Hello Dr Cherner!

 Wow, it's so bright in here, I said when Debbie led me into the exam room.

I stepped on the scale to get weighed..... it read 132.6.... I did lose weight! Six pounds, from giving up cheese and Mallomars.

Do I have a big belly? I asked Dr Cherner when he began examining me.

Yes, but some people have bigger ones.

He did a thorough physical exam, as if he were a doctor.

Oh! He is a doctor.

The artwork on his walls? All done by Rachmel and his late wife, Aileen, who died last year, Feb. 2013, of complications of diabetes.

 Plenty of literature in the exam room, including the recipes from the Willow Grove Giant Supermarket.

 The procedure: He examines you and then you report to his office for follow-up. Luckily, the office of my nephrologist Victor Ghantos had just faxed in my test results.

"You're a healthy person," said Cherner.

"Your diabetes is mild."

No one ever told me that before. Made me feel great!!!

I showed him my log book


 Log book is below all my drug paraphernalia..... I had a whopping high from that damn Mallomar I ate for dinner... one measly Mallomar

"I don't like to see it go above 140," he said.

Good parameter, I thought.

 Dr Cherner has been at the Regency Towers in Willow Grove for nine years.



He graduated from Thomas Jefferson Medical College. Told me some great stories about how he was hired. While he was a med student, his mentor, a Dr Dietrich, I believe, persuaded him to go into endocrinology.

I asked him to explain why his parents named him Rachmel. The suffix, he said, is similar to Daniel. In Hebrew, it means....  since I wasn't taking notes I can't remember but it had something to do with God.

In the Waiting Room, I filled out the usual Q'aires for new patients. Some of the Qs were really interesting, as they tested a person for depression.

One question was: Do you like your living situation. If the answer is No, tell why.

I accidentally filled out the section MEN ONLY, realized it when it was too late, and simply crossed off the sections about the penis and the urine stream.

Erudite books and chatkas livened up his very cheerful office. I LOVE visiting people's offices.

Rachmel designed this huge tapestry and his wife Aileen sewed it.

Thirteenth-century Physician/Rabbi/Philosopher/Astronomer Moses Maimonides  on the left, near the menorah, is healing a man who walked in with a cane.

Dr Cherner told me that upon graduating medical school, people take the oath of Maimonides.

I always thought it was the Hippocratic Oath.

"The eternal providence has appointed me to watch over the life and health of Thy creatures. May the love for my art actuate me at all time; may neither avarice nor miserliness, nor thirst for glory or for a great reputation engage my mind; for the enemies of truth and philanthropy could easily deceive me and make me forgetful of my lofty aim of doing good to Thy children.

May I never see in the patient anything but a fellow creature in pain.
Grant me the strength, time and opportunity always to correct what I have acquired, always to extend its domain; for knowledge is immense and the spirit of man can extend indefinitely to enrich itself daily with new requirements. Today he can discover his errors of yesterday and tomorrow he can obtain a new light on what he thinks himself sure of today.
Oh, God, Thou has appointed me to watch over the life and death of Thy creatures; here am I ready for my vocation and now I turn unto my calling.

I asked him if I should get one of those pumps that attach to your body.

No, he said.

I breathed a sigh of relief.

He gave me a number of handouts. He still publishes articles.

In "12 Treatment Pitfalls" published in a 2013 Consultant360.com, he lists the best places to inject yourself due to your body's ability to quickly absorb the insulin:  abdomen, arms, thighs and butt.

He reminds patients to alternate sites, which I do.


Aren't you glad you don't have diabetes?