Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Article

Moral Injury: The Spirit’s Unseen Wound

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: August 14, 2023

On July 17, 2023, several media outlets covering military and federal news carried a story about the US Depa...

Article

Fireworks, Veterans, and PTSD: The Ironies of the Fourth of July

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: June 29, 2023

When I was a child, every Fourth of July holiday my father would take me to the military fireworks display at Fort Sam Ho...

Article

Weaponizing Education: The Rise, Fall, and Return of the GI Bill

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: February 9, 2023

Nelson Mandela ¹

Growing up I can remember my father telling stories of ...

Article

Doctors of Virtue and Vice: The Best and Worst of Federal Practice in 2023

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: December 14, 2022

Regular readers of Federal Practitioner may recall that I have had a tradition of dedicating the last column of the year to an eth...

Article

The Long Arc of Justice for Veteran Benefits

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: November 9, 2022

This Veterans Day we honor the passing of the largest expansion of veterans benefits and services in history. On August 10, 2022, President Biden s...

Article

Psychedelics and the Military: What a Long, Strange Trip It’s Been

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: October 12, 2022

Human subjects’ protections have exponentially improved since the days of the military’s secret LSD research, but the federal government must tread...

Article

In the Heat of Anger: The Impact of Increasing Temperatures on Veteran and Military Mental Health

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: July 1, 2022

As temperatures climb, we must redouble our efforts to educate patients about the dangers of extreme heat and advocate for federal policies and pro...

Article

Green Alerts: Balancing Suicide Risk and Privacy

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: May 11, 2022

Green Alerts deploy media and law enforcement to search for missing veterans believed to be vulnerable to harm, but the call to safeguard the digni...

Article

The Balance of Truth-Telling and Respect for Confidentiality: The Ethics of Case Reports

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: February 4, 2022

The CARE guidelines can help case report authors hone the art of anonymizing the protected health information of subjects while also accurately con...

Article

A Simple Message

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: January 7, 2022

Find something to be grateful for: your loved ones, your companion animals, your friends; these are things even the pandemic cannot take away from ...

Article

The Angel of Death in Clarksburg

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: December 10, 2021

Compassion and competence can help us to follow the good inclinations of our hearts that together with system changes can bar the doors of our hosp...

Article

The Delta Factor

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: September 13, 2021

With the rapid emergence of the COVID-19 Delta variant the war has changed and so has the need to mandate vaccination for those on whose service de...

Article

Affirming Pride

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: August 9, 2021

The VA decision to provide gender-confirmation surgery removes an ethical dilemma and allows health care providers to use the procedure to promote,...

Article

Mistrust and Mandates: COVID-19 Vaccination in the Military

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: June 9, 2021

Part of the accountability we all bear for health care inequity and racism is to better understand vaccine hesitancy among military and veteran coh...

Article

An Anniversary Postponed and a Diagnosis Delayed: Vietnam and PTSD

Author:: Cynthia Geppert, MD, MA, MPH, MSBE

Publish date: May 12, 2021

Postponement of the National Vietnam War Veterans Day should not diminish our recognition of their service and our focus on posttrauamtic stress di...