Transcript
Speaker: Oh, gosh.
Speaker: These are the flies that they like.
Speaker: They're called bot flies?
Speaker: Yeah, bot flies.
Speaker: They like lay their eggs in your skin.
Speaker: Ew.
Speaker: And then, oh my gosh, YouTube it.
Speaker: It's like people.
Speaker: No, I don't want to YouTube that.
Speaker: This is on call.
Speaker: This would be really cool to just wear scrubs all the time and you don't have to think about what you're going to wear to work.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: We're here to answer your questions.
Speaker: We can sit down and discuss all the time.
Speaker: wait i gotta go i'm on call wait you're on call i thought i was on call hey everybody welcome back to another episode of on call with april and alicia i'm alicia i'm april and it's still fall it is and the fall weather is actually back i woke up this morning and um oh you sound easily 48 degrees outside do i
Speaker: just in just the way you said it for just a moment oh now you've been traveling I don't feel sick I have been traveling so god knows or I said the hospital the airplane ick well I was in a hospital traveling for work yes so it could be any of the and I was also at Disney so it could be any of the oh good lord you know it could be you know the um
Speaker: The, the rails and the, you know, lines that you touch everything that you've touched the whole time, which funny story about that.
Speaker: I was in line with, um, my younger daughter for a ride and there was this couple behind us.
Speaker: And I don't know if the wife was like a dermaphobe or what, but anytime the husband touched the railing, she would like freak out.
Speaker: She was like, stop touching that.
Speaker: And I was like, this lady really doesn't like these railings, like the germs on them.
Speaker: It was funny.
Speaker: Yeah, it makes me think of our dear friend Jill Barna.
Speaker: Yes, we we always at any time I have some kind of like disease confrontation or potential potential outbreak situation.
Speaker: She's always the first one.
Speaker: I'm like, you'll understand what I mean by this.
Speaker: This was gross, right?
Speaker: Yeah, which admittedly, like during COVID, when we would go to theme parks, I wouldn't let my kids touch the railing.
Speaker: I would be like, stop it.
Speaker: And I would say to them every time.
Speaker: Oh, my gosh.
Speaker: Like our phones are so gross.
Speaker: Or just our phones in general.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I always laugh when people are like, it's so good.
Speaker: It's like, I'm not going to take my cup into the bathroom with me because that's gross.
Speaker: I'm like, but you took your phone in and then you sat there on the toilet with your phone.
Speaker: And you probably had an owl sitting in the skull somewhere.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: Let's not pretend that nobody takes their phone in with them.
Speaker: And then you flush the toilet and then you go wash your hands.
Speaker: Did you wash your phone?
Speaker: I mean, you know, I don't know.
Speaker: I think we pick and choose, but I don't know.
Speaker: I like to make a mess.
Speaker: Well, speaking of making a mountain out of molehill,
Speaker: when we last talked for APP week, I was in Cabo and it was a fantastic, fantastic single getaway.
Speaker: It was so, it was great.
Speaker: Again, I just strongly recommend you guys find your, find your solo energy and go do it.
Speaker: It was so much fun, but I had this obsession around flies down there because I don't know if it was just a time of the year and I'm sure it was, but if you even remotely have,
Speaker: any like type of food item or drink item, it's suddenly this, like there were flies everywhere and it's open.
Speaker: Like the restaurants are open at the resort, you know, it's like kind of more of an open area.
Speaker: So you can't keep them out of everything, but I like to sit outside and I like to sit at the water and I like, you know, you kind of pay for the view.
Speaker: So there were these flies that I swear, I was like, these are bot flies.
Speaker: And I had this whole, this whole obsession around these flies down there that have you ever seen bot flies?
Speaker: I don't think so.
Speaker: Oh, gosh.
Speaker: These are the flies that they like.
Speaker: They're called bot flies?
Speaker: Yeah, bot flies.
Speaker: They like lay their eggs in your skin.
Speaker: And then, oh my gosh, YouTube it.
Speaker: It's like people.
Speaker: No, I don't want YouTube that.
Speaker: It's like YouTube porn, like for people that they, like poppers of like, I don't like.
Speaker: popping stuff, or at least watching the videos.
Speaker: I don't like that.
Speaker: But yeah, they're, they literally like a more, like the rainforest, like Costa Rica, those areas, the Amazon, these flies are big, but they like lay on you, then they like lay their eggs in you.
Speaker: And then you get this like lump.
Speaker: You don't know what it is.
Speaker: And then you, they cut it out and it's a bunch of freaking botfly babies under your skin.
Speaker: It happens.
Speaker: I wish you could see my face right now.
Speaker: Cause it's like a face of like total disgust.
Speaker: Like I can't wait till we get on our video platform.
Speaker: That's coming guys.
Speaker: It's coming.
Speaker: I promise.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: It's disgusting, but that's what I kept thinking about.
Speaker: But those flies are where you were?
Speaker: No, but they were huge.
Speaker: They were just the biggest flies I'd seen.
