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Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month w/ Dr. Jossen Gastelum image

Celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month w/ Dr. Jossen Gastelum

S1 E15 · New Dentists on the Block
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50 Plays1 year ago

Dr. Jossen Gastelum joins the podcast to discuss his journey as a dentist and the importance of representation for Latino dentists. He shares his experience of graduating during the COVID-19 pandemic and the challenges he faced transitioning into private practice. Dr. Gastelum also talks about his passion for esthetics and the impact of social media on his career. He emphasizes the need for open conversations about burnout in the dental profession and the importance of an abundance mindset. Dr. Gastelum concludes by discussing his future plans, including the possibility of owning his own practice.

About The Guest:

​Dr. Jossen Gastelum is a practicing General and Cosmetic Dentist currently based in Scottsdale, Arizona. A graduate of the 2020 class at the University of Louisville’s School of Dentistry, but originally from Tucson, Arizona—Dr. Gastelum practiced at home in the Tucson/Marana area for over two years before making the move up to the Phoenix area for a new opportunity. His interests in dentistry range from Cosmetics, Biomimetic/Minimally-Invasive Dentistry, to injectables such as Botox.

Better known as @DoctorJossen on Tik Tok and Instagram, Dr. Gastelum has successfully used social media as a way to connect and network with fellow dentists and current dental and pre-dental students, as well as to share educational content with the general public. A proud Latino dentist, Dr. Gastelum also frequently shares content relating to his journey as a Latino and First Generation graduate. His goal is that by sharing this content he will help to increase visibility and representation of Latinos in dentistry in hopes of inspiring more future Latino representation in the field. As a dental student, Dr. Gastelum was heavily involved with student organizations including the Hispanic Student Dental Association where he served as President. He also served as the Social Media Chair for the Louisville Chapter of the American Student Dental Association where he began his interest in creating content and learned about the power of social media networking.

Key Takeaways:

​1. Graduating during the COVID-19 pandemic was a challenging time, but Dr. Gastelum found support through social media and connecting with other dentists.

2. Dr. Gastelum's passion for esthetics led him to pursue certification in Botox and fillers, which has opened up new opportunities for him.

3. Burnout is a common issue in the dental profession, and it's important to have open conversations about it and support one another.

4. Social media has been a valuable tool for Dr. Gastelum to connect with pre-dental students, dental students, and potential patients.

5. Dr. Gastelum sees ownership as the future of his career and believes it will allow him to have more control over the type of dentistry he wants to practice.

6. Being Latino in the profession and serving as a mentor to fellow Latinos is a passion for both Joseen and Tanya Sue.

Connect with Jossen Gastelum on IG: @drjossen 

Connect with Jossen Gastelum on Tiktok: @drjossen

Connect with New Dentists on the Block: @newdentistsontheblock

Connect with Tanya Sue Maestas: @tsmaestas.dds

Full video on Youtube

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Transcript

Podcast Introduction

00:00:09
Speaker
Welcome to New Dentists on the Block, a podcast featuring new dentists sharing their experiences in the world of dentistry. Successes, challenges, and life in between, navigating dentistry together one experience at a time.

Hispanic Heritage Month

00:00:24
Speaker
Happy Hispanic Heritage Month. Feliz Mez Nacional de la Arencia, Espana.

Meet Dr. Joseon Gastelum

00:00:29
Speaker
On today's episode, we have Dr. Joseon Gastelum. That's right, the Dr. Joseon. Dr. Joseon is a passionate and influential dentist. Him and I had the opportunity to discuss our journey in dentistry and the importance of representation for Latinos in the profession.

Graduating During COVID

00:00:45
Speaker
He shares his experience of graduating during the COVID-19 pandemic
00:00:48
Speaker
and the challenges he faced transitioning into private practice. Dr. Joseph highlights the significance of social media and connecting with others and promoting dental growth and dental education. We talk about our time in ASDA and how we cross paths, and he emphasizes the need for open conversations about burnout in the profession and the importance of an abundance mindset.

