Heal The Burn The Podcast

Heal The Burn episode 18: Am I an Island?

Are physicians islands? We spend years learning to be self-sufficient, to have answers, and to keep moving forward when things get hard. But what happens when the weight of the work becomes too much to carry alone? In this episode, Dr. Natalie Bowersox joins me for a conversation about teamwork, conflict, difficult outcomes, coaching, and the moments that remind us we were never meant to do this work by ourselves. It's a thoughtful discussion about connection, vulnerability, and why asking for help may be one of the strongest things we can do.

Heal The Burn episode 17: Buying Back Time

In this episode of Heal the Burn, I talk with Dr. Carrie Hersh, a neurologist and multiple sclerosis specialist at Cleveland Clinic in Las Vegas, about burnout, identity, and what it means to “buy back time.” Carrie shares the story of reaching a point where she seriously wondered whether she could stay in medicine at all. She shares how, with time, support, and a lot of reflection, she realized that medicine itself wasn’t the problem. The problem was trying to do everything, all at once, without enough room to breathe. We talk about the hidden stories physicians carry about productivity, seriousness, and success — and how changing the shape of a career can sometimes be the thing that allows us to stay connected to the work we still love.

Heal The Burn episode 16: Costless But Priceless

You can work with the same people every day and still feel like you don’t really know them sometimes. Even worse, they may feel like they really don’t really know you either. So, how does our sense of belonging in the work place affect us? Turns out important studies show this to be profoundly important in terms of burnout. I had the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Sofya Asfaw, whose leadership work focuses on safety, quality, physician wellness, and the human side of healthcare. Together we explore something that likely fuels a lot of burnout: the simple (and not so simple) idea of belonging. Join us as we discuss what this means and why it matters. And how something as small as saying hello can be costless, but priceless.

Heal The Burn episode 15: Strong And Fragile At The Same Time

We often talk about resilience as if it appears the moment crisis arrives. In this episode of Heal the Burn, I speak with Dr. Prema Samy, an otolaryngologist from Ontario, Canada, whose husband, also a surgeon, suffered a life-changing stroke. Overnight, she found herself not only a physician and mother but also a caregiver, all while trying to recreate herself and discover what it takes to survive in her new reality. We discuss identity, control, empathy, and why resilience may be best created long before we need it. This conversation is less about stroke than what remains when certainty disappears. She wrote a book about this experience that encompasses her voice, as well as her husband's, as they try to figure out what new normal looks like that you can check out here: Frontiers: The Journey of Two Surgeons Through Stroke [https://a.co/d/077CvdHW]

Heal The Burn episode 14: You Are Not In Trouble!

In this episode, physician coach Anne Hirsch, MD talks with me about communication shifts and behavior changes that often appear long before burnout gets identified. Drawing on more than three decades in medicine and years of coaching experience, Anne explains why high-performing physicians often struggle to see these changes in themselves, and how we can help each other.