America doesn’t have a healthcare problem.

It has a healthcare business problem — and we’re all trapped inside it.

In this powerful episode of Broken Healthcare, host Ray Kober sits down with Chris Deacon — attorney, healthcare policy expert, former Director of State Health Benefits for New Jersey, and author of The Great American Healthcare Heist — to expose how America’s healthcare system became a $5 trillion machine that patients, employers, and taxpayers can’t escape.

Chris isn’t a theorist.

She ran healthcare for nearly 800,000 lives and managed a $6–7 billion annual healthcare budget inside government.

What she discovered changed everything.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

- Why Americans are paying $17,000–$50,000 per family per year and still can’t afford care

- How insurers, PBMs, and hospitals operate as vertically integrated monopolies

- Why “nonprofit” hospitals behave like Wall Street corporations — without paying taxes

- How consolidation destroyed community hospitals and accountability

- Why politicians of both parties are trapped by lobbying and reelection incentives

- How young government staffers are “educated” by industry lobbyists

- Why $1.5 BILLION in savings was realistically achievable — without cutting benefits

- How employers blindly write healthcare checks they’d never approve anywhere else

- Why Americans are handed a $50,000 system with no instruction manual

- How the healthcare system itself can become dangerous if navigated incorrectly

Chris delivers one of the most important analogies in healthcare today:

“We hand people a $50,000 Volvo and say ‘good luck’ — no driving lessons, no instruction manual — and then blame them when it goes wrong.”

This conversation isn’t partisan.

It’s not theoretical.

And it’s not about selling you anything.

It’s about education, accountability, and taking control of a system that quietly drains families, employers, and communities.

If you’ve ever:

1- Been afraid to seek care because of cost

2- Opened a medical bill and thought “this can’t be real”

3- Managed employee benefits and felt completely boxed in

4 - Wondered why healthcare feels impossible to fix

This episode will change how you see everything.

Watch. Share. And start asking better questions.

ABOUT CHRIS DEACON

Chris Deacon is an attorney, healthcare policy expert, former Director of State Health Benefits for New Jersey, national speaker, whistleblower, and featured voice in the documentary It’s Not Personal, It’s Just Healthcare. She oversaw healthcare for nearly 800,000 public employees and dependents and managed one of the largest state healthcare budgets in the country.

She now focuses on education, policy consulting, and public advocacy to help employers, policymakers, and the public understand how the system actually works — and how it can be improved.

PURCHASE HER BOOK

The Great American Healthcare Heist by Chris Deacon

Available at:

Amazon

Major online book retailers

Independent bookstores (by request)

(Search: The Great American Healthcare Heist – Chris Deacon)

HOW TO CONTACT CHRIS DEACON

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cdeaconc/

Active on LinkedIn with regular healthcare insights and commentary

Long-form writing available via Substack: https://substack.com/@chrisdeaconahealthcareheist

Open to messages, dialogue, and education-focused engagement

SUPPORT THE SHOW

If this episode resonated:

Like the video

Subscribe to Broken Healthcare

Share with someone who’s tired of the status quo

Healthcare doesn’t change without informed pressure — and that starts here.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Broken healthcare is failing millions of Americans — especially hourly and frontline workers.

In this episode of the Broken Healthcare Podcast, host Ray Kober sits down in-studio with Lexie Leitner, PA-C, Vice President of Clinical Operations at River Health, to unpack why the traditional U.S. healthcare system no longer works — and what it will take to fix it.

Lexie shares her journey from family medicine to healthcare innovation, and explains how River Health is rethinking access, affordability, and care delivery for workers who are often left behind by employer-sponsored insurance.

One of the most powerful parts of River Health’s model? Mental health is treated as essential care — not an add-on. Members receive unlimited virtual therapy plus free access to the Calm app, helping address anxiety, burnout, depression, and everyday stress without barriers, copays, or long wait times.

• Why high-deductible health plans leave Americans functionally uninsured
• How hourly workers fall through the cracks of traditional healthcare
• The real reason healthcare costs keep rising (and who actually pays)
• How River Health delivers unlimited virtual primary care, labs, prescriptions, imaging, and urgent care access for a flat monthly cost
• Why unlimited teletherapy and Calm access are critical in today’s mental health crisis
• How employers can support workforce health without $40,000 insurance plans
• The difference between insurance and actual access to care
• How healthcare became so complex — and what simplicity looks like again

If you’re an employer, HR leader, healthcare professional, or someone frustrated with the cost and confusion of U.S. healthcare, this conversation will challenge how you think about coverage, value, and care.

🎧 Subscribe to Broken Healthcare for real conversations about what’s broken — and what can actually fix it.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The U.S. healthcare system is broken — and doctors are burning out just as fast as patients.

In this powerful in-studio episode of the Broken Healthcare Podcast, host Ray Kober sits down with Dr. Dana Mincer, a board-certified osteopathic physician and Direct Primary Care (DPC) doctor, to expose what’s really happening behind the scenes of American healthcare.

Dr. Mincer shares her raw, unfiltered journey — from medical training and provider burnout to mental health struggles, patient advocacy, and ultimately walking away from the insurance-driven system to build a direct primary care practice centered on time, transparency, and human connection.

In this episode, we cover:

- Why traditional insurance-based healthcare is failing both patients and doctors

- What Direct Primary Care (DPC) actually is — and why it works

- The healthcare insurance cartel, price opacity, and hospital consolidation

- Doctor burnout, moral injury, and why so many physicians want out

- Mental health, ADHD, anxiety, and the limits of medication-only care

- Why relationship-based medicine leads to better outcomes and lower costs

- How free-market healthcare models are restoring trust and autonomy

This conversation is a must-watch for patients, employers, physicians, and anyone who knows the system feels wrong but hasn’t been able to put it into words.

🎙️ If you care about:

✔ Broken healthcare

✔ Direct primary care

✔ Medical burnout

✔ Mental health reform

✔ Free-market healthcare solutions

— this episode is for you.

👉 Subscribe for more conversations on fixing the U.S. healthcare system from the inside out.

👉 Like & comment to help this message reach more people who need to hear it.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.