October 1, 2023 • 48 mins
Meet Dr. Jonathan Baktari, triple Board Certified physician and Founder of e7 Health, a company that leverages technology to offer innovative medical care while providing cost savings for their patients and clients. We talk about the lessons learned from COVID-19 and how to better prepare for the next pandemic. We also discuss why AI and digital health are the future of healthcare. Check out his podcast BaktariMD
https://jonathanbaktarimd.com/
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Okay, you can see one patient at a time and you know
make an impact, and it is stillthe biggest honor on the planet
to take care of patients.
If anyone takes that forgranted, they're missing the
boat.
It is probably the.
It's a unique thing that onlyhealthcare providers, and
specifically physicians, havethe privilege and honor of you
(00:22):
know having these kind ofinteractions.
Right, but can you help evenmore people?
Can you help tens of thousandsof people potentially with your
knowledge?
So I think I thinkunderstanding that you can
impact one patient at a time,but then, as you go through your
travels, are there anyopportunities to impact many
(00:43):
more multiple of the ones you'recurrently touching?
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Just your collar is getting away from you, minor.
No, yours is fine.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Just be aware it's pretty irregulant.
Irregulant is that the word,and unscripted.
We find it's better that way.
So I mean we have some talkingpoints to discuss with you, but
it's really relaxing.
And I don't know what those are.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Those are my readers.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
All right, so Dr Clinton can screen.
Why don't you start us off withour screen?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
You know you're getting old when you I recently
had to increase my font size onthe iPhone.
I was always making fun ofpeople who had to do that, but
now it's like I've reached theage.
So welcome back to recommendDaily Dose.
I'm Dr Clinton Coleman with myreaders and Dr Seraad Sucker
with his collar who's yourtrusty sidekick with that collar
(01:45):
.
Sidekick back from Norway.
Right, I came out from Norwayyesterday.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
It was an amazing trip from my parents 50th Wang
anniversary and Norwegian glowto you.
Yeah, exactly, you know justate a lot of cheese and pink
salmon, so chief.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
All right, we have a special guest, triple board
certified not one, not two, butthree Dr Jonathan Baktari.
He's a healthcare CEO andfounder of multiple companies,
also a vaccine and COVID-19expert.
I'm looking at your your resume.
It's pretty impeccable.
I don't want to shortchange you.
I wonder if you'd be willing togive us an introduction of who
(02:20):
you are and everything you do.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Oh thank you.
Yeah, thanks for having me.
What an honor, by the way.
No, I'm sorry.
You know, kind of a straightarrow, probably like you guys,
went to college, premed, thengot into medical school,
residency, fellowship, got myboards in internal medicine,
pulmonary critical care, andthen went into clinical medicine
(02:45):
as well as teaching, and theneventually kind of branched out
into administrative medicine andthen eventually sort of we
started our own healthcarerelated companies that focus on
technology, and that's reallybeen my story in a real short
version.
It's been the exploration ofobviously getting into medicine
(03:06):
and being a physician and then,you know, trying to figure out
ways that you know you can makea difference, you know, in
addition to seeing patients, andthat's been our the journey so
far.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
Yeah, I want to dive into it.
I will see in much more detail.
But just on a very broad level,I always feel that you know, as
physicians for a long time youget pigeonholed right.
You go to I even went to gradschool before, you know, worked,
I did my time in the lab at NIH.
So you kind of just focus, verystraightforward, you know.
And then you reach thispinnacle right of your career
and I think you talk about thisthat okay, now I'm triple board
(03:39):
certified.
You know, probably now we'regetting to the age where we can
become not just diplomats of ourboards but even fellows of our
boards.
But then what's?
next is you know, it's aprivilege obviously to see
patients and take care ofpatients and always will be.
But then you know, for thosethat may have the desire to do
more, I don't think that medicaland this way teaches us how to
(04:02):
be entrepreneurs or thinkoutside the box of straight
straight medicine.
So how did you kind of thinkthat, hey, I need to me, you
know, I've done very well, Ireached a pinnacle my career
that you need to move on tosomething else?
I mean, what is that processlike for you?
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Or was?
Speaker 3 (04:17):
it like for you.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Right.
I think a lot of people thinklike it's just sort of, you know
, you wake up one day and you'vehad an epiphany or something
happens.
But for me it was much moregradual.
I think when I finished sort ofgetting board certified and
becoming a senior partner in mygroup and teaching, you know as
(04:38):
clinical faculty, there was thisneed to try and do things more
and I started doingadministrative medicine, got on
committees, and what I found isone door would open another door
.
So it wasn't this sort of setplan where I sat down at the
kitchen table and said, okay, Ineed to do these other things.
(05:00):
What I found is this reallyinteresting phenomenon of one
door opening another door, youknow, getting on the you know
some pharmacy committee at thehospital or becoming chief of
medicine at the hospital, andevery time I did something like
that, you know someone came upto me and said, hey, you seem
(05:21):
like you enjoy this.
Would you mind being on thiscommittee or would you mind
being involved in, you know,with this insurance company or
this hospital thing?
And so for me it was a gradualthing.
It was like watching grass growover a long, long period of
time.
I think the only difference wasI knew I wanted to do additional
(05:44):
stuff.
I didn't know what it was, butI didn't want to stop the
expanding learning and thejourney and I think, if I, I'm
gonna anticipate what you'relooking for.
So let me give you two thingsthat hit me over the head.
That caught my attention earlyon.
I had a friend of mine whopointed this out and he said you
(06:07):
know, doctors think they'rereally smart, but how smart are
they really?
Because if they couldn'tpractice medicine today, could
they put food on the table?
Speaker 3 (06:19):
Right, our repission holds into one.
You know one trick, right.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
Right, I mean.
But think about it.
If someone says, okay, you like, how could we make a living?
If we're so smart, Could wemake a living?
So that's number one, and numbertwo is this concept that
someone taught me is and I thinkyou hit the nail on the head
with it's an honor and aprivilege to take care of
patients.
But in addition to that, canyou impact patient care on a
(06:45):
more broader sense?
Sure, Right, because, okay, youcan see one patient at a time
and, you know, make an impact.
It is still the biggest honoron the planet to take care of
patients.
If anyone takes that forgranted, they're missing the
boat.
It is probably the.
It's a unique thing that onlyhealthcare providers and
(07:06):
specifically physicians have theprivilege and honor of you know
having these kinds ofinteractions.
But can you help even morepeople?
Can you help tens of thousandsof people, potentially with your
knowledge?
So, I think, understanding thatyou can impact one patient at a
time, but then, as you gothrough your travels, are there
(07:29):
any opportunities to impact manymore multiple of the ones
you're currently touching?
Speaker 2 (07:36):
I think the challenge is whether you stay in medicine
and just bang your head againstthe wall or you try to.
You know do something inside ofmedicine actually, like you
said, benefit the lives ofpatients.
So I want to talk about yourcompanies, because I think
that's important, especiallywith the technology aspect.
What prompted you to want toget involved in that?
Speaker 1 (07:59):
Well, I think the first company we set up was E7
Health back in 2009.
And you know, back then werealized that adult vaccination
was a big, big hole in thehealthcare system.
We were essentially think of italmost like a COVID company.
Before COVID hit, that was awhole idea of vaccinating adults
(08:20):
.
Because what happened?
I think in the 70s, 80s and 90s, primary care doctors started
to not stock adult vaccinationsanymore.
Just, I assume, partly becauseof reimbursements in the house
Reimbursement expands.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
I think a lot of them didn't know how to properly
code for it and they would feelokay, I bought X amount of
vaccines and no one used them,and now they're expired.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
Right, and actually now that I'm in the vaccine
world it gets even morecomplicated than that, because
to properly store them you need,like a Panasonic vaccine
refrigerator which costs $10,000.
And they were using sort of youknow, home depot refrigerators
to keep them, and some need tobe frozen, some need to be in
(09:04):
the fridge and their MAs need tounderstand which one's sub-Q
which one's.
You know, I am.
It was a whole learning curvethat if you really wanted to
have a lot of vaccines and so,besides expiration coding, there
was how to store them.
You know how to deliver them asyour MAs and nurses turn over.
Who's training all of them onhow to dilute?
(09:27):
You know, get the diluent anduncertain vaccines.
It's a whole universe.
It's almost, I would argue,vaccine medicine is.
You could almost do a residency.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Specialty yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Yes, and so I think having primary care doctors do
this vaccine thing as a sidehustle in a good way didn't make
sense.
And, of course, when theystopped doing it or started
pulling back, you know Walgreensand CVS and pharmacies started
doing it, but you know what Imean.
Truth be told, pharmacistsweren't trained to touch
(09:58):
patients and give them shots,and so there was that whole
thing.
And you know the pharmacies arebusy selling diapers and
Frito-Lays and other stuff.
Now they're giving vaccines,and you know.
So that didn't seem like theright solution either, of course
.
So it just seemed like weneeded to come up with a concept
(10:18):
for adult vaccinations.
People take it for granted.
I mean, people just think theflu shot, but getting people
caught up on their childhoodvaccines that they missed,
getting caught up on hepatitis B, the Gardasil, the sexually
transmitted vaccines that wehave, and then as well as Zoster
(10:39):
and what have you, so there's awhole pneumonia.
And then, of course, covid camealong.
So I think the CDC reportsthere's about 50,000 vaccine
preventable deaths in the UnitedStates.
That is more than the number ofpeople that died, or equal the
number of people that died inthe Vietnam war, and that's
annually.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
Yeah, I always tell, like med students, you know, if
you add up all the lives savedby modern medicine and I'm all
together still doesn't equate toall the lives saved by modern
day vaccines.
I mean, and peopleunfortunately, I mean you know
this and we all know this, butwe'll, I think, any opportunity
to get it out there, talkingabout the one in you know, 10
million adverse effects that mayhappen when they don't realize
(11:25):
all the lives that are saved.
So you're talking, obviously,on a public health point of view
.
You know, between that andadding fluoride to the water and
iodine, the salt is reallygreat things that have shown to
be such a benefit throughouthumanity.
Right, it affects so manypeople.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
So, yeah, well, said Right.
And then you know, the otherthing that kind of as I got more
into it, is some of the travelvaccines.
For example, I would say 90,and I'm gonna include myself.