Latino Representation in Dentistry

00:01:10
Speaker
Let's get to it. Dr. Joseph Gastelum, welcome to New Dennis on the Block. How are you doing today? Thanks. I'm doing really well. What about you?
00:01:18
Speaker
I am so excited to finally connect with you. Joseph and I have tried to connect probably all year and we haven't been able to technical difficulties timing schedule. And so I'm absolutely excited to be connecting during this special month for us Hispanic heritage month, which is an exciting time for all Hispanics everywhere. And I would say everyone across the country because it's a, it's a way for us to kind of celebrate our culture and dive into maybe a culture that others don't really know about.
00:01:46
Speaker
Yeah, definitely. I think it's really important for

Journey from Louisville to Arizona

00:01:49
Speaker
us, especially as Latino dentists, to be able to represent in the field, especially. I don't know what the latest figures are, but the last time that I knew it was like 5.9% of US dentists are Latino. So we're a small minority in there and growing every day and it's always good to be a good representation.
00:02:11
Speaker
Absolutely, and I know that both you and I are very passionate about seeing other Latinos grow in the profession and finding others who are interested in going into dentistry to help find avenues to help them kind of find their way into dental school and into the profession as well. Yep, definitely. Dr. Justin, I would love if you would tell myself and our listeners a little bit about yourself.
00:02:32
Speaker
Yeah, so I'm Dr. Joseph Stellum. I graduated from University of Louisville back in 2020 during the pandemic. Beautiful time to graduate. So I've been practicing for a little bit over three years, almost four years. I started off actually practicing in Kentucky for a couple months just because during the pandemic it made sense at that time. But then I ended up moving back to Arizona, which is where I'm from.
00:03:00
Speaker
I practiced in the Tucson, Arizona area actually in Marana for about a little bit over two years there at a very nice private practice that taught me a lot that I know today. Just recently in the last six or seven months, I decided to move up to the big city, up to Phoenix, Arizona area.
00:03:23
Speaker
And this is where I've been practicing for the past six or seven months.

Social Media as a Networking Tool

00:03:29
Speaker
But really what I've been doing recently that has gotten more attention is the social media stuff. So I do TikTok, I do Instagram, it started off very cheesy little educational videos and dances and all the cringy stuff that we love from social media dentists.
00:03:47
Speaker
It has really turned into an amazing networking tool, a way to connect with pre-dental students, with dental students, possible patients. Yeah, it's been awesome. Well, I have loved to watch your growth on social media, and it's exciting to see all the content that you put out. But before you were popular on social media, you and I met each other, good old as the days, at one of the annual sessions. I think it was, what was it, 1617?
00:04:15
Speaker
It was the Disney one. And so that was my first ever time doing that. So during dental school, I was part of my local and the national chapter of the American Student Dental Association. In our case, it was called LASDA because Louisville ASDA. And so I did social media back then also because it was something that I was interested in at the time also. But when I did it, I think that
00:04:39
Speaker
it was you had already become president, and so this was you giving your presidency over to RuPauli, if I remember correctly. But yeah, that's when we had met, and I just remember going to this event. At my dental school, I was the only Mexican-American student in my class. There were other Latinos in my class, but some of them were like Chilean or Cuban or
00:05:07
Speaker
at Puerto Rican, but I was the only Mexican American one. And so when I got to see Tanya Sue, you know, up there, it was it was pretty exciting for me. You know, I kind of had like a little I was like fan grilling over you, which is really funny. But but yeah, it was just like a moment where it was really impactful for me. And I remember even like right after like seeing you like talk like up on the stage. I don't we've never talked about this before because, you know,
00:05:35
Speaker
We never have, yeah. We never have, but I remember like texting my mom and be like, oh my gosh, mom, like the president of ASDA is a Mexican American, you know, Latina. So yeah, it was it was a really special moment.
00:05:51
Speaker
When I was running and before I won, I guess I'd never realized the impact that that would make. And the amount of people that came up to me after I became president, as when I won that day as president, so many people came up to me and they were like, ¿Qué hoy, goyo? We are so proud that somebody Hispanic, Latina, is up there representing us.
00:06:15
Speaker
That week that you're running, it's all chaos and it just hit me, we need that representation. We need others to know that if they want to get involved in leadership, they absolutely can do that. My mom and I always remember because we remember when you came up to us to introduce yourself and we were so excited to meet you. She often recalls and she'll ask me, how is he doing? I'm like, he's doing great. We'll see him eventually if we ever go back to Arizona. Eventually, actually will happen.
00:06:44
Speaker
Oh, I'm sure we'll cross paths at some point for sure. Yeah. One of the major reasons why I decided to move up to Phoenix is that so you you were recently in Phoenix probably like a year or so ago. Do you remember this? Yeah, yes. Yes.
00:07:00
Speaker
And so you had messaged me and you were asking like, oh, let's meet up or whatever. And so this happened all the time, especially with like social media or just like my friends. Whenever people come to Arizona, they come to Phoenix or Scottsdale or, you know, wherever the area is. And so I would get so many times where people would be like, hey, I'm coming to Arizona, let's meet up. And I'm like an hour and a half away down in Tucson, Arizona. And sometimes I would be able to make it, you know, I would actually like drive up, especially if it was like on a weekend or something.
00:07:29
Speaker
But during the weekdays, it just was really difficult to make that happen. And so as I started seeing that growth happening more with social media, it just made more sense to be in the capital city of the state.
00:07:43
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. I can remember messaging you that and saying, yeah, come visit us. And you're like, yeah, I can't. It's a weekday. And I was like, oh, come here. But now that you're in Phoenix, in the Phoenix area, hopefully we'll make time to do that. But tell us a little bit about the practice you're in.

