The Dose

What happens when your zip code threatens your health? Broadband access is often framed as a tech issue, but in some rural communities it's a matter of health equity. Broadband internet is so limited in some areas that patients can't use remote monitoring devices, hospitals can't support telehealth, and electronic health records slow down care instead of streamlining it. On this week's episode of The Dose, journalist Sarah Jane Tribble joins host Joel Bervell to explain how internet dead zones are deepening chronic illness in rural communities. Drawing from her reporting for KFF Health News, Tribble shares the stories of people managing diabetes and kidney failure without reliable digital tools, and hospitals lacking the internet speeds needed to monitor high-risk patients.

Data is the engine of health innovation, but too often it can't tell the full story. On this week's episode of The Dose, Dr. Sema Sgaier joins host Joel Bervell to talk about the future of equitable health care: how we collect data, who's included, and what it means for clinical trials, mental health, and the role of AI. Tune in to hear Dr. Sgaier explain why solving health care's toughest challenges starts with understanding the human side of health — and how inclusive data can lead to smarter policies, safer treatments, and better care.

We're in a pivotal moment for health care equity and public health. Systems for tracking data on maternal mortality and chronic disease are being dismantled, with consequences that could last generations. On this week's episode of The Dose, Dr. Marcella Nunez-Smith joins host Joel Bervell to talk about who's represented in the health data we collect, and who isn't, and why it's so important for "people to feel safe in sharing" their data and "to have trust that it's protected." Dr. Nunez-Smith also explains how her experience as a parent of a child with a rare disease frames how she approaches her work in health equity.

Dr. Zirui Song, a general internist at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School professor, dives into the impact of private equity on health care. He explains how these firms profit by cherry-picking patients and cutting staff, leading to increased complications post-acquisition. Dr. Song discusses the rise of outpatient specialties and the effects of new laws aimed at increasing transparency. With a focus on protecting patient care, he highlights the challenges and future of financial oversight in health care.

As the American Medical Association's first chief equity officer, Dr. Aletha Maybank guided the legacy medical institution through a difficult reckoning with its past exclusion of Black and women physicians. In a new episode of The Dose, host Joel Bervell talks to Dr. Maybank about how she did it, what lessons the AMA holds for our current moment, and why she has hope that American institutions can evolve into places that serve all of us.

Yes, the planet is getting hotter, tropical storms are becoming ever more fierce, and the Arctic is melting — but what's that got to do with health care? This week on The Dose podcast, host Joel Bervell explores the intersection of climate change and public health with Admiral Rachel L. Levine, M.D., the U.S. Assistant Secretary for Health. Levine, who oversees the federal Office of Climate Change and Health Equity, talks about how weather-related events are already having a serious impact on our fragile health system supply chain, even though those effects can go unnoticed by the broader public. In communities repeatedly ravaged by storms or heat waves, a lack of blood donations is leading to delays in surgeries and treatment for diseases like sickle cell. In rural Alaska, where the melting permafrost is wreaking havoc on wildlife populations, native tribal communities are forced to rely on shipments of food items that are typically high in sugar and salt — a diet contributing to rising rates of hypertension, diabetes, and heart disease. "Climate change is the most significant threat to human health in the 21st century, and climate change is having those serious impacts on health right now," says Levine.

As climate change intensifies and New Yorkers face record-breaking heat, the city is taking new measures to protect residents' health. Landlords will soon have to provide air conditioning to tenants, school bus fleets are going electric, and efforts are underway to make housing more affordable. Cameron Clarke of WE ACT for Environmental Justice is on the front lines of the push to build a healthier New York City. One recent initiative focused on developing an asthma policy agenda. "We wanted to talk about housing, transportation, education, and the actual landscape of the built environment and craft a policy agenda that connects all of these different things to environmental justice — all through the lens of asthma," Clarke explains. On this episode of The Dose podcast, recorded during Climate Week NYC in September, host Joel Bervell talks to Clarke about advancing health and environmental justice in New York and providing people with the tools they need to navigate a complex health system.

Evidence of a mental health crisis is everywhere — from the recent surgeon general advisory about social media's effects on our youth to the pandemic's documented impact on medical professionals. To whom does a college student turn for help so far from home? And who cares for the mental health of those caring for us? Enter Dr. Jessi Gold, a psychiatrist and the University of Tennessee's first chief wellness officer, who aims to change the way student mental health is addressed on campus. She favors an open, flexible approach to helping students find the kind of help that's right for them. Off campus, Dr. Gold has been conducting research into the overlooked mental health needs of our medical professionals. On this episode of The Dose podcast, host Joel Bervell talks with Dr. Gold about the systemic changes needed to support mental wellness across our college campuses and the entire ecosystem of medical professionals.

Moving the needle on health care access and health disparities is no easy task. Inequities for people of color are embedded in the U.S. health system, shaping their health care journeys and often leading to outcomes worse than those experienced by white Americans. That's where Dr. Chris Pernell, director of NAACP's Center for Health Equity, comes in. "Sometimes you got to make those systems bend, and other times you got to disrupt those systems, innovate and invent, and create and design." In this episode of The Dose podcast, host Joel Bervell talks to Dr. Pernell about her work on health equity, the systems that need to be disrupted, and the innovations needed to build a more inclusive health system.

In this special two-part edition of The Dose, we're bringing listeners along to an exhilarating gathering of health care's most innovative thinkers and changemakers — Aspen Ideas: Health. In part 2, host Joel Bervell talks to two people who are reshaping how we think about community health: Mary Oxendine, a Lumbee and Tuscarora woman and the former North Carolina Food Security Coordinator at Durham County; and Shameca Brown, a mental health provider and advocate for Black and brown people in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and former member of the Mental Health Association of Oklahoma's board of directors.