Speaker: And I was like, what if they are bot flies?
Speaker: So I kind of ruined my own experience to some degree, because I was like, I just won't eat at the pool.
Speaker: You know, like I'm not going to order food.
Speaker: So then I don't have bot flies laying their babies in me.
Speaker: In your food?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Also, I probably have to declare that in customs or immigration when I come back.
Speaker: I'm bringing home some flies.
Speaker: I'm bringing home bot flies.
Speaker: I have like sometimes worried if like, you know, a big fly gets in my house.
Speaker: And I'm like, oh my God, are they going to lay eggs somewhere in my house?
Speaker: I'm going to have all these little baby flies like running around.
Speaker: So I try to kill them as soon as I can.
Speaker: Baxter eats them usually for me.
Speaker: Baby flies?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: He will like chase them.
Speaker: Like I'll just hear this like random like snaps at them.
Speaker: Yeah, and I will hear like a random like him just randomly running into the window.
Speaker: Like, what is going on?
Speaker: And he's trying to get a fly that's like in between the blinds.
Speaker: And I'm like, oh my goodness.
Speaker: But he usually gets them for me.
Speaker: So we got a fly zapper.
Speaker: Like one of the fly swatters that's a zapper?
Speaker: It's a swatter, but it's like... And I know it sounds...
Speaker: but their flies come on people.
Speaker: Oh, no, I will not judge.
Speaker: Flies are so nasty to me.
Speaker: When they land on food and people are like, just swat it and keep eating, I'm like, they just puked on your food.
Speaker: And now they're going to... Isn't that what they do?
Speaker: I think they vomit on... I don't know.
Speaker: Let's not talk about it anyway.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Well, bot flies is a medical mystery, right?
Speaker: But listen, I think it's time we did...
Speaker: We did two back-to-back.
Speaker: Fact or fiction, fake or for reals.
Speaker: But what I really enjoyed that we did last month was our headlines, healthcare headlines.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I know we talked about this already, but let's take this episode for healthcare headlines that does not have to do with Bob lines.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Sounds good to me.
Speaker: We'll take it away for October.
Speaker: I will say, though.
Speaker: It's October.
Speaker: What the heck?
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: I can't believe it.
Speaker: Like, the year is flying by.
Speaker: I can't.
Speaker: It was just my birthday.
Speaker: You know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like, I just feel like it was just the beginning of the year where, okay.
Speaker: Anyway, we're lamenting now.
Speaker: Now, where is my vitamin D light?
Speaker: I need my vitamin D light.
Speaker: Okay, let's go.
Speaker: I don't have it yet, but wait till we get on video.
Speaker: I'm going to have a big one.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So what I liked that we did the last time, April, was healthcare headlines.
Speaker: And I kind of missed it.
Speaker: So what do you think?
Speaker: I know that we already talked that we're going to do this so you don't get to say no.
Speaker: But let's take this episode with some healthcare headlines.
Speaker: Digging up some stuff from the basement.
Speaker: Sounds good.
Speaker: I mean, I do have to say, um, when I was looking for articles about this, there was one that came up about, um, dust mites.
Speaker: Bob flies?
Speaker: Oh, no, dust mites.
Speaker: But there was like all these little bug pictures and it made me think of, do you remember like an anatomy class or what?
Speaker: I don't remember what class it was.
Speaker: They showed that video of all the bugs around you all the time.
Speaker: And I was like, oh my God, I can't read this.
Speaker: Dust mites were a big one.
Speaker: I remember in school, um,
Speaker: this must have, this might've been nursing about like asthma.
Speaker: You know, that was always like a big thing about babies or young children with stuffed animals and like to keep those things out of cribs and out of beds.
Speaker: And I was always like, why?
Speaker: And it's always like, cause of dust, but it's really like the dust mites, right?
Speaker: And they're like, oh, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Anyways, okay, no more bunting.
Speaker: That's scabies.
Speaker: There's...
Speaker: there's a lot of little bed bugs i mean we could keep going if you know we're done we're done we're gonna do a whole episode on bugs y'all no because then i won't like sleep for a week bugs are like i can't do it you know do you check your mattress when you go to no no you don't because i actually don't um but there was in
Speaker: They're an equal opportunity employer.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Bed bugs don't care how much money you have or don't have.
Speaker: They will find you.
Speaker: They will find you.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: I know they will.
Speaker: I can't.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Well, we've got to face reality.
Speaker: Maybe our listeners want to know.
Speaker: Hey, let us know, guys, if you want to hear about bed bugs and dust mites and scabies.
Speaker: And if you do, we'll do a special episode, an ID episode.
Speaker: yeah all right go ahead one time i saw this patient and then after i left the room the nurse called me he was like we think this patient has been bugs and i i like legit ran into the bathroom and like was immediately shaking out my clothes not that i think that's gonna help at all i will be majorly vulnerable with you here my brother i won't say his name because i have several um
Speaker: Worked at the hospital that I worked at and his fiance at the time was one of the nurses and he, he was in the air force.