Career Moves in Phoenix

00:07:58
Speaker
And I think maybe you have some news to share.
00:08:00
Speaker
Yeah, so I've always worked in private practice settings. And that was just something that I had a specific vision for the type of dentistry that I was trying to provide. And I'm very into aesthetics. And I got certified to do Botox and fillers and that kind of stuff. So it just made sense. But I got a really good opportunity to move up to Phoenix. And I was doing that for a little bit. But then recently, I've had another opportunity
00:08:29
Speaker
look to another private practice which is up in like the North Scottsdale area and so I'm actually gonna be doing this I guess this is technically recorded in the past but maybe yeah yeah but I will all be starting that in October so I'm really excited for the opportunity to
00:08:49
Speaker
try something a little bit different. It's always from every experience that you get, you get new experiences from staff, new experiences from the technology and the type of dentistry that you're doing. And so it's always a blessing to be able to do that. But yeah, speaking about your mom too, I always remember her too.
00:09:11
Speaker
Oh, thanks. A lot of people always ask for her and that always warms in her heart because that's very nice. Yeah, and actually, like one of the major things that I remember is that your mom was basically like at conferences where you would take her to like
00:09:43
Speaker
maybe first-generation, I'm assuming you're first-generation as well. First-generation college graduates, first-generation dentists in general, being able to bring our parents to us to these events and let them experience things that they didn't necessarily get to experience because they were...
00:09:47
Speaker
to travel with you.
00:10:05
Speaker
working with us growing up, I think is a huge blessing. So that was something that really stood out to me, not only you being Latina and everything, but just seeing your connection with your mom just was really special.
00:10:19
Speaker
Oh, thank you. And yes, it's super fun. I still take her to a lot of the conferences and she has a ton of fun and loves to meet all the dentists. She's a huge advocate on everything that we do and of course everything that I do. So yeah, I completely agree. Just having the opportunity for both of us to experience it together is really, really fun. And if we can, we always sneak away to get some shopping done.
00:10:40
Speaker
Yeah, a lot of people don't don't really understand that I feel like being from with our heritage and with our background like we really are very family oriented but I would say that other cultures don't really understand that which is really it's huge it's huge and it's pretty funny because
00:10:55
Speaker
I'm like within this whole time that I've been kind of moved back from dental school so so dental school is like really my my first experience living outside of home I always lived at home growing up I went to University of Arizona which is in Tucson and so I was blessed that I was able to
00:11:13
Speaker
you know, spend that time with my mom. And so when I moved over to Kentucky for dental school, I was like living on my own. I had an apartment, you know, that whole kind of thing. And so that was like really exciting. But then like during the pandemic, it kind of like reverted again because I moved back home and I was living at home. And so the whole purpose of
00:11:32
Speaker
of moving up to Phoenix was like, you know, to kind of get a little bit of independence again, which is, it's really hard because I feel like as first-generation students and especially with our parents going through so much with us, you almost feel like guilty, you know, like leaving the nest. But it's not really supposed to be anything personal. But us as first-generation students, we just like take it like very personal all the time. And our parents sometimes I feel like they do too.
00:12:01
Speaker
even though they always want the best for us. A hundred percent. And I have loved watching your travels with your mom, but the videos that you put up recently with your grandma, oh, so sweet. I love that, you know, she's still a part of your life and you're able to visit her. She's able to cookie meals, which is a beautiful thing and a delicious thing. But I think that that's so special that you are so open to sharing that with the world, which is really nice.
00:12:27
Speaker