When I was practicing andsomeone, if someone, came up to
me when I was practicing and Iwas triple board certified, I
thought I was the smartest guyon earth, theoretically, and
someone said to me tell me aboutthe yellow fever vaccine or
(12:01):
Japanese encephalitis vaccine.
I wouldn't even.
I wouldn't even know where tostart.
So this lack of education amongphysicians for some of these
vaccines that are out there.
I can't tell you the number oftimes we see people in our
clinic who come in for a travelconsult because they're going to
a developing nation and westart telling you about yellow
(12:24):
fever and Japanese encephalitisand some of these other travel
vaccines and they tell us well,I went to my primary care doctor
, how come he didn't tell meabout any of this?
And he said, well, just don'tdrink the water.
It was like the only advicethey could get from their
primary care doctor.
Well, that's not going to cutit if that's what the primary
care doctors are saying, and Idon't blame them because I don't
(12:45):
think the training is there toeducate.
I mean, even if you go toMexico for the weekend, you
theoretically need travelvaccines.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
Yeah, so I think the awareness, like you said, is not
there, that there may be travelclinics, right Even the ID
world, myself included.
Our office doesn't see thevolume to justify the cost and
expense and expertise to stocksomething like yellow fever.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
But then whose whose purview should that be?
I mean it's literallypreventive medicine.
So I mean your primary shouldbe preventative.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Well, so that was our concept, what we thought we
would revolutionize.
The concept is could we set upa clinic that would only do
adult vaccinations at theexpense of doing primary care
and urgent care?
Speaker 2 (13:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
So what we did is we set up E7 Health back in 2009.
We built two brick and mortarlocations and then we wrote
software to support it, becausethe other thing we found is none
of the EHRs could handle it.
So that's how we actuallyslowly became a technology
company, because if you come toour clinic, nothing you touch
(13:51):
will be a third party softwareEverything from our electronic
health records to appointmentsoftware, to portals, patient
portals.
We're like the only clinic inthe country that we don't have a
medical records department.
Everything we do for you ispushed to the cloud.
And then we started providingservices around the vaccination.
(14:11):
So if you're getting studenthealth vaccines for allied
health schools and you need a TVskin test, physicals
quantifierons, we an audiometrictest and vision testing for any
either school related oremployment related need.
As you got the vaccines, weprovided all the services around
the vaccines so you could comeget the vaccinations and
(14:35):
everything you needed aroundthere.
You know, if you need a visa togo work in Saudi Arabia,
there's a whole host of vaccinesyou need to get If you wanna,
if you work for a civiliancontractor, you wanna get
deployed to, you know, iraq,afghanistan.
You need a whole host ofvaccines for civilian
contractors.
So there's a whole segment ofadult vaccination that was not
(14:57):
being addressed, and so wethought we would tackle that.
At the exclusion of primarycare, urgent care and
occupational medicine, almosteverybody that tries to do what
we do can't help themselves butsneak in a few primary care
patients, or sneak in a few youknow Ocmet patients, or sneak in
(15:17):
a few urgent care patientsBecause-.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
So was that what that done, so that you, the
primaries that may refer to you,would feel comfortable that,
okay, they're just doing thisone niche thing and that they
wouldn't necessarily take mypatient away, so to speak?
Speaker 1 (15:28):
No, not really, Because honestly, my staff is in
terms of, it takes them six to12 months for us to train it as
a typical nurse to understandwhat we do without doing primary
care.
Imagine if we did primary careyeah, I mean, if I have a new PA
, literally first of all, forthree months they can't even see
(15:51):
a patient.
So it's not something thatsomeone can just start tomorrow,
and even my.
You know, I'm sure you guys arereally smart guys If I put you
into our community.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
There's more than others, but yeah, yeah one of us
.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
But there is such a learning curve to understand
vaccine, adult vaccination,medicine and everything that
goes around it that it's notsomething that someone can just
walk in and do.
So if we had to do primary careand urgent care we wouldn't be
able to provide the service wedo.
It's sort of like you know, ifan infectious disease guy wants
(16:28):
to add dermatology, I mean itcan be done, but it's not going
to help the case.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
So, just to be since you started the beginning and I
know Clint is interested becausehe has several startup ideas
that maybe he can talk about buthow did this grow?
So you started this in the yearyou know, 2009, 10, where did
it grow into, or where are youat now and what did you learn?
I understand that you kind ofuse this as a platform to just
(16:55):
springboard off into otherventures as well.
So I think really what it comesdown to is you know, can other
people listening out theremyself included you know that
would want to have theentrepreneurial spirit still
help people on a broad base.
You know, how do you have thatforesight?
So you said, okay, we've gotsomething here and where did it
kind of naturally progress fromthere?
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Well, so let's compartmentalize that.
So, when it comes to E7 health,what we then did is, and we
continue to do, is writetechnology.
So if we opened up another E7health in Texas or whatever,
that it would be scalable.
So our current software isgetting to the point where,
literally, we could open up astore anywhere in the country
(17:39):
and, just like if you opened upat McDonald's, they provide you
with all the software, thetechnology, the policies,
procedures, even the marketing,the training.
We have an online universitythat trains your front office
and online university.
We have a phone module that youknow.
We found that people didn'tanswer the phone correctly.
So someone's calling for acertain vaccine related stuff.
(18:00):
The staff wouldn't know what tosay.
So we actually have analgorithm depending on what they
ask for it.
Actually the screen is almostlike a teleprompter so they can
walk our staff through how tonavigate and provide the right
information to different typesof caller if they're trying to
get an immigration physical thatneeds vaccines, or deployment
(18:22):
or SCD anything that needsvaccines.
So we've been writingtechnologies so the concept is
scalable.
Sort of like if you go toMcDonald's, you know and you
want to buy one, they're goingto give you all everything.
They're going to give you thetechnology.
So we're on the forefront ofprobably the next 12 months
(18:43):
completing that so we'll befully scalable and literally our
software cloud-based technologycould support 500 clinics
across the country, if need be.
You know we wrote it all inMicrosoft Azure.
We've literally thought ofeverything in terms of our
(19:04):
appointment software.
When you come in, there's noclipboard.
We actually have four computerterminals.
If you didn't register on yourphone when you booked the
appointment, you upload whateverwe need, you answer whatever
questions we need and visitafter visit we already have
everything.
So we don't have a medicalrecords department, we don't
have a billing department.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
It's a pretty cool concept and does everything need
to be like brick and mortar?
I know in McDonald's you haveto have a physical location, but
I mean with online visits and,I guess, outsourcing, maybe if
someone set up an appointmentwith you guys and they'll come
to Dr Suggur and get theirvaccine with something like that
work.
Speaker 1 (19:45):
Well, because the vaccine is only 1% of it.
And here's the thing if yourstaff is busy doing other stuff,
they're not gonna be able topull off what we're talking
about.
But we did branch out you cansee over here, e-national
testing, so the part that is thepart that.
So that's a separate company,but it's really the same concept
in a non-brick and mortarfashion.
So the stuff we can do at E7Health that doesn't require
(20:09):
someone giving you a vaccine orgiving you doing a physical.
We started another company whichconnects to thousands of
laboratory centers where you cango on E-National testing order,
what you need a quantifier onor what have you, and literally
it's sort of like Amazon-esqueyou just three clicks away,
there's a lab within a half amile and we have doctors who are
(20:31):
licensed in all 50 states towrite the orders.
So that is the sort of theproblem, sort of the part you're
referring to.
And then the drug testingcomponent of our company is
another one that we can use andleverage a network of sites to
collect the drug testing.
(20:52):
So that became US Drug TestCenters.
So those two companies areexactly what you're talking
about, the national version ofE7 Health, but E7 Health itself
has to be brick and mortarbecause we do audiometric
testing, vision testing, givevaccines, do physicals.
So that is the part thatprobably within 12 months will
(21:13):
be ready to go.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Nation one and just a reminder, what you're based in
the South of the East, right inVegas.
Las Vegas.
So here on the East Coast, veryheavily saturated, large
academic centers and very moredense population, so could
something like E7, is thatsomething you're looking at?
Is it going to be more regional, like in the desert southwest
(21:37):
and Texas and, like you said, inthat area, or is this something
that could be done and scalable, even franchised, in the
Northeast, mid-atlantic or theWest Coast?
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Yeah, I mean we have a pitch deck that we've been
starting to write and the goodnews about our concept, since
really we have no naturalcompetition.
Everyone does a little bit ofwhat we do, but they do it as a
sort of side hustle.
Urgent Cares do a little bit ofit, walgreens does a little bit
of it, but no one doeseverything we do.
(22:07):
And what we found is most ofour clients and half of our
clients are businesses, they'reallied health schools, they're
defense firms we have Fortune500 defense firms that are our
clients, as well as anyone whoneeds an employee health
department, for example, butcan't afford it.
(22:28):
I mean, think about thehospital you're at.
They have an employee healthdepartment with a nurse, with a
refrigerator, but not every homehealth company can do that.
Not every nursing home can dothat, can have their own
employee health there.
So we become the outsourcedemployee health department for
(22:48):
all the organizations that can'tdo what your hospital is
currently doing, which is highlydedicated, and that's just with
employee health.
Then we have student health,travel medicine, std All of
these.
Instead of thinking of it asone store, think of it as a food
court with seven stores.
But they're related becausethey're all vaccine related.
So our clients who need studenthealth, whether it's an allied
(23:12):
health school, who can't affordto have their own student health
department for every UCLA orStanford, there's 20, 30 allied
health schools which don't havestudent health departments, so
we cater to them.
So literally what we do.
We've created this space andit's a multi-billion dollar
(23:35):
industry that currently is beingspread out to a bunch of
different providers who aredoing it as almost like a side
thing versus us, where it's ourcore.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Yeah, I appreciate that clarification and I have to
ask because I face it in my ownpractice all the time,
especially after COVID, some ofthe politicization of vaccines.
After a pleasure doing COVID.
I always wonder if you couldjust touch up on that in all
your experience of vaccines, ofhow you may deal with that.
Just in the community of peoplesay, well, vaccines are money,
(24:12):
revenue, they are revenue forbig pharma, et cetera.
Are you seeing a decrease indemand or are you still seeing
that people are seeing theimportant public health and
personal health attributes andnot listening to all the
political noise that are outthere?
