What happens to the mortality rates of cardiac arrest patients on days when there is a marathon happening in the city? What happens to surgical complication rates when it's the surgeon's birthday? Why do patients of younger doctors seem to have better health outcomes? 

These and other quirky questions are what preoccupy health economist, Anupam Jena, MD, PhD. Dr. Jena is a professor of health care policy at Harvard Medical School, professor of medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital, host of the popular Freakonomics, MD podcast, and, together with Dr. Christopher Worsham, co-author of the 2023 book Random Acts of Medicine. 

Over the course of our conversation, we discuss the often-unintuitive role that random chance plays in our health outcomes, the hidden drivers of medical decision-making, misconceptions about physician burnout, and more. As we'll see, through tackling what can be amusing questions about why physicians and patients behave the way they do, Dr. Jena encourages us to reconsider our own ways of thinking and imagine how we can do better and be better.

In this episode, we discuss: 

2:18 - The path that took Dr. Jena to the intersection of medicine and economics

8:54 - How Dr. Jena discovers topics for research

12:12 - Unexpected and important findings that Dr. Jena has learned over the course of his work

19:18 - Dr. Jena’s focus on “natural experiments”

22:02 - Thinking about physician burnout from an economist’s perspective

36:42 - The mission Dr Jena had when he set out to write Random Acts of Medicine

44:08 - Dr. Jena’s advice for medical trainees on how to understand the hidden forces of the medical system

Dr. Anupam Jena can be found on Twitter/X at @AnupamBJena.

Dr. Jena is the co-author of Random Acts of Medicine (2023) and the host of Freakonomics, MD. 

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