Yeah, and I get a lot of super nice messages from people whenever I share it. And the purpose of me sharing it is obviously I get to show my friends and everything what I'm doing, and I always get questions from friends like, hey, how's your mom doing? How's your grandma doing? But it's also literally just my own personal diary, and I have it all in archives, and it's just going to be something really special to look back on.
00:12:54
Speaker
Oh, absolutely. For sure. I'd like to kind of backtrack a little bit and talk about your experience of graduating during COVID. How that was for you and transitioning into private practice. Was it a huge leap for you? Did you feel like you were, um, uh, ethically, uh, trained to go into practice?
00:13:13
Speaker
So whenever the COVID pandemic started, it was right around March 2020. So in February was when we were about to go on our spring break that we never came back from, essentially. And at the time, I was actually already done with my requirement. So I was already kind of
00:13:37
Speaker
Not necessarily slowing down, but I was doing more procedures because I wanted to learn versus I'm just trying to get my requirements done. And so when the pandemic happened, obviously it's a scary time because nothing's guaranteed. You don't know whether you're going to be having a job, what's going to happen, things are locking down.
00:13:56
Speaker
And I wasn't really like necessarily worried that I wasn't gonna be able to graduate because I had the requirements done. But yeah, it was definitely like a scary time and licensing was kind of like unsure. I hadn't taken my boards yet at the time. And then personally like a lot of people like didn't really like there were
00:14:17
Speaker
people that were not really concerned about graduation or the ceremony or anything like that. But for me, as a first-generation student, it was a really huge deal to get the doctor title and to have my family come and see me walk across the stage and get that title. And for us, our family is really close and big and my mom's one of eight siblings and so all of her
00:14:42
Speaker
Yeah, all of her siblings, they were going to rent this big house in Louisville, and they were going to do a barbecue, and we were going to basically have a party for a week, and they were all going to go to my graduation, and we were going to go to the Derby, and it was going to be this big old thing, and to see all of that.
00:14:59
Speaker
you know, kind of like taken away was pretty sad. And it feels like, again, like you feel kind of guilty feeling like that feeling of sadness or almost like I missed out on something. But especially with like, you know, so many other things that happen with people being sick and people passing away. And it was just like a very like emotional time for everybody. But yeah, it's definitely something that I feel like I never got the opportunity to have that graduation. And so it's like something I'm always gonna
00:15:28
Speaker
like feel like foam before. Does that make sense? So literally every time that there's graduations, it's like me and my classmates were always like talking about how we have like the sense like we didn't get closure. But in regards to practicing,
00:15:45
Speaker
Since the pandemic was kind of complicated, I had to initially work in Kentucky for a couple of months until Arizona decided that they were going to accept the mannequin boards that we were taking, which actually was a really interesting time because I remember when I was in ASDA, we were advocating for the mannequin boards and then suddenly the pandemic happens and I'm like,
00:16:08
Speaker
Okay, now we're gonna be forced to do it. Now it's acceptable. Okay. Now it's acceptable. It's crazy. But yeah, that was like a very interesting like turning point for I guess our profession in general and I think a really good one in order to stop people from using like live patient boards and you know, like the whole ethics of that and in general just like taking away some of the stress for
00:16:35
Speaker
students and finding patients and all that kind of stuff. But of course, the mannequin boards themselves brought in new challenges including standardization and whether the tooth was actually realistic or not and all this kind of stuff. But yeah, I worked in Kentucky for a little bit.
00:16:54
Speaker
And then I ended up moving to Arizona and basically one of the office that I ended up working at, I got the job via a classifieds on the State Dental Board page and then at that

