From Posture to Migraines: Dr. Ruan on the Hidden Impact of Oral Health

Welcome to the Wellness Dentist Podcast. Join biological and cosmetic dentist Dr. Katie to as she explores holistic wellness through trending ideas, real stories and patient experiences. This podcast will inspire you to make healthy lifestyle choices and take charge of your dental wellness. And now, your host, the wellness dentist, Dr. Katie To.

Welcome to the Wellness Dentist Podcast Today episode. I have a special, special, special special guest for you. It's almost like a miracle to get this guest intel space and have this episode because I can't wait for you to listen to Dr. Chang's Ron. All right, can you introduce to our audience who you are and how your journey into medicine?

Yeah, my name is Chang Ron. I'm an md. I'm an internal medicine physician by training. And my journey into medicine is sort of an interesting one. So my mother is Eastern medicine, acupuncture, and. And then my father, he's almost on the other side where he's like MD, PhD, research analytics and stuff like that. And so I kind of grew up with both worlds, but I thought they were just really one world. And so my entries to medicine really came from an understanding that we have to address the way that we heal. It's not just like disease management. It's like what does a healing process actually looks like. And we do it in a way where it's efficient and it's purposeful. And so when I went through medical training, I saw that medicine is not efficient nor is it purposeful for a lot of different disease states, especially with chronic illnesses, brain health, dementia, mental health issues, et cetera, et cetera. So I seeked out different trainings. I was training in integrative medicine, ultimately functional medicine, and then mind body medicine. And now we have this thing called consciousness medicine, which is, I think, my new thing. And what we want to do is want to recreate the entire dynamic of what medicine is supposed to be like. And that's the way moving forward. And interestingly enough, I find that I actually can't do this without dental professionals. It's almost impossible to do this without dental professionals.

What a perfect introduction. I can tell you that when we seeing patients coming from your practice, which is called Texas Lifestyle Center, Texas Lifestyle Medicine, they have very different mindset.

Yeah, yeah.

And so I know that when you seeing them, your team treating them, you have a very important question that you asked them at the very beginning. Can you share with us what that question is?

I think that a lot of times when patients go to their doctor's office, they're already a little bit intimidated and a bit scared and a Lot of them have gone through a lot of different medical offices and dental offices, and they're in this space of vulnerability. And the question I always address with them is, what is your outcome? Like, what do you really want to achieve for your health? And I pause, and they usually think, because no one's really ever asked them before, you know, and half of them will say, oh, that's a really interesting question. Let me think about that. And the other half will go into, well, I got this lab and this lab. I won't do this and this and this. But the reality is, like, we all have a different health journey. In order for us to go on this health journey, we have different perception of what healthy is. Every human walking through the door has their own perception of what healthy looks like. And we never want to assume that it's a perfect cholesterol lab or blood sugar or whatever, right? And so it's really defining. Have the patients, like, define their outcome of what determines their success. Like, what is their success criteria? And we have to assume that everyone's totally different. And often it is. Everyone's totally different with their success criteria.

It's a very different way to talk about that up front. Then lead the patient now. So many testings, so many supplements, so many medications or even lifestyle changes, and they're like, I'm not there yet, because they didn't define that success at very beginning. And so they keep chasing something that. That they're not sure what that is.