Speaker: So for the summer, he'd come home and or is it the academy?
Speaker: So somewhere he would come home and then he was a transporter and it was the year Matt and I were getting married and probably several weeks before our wedding.
Speaker: And my oldest daughter had stayed at my mom's house and that's where my brother was staying during the summer.
Speaker: And she comes home and she has all these bites on her arm.
Speaker: And my mom is nothing, but she slept with my mom.
Speaker: But short story, my brother must have brought a bed bug home from work or bed bugs because they could like, like these exterminated people are brilliant.
Speaker: They're able to tell like exactly like where was the index place, but it started in the room he was staying in, in the hamper.
Speaker: So they were like, it had to have come off as clothing somewhere, but they like migrate through the floorboard, you know, like the trim and then up to the beds.
Speaker: Cause that's like the body is this life source, but they'd made its way into my mom's room.
Speaker: I had everybody right before my wedding at my house, staying at my house.
Speaker: And my biggest fear was not that I would have been completely overloaded by my entire family, but they brought the bugs.
Speaker: Did they bring them with them?
Speaker: That's all I can remember.
Speaker: That's all I would think about, too.
Speaker: I was like, I will torch this house, which does not land well, given the fact that our house did actually burn up this year.
Speaker: But it wasn't because of bed bugs.
Speaker: But yes, it was awful.
Speaker: And that's why I always say they don't discriminate.
Speaker: And yes, we go, ew, it's gross or whatever.
Speaker: But you can get a movie theater anywhere.
Speaker: You just got to pay attention.
Speaker: You got to look at your corners of your mattresses, Ape.
Speaker: Yeah, I know.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Anyways, they totally derailed us.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So that's all right.
Speaker: People wanted to hear about this.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: We might do a part one and part two again.
Speaker: Who knows?
Speaker: We're probably all itchy right now listening to us.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Good itchy Wednesday evening.
Speaker: If you're listening to this when it first comes out.
Speaker: It could be itchy with us because I'm going to itch all day.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: That's right.
Speaker: It's nighttime and all of you guys are scratching yourselves.
Speaker: All right, let's go.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So my first one is not, it's not actually like a news headline, but something that I got to see recently in person that I thought was really cool.
Speaker: So I wanted to tell you about it.
Speaker: So there is a, um, a new PA school that's getting ready to start near me.
Speaker: And so at my hospital for people who don't know, Oh, physician assistant, uh, school.
Speaker: So, um,
Speaker: we are going to be precepting their students at my local, at my hospital where I work clinically.
Speaker: And so a few of us went over to tour the, the school and like see all the technology and stuff.
Speaker: And so they have this table called an anatomized table.
Speaker: Have you heard of this?
Speaker: No.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it's called an anatomized and this is just one brand of, of this table.
Speaker: I think there's a few of them, but it is the coolest thing.
Speaker: So it, um,
Speaker: It's, you know, so you turn on the table and you see a human body like, you know, laying on the table and you can dissect it.
Speaker: You can practice procedures on it, like practice placement of like a lumbar puncture, for instance.
Speaker: Like they showed us how you can like you can take the patient and move them and then.
Speaker: you know, change the direction of your needle and change the position of your needle to like practice procedures.
Speaker: But you can also like dissect it any way that you want.
Speaker: So you can take the skin off and see just bones.
Speaker: You could see just nerves and how they run the body.
Speaker: You can see the blood vessels.
Speaker: We could, we could isolate the heart and look at the vessels in the heart and watch it beating and watch the blood flow.
Speaker: Like it was the coolest thing.
Speaker: thing but then also you can upload cases like you can you know say you have a case that you think is cool or a learning case you can upload the information on that case and then the table will make those physical findings on the these patients it's so amazing like i think when i was in school i would have spent hours on the same table so um
Speaker: I know last week during our APP week episode, we talked about education and things like that.
Speaker: So I just thought it's, it's interesting to see how much is advancing from when we were in PA school and when we were in school.
Speaker: Oh my gosh.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, we had, um, did you have cadaver lab?
Speaker: We did, which this program will do a cadaver lab as well.
Speaker: Cause you just can't replace that experience, you know, but it's so, it's so, I was going to say creepy is not the right word.
Speaker: It's interesting for anybody listening that's actually in healthcare that has done cadaver lab.
Speaker: It is...
Speaker: I think my very first time in cadaver lab was challenging for me because they put the bag over the head for the most part, but it was just a little weird at first where I was like, oh, like this.
Speaker: I'm like, oh, sorry, sorry.
Speaker: Like, oh, sorry.
Speaker: Like, that was a little rough.
Speaker: Did that hurt?
Speaker: Like, there's no one talking to you.
Speaker: But, you know, like I think we get so used to mannequins that cadavers make it more real.
