How American doctors lost respect, exhibit one

Yesterday, I received the strangest of emails. It was nominally from the founder of a physician services company, one of those that will, for an undisclosed “signature membership” fee, help doctors with contract negotiation, financial planning, estate management and such. Fine. Stylistically I doubt that the founder, or indeed any human, has had much input on the contents, which were this: sign up for a free 3-day online course and your host, an “expert on lead generation and trust-building” will teach you how to increase revenue and influence in order to get more patients to your clinic. He once, and I am quoting directly from the email here, “helped a little-known surgeon go viral, ⊕ [Note: This is most likely a reference to John P. Williams, a breast cancer surgeon and the creator of the YouTube channel Breast Cancer School for Patients. He was the chair for two and a half years. ] fill his waiting room, and become the White House–appointed chairman of the President’s Cancer…