And some people don't know what their success criteria is. I would say about half the patients don't really know what determines the actual success. And they're here. So we order labs and do our testing, and, you know, we do brain mapping and stuff like that. And they're like, what does the results show? I'm like, the results aren't as important as what you want. Like, tell me what you want first. What is your ultimate desire, like, for yourself, for your health? Inevitably, it doesn't matter what diagnosis it is. There's three things I usually come up. I want to have more energy, I want to be there for my kids or spouse, and I want to be able to be a better version of me. Those are the three things I usually come up. There's nothing wrong with that. But then we get into specific. I was like, okay, well, if you want those three things. And what is my role in your journey? It's really important. What is my role in your journey? So my role being the healthcare professional, but it's your journey, right? And so Giving them permission to assign me as part of the journey and what their belief systems are. And a lot of times they'll come in, well, you know, we'll love for you to order labs and do X, Y and Z. I'm like, well, that's. That's not my belief system. My belief system is. My role is for me to be your guide. And I have a team here to help guide you. Right. And I think that's where medicine really should head, because, like, we have this thought process that medicine should be individualized. That's individualized to the outcomes that they set for themselves, for the patient, not the outcomes that we assume that they really want. Here's a really good example. We have a lot of patients that come in and say, hey, my doctor order these cholesterol labs and these cholesterol labs. And they're not perfect and wants to put me on medicine. And, you know, but I heard that medicines have side effects. They cause memory issues. Well, what do you think, Doctor? So, like, all right, well, first of all, what is your goal? How do you define what success is for the rest of your life? Like, imagine it's 20 or 40 years later. Like, what does that look like for you? And the patients often are like, well, you know, I want to be there for the grandkids. I want to do things and be super physically active. I want to be around. Okay, and what is keeping you from that? Is it going to be your cholesterol panel? And patients say, well, maybe. Maybe it's other things. Well, let's talk about those other things. So this is reframing and redirection, because at the end of the day, cholesterol panel doesn't really mean much of anything. It's really defining, like, what people really want as we age. And we want to be able to age gracefully. Like, no one has said, I want to be stuck in assisted living facility or a nursing home, debilitated, and my legs can't work and it's swollen, and, you know, I have to get dialysis and stuff like that. No one ever says that. Right. But we see a lot of people in chronic illnesses go that direction. But you have to, you know, design what life is like. And this is what consciousness medicine is. It's like, you have to be conscious of what success looks like, and you also have to be conscious of your role as a provider, as a clinician into the patient journey. And it's not what we learn in school. It's what the patients really want, what role they want for us to Provide in their lives. And oftentimes it doesn't match up. If they're coming for something and they're expecting me to do X, Y and Z. If it doesn't match with my. What my belief systems are like, we can end this doctor patient relationship. No harm, no foul. Right. But if you want me to take you down sort of this row of consciousness, understanding and about yourself more from a coaching perspective, that's what we do. We're a coaching practice. Texas center for Lifestyle Medicine. We're a coaching practice. And we coach so that people can make their own decisions. And ideally, they'll be with us for a year and two years and never need us again. That's our goal, that's our outcome. Right?

Amazing. Yeah, yeah. And so I know with the conscious medicine, you have a huge team in terms of physician, nurse practitioner, health coaches. Can you share with us, like, successful program you are having that helping patients overcome actually not just medical conditions, but a lot of. I would say psychological.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So everything starts in the head. All right. It's all on your head. It's true. Everything starts in the head. We can manifest diseases quite easily right now, like me and you, we both have a continuous glucose monitor on. Right. And so if I'm not sleeping well enough, I'm under a lot of stress, it'll look like my sugars will look like I'm diabetic. And at the end of the day, if you're looking at diagnostic criteria, oh, you're in the pre diabetes category. But you know, how much of it is stress usually? It's a lot of it. Right.

And sleep.

Yeah, stress and sleep. Yeah. They go hand in hand. Right?

Yeah.

And some people sleep too much. Maybe they're not sleeping. The quality of sleep is not enough. Maybe they're getting up a lot. Maybe something's bothering them. So it creates inflammation and metabolic issues, which is the core of all chronic illnesses. Right. So conscious medicine understands that the perception of our reality is able to generate diseases, and the perception of a reality is able to mitigate those diseases and heal. Right. And it's understanding that foundational concept is what this is all about. So if someone comes in and they have high cholesterol, they have high blood sugars or. Well, okay, well, that's nice to know. But consciously, what has created that pattern? Right. And maybe it's not even the patient's consciousness. Maybe it's their parents. Maybe it starts with the parents side. Maybe it's the grandparents. There's a lot of trauma that actually compounds A lot of chronic illnesses over different generations, and maybe that's what's causing it as well. Right. We can recognize that and understand that and normalize it. So we take away the stigma of, like, mental health issues, depression, anxiety, stuff like that. Right. So, you know, I have different terms for them. So, Katie, I want you to think about this. Like the term anxiety. For me, all it means is a sequence of unmade decisions. Anxiety is a sequence of unmade decisions. So if you think about it, if it's a sequence of unmade decisions, can you mitigate anxiety by making those decisions?