Speaker: But even this thing sounds like, oh,
Speaker: like incredible it's so cool we were all like amazed I mean there was three of us four of us maybe that you know practice clinically together in our hospital and um it was really cool so that's awesome I like that it's PA we will have to talk about that a little bit later anyway right so great way to lead that one off I like that all right so my my headline my health care headline Huntington's disease is something we don't talk about a lot right but
Speaker: Just imagine if you're sitting around a family that's been told for generations that Huntington's disease is just inevitably, it's a devastating neurodegenerative disease.
Speaker: It robs your movement, your mind, your personality.
Speaker: But it seems like now, for the first time, there may be a little bit of hope.
Speaker: There was a small...
Speaker: but groundbreaking trial for patients who received a viral vector vector gene, excuse me, that infused directly into the brain.
Speaker: Um, it did show a 75% slowing of the disease progression over three years.
Speaker: Now the therapy, I thought that was like, cool, but how they do it is interesting.
Speaker: Literally the, the neurosurgeons literally
Speaker: Deliver the therapy by drilling into the skull makes me think of lobotomies.
Speaker: We were doing those to treat mental illnesses, but they delivered the therapy.
Speaker: They drilled directly into the skull.
Speaker: They injected into the striatum and then.
Speaker: they kind of seal things up and see what happens after that.
Speaker: But apparently the therapy silences the faulty Huntington gene.
Speaker: It cuts down its protein.
Speaker: It doesn't allow it to reproduce.
Speaker: And then that's basically akin to putting the brakes on like replication from a DNA perspective.
Speaker: So it's a small, small, small trial.
Speaker: But if you think about it, I was thinking about it more in the sense of
Speaker: It's just a glimmer of hope for a lot of these neurodegenerative illnesses that we deal with, Alzheimer's, ALS, and even like psychiatric diseases.
Speaker: If this works, these all have genetic underpinnings.
Speaker: And if this works for that, we may be able to really be able to go after these even more devastating neurodegenerative diseases.
Speaker: So I just thought that was a very interesting study.
Speaker: It is interesting.
Speaker: I mean, I think I would be...
Speaker: super freaked out to have something injected right into my brain.
Speaker: But I think that compared to the alternative of this, you know, the disease, the sickle.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, your, your movement, your mind, your, I mean, Huntington's is terrible.
Speaker: And, but so as, as we've seen ALS devastating and I, you know what, it's really not fair to label it.
Speaker: you know, ALS as more devastating as something else.
Speaker: It's all devastating, but it's terrible.
Speaker: And we're going through it personally right now to watch a family member lose, lose their cognition.
Speaker: And, and it got, it's definitely a disease that affects the family, very similar to addiction.
Speaker: So just, I think maybe being a little bit more close to it now, it does offer a little bit of hope that there may be some, some alternative therapies in the future.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: that's cool thanks i'm pretty cool i know sometimes only on days at nny thank you okay what do you got that's definitely not true okay um the next one i have is um synthetic blood have you heard about the research around this
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I know about synthetic blood from a theater perspective.
Speaker: Like when we were in theater, we had to use fake blood, which was either ketchup or something weird.
Speaker: Probably not something you would infuse in a patient.
Speaker: No, nothing that actually saves our lives.
Speaker: It just looks gory.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: So there's all this research around synthetic blood.
Speaker: So you, um, which obviously has a lot of implication, you know, like use cases, uh, military being one of them, right.
Speaker: In the battlefield, uh, you could potentially give patients blood transfusions also out in the field, um, places where you can't store, you know, because human blood that's donated needs to be stored, you know, specific temperatures and all that sort of thing.
Speaker: And so there's a lot of work around, there's some research going on now about creating synthetic blood that is actually stored as like a freeze dried powder.
Speaker: And then it's like moon blood.
Speaker: Yeah, well, kind of, but then you use saline to mix it and then to give it.
Speaker: And so what they do is they take the hemoglobin, you know, from the blood, which is our, you know, the protein that nourishes our blood with oxygen.
Speaker: They're taking that and essentially creating like artificial red blood cells with the hemoglobin.
Speaker: And so...
Speaker: In the US, actually in Maryland, there, University of Maryland, there is studies going on on rabbits to do this.
Speaker: And so far on animals, it seems relatively safe.
Speaker: But of course, human trials have to happen.
Speaker: But in Japan, they're also doing it, which is interesting because I was, you know, my experience with in Japan recently.
Speaker: But so they're actually doing some human testing there of of this.
Speaker: So it's interesting.
Speaker: There's a lot of, you know, it could.
Speaker: you know, solve our blood shortage, right?
Speaker: Like we're always looking for blood products for patients and there's also less risk of
Speaker: infection and things like that from the blood that you receive there's less risk of rejection all those things i was going to ask you what like what the rejection like did they talk about that at all yeah so what did that look like they think that um the rejection will be less because they don't have the cells don't have you know what we would have on our outside of ourselves that cause like the proteins on the outside of the cells that would cause our body to reject it so it would be less risk of rejection so
Speaker: Oh, interesting.
