Author Archives: hcolt

New Article on Substack

A new essay has just been published on my Substack, The Art of Being Human.

In “The End of Automatic Authority,” I examine one of the quiet revolutions unfolding around us. For much of history, authority was rooted in privileged access to knowledge. Today, that foundation is rapidly disappearing. The democratization of information, accelerated by artificial intelligence, is reshaping how we learn, whom we trust, and what it truly means to possess expertise.

This essay explores why authority, respect, experience, and judgment should no longer be viewed as inseparable, and why the future belongs not to those who simply know more, but to those who can think more clearly, exercise sound judgment, and help others navigate uncertainty. I hope you’ll take a few minutes to read it, and, as always, I welcome your thoughts and discussion.

You can read the essay on my Substack: The Art of Being Human.

If you enjoy these essays, I would greatly appreciate your support by subscribing, sharing them with others, or leaving a comment. Your engagement helps these conversations reach a wider audience.

Thank you.

Bronchoscopy Academy New Modules

Tracheal Anatomy Training Video


Dear colleagues,

Another couple of educational modules were added to the Bronchoscopy Academy YouTube channel, expanding our growing library of foundational bronchoscopy and airway education resources designed for trainees, fellows, practicing clinicians, nurses, respiratory therapists, and others involved in pulmonary and airway care. More are coming in the next weeks!

Recent topics include:

• Normal laryngeal anatomy
• Laryngeal abnormalities
• Tracheal anatomy fundamentals
• Bronchoscopy equipment fundamentals
• Bronchoscopy brushing techniques
• Bronchoscopy reports and documentation
• Additional foundational airway recognition modules

These short educational videos emphasize practical anatomy, procedural fundamentals, airway recognition, and structured learning intended to support bronchoscopy education worldwide.

Videos may be viewed here:   Another New Module.

If you find the material useful, please Like, Subscribe, and Share New Modules Available to my YouTube channel to receive notifications as other new modules are added.

My hope remains what it has long been: to help democratize bronchoscopy education and make high-quality learning resources more widely accessible.

With best wishes,

Henri Colt, M.D.
Bronchoscopy Academy
Bronchoscopy.org

Bronchoscopy Academy More modules added

Bronchoscopy Academy Modules with bronchoscopy image


Dear colleagues,

Another couple of educational modules were added to the Bronchoscopy Academy YouTube channel, expanding our growing library of foundational bronchoscopy and airway education resources designed for trainees, fellows, practicing clinicians, nurses, respiratory therapists, and others involved in pulmonary and airway care. More are coming in the next weeks!

Recent topics include:

• Normal laryngeal anatomy
• Laryngeal abnormalities
• Tracheal anatomy fundamentals
• Bronchoscopy equipment fundamentals
• Bronchoscopy brushing techniques
• Bronchoscopy reports and documentation
• Additional foundational airway recognition modules

These short educational videos emphasize practical anatomy, procedural fundamentals, airway recognition, and structured learning intended to support bronchoscopy education worldwide.

Videos may be viewed here:  New Modules Available

If you find the material useful, please Like, Subscribe, and Share to my YouTube channel to receive notifications as new modules are added.

My hope remains what it has long been: to help democratize bronchoscopy education and make high-quality learning resources more widely accessible.

With best wishes,

Henri Colt, M.D.
Bronchoscopy Academy
Bronchoscopy.org

New Bronchoscopy Academy Videos Available


Dear colleagues,

New educational modules have recently been added to the Bronchoscopy Academy YouTube channel, expanding our growing library of foundational bronchoscopy and airway education resources designed for trainees, fellows, practicing clinicians, nurses, respiratory therapists, and others involved in pulmonary and airway care. More are coming in the next weeks!

Recent topics include:

• Normal laryngeal anatomy
• Laryngeal abnormalities
• Tracheal anatomy fundamentals
• Bronchoscopy equipment fundamentals
• Bronchoscopy brushing techniques
• Bronchoscopy reports and documentation
• Additional foundational airway recognition modules

These short educational videos emphasize practical anatomy, procedural fundamentals, airway recognition, and structured learning intended to support bronchoscopy education worldwide.

Videos may be viewed here: New Modules Available

If you find the material useful, please Like, Subscribe, and Share to my YouTube channel to receive notifications as new modules are added.

My hope remains what it has long been: to help democratize bronchoscopy education and make high-quality learning resources more widely accessible.

With best wishes,

Henri Colt, M.D.
Bronchoscopy Academy
Bronchoscopy.org

A Final Note from Colt’s Corner

Substack Banner Henri Colt Art of Being Human


Dear Friends,

Over the past years, you chose to receive these brief reflections through Colt’s Corner. I have always been mindful that your attention is not casual—it is given, and you have generously subscribed to Colt’s Corner with interest and enthusiasm.

