April 30, 2025 • 39 mins
The salient focus of our discussion today revolves around the transformative potential of lifestyle changes in reclaiming metabolic health, as articulated by our esteemed guest, Dr. Robert Lufkin. As a distinguished physician, professor, and New York Times bestselling author, Dr. Lufkin has dedicated his career to empowering individuals to confront chronic diseases through informed lifestyle choices rather than solely relying on conventional pharmaceuticals. He shares his own journey of overcoming four chronic ailments, illustrating how these conditions can be reversed through strategic lifestyle modifications. Furthermore, Dr. Lufkin emphasizes the interconnectedness of chronic diseases, elucidating how addressing root causes such as insulin resistance and inflammation can mitigate a range of health issues. Our conversation not only seeks to illuminate the efficacy of these lifestyle interventions but also aims to foster a paradigm shift in how we approach health and wellness in contemporary society.
Dr. Robert Lufkin, a prominent physician and author, shares his transformative journey from chronic illness to health advocate, shedding light on the critical issue of metabolic health. His personal experiences serve as a catalyst for broader discussions about the alarming rise of chronic diseases in modern society, including diabetes, obesity, and hypertension. Dr. Lufkin articulates the inadequacies of conventional Western medicine in addressing these conditions, advocating for a fundamental shift towards lifestyle interventions as a primary means of prevention and reversal.
The conversation delves into the interconnectedness of various chronic diseases, highlighting common root causes such as insulin resistance and systemic inflammation. Dr. Lufkin emphasizes the importance of understanding these underlying mechanisms rather than merely treating symptoms in isolation. He encourages listeners to adopt a proactive approach to their health, leveraging insights from his latest book, 'Metabolic Health and Longevity,' which provides practical guidance for achieving better health outcomes through informed lifestyle choices. This episode serves as a crucial reminder of the empowering potential of personal agency in health management, urging individuals to take control of their well-being and make conscious decisions that promote long-term health.
Furthermore, Dr. Lufkin critiques the current healthcare paradigm, which often prioritizes pharmacological solutions over holistic approaches. He argues that true health cannot be achieved solely through medication, but rather through a comprehensive understanding of one's lifestyle and its impact on overall well-being. This discussion not only educates on the significance of metabolic health but also inspires listeners to become active participants in their health journeys, fostering a movement towards greater awareness and proactive health management.
Takeaways
- Dr. Robert Lufkin elucidates the profound impact of lifestyle on metabolic health and chronic disease reversal.
- The podcast emphasizes the importance of understanding root causes of chronic diseases rather than merely treating symptoms.
- Lufkin advocates for a dietary approach that reduces carbohydrate intake to manage and potentially reverse type 2 diabetes.
- The discussion highlights the interconnectedness of chronic diseases, underscoring the significance of holistic health management strategies.
- Dr. Robert Lufkin emphasizes the critical influence of lifestyle choices on metabolic health and chronic disease management.
- The podcast discusses how lifestyle interventions can reverse chronic diseases, contrary to traditional medical approaches focusing solely on medications.
- Lufkin's journey through chronic illness led to a transformative understanding of the importance of addressing the root causes of diseases.
- The...
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:50):
My guest today, Dr.
Robert Lufkin is a physician,medical school professor at UCLA
and USC and a new York Timesbest selling author empowering people
to take back their metabolichealth with lifestyle and other tools.
A veteran of the Today showand USA Today and a regular contributor
to Fox and other news networknews stations, his weekly video podcast
(01:14):
reaches over 400,000 people.
After reversing chronicdisease and transforming his own
life, he is making it hismission to help others do the same.
His latest book, metabolicHealth and Longevity is an instant
New York Times bestseller asreframed our thinking about metabolic
health and longevity.
In addition to practicingmedicine, he is the author of over
(01:36):
200 peer reviewed scientificpapers, 14 books available in 13
languages.
His social media posts haveover 400,000 followers worldwide.
We welcome him to the podcast.
Well, Doctor, welcome to the podcast.
How you doing today?
Great.
Great.
It's so nice, so great to beon your program.
(01:58):
Dr.
Keith.
Well, thank you.
I'm looking forward to this conversation.
Love talking about thesetopics and we all need to get better,
a little bit more healthy.
So this should be afascinating conversation.
Yeah, yeah, can't wait.
So I'm going to ask you myfavorite question.
What's the best piece ofadvice you've ever received?
(02:19):
Wow, that's.
