TOP Doctors Interviews - Advanced In Regenerative Medicine - Featuring Dr. Truong

Coming up, we'll be on location at Trong Rehabilitation center in Fredericksburg, Virginia, discussing the latest advances in regenerative medicine and how they can effectively help treat injuries and restore your health and well being without any surgery or downtime during with one of this area's top doctors, Dr. Ann Truong. Dr. Truong received her medical degree from Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas in physical medicine and rehab. She is also on the faculty at Virginia Commonwealth University at the College of medicine. And Dr. Trung has recently in 2018, been nominated and named and awarded Entrepreneur of the year. Welcome, Dr. Truong. It's a pleasure having you on our program.

Thank you for having me.

It's your first time, in fact, on the top doctors interviews. We have a lot to talk about. We have some patients we're going to be hearing from later, not to mention some treatment and procedures that you're going to be performing, including the very popular Vampire facelift. So before we get to all that, I wanted to begin, If I may, Dr. Truong, by having you, please take tell us what regenerative medicine is and how it works, because it's helping a lot of folks.

So what that is is essentially harnessing and using your own body stem cells like your blood and your own stem cell from your bone marrow and your fat to help heal yourself from either injury or pain. You can even use that to also improve looking younger and getting rid of those wrinkles, and also improve it for sexual dysfunction as well. So it's a new treatment avenue that we have now instead of surgery and medication that harness and use your own ability, healing power from your blood and from your own stem cell to help you heal yourself.

Yes, indeed. And what I love about that is it's obviously non surgical, non invasive. You're using your own blood. Right. As you just mentioned, as far as the PRP treatment goes. So. So it's a very natural way to regenerate our bodies.

Absolutely. And that is what we want to focus on. We want to focus on more natural holistic therapy to help the whole person.

And what types of treatments are currently available within regenerative medicine.

Well, I'm glad you asked that because right now we're in 2018 and every year we learn more and more about our ability to, to help us heal ourselves. So now you can use platelet rich plasma, which is your own blood, as a form of healing power, but you can also use the bone marrow, the blood from your bone marrow to help you heal as well. And they have stem cell and you can actually get stem cell from your fat, the part that we hate. But within the fat are stem cells that help us heal, that help us make cartilage and ligaments and muscles. And, and there's now another new modality that's from the amnion, which is the tissue from the mother and the baby, which we can use for stem cell therapy as well. But I believe in the future there'll be more modalities that will be treatment will be available for stem cell therapy. And I believe that right now we're probably at just the tip of the iceberg that we will be discovering more treatment.

Yes, indeed. And what health problems do these treatments that you briefly mentioned, Dr. Truong, really address as far as folks out there.

Watching right now for pain issues in your joints, like your joints, like your shoulder, your hips, your knee, your ankle and the spine. And really anywhere you hurt, that is a muscle or ligament or tendon, and particularly for cartilage like osteoarthritis. And then the other areas too that you can use this for is for aesthetics, to improve younger looking skin and just feeling better. And also you can use it for, to treat sexual dysfunction for men and for women.

Very interesting. So really, these treatments can help a wide, wide range of folks out there.

Yes.

Covering the spectrum, literally.

Right. And we can, we treat patients all the way from 12 years old to 100 plus, anyone that has pain or anyone that wants to have a better quality of life. And what's so good about the stem cell therapy is that it's quick, you can see result within three weeks and you don't miss any time from work and it's no scarring and you don't have any type of side effects.

Yes. Now who's a good candidate that can benefit from regenerative medicine and all these different treatment options that are available to them?

Well, everybody is a good candidate for the regenerative medicine and healthier you are, the better you respond. But even if you're not healthy and you're unable to walk, you can benefit from that as well too. But it's something you want to consider before you do surgery or take a serious pain medication, for sure.

And what are some of the benefits, Dr. Truong, of regenerative medicine, say, as compared to the more traditional options that have been available?

Right. Well, you know, with the opioid epidemic, it has created a negative impact and we don't want to continue prescribing pain medication like we used to. So what the regenerative medicine does it offers an alternative to surgery and medication, but it's effective quickly. The moment you receive the treatment within three weeks, you see the result and the result lasts for years. It actually heals the problem and treat the source of the problem, not just padding it or medicating it at this point. So, so, and the result is permanent and is long lasting at this point. So it's nothing better than using your own natural healing power to help you heal yourself.

What type of results are your patients experiencing from these regenerative medicine treatment options?