Mentoring Pre-Dental Students

00:17:11
Speaker
office. I ended up being there for over two years and it was an amazing opportunity. I got to work with all of the assistants that were there, all of the doctors that were there, but I also got to mentor a couple of pre-dental students. I had one student that came into shadow.
00:17:26
Speaker
And she ended up, she's applying to dental school this year. And so I wrote a letter of recommendation for her. And yeah, it feels like it's all gone by so quickly. I feel very disconnected from the dental school me because you just, I can't believe the stuff that you can do now and the stuff that you know and all the stuff that has changed. But at the same time, it doesn't feel like it's that long ago, which it's not, but yeah.
00:17:57
Speaker
Time flies. I feel like the older we get, time just goes by so fast. Yeah, definitely.

Burnout and Biomimetic Dentistry

00:18:02
Speaker
Since graduating, I know you share that you enjoy injectables and aesthetic cases. Have you taken any CE courses that you feel have really upped your game?
00:18:14
Speaker
Yeah, so during the pandemic, I actually won a giveaway for a JAD Biomimetics course. And that kind of changed the game, I guess, in general. I don't really do a lot of strict biomimetics anymore, but I think it changed the game in regards to really understanding adhesive protocols and bonding and everything that's possible with our new
00:18:42
Speaker
materials that we have available to us today. And so that was really something that I think reignited my passion for dentistry because those first six months out of school are not in your case, but those first six months of school are definitely difficult because in school, we're used to working on two or maybe three patients a day.
00:19:03
Speaker
and then suddenly you're in private practice and you have your own schedule of 8 to 12 patients plus all of the hygiene that you're juggling with. And so trying to make sure I was being able to see everybody within a good time was really difficult and then just diagnosing quickly was difficult. And so at first, I had a little burnout period where I was hating dentistry and
00:19:31
Speaker
It's weird because you graduate and nobody talks about it. Nobody wants to admit that they're maybe not super happy with the field or they're struggling or anything like that. So yeah, I went through that period where I was struggling a little bit and I did the course and started really implementing these adhesive protocols in my practice and we had AirBrage, my Mexican accent is coming out a little bit.
00:20:01
Speaker
We had air abrasion units in every operator. The owner dentists at this office really embraced that and let me do that. It got me really excited about dentistry again. I started posting stuff onto Instagram and I would get messages from people that were interested in it. I even got to message with a couple of classmates where I got to talk about the struggles and were realizing that
00:20:28
Speaker
You know, the struggles that we go through are like very common and just like nobody likes to talk about them.