Because, as we always say,covid-19 was a pandemic of
misinformation as well and Ithink still to this day, talking
(24:33):
to patients, I still will getsome negative feedback about if
I even bring up vaccines withthem.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Right, you know, to answer that question I had to
actually come to a resolution inmy own mind why vaccines even
fall in this debatable category.
Because I don't see a Facebookgroup of moms that don't believe
(25:02):
in anti-migraine medicationsfor their children, right?
I don't see a Facebook group ofpeople that are against.
You know antibiotics for theirchildren.
I don't see a Facebook.
So what is it about vaccines?
Excellent question, but I thinkI stumbled onto the answer.
I think because I didn'tunderstand it myself.
(25:22):
Like why are people not blaming?
You know different things onantibiotics, or you know white,
or you know antacids, or youknow anti-ulcer medicines.
Speaker 3 (25:35):
What is?
Speaker 1 (25:35):
it about vaccines.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
Why are those acceptable without you know,
without and taking Right, I mean?
Speaker 1 (25:40):
because they all have side effects, right?
I mean, we all, you and Iprescribe medication for most of
our career.
A lot of them have known sideeffects.
We all know it.
Speaker 2 (25:49):
I can give you a weight loss medication that may
cost thyroid cancer or EDmedication, without you know.
They'll take it without evenasking a question.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
Right, that's it.
And nobody says like, even ifyou have a procedure, nobody,
like everybody, knows if youhave a knee replacement, a
certain percentage of thosethings don't go well, but nobody
stops getting knee replacements, right.
So what I realized is that thereason vaccines seem to fall
into this weird category it'sthe one thing that is mandated
(26:22):
for public health reasons, likeschools and what have you, and
it's sort of it kind of once itcrosses over where you know the
government or the school systemsays your kid can't show up to
seventh grade without these.
Speaker 3 (26:34):
Then the conspiracy theories start right.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
Right, because otherwise it's.
I would argue there are a wholehost of other things that are
much worse.
You know anti-migraine,anti-alcertain.
The other thing that was reallyinteresting that I, now that
I'm in the vaccine world, is Ilove people who, like, say I
want all natural.
You know, I want to give birthat home.
(26:58):
I don't want an epidural, Idon't want this, I don't want
that.
But I cannot think of onemedication, one category.
It's not even medication.
I can't think of one categorythat is more organic than
vaccines.
Because at the end of the day,let's take your typical vaccine,
what are we really doing?
We're, you know, as I describedto my patients for inactivated
(27:20):
vaccines we're taking a bug,we're putting it in metaphoric
blender and we're giving you thetoes and elbows into your
system so your body thinks it'sseeing the whole bug.
If you view it like that,vaccines are probably the most
organic thing you can get right,because everything else is a
chemical for the most part.
(27:41):
When you get rosephan, you'regiving a real chemical 100%
chemical structure.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
yeah sure Right.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
But when you're giving antigens, for the most
part yes, there are some otherbyproduct, but for the most part
you're just giving a littlepiece of the corpse of the bug
which the person more thanlikely will meet the whole bug.
As I would say, during COVIDyou got two choices you either
get to see a piece of the bug or, more than likely, you'll get
to see the whole bug.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
If you view it like that, vaccines should be the
last thing that arecontroversial.
If you view it like that, bothof you probably prescribed
medication this morning and thatwere 1,000% just pure chemicals
.
I'm going to argue thatvaccines are just antigens.
They're essentially in theworld anyway.
(28:30):
For the most part, we're justputting them in a blender and
cutting them up and giving thema little delivery system.
Speaker 3 (28:37):
I think you said it very eloquently that the moment
you say, well, it's required ifyou attend school, college,
elementary school, that that'swhere the conspiracy theorists
take it.
Speaker 1 (28:51):
And run Because nobody says that about.
I don't know why I'm focused onmigraine making, but I don't
see anyone saying it.
Probably to say a Z-Pack.
Speaker 3 (29:00):
People will scream at me that I didn't give them a
Z-Pack for adenovirus.
They won't be upset unless theyleave with something in their
hands.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
They never say let my immune system fight itself, but
they'll say that about avaccine.
How did you guys navigatethrough COVID-19 with vaccines
and especially testing?
Speaker 1 (29:21):
So we really lucked out because we had already
written our technology andsoftware to test for MMR
Varicella.
We were a vaccine clinic beforethis thing hit.
We had our software up andrunning.
So literally to add COVID tothe list was just one more virus
we were going to test for.
So we set that up, we partneredup and we were one of the first
(29:45):
clinics in the country tointroduce nationwide home saliva
testing where we would mailkids to employers as well as
individuals, fedex them early onin the pandemic.
And it was.
We did the saliva in a tube, soit wasn't even the swab.
So we launched that nationwidevery early on, mainly because I
(30:08):
think this is what we were doingbefore the pandemic hit.
We were essentially a COVIDcompany.
Before COVID A lot of doctorclinics companies pivoted
towards COVID.
We just added to the list.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
I wanted to ask you just to switch gears for a
second, because some takeawaysthat you can perhaps give to
some of our listeners andviewers in terms of just
everyday concepts that you haveacquired through your developing
these companies, that otherphysicians, whether they're
interested in starting largecompanies or just interested in
better being, better divisionchiefs, mentors, what have you?
(30:49):
We're all the above.
I feel like you hit on the headof the house.
Smart, are we?
And I remember when I was ingrad school, someone said why
are you going to med school?
They, all you do is just learnwhat someone else found out.
Why not go to get a PhD?
And I remember thinking well,that wasn't for me.
I'm very happy that I went tomedical school, but I oftentimes
(31:09):
think, like you know, I'm notinventing something right, I am
reading and learning fromphysicians prior to me and I
gained we all gain clinicalknowledge.
But you know, you have theunique experience of developing
something from scratch as astartup and then learning all
these experiences and learningall these Valuable lessons.
So what can you port take toother physicians out there who
(31:30):
forget those?
The burnout and all that stuffwhich you know has been talked
to death about, really.
But just that may be interestedin Doing something
entrepreneurial in whateverscale it might be yeah, very
small, I think.
I think these lessons could beapplied kind of universally.
Speaker 1 (31:44):
You know, can I do a shameless plug because you're
like leading right into this.
So I get this.
I get this question a lot andso you know, as you probably
know, I have my own podcast,baccari MD, and so this season,
what I did was I actuallyLabeled the second season crash
CEO school, where I talk aboutall the mistakes I made and what
(32:08):
I learned in terms ofleadership and Mentoring other
people, enrolling people andskill sets that you need.
I think my first video was top10 mistakes people make and is.
I think we're on episode fiveor six, but so I get this
question a lot and and I gothrough it in my podcast, the
(32:29):
one thing that I would say toanswer your question is I think
people think being a leader, aCEO or head of a division
requires soft skills like I'mlikable, I'm knowledgeable,
people like me, people like tobe around me, I make people
laugh, I get along with people.
(32:49):
Yes, though those are fantasticand if you didn't have it, you
would be a failure in leadership.
However, but you're going toneed additional skill sets.
You know how to enroll peoplein your vision, how to hire,
fire, promote, how to Encourageand and how to calibrate all
that depending on differentpersonalities.
(33:10):
So what I would say is you know, just because you're likable
and you're smart won't make youland the 747 at 30,000 feet, and
I and I think physicians makethis mistake that I'm likable or
I have a lot of knowledge, soI'd be great at running an
(33:30):
organization and that doesn'ttranslate.
Speaker 3 (33:32):
Well, you're saying right?
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yeah, you've heard about the concept of the Peter
principle, which is, you know,people get Promoted to the level
of incompetence.
So just because you're a greatengineer Doesn't mean you'll be
great at being the head of theengineering department.
And just because you're a goodaccountant doesn't mean you'll
be great being the head of theaccounting department.
(33:55):
Sure, and I think physiciansoften mistake Every all the
great things that they do asthey.
Well, naturally, I would, Ishould be there, and all I would
say to them is acquire thosetechnical skills to be in
leadership, so you don't have tomake them one by one, and and,
and you think that's acquired byan executive MBA, which
(34:17):
oftentimes I've looked and thenrealized I didn't have the
energy to do.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
Or is that on the world, on the job?
You know real-world experience.
Where is that?
Is it like Clinton who readsthe Eclipse notes?
You know about how you'releader, like where, where those
heart I.
Like audio books up soft skillsin the hard skills.
I think a lot of us have thesoft personal skills, but some
of the more hard skills is thatonly learned in business school.
Or where can the averagephysician acquire those things?
Speaker 1 (34:43):
well, here's what I would say.
If you, if you watch my podcastand some of the skills that I
go through, you'll see that it'snot somewhere you can
necessarily pick up in a courseor what have you.
But what I would say to that isthat, short of finding a mentor
, as You're going through theprocess, you know there's really
(35:06):
no other way.
Those books will help, courseswill help, but I was super lucky
because I stumbled on to acouple of mentors and the one
thing I knew is I sort of usedthe strategy when I was a fellow
or when I was an intern, orwhen I let's go back to being a
medical student.
When I was a medical student, Ishut up and I listened to my
intern.
When I was an intern, I shut upand I listened to my resident.
(35:28):
When I was a resident, I shutup and listen to the fellow.
And was a fellow, I shut up andI listened to the attending.
So when I started doing thisstuff, I'm like I looked around,
said, hey, how have I gottenthis far?
Let me use the same strategy.
Okay, and just because I thinkwhat happens by time we're
attending, we're like, okay, wenow always have to be the
(35:51):
smartest guy in the room andthis whole idea if you're about
to go into something out ofsight of traditional medicine
After you are at the top of theheap, to then shut up again you
know, I already went throughthis.
No, no, there's one more time.
You, you got to find mentorsand you, you cannot be the
smartest guy and I told this tomyself because I'm guilty of it.
(36:13):
You cannot be the smartest guyin the room all the time.
When you, you know, if you wantto talk pulmonary critical care
, I'm okay with saying I'm assmart as anyone else in the room
.
But as soon as you stepped outof that purview, you got to step
back and say I'm not thesmartest guy in this room who is
.
They can't just go up to anyrandom person.