Speaker: Yeah, it is.
Speaker: Um, I'm just, I, the reason I said like the moon, when I said like the moon, um,
Speaker: Moon packet or whatever, like, do you remember like all of the, what are those called?
Speaker: It's the things, gosh, it's three letters.
Speaker: Somebody out there.
Speaker: And thank you.
Speaker: I was like, somebody's like, get it together, Alicia.
Speaker: So it's like MRE blood.
Speaker: It's kind of what it sounds like in your little moon pack.
Speaker: It's like a freeze dried.
Speaker: blood that you can carry and you know I mean you're out in the field and you could easily have it ready to give a patient um so it's interesting okay okay I think it will also make patients you know maybe a little less hesitant to take it I mean I
Speaker: after my first C-section, like they wanted to give me blood and I was really hesitant because of all the risks of it.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: It's interesting.
Speaker: It was interesting because I was practicing at the time and had transfused many patients.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But when it was me, I was, um, just a little hesitant, I guess.
Speaker: I was like worried about risks and stuff.
Speaker: And actually when I had my second one, my dad proactively donated blood in case I needed it for me.
Speaker: So he went in and donated it in case I needed it.
Speaker: But I don't I don't know why I was I don't know.
Speaker: It was also like just a rough time.
Speaker: It's a rough C-section.
Speaker: So, you know, I was.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But.
Speaker: I was in one of those situations where it was like, we could give it to you or we could wait like it was kind of on the the borderline.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: So you were, I think if my physician had said you have to do this, like I would have obviously.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But given the choice, I was like, Oh, eat some iron instead.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: Well, I, I think it should probably leads us all back to Ryan White.
Speaker: And I know that sounds morbid, but, um,
Speaker: what Ryan White was that the young, was he 12 or 13?
Speaker: I think we talked about him on another podcast, but the kid that got HIV from his blood transfusion.
Speaker: But it is interesting when you think about it happening to yourself.
Speaker: That's kind of why I asked you that.
Speaker: Cause I don't think I've ever, I've never needed blood that I am aware of unless I got it during a procedure that I don't remember.
Speaker: I would think so, but I,
Speaker: I don't think I've ever thought about how I would feel about that.
Speaker: But when you said that it did strike something personal in me.
Speaker: So that's why I was asking you, like, tell me more about that because maybe we need to have a little bit more grace for patients in those moments.
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, it did.
Speaker: It made me, I mean, because I had had the conversation with, you know, many patients at that time, you know, before then to say, hey, like, you know, we're recommending a transfusion.
Speaker: These are the risks.
Speaker: And
Speaker: You know, so to be the person in that situation was it was different, you know, when it was me.
Speaker: So, yeah.
Speaker: Well, and I think that's that's actually great medicine to practice, in my opinion, is when you can actually take your personal experiences and project them forward.
Speaker: I think that makes us better providers if we if we are willing to open our minds that way.
Speaker: OK, so from going from blood.
Speaker: And what, you know, obviously something that the body needs.
Speaker: I'm going to go to something a little bit more mainstream here.
Speaker: What our bodies don't always need, but what we're doing a lot of is Ozempic recently, right?
Speaker: We're hearing a lot about Ozempic.
Speaker: But here's one thing that really blew my mind.
Speaker: We have all these weight loss, these diabetes drugs, Ozempic, Wagobe, Monjoro, and they work by mimicking a hormone that's called a GLP-1, right?
Speaker: So these are our GLP-1 meds.
Speaker: We've always been taught that GLP-1s come from the gut, but it turns out your pancreas makes them as well.
Speaker: So,
Speaker: Your alpha cells, the same ones that normally raise your blood sugar with glucagon, can actually flip internally and switch and start making GLP instead.
Speaker: So to me, I was thinking about this, like it's like discovering your pancreas has kind of been...
Speaker: sitting as a blockbuster drug this whole time and we've just not been using it.
Speaker: Instead, we're like finding these synthetic GLP-1s.
Speaker: What could we do if we actually coax ourselves to crank it up on their own and actually act as their own GLP-1s?
Speaker: So study's still in process, but
Speaker: What I just find interesting is that we're supplementing something that our body can make.
Speaker: And I don't know, wouldn't it just be wild if like the next phase of medicine isn't really giving people more drugs, but it's actually teaching their bodies to unlock what we already make.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And so this wasn't really more like, I don't have a big conclusion here, but it was more of a discussion story for me because I was like, I'm sure our body is brilliant.
Speaker: Her body really is brilliant if you think about it.
Speaker: I was having a discussion about coronary artery disease with a dear friend.
Speaker: He's an older gentleman who lives in Cabo, actually.
Speaker: And it's interesting to talk to somebody about medicine and how they experience everything there because they have to pay everything up front.
Speaker: And I'm sure he wouldn't mind me sharing this, but he had pneumonia.
Speaker: And went into heart failure.
Speaker: I mean, he was like multi-system organ failure by the time he got to the hospital.
