The Doctor's Art

When a child tragically gets cancer, parents and families often find themselves grasping for ways to make sense of their new reality. It is one thing to know abstractly that we live in a world where the innocent suffer, but it is another thing entirely to suffer alongside your own child. Such a life-altering experience can raise heavy questions for parents, at times forcing them to reassess their most closely held narratives and ch...

GLP-1s have taken the country by storm. Patients are losing and keeping off weight at levels previously only seen through bariatric surgery. Research trials have shown the drugs to be effective at reducing the risk of heart attack, stroke, and cardiovascular death. They protect the kidneys, reduce sleep apnea, and treat fatty liver and peripheral artery disease – all while being studied for a laundry-list of additional indica...

The hospital can be a harsh backdrop to many of life’s most pivotal events. Alarms blare at inopportune times, rounding doctors intrude on delicate conversations, and vigilant nurses disrupt rare periods of rest. All the chaos can add to the stress of a patient’s hospital stay and create an emotionally discordant experience — seemingly out of step with the profound grief, joy, or intimacy one might expect to accom...

Many patients interpret their illness through the lens of their religious tradition. Sometimes this process brings hope, comfort, or growth – but other times it compounds their suffering. What are patients supposed to do when they don’t see their lives reflected in the religious stories they cherish? And how can physicians recognize and respond to spiritual suffering that is layered on top of the physical? 

Our gues...

The creation of Medicare and Medicaid in 1965 enabled millions of Americans to meaningfully access healthcare for the first time — and dramatically increased demand for doctors. The passage of the Hart-Celler Immigration and Nationality Act a few months later enabled tens of thousands of immigrant physicians to migrate to the US. Since then, immigrant physicians have comprised between 25 — 40% of the physician workforce...

The epidemic of physician burnout isn’t just a personal problem. Burned out doctors are more likely to make mistakes, less likely to follow preventative care guidelines, and more likely to have dissatisfied patients. When a burned out physician leaves an institution or quits all together, it can cost north of a million dollars to replace them. Unwell doctors lead to unwell patients — and an unwell health care system. Th...

The electronic medical record (EMR) has become an unwelcome interloper in the exam room. Too often, patients find themselves answering questions delivered from behind a monitor by physicians hurriedly typing away. This isn’t the kind of care anyone wants — but it’s what the system demands. Thankfully, change may be on the horizon.  AI scribes are now being rolled out in EMRs across the country, capable of lis...

In recent years, Silicon Valley has imagined for us a new way of life – one where almost anyone can be a twenty or thirty-something-year-old with a supernatural glow, toned physique, understated intelligence, and a superabundance of vitality. This is not reality for most people, even for the twenty or thirty-something-year-olds, but medicine and technology originally intended to help people achieve baseline health are increas...

Electronic Medical Records have transformed the way we practice health care, making patient data readily accessible to health care providers, facilitating collaboration within and across large medical teams, increasing transparency, and drastically improving the legibility of patient charts and prescriptions. But despite these benefits, many physicians cite the electronic medical record as a primary driver of burnout, pointing to t...

Over the past 160 episodes, two themes that have appeared repeatedly feel as relevant and urgent as ever are 1) the pros and dehumanizing cons of technology and 2) approaching suffering in the human experience. In this episode, we are excited to bring back a panel of notable past guests to discuss the interplay between medicine, suffering, technology, and the human experience. 

We are joined by historian Christine Rosen, PhD, p...

Most medical encounters are structured as transactions. The patient comes in with a specific complaint, the medical expert identifies a discrete problem, and a specific intervention is prescribed.

But at the heart of a medical encounter is a story. When a patient comes in with a medical problem, the problem cannot be disentangled from their life’s narrative — doing so risks hollowing out the essence of what it means to c...

Dr. Bryant Lin is a primary care physician, educator, and researcher at Stanford University. In 2018, he founded CARE – the Center for Asian Health Research and Education. In 2023, CARE began a focused research effort investigating lung cancer in non-smoking Asians. In 2024, Dr. Lin was diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer, having never smoked in his life. 

After his diagnosis, Dr. Lin sprung into action. He began receiving...

Many of us quietly accept the idea that our best self lives somewhere in the past — that youth is the ideal and aging is a slow erosion of who we really are. But what if getting older isn’t about losing our identity, but deepening it? What if the second half of life could be defined not by decline, but by “joyspan”—our capacity for meaning, connection, and contentment as we age?

Our guest on this episod...

Many of the world’s best physicians find it surprisingly difficult to answer the question: Why are you in medicine? In the long, arduous journey of medical training or within the technocratically-minded healthcare system, one can easily get lost in the life of the mind—and become estranged from the life of the heart.

Our guest on this episode is Brewer Eberly, MD, a third-generation family physician and a fellow at Duke ...

We often confuse happiness with the absence of sadness, or a meaningful life with a productive one. The result might be a life that runs smoothly, but feels strangely flat — as if something essential is missing from the story. What if a truly good life isn’t just happy and meaningful, but also interesting?

Our guest today is Shige Oishi, PhD, professor of psychology at the University of Chicago and author of Life in Thre...

When a religious person is isolated from their community, whether due to hospitalization or military service, they can often rely on a chaplain for spiritual support. But where does a non-religious person turn when facing the same circumstances? And what tools do they have for meaning making?

Our guest is Greg Epstein, humanist chaplain at Harvard and MIT and author of the New York Times bestselling book Good Without God. As a human...

Many medical trainees are driven to medicine by their moral or religious principles — only to find that they are expected to check their principles at the patient’s door. When this happens, physicians and patients may lose the opportunity for deeper, more healing relationships.

Our guest on this episode is Dr. Farr Curlin, a hospitalist and palliative care physician at Duke University School of Medicine. Dr. Curlin holds...

Medical trainees spend years mastering what to do when biology fails — countless protocols, procedures, and split-second decisions. By the end, they’re primed to fix what’s broken. But what if the mandate of medicine is simpler — and more human?

Our guest on this episode is Dr. Jessica Zitter — a physician, author, and filmmaker who has spent her career at the fault line between intensive care and palli...

Editorial Note: 

This episode was recorded in December 2024, after the nomination of Robert F Kennedy Jr as Secretary of Health and Human Services had been announced but prior to his confirmation.  Some comments by the podcast hosts and our guest will reflect this timing.

Elephants rarely get cancer, ants quarantine when sick, and altruistic pigs have a higher pain tolerance. In this episode, we discuss insights from the an...