Knock Knock, Hi! with the Glaucomfleckens

Knock Knock, Hi! with the Glaucomfleckens

"Knock Knock, Hi! with the Glaucomfleckens" dives into the highs, lows, and WTFs of healthcare. Whether you're in the medical field, live with a healthcare worker, or broke your arm once and are still paying off your medical bills, this is a must-listen. Join Will and Kristin Flanary (aka the Glaucomfleckens) for candid chats with leading healthcare voices like Dr. Mike and Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy. Discover fun facts about eyeballs, hear relatable stories from medical training, and sneak a peek into the U.S. health insurance industry (spoiler alert: it's not great!). We'll share our own perspectives of being a patient or family member experiencing the healthcare system. And, of course, we explore the question on everyone's minds: "Why has Dr. Glaucomflecken never had his eyes dilated?" Combining science with humor and a dash of snark, we unpack the human side of healthcare.

Episodes

February 24, 2026 38 mins
This episode starts with TikTok’s updated Terms of Service, specifically the part where apps want to know where you are at all times, and quickly spirals into a much bigger question: did we accidentally sign up for the surveillance state… or was it always inevitable? Kristin and I debate privacy, inevitability, pessimism, preparedness, and whether refusing to participate actually protects you, or just makes life harder. Somewhere ...
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We start this episode exactly where you’d expect: Olympic penis drama. From pole vault mishaps to ski jumpers allegedly injecting hyaluronic acid for aerodynamic advantage, we briefly explore how far humans will go for gold. Then we pivot to the eyeballs. First, a patient with sudden, painless loss of half their vision walks into the ER. What sounds like a retinal detachment turns out to be something far scarier: a branch retina...
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This week, Kristin and I unpack what really happened after Step 1 went pass/fail and why medical students are now under more pressure, not less. We talk about how Step 2 quietly became the new make-or-break test, why students are leaving clinical rotations early just to study, and why calling this generation “less dedicated” completely misses the point. We also zoom way out and ask a bigger question: are we solving the right probl...
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Let’s talk about something deeply unsexy but incredibly important: pre-op clearance for cataract surgery. After watching a colleague get sent to their own primary care doctor for a seven-minute procedure under minimal sedation, I realized how far we’ve drifted from common sense. Cataract surgery is one of the safest, most routine operations in medicine, yet we’re still funneling millions of patients into unpaid, unnecessary pre-op...
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This episode opens with an extremely serious debate about whether buying a $5,000 air hockey table is financially irresponsible… or medically necessary for eye-hand coordination. From there, we read listener feedback from our EMS episode, including why dispatchers are absolute heroes, how CPR instructions actually work over the phone, and the big difference between fire-based and non-fire-based EMS funding. Then we get into Cha...
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This episode is a tough one. I start by talking about the killing of Alex Preti and Renee Good in Minneapolis and why it’s been sitting so heavily with me as a physician, a parent, and a human being trying to make sense of what’s happening in this country. Then I focus on something concrete I can do: explain what pepper spray and tear gas actually do to your eyes and how to protect yourself if you’re exposed. From corneal abrasion...
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It’s Heart Month, so we went straight to the top and invited Dr. Stacy Rosen, Volunteer President of the American Heart Association, to help us answer one simple question: What actually keeps your heart healthy… and what’s just noise? We talk about why 80% of heart attacks and strokes are preventable, what the AHA’s Life’s Essential 8 really looks like in real life (spoiler: you’re still allowed to eat cookies), and why sleep, mov...
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This episode we get into a new JAMA Ophthalmology study takes a hard look at pickleball-related eye injuries, and the numbers are… not great. Retinal detachments, hyphemas, orbital fractures, and even open globes are showing up more and more, especially as the sport explodes in popularity among older adults. I break down exactly how these injuries happen, which ones are true emergencies, and why I am once again begging you, polite...
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Kristin and I read through listener comments, including theories about how I can create characters without an inner monologue, and real-world ophthalmology stories that lead me to beg you, once again, to call your eye doctor before going to the ER. We also talk about scrubs, fashion, and the fact that someone published a real scientific paper about what patients think doctors should wear. Then we play a game where Kristin has to g...
