This week's health care communication topics include:

• the critical role of pharmacists in public health,

• ways to reduce resistance and increase receptivity from patients

• the advantages of sound bites and talking points,

• the importance of tailoring messages for specific audiences, and

• what it means to "embrace the messy yes" of patient interactions.

Guest Messenger
Dr. Christina Madison, a clinical pharmacist specializing in public health with a focus on communicable diseases and founder of The Public Health Pharmacist

Chapters
0:00 Intro
2:46 Christina’s Origin Story
5:09 Every Day I Was Helping Someone
7:36 Every Pharmacist is a Public Health Pharmacist
9:34 Communication is Even More Important For Pharmacists
11:21 Making That First Connection (and Meaning It)
13:34 Christina's Only Formal Communication Training
17:07 Sound Bites & Talking Points
19:10 Disciplined Messages & Back-of-Napkin Summaries
20:30 The Snapchat of Vaccinations
21:28 You Can’t Use The Same Message for Everyone
22:31 That’s a You Problem, Not a Them Problem
24:05 I Realized I Failed Them
27:25 The Best Thing You Can Do is Shut the Hell Up
28:48 Asking Permission
32:04 Moving the Needle to Receptivity
34:04 The Blowhard at the End of the Bar
35:35 We Optimize Health Care by Working as a Team
37:10 The Evolution of the Pharmacy Tech
40:50 EveryHCP Needs a YouTube Channel
46:24 Is it Really a Soft Skill?
49:08 Embrace the Messy Yes
51:40 Educator Shout-Out: Dr. Dennis Fuller

New episodes drop every Friday.

Video versions here.

Check Out Our Web Site
http://trustedmessengerprogram.org

Follow Us On LinkedIn
http://linkedin.com/company/trusted-messenger-program

Good communication is essential to good health care.

This week's topics include:

• teaching as a way of connecting with patients,

• trusting the intelligence of your patients (and yourself),

• finding the common ground necessary for patient conversations, and

• learning communication in both the classroom and the exam room.

Guest Messenger
Dr. Cedric "Jamie" Rutland, pulmonary critical care physician and producer/creator of Medicine Deconstructed and The Health Exchange Podcast.

Chapters
0:00 Intro
2:29 Jamie’s Origin Story
5:39 The Lack of Connection to What Patients Understood
6:36 I Would Enter the Room and Start Teaching
8:01 You Oughta Start a YouTube Channel
10:45 Teaching Physicians How to Communicate
12:20 The Problem With COVID
13:43 The Geometry of Immunology
14:56 I’m Just Teaching Infection
17:07 The Struggle to Connect
18:27 Trusting the Intelligence of the People to Whom We’re Speaking
20:26 The Ground Where Discussion Can Take Place
23:49 You’re Smart Enough to Explain This
26:52 Patients Don’t Have to Take Board Exams
28:30 Memorizing Minutiae vs. Learning Communication
30:17 Small Problem: The Family Was Racist
32:22 You Need to Learn How to Storytell
35:33 The Problem is the Role-Modeling
36:42 Where Med Schools are Failing Miserably
38:40 I Can Make Anyone a Good, Solid Communicator
41:17 Go in There and Tell Her She Has Cancer
44:01 A Story About Speakers’ Training
48:28 Give Me More Todd
49:50 The Importance of Being Open-Eared
53:19 Educator Shout-Out: Dr. Mohammed Milhem
54:11 Eagles-49ers Predictions

New episodes drop every Friday.

Video versions here.

Check Out Our Web Site
http://trustedmessengerprogram.org

Follow Us On LinkedIn
http://linkedin.com/company/trusted-messenger-program

Good communication is essential to good health care.

This week we dig in to:

• storytelling as a tool for health communication,

• strategies for delivering information & building health literacy in entertaining ways,

• why the human brain prefers stories over logic, and

• the power of narrative to educate, engage, and empower patients.