You have to seek out truementors who and who have a
(36:37):
connection to you, who arewilling to help you.
So it's not so simple, but it'snot so complicated.
But what?
And then the other way is to doit by hard knocks.
You know, pay tuition by makingcrazy mistakes that you don't
want to.
So I think a combination ofJust like when you were an
intern and resident, you knowyou kind of grew and what have
(37:00):
you.
Hopefully there was someonethere to Catch your mistakes.
But it's the same concept takento a different direction.
Speaker 2 (37:07):
I does that make sense?
Yeah, I think that's adifference.
They spend so much time workinghard to try to get where they
are.
They don't want to spend thatmuch effort trying to do
something different.
It's like starting from scratchagain.
Speaker 3 (37:18):
No, I like that on top of the heap.
It's hard to.
It certainly is hard to Step,you know, admit that you know,
now you're the top, and then totake a step back and again being
learning mode.
But I think we're all taughtthat we have to be learning our
whole lives, so Sometimes it'sjust better to just you're
learning how to play tennisright Like that was a new thing
(37:39):
that has come naturally to me,my friend.
Well, another thing I want toyou know is you were talking
about not being the smartest guyin the room.
So you know I wear a couple ofhats, actually many hats, but
you know the hair is going but Idon't have the beautiful hair
that that the Coleman has.
He was me to wear a hat, but,is you know, I'm the director of
(38:03):
our research department, so wedo a lot of clinical trials, a
lot of industry, industryexperience, etc.
And so you know the hospitalsay you know what.
We want you to be more involvedwith innovation and kind of
vetting innovation and andtechnology, and, of course, a
lot of it has to do with AI.
So I wonder if you could toucha little bit about, because this
is the big buzzword, but no, Istill think a lot of business,
don't they like to say AI andit's like crypto.
(38:25):
Right, you say it, maybe youinvest in it.
You have no idea what you'reinvesting in.
So, same idea with AI.
Want to know what your thoughtsmight be with AI and healthcare
and where you might see that.
I think it's a big, it's likethe next, you know, a calm.
There could be a lot ofpotential there for investments
and entrepreneurship, as well asPhysicians being obviously
being involved in development ofstartups and companies.
(38:46):
But what are your takes onwhere that's headed and how
that's gonna be impacting us?
Speaker 1 (38:52):
Yeah, I have general concerns about AI in general,
meaning as a society.
In terms of medicine, I'm a lotmore optimistic because, yeah,
because If you really thinkabout it, like when I was an
intern or as I'm not to giveaway my age here you know I had
the Washington manual in my coatpocket and me too.
You know, I had to so, you know,Would I have been better off if
(39:15):
the Washington manual and ahundred other manuals were
somehow Served up to me based onthe question I asked?
Of course I would.
And if that's what?
If that that part of AIIntuitively appeals to me, right
?
So if I can say, hey, give methe top 10 symptoms of Harry
(39:37):
Salukimia.
And somehow it magicallyappears and you know, and gives
you, is able to collate andserve up data in ways that we
can easily get to Right, how canthat?
That can only help patient care.
So I'm optimistic in that sense, just like I'm sure medical
(40:02):
students would laugh at anyonewalking around with a Washington
manual today.
You know, I'm hoping one daypeople can't imagine Getting
some data from AI that doesn'thelp them as they're seeing
patients and thinking aboutpatients.
Speaker 3 (40:18):
So I don't know if that answers your question, but
I'm optimistic in that sense ofCollating and serving up data
any more, in the sense that whenI went to this innovation kind
of seminar in healthcare and Iwas there to bet these different
technologies and this wassomething called the ARC
Symposium in Tel Aviv and Israeland you had like venture
(40:39):
capitalists there and you knowthere's financial people there
as well I mean, there's a bigsense of that.
Well, you know the next bestthing, whether it's AI enabled
ultrasounds that do echoes orbedside echoes, you know where,
in areas where you don't mindhaving cardiologists available
or radiologists, you know two inthe morning.
So I think there's just.
(41:00):
If you're talking aboutinnovation and then you're
talking about entrepreneurship,it seems to me who is not the
expert you are, that there is aand I'm seeing, like I probably
look at the stuff or read asmuch as I can.
So now my social media feedsare being filled with AIs for
dummies type of things.
(41:20):
Mit has AI in healthcare forphysicians and always in the
courses.
So I guess the idea is like youknow, is this something that a
physician who has an eye onother things that could help
patients on a larger basis,population basis, be looking
into?
Because I feel that this is avery, very large area where
(41:42):
you're going to have some, a lotof people trying to buy for
certain spots to have commercialand you know, and success.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
Yeah, I mean I saw an article about even like review
and having AI review cascansthat even radiologists might
miss certain areas, especiallyif you're going through 100
cascans a day.
So these are all the parts thatI don't think can replace
medical decision making.
But in terms of pointing out orserving up information in a
(42:13):
more organized way so we canmake better decisions can only
help.
And, like you said, in remoteareas where you don't have a
radiologist or what have you inan emergency or what have you,
either way, the more we cancollate data and serve it up,
whether it's on a CAT scan orwhether it's on a disease
process or pharmacy relatedissues, it can only be a win.
(42:38):
I mean, what I've seen is veryexciting and I think the more
that comes that can help thephysician or healthcare provider
at the bedside or near thebedside is going to be a win for
the patients.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
Yeah, I'm waiting for the new AI co-hosts for a
podcast.
Speaker 3 (42:56):
Amazing, I can tailor it to who and what I wanted to
look like and speak, then youwill, then I can, you will need
my me to carry this podcast andI can go to.
Speaker 1 (43:04):
ER.
I can feel the tension.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
Oh no, I know, I'm joking.
Speaker 1 (43:12):
I actually can feel the friendship.
Speaker 3 (43:14):
You should be able to .
We're like two coins, just youknow flip sides of the same coin
.
Yeah, tell us a little bit aswe're wrapping up, tell us a
little bit about some of yoursocial media handles.
I know you're on the media lab,but just kind of what's next
for you, where people can findyou, all those different things.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
Yeah, so of course, my podcast, baktari MD is on
YouTube as well as all thestandard places.
Baktarimdcom is our website,where I have all my interviews
and all our products are onBaktari MD.
Of course, e-national testing,us Drug Test Center's E7 Health,
as well as people can reach outto me on LinkedIn.
(43:52):
So just Baktari MD on LinkedIn.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
I find you on there, great.
Speaker 1 (43:58):
So that can be of any help to anyone or provide any
guidance or information.
That's part of our mission.
Part of our mission at leastalso with the podcast is to help
other physicians or healthcareproviders who are navigating a
potential transition or additionto what they're doing, or more
unhappy to help.
Speaker 3 (44:17):
Well, I tell you, I mean that idea of physicians
transitioning out of clinicalmedicine maybe not 100%, but
it's.
You know, sometimes I feel likeit's almost like you're going
from the military to a civilservice, it's a military to a
civilian right, and it's a scaryidea that you're no longer
going to be at that pinnacle orrelease in general, where you're
going to be getting out of yourcomfort zone.
And I think having more peoplelike you that have already made
(44:40):
that journey that can provideinsight and guidance and
counseling is extremelyimportant, because I think, if
these are my thoughts, you don'thave physicians that are being
at the table of these varioushealthcare entities.
Than who else are you going tohave?
People will complain that, well, administration, you have
non-physicians making decisions.
(45:02):
But you know myself, clinton,we do a lot of committees, like
you have, and a lot of possibleadministrative work, and then a
lot of people say why do youguys bother?
It's just a waste of time.
But you know if it's not usdoing it, then who else?
You know?
You need physicians to step upand, kind of you know, take that
conversation and provide allour insight medically,
clinically and otherwise.
Speaker 1 (45:20):
I commend both of you for doing that.
I think, to add to what you'resaying, one of the difficulties
for a lot of my colleagues andfriends that I talked to was
being a physician is part oftheir identity.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
And I think who they are as a human being often and I
think the concept of evenwalking away slightly from
patient care and I did a videoon this, leaving clinical
medicine on my podcast last yearis this losing their potential
identity.
Because, oh, if I'm not seeingpatients, you know what will
(46:00):
that mean to myself, image ofwho I am as a person, and I
think that takes a little bit ofwork.
The interesting thing is, atleast when I did it, although it
was gradual, I think thatthere's a level of just being
comfortable in yourself, thatsaying you know, just because,
just because you know you likepizza, you're not going to have
(46:24):
it every day and there's nothingwrong with having a chapter two
to your life or chapter three.
No one said there's got to beone chapter, nobody.
That wasn't a rule that anyonegave us.
That okay, you can be a doctor,that's it.
And why not have chapter two?
Why not have chapter three forthose who want it?
And the flip side is I knowpeople who they love seeing
(46:48):
patients, which we all do, butthat gives them so much joy that
anything that distracts fromthat is not acceptable and I
think that's amazing and I thinkthat's wonderful too.
So but for those that want todo help patients in a different
way, there should be otheroptions.
Speaker 3 (47:08):
Yeah, I like that.
You know, like you said, a lotof people that maybe don't
realize that they can have achapter two.
On a side note, I know Clintonstill is hoping for a chapter
two MBA career in some shape orform, but you know, you provided
so much insight today.
We really appreciate it.
I hope that all our listenerswill check all your social media
(47:29):
handles out, your podcast, yourwebsite, so we will certainly
have all information.
You know, when this episodecomes out, and myself, my, my
psychic, or you might or mightyour psychic, or fine, I'm, as
Dr Cole Clinton, coleman,psychic.
We thank you very much forcoming on our humble podcast,
for educating us, educating our,our listeners and really, you
(47:52):
know, being a model for a lot ofphysicians who have these ideas
and thought processes ofleaving clinical medicine some
shape.
We are formed.
We really appreciate all thehard work you're doing, so thank
you so much for coming on.
Speaker 1 (48:02):
Oh, thank you.
I have to tell you what a bighonor is to be on your show.
Thank you so much.
Oh, stop it.
Speaker 3 (48:08):
And for our listeners out there, you know, please
continue to like, listen, rateand subscribe, and till next
time I'm Dr Suggard, dr Coleman,be well.
Okay, you can see one patient at a time and you know
make an impact, and it is stillthe biggest honor on the planet
to take care of patients.