Yeah, of course.

Absolutely.

Make the decisions.

Yeah. And then depression is a sequence of regrettable decisions. Okay. A sequence of regrettable decisions. And so can you make the regrettable decisions? Right. By making other decisions, Whether that's connecting, apologies, taking away resentment. Yeah. So those two concepts is able to mitigate all of disease. All right, here's a really good one. So this is, I think, 2017, 2018, and we had a patient. I'll never forget her story. She comes in a whole lot of family with her. This is like four generations with her. She's 89 years old. No, she's 89 now, so whatever.

85.

Yeah, around that time. It's cool because I get to see the patients after the success journey. So she comes in and I'm like, well, it's going to make it a success for you and the family member that's coming in. I was like, you know, you know, the sons start talking. Mom has dementia and Alzheimer's, etc. Etc. And then she just hear eyes kind of glazing over. It's like, whatever. Right? And I'm like, you know what? Give me a second. Can everyone leave the room? Can I. Can I talk with Mom? Is that okay? So I asked her, what are you doing here? He's like, I'm like, all right. So were you brought here by your family members? And she was like, yeah. I was like, you know my family members, so what are their names? She's like, I hate it when doctor asks questions like this. Just went through neurologist. All right, it's fine. I'm like, what year is it? She's in 1972. I'm like, great, that's awesome. I pulled out my iPhone. I was like, whoa, what is this? She's like, it looks like a computer. I'm like, great. So what's around you right now? So I basically walked in. Her reality of where she was in 1972 happens to be the time before a major Trauma hit for her family, which is the death of a family member. And so I walk along the journey with her. All right, it's 1972. Tell me who's around you, and walk me through all this. And she had the greatest time. And the way that she communicated was very fluent. Now, this is a lady that's supposed to be severely demented, barely verbal, but when I existed with her in 1972, she was able to give so much detail. So is this person really demented, or are we just living in two different timelines right now? And I went to her timeline to talk with her. So I got the family members in. I was like, hey, family, it's 1972. Let's. Let's take a walk with her. And the way that she spoke, the family members, they start crying because they haven't heard her speak this eloquently in about a decade or so. Right. And they were hearing her, you know, explaining the things that around here was such beautiful detail. And she was a ballerina. She's from Eastern Europe. And I'm like, this is sound like someone who has a lot of dementia and they're not talking, or did no one just give her permission to be in 1972? Right. Long story short, she had other health issues and stuff like that. We were able to help resolve a lot of that. But every time she came in, I'm like, what year is it? And ultimately, it became the year that we're in. Right. And then she started recognizing people more, but she really had to have permission. So our consciousness sometimes will sequester memory based on traumas. And until we're shown acceptance and love, like, sometimes that memory just kind of sequesters away. This is not true for all dementia patients. I'm not saying that's the case, but for huge population, this is called pseudo dementia. To determine neurology. Pseudo dementia, not quite dementia, but there's a mental health aspect of it that is not allowing them to express certain things, right?

Yes.

And so now, many years later, we're in 2025, she's doing great. She's cooking for the family. She doesn't really need to come to us. She just comes to us for fun. And we do Medicare programs, tai chi, Qigong sessions and stuff, and. And so. But like her, her journey was such an impactful one for me and my team that allowed us to kind of share this collective vision of, hey, consciously, there's things that are going on that's beyond our understanding and we have to respect it. But in order for me to ask her the original question of where are you right now? Take me into that time with you. I have to have a fundamental belief system is that she's already awesome, she's already perfect the way that she is, and that I can't see her as a diseased person. Right. Instead I asked her to take me into her reality. Because every one of us, we have our own realities. And until we explore each other's realities and consciousness, we really don't have a greater understanding of other people.