Guest Messenger
Tim Jones, co-founder and CEO of Health Nuts Media

Chapters
Tim0:00 Intro
2:00 Tim's (Emmy-Award Winning) Origin Story
4:00 Talking to Teens About Cancer & Chemotherapy
5:40 Dropping Names & Saving Lives
6:59 Addressing Health Literacy & Underserved Populations
9:23 Storytelling is a Cheat Code
10:34 The Human Brain is a Story Processor, Not a Logic Processor
12:23 Curling Up on the Couch With a Good Spreadsheet?
13:00 Empathy Machines...
14:05 …vs. Data Machines
16:29 The Power of Metaphor
18:45 We All Want Closure
19:29 Why So Serious?
21:34 Graduating at 70% Effectiveness
22:46 The Real Danger of the Algorithms
25:15 Optimizing the Health Care Communication Ecosystem
26:50 Preparing for Those Precious 8 Minutes
28:37 Wheel of Fortune & Taking Some of the Burden Off
33:33 Animation & The Elimination of Bias
34:39 Family Guy & The Best COVID-19 Vaccine Explainer Ever
36:54 Health Nuts Clip: "50 Things You Might See in the Hospital"
39:45 Health Nuts Clip: "NPO Instructions"
43:53 Communicating to People Where They Are
46:04 Talk to Me About Hospice When You’re Shoveling Dirt on My Coffin
48:15 David Byrne, Lyrical Tricks, and Opening the Door for Patients
50:07 Our Job is Not to be Encyclopedic
50:52 Everything is Tuberculosis
52:35 The Idea of Narrative Medicine
54:50 Educator Shout-Out: Professor Michael Mott
55:49 Mystery, Not Muddle

Show Links
Family Guy COVID 19 Video Explainer

New episodes drop every Friday.

Video versions here.

Check Out Our Web Site
http://trustedmessengerprogram.org

Follow Us On LinkedIn
http://linkedin.com/company/trusted-messenger-program

Good communication is essential to good health care.

This week's topics include:

• the intersection of competence and communication,

• strategies for teaching communication in both med school and residency,

• some skill sets that improve every patient visit,

• the NURSE mnemonic for patient interactions, and

• the importance of (really, truly) meeting patients where they are both physically and emotionally.

Guest Messenger
Dr. Andy Nowalk, Clinical Director of the Division of Infectious Diseases at UPMC Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh and Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine

Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:10 The Robert Klein to Our Johnny Carson
2:59 Communication is a Muscle
3:46 Families Have Trouble Seeing Competence
5:58 Combining My Educator Hat & My Infectious Disease Hat
7:35 Kurt Russell, Used Cars, & Essential Oils
8:51 Several Levels of Benefits
10:50 Residency Program Communication Strategy
13:22 A Clarification About Todd & Clinical Errors
14:15 Interventions That Start You Off on the Right Foot
16:52 Listening for Emotion & Using the NURSE Mnemonic
20:46 Actually Meeting People Where They Are
23:35 You Do This Every Day
25:25 If You Ignore it, the Visit is Over
26:58 I Can Give You a Tool Set That Makes Every Visit Better
28:49 People Don’t Realize How Long Bad Communication Takes
31:37 Building a General Tool Set
33:30 How Do You Get Them to Use Their Stethoscope?
35:35 Like Reaching for the Right Antibiotic
37:44 One of the Things Drove Me Out of Academia
39:40 Introductions & Expectations
41:40 The Death Knell of Most Medical Conversations
42:30 A Little Bit of Teach-Back Goes a Long Way
43:52 The Kitchen Table Test
44:52 Circling Back to Where We Started
47:37 Standing on the Shoulders of Giants

New episodes drop every Friday.

Video versions here.

Check Out Our Web Site
http://trustedmessengerprogram.org

Follow Us On LinkedIn
http://linkedin.com/company/trusted-messenger-program

Good communication is essential to good health care.

Our topics this week include:

• shared clinical decision-making,

• the often muddy waters of health care in 2025,

• the importance of creating support tools for front-line clinicians, and

• some helpful, practical tips for health care providers to use in practice.

