician health and monitoring.

We're also going to talk about some of the barriers to care

caused by these systems, what we can do to improve it, and how we can

...