Creating a New Healthcare

As we close out the year, Dr. Zeev Neuwirth steps away from his usual interviews to share a heartfelt, personal message directly with you, our listeners.

Certified Nursing Assistants. They are the lifeblood of so much of what we do in healthcare, particularly in elder care, and yet they rarely share the limelight with the doctors, surgeons, and specialists.  Our guest today, Peter Murphy Lewis, is a documentary film maker who started out just trying to educate the Nebraska government on the shortage of CNAs in their state. What started as a single, 20-min documentary has turned into multiple seasons of the hit show, People Worth Caring About. The docuseries highlights the work of CNAs in nursing homes, sharing their stories in order to change perceptions about the work they do and demonstrate the value and reward of this much-needed profession.  Peter Murphy Lewis is a healthcare advocate and former CNA himself. His work spans television, podcasting, and marketing, with a focus on caregiving and long-term care. Born in Kansas, Peter’s path took a dramatic — and deeply personal — turn when a health scare forced him to reassess his priorities. What followed was a journey from academia and international politics to global media, entrepreneurship, and eventually founding Strategic Pete — a platform dedicated to helping small businesses and entrepreneurs grow. Now, Peter uses his storytelling skills to challenge misconceptions about caregiving, aiming to reshape how society values care and those who provide it.

We know that healthcare is broken, but how, exactly? And why is it that nothing seems to be helping? Well, as Chris Deacon says in this honest, open interview, “Until the chassis of healthcare is rebuilt…what we put on top of it is always going to be fundamentally broken.”  Chris Deacon is a legal expert, a healthcare activist, and an author. Her most recent book, The Great American Healthcare Heist: Why We’re Paying More and Getting Less seeks to demystify the broken nature in order to help the recipients of that care…us…look at the world through a different lens. She believes that the one stop gap we haven’t yet employed in our efforts to change healthcare is the power of the American people and their vote, but they have to first understand the systemic reasons why healthcare is broken.  Chris Deacon is a distinguished consultant in employer-sponsored healthcare, advocating for cost-effective strategies that benefit both employers and employees. As a seasoned national speaker and a reliable source for industry publications, she stands out for her integrity and impactful content in healthcare discussions. Deacon’s tenure at the New Jersey Department of Treasury was notable for implementing cost-saving measures exceeding $3 billion, reflecting her commitment to fiscal responsibility and healthcare quality. Her leadership at VerSan Consulting, LLC is marked by innovative solutions that have significantly reduced healthcare expenditures.

See, Believe, Create. Could it be so simple? Our guest today believes so. Dr. Tom Frieden has spent his entire career working public health, and in his estimation, these three words hold the key to better health for our communities, our world, and ourselves. It’s, as he says, a formula. In our conversation, Dr. Frieden shares tangible examples of how this formula has been applied successfully, and what changes we need to make as a country and society to achieve more affordable, more effective healthcare. Author of the book, The Formula for Better Health: How to Save Millions of Lives—Including Your Own, which distills four decades of public health leadership into a clear, actionable framework to prevent unnecessary deaths, Dr. Frieden is also the founder and CEO of Resolve to Save Lives, a global health organization that accelerates action against the world’s deadliest health threats. Resolve to Save Lives has worked with governments and other partners in more than 60 countries to save millions of lives. Dr. Frieden previously served as director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and New York City Health Commissioner, where he led efforts that increased life expectancy by 3 years and helped end major health crises including the largest US outbreak of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis, the 2014 West Africa Ebola epidemic, and responses to H1N1, Zika, and other threats.

As an industry, we’ve been circling around the idea of value-based care for the past decade. But, did it ever occur to anyone to ask real people, the recipients of said care, what they thought or felt about that term? Turns out, they hate it.  Through focus groups and a step-by-step methodology, Natalie Davis and her team at United States of Care are redefining value-based care and many other critical issues in healthcare. The new branding, “Patient First Care” doesn’t just come with a new logo and look; it’s the language that can help policymakers get the bills that support this financial framework passed. Imagine that…listening to people, taking their feedback seriously, and crafting legislation that reflects what matters to them. Sounds brilliant, doesn’t it? Our guest today is Natalie Davis, the co-founder and CEO of United States of Care, a nonpartisan organization working to ensure everyone has access to quality, affordable health care. She has nearly two decades of experience shaping health policy, including serving at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services during the rollout of historic coverage expansions. She was recently recognized as one of Washingtonian’s “500 Most Influential People of 2025”