Well, what the incredible thing about the regenerative is that you get quick results. And for instance, for pain, you can get pain relief within three weeks and, and get on with your life and participate in sports within six weeks. And for aesthetic, you see the immediate result after the treatment, we see a younger natural looking skin. And the patient can get this at lunchtime. It'll be like a lunchtime facelift and go back to work and you're just gonna look like as if you just had a sunburn. So the effects are immediate and it continues for months to years because your body integrate these stem cells and will work synergistically to rebuild your cells again.

Yes, absolutely, Dr. Truong. And I would think from what you just said here, what really stands out to me is that all these regenerative medicine treatments that you have are all natural. They're non surgical, obviously non invasive, minimal to no downtime. And, and yet they're getting great results with no surgery, no medication, as you just touched on a couple of minutes ago. Like other options require one or both of those, generally the ones that require surgery, then you need medicine afterwards. Here you get those results in a more natural way without the negatives of say, surgery and medication. So some great work that you're accomplishing and you're doing here at your rehabilitation center. And speaking of results, we're now gonna from some patients of Dr. Truong.

When I was in the Marine Corps, I sustained some back and neck injuries that affected several nerves and a small part of my spinal cord. And because of that, that was 15 years ago. Because of that, I was rendered completely impotent. And so after years of trying through the military medical system and the VA as well as private practice with all the traditional medications, and nothing seemed to be effective, I researched Dr. Truong's practice and here I am. Well, it was, you know, kind of discouraging that nothing really seemed to help. So that brought another battle in itself. Just trying to keep a positive attitude. It obviously affects your physical relationships. But thankfully my wife is the most understanding person on the face of the earth, so she helped me through that. And you've got to work with what you've got. You got to deal with it. Obviously, as a man, it does have an impact on you. Here at Dr. Truong's office, I went for the P shot as well as the follow up shock wave treatment to help with, you know, I'd researched it, the science and the concept behind the treatments, and it all made sense to me. And you know, I've always thought that one of life's biggest regrets is missed opportunities. And after I did the research, I knew I had to at least give it a shot. No pun intended. But so I went for both the P shot as well as the shockwave therapy. Yeah, well, the results actually are living up to the, you know, to the advertisement that I and the research that I did beforehand. And to be honest, it's only been seven weeks. And in the past seven weeks, I've got more function than I had in the last 15 years. And so, you know, I've got a smile on my face and so does my wife. Dr. Truong has all the latest protocols as far as I can tell from my research. So number one right there, she's on the cutting edge in my book. But as far as the facility itself, even though everybody is no nonsense, you know, everybody is still very pleasant, very personable and professional the whole time. So I couldn't ask for a better experience. So anyone who's in the same, you know, predicament that I'm in, and especially someone who has a healthy spine, I mean, I can just imagine what the results would be. So would I recommend coming here? Absolutely. In a word, like I said earlier, life's. One of life's biggest regrets is missed opportunities. And this is not one you should pass up. I wish this had been around a lot Sooner. I mean, 15 years has gone by and then now, you know, it's almost, you know, I don't want to be cliche and say a fountain of youth, but you know, I mean, I'm 60 years old and if I could have found this years ago, but you know, I'm here now. Truong Rehabilitation center in one word, smile.

