Anh-Vu Nguyen, MD

WENDY R. LEVINE GROSS

Anh-Vu Nguyen, MD

Emergency Room Physician Does Double Duty as an Author


Board certified in emergency and family practice medicine, Anh-Vu Nguyen, MD, FAAFP, was exposed to the world of medicine at an early age through his mother, now a retired orthopedic nurse.

Referring to himself as a "math and science" person, Nguyen, an emergency medicine physician at Bay Pines Veterans Administration Hospital and preceptor for the family practice residency program at St. Petersburg's Bayfront Medical Center, initially thought he was going to be an engineer.

However, as an undergraduate at Tampa's University of South Florida (USF), he took "more and more" science classes and redirected his focus towards science and medicine.

In 1996, Nguyen graduated from the USF College of Medicine and was also named Family Practice Student of the Year.

Reflecting on emergency medicine as his specialty of choice, Nguyen noted that during his family medicine residency at Bayfront Medical Center, he was given a broad range of training including obstetrics and emergency medicine.

During the final year of his residency, he took many emergency medicine electives and as luck would have it, upon completion of his courses, was hired by Tallahassee Community Hospital (now known as Capital Regional Medical Center) as an emergency medicine practitioner.

Crediting Louis R. Bolen, MD, then director of emergency medicine at the hospital, with giving him a "big break," Nguyen explained that in 1999 when he completed his residency, it was difficult for a family-trained physician to get a job at an urban emergency room.

According to Nguyen, who met Bolen while studying in Tallahassee, there is a high burnout rate among emergency room physicians. Citing his brother, Dung, a family physician practicing in Tallahassee, and Bolen as influences on his professional life, Nguyen acknowledged that Bolen helped teach him administratively as well as academically.

As an emergency room physician, Nguyen has treated many patients over the years. When asked about his most memorable emergency, he thought for a moment and recalled an incident involving a "sleeping woman" from early in his career.

He explained that, oblivious to heavy rains and a thunderstorm around her, his patient was awakened when lightning hit the roof of her home. The roof caved in and crushed half of her face, necessitating plastic surgery.

Nguyen took care of this woman until the plastic surgeon stepped in, but the irony of the situation remains with Nguyen today. "I was out and driving to the hospital during the bad weather and this woman who lay sleeping in her home was the one injured," he said.

In addition to his work as an emergency physician, Nguyen has a strong interest in medical-legal medicine and has co-authored three books with his brother, Dung – a two-volume book Learning from Medical Errors: Legal Issues; Learning from Medical Errors: Clinical Problems published in 2005 by Radcliffe Publishing and Medical Perceptions, Fact or Fiction published in July 2008 by Publish America.

The authors hope the information in these volumes will increase physicians' awareness of common clinical errors as well as help colleagues decrease their chances of finding themselves in a courtroom setting.

Intended as a learning tool, the first volume of Learning from Medical Errors is written in a case-based format using simplified legal terms. Using various medical issues from all specialties, the book provides background information on malpractice cases as well as tips on proper medical diagnoses.

The second volume contains information on the most common medical issues doctors are sued for. According to Nguyen, abdominal pains, fevers, chest pain, wounds and lacerations are among the most common malpractice suits and also yield the largest settlements.

Written in laymen's terms, Nguyen's latest book, Medical Perceptions, Fact or Fiction, contains more than 100 common perceptions. Organized in chapters, each misperception has a clinical scenario. Examples given by Nguyen: colds transmitted by cold weather and people commonly getting sexually transmitted diseases from toilet seats.

The book also points to limitations in medicine. Nguyen explained that when a patient presents with chest pain and the electrocardiogram (EKG) and blood tests are normal, this is not an indication that everything is indeed okay as sensitive blood markers often do not show up until later. Similarly, he noted that depending upon the type of heart attack a patient has, their EKG may not show abnormalities.

For instance, in a transmural heart attack where damage occurs to almost the entire wall of the heart, one would be more likely to see characteristic changes instantly versus a subendocardial attack affecting only the inner third to one-half of the heart muscle, where it may take up to 12 to 24 hours before changes can be visualized. "That's why there are a lot of chest pain centers within hospitals whose sole purpose is to admit and monitor the patient, performing frequent blood tests and serial EKGs," said Nguyen.

When not engaged in clinical work or writing, Nguyen, the father of three, enjoys movies, reading and taekwondo. He won gold medals in taekwondo form and sparring at the 2008 Florida Sunshine State Games.

He also serves as an expert medical witness for the Florida Department of Health and Board of Medicine and the American Medical Forensic Specialists.