Dr. Robert E. Marx spotlights Dr. Marc (Mike) Siegel—NYU clinical professor of medicine and prominent COVID-era clinician—and his new faith-forward book, Miracles Among Us. Dr. Marx highlights Siegel’s emphasis on real patients, resilience, and the role of faith, contrasting it with the top-down, vaccine-only approach he believes dominated public messaging during the pandemic.
He then pivots to his own forthcoming audiobook and reads Chapter 18: “The Bull Neck” from 28 Life-Changing Patients: Chronicles of an Oral & Maxillofacial Surgeon—a gripping case of massive neck tumors ultimately diagnosed as thyroid cancer, the system hurdles it exposed, and the teamwork that saved a life.
Why Siegel’s Book Matters (to Marx):
Faith, perseverance, and patient-by-patient learning (“the practice of medicine”).
Therapeutics discourse that, in Marx’s view, was sidelined during COVID.
What an Oral & Maxillofacial Surgeon Actually Does:
The dual world of dentistry + medicine: from extractions and cosmetics to complex cancer surgery.
Live Reading — “The Bull Neck” (Chapter 18):
A late-40s patient presents with bilateral, football-sized neck masses.
Office FNA and urgent coordination with pathology reveal thyroid cancer.
Social work secures coverage; extensive neck dissection removes 4.2 lbs of tumor.
A small recurrence at 14 months is resected; moderate-dose radiation “mops up” residual risk.
Seven-year disease-free follow-up before the patient relocates—meeting the bar for “cure.”
System Lessons:
The peril of delaying care.
The difference between reconstructive vs cosmetic surgery (and why protocols must reflect it).
How multidisciplinary cooperation (surgery, pathology, radiation oncology, social work) changes outcomes.
“We call it the practice of medicine because every patient teaches us something.”
“Reconstruction isn’t vanity—it’s restoring what disease took away.”
“Faith and science aren’t enemies; for many patients, they’re partners in recovery.”
Don’t wait on worrisome symptoms—earlier is safer and often simpler to treat.
Learn the difference between cosmetic vs reconstructive care when insurers push back.
Complex cases are won by teams: surgeons, pathologists, radiation oncologists, and social workers.
Books like Miracles Among Us and 28 Life-Changing Patients can re-humanize healthcare—one story at a time.
Miracles Among Us by Dr. Marc Siegel (faith-based patient stories).
28 Life-Changing Patients: Chronicles of an Oral & Maxillofacial Surgeon by Dr. Robert E. Marx (print; audiobook coming).
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