Matthew Zachary reads from We the Patients for the first time at the Cervivor Summit. Surrounded by cervical cancer survivors, he breaks down while honoring families crushed by medical debt and systemic failure. A defining moment ahead of the book’s May 2026 release.

National healthcare leaders put their names on We The Patients because they recognize what patients have endured for decades. From Scientific American to former Medicaid and CDC officials, these endorsements validate a movement to reclaim power from a system that failed the people it was built to serve.

A blinking answering machine. That's how I found out I had brain cancer. I was 21. Thirty years later, I wrote a book about it. "We the Patients" isn't a memoir—it's a manual. The system isn't broken. It was built this way. Don't try to fix it. Rig it in your favor. This book shows you how.

I was 21. Brain cancer came via a blinking answering machine. There was barely an internet. No young adult programs. We kind of all just died back then. But I didn't. I've watched three decades of impossible become ordinary—and it's been the greatest terrible privilege. 2026 is the Year of the Patient.