The VPZD Show

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Science
**The VPZD Show**

Two doctors, one podcast, Alt-Middle as heck. Featuring Dr. Vinay Prasad (host of Plenary Session) and Dr. Zubin Damania (host of The ZDoggMD Show).

Latest Episodes:

Elizabeth Holmes Doc, Pope Leo Cancer, Bryan Johnson Genome Oct 20, 2026

Show notes

The all-new Nissan Nystagmus: Deviate your Driving! 😁

It's VPZD Ep. 46, ⁠originally streamed LIVE on YouTube⁠.

Chronological topic list

Housekeeping: clarifying brain death versus severe brain damage, and why a competent examiner matters
Zubin’s first travel speaking engagement in three years, a pain medicine panel in Dallas, and the Rodeo Goat burger
Vinay’s panel at a biotech conference and the longevity target question
Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos, and how John Ioannidis spotted the lack of peer reviewed papers
Why you can’t run 100 tests off a single drop of blood
Zubin’s Theranos lipid panel at TEDMED and whether the numbers were real
Finger sticks versus venipuncture, and why lancets hurt
The Nathan Fielder documentary and the 35 days before federal prison
Holmes’s personality, her belief that the machine works, and “Theranos 2.0”
Puppeteer or puppet: Billy Evans, Sunny Balwani, and the men in her life
Amanda Seyfried’s reenactments and the second half of the film
Did she commit fraud, did it harm patients, and was she scapegoated for flying too high
Why Holmes picked a claim that could be tested in minutes, and the harder to falsify claims in biotech
Health influencers, creatine, and observational studies as placebo
Stanford versus Berkeley, and the CAC score as a better measured number than Theranos
A glioblastoma device and the ambiguity of its trial
Whether Holmes really didn’t understand the “Who’s on First” joke
Spiritual people, pop culture, and why VPZD isn’t cognitive dissonance
Pope Leo’s lung cancer: luck or Providence, lead time bias, or an indolent tumor
Why Pope Leo’s case gets spun as proof that screening works, and the case against scanning non-smokers
Whether adenocarcinoma, secondhand smoke, and a Peruvian mission shaped the diagnosis
The Pope’s reported equanimity, and the politics of the papal job
A New York Times Daily episode on Texas Trump voters, and why a cherry-picked anecdote isn’t a poll
Why polling is a flawed science, plus spam calls and the “right to be left alone”
Indian call center scammers and YouTube videos of people hacking them
AI car dealership calls, and medical car names like the Ford Infarct and the Toyota Tetralogy
Bryan Johnson’s post that his genome was of no use, and Anne Wojcicki’s response
Francis Collins’s promise that genomes would guide blood pressure pills
Zubin’s factor V Leiden and prothrombin findings, and what a genome did and didn’t tell him
Why reading DNA like letters in a book is the wrong metaphor, and the Lego exhibit analogy
Craig Venter’s genome talk and his “we can tell you when you will die” pitch
Bryan Johnson’s changing positions, and what he eats
Cheese fries, GERD, and a Dallas talk that felt like the whole room was talking
Pain providers, opioids, the Sacklers, and the overcorrection that followed
The parallel with SSRIs and the dilemma of taking people off a drug they shouldn’t have started
A reported 40% rate of pancreatic cysts on MRI, IPMN, and the scan industrial complex
Jalen Hurts’s blood clots: cleats to the calf, a long flight, and Virchow’s triad
Lupus anticoagulant, factor V Leiden, and oral contraceptives
Zubin’s daughter’s factor V Leiden and whether she can take the pill
Goldfinger, a Scooby-Doo clip, and how standards have changed
Next week’s topics and a plug to watch the Holmes documentary

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Nobel Prize Snubs, AI Medicine, Brain Death, SSRIs Oct 09, 2026

Show notes

AI gave Zubin hair in our thumbnail...we truly are at End Times 😁

It's VPZD Ep. 45, originally streamed LIVE on YouTube.