Abundance Mindset vs. Competition

00:20:33
Speaker
So yeah, yeah.
00:20:35
Speaker
You mentioned two very important points here. Well, the first one may not be super important, but a biomimetic dentistry is something that I feel very passionate about as well too. I find joy in dentistry because a lot of these protocols and it kind of just makes sense. I feel like in dentistry I kind of was just going through the motions and didn't really understand the why. Maybe I understood it to answer some test questions, some board questions, but not really exactly 100% what I was doing.
00:21:01
Speaker
And so I took a Nezha course as well. I took a shift in house, his online platform when it first came out. And I absolutely loved it. And overlays have really changed my life and bring me joy. I prefer to cut an overlay than I do a crown. But those principles are really cool. I feel like if you are looking for more of a reason as to why you're doing dentistry, those are two great platforms to look into. They're really informative and they're two great people that really take time out of their day to answer different questions from people who are interested in biomimetic.
00:21:30
Speaker
Yeah, I think in general, not necessarily with the biomimetics in general, but feeling good about the quality of your work changes everything because then you can show your patients and you can explain to them what you're doing. Definitely those protocols just made me a better dentist overall.
00:21:53
Speaker
100%, 100%. But burnout is the second point that you mentioned. And burnout is very, very active in our profession and not something that I feel like we're speaking about enough. I think that we're doing a better job. I think as of late, especially our generation, we're more cognizant and kind of more active in having these conversations and kind of creating a support network. But I still feel like we as a profession need to continue to do more
00:22:18
Speaker
Because there are a lot of people who who don't know their place in dentistry and definitely feel burnout and really don't want to be involved in their and the profession so yeah, I think really the the First person that I kind of like saw talking about it Like a lot more openly was dr. Avi. I don't know if well, I think he's been on this
00:22:35
Speaker
podcast people, right? So I've seen him like really kind of like embracing it, like talking about it, and people are really like celebrating him for it. And it's definitely something that that people like in general don't talk about. And I think that the culture and in dental school is very like, you know, that gunner culture where everybody is like trying to
00:22:57
Speaker
Not like really share information with each other not really like give too much information and in in reality I think that the major thing that we have to learn and it's something that I I just took a Course with dr. James Heaton and dr. Michael Allen, which is called smile trend Which is actually like this is not a plug by the way, but that's where I got this this white
00:23:19
Speaker
But they were talking about this concept of abundance mindset, which is basically where you think that there's a lot for you to give and a lot for you to receive from the world. And so in reality, if you change your mindset and stop thinking of everybody as competition or thinking of everybody as somebody that's going to get in your way, you can see everybody as humans and people that are
00:23:47
Speaker
available to receive energy from you and you to give energy to them. I think that it really changes everything with regards to how you view not only the type of work that you're doing, the stuff that you're sharing with your colleagues, the stuff that you're learning from them. I think it makes us all better dentists.
00:24:08
Speaker
Absolutely. I read something which means I probably saw a TikTok on it that said it was somebody saying like when you start celebrating the accomplishments and the joys of your fellow peers, your life becomes a lot better as opposed to seeing them as a threat or competition because maybe they're taking
00:24:28
Speaker
better steps or advancing a lot faster than you are. I think that for dentistry, you really got to stay in your lane, find inspiration from others to try and be better and grow yourself in your practice, but know that your practice of dentistry is the way that you're practicing and you will continue to grow at your own pace.

Building Friendships via Social Media

00:24:47
Speaker
Which is why I've been like really loving like social media dentistry in general and like the whole world that this is Because I've met like so many people that I I would have never known otherwise if I hadn't gone into Like social media that have like different perspectives all have like different things to share like my friend dr. Steven Liu he is a while he was a public health dentist and
00:25:12
Speaker
And now he just switched over to private practice. And him and I connected via social media. We kind of like talked. We ended up going to the American Dental Association conference in Vegas. Together, that was the first time we ever met. We were friends for like two years before then.
00:25:29
Speaker
and we're suddenly sharing a hotel room and hanging out. And when we met, we had this instant connection. We were friends for years. It wasn't awkward. He's still one of my best friends and it's a social media friendship that I made. And so I think that in general, all of us coming together via the internet and sharing with each other has really opened up a whole new world for our generation of dentists.
00:25:57
Speaker
Oh, for sure. Yeah. Instagram university as they call it, right. And we're all just kind of students in it. And I used to think that, you know, I would learn so much more from an individual post, which I do, but then it kind of leads me into reading like more articles and learning more.
00:26:10
Speaker
like your Xylitol post that we kind of went into a deep dive about. But that is definitely a conversation for another day because I still don't know. We'll have to do an updated podcast for that one. For sure. Absolutely. Absolutely. I am curious in your future, do you foresee yourself buying your practice?