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This episode we tackle something a lot of people are quietly worried about: virtual residency interviews. Are they here to stay? Are they fair? And how exactly are programs supposed to deal with applicants using AI to help answer questions in real time? Then we get into the eyeballs. A young woman with hair growing where hair absolutely should not exist. A 78-year-old with “sudden vision loss” that turns out to be anything but. An...
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This episode we head to North Dakota, a place that is extremely flat, very windy, and filled with some of the kindest humans I’ve ever met, including Dr. Erik Heitkamp, a hospitalist in Fargo, and Courtney Koebele, the Executive Director of the North Dakota Medical Association. Together, we dig into what physician advocacy actually looks like at the state level, not the cable-news chaos, but the real work: drafting bills, educati...
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After surviving Disney motion-simulator rides that nearly ended me, I dive into a question that’s been rattling around my brain all break: if AI replaces doctors… who gets sued when something goes wrong? We talk AI hype, liability, tech companies discovering malpractice culture the hard way, and why replacing physicians isn’t as simple as Silicon Valley thinks it is. Then we get back to basics: how to actually take an eye history,...
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This episode starts with the important questions, like whether I’m emotionally prepared to return to my ancestral homeland of Big Bend National Park, and whether Kristin would rather share a cabin with a venomous snake or a tarantula. From there, things take a turn into real life: a med student driving for Uber and Lyft just to make ends meet. That story opens up a bigger conversation about medical school debt, why med students s...
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In this episode of Knock Knock Eye, I start by breaking down Elon Musk’s latest medical hot take. The idea that everyone should get a yearly full-body MRI interpreted by AI. Then I talk about why I finally said screw it and paid cash for my own medical care after insurance insisted my testicles might have magically regenerated. And finally, a mystery case that starts as blurry vision and floaters and ends with one of the rarest e...
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This week, Kristin and I talk with Jason Pang, Director of EMS, and Joe Stoffolano, Division Chief of Community Risk Reduction in Miami Township, Ohio. These guys take us deep into the world of pre-hospital medicine. We’re talking how EMS is funded, why those funding streams vanish, the future of EMS, and much more. We also break down how 911 dispatch actually works, how EMS decides what units to send, why response times vary so w...
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Hollywood, we need to talk. If one more movie shows an eyeball dangling from someone’s cheek, I might start mailing anatomy textbooks to Los Angeles. And while we’re at it, can we please stop calling every wandering eye a “lazy eye”? After a quick rant about my personal ophthalmology pet peeves, I dive into one of the strangest mystery cases I’ve ever seen: a 47-year-old with sudden, complete ophthalmoplegia and normal imaging. Ne...
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This week, Kristin and I answer listener comments about colonoscopy prep, including a truly cursed diet of mashed white vegetables and learn about Cologuard, the screening test where you… mail your poop. Through the actual mail. To a stranger. We also dive into the ongoing household war known as “Kristin Won’t Stop Sleeping in Her Contacts,” which leads to a horrifying discussion about wrinkly eyeballs, saggy conjunctiva, and what...
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This week, I start by sharing why First Descents, the nonprofit that helped me rebuild community and trust in my body after cancer, deserves a spot on your end-of-year giving list. And then, because it is Christmas, I diagnose the eyeballs of Charlie Brown, the Grinch, Rudolph, and even Jack Skellington. From aniridia to jaundice to reindeer esotropia, it’s a holiday episode only an ophthalmologist could make. Takeaways: ...
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It’s Christmas, which means two things: Kristin’s wearing a periodic-table tree shirt, and I’m reminiscing about the worst cafeteria meal in VA history (“brown meal,” may it never return). But the real adventure this week? Our kid suddenly developed mysterious brown patches on her skin, smooth, painless, and deeply unsettling for two parents whose medical degrees contain zero pediatrics. Cue the panic Googling, the advice nurse, a...
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This week, I’m answering your YouTube questions, including why my histology shirt is back, and then diving into a mystery case straight from the ICU. A sedated teenager with a swollen face, red eyes, and a whole lot of chemosis needs help, and I show up with… my ophthalmologist luggage. What I found is something every ICU clinician has seen but doesn’t always recognize: exposure keratopathy, the completely preventable eye emergenc...
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