A Newsletter Where Medicine Meets Humanity
unflinching stories, questions, and reflections on how care, power, and empathy shape the doctor–patient world
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Hi, I’m Zed Zha
I am a physician, author, and medical cultural critic who speaks about the urgent need to restore patient autonomy in medicine.
My upcoming book, Consented: A Doctor’s Call to End Medical Violence and Reclaim Patient Autonomy, exposes the hidden injustices within healthcare.
My children’s book, Why We Eat Fried Peanuts, honors heritage and resilience through my great-grandmother’s extraordinary sacrifice a century ago.
Through my op-eds, talks, and newsletter, Ask The Patient, I explore medical ethics, gaslighting, misogyny, and the urgent work of restoring humanity and consent in care.
Browse the newsletters:
The Patient Who Googled Her Symptoms
Then out-googled all her doctors.
The Angry Daughter
When a daughter’s anger becomes her inheritance, the echoes of family and medicine collide.
The Medicaid Patient
When the safety net fails families.
Upcoming book:
Medicine is sick. Consented is the book that names the crisis of coercive medical practices and calls for a revolution in restoring true patient autonomy.
On-sale date: April 14, 2026
Recent Public Lecture - Racism in Medical Education
Dartmouth College, 2/6/2025
The Problematic Racial History of Medical Education
The Rabbi Marshall Meyer Great Issues Lecture on Social Justice
Why We Eat Fried Peanuts: A celebration of Family and Lunar New Year Traditions
My first book was a children’s book based on the true story of my great-grandmother’s heroic act of saving a baby 100 years ago in China. The book invites kids and their families to learn about Lunar New Year traditions, practice simple Chinese phrases, and make a yummy treat together.
Storytelling & Live Performance
Alongside my lectures and keynotes, I tell stories on stage. This is my live performance from a Nocturnists and Bellevue Literary Review event at the Leonard Nimoy Thalia Theatre — a funny, heartfelt retelling of how my mother stole me out of a hospital.
The story went viral after artist Pan Cooke turned it into a comic that received over 500,000 likes on Instagram. Pan and I are now collaborating on a graphic memoir, My Mother Was a Thief (working title). You can see early sketches in my newsletter.