The Pulse

When was the last time you were annoyed about something related to your health care? A big bill, scheduling troubles, tests that don’t give you answers…getting great care can be hard under the best of circumstances, and on this episode of The Pulse, we’re upping the stakes. What does that care look like in difficult situations, with tough patients? 

We’ll take you inside stories of offering hope for people with relentless depression, finding sanity when your personal history has a dark chapter, facing tough choices abroad, and life after prison. 

Our relationship with animals is, as they say on Facebook, complicated. Humans love animals. We drop big bucks on those we keep as pets. We eat animals. We make them work for us. We protect them, and we hunt them. We step on some of them without thinking twice, while we consider granting basic human rights to others. 

On today’s show, we’ll explore our interactions with animals — pet hospice, cat plastic surgery, turtles saved by sound, stingrays cleared of a crime, plus a dog with a purple mohawk. 

Is the computer the elephant in the exam room? On this episode, we explore the world of high-tech medicine — technology that changes treatments, and predicts health and safety risks. We’ll take you through stories of what can be gained from technological advancements, but also, what is lost in the digitization of our lives. 

Think of all the conversations every generation has had — to vaccinate or not, what makes us happy, what foods are bad for you, and more. We talk about these things over and over again but we never take the time to look back to see what previous generations have said or done.

On this episode, we’re seeking out historic Déjà vu moments. We dug around in our archives for stories that bring perspective to big health and science topics, then and now. 

Ever have a moment where you realized you’ve been looking so hard at one thing, and you’ve completely failed to notice another? Today’s show explores just that — Hepititis C researchers are now refocusing their attention on Hep B, biologists are discovering new species in museum drawers, instead of exotic locations, and suicide prevention experts are using an unlikely tool to combat depression…humor. 

Sit back, relax, and explore the less obvious options. 

Today’s show is all about sacrifice.  What would you give up for love, for opportunity, or for science?  

We’ll meet one woman who gave a life-changing gift to a near stranger, family caregivers who learned sacrifice on the fly and twins who were separated at birth… for the sake of science. 

Winter is nearly over, Spring is near, love is in the air — and that got us in the mood to make a match…in a health and science sort of way, of course. 

In this episode, we’ll hear about young physicians being matched with their first jobs, we’ll match healthcare policies with presidential candidates, plus, we’ll learn how some men are matching their vasectomy recovery time with March Madness. 

In health care, interventions can make a huge difference. Can you reduce deaths related to gun violence by teaching more people first aid? If you get a person into treatment right after their first psychotic episode – will they have a better outcome? Or – if we can all recognize the rare symptoms associated with heart attacks in women, can we save more lives? 

Sit down for an intervention with The Pulse. 

Pam Gilbert could hear things that other people couldn’t. That superpower quickly turned into a nightmare when she began to hear noises inside her own body — her heartbeat was as load as a booming bass drum, and her eyeballs moving sounded like a high pitched screeching.

We follow her through her first symptoms, her darkest moments, and finally, to her diagnosis. 

It’s the same enemy, but a different kind of war. The way we’re fighting drug epidemics today looks vastly different than the way it used to — we’re armed with a drug that can overpower overdose, a new perspective on addiction and in some cases, more compassion. 

But is this a losing battle?