031 - The Future of Preventative Health, AI, and Patient Advocacy | #ClearCardio

You know, it's always the focus on the patient. What can we do for the patient? How can we take this tech, identify the tech, and then apply it to that patient so we get better outcomes? And that is always the goal. Never, I want to be the world's best stress tester. Okay, well, yeah, good for you. But that's always a dead end.

But again, it's not delivering the actual value that people are looking for.

Right.

Awesome.

Yeah. Well, welcome everyone to yet another fantastic episode of Prevention is Power with Clear Cardio. Today, I'm truly excited to have a visitor coming all the way from Florida, coming up today to let us do our magic with him, our Clear Cardio scan on him today, and it is Ben Lee. So Ben Lee is a real visionary in healthcare. And today we're really gonna take time and, uh, I, I'm gonna, uh, really explore Ben's journey through healthcare, uh, where he came from, where, where the, uh, the big exciting turns were in his career and pathway and insights, uh, and kind of what he's doing now and then what, uh, where he sees things going in the future as well. So I think this will be a fantastic episode. Uh, it'll really be very, very enlightening and really a leader in, in healthcare and kind of where we're headed.

Yeah.

So sit down, buckle up, and get ready. So we have Ben Lee, and Ben, welcome so much. Welcome and thank you so much for coming all the way from Florida up here. We did your scan earlier. If you want to share any insights there, you certainly may, but really this is all about you. So I really am delighted to have you here and want to hear about your journey and how kind of ultimately where we Absolutely.

So, uh, for me, health and wellness has always been a passion and lifestyle of mine. I remember as a kid in high school, I actually worked at a nutrition store, and I remember at the time it was— what was it? Uh, Body for Life by, uh, was it Bill Phillips, right?

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

So they had that at EDS. And I remember just, I pored through that entire book and just memorized everything. I was like, oh, like HLB does, you know. So all the Uh, mechanism of action. And that's kind of where it started because I was like, hey, I really want to figure out ways to really put the body in the best position to succeed, right? And, you know, supplements and obviously, you know, understanding, uh, you know, your levels, you know, with, you know, blood work and everything, you know, I think it's imperative, you know, for people to live, you know, a high-quality life, right? Not just lifespan but also healthspan.

Right.

As well. So, you know, from there, that's kind of where it started. And then throughout my career, I was also in real estate. I was a financial trader. So I've, you know, dabbled in a lot of different things. And then my parents started investing in microcap public companies. And one of them was a pharmaceutical drug delivery technology company that used to create oral thin film delivery systems. So they could infuse, you know, pharmaceutical Nutraceutical, veterinary, and even cannabis, you know, on that delivery system. And then also I was working with some cannabis companies as well. So that's kind of where, you know, my first foray into like health, you know, healthcare kind of started. And then, uh, after that I actually became the Chief Operating Officer of what is now 10x Health System.

Ah.

So I was working with Gary Brecka. It was called Struva Medical Group at the time. Helped him scale it to, you know, the degree where it was actually acquired by Grant Cardone and Brendon Bostrom.

Mm-hmm.

And then, you know, not long after, you know, I was like, you know what, I still want to help people. And, you know, we started our own company called 4BPM about 4 years ago. Yeah. And we're super excited about what's, you know, coming on the horizon because when I was building that specific business, I sat down and said, okay, what did they do extremely well? Right? So they were great at getting people through the door, but the challenge was the execution of the expectations that they set.

Right.

So I was like, okay, well, you know, it's hard enough to try to find high-quality people to staff one location, and they were trying to open up a ton of locations all over the US and have franchisees. And I was like, you know what, instead of trying to compete with them— because again, I'm never going to scream louder than them on social media or anything, that's just not my personality— so I was like, well, How do I help more people? How do I add more value? How do I be of more service? And the entire premise or hypothesis behind our business model is to empower the people that already have, let's say, rapport with clientele that are already seeking optimal health and wellness. So what we built was a white label, done-for-you health and wellness business solution in a box. Where we can basically plug in all of the diagnostic testing that we do. So we do blood work, genetics, PGX, metabolomics, urine testing, cancer screenings. And we're always on the lookout for more testing, right? That we can obviously quantify, but then also have that practical application with. So it's like, I mean, if you have a bunch of data, which is great, but if you have too much data and there's nothing to do with it, you're kind of like, well, right. I mean, there's no real—

Looking for the actionable data.

Exactly, exactly. So we're always looking for, like I said, testing that, you know, will give us that actionable data, you know, and we can show improvements based on, like, certain protocols that we implement. And then obviously all of the requisite protocols that come off of all the testing. So, you know, if somebody needs hormone replacement therapy or peptides or regenerative medicine or supplementation or, you know, if they have heart issues, then we obviously will send them to you.

Yeah.

You know, we've done with a few of our patients, you know, already.

And we appreciate that.

Yeah, appreciate the trust. Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, just completely, uh, I mean, impressed is, I think, too— not a powerful enough word with, uh, you know, the, the scans that you showed me earlier. And, you know, I'm super excited to see, you know, the, the AI as well because, you know, and we're using a lot of AI too because, uh, when we were, you know, building, you know, this business, we could have thrown human capital Right, at a problem, right? Or I was like, hey, I'd rather build a technology solution for it.

Mm-hmm.

Because then we can scale it much more quickly. Uh, and, you know, just make it easier for everybody.

