Pain Matters Podcast Network

The Pain Matters Podcast Network is presented by the American Academy of Pain Medicine. It’s the nation’s leading podcast network for healthcare providers focused on providing the best care today, tomorrow, and beyond. Home to multiple pain-focused podcasts, we share the latest innovations and practical applications that directly impact how we care for patients and measure success in multidisciplinary care in every episode.

Contributors

Host

Sudheer Potru, DO, FASA, FASAM

Dr. Potru is a triple-board-certified anesthesiologist, pain medicine physician, and addiction medicine physician practicing in Atlanta, GA. He serves as a multidisciplinary complex pain clinic director, where he cares for patients with chronic pain, refractory mental health conditions, high-dose opioid use, and substance use disorders, and also trains clinical fellows in pain medicine, addiction psychiatry, and palliative care. He serves on national committees for the American Society of Anesthesiologists, ASRA Pain Medicine, and AAPM. He serves as faculty for UC-Irvine’s TNT-PC-TEAM virtual fellowship program in addiction medicine. He is passionate about equipping trainees and practicing clinicians with the information and conversational tools to empathetically recognize and treat pain and suffering, practice medicine with integrity, and navigate challenging clinical discussions related to chronic pain, opioid safety, and substance use disorders.

Co-host

Mustafa Broachwala, DO

Dr. Broachwala, is an interventional pain physician and Medical Director at National Spine and Pain Centers in White Marsh, Maryland. Dr. Broachwala completed his Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation residency at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and Interventional Pain Fellowship at the University of California, San Diego. Dr. Broachwala has a strong role in research and mentorship for the next generation of physicians. During his training, Dr. Broachwala was brought on as co-host of the Pain Matters podcast with an emphasis on bringing forward pressing topics and current events across the field of pain medicine, with special attention to finding the best subject matter experts in the field.

Co-host

Zafeer Baber, MD

Dr. Baber received his BS in Biomedical Engineering at Columbia University. After receiving his MD from Chicago Medical School, Dr. Baber pursued a residency in Anesthesiology at Columbia University Medical Center. Dr. Baber then completed a Fellowship in Pain Medicine at The Johns Hopkins Hospital. He is now Board Certified in both Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine and is currently practicing both specialties at Newton Wellesley Hospital in Newton, Massachusetts.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/zafeer-baber-md-86a15a54/

Guests

Guest

Jeremy Adler, DMSc, PA-c, DFAPPA

Jeremy Adler is a distinguished Physician Assistant (PA) who has dedicated over 25 years to the field of pain medicine. Practicing at UC San Diego's Center for Pain Medicine, Jeremy brings a wealth of experience from his extensive career in private practice, where he played a pivotal role in his practice's operations. His educational journey includes advanced medical science degrees and a strong commitment to advancing the role of PAs within the medical community. Jeremy is an advocate for multidisciplinary approaches to pain management and plays an active role in promoting collaborative practice models to improve patient outcomes.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremy-a-adler-dmsc-pa-c-dfaapa-9534b6b/

Guest

Maia Szalavitz

Maia Szalavitz is the author, most recently, of Undoing Drugs: The Untold Story of Harm Reduction and the Future of Addiction, which is the first history of the movement aimed at focusing drug policy on minimizing harms, not highs.

Her previous New York Times bestseller, Unbroken Brain: A Revolutionary New Way of Understanding Addiction, wove together neuroscience and social science with her personal experience of heroin addiction. It won the 2018 media award from the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

She is a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times and has written for numerous other publications, including TIME, Wired, Elle, the Nation, and Scientific American.

Her 2006 book, Help at Any Cost: How the Troubled Teen Industry Cons Parents and Hurts Kids, was the first to expose the damage caused by “tough love” youth treatment and helped spur Congressional hearings.

https://maiasz.com/bio/

Guest appearance on:

Exploring Addiction Myths and Harm Reduction with Maia Szalavitz*

Guest

Shravani Durbhakula, MD, MPH, MBA

Dr Shravani Durbhakula is a board-certified interventional pain physician and anesthesiologist with nationally recognized media projects. She joined the faculty of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in 2017. In the past, she has served as the Director of Pain Education and the Program Director of the Multi-disciplinary Pain Fellowship. Currently, she is the Course Director of the School of Medicine’s pain and opioids course, a novel mandatory curriculum for medical students that was featured on NPR due to its innovative value. She is also the creator and founder of PainRounds.org, a digital neuromodulation curriculum that fulfills a federally recognized need for better provider education on pain devices.

As Pain Matters founding host, Dr. Durbhakula served as host from 2022 through September 2025.