Speaker: So he's now got an EF of like less than 30.
Speaker: And he doesn't understand medicine.
Speaker: Family is from Sinaloa.
Speaker: And he's only got these two children.
Speaker: And so every time that I, when I go down there, he's one of the neighbors.
Speaker: And so we'll talk and he's like, I'm going in for this heart testing, which I didn't determine was angiogram.
Speaker: But he basically got vessel occlusion.
Speaker: But he was trying to explain to me how his LAD had created like, what do they call this?
Speaker: Like their runoffs, basically, for blood flow.
Speaker: So he was his mind was so blown at the fact that he has this occlusion.
Speaker: And he's like, I should be dead.
Speaker: But he's not because his heart created collaterals.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Um, for blood flow.
Speaker: And I just think the body is so amazing.
Speaker: What if we could just start tapping into what the body does?
Speaker: Um, naturally, I don't know.
Speaker: It's true.
Speaker: I mean, it's pipe dreamy thing for me, but yeah, I just, it's, it's fascinating.
Speaker: It is.
Speaker: I mean, the body is, I mean, I randomly will think about what that when I'm like driving my car, I'm like, you know, it's pretty cool how we like do all these things ourselves, like in this body of ours.
Speaker: But, um, I mean, I see it too.
Speaker: And
Speaker: like there's a lot, and we talked about this during one of our episodes, but there's a lot of supplements that people are saying will just boost your own natural metabolism.
Speaker: Yeah, what is that?
Speaker: You know, for turmeric was one of them.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Ginger is another one.
Speaker: So, you know, taking, studies are showing that just taking those, which, you know, then you have to figure out side effects of those, but just you can boost your own natural metabolism.
Speaker: And then it's a perfect balance there, too, because that that balance is.
Speaker: We you can go to hardcore like for some people, you can go to hardcore Western medicine and that's like, let's just throw a drug at everything and not maybe make the actual person responsible for some of.
Speaker: the outcome, or you can go far left and it's like, it's herbs and I like respect both approaches, but drugs are drugs are drugs to me.
Speaker: And we did an episode on this, even like your, you know, our herb,
Speaker: Let's check our herbs.
Speaker: Look, when you're taking herbs, those drugs, they're not always FDA regulated.
Speaker: But there's something I think in our psyche, at least maybe as Americans, that tell us that they're healthier substitutions.
Speaker: But it's interesting that you could go to five herbs for one blood pressure med.
Speaker: And that's where my mind starts asking a lot of questions like, well, why do I need a five to one?
Speaker: Versus a one-to-one just because it's made by a drone company.
Speaker: Like, but they're legit in my mind, legit questions.
Speaker: But I do think that there also are alternatives that require a buy-in from the actual consumer, which is us.
Speaker: Hello patients.
Speaker: We actually have to do some work too.
Speaker: We just can't expect the pill to be the magic pill.
Speaker: And that, I think that's largely what we battle.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So anyway, but anyway, GLP ones guys, you want, you want your Zempic, you got your own resources.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: We just got to figure out how to stimulate them.
Speaker: There you go.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: That's round.
Speaker: Let's go one more round here.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: My next one is around robotic surgery.
Speaker: So, yeah, I thought this was interesting because...
Speaker: And it makes total sense to me of why we would need to do this.
Speaker: So there is some developments in robotic surgery with what they're calling haptic feedback.
Speaker: So what it does is it provides the surgeons with a sense of touch during like minimally invasive surgeries.
Speaker: when they're using the robot, right?
Speaker: So obviously, if you're using a robot, you're not feeling that tissue or you're not feeling any pressure against whatever it is you're trying to cut or whatever.
Speaker: And so these robots will have sensors on them, like on the surgical instruments that will transmit real time
Speaker: feedback into the what the surgeon is holding like the surgeon's console haptic haptic haptic is what happens when your haptics is what we have with our iphones yeah if yeah like where they kind of is that what you're talking about like that um vibration yeah feeling yeah okay all right so yeah so we'll kind of um sort of help them figure out like you know is there a lot of resistance here or whatever and it can help them adjust the um
Speaker: the pressure of their movements, you know, and, and can, which is really important, especially if it's like friable tissue, right?
Speaker: Like if it's delicate tissue that you're, you're working with.
Speaker: And so, so there's some new developments around that, which I thought was really interesting, you know, like,
Speaker: I feel like that's in everything too.
Speaker: It's in our cars.
Speaker: Like, especially you get a rental car.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: Have you ever gotten a rental car?
Speaker: Sometimes I think if we could just put like cameras in rental cars for the first 30 minutes that the person gets it because learning a new car is pretty hilarious.
Speaker: I'm laughing because I was just in a rental car.
Speaker: So like when it gets that somebody gets too close or you get it, it's like, beep, beep, beep, it beeps at you, but it also is like, and you're like, you're having this like moment in your car.
Speaker: Like, I don't know what just happened, but I just wrecked my car because you tried to warn me about not wrecking my car.
