In our debut episode, meet your hosts—two ER doctors turned health policy nerds—who are fed up with pretending everything’s fine in healthcare when it’s clearly… not. From government chaos to moral injury in medicine, we kick off with a candid (and sometimes hilarious) look at why the system feels broken and what inspired us to start this podcast.

We dive into:

• Why DC’s silence is anything but quiet
• How we met (shout out, UNC!)
• Why instability isn’t the end—it’s the start of something real
• What we’ve seen across U.S. and U.K. healthcare systems
• The absurdity of public service layoffs, burnout, and corporate creep
• And yes, the origin of our name—including a very real code brown moment

If you’ve ever felt disoriented navigating the healthcare system—from inside or out—you’re not alone. We're here to pull back the curtain, talk about what’s actually happening, and invite the brilliant, bold, and brave to help us make sense of the madness.

In this episode of Unstable Vitals, Dr. Adam Brown and Dr. Lara Zibners dive into one of the biggest challenges in healthcare today: misaligned incentives. Should our system prioritize profit or patients? How do payment models, public policy, and personal responsibility collide to shape health outcomes?

From fee-for-service vs. value-based care to the impact of public transportation, food policy, and behavioral nudges, Adam and Lara unpack the hidden forces driving both innovation and inequity in modern medicine. Along the way, they share personal stories, debate policy trade-offs, and explore how we can make healthy choices easier, care more accessible, and incentives better aligned, without sacrificing innovation.

If you’ve ever wondered why our healthcare system feels broken (and what it would take to fix it) this episode is for you.

🎧 Listen now to hear:

• Why profit-driven incentives often work against patient health
• How public health policies intersect with economic growth
• The promise and pitfalls of value-based care
• Behavioral nudges and making healthy choices easier
• Why doctors need to understand the business of healthcare

Listen to Part 1 before diving into Part 2.

Why is the U.S. healthcare system so expensive, yet so ineffective? In this episode of Unstable Vitals, Dr. Adam Brown and Dr. Lara Zibners dive deep into the tangled web of patients, profits, and misaligned incentives driving instability in American healthcare.

From skyrocketing medical school debt and low primary care reimbursements to insurance company profits and hospital billing practices, Adam and Lara expose the financial forces shaping how (and if) patients receive care. They compare the U.S. system to models in the U.K. and Europe, exploring why Americans pay more but live shorter, less healthy lives.

This episode tackles big questions, like:

• Why do we prioritize treating illness over preventing it?
• How do insurance companies profit while patients struggle with medical bills?
• What does “health” actually mean and who gets to decide?
• Can we fix a system where profit often outweighs patient care?

If you’ve ever wondered why navigating healthcare feels so complicated, or why the U.S. spends more per person on healthcare than any other developed nation but ranks lower in life expectancy, this conversation is a must-listen.

Residency: the rite of passage every doctor must survive before practicing on their own. But is the system built to train (or to break) young physicians?

In this episode of Unstable Vitals, Dr. Laura Zibners and Dr. Adam Brown sit down with Dr. Jared Dashevsky, a resident physician at Mount Sinai and founder of Healthcare Huddle, to unpack the realities of residency and what it reveals about the larger instability in U.S. healthcare.

From 80-hour work weeks and six-figure medical school debt to the high-stakes “Match” process and the infamous July 1st turnover, we dive into the pressures that shape doctors before they even become attendings. Jared shares his perspective as a third-year resident, new father, and healthcare communicator, offering an unfiltered look at the sacrifices, frustrations, and occasional absurdities of residency life.

Along the way, we ask:

• Is the residency system outdated?
• How do pay disparities and debt burden destabilize medicine?
• What changes could make training more sustainable for doctors and the patients they serve?

Whether you’re in medicine, thinking about it, or just want to understand what’s behind the curtain, this conversation exposes the cracks in the system and why they matter for all of us.

In this episode of Unstable Vitals, we dive into a staggering truth: women make 80% of healthcare decisions, yet only 4% of R&D dollars focus on women’s health.

Dr. Marina Gerner, award-winning journalist, author of The Vagina Business, and professional myth-buster, joins Dr. Lara Zibners and Dr. Adam Brown to unpack why the system is built on male-centric research, why funding for women’s health innovations still lags behind, and how centuries of normalized female pain have kept progress stalled.

From the under-research of PMS compared to erectile dysfunction to the under-researched effects of blockbuster drugs like Ozempic, we pull back the curtain on the biases, blind spots, and investment taboos that keep women’s health unstable.

Can we really Make America Healthy Again?

In this dynamic and slightly unconventional episode, our hosts Dr. Adam Brown and Dr. Lara Zibners combine a spin class with a candid conversation on the fragility of the American public health system. As they pedal through pop hits and resistance levels, they dig into the recent political shifts shaking up healthcare leadership, namely the appointment of RFK Jr. and others with controversial public health views. They challenge the legitimacy of decisions like dismantling vaccine review boards and appointing science skeptics to positions of power, all while reinforcing the importance of evidence-based healthcare policy.

Beyond politics, the conversation expands into the broader social determinants of health, including how infrastructure, socioeconomic status, and nutrition access influence America's wellbeing. They contrast Europe’s walkable cities and food transparency with the U.S.’s car dependency and ultra-processed diets.

Whether you're on a bike or a walk, this episode will get your heart rate up.

In this episode of Unstable Vitals, ER docs-turned-entrepreneurs Dr. Adam Brown and Dr. Lara Zibners sit down with Dr. Owais Durrani — emergency physician, media personality, STEM advocate, and Coldplay superfan — for an unfiltered conversation that flies from fighter jets to frontline care. A first-generation college student, Dr. Durrani shares how his lived experiences shaped his passion for equitable healthcare, science education, and public policy.

They unpack the harsh realities of an unstable U.S. healthcare system, the impact of funding cuts on STEM initiatives, and why inspiring the next generation of scientists matters more than ever. Oh, and yes, Coldplay and sh*t golfer names all make an appearance.

In this episode of Unstable Vitals, hosts Dr. Adam Brown and Dr. Lara Zibners sit down with Dr. Melissa Parsons, a former top pediatrician turned life coach, to unpack the emotional cost of surviving in the healthcare system. Melissa shares her deeply personal journey from burnout and perfectionism to finding healing through coaching, vulnerability, and letting go of the unrealistic expectations placed on physicians. Melissa walks us through the moment she realized she needed help—and how that decision transformed her life.

Together, the trio explores the culture of silence and shame in medicine, especially around mental health, and the dangerous separation of emotional and physical well-being. They confront the damaging myths doctors are taught: that resilience means suppression, that rest is weakness, and that showing emotion is unprofessional. The episode tackles physician burnout, systemic failures, and the urgent need to create a healthcare system that supports its healers.