Support for the Nocturnist comes from the California Medical Association.

At the Nocturnist, we are careful to ensure that all stories comply with healthcare privacy laws. Details may have been changed to ensure patient confidentiality. All views expressed are those of the person speaking and not their employer. Hey everyone, it's Emily.

As you may know, we wrapped our uncertainty series last week, but this week we've got a bonus

episode for you.

It features me and our uncertainty correspondent from the series, Alexa Miller.

A few weeks ago, the ABIM Foundation

invited me and Alexa to do a webinar where we shared some reflections on the series, and it

turned into a really thoughtful conversation. So give it a listen. We hope you enjoy it.

To start us off, I'd like to ask everyone in the audience if you could please put one word in your chat that comes to mind when you think about uncertainty in medicine.

So, Emily and Alexa, when you see these words, what comes to mind, what comes to mind for you? I mean,

I want to say, first of all, my word is angst, but what comes to mind for you? And maybe you can

each share a moment, big or small, when uncertainty in medicine really came to life for you. So

stressed, I see anxiety, I see concern, hesitancy. Let me start

with you, Emily. Yes, so I'm definitely seeing a lot of those words, angst, stressed, anxiety,

concern, and that's super normal and super common.

And I share those feelings. There's a lot of angst, I guess you could say,

when it comes to sitting in uncertainty.

One of the things that I learned in working with Alexa

and reviewing a lot of the uncertainty literature and

scholarship is that even though there's a lot of negatively valenced emotions associated with

uncertainty, there can also be positively valenced emotions associated with it. And that was

eye-opening for me because it really helped me shift and

...