If anyone takes that forgranted, they're missing the
boat.
It is probably the.
It's a unique thing that onlyhealthcare providers, and
specifically physicians, havethe privilege and honor of you
(00:22):
know having these kind ofinteractions.
Right, but can you help evenmore people?
Can you help tens of thousandsof people potentially with your
knowledge?
So I think I thinkunderstanding that you can
impact one patient at a time,but then, as you go through your
travels, are there anyopportunities to impact many
(00:43):
more multiple of the ones you'recurrently touching?
Speaker 2 (00:59):
Just your collar is getting away from you, minor.
No, yours is fine.
Speaker 3 (01:06):
Just be aware it's pretty irregulant.
Irregulant is that the word,and unscripted.
We find it's better that way.
So I mean we have some talkingpoints to discuss with you, but
it's really relaxing.
And I don't know what those are.
Speaker 2 (01:17):
Those are my readers.
Speaker 3 (01:20):
All right, so Dr Clinton can screen.
Why don't you start us off withour screen?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
You know you're getting old when you I recently
had to increase my font size onthe iPhone.
I was always making fun ofpeople who had to do that, but
now it's like I've reached theage.
So welcome back to recommendDaily Dose.
I'm Dr Clinton Coleman with myreaders and Dr Seraad Sucker
with his collar who's yourtrusty sidekick with that collar
(01:45):
.
Sidekick back from Norway.
Right, I came out from Norwayyesterday.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
It was an amazing trip from my parents 50th Wang
anniversary and Norwegian glowto you.
Yeah, exactly, you know justate a lot of cheese and pink
salmon, so chief.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
All right, we have a special guest, triple board
certified not one, not two, butthree Dr Jonathan Baktari.
He's a healthcare CEO andfounder of multiple companies,
also a vaccine and COVID-19expert.
I'm looking at your your resume.
It's pretty impeccable.
I don't want to shortchange you.
I wonder if you'd be willing togive us an introduction of who
(02:20):
you are and everything you do.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Oh thank you.
Yeah, thanks for having me.
What an honor, by the way.
No, I'm sorry.
You know, kind of a straightarrow, probably like you guys,
went to college, premed, thengot into medical school,
residency, fellowship, got myboards in internal medicine,
pulmonary critical care, andthen went into clinical medicine
(02:45):
as well as teaching, and theneventually kind of branched out
into administrative medicine andthen eventually sort of we
started our own healthcarerelated companies that focus on
technology, and that's reallybeen my story in a real short
version.
It's been the exploration ofobviously getting into medicine
(03:06):
and being a physician and then,you know, trying to figure out
ways that you know you can makea difference, you know, in
addition to seeing patients, andthat's been our the journey so
far.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
Yeah, I want to dive into it.
I will see in much more detail.
But just on a very broad level,I always feel that you know, as
physicians for a long time youget pigeonholed right.
You go to I even went to gradschool before, you know, worked,
I did my time in the lab at NIH.
So you kind of just focus, verystraightforward, you know.
And then you reach thispinnacle right of your career
and I think you talk about thisthat okay, now I'm triple board
(03:39):
certified.
You know, probably now we'regetting to the age where we can
become not just diplomats of ourboards but even fellows of our
boards.
But then what's?
next is you know, it's aprivilege obviously to see
patients and take care ofpatients and always will be.
But then you know, for thosethat may have the desire to do
more, I don't think that medicaland this way teaches us how to
(04:02):
be entrepreneurs or thinkoutside the box of straight
straight medicine.
So how did you kind of thinkthat, hey, I need to me, you
know, I've done very well, Ireached a pinnacle my career
that you need to move on tosomething else?
I mean, what is that processlike for you?
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Or was?
Speaker 3 (04:17):
it like for you.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Right.
I think a lot of people thinklike it's just sort of, you know
, you wake up one day and you'vehad an epiphany or something
happens.
But for me it was much moregradual.
I think when I finished sort ofgetting board certified and
becoming a senior partner in mygroup and teaching, you know as
(04:38):
clinical faculty, there was thisneed to try and do things more
and I started doingadministrative medicine, got on
committees, and what I found isone door would open another door
.
So it wasn't this sort of setplan where I sat down at the
kitchen table and said, okay, Ineed to do these other things.
(05:00):
What I found is this reallyinteresting phenomenon of one
door opening another door, youknow, getting on the you know
some pharmacy committee at thehospital or becoming chief of
medicine at the hospital, andevery time I did something like
that, you know someone came upto me and said, hey, you seem
(05:21):
like you enjoy this.
Would you mind being on thiscommittee or would you mind
being involved in, you know,with this insurance company or
this hospital thing?
And so for me it was a gradualthing.
It was like watching grass growover a long, long period of
time.
I think the only difference wasI knew I wanted to do additional
(05:44):
stuff.
I didn't know what it was, butI didn't want to stop the
expanding learning and thejourney and I think, if I, I'm
gonna anticipate what you'relooking for.
So let me give you two thingsthat hit me over the head.
That caught my attention earlyon.
I had a friend of mine whopointed this out and he said you
(06:07):
know, doctors think they'rereally smart, but how smart are
they really?
Because if they couldn'tpractice medicine today, could
they put food on the table?
Speaker 3 (06:19):
Right, our repission holds into one.
You know one trick, right.
Speaker 1 (06:22):
Right, I mean.
But think about it.
If someone says, okay, you like, how could we make a living?
If we're so smart, Could wemake a living?
So that's number one, and numbertwo is this concept that
someone taught me is and I thinkyou hit the nail on the head
with it's an honor and aprivilege to take care of
patients.
But in addition to that, canyou impact patient care on a
(06:45):
more broader sense?
Sure, Right, because, okay, youcan see one patient at a time
and, you know, make an impact.
It is still the biggest honoron the planet to take care of
patients.
If anyone takes that forgranted, they're missing the
boat.
It is probably the.
It's a unique thing that onlyhealthcare providers and
(07:06):
specifically physicians have theprivilege and honor of you know
having these kinds ofinteractions.
But can you help even morepeople?
Can you help tens of thousandsof people, potentially with your
knowledge?
So, I think, understanding thatyou can impact one patient at a
time, but then, as you gothrough your travels, are there
(07:29):
any opportunities to impact manymore multiple of the ones
you're currently touching?
Speaker 2 (07:36):
I think the challenge is whether you stay in medicine
and just bang your head againstthe wall or you try to.
You know do something inside ofmedicine actually, like you
said, benefit the lives ofpatients.
So I want to talk about yourcompanies, because I think
that's important, especiallywith the technology aspect.
What prompted you to want toget involved in that?
Speaker 1 (07:59):
Well, I think the first company we set up was E7
Health back in 2009.
And you know, back then werealized that adult vaccination
was a big, big hole in thehealthcare system.
We were essentially think of italmost like a COVID company.
Before COVID hit, that was awhole idea of vaccinating adults
(08:20):
.
Because what happened?
I think in the 70s, 80s and 90s, primary care doctors started
to not stock adult vaccinationsanymore.
Just, I assume, partly becauseof reimbursements in the house
Reimbursement expands.
Speaker 3 (08:34):
I think a lot of them didn't know how to properly
code for it and they would feelokay, I bought X amount of
vaccines and no one used them,and now they're expired.
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
Right, and actually now that I'm in the vaccine
world it gets even morecomplicated than that, because
to properly store them you need,like a Panasonic vaccine
refrigerator which costs $10,000.
And they were using sort of youknow, home depot refrigerators
to keep them, and some need tobe frozen, some need to be in
(09:04):
the fridge and their MAs need tounderstand which one's sub-Q
which one's.
You know, I am.
It was a whole learning curvethat if you really wanted to
have a lot of vaccines and so,besides expiration coding, there
was how to store them.
You know how to deliver them asyour MAs and nurses turn over.
Who's training all of them onhow to dilute?
(09:27):
You know, get the diluent anduncertain vaccines.
It's a whole universe.
It's almost, I would argue,vaccine medicine is.
You could almost do a residency.
Speaker 2 (09:36):
Specialty yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Yes, and so I think having primary care doctors do
this vaccine thing as a sidehustle in a good way didn't make
sense.
And, of course, when theystopped doing it or started
pulling back, you know Walgreensand CVS and pharmacies started
doing it, but you know what Imean.
Truth be told, pharmacistsweren't trained to touch
(09:58):
patients and give them shots,and so there was that whole
thing.
And you know the pharmacies arebusy selling diapers and
Frito-Lays and other stuff.
Now they're giving vaccines,and you know.
So that didn't seem like theright solution either, of course
.
So it just seemed like weneeded to come up with a concept
(10:18):
for adult vaccinations.
People take it for granted.
I mean, people just think theflu shot, but getting people
caught up on their childhoodvaccines that they missed,
getting caught up on hepatitis B, the Gardasil, the sexually
transmitted vaccines that wehave, and then as well as Zoster
(10:39):
and what have you, so there's awhole pneumonia.
And then, of course, covid camealong.
So I think the CDC reportsthere's about 50,000 vaccine
preventable deaths in the UnitedStates.
That is more than the number ofpeople that died, or equal the
number of people that died inthe Vietnam war, and that's
annually.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
Yeah, I always tell, like med students, you know, if
you add up all the lives savedby modern medicine and I'm all
together still doesn't equate toall the lives saved by modern
day vaccines.
I mean, and peopleunfortunately, I mean you know
this and we all know this, butwe'll, I think, any opportunity
to get it out there, talkingabout the one in you know, 10
million adverse effects that mayhappen when they don't realize
(11:25):
all the lives that are saved.
So you're talking, obviously,on a public health point of view
.
You know, between that andadding fluoride to the water and
iodine, the salt is reallygreat things that have shown to
be such a benefit throughouthumanity.
Right, it affects so manypeople.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
So, yeah, well, said Right.
And then you know, the otherthing that kind of as I got more
into it, is some of the travelvaccines.
For example, I would say 90,and I'm gonna include myself.
When I was practicing andsomeone, if someone, came up to
me when I was practicing and Iwas triple board certified, I
thought I was the smartest guyon earth, theoretically, and
someone said to me tell me aboutthe yellow fever vaccine or
(12:01):
Japanese encephalitis vaccine.
I wouldn't even.
I wouldn't even know where tostart.
