Out of Patients
with Matthew Zachary
Welcome to 2026: The Year of the Patient where the sick shall inherit the ballot.
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Patient Revolution
I wrote We the Patients for people trying to survive American healthcare. I did not expect physicians, academics, and medical educators to start asking whether it belongs in the classroom. So, naturally, I have one question: How the hell did this happen?
My Book May Have Side Effects: What happens after you understand how American healthcare actually works?
What happens after you understand how American healthcare actually works? The We the Patients reader survey asks whether healthcare literacy creates agency, anger, preparedness, or something more powerful: the expectation that the system should change.
They Gave Every Medical Student My Book. Then We Talked About the Storm They’re Inheriting.
At the 2026 Robert A. Winn Clinical Investigator Symposium, hundreds of medical students received We the Patients and were challenged to see healthcare from the patient side of the bed rail, including the burden, bureaucracy, and hidden labor that medical training too often ignores.
Out of Patients?
Join the recurring Out of Patients dispatch from Matthew Zachary covering the latest American healthcare shenanigans. Essays, podcast episodes, media appearances, book updates, and live events delivered with a sardonic Gen X perspective from a patient who simply refuses to shut up.
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