Bob Wachter
speaker
553 appearances
2 recordings
1 series
first heard Jan 2026
last heard 24 Apr
Bob Wachter’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Apr 2026 with 1.
Appearances
And finally, I found where this history of a pulmonary embolism, which we often shorten as PE, came from.
The other thing we shorten as PE sometimes is physical exam.
And the patient, 20 years ago, had a physical exam, which the doctor labeled as PE and wrote the patient's physical exam under that.
The next doctor, probably in a rush, looked, saw the initials PE, and on the patient's problem list, now the patient had a pulmonary embolism.
And that stuck to the patient like gum on a shoe for the rest of their life if I hadn't caught it.
So for all our concern about hallucinating or bullshitting by AI, human intelligence is quite fallible, we should say.
Intelligence and time.
This was not a matter of someone being not intelligent.
It's just there's no way to get the work done that needs to be done.
Is it cutting down on pajama time?
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
And in a way that is very meaningful for physicians to the point that it has led them to be open to, OK, that was great.
What's the next thing?
Okay, so what is the next thing for AI in healthcare?
That's coming up after the break.
I'm Stephen Dubner.
This is the Freakonomics Radio Guide to Getting Better.
If you haven't heard the earlier episodes in our series, they are sitting right behind this one in your podcast queue.
And we will be right back.
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