I’ve decided now to bring this work into a single, more deliberate space on Substack. Not simply as short reflections, but as a sustained body of writing that explores what it means to live, to act, and to care attentively. I publish essays and reflective pieces that move between clinical experience and personal narrative, between art, literature, philosophy, science, and medicine.

With that, Colt’s Corner will no longer be updated.

If these notes have been meaningful to you, I invite you to continue with me here: henricolt.substack.com

Judgment, Identity, and the Age of Systems


Medicine is no longer defined solely by what physicians can do, but by how they assume responsibility for decisions made within increasingly structured, technology-driven systems. As diagnostic pathways, algorithms, and artificial intelligence begin to organize clinical decisions in advance, the physician no longer stands outside the system, but operates within it. What can be done is expanding rapidly. Yet, as capability grows, so too does the burden of deciding what should be done.

In this evolving landscape, professional identity is shifting. It is no longer anchored primarily in technical skill, but in judgment—the ability to interpret, question, and assume responsibility within systems that increasingly shape the conditions of decision-making. Technology can organize information and suggest pathways, but it does not bear responsibility. That remains strictly human.

👉 Read the full essay on Substack:
Judgment, Identity, and the Age of Systems

If you like what you read, please follow me and subscribe to The Art of Being Human on SUBSTACK


This essay also accompanies a recent video lesson exploring these ideas in greater depth—particularly the evolving role of judgment in interventional pulmonology.

Watch here:  Who Are We Becoming

Steps to More: From Space to Medicine

Health care provider gain at the stars.


On April 10, the child in me—now seventy years old—was stirred back to life as I watched a space capsule descend into the Pacific Ocean. Decades earlier, I had watched another moment unfold on a flickering black-and-white television in a Washington hotel room as Neil Armstrong stepped onto the surface of the Moon. What I did not understand then was that the journey to the Moon would not end there. Its influence would be felt in hospitals, clinics, and in remote settings, shaping the way we monitor, diagnose, and care for patients.

From telemetry and remote monitoring to precision medicine and systems-based care, the legacy of space exploration is deeply embedded in modern medical practice. Yet its deeper significance lies elsewhere. It resides in the human impulse to look toward the unknown, to imagine ourselves beyond present constraints, and to extend the boundaries of what is possible.

If you like what you read, please follow me and subscribe to The Art of Being Human on SUBSTACK

👉 Read the full essay on Substack:
Steps to More: From Space to Medicine

Who is the Best?

surgeon waiting at the cross roads at patient's bedside


Patients often ask a question that seems simple but resists a clear answer: Who is the best doctor for me? Even if transparent outcomes data were widely available, the answer would remain uncertain. Because excellence in medicine is not confined to what can be measured.

In the end, what patients are really asking is something deeper. Not just who can perform a procedure, but who knows when to act, when to wait, and how to navigate uncertainty. These are not matters of technical skill alone, but of judgment—and judgment, ultimately, reflects character.

👉 Read the full essay on Substack:
Who is the Best?
https://henricolt.substack.com/p/who-is-the-best

If you like what you read, please follow me and subscribe to The Art of Being Human on SUBSTACK

The Disease We Romanticized­—Then Forgot


There is a particular stillness in the faces of Amedeo Modigliani’s portraits. Elongated and instantly recognizable by their hollowed or pale blue eyes, with heads tilted like flowers resting on thin, swan-like necks, they now grace the walls of the world’s great museums. Many carry an unspoken fragility—a sense of life both vivid and already receding, much like their creator, who lived and died under the shadow of tuberculosis.

Tuberculosis was once so visible that its outward signs were aestheticized—what came to be known as “tubercular chic.” Today, the opposite has occurred. The disease has not disappeared, but rather receded from public awareness. Yet it remains the leading cause of death from a single infectious agent worldwide, affecting millions each year.

👉 Read the full essay on Substack:
The Disease We Romanticized—Then Forgot

If you like what you read, please follow me and subscribe to The Art of Being Human on SUBSTACK

The Question Patients Cannot Answer

Physician torn between two worlds: patient care and data


Procedural medicine is built on the premise that skills can be seen, measured, and compared. Physicians who perform procedures are trained, above all, to intervene, and their success is often defined by dexterity, decisiveness, and outcomes. It is therefore natural that patients would want to choose their doctors based on published results of technical success. Yet, somewhat paradoxically, only a handful of specialties provide robust, publicly accessible, risk-adjusted outcomes that allow meaningful comparisons across institutions, and even fewer at the level of individual physicians.

In Interventional Pulmonology, where technological advances have expanded the ability to diagnose and treat complex airway diseases, this gap remains particularly evident. Patients who require these often life-altering or life-saving procedures are left without clear guidance on how to choose their physicians. The question they most want answered; Who is the best doctor for me? is one that medicine, despite its commitment to evidence and measurements, is not yet equipped to fully address.

👉 Read the full essay on Substack: The Question Patients Cannot Answer

If you like what you read, please follow me and subscribe to The Art of Being Human on SUBSTACK