Hello everybody and welcome. Uh, this is Dr. John Osborne, the Chief Medical Officer of Clear Cardio, and I have something really exciting I wanna share with you. We now have a newsletter. So, uh, this newsletter is all of the great science that I look at every day and read and scour the medical literature for important studies, important outcome studies, new tools, new drugs, new data on nutrition, all of the different things that I commit my life and have committed my life to and am passionate about in helping me to further preventative cardiology. From new diagnostic tools to new blood tests to new medications to the latest on intermittent fasting and dietary approaches to help people live longer and better. So it will all be in our newsletter. It is great reading. The price is right too, because it's free. So please subscribe to our newsletter. Go to clearcardio.com, or you can click down below and get access to our newsletter. Whether you're one of our patients or not, it's all good. But I love reading. I am a voracious reader. I love medicine. And I love finding all the little charms, little treasures out there that make me a better doc, that better inform me, and ultimately help people along the way. So please, please support my habit of finding the greatest, newest, most important literature, and I'm delighted to share that with you. So please click below, subscribe, we'll get you on the newsletter list. And I think you'll really find it fascinating. So again, click below, join our newsletter, and we'll be really excited to help educate— or because we're in Texas, I like to say edumacate you— on preventative cardiology and what the latest and greatest tools, tricks, and treasures are. So thank you again. This is Dr. John Osborne, the Chief Medical Officer of Clear Cardio, and Click below and get on that newsletter. So I think that AI, obviously it's impacting everything around us and certainly healthcare. I always sort of think about AI and you were talking about how to leverage AI rather than human capital, which is great, but very expensive, how to leverage AI so we can accomplish more. In my world of heart disease and all that, I think about risk factors for heart disease, right? There's cholesterol. Think of that as a line, right? We got blood pressure. That's another line. We got diabetes and prediabetes and inflammation, right? What you begin to think about, if you think about all of those linear kind of those lines, right? In reality, how they all interact in an individual person, I can think along 2 dimensions. I can think along maybe 3 dimensions.

Right.

But I can't think in 10, 12, 24 dimensions. And I think where I put all of those things together, and I think that's kind of where AI is leading us, right? It allows us to do something that we just, our brains just could not handle. And I think obviously we're seeing that tremendous benefits in healthcare and of course in everything else as well. So it is interesting how if there's a stream that runs through it, it really is AI.

Yeah.

And I think it has huge promise. I think we're gonna do amazing things. Our advances will be even more exponential, but of course also poses lots of potential concerns as well. So we'll see how all that plays out.

But, uh, I mean, I couldn't agree more. I think with AI, with— I think a lot of people, they don't even understand the type of acceleration and increased velocity of just progress, you know, it's going to happen just you know, based with, uh, or using AI because like our minds can't actually fathom the amount of, you know, progress, especially with quantum computing and also AI. And, you know, it'll be very interesting to see like, you know, where it leads. And obviously, hopefully the people that are quote unquote controlling it, right, or developing it, you know, actually, uh, you know, put the proper guardrails there.

Right.

To ensure that, you know, it doesn't create like The Terminator, the Skynet, right?

Exactly. As all this, you know, unfolds, I am very careful to make sure that I'm grateful and thankful to our computer overlords. So, computer overlords, just note that I've always been behind you.

Hey, we said thank you, you know, for, you know, in all our prompts. So yeah, be nice to us.

Yeah, it's the brave new world, right? And I think too, with what you're doing, right? All of that data, right? Genomics, pharmacogenomics, metabolomics, all of that stuff that I think the only way we're really ever gonna be able to get a handle on it as poor mere humans, not our computer overlords, is to use the AI to really chunk that down so that we can take that amazing dataset and then convert it into something that we can understand. And that, as you said before, Right. Right. Because data are data. We need information.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think like just genetics in general, right, kind of lend to that more because it's so much data, right? You know, you have 22,000 genes, right? You know, which ones are functional versus which ones aren't. And I think a lot of people when they actually, like 23andMe and Ancestry, obviously it's not functional genomics, but they get all this data and they're like, okay, great. Well, I have this data now. What do I do with it?

Right?

And most people have that analysis paralysis because no one has curated it for them to say, these are really the main things you need to focus on, because they're like, all right, well, I don't even know what to do. So, I think there's that disconnect there where people do the genetic testing, but then they're like, okay, great. Well, how do I practically implement it or apply it to just my normal daily life?

Mm-hmm.

So, that's what we really focus on. to be able to show people, hey, the reason why you've experienced something throughout your life is because your genetics are wired this specific way. So if you have suboptimal expression of, let's say, your AMY1 gene, which is your amylase gene, amylase is actually what starts in the mouth and also in the digestive system. And if you have a poor expression of it, then you don't break down carbohydrates as well as somebody else.

Mm-hmm.

So those people, when they have that suboptimal expression, they're more prone to weight gain if they eat carbohydrates. So people are like, oh well, if I look at a piece of bread, I'll gain weight. Well, chances are there's a high probability that they have that specific gene. And then what do you do? You either avoid the carbs or you actually take digestive enzymes to facilitate, right?

Sure.

But at least people will understand it. And the way I love to explain it is it's like trying to get a piece of furniture from IKEA. And then as you're building it, you don't have the instruction manual. So you're like, think about it, right? I got all these pieces and—

I've done that. And I mean, yeah, it'd be a puzzle you couldn't solve.

Right. And then sometimes you're like, all right, well, I have extra pieces. You're like, I don't know what this is supposed to look like. I think this is what it's supposed to look like. And that's what a lot of people experience throughout their lifetimes because, you know, they've never been shown the instruction manual.

And then you end up with all those pieces left over.

Exactly.

Exactly.

And so, you know what, you might gain some insights along the way, But again, it's more trial and error, right? Versus, hey, the reason why this is happening is because the genes are expressed in this particular fashion.

