GeriPal - A Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine Podcast · Alex Smith, Eric Widera
Uncertainty In Medicine: Jonathan Ilgen and Gurpreet Dhaliwal
January 15, 2026·51 min·4 clips
Emergency physician John Ilgen explains why medicine's obsession with certainty is incomplete and misleading.
As heard by us
A clear-eyed look at how clinicians name doubt in the moment.
GeriPal makes uncertainty in medicine feel less like a slogan and more like a real bedside problem. Eric Widera and Alex Smith keep pressing on the questions that matter: what clinicians notice, how they separate a vague worry from a real red flag, and when saying "I'm worried"…
Why you'd press play
You want a clinical conversation that says uncertainty out loud instead of smoothing it over.
Listen to the show on