I had torn shoulder tissue or muscle tissue in my right shoulder and was not getting any relief. So I came to see her and she said, oh, I can do prp, which I didn't know what that meant. It's platelet enriched plasma. I think I have that right. And Injections, which will regrow the muscle tissue. She did that, and she said, if you follow my directions, do exactly as I tell you, you'll heal and be perfectly fine, which I am. I have full use of my shoulder. In January, I came to her again because I was having hip problems, thought I was going to fall. You know, the hip wasn't working properly. I had pain in my thigh. And she said, we'll do an MRI and see what's going on. And I had an impingement of the bone due to arthritis. So for that, she did the PRP plus bone marrow injections, which she did in February. And again, follow her directions, and you will heal perfectly. And I walked in here fine. Nobody would know I had any problems. So I've avoided surgery, and my body's healed itself with these injections. So I'm happy. It's very miraculous. Is your body healing your body? I mean, that's the only way to put it. Your body has everything it needs, apparently, to heal itself. Sometimes it just needs a little help. So by taking stem cells and plasma and bone marrow if necessary, and putting it back where you have a problem, your body takes over. You eat good, take a few vitamins, exercise, and you're back to normal. I have to tell stories to kids. I'm a librarian for a K through 2 school, so I'm used to telling stories. Oh, this is a true story. Well, I went back to being able to do whatever I please. I like to do yard work. I like to do my own housework. I like to do painting, repairs, you know, whatever I can physically do. So I was back to being able to do that with no restrictions. I just like to have lots of greenery and colorful flowers to look at out here outside. Well, I can say that it made my husband happier because he didn't have to help vacuum. And I could do the yard work I'd been doing that he doesn't do. So I guess it helped the whole family. Oh, it's a big mental boost because it's very discouraging if you're independent. Not being able to do things you're accustomed to doing. It makes you. You just feel hampered when you can't. You start to do something and you have to say, nope, can't do that. It's too painful, or I may fall or I may drop something. So it just makes you feel more in control of your life. All right. The treatments it did was the injections of fat cells and plasma in the case of just muscle, muscle tissue. And it's anyone's interest in science is very interesting the way it's done, because you remove the fat cells and everybody wants to get rid of fat, so that's not a problem. You want to donate fat if you can. The fat cells, the plasma spun together, centrifuge, I think it's called, and then re injected in all around the area, something like 12 or 15 injections. And the cells know exactly what they need to do. So they just go to the area that's torn and regrow it. So as long as you do some exercises, she will instruct you on exercises to do the day after. You have this. If it's muscle tissue and if you follow those directions, exercise therapy. And that heals, basically the muscles heal themselves. If bone is involved. When you add the bone marrow there, again the cells know where they need to go. They go to the area that needs to be regrown and improved and do it. They just do it. And again follow the directions of limited exercise or none for a week or two, depending on the problem and physical therapy. So I think I was out of work for three weeks with my hip just because I wanted the baby cells to grow. And then therapy and I'm back to normal, walking, no problems. It makes me feel like I never had a problem to begin with. And I think anytime you take a pill or you have a procedure, a medical procedure, you want to go back to where you were before. And I feel like that's what this has done for me. I don't have to think about picking up things or walking or turning. The muscles and the bone are completely back to normal. So it has improved my quality of life 100%. They are very friendly, reassuring. There's lots of paperwork, lots of brochures you can read if you're not sure about what a procedure is going to be. Everyone I've worked with here that has helped me have been very forthcoming, answer questions, reassure you, but tell you the truth. There might be a little pain, but no pain, no gain, which is pretty true in everything. Dr. Truong is very straightforward in telling you what your problem is, how it can be fixed. If she can do it, she'll tell you she can do it. If not, she'll say, this isn't something that I can help you with. So I very much appreciate the honesty from her as a physician. And as I said, all of the assistants and people at the front desk are just very friendly and very helpful. I have recommended Dr. Truong to a number of people I know of at least Two co workers who have come to her and gotten. In one case, the gentleman got a shoulder repair and he was thrilled to death. Another co worker had problems with her knee, and she's much younger than I am, so she was very anxious to get it fixed with minimal invasions. So Dr. Trong took care of her knee problem and she's feeling great. So I have recommended her to a number of people. And the thing that makes me want to recommend her is you come to her, explain your problem, and Dr. Truong will honestly say, yes, I can help you, or no, I'm sorry, I can't. And like I said, I really appreciate that honesty. Well, I guess I can just say that I appreciate Dr. Truong and I respect her intelligence and her willingness to want to help people, just feel better. And she does that in her role as doctor.

