Health & Veritas
Howard Forman and Harlan Krumholz, two Yale physician-professors, discuss the latest news and ideas in healthcare and seek out the truth amid the noise.

Episodes
- PodcastEpisode 74Duration 35:45
Helen Burstin: Research with an Impact
Howie and Harlan are joined by Helen Burstin to discuss her career examining issues of equity and quality in healthcare, and her current role as CEO of the Council of Medical Specialty Societies. Harlan reports on new research about the daily health effects of coffee; Howie looks at two investigations of misconduct by the insurance company Cigna.
Links:
“Acute Effects of Coffee Consumption on Health among Ambulatory Adults”
Helen Burstin: “Socioeconomic Status and Risk for Substandard Medical Care”
Helen Burstin: “Impact of language barriers on patient satisfaction in an emergency department”
“Your Surgeon Is Probably a Republican, Your Psychiatrist Probably a Democrat”
Council of Medical Specialty Societies: Patient-Led Research Scorecards
Patient-Led Research Collaborative: About Us
Medicare.gov: How do Medicare Advantage Plans work?
“How Cigna Saves Millions by Having Its Doctors Reject Claims Without Reading Them”
“DOJ sues Cigna over alleged Medicare Advantage overpayments”
Learn more about the MBA for Executives program at Yale SOM.
- PodcastEpisode 73Duration 37:31
Michael Ivy: Doctors and Mental Health
Howie and Harlan are joined by Michael Ivy, a surgeon and Yale New Haven Health's deputy chief medical officer, to discuss the mental health issues facing physicians and his own experience with burnout and depression. Harlan reports on new research casting doubt on the benefits of intermittent fasting; Howie explains how a new drug can help reduce the disproportionate rate of renal failure among people of African descent.
If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, you can call 988 or text HOME to 741741 for 24/7 support.
Links:
“Effects of Time-Restricted Eating on Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease”
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services: Health Worker Burnout
Stanford Medicine: The Stanford Model of Professional Fulfillment
College of American Pathologists College: CURES Act Fact Sheet
“Inaxaplin for Proteinuric Kidney Disease in Persons with Two APOL1 Variants”
“Inhibiting APOL1 to Treat Kidney Disease”
Learn more about the MBA for Executives program at Yale SOM.
- PodcastEpisode 72Duration 32:43
Harlan Krumholz, This Is Your Life
Howie interviews Harlan about his path to medicine and his career as a physician and scientist.
Links:
Harlan Krumholz: “Cost effectiveness of thrombolytic therapy with streptokinase in elderly patients with suspected acute myocardial infarction”
Harlan Krumholz: “Participation in Cancer Clinical Trials”
Harlan Krumholz: “Strategies for reducing the door-to-balloon time in acute myocardial infarction”
Harlan Krumholz: “Hospital-Readmission Risk - Isolating Hospital Effects from Patient Effects”
Harlan Krumholz: “An administrative claims measure suitable for profiling hospital performance on the basis of 30-day all-cause readmission rates among patients with heart failure”
Learn more about the MBA for Executives program at Yale SOM.
- PodcastEpisode 71Duration 33:14
Ami Parekh: Tools for Navigating Care
Howie and Harlan are joined by Ami Parekh, chief health officer of Included Health, which provides virtual care and data-driven guidance on finding the right doctor. Harlan reviews new research on alternatives to statins; Howie looks at the effect of mandated sick leave for screening tests like mammographs and colonoscopies.
Links:
”Bempedoic Acid and Cardiovascular Outcomes in Statin-Intolerant Patients”
“Side Effect Patterns in a Crossover Trial of Statin, Placebo, and No Treatment”
“Prevalence of statin intolerance: a meta-analysis”
“Grand Rounds Health and Doctor On Demand Acquires Included Health”
“Cancer Screening after the Adoption of Paid-Sick-Leave Mandates”
Learn more about the MBA for Executives program at Yale SOM.
- PodcastEpisode 70Duration 31:56
Brita Roy: Leveraging Community Resources for Better Health
Howie and Harlan are joined by Brita Roy of NYU Langone Health to discuss her work drawing on the existing assets of a community to improve health outcomes. Harlan reports on new research on the dangers of sugar substitutes; Howie reflects on the growing openness to the lab-leak hypothesis for the origins of COVID-19.
Links:
“The artificial sweetener erythritol and cardiovascular event risk”
Harlan Krumholz: “Why One Cardiologist Has Drunk His Last Diet Soda”
“Yale Partners With the Urban League and Others to Address Gun Violence in New Haven”
“Meet Yale Internal Medicine: Brita Roy, MD, MPH, MHS”
Brita Roy: “COVID-19 Vaccine Acceptance and Access Among Black and Latinx Communities”
“WHO abandons plans for crucial second phase of COVID-origins investigation”
“U.S. Dept of Energy says with ‘low confidence’ that COVID may have leaked from a lab”
“FBI director says covid-19 ‘most likely’ originated from lab incident”
Learn more about the MBA for Executives program at Yale SOM.