Guest Messenger
Dr. Charlene Wong, pediatrician and Executive-in-Residence at the Common Health Coalition

Chapters
0:00 Intro
0:35 Shoutout to Our Theme Musician
1:38 Dr. Wong’s (Highly Impressive) Background
4:56 Communicascope Training
6:42 The Importance of Proactive, Strategic Communication
8:49 Tiny Tears of Joy
9:48 How Do We Enhance Our Public Trust?
10:59 RSV Communication & What "Feels Real"
14:38 Distilling the Message for Front-Line Clinicians
16:50 In 2025, It’s Not Just Face-to-Face
19:24 What the CDC Says Matter Less Than We Think
21:13 The Common Health Coalition
25:29 Creating Clinician Support Tools
27:14 It’s Gotten Trickier Out There
28:46 Shared Clinical Decision-Making
32:11 A Muddying of the Health Care Waters
33:44 Important Points on Vaccine Coverage & Documentation
36:03 So Many Providers Were Asking the Same Questions
39:01 Avoiding the Ol' "Safe and Effective"
39:56 Why are We Doing This in the First Place?

New episodes drop every Friday.

Video versions here.

Check Out Our Web Site
http://trustedmessengerprogram.org

Follow Us On LinkedIn
http://linkedin.com/company/trusted-messenger-program

Good communication is essential to good health care.

This week we explore:

• the pros, cons, and cautions of social media,

• the tension between what you learn in med school and what patients want in the exam room,

• the necessity of engaging patients both in-person and online, and

• the need for common humanity in health communication.

GUEST MESSENGER
Dr. Margot Savoy, Chief Medical Officer of the American Academy of Family Physicians

CHAPTERS
0:00 Intro
1:40 When Todd Met Margo...
3:58 The Wild, Wild West of Social Media
5:31 The Best Social Media Platform is...
7:35 Questioning & Challenging the Discourse
10:54 If You Like Us in the Office, You’ll Love Us Online
12:07 Serving Patients in the Era of Algorithms & Instant Gratification
14:03 Finding & Normalizing HCPs
16:22 The Lessons of Selfies & Sourdough
20:20 Social Media Abhors a Vacuum
22:44 The Trust You Have is Transferrable
24:30 The Value of Social Listening (Before it Was Called That)
26:35 Building Trust By Admitting What You Don’t Know
31:00 Med School Doesn’t Teach Us to Be Warm & Fuzzy
35:42 We Just Need to Do Better
37:28 This Core Idea of Humanism
39:46 Your Single Best Diagnostic Tool
41:02 There are at Least Four Truths
43:41 Real Trust & Connection by Just Being You
45:31 The Three Most Important Words in Communication
46:30 You Should Come Back Next Week

New episodes drop every Friday.

Video versions here.

Check Out Our Web Site
http://trustedmessengerprogram.org

Follow Us On LinkedIn
http://linkedin.com/company/trusted-messenger-program

Good communication is essential to good health care.

In our first episode, co-hosts Chad Hermann and Dr. Todd Wolynn talk about their work at the Trusted Messenger Program, consider how (and why) local health care providers are America's most Trusted Messengers, explore why good communication is essential to good health care, and drop a few hints on the focus of future episodes.

Chapters
0:00 Intro
1:30 The Todd & Chad Origin Story
5:10 Communication Makes Everything Better
6:07 Long Before We Talked the Talk, We Walked the Walk
7:57 A Culture of Communication, Locally & Nationally
9:35 The Difference Between Use & Power
11:15 A Year of Radical Meltdowns
14:25 Trust is Local
17:14 Taking the Social Out of Social Media
20:01 The Only Issue in America on Which Everyone Agrees
22:02 Empowering All Health Care Providers
24:08 When None of the Hands in the Room Go Up
25:02 Your Clinical Acumen Means Absolutely Nothing
26:26 C-Suites, Burnout Data, & Value-Based Care Gaps
30:24 Free CME & Impromptu Comedy Routines
33:41 We Have a Lot of Ground to Cover
34:56 The Rise of Digital Natives
41:39 From Green Day to Jeff Verszyla
43:22 People Who Read People (& Chad’s Happy Face)
45:45 Where We’re Failing
47:35 Good Communication is Essential to Good Health Care
48:22 Quality, Efficiency, & Effectiveness

New episodes drop every Friday.

Video versions here.

Check Out Our Web Site
http://trustedmessengerprogram.org

Follow Us On LinkedIn
http://linkedin.com/company/trusted-messenger-program

Good communication is essential to good health care.