Severe pain, couldn't bend my knee, couldn't sleep at night. Pain was excruciating. Being a stubborn person, I figured, oh, I just did something in the yard and pulled a muscle wrong. So my husband had already seen Dr. Truong dragged me in here and she took a look and we went from there. MRI first, of course, then we did the stem cell therapy. It turns out that I had no cartilage. My knee was bone on bone, and the stem cell therapy worked. Within about 12 to 14 months, cartilage was growing, had grown back. No pain, no nothing. Back to normal. My life was back to normal because prior to that, I couldn't do anything. I'm a gardener. You can't work in the yard if you can't bend your knees. So that fixed it. That was the first time. Second time, I had torn rotator cuff on my left shoulder. I wasn't about to go through surgery for that. So again I came to Dr. Truong and the shoulder was so bad, I couldn't comb my hair, I couldn't reach behind me. I couldn't do anything. We did the PRP in the shoulder and I have full range of movement now with no pain whatsoever. And the last time I was just here the 22nd for some more stem cell therapy. My right knee again, not for the cartilage, but for the meniscus, which pretty much destroyed itself. So I had the stem cell therapy the 22nd. I was back here Monday for the PRP follow up. And so far, so good. I'm doing great. Well, when you can't move without pain, you don't have much of a life with your right leg. You can't bend your knee, you can't drive a car. Can't go anywhere again. I'm a gardener. I couldn't work in the yard. That was with the knee. So we got that fixed, and my life came back. The left rotator cuff again. If you can't comb your hair or reach for things without pain again, you don't have much life. So the PRP repaired it and fixed it, and now we're on the third go around for this knee. I'm hoping for the same results, and I have no doubt that it'll be just as good as before. After the stem cell, I did physical therapy and I did aqua therapy here, which helped a lot. And I've got to go upstairs when I leave here and sign up for therapy, physical therapy for this knee now. And that's it. Physical therapy. Normal activity, walk, you know, do your normal stuff. The results are phenomenal. My quality of life is back to what it should have been or what it has been. I wouldn't hesitate to do it again, as I just did two weeks ago. So I'm thrilled. The staff is wonderful. I've had no complaints whatsoever. I like that she's up front and she's honest. If she can't fix what's wrong with you, tell you she can't fix it, she'll sit you someplace else. In my case, she said, if I can't fix your knee, you're in line for knee replacement. And I said, okay, well, let's see what happens. So we did the physical therapy first. Actually, that improved the muscle tone a little bit. She said, okay, I think you're a good candidate for the stem cell, so let's go for it. And we did, and it worked. And I still have my knee. Actually, I had a new door installed in my house yesterday. I noticed one of the guys was my age, maybe a little bit younger. He was wearing a knee brace. And I said, what's wrong with your knee? He says, I have arthritis. I said, great. Have you been to see Dr. Truong? He said, who's Dr. Truong? I said, she's the doctor that fixed me up. And I gave him her card and information. So I passed this along to everybody I know who seems to have joint problems. Because we've been so successful, my husband and I, that I see no reason not to share the wealth. Oh, yeah, he was the first one here. He's had both of his knees done, and he also had torn rotator cuffs in his right shoulder. And he couldn't even move his arm. And he's back to work and doing great now too. I mean if anybody has any joint problems, this is the person to come see. It's a one stop shop. She is here. She's got physical therapists upstairs, she's got the doctors down here, she has massage therapists here. I mean this is the place to come.

For about eight months I couldn't use my right arm, couldn't lift it more than 6 inches. Went to another doctor, found out I had torn rotator cuff, major tears. Was set for surgery on a Monday, came here on a Friday. She said she could fix me without surgery. I got referenced by a friend and decided to come in and see her and go with her instead of getting the surgery, which the surgery was one year recovery. She told me she could have me back up and going within four months. And within two months I was fully using my arm again in therapy. A month and a half of therapy and back to normal. It was horrible. I couldn't even wash my hair with two hands. I couldn't do minor chores around the house. Couldn't open a cabinet or refrigerator with my right arm. It was horrible. I thought it would heal, but it didn't. So it was very painful. I couldn't do things that I normally do. Getting in and out of bed was more difficult. At work it was more difficult. It would wear you out a lot quicker during the day. So it was very, very painful. In order to help me, we used a PRP. It was a plasma replacement and Dr. Truong suggested using the plasma as opposed to surgery. Non invasive, just injections. And it was absolutely incredible. No medications, no downtime. I can do anything I want to do now where I couldn't before at all. So quality of life is much better and pain free. Not only would I recommend her, but I recommend her almost daily. I run into a lot of people daily that have issues and family members. And I always tell them, don't go to a doctor and get cut on. Come to Dr. Trong and she'll take care of you.

We're now back with Dr. Truong. I must say the patients are very happy with the results. You're really, you must be getting a lot of satisfaction because, because you offer so many different, different modalities, treatment options, services. Here at your integrative rehabilitation center. You can really help pretty much almost everyone out there watching in this community.

Well, I hope so. I hope so. I want to bring the message out there that you know, there are alternative to surgery and seek that out first to see if you're a Candidate, I'm not saying that you shouldn't do surgery, but you should seek an option first before you go forward with no.

As we just heard from the patients. Doctor, you can really help a lot of different types of folks who may benefit from what you have here. Right. In the non invasive manner as opposed to going through the traditional surgery. Surgery should always be the last resort. In other words.