So this lack of education amongphysicians for some of these
vaccines that are out there.
I can't tell you the number oftimes we see people in our
clinic who come in for a travelconsult because they're going to
a developing nation and westart telling you about yellow
(12:24):
fever and Japanese encephalitisand some of these other travel
vaccines and they tell us well,I went to my primary care doctor
, how come he didn't tell meabout any of this?
And he said, well, just don'tdrink the water.
It was like the only advicethey could get from their
primary care doctor.
Well, that's not going to cutit if that's what the primary
care doctors are saying, and Idon't blame them because I don't
(12:45):
think the training is there toeducate.
I mean, even if you go toMexico for the weekend, you
theoretically need travelvaccines.
Speaker 3 (12:54):
Yeah, so I think the awareness, like you said, is not
there, that there may be travelclinics, right Even the ID
world, myself included.
Our office doesn't see thevolume to justify the cost and
expense and expertise to stocksomething like yellow fever.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
But then whose whose purview should that be?
I mean it's literallypreventive medicine.
So I mean your primary shouldbe preventative.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Well, so that was our concept, what we thought we
would revolutionize.
The concept is could we set upa clinic that would only do
adult vaccinations at theexpense of doing primary care
and urgent care?
Speaker 2 (13:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
So what we did is we set up E7 Health back in 2009.
We built two brick and mortarlocations and then we wrote
software to support it, becausethe other thing we found is none
of the EHRs could handle it.
So that's how we actuallyslowly became a technology
company, because if you come toour clinic, nothing you touch
(13:51):
will be a third party softwareEverything from our electronic
health records to appointmentsoftware, to portals, patient
portals.
We're like the only clinic inthe country that we don't have a
medical records department.
Everything we do for you ispushed to the cloud.
And then we started providingservices around the vaccination.
(14:11):
So if you're getting studenthealth vaccines for allied
health schools and you need a TVskin test, physicals
quantifierons, we an audiometrictest and vision testing for any
either school related oremployment related need.
As you got the vaccines, weprovided all the services around
the vaccines so you could comeget the vaccinations and
(14:35):
everything you needed aroundthere.
You know, if you need a visa togo work in Saudi Arabia,
there's a whole host of vaccinesyou need to get If you wanna,
if you work for a civiliancontractor, you wanna get
deployed to, you know, iraq,afghanistan.
You need a whole host ofvaccines for civilian
contractors.
So there's a whole segment ofadult vaccination that was not
(14:57):
being addressed, and so wethought we would tackle that.
At the exclusion of primarycare, urgent care and
occupational medicine, almosteverybody that tries to do what
we do can't help themselves butsneak in a few primary care
patients, or sneak in a few youknow Ocmet patients, or sneak in
(15:17):
a few urgent care patientsBecause-.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
So was that what that done, so that you, the
primaries that may refer to you,would feel comfortable that,
okay, they're just doing thisone niche thing and that they
wouldn't necessarily take mypatient away, so to speak?
Speaker 1 (15:28):
No, not really, Because honestly, my staff is in
terms of, it takes them six to12 months for us to train it as
a typical nurse to understandwhat we do without doing primary
care.
Imagine if we did primary careyeah, I mean, if I have a new PA
, literally first of all, forthree months they can't even see
(15:51):
a patient.
So it's not something thatsomeone can just start tomorrow,
and even my.
You know, I'm sure you guys arereally smart guys If I put you
into our community.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
There's more than others, but yeah, yeah one of us
.
Speaker 1 (16:05):
But there is such a learning curve to understand
vaccine, adult vaccination,medicine and everything that
goes around it that it's notsomething that someone can just
walk in and do.
So if we had to do primary careand urgent care we wouldn't be
able to provide the service wedo.
It's sort of like you know, ifan infectious disease guy wants
(16:28):
to add dermatology, I mean itcan be done, but it's not going
to help the case.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
So, just to be since you started the beginning and I
know Clint is interested becausehe has several startup ideas
that maybe he can talk about buthow did this grow?
So you started this in the yearyou know, 2009, 10, where did
it grow into, or where are youat now and what did you learn?
I understand that you kind ofuse this as a platform to just
(16:55):
springboard off into otherventures as well.
So I think really what it comesdown to is you know, can other
people listening out theremyself included you know that
would want to have theentrepreneurial spirit still
help people on a broad base.
You know, how do you have thatforesight?
So you said, okay, we've gotsomething here and where did it
kind of naturally progress fromthere?
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Well, so let's compartmentalize that.
So, when it comes to E7 health,what we then did is, and we
continue to do, is writetechnology.
So if we opened up another E7health in Texas or whatever,
that it would be scalable.
So our current software isgetting to the point where,
literally, we could open up astore anywhere in the country
(17:39):
and, just like if you opened upat McDonald's, they provide you
with all the software, thetechnology, the policies,
procedures, even the marketing,the training.
We have an online universitythat trains your front office
and online university.
We have a phone module that youknow.
We found that people didn'tanswer the phone correctly.
So someone's calling for acertain vaccine related stuff.
(18:00):
The staff wouldn't know what tosay.
So we actually have analgorithm depending on what they
ask for it.
Actually the screen is almostlike a teleprompter so they can
walk our staff through how tonavigate and provide the right
information to different typesof caller if they're trying to
get an immigration physical thatneeds vaccines, or deployment
(18:22):
or SCD anything that needsvaccines.
So we've been writingtechnologies so the concept is
scalable.
Sort of like if you go toMcDonald's, you know and you
want to buy one, they're goingto give you all everything.
They're going to give you thetechnology.
So we're on the forefront ofprobably the next 12 months
(18:43):
completing that so we'll befully scalable and literally our
software cloud-based technologycould support 500 clinics
across the country, if need be.
You know we wrote it all inMicrosoft Azure.
We've literally thought ofeverything in terms of our
(19:04):
appointment software.
When you come in, there's noclipboard.
We actually have four computerterminals.
If you didn't register on yourphone when you booked the
appointment, you upload whateverwe need, you answer whatever
questions we need and visitafter visit we already have
everything.
So we don't have a medicalrecords department, we don't
have a billing department.
Speaker 2 (19:25):
It's a pretty cool concept and does everything need
to be like brick and mortar?
I know in McDonald's you haveto have a physical location, but
I mean with online visits and,I guess, outsourcing, maybe if
someone set up an appointmentwith you guys and they'll come
to Dr Suggur and get theirvaccine with something like that
work.
Speaker 1 (19:45):
Well, because the vaccine is only 1% of it.
And here's the thing if yourstaff is busy doing other stuff,
they're not gonna be able topull off what we're talking
about.
But we did branch out you cansee over here, e-national
testing, so the part that is thepart that.
So that's a separate company,but it's really the same concept
in a non-brick and mortarfashion.
So the stuff we can do at E7Health that doesn't require
(20:09):
someone giving you a vaccine orgiving you doing a physical.
We started another company whichconnects to thousands of
laboratory centers where you cango on E-National testing order,
what you need a quantifier onor what have you, and literally
it's sort of like Amazon-esqueyou just three clicks away,
there's a lab within a half amile and we have doctors who are
(20:31):
licensed in all 50 states towrite the orders.
So that is the sort of theproblem, sort of the part you're
referring to.
And then the drug testingcomponent of our company is
another one that we can use andleverage a network of sites to
collect the drug testing.
(20:52):
So that became US Drug TestCenters.
So those two companies areexactly what you're talking
about, the national version ofE7 Health, but E7 Health itself
has to be brick and mortarbecause we do audiometric
testing, vision testing, givevaccines, do physicals.
So that is the part thatprobably within 12 months will
(21:13):
be ready to go.
Speaker 3 (21:15):
Nation one and just a reminder, what you're based in
the South of the East, right inVegas.
Las Vegas.
So here on the East Coast, veryheavily saturated, large
academic centers and very moredense population, so could
something like E7, is thatsomething you're looking at?
Is it going to be more regional, like in the desert southwest
(21:37):
and Texas and, like you said, inthat area, or is this something
that could be done and scalable, even franchised, in the
Northeast, mid-atlantic or theWest Coast?
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Yeah, I mean we have a pitch deck that we've been
starting to write and the goodnews about our concept, since
really we have no naturalcompetition.
Everyone does a little bit ofwhat we do, but they do it as a
sort of side hustle.
Urgent Cares do a little bit ofit, walgreens does a little bit
of it, but no one doeseverything we do.
(22:07):
And what we found is most ofour clients and half of our
clients are businesses, they'reallied health schools, they're
defense firms we have Fortune500 defense firms that are our
clients, as well as anyone whoneeds an employee health
department, for example, butcan't afford it.
(22:28):
I mean, think about thehospital you're at.
They have an employee healthdepartment with a nurse, with a
refrigerator, but not every homehealth company can do that.
Not every nursing home can dothat, can have their own
employee health there.
So we become the outsourcedemployee health department for
(22:48):
all the organizations that can'tdo what your hospital is
currently doing, which is highlydedicated, and that's just with
employee health.
Then we have student health,travel medicine, std All of
these.
Instead of thinking of it asone store, think of it as a food
court with seven stores.
But they're related becausethey're all vaccine related.
So our clients who need studenthealth, whether it's an allied
(23:12):
health school, who can't affordto have their own student health
department for every UCLA orStanford, there's 20, 30 allied
health schools which don't havestudent health departments, so
we cater to them.
So literally what we do.
We've created this space andit's a multi-billion dollar
(23:35):
industry that currently is beingspread out to a bunch of
different providers who aredoing it as almost like a side
thing versus us, where it's ourcore.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Yeah, I appreciate that clarification and I have to
ask because I face it in my ownpractice all the time,
especially after COVID, some ofthe politicization of vaccines.
After a pleasure doing COVID.
I always wonder if you couldjust touch up on that in all
your experience of vaccines, ofhow you may deal with that.
Just in the community of peoplesay, well, vaccines are money,
(24:12):
revenue, they are revenue forbig pharma, et cetera.
Are you seeing a decrease indemand or are you still seeing
that people are seeing theimportant public health and
personal health attributes andnot listening to all the
political noise that are outthere?