Speaker: Well, and they're so angry.
Speaker: I mean, so I drive a, you know, an old car, like I drive a 2012 minivan because I don't go anywhere.
Speaker: Like I just stay home most, you know, like on a daily basis, I don't go a lot of places.
Speaker: So we're keeping my van alive as long as I can.
Speaker: And so there is no like, oh, hey, you're about to go into somebody else.
Speaker: You're supposed to, you're about to go into the lane.
Speaker: Like there's, there is no, you know, warning of anything.
Speaker: And so I get in this car when I,
Speaker: driving the last two days when I was traveling for work and I get in and I, the very first time I like went to switch a lane or something, the car felt like I got too close to another car and it like angrily, like it starts screaming at me and I was like, what is going on?
Speaker: It pulls the wheel back from me.
Speaker: Like you stupid human.
Speaker: Why are you driving this car?
Speaker: I'm like, then you just do it.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: You do it.
Speaker: Or you get too close to a line and it's like vibrating like crazy and you're like, what is wrong with you?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: It's terrible.
Speaker: It really is.
Speaker: It, um, I just, but I, and then I ended up laughing at myself cause I always do some kind of like, Oh, like some moment that it just completely catches me off guard.
Speaker: I just think it would be funny to see everybody get in a car.
Speaker: They don't like, if you got in my car, my car is,
Speaker: It doesn't have a gear like like in the regular gear place like either, you know down at the bottom in the middle of the console or like the one that you like crank down it.
Speaker: It's gear is managed by like what you would do for your windshield wipers.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: I thought I was really cool.
Speaker: And I bought my car and I was like, no, I don't need you to tell me anything about it.
Speaker: I got this all figured out.
Speaker: Like, I know exactly what I'm doing.
Speaker: It's fine.
Speaker: And I sat there for a minute and I was like, I don't even know how to put it in reverse.
Speaker: Where is reverse?
Speaker: Like I didn't know.
Speaker: I, and it, like I sat there out of straight pride.
Speaker: You guys would all be proud of me straight pride.
Speaker: I was not going to ask.
Speaker: I Googled.
Speaker: Of course I did.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I was not going to get back out and tell my sales associate that I did not know how to reverse the car.
Speaker: You probably wondered what you were doing sitting in the car.
Speaker: No, he probably was like, yeah, I figured her out this whole time.
Speaker: She's been a pain in the butt the whole time.
Speaker: So it's because the first time I got an Uber, that was a Tesla.
Speaker: Oh my gosh.
Speaker: And you couldn't get in the door?
Speaker: To get in the door.
Speaker: Like I'm like standing.
Speaker: Cause usually like the Uber driver will like get out and like, you know, put your bag in and you know, some will open the door for you.
Speaker: This person didn't, they just sort of sat in the car.
Speaker: So I threw my bag in the truck and I'm like, Uber X, not comfort or black honey.
Speaker: I'm not getting out.
Speaker: I, um, yeah.
Speaker: So I'm like standing at the door for like, like probably a full minute and like staring and I'm like, I see the handle, but I'm like, I don't know how to, how to do this.
Speaker: And I look like an idiot and I don't want to break this guy's car.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh my God, I just snorted.
Speaker: That was so funny.
Speaker: Oh my God.
Speaker: I was like, oh, he probably thinks I'm an idiot.
Speaker: I think, listen, if we're all being honest with ourselves, we can all think about the moment that we first stood, walked up to in Tesla and did not know how to open the door.
Speaker: If anybody out there goes, oh, I knew from the beginning, you're a liar.
Speaker: I'm sorry.
Speaker: You're just a liar.
Speaker: It's just not intuitive at all.
Speaker: It's not.
Speaker: You have to push it for it to come out at you.
Speaker: And I'm like, whatever.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Just open the daggone door.
Speaker: Like it's self drive, self open the doors.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Driving all these rental cars makes me want to stick with my van.
Speaker: I'm just going to say, I don't, I don't need all these bells and whistles.
Speaker: I just want to get my car and drive.
Speaker: Oh, I get actually mad when my backup camera stops working.
Speaker: Cause for some reason I realized I didn't learn how to drive with a backup camera, but I've,
Speaker: And that becomes somewhat dependent on it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: More so than I thought that when it went out, I was like, wait, I spent more time trying to figure out why it went out than just backing out of my driveway.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know?
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Speaking of things coming back and regenerations of things and all kinds of things that are Tesla's.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: None of that made sense, but here's my final story.
Speaker: Tooth regeneration.
Speaker: Have you heard about this?
Speaker: What is it?
Speaker: Tooth regeneration.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: So I'm going to ask you a question before I tell you just a brief excerpt.
Speaker: If you knew you could grow teeth whenever you needed them, would you, would you really take care of your teeth?
Speaker: Or would you?
Speaker: I would.
Speaker: Cause I think, I don't know.
Speaker: I'm like worried about my teeth.
Speaker: I am too, but not weird about that.