Yeah. It's— I can tell you over the course of my years, so I'm about 30 years into preventive cardiology, what I knew or thought I knew when I started versus what I think I know today, it's just astonishing.

It's incredible.

Yeah.

Because I mean, the one thing I tell everyone is the only thing I know with 1,000% certainty in this lifetime is that I don't know everything. And I think, you know, as, you know, obviously practicing medicine or in healthcare or, you know, any obviously, you know, thing where you're always constantly learning, right? You have to have that open mind. And, you know, I think that's a challenge with a lot of healthcare providers too. Like, They go to medical school, and then you can actually figure out exactly when they went because it's the information that they learned, right?

Carbon dating.

Yeah, exactly. You're literally carbon dating when you went to medical school because of the information that you learned, right? So, and, you know, when most practitioners, you know, come out after medical school, it's like, okay, they have to do, you know, continuing education and whatnot, but it's not— unless they're a researcher, right, or, you know, they really want to be on the cutting edge, most don't, right?

They don't evolve.

Yeah.

Exactly.

So, right, uh, and, you know, that's obviously not great because obviously as we learn more, like, you— most everyone should be on the cutting edge, right? Because then, you know, you're really applying the, uh, you know, whatever doctrine or, or, uh, protocols, you know, are, are the best, right, that, that, uh, that are for that specific moment. So, you know, I think that's extremely important.

It just struck me kind of, I think about 30 years ago, right, we had carburetors.

Yeah.

Then we went to fuel injection, and now we don't even have gas, right? It's electric. And, you know, if I were the carburetor guy in 1997 when I finished my training, and that's all I'm going to do, it's going to be pretty lonely, and, and, and, uh, I'd be pretty hungry.

Exactly, exactly. Yeah. And, you know, it's a shame that most people don't have that mindset, you know. And again, I have 4 physicians in my family. I love him to death, but I don't talk about what we do, like, like, because we're gonna sit there and because I didn't go to medical school, right? But, you know, I just understand and I love to read white papers, research papers. And so, uh, when it comes to, you know, the optimization of the body, that's just obviously when you focus on something, you know, with so much time, effort, and energy, right, you're going to become an expert at some point, right? You know, the whole, you know, 10,000 hours. So, uh, like I said, it's just difficult to have that conversation with them sometimes because again, they're just so set in that mindset. So, well, it—

so back to '97, I finished my training at Harvard. And if I think about what I knew then, what tools I used, in fact, we had stress tests and we had the heart cath, an angiogram, invasive angiogram, right? Neither of which 30 years later I use. They're 20th century technology. They had a role. We didn't have tools like we do, like cardiac CT and all the stuff that we do use on a daily basis that is critical for me to get an insight in what's going on, provide not just information but knowledge to my patients, guide them to make sure that, as I like to say, that we keep their lives medically boring, right? Early detection, keep it medically boring. No balloon stents, bypass surgery, heart attack, strokes, all that stuff that unfortunately still kills the majority of people in the US, that the tools I use on a daily basis today, I couldn't even imagine or think of 30 years ago. Not even a gleam in my eye. That's how much the practice of cardiology, specifically preventative cardiology, has evolved since then.

Yeah. And I love your philosophy because I think for most of the traditional allopathic disciplines, all they're doing is they're diagnosing a cluster of symptoms and then automatically they're thinking, What prescriptions we need to prescribe, right? So all you're doing is masking the symptomology instead of actually looking at root cause. Whereas you all, right, are looking at, hey, the higher blood pressure will cause the increase of the density of the muscle fiber in the heart. Without cholesterol, then you wouldn't be able to form the plaque and atherosclerosis. So I love that you guys are really focused on the root cause because then it's actually a chronic solution, right?

Exactly.

In that sense, right? Because then you're really focusing on the things that are really gonna move the needle versus, okay, well, whatever else, you know, like utilizing like a heart cath or whatever it is, right? It just doesn't work as well. Or the, and I had just done a stress test, you know, last month, you know, and I'm like, okay, great.

It's okay. It's all right. We do 10 million nuclear stress tests a year in the US. We do 2.5 million diagnostic invasive heart caths a year in the US. And I gave those up 20 years ago.

Yeah.

So yeah, well, it's okay. But I think the tipping point is coming soon. There's a lot of people that were trained back when I trained, and that's what they learned. And then basically go, well, I don't know, this is what I learned. Why evolve? Just kind of keep— I learned how to put that nut on the bolt and keep doing that for 30 years, and then I retire. My opinion, if that's all that my career was, I would have gotten out of this years and years ago. I mean, how, how just soul-depressing to think that I'm not gonna learn and integrate and, and translate that into how do I take care, better care of patients?

Right, right.

And I think, you know, I, I would probably suggest that between the two of us, you know, it's always the focus on the patient. What can we do for the patient? How can we take this tech, identify the tech, and then apply it to that patient so we get better outcomes? And that is always the goal. Never. I want to be the world's best stress tester. Okay, well, yeah, good for you. But that's always a dead end.

But again, it's not delivering the actual value that people are looking for, which is, you know, I think what they're missing as well.

Yeah. And I think, as you said it too, it's really the focus on the root causes, right? I'd rather identify the root cause, take care of the root cause, rather than letting it expand into 60 different diseases and you get such 60 different tools drugs, whatever, right? Let's think about what are the root causes, in which case we take care of 60 problems with one particular root cause solution. I think we're really, really evolving towards that rapidly.

Yeah. And, you know, I think also with regards to, you know, the traditional allopathic disciplines, they believe that aging is normal, right? And, you know, our philosophy is what you experience during aging is your body's not creating the same hormones, compounds as it used to. And, you know, if you want to talk about the The food supply here in the US, right? It's not great.