Thank you. Yes, I hope so.

And I know it depends on each treatment and each patient and his or her situation. But in general terms, how many treatment sessions do your patients typically look at?

Usually they do one or two treatment and depending on some condition, we'll do three. And the three will involve more of the aesthetic procedures. But most of the time for pain procedure is one, maximum two.

Oh, we're not talking about a lot though.

No, not at all.

And what other treatments do you have here besides these regenerative medicine treatments that you've educated us about this thus far? Because you have an integrative center, Dr. Truong, as we touched on a couple of minutes ago, you offer a wide range of services, including on the aesthetic side. And you in fact are one of this region's top practitioners with aesthetic treatments as well. And for example, the vampire facelift, which we like to call the lunchtime facelift because for the busy folks out there watching, they can literally come in here and look a lot better and leave within an hour or less. And I wanted you to tell us about that.

The vampire facial. Well, what that is is using your own blood. We put it in your face and we're using a very small needle and we put that into the skin. And what it does is that it get rid of the wrinkles and gives you a nice young looking skin, a nice glow, get rid of the large pores and the sunspot. You have immediate result when you leave here. Your skin will feel and look like you're 10 years younger. And the effect lasts for about a year and a half or so. But you can get it done within an hour. And patients come and within an hour they become a new, different person.

Yes, and they look much better and no one knows they had something done because it's a natural option that you have here. That's great. And are there any other types of services that you'd like to educate folks about?

Well, we're an integrative practice here. So in addition to the regenerative cell and PRP therapy, we also do a whole spectrum of treatment. Hormone replacement therapy using bioidentical hormone, and we also do IV Therapy to help a patient replete their nutrition. On top of that, we also do pain management as well too, but focusing more on treatment and rehabilitation as well. And we also have massage therapy and physical therapy here in the facility. So our practice encompasses the one stop shopping. If somebody has an issue, they come here and we can really look at the whole picture and give them what they need when they do need it.

Absolutely. Now we're literally out of time, Dr. Truong. And I just wanted to ask you before I let you go, I know you touched on some of that just a moment ago, but you and your practice, Trung Rehabilitation center here in Fredericksburg, Virginia have certainly established a reputation for excellence. You guys are not only one of this area's leading facilities as far as integrative health, anti aging and wellness and a whole host of other options and treatments that you offer here, but you are one of this area's top doctors. In fact, you have published a best selling book, you have been nominated and awarded entrepreneur of the year, and you have a great reputation. And that's why I wanted to ask you, Dr. Truong, what you feel helps separate you and your practice apart from many of the others.

So what separates us is that we're an integrated practice that offers the patient a one stop shopping or like a mall. From pain management to rehabilitation, to supplement to hormones replacement therapy. So what I see is if a patient comes in, we want to evaluate them as a whole and, and not as a symptom. So if somebody comes in with low back pain, we want to look at them as a whole. What's causing the back, how can we treat the back? But how can we rehabilitate that and educate them? And then on top of that, how can we have them lead a better quality of life? Whether that's optimizing their hormones or weight loss, or doing massage therapy or physical therapy so they can get stronger. So I believe in that. You have to treat the patient as a whole. And what set us apart is that we have everything here on site, one stop shopping. And a patient doesn't have to think about it. And we give them what they need at the time that they need so we don't throw everything all at once. And it's also customized therapy for their condition.

Now also, before I let you go, I wanted you to hold up your book. You're a best selling author as I mentioned a few moments ago. Can you please tell us about it?

I wrote this book because I feel that right now 35 million men are suffering from erectile dysph and they don't know that there is an alternative to treating this erectile dysfunction condition. And right now we can treat it and reverse erectile dysfunction by using platelet rich plasma stem cell therapy. And it's an important aspect because this is what make a person whole. And in my book I talk about various treatment other than just the prp. I talk about hormone therapy, I talk about other modalities as well. And I'm proud of it because I want to make sure that this information gets out to offer men as an alternative for erectile dysfunction.

Absolutely. You're doing some great work indeed. And on that note, we'd like to thank you for joining us, educating us, being a guest in our program. It was our pleasure having you on. Dr. Truong.

Thank you very much for having me.

Thank you. And we'd love to have you back on in the future.

I'm looking forward to it.

With all that you offer, we definitely have a lot more to talk about on later date.

Thank you.

Thank you.