Speaker: You got your final set right now.
Speaker: So I always get these dreams.
Speaker: I guess that's true.
Speaker: But I don't want my teeth to hurt.
Speaker: I don't either.
Speaker: I don't know if I'd call it a biggest fear, but I always have this dream that I have a loose tooth.
Speaker: And somebody out here is going to be like, that really means that you're insecure about life.
Speaker: Somebody's going to tell me something like that.
Speaker: And you may be right.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: But I have this dream.
Speaker: And in my dream...
Speaker: My one of my two front teeth, the larger teeth are loose, loose to a point like you're a kid.
Speaker: You sat there and worked out with your tooth.
Speaker: I mean, excuse me, with your tongue.
Speaker: Where you're just like, oh, yeah, this bad boy is about to come out.
Speaker: But as an adult, it's a different kind of angst.
Speaker: You're like, it's going to come out, but there's nothing behind it.
Speaker: You know, so I thought this story was interesting because.
Speaker: It does sound straight out of science fiction, but Japanese researchers right now are testing a drug that can block a protein.
Speaker: It's called USAG-1.
Speaker: So USAG-1, it basically lifts the brakes on your hidden tooth buds, which is what the tooth buds are what prevent us growing another set.
Speaker: So the result is people, if they can block this HG1,
Speaker: USAG one, they can actually regrow missing teeth.
Speaker: So they've already started with trials with kids who are born without certain teeth and get this.
Speaker: They use this with ferrets because their two patterns mimic ours more than mice do.
Speaker: And the ferrets regrow their molars.
Speaker: So if this works, dentures and implants are going to be gone.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, it's going to be done.
Speaker: But I was like, also, maybe I'll stop dreaming about it because I'm not going to grow.
Speaker: Because now you don't have to worry about it.
Speaker: Yeah, that's all I ever worry about is my teeth.
Speaker: Interesting.
Speaker: Like chipping a tooth or losing a tooth.
Speaker: As an adult, you can't hide that.
Speaker: Yeah, that is interesting, actually.
Speaker: I think it was wild.
Speaker: It is.
Speaker: I mean, I know people who have had repeated dental issues despite getting multiple caps and all.
Speaker: Yeah, you got to get screws in your mouth.
Speaker: They implant these things.
Speaker: Back in the day, they did wooden teeth.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: George Washington, baby.
Speaker: I got a whole thing to tell you about why people wore wigs back in the day, too.
Speaker: It's not for what you think.
Speaker: This will be on our next Healthcare Headlines podcast.
Speaker: That's funny.
Speaker: But no, I think it would be... I mean, I actually tell the dentist every time I go that I hate going to the dentist.
Speaker: This is my... I know, and they're probably like, yes, we know.
Speaker: They're going to tell me I have to get a feeling and I hate it.
Speaker: Them and like, I don't even know, probably dentists.
Speaker: Dentists would be the most like that and orthodontist for us that we're stuck in braces.
Speaker: But forget orthodontist.
Speaker: We got a really big week this week.
Speaker: April.
Speaker: We do.
Speaker: Let's sing out to the young songs.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So we already talked about a little bit, but it is PA week.
Speaker: So physician assistant.
Speaker: Happy PA week.
Speaker: Physician associate, depending on where you are and what name you're using.
Speaker: But yes.
Speaker: So as we talked about during APP week recently,
Speaker: PAs do play a huge role in our healthcare that we provide today across sound, but also outside of sound everywhere.
Speaker: So thank you to the PAs out there for all the work that you do.
Speaker: You really make a huge impact in the lives of your patients and their families.
Speaker: So thank you, and we hope you have a happy week.
Speaker: That's right.
Speaker: Happy APP week.
Speaker: Hey, hey, PAs.
Speaker: I just say P. I'm sorry.
Speaker: Happy PA week, but you are one of our APPs.
Speaker: That's true.
Speaker: I can keep up with all of our celebrations for our people.
Speaker: So happy PA week.
Speaker: And for our PAs out there, hey.
Speaker: If one of you guys want to send us an email, because nobody else is, please send us an email at on call podcast at sound physicians.com.
Speaker: We would love to hear some show ideas from you guys.
Speaker: And we would love to hear just some feedback generally.
Speaker: What are your healthcare headlines?
Speaker: What are some stories that you guys are seeing?
Speaker: You can follow us on LinkedIn.
Speaker: That's On Call with April and Alicia.
Speaker: You can also follow us on Instagram, On Call with April and Alicia.
Speaker: You can listen to our podcast.
Speaker: Please subscribe, follow us.
Speaker: We'd love to engage with you guys.
Speaker: Any show ideas, like I mentioned, that you have, let us know.
Speaker: Any feedback, anything.
Speaker: We'd love to hear from you guys.
Speaker: It's been great.
Speaker: We love talking to you, and we look forward to our next week with you.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: And until next time, you stay well, and we'll stay on call.
Speaker: Happy PA week, everybody.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: Thanks, everyone.