What I noticed that seeing we having a lot of mutual patients. In your conscious medicine, you are paying huge attention to the mouth. Of course, you said, hey, all the disease in the head and the mouths are part of the head. So telling us, and our listener, of course, what do you see in the. Of course, the mouth, body connections.

Yeah.

And then dentistry and medicines working together.

The mouth tells you a lot, actually. The whole face. Right. So there's different things in anatomy you can really look at. Right. Let's say there's some small jaws, retro nafia, maybe some masseter hypertrophy, like me, because I have sleep apnea. Right. And maybe there's dark circle around the eyes. We call them allergic shiners. And maybe you have sort of the corner of the mouth that are a bit downturned. Maybe they're asymmetrical ones, turned differently than others. What's happening here is that the only moving joint in our head is our tmj.

That's right.

Right here. Right. And if the body is fighting existence, it's trying to move the TMJ in a way where it becomes more neutral. That could be sleep apnea, fascia issues, etc. Etc. So what happens is that our body then creates hormones that go into fight or flight survival, and these hormones are seen as abnormal. Okay. And so, for example, if someone is more dopamine dominant, and maybe they're trying to fixate their airway, maybe they have narrow palate, high steeple palate, airway obstruction issues, then the only way they can exist if they have persistent fight or flight, which psychiatry calls ADD and adhd, but that's designed for them to survive. So should we really call it that or should we call it neurodivergent? They're just really divergent from the normal population. And so my thing is like, we can't call compensation mechanisms diseases just because it doesn't fit with in the box. Right. Another one is bipolar disorder. That's a huge one. Bipolar and airway issues. That's a huge one. Right.

Yeah.

So there's a lot of mental health labels that we're seeing. And what's so funny is I talked to a group of psychiatrists. I was like, hey, can you tell when someone walks in the door what mental diagnosis is going to happen? Oh, yeah, There's a specific look to them. Well, what do you think that look is? Maxillary deficiency. Right. Sort of the dark circle, stuff like that. Right. And then in, like, functional medicine, when we learn, oh, you know, there's these patients and they're mold toxic. Well, what do they look like? Well, they have this Disney princess chin where it's like tapered down here. They have sort of the high cheekbone look. Right. They have dark circle around the eyes. Well, okay. People who get mold toxic are also these people who get these psychiatric diagnosis, right?

That's right.

So you can link them together. So the face and the airway have so much characteristics of it, of people trying to compensate. And what's happening is that over time, our skull structures are developing differently, but we can't have the same diagnoses we have for airway disorders of the original ICD classification diseases in 1965. We can't have that. And so with dental professionals, it allows me to work with dental professionals and understanding what's causing the bruxism and airway issues, et cetera, et cetera. Right. And this is why I really enjoy, like, airway dentistry. And holistic dentistry is really tie the whole body together. Without dentistry, like, I can't practice in brain and mental health. That's impossible. There's no way. Well, there's a way I can prescribe drugs. Right. But there's no way for the healing potential to really improve unless we address the airway and the dental stuff. Right. Another huge one is periodontal disease. Periodontal disease and organisms that harbor within the gum lines and stuff like that. If you have that, your body is shifting its positioning to sequester those toxins, your posture becomes different. Right. You have a lot of tension. You have migraines and things that sort of develop in traditional neurology. You know, what we do is like, you inject some Botox here and there, try to relieve the tmj, but what's it really doing? Right? And so once again, it's a compensation mechanism. So we can't call a migraine a migraine unless we're like migraine secondary to something else's going, going on. Maybe there's some periodontal disease that's going on. Right. Same thing. Parkinson's syndrome. That's a huge one. Our first major neurological case we collaborated was Parkinson's. And after the patient got treated for his periodontal disease, well, he was fine. He was undiagnosed with Parkinson's. Right?