I guess I know, just shootingfrom the hip.
I was going to say pay attention.
Really important if you're a doctor.
(02:40):
I love it.
Yeah.
Just, I mean, seriously,seriously, to be, to be open minded
and realize that at least asfar as science is going, it's a moving
target.
Everything is changing andwhat we thought we KNEW, you know,
five years ago, 10 years ago,may not be, may not be the best way
(03:02):
to approach things anymore.
And just to keep an open mind,a beginner's mind as we look at things
fresh and are open to new waysof looking at things.
I love that.
I'm also curious, just lookingat your background and your years
of experience, are there somepeople in your life who served as
(03:23):
a mentor for you or even aguide in your journey?
Yeah, I mean, other than, youknow, obviously my parents, of course,
but other people there was, mytraining is in radiology.
So one, one gentleman was aradiologist I worked with for many,
many years and he sort of tookme under his wing and I learned a
(03:48):
great deal from him.
His name's William Hanafi andhe just, I mean I learned a lot from
about radiology, but alsoabout life and the way he approached
things.
You know, as with any greatmentor, we oftentimes learn a lot
more than just the subjectmatter, it's more about a way of
(04:11):
being, a way to exist in the universe.
I love that.
So I'm looking at your background.
Can you share some of yourpersonal experience from your time
as a professor at UCLA and uscand what influenced you as you wrote
these great books you have outon health?
Yeah, I mean, the, the mostrecent book, the Lies I Taught in
(04:34):
Medical School, what, whatmade me, what, what compelled me
to write this book was that Iwas, I was going along minding my
own business as a professor,where I got to not only teach medical
students and doctors andoftentimes it's not learn from them
more than I taught them, butalso do research and conduct.
(04:58):
I've written many peerreviewed scientific papers.
My lab has been paid by drugcompanies and device makers and the
nih, National Institutes ofHealth to do research and then also
to literally practice medicineand actually see patients, which
is very fulfilling.
So it is a great job being amedical school professor.
(05:22):
But what changed for me was Icame down with four chronic diseases
that were unexpected.
And I went to my doctor and Iwas prescribed, like so many people,
prescription medicines foreach one of these diseases.
And you know, I said, hey, arethere any other options?
(05:44):
You know, what about lifestyleor anything else?
And they said, nah, thatdoesn't really work.
You know, you're going to beon these pills for the rest of your
life, so get used to it.
And that, that was what reallycompelled me to look closer at the
things that I believed thatI'd been teaching, that many of my
colleagues were still teachingabout, about these chronic diseases.
(06:07):
And that's, that's really thetheme of this, this whole book.
And if I, if I could take amoment and just sort of set the stage
on this, I mean, I, I'm aproduct of Western sort of allopathic
medicine, if you will.
But this book is very criticalof Western medicine.
And I have to say I'm still afan of Western medicine despite the
(06:30):
book.
I mean, if I get hit by a carand I need a blood transfusion and
I need my spleen removed and Ineed surgery, I want the best that
Western medicine has to offer.
And in fact, Western medicinetransformed our lives in the 20th
century.
You know, truly, the pills,the surgeries that were developed,
(06:53):
and also largely throughpublic health measures with infectious
disease and all, it's made theworld truly a better place for all
of us.
But the problem is in the 21stcentury, where we are now a quarter
of the way into it, we'refacing literally A tsunami of what
are called chronic diseases.
(07:13):
And these are diseases thatwere present in the 20th century,
but nowhere near in the almostbiblical proportions.
The numbers that they'recoming now, and these are familiar
diseases.
We've heard of things like,things like obesity.
Today, most people in theUnited States are either obese or
overweight.
Diabetes, type 2 diabetes,most people, up to a half people
(07:37):
are either pre diabetic ortype 2 diabetic.
And the numbers are growing.
Hypertension, cancer, heartattack, stroke, Alzheimer's disease,
even mental illness.
This whole umbrella of chronicdiseases is exploding and the numbers
are taking off.
And the problem is whenwestern medicine takes the pills
(07:59):
and the surgeries that were soeffective during the 20th century
and really transformed ourlives, they don't really work on
the chronic diseases.
In other words, they may treatthe symptoms and prevent us from
dying in the moment.
But in many, many of thesediseases, I would say the majority
of them, they don't reversethe underlying disease and the disease
(08:23):
continues to get worse andworse and worse.
And that's what I was facingwhen I had four of these chronic
diseases.