Yeah.

And it really is like the food industry is a funnel for the healthcare industry. So you have people eating all the processed foods, which literally drives them into prediabetes, diabetes, that diabetic corridor, and literally just leads them into the healthcare industry, right? And then instead of actually preventing that from happening, people are like, oh, I'd rather just give insulin.

Right.

And sure, right, just keep them on insulin for the, you know, for the rest of their lives, which won't be that long. Right, exactly.

Yeah, yeah.

So I mean, for us it's like, okay, well, why do that? Instead of like a medication, why don't we just give your body what it had before at the levels that you have when, let's say, you were in your early 20s? Uh, then you're going to feel a lot like you did back at that age, right? It's not rocket science, but again, modern medicine doesn't think of it in those terms.

And yeah, I just saw aging as just That's just what happens. And I would disagree.

Right, exactly. And we work with a lot of female patients and when they go to their OB-GYN or their PCP, their primary care physician or whoever it may be, and they're experiencing peri or post-menopause, they're like, well, that's how you're supposed to feel. Whereas, hey, if we just replace the levels that you had of your estradiol, your estriol, your progesterone, pregnenolone, DHEA, and testosterone, they're gonna feel like so much better. And, you know, I— we literally have women that just are completely just from feeling like 52. So for example, I have a, you know, uh, we have one patient, um, she was 52 years old, uh, she'd gained like— she used to be a professional bodybuilder.

Mm-hmm.

And then, you know, she's always been fighting, right, the perimenopause and the postmenopause. And she's like, I tried to muscle my way through it, but—

Literally? Literally, yeah.

And she ended up gaining like, I think like 50 pounds. And, you know, she started working with us since March of this year and she released all of it. And, you know, we got her hormones all dialed in and, you know, she was experiencing restless leg syndrome. You know, we were able to identify that by helping her increase dopamine levels. You know, we gave her, you know, the progesterone, you know, estradiol, all that, and now she's like, I feel like I'm 30 again. And I think that's where a lot of people kind of don't realize there are better solutions out there. You know, it's not just what the normal, you know, like traditional allopathic disciplines, you know, just say, hey, this is the only thing that's available. And one of the things that we really strive to do is We really try to help educate and empower people to be able to take control of their health and wellness, but also to be able to probably advocate for themselves as well if, you know, they experience some healthcare challenges.

Sure, sure.

And, you know, for me, it's something very personal because that's what happened to me last year. I experienced diverticulitis, and what I believe occurred was a couple weeks before I had that episode, I had 4 of my wisdom teeth taken out. 2 of them were impacted on the bottom. It was a Friday morning, felt great until Wednesday, and then all of a sudden my mouth just started radiating, like, in pain in the bottom. So I think I developed dry sockets, and the surgeon had given me tramadol, and I was taking it and didn't do anything, right? So, you know, my pain level was extremely high, and so he suggested I take 12 Advil and Tylenol every single day.

Right.

And then I'm thinking, okay, yeah, that makes sense.

Again, you don't know what you don't know.

Exactly. Well, you're like, oh, they're over-the-counter.

Like our patients, right?

Right.

They don't know what they don't know.

And then—

And yeah, it's an over-the-counter.

Over-the-counter. Yeah.

It's, you know, it should be great.

They're jelly beans.

Yeah.

And literally I did that for 5 days and then 2 days later I developed diverticulitis. And then if you look at the research, NSAID use, right? Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. increased diverticulitis risk. And obviously, you know, when they do anything with your mouth, you know, they were, uh, they provided me prophylactic, right? So antibiotics. So I'm sure that killed the flora as well. So yeah, one thing after another.

Yeah.

And then, yeah, I was actually in, in the Keys, uh, you know, my ex-fiancée, her parents were meeting my parents for the first time.

And boy, you had an exciting month or so. Geez. It was terrible. Wow.

Uh, I mean, it was a beautiful place. you know, the Playa Lago Resort in Murata. The 4 of us, so my ex, my parents had gone down there Wednesday. We, you know, were there for happy hour, you know, had dinner, everything was great. And then the next morning I woke up, felt great, had a cup of coffee just like now, right, on an empty stomach. And then all of a sudden my stomach just started feeling a little off and I was like, okay, well, that's a little weird. And I have these Japanese Like stomach pills, and they literally like knock out anything. Like you take three of them, and like if you have any upset stomach, like it just disappears. So I took nine of them, didn't work, and then I just reherded. Yeah, Pepto, like all you know, Pepcid, and I was like, man, and just my stomach just wouldn't settle down. And you know that entire day I maybe ate like half a piece of toast. Okay, and to the point where you know I just told everyone to go to dinner. I'm like, hey, listen, I'm. I'm just gonna lay in bed. I don't feel great. So, you know, you guys can just go to dinner. And then, you know, my parents and my fiancée were telling me, hey, you should probably go to the hospital. But I'm like, listen, like, where are the keys?

Well, you're in the Keys.

Yeah, exactly.

The hospital's like 10 beds. Well, right. I mean, so— It's a micro hospital, I'm sure.

So I told this joke the other day and somebody thought I was being racist. So I thought it was really funny. So I said, well, listen, if I go there, right, the surgeon Probably he's just getting off the boat, right, from fishing, right? So he's probably got fish guts on him, probably got his sea legs or whatever. And the lady thought, oh, that was racist, he was fresh off the boat. I'm like, no, no, no, no, like the fishing boat. I'm like, I'm Asian, really? I'm like, right, we could— I'm like, I can technically say that. I thought it was funny. But then I was like, you know what, it just doesn't make sense because if we're there, then, you know, we're kind of stuck there for a while.