Yeah.

And so that's a huge one as well, because that's my personal story. I was diagnosed with movement disorder, and they call it Parkinson's syndrome when I was in my 20s. But it turned out to be my very first encounter with periodontal disease at that time in airway obstruction. Right. But we see this over and over again where different health sectors are siloed with their own thing. There's no cross discussion, no cross collaboration. That becomes a big issue because it's a really massive issue. Another thing that is a part of all the head and dental and stuff like that is I never really truly appreciated how much pain came into the picture. Right. Especially like fibromyalgia. Fibromyalgia for me is if you don't have a dentist that's working with you in fibromyalgia, it can never heal. And it's because so much of it comes with the teeth coming together, the airway. Right. And so a lot of what we are now naming these things have to do with some root ideology that could be traced back whenever we look at dental origins. Or the dentist can actually show us the way. Right. It can actually show us, hey, this is what's going on. Here's the bite differences. I'm like, oh, okay. And so this is where I got into working with dentists on trying to figure out appliances, trying to figure out what's going to be helping them with their chronic pain, because medication is not going to do it. You know, that's right. You can take all the meds you want, but the root cause may be an alignment issue that has to do with the head and neck. Right. And another huge thing is teeth alignment controls your diaphragm, the way you breathe. It also controls your bladder function and pelvic floor. Right. And so it also controls your plantar fascia. So like your plantar fasciitis, foot pain and stuff like that, right?

Yes.

All comes from, like, this mouth origin. So there's so much of it that's actually taught in Eastern medicine, Chinese medicine, that's not really taught in Western medicine. And the philosophy has to kind of flow through the the same way. So I think seeing patients is two step. One is understanding that all patients are awesome. Everyone's awesome, everyone is perfect the way they're made. Number two, Identify the compensation mechanism. Right. And see what we can do to adjust the compensation mechanism. Most chronic illnesses are compensation mechanisms in.

The body so powerful. So the audience listen to this and say, what is one tip from you today that they can follow and say, hey, I can work on my health today, or I can start making that journey today, now that I have an understanding that it's not just a physical, it's more than just the physical. Right? So what is one health tip that you would give to the listener that they should do to start this conscious medicine journey?

I think what we should all do is identify something that's bothering us. Like one thing that's bothering us. Like a trigger, right? Could be a person, a thing, an idea. So one thing that's a trigger. And think about, if we focus on that, what emotion does it really bring up? And then when we're exhibiting that emotion, what do we look like? What does our posture look like? How do we stand? How do we show up with people? Right? And so is that still serving us? Is the question, is that triggering emotion still serving us? So the answer is no. What can we do to flip it and change it? So the idea is that whatever we're focused on is our own reality. That's no one else's reality. We can't expect other people to have our own reality. So whatever we focus on is our own manifestation as well. Right. And because everyone exists in their own realities and their own manifestations of what they perceive consciousness and life to be like, no one's ever wrong. They're right for them. They're right for them.

I love that.

Yeah. And so we want to play this game. And the game is, what if the opposite was true? So let's say you have a triggering emotion. Let's say someone pissed you off. Maybe they cut you off on the freeway. Okay. Maybe they cut you off on the freeway and you're like, ah, how dare you do something like this. Flip off the middle finger or something like that, Right? So your focus is on how dare they do something like this to you while the other person is like, oh, my gosh, my kid fell at school. I need to pick her up from Montessori school. I need to get there as fast as possible, no matter what. My kids the most important. So that's their focus. That's their reality in that car. And the thing is, we all have our own different realities, right? And so if we were able to exchange realities and see, hey, this is my reality. My perception is that you cut me off. And the Other person's like, listen, my kid is at school. And you're like, oh, you know, I have a kid in Montessori school. I totally get it. You want to escort, I can escort you. And then you align these different things. So you play the game. What if the opposite was true? What if this person was not trying to cut me off? What if this person was trying to do something that's a survival mechanism for them that starts an entire health journey that is super, super powerful to understanding our conscious state and what it creates. Right. I will give you an example of diagnoses that are part of consciousness based. So in functional medicine, we have this concept of adrenal fatigue.