- PodcastEpisode 69Duration 33:12
Anna Kaltenboeck: Untangling Drug Prices
Howie and Harlan are joined by health economist Anna Kaltenboeck, a graduate of Yale SOM’s EMBA program who served as senior health advisor to the Senate Finance Committee during the development of the drug pricing reforms in the Inflation Reduction Act. Harlan reports on recent research on the timing of exercise; Howie reflects on the limitations of a blue-ribbon panel’s recommendations on healthcare spending.
Links:
“For a longer life, afternoon exercise may be best, a large study shows”
“Time of day determines postexercise metabolism in mouse adipose tissue”
“Atlas of exercise metabolism reveals time-dependent signatures of metabolic homeostasis”
Learn more about the MBA for Executives program at Yale SOM.
- PodcastEpisode 68Duration 33:18
Tara Lagu: The Doctor Won’t See You Now
Howie and Harlan are joined by Tara Lagu, a hospitalist, pharmacist, and researcher at Northwestern University, to discuss the startling bias faced by people with disabilities seeking care. Harlan reports on a study of attitudes toward genetic editing of embryos; Howie explains the debate over the looming shortfall in Medicare funding.
Links:
“Public views on polygenic screening of embryos”
Tara Lagu: “Access to Subspecialty Care for Patients With Mobility Impairment”
Tara Lagu: “Physicians’ Perceptions Of People With Disability And Their Health Care”
Tara Lagu: “Opinion: People With Disabilities Deserve Better Health Care. We All Do.”
Harlan Krumholz: “A Note to My Younger Colleagues...Be Brave”
“Biden has yet to say just how he would strengthen Social Security and Medicare trust funds”
- PodcastEpisode 67Duration 36:31
Jeffrey Sonnenfeld: The CEO Whisperer
Howie and Harlan are joined by Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, an expert on leadership at the Yale School of Management, to discuss his decades of dialogue with top executives and his insights on healthcare leadership. Harlan reports on his new study exploring the causes of persistent hypertension; Howie reflects on CVS’s acquisition of Oak Street Health and asks who benefits from recent innovations in the healthcare industry.
Links:
Yale School of Management: Chief Executive Leadership Institute
“How Poisoned Tylenol Became a Crisis-Management Teaching Model”
“Why the Amazon, JPMorgan, Berkshire Venture Collapsed: ‘Health Care Was Too Big a Problem’”
“CVS Health to Acquire Oak Street Health”
“Amazon and One Medical Sign an Agreement for Amazon to Acquire One Medical”
Donald Berwick: “Salve Lucrum: The Existential Threat of Greed in US Health Care”
“CVS Health and RUSH collaborate to increase health care access for Chicago-area Medicare patients”
- PodcastEpisode 66Duration 38:31
Countering COVID Revisionism
Howie and Harlan discuss Howie’s recent bout of COVID-19 and the takeaways from new research on adverse events in hospitals, and they consider claims from Tucker Carlson of Fox News about the pandemic response.
Links:
“5 COVID mistakes Biden’s new chief of staff must admit”
Harlan Krumholz: “A prescription for the US FDA for the regulation of health misinformation”
“What older Americans need to know about taking Paxlovid”
NIH COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines | Molnupiravir
“Efficacy of Antiviral Agents against Omicron Subvariants BQ.1.1 and XBB”
“China Cautiously Takes to the Road for Lunar New Year”
“President Biden to end COVID-19 emergencies on May 11”
Donald Berwick: “Salve Lucrum: The Existential Threat of Greed in US Health Care”
“The Safety of Inpatient Health Care”
“Nearly 1 in 4 U.S. hospitalized patients experience harmful events, study finds”
“Trends in Adverse Event Rates in Hospitalized Patients, 2010-2019”
- PodcastEpisode 65Duration 34:58
Leora Horwitz: Toward a Continuously Learning Healthcare System
Howie and Harlan are joined by Leora Horwitz, director of the Rapid Randomized Controlled Trial Lab at NYU Langone Health, to discuss her work using experimentation to improve the delivery of care, and her experience as a clinician and researcher in the chaotic first months of the COVID-19 outbreak in New York City. Harlan reports on his new study examining the impact on patients of early-morning blood draws in hospitals; Howie reflects on new business models for delivering discounted generic drugs.
Links:
NYY Langone Health: Rapid Randomized Controlled Trial Lab
Leora Horwitz: “‘I Am Not the Same as I Was Before’: A Qualitative Analysis of COVID-19 Survivors”
Leora Horwitz: “Tweeting Into the Void: Effective Use of Social Media for Healthcare Professionals”