Family Health Influences Career

00:26:28
Speaker
Yeah, so definitely that's something that I recently actually even considered doing. I kind of slowed down on the buying a practice aspect because we had a personal thing with my mom where she had a cancer scare. It was actually like a thyroid cancer scare, which
00:26:47
Speaker
coincidentally also just made me even more interested in the importance of our oral cancer screenings and all that kind of stuff. But yeah, I kind of slowed things down a little bit because of stuff that was going on at home and just trying to make sure that I was there for my family. Again, we talked about the importance of
00:27:07
Speaker
of family in general. I know everybody cares about their family, but especially Latino families, we're very, very close with our family members. And if they need us to help them out, we're going to be there, even if it means my mom is moving in with me or anything like that. And so, yeah, that was all running through my head, and it's the reason why I slowed down on doing it. But it's still something that I'm very interested in, hopefully, within the next
00:27:33
Speaker
year or so, we'll see how things go. Obviously, I'm just about to start out a new practice and they're actually aware that I had been potentially searching to open my own practice at some point. And so, I don't know if from that there will be a
00:27:50
Speaker
partnership opportunity at some point, we discussed, but I don't know if that's going to really happen. I don't know what the future is going to look like. So I'm kind of taking it step by step, but it's definitely, I think that ownership is the only way that we can really, you know, do the dentistry that you want to do because ultimately whenever you're working for somebody else,
00:28:09
Speaker
you're limited based off of what they want to do for their office, the culture that they want to set up for their office. And the only way to really control that is to be the one that's controlling everything, calling the shots. And so it's a really good opportunity. Not everybody is going to be wanting to do ownership. And for some people, being an associate is what they want to do and it's what works for them. But yeah, that's definitely something that I see in my future.
00:28:39
Speaker
super excited to see what's to come

Future Plans and Family Support

00:28:41
Speaker
for you. And I hope that the health of your mom is stable and we'll send her good thoughts and prayers for sure. Actually, we got so blessed. We had so many prayers from my friends and family. Like I'm saying, Dr. Steven Liu, actually, he was one of my good friends. You never expect to make friends on social media and suddenly they're praying for your
00:29:03
Speaker
for your family and he was like checking in and stuff like that. And yeah, she ended up having a biopsy. It ended up being benign. She's still not completely out of the blue. They're going to have to do another biopsy in a year, but we got really blessed with a benign finding. Thank God. And that's beautiful to hear that Steven and his family was praying for your family. I think that that's wonderful and the beauty of community.
00:29:32
Speaker
Well, Justin, you and I could probably talk for hours on end, I'm sure. But before we take off, I would love to leave a message to our Hispanic and Latino listeners.
00:29:51
Speaker
Yeah, so funny story about that. My name is so people usually thought it was like Jose or something like that. Yeah, it's just Jocelyn. Jocelyn. Jocelyn, yeah. Jocelyn, para mi la comunidad es Espana y representar es muy importante porque por somos una comunidad grande, somos una comunidad de personas de muy trabajadores.
00:30:16
Speaker
uh the person ask a son um muy uh muy de familia y y para mi eso eso norguyo ser un undentista un doctor uh poder enseñar mi um mi representacionen en
00:30:33
Speaker
in dentistry, I'm like, it's weird being like, I'm not a no sabo kid. I made a video on this recently. I'm not a no sabo kid, but when I was a kid, I was very professional, I was like, it's difficult, no?
00:30:49
Speaker
So, for all of the people who work with me on the market, and I know that when I'm meeting a person, that's why I'm here. It's a very special place to connect with people who work with me, because it's very important for me to have a representation. We're very happy to have you here, and we're very happy to have you here in the future.
00:31:13
Speaker
Dr. Joseph, thank you so much for your time. If our listeners would like to connect with you, what's the best way?

Connect with Dr. Gastelum on Social Media

00:31:21
Speaker
So at Dr. Joseph, it's all together, no spaces, J-O-S-S-E-N. My mom decided to be very unique with our names there. So at Dr. Joseph on TikTok, Instagram, even like YouTube shorts, although I don't really like posts on there, but yeah. Very cool. Thanks so much again for your time and we'll catch everyone next time. Thank you.
00:31:43
Speaker
Thank you for tuning in to this episode of New Dentists on the Block. If you're not following him already, be sure to follow Dr. Joseph on TikTok and on Instagram at Dr. Joseph. We look forward to continuing to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month, not only during this month, but throughout the entire year. Please be sure to subscribe to the podcast on YouTube and on all major podcast platforms.
00:32:12
Speaker
I would love if you would leave a review of the podcast. If you have a new dentist you would like to recommend for the podcast, be sure to send an Instagram message to at newdentistontheblock. And be sure to follow me on Instagram at tsmysus.dds. We'll catch you next time.