Yeah.

Right. And, uh, we were leaving the next morning anyway, so I was like, you know what, why don't we just wait for I'm still not feeling well tomorrow, like, we'll definitely go to the hospital, but let's get closer to home at least.

Right.

And, you know, we were about 2 and a half, 3 hours from home.

Yeah.

And that morning I had thought it was maybe a peptic ulcer. And so, you know, my fiancée at the time was like, hey, listen, why don't you have a bite of an apple? That, you know, could help with kind of lowering the symptoms. And so literally took a bite, swallowed, and then Right after, I mean, the most excruciating pain. Like, it felt like I had an open wound in my stomach and somebody's pouring salt, like, on it. I was like, oh my goodness. I'm like, yes. I'm like, get me to the hospital now. I couldn't even walk from, from my room to the car. They had to get a wheelchair. I mean, that's how much pain I was in. And then obviously the entire drive up, right? I felt every bump, every crevice, every time I stepped on the gas. It's a long way. And I was like, oh my goodness. Like, I'm in so much pain. I'm like, And we had gotten to Hollywood, you know, Florida.

Yeah.

And, you know, her parents actually lived like a couple minutes from a more regional hospital. And she's like, you know what? She's like, I'm just going to take you there. I was like, okay.

I'm like, fine.

Yes. I'm like, I'm in so much pain. Yes. Just, just get me to any hospital. So we pull up there around 4:00 in the afternoon and obviously, you know, get there and, you know, I'm in excruciating pain. They admit me, they give me morphine to try to, you know, lower the pain. I'm like, didn't do anything, like nothing. So they had to give me Toradol and Dilaudid on top of that.

Wow.

Then I felt like a normal person. And, you know, they brought me in for a CT scan. They found, you know, the air bubbles and like, oh, you have multiple perforations in your colon. We need to go in and, you know, obviously either patch it back up or we need to remove that part of the colon. So I was like, okay, well, Great. Like, not ideal, right? But they're like, yeah, you have to do it or else you're gonna die of sepsis. I'm like, okay, well, fine.

Give me a choice.

Yeah, you're not really giving me, you know, much of a choice here. And going through that experience, like, I started to realize that, you know, again, with all of my resources, right, 4 physicians in my family, you know, or, you know, my own medical team, I have a ton of associates in the healthcare space that I can, you know, lean on, you know, for advice. You know, my ex-fiancée also worked for Optum, you know, which is part of UnitedHealthcare, which is the largest health insurance company in the world. So again, I'm not your normal patient, but I still couldn't properly advocate for myself in the hospital because obviously, you know, when you're in there and I was in massive pain, right? So I'm on painkillers.

Right.

So again, I'm not thinking, you know, necessarily the most clearly per se. And then during the recovery part of it, they would wake me up every 2 hours in the middle of the night to take my vitals. Like, listen, if I'm coding out, wake me up, right? Otherwise, if you just let me sleep the 8 hours or 10 hours, I'm actually going to recover faster and get out of here sooner. Right. But they don't care. Right, right. And then—

It's the SOP, right? Which can be death by SOP.

Yeah, that's true too. And then at 5:30, 6 o'clock every single morning, you know, I'd be sleeping, you know, and I would, I would wear my Oura Ring too. So I only had like 2 or 3 hours of sleep every single night. And obviously you're not going to recover well that way. And, you know, they would just barge in the room, they turn on fluorescent lights, and then, you know, I got drool like on my face, you know, I got like, I'm like, what's going on? Right? I'm like, I don't know.

I've seen the videos.

And then all of a sudden, you know, like, I kind of just, you know, open my eyes and there's 10 people staring at the foot of my bed, you know, at me. And they're like, hey, we're going to do all this fun stuff to you for the next 24 hours. You have any questions? It's like, huh? Like, how can I have an intelligent conversation with you when you just woke me out of a dead sleep. And all they're trying to do is to get through the rounds as quickly as possible.

Right. So if you don't have any questions or if you're not fully prepared, that's, that's the strategy.

Right, right. They just want to railroad you through the system and just collect as much insurance money from you as they can, obviously. And at that time—

And the less you say and ask.

Yeah.

The simpler it is.

Yep.

Okay.

Nothing. Okay, good. And then they're literally running to the next room. Right. And unless you sat down and wrote every single question and concern for the last 24 hours, you're not going to see them again for another 24 hours.

Right.

You know, in that time. And then obviously when they come, you know, it's so early that it's before visiting hours. So unless, let's say, you know, a loved one or somebody stayed the night before, right, in that very uncomfortable chair, right, then you're by yourself and there's no one else that will advocate for them. So, you know, that's where I really just saw the massive hole that was there. And, you know, there's that huge disconnect between patient and provider, right? And what I learned was, you know, no one's gonna advocate for your health more than you will. Because again, you're the one experiencing it.

You're the one with the skin in the game.

Exactly. So the challenge is, if you don't know anything about what's happening in your body, Right? How can you make educated decisions on your health, your wellness, your diet, your lifestyle?

Yeah.

And obviously if you're experiencing a healthcare issue like I did, like what questions do you ask? Right? And that's why I built a platform called LEAP, which is the Lab Education and Advocacy Platform. And, you know, when we're all finalized with this, so we, you know, it's available for our patients currently, but, you know, there will be a public-facing platform where Anybody in the world eventually will be able to upload lab results and it'll actually populate educational videos, components, frequently asked questions, and really just uplevel the education for that patient. Because the challenge with such an entrenched and established industry like healthcare, right? You can't attack, you can't attack, right? They'll suicide you, right? You can't change the system from within the system either.

