
Freakonomics, M.D.
Each week, physician and economist Dr. Bapu Jena will dig into a fascinating study at the intersection of economics and healthcare. He takes on questions like: Why do kids with summer birthdays get the flu more often? Can surviving a hurricane help you live longer? What do heart surgery and grocery-
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Science
Society & Culture
78. Do Kids Cause Divorce?
Couples get divorced for all kinds of reasons. Is ha...
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Mar 31 2023 18m
Chapter 1 8 mins
The Impact of Twins on MarriageChapter 2 12 mins
Risk of Divorce
77. They Make Minimum Wage. They Could Save Your Life.
Doctors and nurses get most of the attention — but a...
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Mar 24 2023 18m
Chapter 1 11 mins
Improving Health Care QualityChapter 2 10 mins
Increasing Minimum Wage in Nursing Homes
76. Is a Spoonful of Sunlight the Best Medicine?
In hospitals, a softer pillow or a nicer room might ...
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Mar 17 2023 17m
Chapter 1 11 mins
Natural Daylight in CareChapter 2 9 mins
Built Environment ImpactChapter 3 1 min
Bringing Levity to Patients
75. What Is Sugar Really Doing to You?
Americans eat a lot of sugar — and it’s hard to dete...
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Mar 10 2023 19m
Chapter 1 5 mins
Impact of Sugar on HealthChapter 2 17 mins
Sugar Exposure EffectsChapter 3 2 mins
Supporting the Podcasts You Love
74. How Does Playing Football Affect Your Health?
It’s not a new question, but it’s a tricky one to s...
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Mar 3 2023 16m
Chapter 1 11 mins
Pro Football Effects on HealthChapter 2 7 mins
Risks of Football & SportsChapter 3 1 min
Supporting the Podcasts You Love
73. Who Pays for Multimillion-Dollar Miracle Cures?
The most expensive drugs in the world are treatments...
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Feb 17 2023 29m
Chapter 1 10 mins
Innovative Solutions for Treating Rare DiseasesChapter 2 13 mins
The Economics of Curing Chronic DiseasesChapter 3 9 mins
Subscription Model for Healthcare
72. What’s Stopping Us From Curing Rare Diseases?
Breakthroughs in biotech that seem like science fict...
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Feb 10 2023 31m
Chapter 1 4 mins
The Promise of Genetic TreatmentsChapter 2 11 mins
AI in MedicineChapter 3 15 mins
CrisprChapter 4 3 mins
Golf
71. What Do COVID-19 and Cancer Have in Common?
mRNA vaccines helped bring the pandemic under contro...
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Feb 3 2023 26m
Chapter 1 9 mins
Immune System and Cancer TreatmentChapter 2 19 mins
Immunotherapies in Cancer
70. Why Are There Still So Few Female Surgeons?
Success and failure are hard to measure in medicine....
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Jan 27 2023 29m
Chapter 1
The Impact of Discrimination in HealthcareChapter 2 5 mins
The Negative Impact of Gender BiasChapter 3 16 mins
Gender Bias Among Healthcare WorkersChapter 4 6 mins
The Impact of Discrimination on Female SurgeonsChapter 5 29 sec
Xfinity Internet and Mobile
69. Home Sweet … Hospital?
We take it for granted that, when people are acutely...
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Jan 20 2023 27m
Chapter 1 6 mins
Home Hospital Lifts All BoatsChapter 2 6 mins
Hospital Care at HomeChapter 3 16 mins
The Home Hospital Program
68. The E.R. Doctor’s Dilemma
Figuring out which patients to hospitalize and which...
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Jan 13 2023 29m
Chapter 1
Why It Can Be Hard to Figure Out Which Patients Need to Be in the HospitalChapter 2 7 mins
What Drives Emergency Department Decisions?Chapter 3 8 mins
AI Algorithm Helps Physicians Reduce Over-TestingChapter 4 10 mins
Algorithms to Make Better Decisions About Who Needs Hospitalization
What Can We Do About the Hardest Patients? (Ep. 51 Replay)
A small number of patients with multiple, chronic co...
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Jan 6 2023 30m
Chapter 1 5 mins
Hardest PatientsChapter 2 13 mins
The Complexity of Healthcare PatientsChapter 3 12 mins
The Camden Coalition Project
67. Why Did This 60-Year-Old Man Collapse at the Supermarket?
Bapu tries to stump master clinician Dr. Gurpreet Dh...
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Dec 30 2022 33m
Chapter 1 13 mins
What to Do in a Medical EmergencyChapter 2 14 mins
Causes of Low Potassium and BicarbonateChapter 3 6 mins
Medical Mystery SolvingChapter 4 1 min
The Many Benefits of Collagen
66. Does Health Insurance Make You Healthier?
It’s a surprisingly hard question to answer. Bapu ta...
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Dec 23 2022 31m
Chapter 1 15 mins
The Oregon Medicaid LotteryChapter 2 9 mins
The Oregon Health Insurance ExperimentChapter 3 8 mins
Healthcare's Impact on Labor MarketChapter 4 1 min
The Importance of Listening to Podcasts
65. How Do Pandemics Change Health Care?
At the start of the 20th century, there weren’t many...
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Dec 16 2022 31m
64. Is Facebook Bad for Your Mental Health?
Half the world's population uses social media — and ...
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Dec 9 2022 31m
63. What Medicine Gets Wrong About Race
Some diagnostic tests give distorted results for Bla...
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Dec 2 2022 32m
Why Don’t We Have a Cure for Alzheimer’s? (Ep. 49 Update)
Promising drugs keep failing in trials. Allegations ...
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Nov 25 2022 32m
62. Dr. Ashish Jha Anticipated a Pandemic. He Didn’t Think It Would Look Like This.
Bapu talks to White House Covid Czar Dr. Ashish Jha ...
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Nov 18 2022 28m
61. Should You Bother Getting a Colonoscopy?
Colonoscopy is strongly recommended for Americans ov...
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Nov 11 2022 33m
60. The Doctor Is Out. The Physician Assistant Is In.
Chances are, at some point you’ll be treated by a nu...
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Nov 4 2022 30m
59. The Most Valuable Resource in Medicine
Time is precious. How can doctors and patients make ...
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Oct 28 2022 27m
58. How Important Is Breastfeeding, Really?
Can a clever new study shed light on one of parentin...
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Oct 21 2022 31m
57. Doctors Know They Prescribe Too Many Antibiotics. Why Don’t They Stop?
Antibiotics save lives. But what happens when we use...
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Oct 14 2022 27m
56. Could Prison Be Good for Your Health?
Incarceration has been linked to infectious diseases...
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Oct 7 2022 28m