Chronological topic list

Shout out to Dentalica, the Metallica cover band of dentists
Follow up on the failed execution and whether healthcare professionals should take part in executions
Firing squad and livestreamed executions as a case for the state owning its violence
Childhood abuse, fetal alcohol syndrome, and whether crime is a medical problem or a moral one
A bilingual doctor barred from speaking Spanish to her patient after failing a hospital proficiency test
Nobel Prize snubs in optogenetics, including Ed Boyden, Feng Zhang, and the Wayne State researcher
Rosalind Franklin, narrative, and why credit in science is so messy
Why science is full of forced moves while art is not, and what that means for AI
Clinical breakthroughs like Gleevec that never win Nobels
Political Nobels, Obama, and Bob Dylan skipping the ceremony
Academic AI studies that are outdated by publication, plus a Lancet “phase one” chatbot trial with no control arm
AI models guessing Trump’s IQ and the case that the voting booth is the health check for politicians
Why Zubin doesn’t vote, and the billionaire tax
The seven levels of wealth and the arc from Rolex to no watch
NYU’s three-year medical school and the cherry-picked comparison groups
Zubin’s fourth year of medical school and finishing Berkeley in three years
Reforming medical training from college through the extra fellowship year
Teaching critical thinking over memorization as the line between charlatan and expert blurs
Zeke Emanuel’s Eat Your Ice Cream, reverse causality, and confounding in observational studies
The descriptive versus prescriptive fallacy in medicine and spiritual awakening
Counseling cancer patients about alcohol
SSRIs, RFK Jr., withdrawal, and why long-term data can’t separate benefit from dependence
Brain zaps and SSRIs in awakening circles
Vinay’s accidental decaf month and the nicotine gum trend
Brain death, advance directives, and who you’d trust to pull the plug
Moral anguish, organ and cadaveric nerve consent, and an ICU nurse’s perspective
Airplane rules, annual PPD testing, and the absurdity of medical bureaucracy

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Lethal Injection Ethics, Meditation Dangers, GRAIL Cancer Screening Oct 04, 2026

Show notes

Should we be medicalizing state-sanctioned executions? Is meditation actually safe? Do liquid biopsies save lives? EASY QUESTIONS ONE AND ALL 😂 Originally streamed ⁠⁠⁠⁠LIVE on YouTube⁠⁠⁠⁠! (#44)

In this episode, we talked liquid biopsies for multi-cancer screening, the evidence behind recent blood test trials, and the risks of false positives and overdiagnosis. We dove into meditation’s possible benefits and harms, including anxiety, dissociation, and psychosis, as well as concerns about using it as a productivity tool. Finally, we hit physician involvement in state executions and the ethics of lethal injection, along with honest conversations about cancer prognosis and goals of care.

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Affirmative Action, AI Medical Recording, AI Doomers Sep 30, 2026

Show notes

Easy topics for easy times 🤭 Originally streamed ⁠⁠⁠LIVE on YouTube⁠⁠⁠! (#42)

Using Beethoven's Archduke Trio as a lens for why AI-generated art still falls short of true creative risk-taking
Whether AI companies calling for regulation are protecting the public or protecting their own competitive lead
The "Chernobyl of AI" idea, and skepticism toward vague doomsday percentage predictions
Burnout across the AI industry, and a personal parallel to burning out in medicine before starting ZDoggMD
Why doctors, unlike coders, are resistant to AI encroaching on their work
A court ruling on whether the raw audio of an AI-assisted medical visit is discoverable in a malpractice suit, and a comparison to body cam data
The DOJ's civil rights division investigation into UCSF and other med schools over affirmative action compliance post-SFFA v. Harvard
Whether standardized test scores, grit, or adversity best predict who becomes a good doctor, and the weak evidence behind racial concordance studies
A broader reflection on how identity and tribalism shape reactions to contested topics, using the Israel-Palestine debate and the Macklemore/Ed Sheeran episode as examples
Institutional neutrality, the NIH funding fight involving Russ Vought, and why one-sided political stances put universities at risk
Addressing a live comment about their COVID-era track record and clarifying actual positions
Closing thoughts and sign-off