Ben Lee did not convince me.

Yeah, exactly. Yes, no, that would never happen. So yeah, you heard it here.

That's right.

In case anything, you know, shady were happening.

We have it on video.

And the whole purpose of that was to be able to give each individual, like, patient or, you know, person in the system, if you attack it from a grassroots level of, okay, upleveling the education of each person, right, then you uplevel the entire system by giving power back to each individual person. So, you know, that's why—

I love that, that grassroots approach. Yeah, right. And I think education is absolutely critical. I mean, I absolutely— I love doing it. And I think that is the ultimate empowerment is, you know, people are so confused. They don't know. And I love to, as you do too, and I think that's really the core of a lot of what we do, is really educating people so that they know the knowns. They— we take them from the unknown unknowns to the, at least the known unknowns, and they can then— they can begin to interact and ask questions and begin to really understand what's happening in them and around them. I think that's absolutely critical.

Yes.

And this system is kind of Ignored. And frankly, it takes too long. Right.

Right.

Because geez, I walked in there, I got 5 minutes to round at 6:30 AM. We turn on the lights and darn it all, he starts asking questions. Shouldn't you be asleep?

Yeah, exactly. Well, no. Well, you're the one who should be asleep. Oh yeah. I was like, hey, can I have Wardell? They're like, no, we gotta, we gotta wean you off. I'm like, oh well, darn it. So, uh, and One of the things I wish I would've known beforehand, and that's why, you know, another reason we're building another part of Leap, which I'll talk about in a second, is when they went through, you know, the surgery, I was like, hey, listen, whatever you do, don't cut me open. Okay? Because, you know, I'd rather not have that scar. And, you know, I was like begging the surgeon, you know, when I was in pre-op, I was like, listen, whatever you do, just, you know, laparoscopic, do not cut me open. He's like, okay, yeah, I'll do my best. So I go under, I wake up and I look down, I'm like, ow. And so I got the huge scar from here to here with, you know, the staples. I mean, it was, it was, it was not pleasant.

Yeah.

And one of the things that I developed afterwards was, so I get outta bed on the left side, I started to get a spasm on my left erector spinae muscle every time I got outta bed. And, you know, what I believe happened was when, and again, it's an emergency situation and the challenge is like, he doesn't, the surgeon that did it will never know. The story unless he happens to see this podcast or whatever it is.

You come in, he cuts, he fixes you, you look great.

Yeah.

He moves on.

Yeah. Right?

Yeah.

And the aftercare was—

There's no, there's no follow-through.

No. And then honestly, when they, uh, I left the first time after 5 days, uh, the aftercare instructions were, uh, no, you're good. Uh, but come back if you're bleeding or if you have a fever. That's it. That was the only aftercare instructions that they gave me. And so I went back to, um, my, you know, fiancée's parents' house to take a nap. And literally 4 hours later when I woke up, I woke up, I'm like, I'm not feeling so hot. And then I took my temperature and I had a fever. So I had to go back into the ER again. And then when I got there, they're like, okay, well, you know, another CT scan. They found an abscess of white blood cells in my pelvis. So obviously when they were doing the surgery, they had to pull everything out, hopefully sanitize as much as they can. Well, it's hard to get everything.

Yeah.

So I had that abscess in my pelvis, and they tried IV antibiotics for about a week, didn't improve. So my white blood cell count was still high. And then they actually utilized interventional radiology to insert a drain from my upper glute, you know, luckily through, and, you know, it was able to drain. But, you know, that took another like week. Yeah. Wow. And, um, when the surgeon, you know, did the surgery, and again, this is— I'm not 100% sure this is, you know, this is the case, but this is what I believe happened, uh, he probably attached multiple layers of my abdominal tissue together, right? And again, emergency situation, I get it. But now it's just like my quality of life is going to be different than what it was, because now each individual layer doesn't move individually anymore, right? And that's one of the questions I wish I would have asked, like, hey, how many sets of sutures are you going to utilize to reattach each, you know, layer of abdominal tissue?

Right.

Because you should have said, hey, I'm using a different set for each layer, uh, and knowing that would have been so powerful, right? And so one of the things that we're building into Leap as well is a community where people that have gone through healthcare issues or experiences with their family or whoever it may be, they have a plethora of knowledge about that specific disease state and what to look out for. And hey, all these things that they learned because they spent the time because they needed to.

Once burned, twice shy.

Exactly. So imagine having a central repository of all that data expertise and experience where you can go. It's kind of like Quora where if you look up diverticulitis, hey, These are, you know, these are the things I wish I would've asked, right? Or wish I would've known beforehand, you know, before going through it. And here's some things that, you know, we recommend, right? So the ability to kind of crowdsource that information expertise, I think would be extremely, extremely powerful.

That's quite a story. And it's amazing. You were in healthcare, then you had this really terrible event happen to you. I mean, frankly life-threatening, had complications. And I will say, I think events like that, anything that does not kill you makes you stronger.

Yeah, absolutely.

I think it really turns you into that much better of a healthcare provider, right? You know, because you've seen it, you've been on the other side, and I think it really gives you deep, deep insights and empathy and compassion. passion for people going through that journey too. And the beautiful thing is you take that experience and then you convert that into something that, you know, thousands and thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of people can benefit from.

Exactly. So yeah, so kudos to you. You know, interestingly enough, because of that too, that's where I also caught, you know, the calcification of the coronary arteries, which brought me to you. So, you know, interestingly enough, you said the path that, you know, kind of You know, life kind of takes you on. If it wasn't for, you know, that episode, I probably could have had a heart attack, like, you know, another year or two, who knows? Like, because, you know, once you kind of, you know, get it to a certain point, right, it really hockey sticks and, you know, it starts to develop even faster. So, yeah, that's another reason why.