Quite common.

Quite common, yeah. So adrenal fatigue just means that you haven't slept well for a long period of time. But what's losing sleep? Is it a perception? Is it a trigger? Like what's really going on? Right. And so now some adrenal fatigue can be adrenal exhaustion, could be Addison's disease. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about the run of the mill adrenal fatigue that people have not slept well. Something's bothering them. Okay. And then when adrenals don't put out enough cortisol to sustain the current reality that you have manifested, two other things increase. One is called dopamine, the go, go, go. The other one is histamine. Right. Histamine is making your body create these symptoms. And dopamine is like you're on this track to go, go, go. Right. And it creates this dynamic within the body of persistent fight or flight. So when your dopamine and histamine is high, your melatonin is low, you can't regenerate the body. All diseases starts getting created at that point, but has to do with what focus you have. What is your conscious state? What is your perception of what's really going on? Right. If you're constantly trying to chase something that doesn't have an end to it, it creates a lot of suffering, and that suffering may not be necessary. So oftentimes we don't even draw labs for some of these patients. Right. Whoa. Let's time out here before we draw labs. Let's figure out what is the root of the suffering and the consciousness that's going on here. Right. Because the more data that we get, the worse off some people get. Because it becomes very analytical and that complexity becomes an enemy of progress, and that creates a lot of destruction. So in answer to your first question, was the one takeaway is to reframe whatever you're focusing on that's bothering you and play the game. Hey, what if the opposite was true? Right? What if what I believe the reality is actually opposite. How would you feel? And that creates an entire different thinking and thought strategy that's going to be successful in your health journey.

Amazing. That's super powerful. And I know that they want to stay in touch with you because listen to this episode is always like open another because I know so many people fatigue in their journey to wellness. Like so many supplements, so many biohacking things to do. It's like the whole day, the whole morning, four hours just to kind of get the day starting, you know, with all the step that they have to do. It's feel like they have to do that to get the health and their wellness back. But now it's kind of opening to see like you start with the success definitions. Yeah, yeah. Look at that mindset and say what trigger me?

Yeah, what's the trigger?

Yeah, what's the trigger? And so share with our audience and our listener. How do they can find you, you know, and your work? Because I know you're super busy. Not every patient can get in right away, but they still want to reach out and, and contact.

Absolutely. So you can contact my team at Texas center for Lifestyle Medicine. You can search it online. And then if you're a healthcare professional, listen to this. I also have a non profit, the Physician Transformation Institute. It's open to all healthcare professionals.

Yes.

That learn and understand this concept of consciousness even for us because this is really not taught in school. So look me up at Physician Transformation Institute. Connect with me on LinkedIn if you're a professional. Instagram. It's my name, Chang Ron C H E N G R U A N M D that's my handle on Instagram and X and all the other platforms as well.

We were so lucky our team and I was joining you and your team on that Physician Transformations retreat last year in Costa Rica, which was epic. So is any future retreat coming or planning? Yes.

Yeah. So we have one coming up in Mexico and a few other ones that are in the U.S. u.S. And the states also. But a lot of our retreats are dedicated to shifting this mindset and the focus right. About consciousness and what that really looks like from our own perspective and connecting with one another. Another huge part I think. And what I learned from the retreats and running these retreats is that people think retreat is something that you go to to relax. While that's true, you go to retreat in order to advance, that's the main thing. In order to advance, you have to go into the retreat space and then re advance and come up with different outcomes for what you want to do with your life and potentially not just what you want to do with your life, potentially create a legacy. I'm a legacy guy, so I like to think things in terms of different generations. Right. And I think that as healthcare professionals, we have this ability to be in that legacy space now more than ever before because the world is changing with artificial intelligence and it's going to be the healthcare professionals that's going to be able to train and also provide a knowledge base with artificial intelligence moving forward so our future generations can be benefit.