Because, as we always say,covid-19 was a pandemic of
misinformation as well and Ithink still to this day, talking
(24:33):
to patients, I still will getsome negative feedback about if
I even bring up vaccines withthem.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Right, you know, to answer that question I had to
actually come to a resolution inmy own mind why vaccines even
fall in this debatable category.
Because I don't see a Facebookgroup of moms that don't believe
(25:02):
in anti-migraine medicationsfor their children, right?
I don't see a Facebook group ofpeople that are against.
You know antibiotics for theirchildren.
I don't see a Facebook.
So what is it about vaccines?
Excellent question, but I thinkI stumbled onto the answer.
I think because I didn'tunderstand it myself.
(25:22):
Like why are people not blaming?
You know different things onantibiotics, or you know white,
or you know antacids, or youknow anti-ulcer medicines.
Speaker 3 (25:35):
What is?
Speaker 1 (25:35):
it about vaccines.
Speaker 3 (25:36):
Why are those acceptable without you know,
without and taking Right, I mean?
Speaker 1 (25:40):
because they all have side effects, right?
I mean, we all, you and Iprescribe medication for most of
our career.
A lot of them have known sideeffects.
We all know it.
Speaker 2 (25:49):
I can give you a weight loss medication that may
cost thyroid cancer or EDmedication, without you know.
They'll take it without evenasking a question.
Speaker 1 (25:58):
Right, that's it.
And nobody says like, even ifyou have a procedure, nobody,
like everybody, knows if youhave a knee replacement, a
certain percentage of thosethings don't go well, but nobody
stops getting knee replacements, right.
So what I realized is that thereason vaccines seem to fall
into this weird category it'sthe one thing that is mandated
(26:22):
for public health reasons, likeschools and what have you, and
it's sort of it kind of once itcrosses over where you know the
government or the school systemsays your kid can't show up to
seventh grade without these.
Speaker 3 (26:34):
Then the conspiracy theories start right.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
Right, because otherwise it's.
I would argue there are a wholehost of other things that are
much worse.
You know anti-migraine,anti-alcertain.
The other thing that was reallyinteresting that I, now that
I'm in the vaccine world, is Ilove people who, like, say I
want all natural.
You know, I want to give birthat home.
(26:58):
I don't want an epidural, Idon't want this, I don't want
that.
But I cannot think of onemedication, one category.
It's not even medication.
I can't think of one categorythat is more organic than
vaccines.
Because at the end of the day,let's take your typical vaccine,
what are we really doing?
We're, you know, as I describedto my patients for inactivated
(27:20):
vaccines we're taking a bug,we're putting it in metaphoric
blender and we're giving you thetoes and elbows into your
system so your body thinks it'sseeing the whole bug.
If you view it like that,vaccines are probably the most
organic thing you can get right,because everything else is a
chemical for the most part.
(27:41):
When you get rosephan, you'regiving a real chemical 100%
chemical structure.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
yeah sure Right.
Speaker 1 (27:47):
But when you're giving antigens, for the most
part yes, there are some otherbyproduct, but for the most part
you're just giving a littlepiece of the corpse of the bug
which the person more thanlikely will meet the whole bug.
As I would say, during COVIDyou got two choices you either
get to see a piece of the bug or, more than likely, you'll get
to see the whole bug.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
If you view it like that, vaccines should be the
last thing that arecontroversial.
If you view it like that, bothof you probably prescribed
medication this morning and thatwere 1,000% just pure chemicals
.
I'm going to argue thatvaccines are just antigens.
They're essentially in theworld anyway.
(28:30):
For the most part, we're justputting them in a blender and
cutting them up and giving thema little delivery system.
Speaker 3 (28:37):
I think you said it very eloquently that the moment
you say, well, it's required ifyou attend school, college,
elementary school, that that'swhere the conspiracy theorists
take it.
Speaker 1 (28:51):
And run Because nobody says that about.
I don't know why I'm focused onmigraine making, but I don't
see anyone saying it.
Probably to say a Z-Pack.
Speaker 3 (29:00):
People will scream at me that I didn't give them a
Z-Pack for adenovirus.
They won't be upset unless theyleave with something in their
hands.
Speaker 2 (29:09):
They never say let my immune system fight itself, but
they'll say that about avaccine.
How did you guys navigatethrough COVID-19 with vaccines
and especially testing?
Speaker 1 (29:21):
So we really lucked out because we had already
written our technology andsoftware to test for MMR
Varicella.
We were a vaccine clinic beforethis thing hit.
We had our software up andrunning.
So literally to add COVID tothe list was just one more virus
we were going to test for.
So we set that up, we partneredup and we were one of the first
(29:45):
clinics in the country tointroduce nationwide home saliva
testing where we would mailkids to employers as well as
individuals, fedex them early onin the pandemic.
And it was.
We did the saliva in a tube, soit wasn't even the swab.
So we launched that nationwidevery early on, mainly because I
(30:08):
think this is what we were doingbefore the pandemic hit.
We were essentially a COVIDcompany.
Before COVID A lot of doctorclinics companies pivoted
towards COVID.
We just added to the list.
Speaker 3 (30:24):
I wanted to ask you just to switch gears for a
second, because some takeawaysthat you can perhaps give to
some of our listeners andviewers in terms of just
everyday concepts that you haveacquired through your developing
these companies, that otherphysicians, whether they're
interested in starting largecompanies or just interested in
better being, better divisionchiefs, mentors, what have you?
(30:49):
We're all the above.
I feel like you hit on the headof the house.
Smart, are we?
And I remember when I was ingrad school, someone said why
are you going to med school?
They, all you do is just learnwhat someone else found out.
Why not go to get a PhD?
And I remember thinking well,that wasn't for me.
I'm very happy that I went tomedical school, but I oftentimes
(31:09):
think, like you know, I'm notinventing something right, I am
reading and learning fromphysicians prior to me and I
gained we all gain clinicalknowledge.
But you know, you have theunique experience of developing
something from scratch as astartup and then learning all
these experiences and learningall these Valuable lessons.
So what can you port take toother physicians out there who
(31:30):
forget those?
The burnout and all that stuffwhich you know has been talked
to death about, really.
But just that may be interestedin Doing something
entrepreneurial in whateverscale it might be yeah, very
small, I think.
I think these lessons could beapplied kind of universally.
Speaker 1 (31:44):
You know, can I do a shameless plug because you're
like leading right into this.
So I get this.
I get this question a lot andso you know, as you probably
know, I have my own podcast,baccari MD, and so this season,
what I did was I actuallyLabeled the second season crash
CEO school, where I talk aboutall the mistakes I made and what
(32:08):
I learned in terms ofleadership and Mentoring other
people, enrolling people andskill sets that you need.
I think my first video was top10 mistakes people make and is.
I think we're on episode fiveor six, but so I get this
question a lot and and I gothrough it in my podcast, the
(32:29):
one thing that I would say toanswer your question is I think
people think being a leader, aCEO or head of a division
requires soft skills like I'mlikable, I'm knowledgeable,
people like me, people like tobe around me, I make people
laugh, I get along with people.
(32:49):
Yes, though those are fantasticand if you didn't have it, you
would be a failure in leadership.
However, but you're going toneed additional skill sets.
You know how to enroll peoplein your vision, how to hire,
fire, promote, how to Encourageand and how to calibrate all
that depending on differentpersonalities.
(33:10):
So what I would say is you know, just because you're likable
and you're smart won't make youland the 747 at 30,000 feet, and
I and I think physicians makethis mistake that I'm likable or
I have a lot of knowledge, soI'd be great at running an
(33:30):
organization and that doesn'ttranslate.
Speaker 3 (33:32):
Well, you're saying right?
Speaker 1 (33:34):
Yeah, you've heard about the concept of the Peter
principle, which is, you know,people get Promoted to the level
of incompetence.
So just because you're a greatengineer Doesn't mean you'll be
great at being the head of theengineering department.
And just because you're a goodaccountant doesn't mean you'll
be great being the head of theaccounting department.
(33:55):
Sure, and I think physiciansoften mistake Every all the
great things that they do asthey.
Well, naturally, I would, Ishould be there, and all I would
say to them is acquire thosetechnical skills to be in
leadership, so you don't have tomake them one by one, and and,
and you think that's acquired byan executive MBA, which
(34:17):
oftentimes I've looked and thenrealized I didn't have the
energy to do.
Speaker 3 (34:20):
Or is that on the world, on the job?
You know real-world experience.
Where is that?
Is it like Clinton who readsthe Eclipse notes?
You know about how you'releader, like where, where those
heart I.
Like audio books up soft skillsin the hard skills.
I think a lot of us have thesoft personal skills, but some
of the more hard skills is thatonly learned in business school.
Or where can the averagephysician acquire those things?
Speaker 1 (34:43):
well, here's what I would say.
If you, if you watch my podcastand some of the skills that I
go through, you'll see that it'snot somewhere you can
necessarily pick up in a courseor what have you.
But what I would say to that isthat, short of finding a mentor
, as You're going through theprocess, you know there's really
(35:06):
no other way.
Those books will help, courseswill help, but I was super lucky
because I stumbled on to acouple of mentors and the one
thing I knew is I sort of usedthe strategy when I was a fellow
or when I was an intern, orwhen I let's go back to being a
medical student.
When I was a medical student, Ishut up and I listened to my
intern.
When I was an intern, I shut upand I listened to my resident.
(35:28):
When I was a resident, I shutup and listen to the fellow.
And was a fellow, I shut up andI listened to the attending.
So when I started doing thisstuff, I'm like I looked around,
said, hey, how have I gottenthis far?
Let me use the same strategy.
Okay, and just because I thinkwhat happens by time we're
attending, we're like, okay, wenow always have to be the
(35:51):
smartest guy in the room andthis whole idea if you're about
to go into something out ofsight of traditional medicine
After you are at the top of theheap, to then shut up again you
know, I already went throughthis.
No, no, there's one more time.
You, you got to find mentorsand you, you cannot be the
smartest guy and I told this tomyself because I'm guilty of it.
(36:13):
You cannot be the smartest guyin the room all the time.
When you, you know, if you wantto talk pulmonary critical care
, I'm okay with saying I'm assmart as anyone else in the room
.
But as soon as you stepped outof that purview, you got to step
back and say I'm not thesmartest guy in this room who is
.
They can't just go up to anyrandom person.