So, is that where they found the calcification?

Yes.

So, tell me about that.

So, during the CT scan to remove the drain to make sure, you know, the abscess was gone, They mentioned in the findings, hey, you had higher calcification of your coronary arteries for your age. So then obviously after I recovered, made an appointment with a cardiologist, and then, you know, that's where they did the whole, you know, CTA.

Right, right.

Did the calcium score, and I was at 434, you know, as of last year. So I was like, oh wow, okay, like I really need to focus on this. And then that's where like I really dove into it because Obviously, I wanted to figure it out for myself, but then I started looking at the research and how so many people are afflicted by it. It's literally the number one killer in the world. One person every 34 seconds dies of cardiovascular disease, which is insane.

Right.

And when I was diving into it, I started to realize that most people don't even know what really causes it. They say, oh, it's high LDL cholesterol.

Well, it's you get old, you die from a heart attack.

Okay.

That's just what happens.

Right.

Which again, I would argue no.

Yeah, exactly. And the thing is most people don't even know what the pathway in which it's created. Obviously, you need to have LDL cholesterol, but typically higher inflammation, typically if you're stressed out or poor detoxification processes based on genetics. If you have, let's say, 9p21, really poor expression of that, so you're more prone to inflammation in the cardiovascular system. So if you have those things, Then obviously, you know, you're more at risk. But the challenge is, like, if you don't know, like, what I just said, right, or what, you know, what you obviously inform and educate your, you know, patients about, then you can't do anything about it, right? And that's where I was like, wow, like, that's why it's such a major issue, because if you don't understand how it's created, then you can't do anything to prevent it.

Right.

So, you know, it's been, you know, something that's, like I said, literally near and dear to my heart, literally and figuratively, that I'm like, hey, I want to get that information out there. And that's why we're here together today.

Well, it's interesting, your journey, your heart journey that started out with the stomach journey that moved to the heart. You're really fortunate because the radiologist that read those images happened to comment saying, hey, I see some calcification. Let's say you're 40?

45.

45. typical average 45-year-old guy, we'd expect none. So, if we see any calcification, that should be a major red light to say, hey, wait a minute, something's going on here. And so, you're very fortunate though that the radiologist saw that and mentioned the report.

True.

There's been really fascinating data from the oncology literature. So, these are people getting cancer, breast cancer, lymphomas, whatever cancers. And when we do that, they get scanned. We're basically doing whole body scans to identify where the cancer is, how much, where it's spread to, all that stuff. And many of these scans, of course, involve either PET scanning or CT scans, which allow us to see these calcifications. So here's the fascinating thing. Now, we've known calcification in the heart is not normal. That indicates something's going on. There is disease there. We had an earlier discussion about how all that works. I won't bore anybody today.

With that.

But, even in the oncology literature, in the oncologic radiology domain, what would happen is most of the time they would not comment. If there were calcifications in the heart, they wouldn't even comment on it.

Interesting.

They'd be focused on cancer. I see lumps, bumps, whatever. But, if they saw calcification in the heart, And on the images, it was never mentioned. That's crazy, right? Now, fortunately, we radiologists are going, wait a minute, if I see calcification, that's an important finding. It's not something we ignore, don't report on. And it's not cancer, but it's cancer of the coronaries, if you will. And so that's evolving, but not until really fairly recently. Most of the time, if there was calcification in the coronary arteries, it was never even mentioned on the report at all. Right?

So, yes, I— so you're fortunate. Yes.

Because that was not always the case. Because, well, I won't bore anybody with why that was the case, but basically they would not call out a very, very important finding typically when they're doing, looking at oncology scans. Right.

Which is, doesn't make any sense.

Right? Right.

And I think the challenge also with the traditional allopathic disciplines is you have your primary care provider, physician, and they know a little bit about a lot.

Right.

And once you get past their level of knowledge, you have to go to a specialist.

Right.

And the challenge is every specialist has their own domain, right? They're very territorial and they don't play well together either.

Right.

So sometimes let's say—

We're all an army of one.

Yep, exactly. So your cardiologist doesn't talk to your nephrologist, doesn't talk to No, just care coordination. Yeah, which is crazy. So that's another piece where like you actually have to coordinate your own care.

Yeah.

Right. And really, like I said, be your own advocate.

And link all these different parts of the system. And it's overwhelming.

It's almost overwhelming.

You really need help.

Right. And, you know, for our future versions of Leap, what we want to do is make it a central repository of data, right? So we have blood work, genetics, you know, any imaging, And, you know, we're gonna develop an AI on top of it, right? That looks at, you know, the, let's say, predictive nature of all that data, right? We wanna look at trends. We can even call out, let's say, the potential symptomologies that they're experiencing currently, but also if they don't change, right? Hey, here's the disease states and stuff that you're literally like bringing on, you know, onto yourself if you don't change.

Right.

You know, which I think is extremely, extremely important.

Absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah.

Well, it's so wonderful in retrospect, now that you've been through all this, to kind of learn how you went through a really horrible experience, healthcare experience, but really translated that into tools that are going to help again multitudes of people.

Yeah.

And that's exciting.

Yeah. So, yeah, so luckily I had to go through it, so hopefully other people don't have to. Right.