And I'm a member of the pti, the Physician Transformation Institute. I can tell you there's so much content, amazing content on the website to really watch it on your own pace. But come out to the retreat. Yeah, it's the in person experience that make it make the difference.

Yeah.

Our team still talk about it and actually we share that with patients and they're like, wow, it's good that you gotta take care of yourself.

Yeah.

You know, you have to put your oxygen mask on first.

That's the one thing that I think people don't realize is the patients really appreciate it if, if you work together as a team. And I think, I don't think that's a perception that's really commonly known for healthcare professionals, but there's a level of respect when you treat your team members right. And also, you know, putting the mask on yourself before helping others.

Awesome. The reason this is a miracle, because seeing Dr. Ron's schedule and our schedule and to get him physically in the studio is challenging. So we're very grateful for the opportunity today. And of course you got to come back and share with us more about not just medical practice, but you also have a tech company where making medicine is no longer 50% paperwork, 50% patient care. That's what most physicians share with me today. They say 50% of their time is take care of paperwork and 50% is like patient care and they burn out.

It doesn't have to be that way. Exactly. So yeah, we have a tech team, we have an AI development team and they do amazing job and it's really changed the way that medicine is practiced. And my 120 year goal here is to actually completely shift the way that medicine is practiced more on a consciousness level rather than more of a reductionistic level. And I think AI is going to help us get us There.

And you receive a lot of compliment from our patients that I want you to hear, because I never share that with you, is that you make medicine, especially conscious medicines, accessible to everyone. Oh, yeah, yeah. Because with functional. A lot of time patients said, well, I can't afford that.

Yeah.

And they think that they have no chance of getting well. But with conscious medicine, he just gave you the number one tip what trigger you. And so it's totally affordable. It's totally accessible. And that's what the patient realized, oh, I don't have to have a lot of money to be well, I can start it today.

Today. Yeah. You can have any budget and be really do well. And one of the things we tell patients is that the most powerful thing they can do for your body is breathe and have a good posture. And that's free.

That's free. Yes.

Right?

Yes. It's for everybody.

It really is for everybody. And the other thing that I think is really important, Katie, is that there's dentists kind of listening to this, is that dentists also require further training to integrate with, like, physicians and MDs, I guess, super, super powerful.

Yes.

The integration has to happen, like, now, because it's not about making pretty smiles anymore. It's. It's about longevity. And I'm telling you right now, from a physician to. To a dentist, like, I can't practice longevity medicine without dentistry. And I don't know what I'm doing with dentistry.

You know, you just refer to the wellness dentist. And we will take care of the patients.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

And complete that team. Same.

Exactly.

And the trust of the patient increased significantly because we communicate with each other.

Oh, yeah. Big time.

Yes.

Yeah. Communication is not only key, but it's actually essential to the survival of the entire medical field. A lot of times we as healthcare professionals, when we go through training, we train on so much of the how and a lot less of the why. And so we really, really have a wealth of information on the how. But the how actually doesn't get us anywhere. It's all about the why. To extract the why from the patients is the foundational step that we're taught to kind of skip in medical and dental training.

That's right.

We gotta put it back in there.

Yeah. And you visit that why at every visit?

Every visit.

Yeah. To remind them why they're doing this.

Yeah.

Yep.

Yeah. It's their choice.

Thank you so much. I appreciate your precious time. You just got back here last night from a long trip, and we definitely have your back. This is a lot of information. And I know I'm gonna get a lot of questions and check your inbox. Cause people are gonna reach out to you.

Will do.

Yes. Thank you for tuning in today. Thank you for listening. Subscribe and we'll see you next episode.

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