You have to seek out truementors who and who have a
(36:37):
connection to you, who arewilling to help you.
So it's not so simple, but it'snot so complicated.
But what?
And then the other way is to doit by hard knocks.
You know, pay tuition by makingcrazy mistakes that you don't
want to.
So I think a combination ofJust like when you were an
intern and resident, you knowyou kind of grew and what have
(37:00):
you.
Hopefully there was someonethere to Catch your mistakes.
But it's the same concept takento a different direction.
Speaker 2 (37:07):
I does that make sense?
Yeah, I think that's adifference.
They spend so much time workinghard to try to get where they
are.
They don't want to spend thatmuch effort trying to do
something different.
It's like starting from scratchagain.
Speaker 3 (37:18):
No, I like that on top of the heap.
It's hard to.
It certainly is hard to Step,you know, admit that you know,
now you're the top, and then totake a step back and again being
learning mode.
But I think we're all taughtthat we have to be learning our
whole lives, so Sometimes it'sjust better to just you're
learning how to play tennisright Like that was a new thing
(37:39):
that has come naturally to me,my friend.
Well, another thing I want toyou know is you were talking
about not being the smartest guyin the room.
So you know I wear a couple ofhats, actually many hats, but
you know the hair is going but Idon't have the beautiful hair
that that the Coleman has.
He was me to wear a hat, but,is you know, I'm the director of
(38:03):
our research department, so wedo a lot of clinical trials, a
lot of industry, industryexperience, etc.
And so you know the hospitalsay you know what.
We want you to be more involvedwith innovation and kind of
vetting innovation and andtechnology, and, of course, a
lot of it has to do with AI.
So I wonder if you could toucha little bit about, because this
is the big buzzword, but no, Istill think a lot of business,
don't they like to say AI andit's like crypto.
(38:25):
Right, you say it, maybe youinvest in it.
You have no idea what you'reinvesting in.
So, same idea with AI.
Want to know what your thoughtsmight be with AI and healthcare
and where you might see that.
I think it's a big, it's likethe next, you know, a calm.
There could be a lot ofpotential there for investments
and entrepreneurship, as well asPhysicians being obviously
being involved in development ofstartups and companies.
(38:46):
But what are your takes onwhere that's headed and how
that's gonna be impacting us?
Speaker 1 (38:52):
Yeah, I have general concerns about AI in general,
meaning as a society.
In terms of medicine, I'm a lotmore optimistic because, yeah,
because If you really thinkabout it, like when I was an
intern or as I'm not to giveaway my age here you know I had
the Washington manual in my coatpocket and me too.
You know, I had to so, you know,Would I have been better off if
(39:15):
the Washington manual and ahundred other manuals were
somehow Served up to me based onthe question I asked?
Of course I would.
And if that's what?
If that that part of AIIntuitively appeals to me, right
?
So if I can say, hey, give methe top 10 symptoms of Harry
(39:37):
Salukimia.
And somehow it magicallyappears and you know, and gives
you, is able to collate andserve up data in ways that we
can easily get to Right, how canthat?
That can only help patient care.
So I'm optimistic in that sense, just like I'm sure medical
(40:02):
students would laugh at anyonewalking around with a Washington
manual today.
You know, I'm hoping one daypeople can't imagine Getting
some data from AI that doesn'thelp them as they're seeing
patients and thinking aboutpatients.
Speaker 3 (40:18):
So I don't know if that answers your question, but
I'm optimistic in that sense ofCollating and serving up data
any more, in the sense that whenI went to this innovation kind
of seminar in healthcare and Iwas there to bet these different
technologies and this wassomething called the ARC
Symposium in Tel Aviv and Israeland you had like venture
(40:39):
capitalists there and you knowthere's financial people there
as well I mean, there's a bigsense of that.
Well, you know the next bestthing, whether it's AI enabled
ultrasounds that do echoes orbedside echoes, you know where,
in areas where you don't mindhaving cardiologists available
or radiologists, you know two inthe morning.
So I think there's just.
(41:00):
If you're talking aboutinnovation and then you're
talking about entrepreneurship,it seems to me who is not the
expert you are, that there is aand I'm seeing, like I probably
look at the stuff or read asmuch as I can.
So now my social media feedsare being filled with AIs for
dummies type of things.
(41:20):
Mit has AI in healthcare forphysicians and always in the
courses.
So I guess the idea is like youknow, is this something that a
physician who has an eye onother things that could help
patients on a larger basis,population basis, be looking
into?
Because I feel that this is avery, very large area where
(41:42):
you're going to have some, a lotof people trying to buy for
certain spots to have commercialand you know, and success.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
Yeah, I mean I saw an article about even like review
and having AI review cascansthat even radiologists might
miss certain areas, especiallyif you're going through 100
cascans a day.
So these are all the parts thatI don't think can replace
medical decision making.
But in terms of pointing out orserving up information in a
(42:13):
more organized way so we canmake better decisions can only
help.
And, like you said, in remoteareas where you don't have a
radiologist or what have you inan emergency or what have you,
either way, the more we cancollate data and serve it up,
whether it's on a CAT scan orwhether it's on a disease
process or pharmacy relatedissues, it can only be a win.
(42:38):
I mean, what I've seen is veryexciting and I think the more
that comes that can help thephysician or healthcare provider
at the bedside or near thebedside is going to be a win for
the patients.
Speaker 2 (42:52):
Yeah, I'm waiting for the new AI co-hosts for a
podcast.
Speaker 3 (42:56):
Amazing, I can tailor it to who and what I wanted to
look like and speak, then youwill, then I can, you will need
my me to carry this podcast andI can go to.
Speaker 1 (43:04):
ER.
I can feel the tension.
Speaker 3 (43:09):
Oh no, I know, I'm joking.
Speaker 1 (43:12):
I actually can feel the friendship.
Speaker 3 (43:14):
You should be able to .
We're like two coins, just youknow flip sides of the same coin
.
Yeah, tell us a little bit aswe're wrapping up, tell us a
little bit about some of yoursocial media handles.
I know you're on the media lab,but just kind of what's next
for you, where people can findyou, all those different things.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
Yeah, so of course, my podcast, baktari MD is on
YouTube as well as all thestandard places.
Baktarimdcom is our website,where I have all my interviews
and all our products are onBaktari MD.
Of course, e-national testing,us Drug Test Center's E7 Health,
as well as people can reach outto me on LinkedIn.
(43:52):
So just Baktari MD on LinkedIn.
Speaker 3 (43:56):
I find you on there, great.
Speaker 1 (43:58):
So that can be of any help to anyone or provide any
guidance or information.
That's part of our mission.
Part of our mission at leastalso with the podcast is to help
other physicians or healthcareproviders who are navigating a
potential transition or additionto what they're doing, or more
unhappy to help.
Speaker 3 (44:17):
Well, I tell you, I mean that idea of physicians
transitioning out of clinicalmedicine maybe not 100%, but
it's.
You know, sometimes I feel likeit's almost like you're going
from the military to a civilservice, it's a military to a
civilian right, and it's a scaryidea that you're no longer
going to be at that pinnacle orrelease in general, where you're
going to be getting out of yourcomfort zone.
And I think having more peoplelike you that have already made
(44:40):
that journey that can provideinsight and guidance and
counseling is extremelyimportant, because I think, if
these are my thoughts, you don'thave physicians that are being
at the table of these varioushealthcare entities.
Than who else are you going tohave?
People will complain that, well, administration, you have
non-physicians making decisions.
(45:02):
But you know myself, clinton,we do a lot of committees, like
you have, and a lot of possibleadministrative work, and then a
lot of people say why do youguys bother?
It's just a waste of time.
But you know if it's not usdoing it, then who else?
You know?
You need physicians to step upand, kind of you know, take that
conversation and provide allour insight medically,
clinically and otherwise.
Speaker 1 (45:20):
I commend both of you for doing that.
I think, to add to what you'resaying, one of the difficulties
for a lot of my colleagues andfriends that I talked to was
being a physician is part oftheir identity.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (45:36):
And I think who they are as a human being often and I
think the concept of evenwalking away slightly from
patient care and I did a videoon this, leaving clinical
medicine on my podcast last yearis this losing their potential
identity.
Because, oh, if I'm not seeingpatients, you know what will
(46:00):
that mean to myself, image ofwho I am as a person, and I
think that takes a little bit ofwork.
The interesting thing is, atleast when I did it, although it
was gradual, I think thatthere's a level of just being
comfortable in yourself, thatsaying you know, just because,
just because you know you likepizza, you're not going to have
(46:24):
it every day and there's nothingwrong with having a chapter two
to your life or chapter three.
No one said there's got to beone chapter, nobody.
That wasn't a rule that anyonegave us.
That okay, you can be a doctor,that's it.
And why not have chapter two?
Why not have chapter three forthose who want it?
And the flip side is I knowpeople who they love seeing
(46:48):
patients, which we all do, butthat gives them so much joy that
anything that distracts fromthat is not acceptable and I
think that's amazing and I thinkthat's wonderful too.
So but for those that want todo help patients in a different
way, there should be otheroptions.
Speaker 3 (47:08):
Yeah, I like that.
You know, like you said, a lotof people that maybe don't
realize that they can have achapter two.
On a side note, I know Clintonstill is hoping for a chapter
two MBA career in some shape orform, but you know, you provided
so much insight today.
We really appreciate it.
I hope that all our listenerswill check all your social media
(47:29):
handles out, your podcast, yourwebsite, so we will certainly
have all information.
You know, when this episodecomes out, and myself, my, my
psychic, or you might or mightyour psychic, or fine, I'm, as
Dr Cole Clinton, coleman,psychic.
We thank you very much forcoming on our humble podcast,
for educating us, educating our,our listeners and really, you
(47:52):
know, being a model for a lot ofphysicians who have these ideas
and thought processes ofleaving clinical medicine some
shape.
We are formed.
We really appreciate all thehard work you're doing, so thank
you so much for coming on.
Speaker 1 (48:02):
Oh, thank you.
I have to tell you what a bighonor is to be on your show.
Thank you so much.
Oh, stop it.
Speaker 3 (48:08):
And for our listeners out there, you know, please
continue to like, listen, rateand subscribe, and till next
time I'm Dr Suggard, dr Coleman,be well.
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