Yeah. Right. I will say, and you opened up a little window for me, the NSAIDs, right? So NSAIDs, if you don't know what that is, it's nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. So these would be your over-the-counter drugs, would be your Aleves, Motrins, Advils, ibuprofens, naproxen, those kind of drugs over the counter. And then we have a whole bunch of prescription versions of those as well. Meloxicam is very commonly used, but a whole bunch of them. These drugs are commonly used, like in your case, right? Over the counter, they're seen as safe, they work, they're effective, they're over the counter, so they must be pretty darn safe. I will tell you, in the cardiac and kidney realm, they're pretty worrisome drugs, right? Because those drugs increase blood pressure, they increase the risk of strokes, increase the risk of heart attacks, can put you into heart failure, can damage your kidneys. Can also cause bleeding and other things. In fact, there's also really fascinating data that shows NSAIDs, that class of drugs over the counter, beyond all those issues, literally block your muscle stem cells.

Interesting.

Yeah. This data is quite clear. It was published a while back, in fact, almost 10 years ago, where the muscle stem cells—

Of course, no one's—

Right, exactly. I mean, no one knows, right? But literally, there are pathways that are blocked via a prostaglandin called PGE2 that is critical for the muscle stem cells to grow and turn over.

Mm-hmm.

Well, if you take an NSAID, you block PGE2 and your muscle stem cells, the normal metabolism and growth and development of those Mm-hmm. So if you're working out, right, you have to have those muscle stem cells to— the cells get stressed and they get stretched and all that. And that's how you build muscle because then those muscle stem cells go, okay, we got to make more muscle cells, and they turn on. Well, if you take NSAIDs, you block that whole process because it's mediated via PGE2, which is blocked by NSAIDs. I mean, drugs are drugs. They have appropriate uses, et cetera. But it's fascinating that a certain class of drugs, and I harp on these drugs all the time with my patients, because a lot of people, they may be taking them, but they don't put them on their drug list because they go, it's over the counter. It's meaningless. Can't hurt you.

Right.

But these drugs have really powerful and potentially really bad effects on the heart, on the kidneys, bleeding. And as I said, even, you know, allowing you with exercise and to build up muscle. So, and all of, you know, so again, back to education.

Yep.

And it is funny, you opened up another line for me. One of my favorite jokes, right, is, and it's that classical dilemma between the generalists and the specialists. So the joke is that I like to say I'm a mile deep and an inch wide. Right. And the generalists are an inch deep and a mile wide. So in reality, when you think about what a generalist does and they have, they have to know everything, right? I can get away with knowing a lot about a little tiny bit. So the joke is generalists know nothing about everything. The specialists know everything about nothing.

That's funny.

That's my favorite.

Yeah.

Joke about that as well.

That's totally true.

So I do have a question though, because with your journey and finding out, I won't say coincidentally because I don't believe in coincidence, but that, oh wait, there's something going on. You got this, we got that taken care of, but you have these calcifications which led you down the heart pathway. So tell me about, I'm fascinated by genetics. So I spent 2 years in the Department of Genetics at Harvard Medical School and Absolutely fascinated by it as one of my postdocs. But, in your family, heart issues, mom, dad?

So, my father has just recently gone through angioplasty.

Oh, God.

Yeah. So, he's in China and they did, I think, a few of— I think the left aorta, I believe, or artery. And then, they were able to clear it out, but I think one of them was so hardened that they weren't able to even get the—

Right. And you know what that is?

Yeah.

That's that big chunks of calcium.

Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, they were able to clear some of it out, but, you know, not all of it. And he's always had higher blood pressure too.

Got it.

Yeah. And I've always had higher, uh, LDL cholesterol, you know, for most of my life. Like, even like, I remember getting blood tests when I was in college, like when I'm 20, and I was still like 120, 130. And then Before my issue, I was, you know, 157/200 in LDL. And I was like, okay, well, yeah, probably I can see why.

Well, the nice thing is, you know, uh, I always love to say I love it when I can fix the blame. Who cares about the problem? Let's forget the problem. I want to fix the blame. So nice to know it's your dad's fault.

Yep.

So, which is good, right? Blame it on dad.

Yep. So yeah, and my 9p21 is— I think I have like 3 Gs, 3, you know, 3 of the G alleles, right? It's like I'm moderate with regards propensity for cardiovascular inflammation. So, and my detox is, it's okay, you know, some of the GSTM1, GSTT1, and GSTP1, I've moderate, you know, so decent detoxification but not like amazing. So yeah, now focus on just trying to not get too stressed, you know, keep that inflammation down. And yeah, obviously, you know, with The rosuvastatin 40 that I'm currently on and the Zetia 10 milligrams to help push that LDL cholesterol down too.

Right, right. Well, I think we will be doing— it's up to you if you give us permission, but I think we did your scan today as we alluded to, and then we'll have the AI. The AI is pending. The AI will blow your mind. So that takes a little bit of time. Next time we get together, we will Zoom it and I will show you all that, and maybe we can throw that into this Yeah, yeah. Into our little discussion here so we can joke before and after. We'll show everybody your AI if you're willing to share that as well.

Yeah.

And, uh, just give people an insight. So here you are yet again being able to take, you know, your, your personal issues and then translate that into huge benefit for everybody out there. So kudos to you, my friend. I'd love to. So, well, listen, this has been a phenomenal time. It's been great to learn more about you and journey and your business journey and your health journey and then kind of bringing all those together. And I'm really, really sincerely happy that our paths crossed.

Yes, I am.

I think it's going to be— we have a lot of opportunities there, a lot of challenges. Being the eternal optimist, I only see opportunities, never downsides. But I think that we touched on a lot of factors that I think will be playing a massive role in education, Uh, in awareness, in, uh, engaging patients before they get sick.

Right.

Right. So that we can all live to be 120 and not just live, right? Health lifespan, but really—