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Macklemore, Confidence Intervals, LG Spying Sep 19, 2026

Show notes

Exploring the issues of the day, (Mackle)more or less 🤭 Originally streamed ⁠⁠LIVE on YouTube⁠⁠! (#42)

Topics covered: the Macklemore/Ed Sheeran controversy over political statements at concerts; land acknowledgments and performative activism; T-Rex body temperature research using tooth enamel isotopes; amateur archaeology and human evolution theories; the fluoride-in-water debate, weighing dental benefits against IQ concerns; a University awards ceremony disrupted by political chanting; Jonathan Haidt's three great untruths and campus culture; why Middle East politics resist typical activist framing; Wall Street Journal's editorial inconsistency on FDA drug decisions; statistics deep dive on p-values, split alpha, and confidence interval interpretation; new ACGME resident work-hour rules and their unintended consequences; administrative burden as the real driver of resident burnout; Angela Duckworth's concept of grit, examined through the lens of descriptive versus prescriptive reasoning; ambition, cortisol, and the psychology of never feeling successful; Harry Potter and the Cursed Child as a surprisingly good stage production; a JAMA study on pilots, flight attendants, and radiation-induced cancer; skepticism toward routine dental X-rays; hot tub-associated lung disease and questionable AI-generated medical advice; cold plunge trends and the lack of supporting data; why subtle political art works better than explicit statements; the controversy over AI assistance in solving a famous unsolved math problem; concerns about LG smart TVs recording audio and network data; and closing thoughts on 90s hip-hop versus the explicitness of modern rap.

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Pancreatic Cancer Drug, USPSTF, Tylenol-Autism Sep 11, 2026

Show notes

We're trying to become better listeners, SO PREPARE FOR SOME SHOUTING 🤭 Originally streamed ⁠LIVE on YouTube⁠! (#41)

We cover the new pancreatic cancer drug daraxonrasib and its rash side effect, survival benefit, and cost; what makes pancreatic cancer especially deadly; Vinay’s clinical background across hematology and oncology; how mechanistically cancer actually kills; the challenge of finding good podcast guests and why authenticity matters more than plugging a product; vaccine mandates and the difference between individual versus population-level benefit; the USPSTF’s recent upheaval and the challenge of evidence-based guidelines on contested topics like depression screening, mammograms, and prostate cancer screening; observational versus randomized evidence, with examples spanning flu vaccines, shingles vaccines and dementia, and Tylenol in pregnancy and autism; the OpenAI Navier-Stokes controversy and AI’s role in mathematics; AI in medicine and a JAMA perspective piece on AI replacing physicians; statins, coronary calcium scores, and personal decision-making around cardiovascular risk; weight stigma in medical training and the complexity of obesity; alternative medicine, longevity influencers, and Vinay’s evolving views on certainty; the ethics and mechanics of prediction markets and biotech stock betting; and reflections on active listening and communication style on the show.

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Fauci's Diary, Vinay's FDA Experience, Jason Arday (Recorded LIVE) Sep 10, 2026

Show notes

Yeah it's been over a year but you can't keep a couple of handsome brown guys apart forever 😎 A BRAND NEW VPZD EPISODE, originally streamed LIVE on YouTube! (#40)

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Ivy Leagues, Vaccine Science, Politics & Stuff Apr 23, 2025

Show notes

We're back, just cuz we had dinner and felt like a live nightcap. Enjoy!

Watch the originally live YouTube video here.

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Trump Transition, Reproductive Rights, Vaccine Truth Nov 14, 2024

Show notes

Why Trump Won & What It Means For Healthcare Nov 09, 2024

Show notes

Regardless of your political leanings, this live podcast WILL traumatize you 😻.

Election reactions, media polarization, what this might mean for healthcare and WAY more than you cared to hear about Peyronie’s disease 🍆🤓. Watch the video version here.

Subscribe to The VPZD Show on your favorite podcast app. Check out VP's Substack Vinay Prasad's Observations and Thoughts as well as Sensible Medicine. Here's all our previous episodes together.

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