So I basically went back tothe, went back to the literature
and did a deep dive not tomake the world a better place, but
more out of self preservation,because I didn't want to die myself,
you know, And I realized that,that, that knowledge has moved on,
(08:46):
that there, there arebreakthroughs in our understanding
that these chronic diseasesactually do respond to lifestyle.
They actually and lifestylecan reverse and push back these chronic
diseases the way no pills insurgery actually can.
And long story short, I begandoing relatively simple lifestyle
(09:09):
changes myself and I was ableto reverse these four chronic diseases
in myself to the point where Iwent off all medications for them.
My doctors couldn't believe it.
They thought the labs werebroken or something like that.
And now I've made it mymission literally, to help other
(09:29):
people take back their lives,their health, their wellness, and
not make the same mistakesthat, that I've made.
And that's the purpose ofwriting this book and help getting
the message out.
So let's dig a little deeperinto some of the root causes.
You mentioned that you hadfour chronic diseases and you had
(09:49):
to get to the root cause of them.
So kind of walk us throughsome of the root causes, some of
the most common illnesses thatpeople are dealing with today.
Yeah, yeah.
This whole concept of rootcause, it sort of goes against a
lot of the way medicine isstill taught today.
In other words, I mentionedthat list of chronic diseases and
(10:12):
they seem like very separate diseases.
How Is diabetes and bloodsugar metabolism related to something
like mental health orAlzheimer's disease or cancer?
But as it turns out, they areall fundamentally related at a basic
root cause.
In other words, there are,there are underlying primary mechanisms
(10:36):
that, that drive all of thesediseases across the board.
These mechanisms are thingslike insulin resistance, things like
inflammation, things like oxidation.
And the, the fascinating thingis when we develop strategies, in
particular lifestylestrategies, to, to reverse these
(11:00):
root causes, then our chancefor all the chronic diseases decreases.
In other words, the samelifestyle that helps me not get obesity
and diabetes also reduces myrisk for Alzheimer's disease and
mental illness and arthritislike gout or osteoarthritis and polycystic
(11:25):
ovary disease if I'm a woman.
And on and on and on.
So it's, it just underscoreshow important it is about addressing
the root cause and then howimportant it is to pay attention
to our lifestyle.
I mean, one other kind of wakeup call I had in writing this book
was, you know, as a doctor, Ithought that, I thought that a disease
(11:48):
starts when I diagnose it.
In other words, as a patient,when I walked into a doctor's office,
the doctor, he or she says,okay, you've got diabetes, you know,
and boom, I have it.
And a week ago I didn't, right?
And a year ago I didn't, butnow I have it.
And that's the way ourhealthcare system is set up.
Insurance has to work that wayand everything.
It's like, oh, you forgot yourkeys and we do some tests and oh,
(12:11):
you've got Alzheimer's disease.
And I'm not trying to makelight of any of these very serious
diseases, but I'm just tryingto help get the message across.
But the wake up call for me iswhat I didn't realize is that even
though the doctor definesthese diseases as starting at a certain
point in time when you, whenyou're in the doctor's office.
(12:32):
If I as a patient wait untilthe doctor diagnoses them, these
diseases don't actually beginwhen the doctor diagnoses them.
The chronic diseases Imentioned, there's very good evidence
for that.
They begin weeks to years toliterally decades before the doctor
makes a diagnosis.
(12:52):
What does that mean?
Well, if I, if I sit aroundand say, hey, I'm healthy, my doctor
says I don't have any diseases.
If I, if I take that attitudeand I wait for the doctor to diagnose
one of these diseases before Istart changing my lifestyle and,
and do these things, I'm, I'mMissing a huge opportunity for prevention.
(13:12):
And, and I have less chance ofreversing them down the line when
I, when, when I finally do get them.
So the idea is that theselifestyle changes are not just for
people when you get thedisease, but there's a benefit for
everyone to begin looking athow they can improve their lives
before they have the diagnosis.
(13:35):
So let's pick one of those for us.
Say you are dealing with type2 diabetes.
What lifestyle changes wouldyou suggest for someone who may be
pre diabetic or has type 2 diabetes?
What kind of lifestylerecommendations would you start with?
That's a great, a greatchoice, Keith.
And actually, full disclosure,One of those four diseases for me
(13:57):
was type 2 diabetes.
It was pre diabetic.
I was diagnosed with that.
So I'm just going to tell,I'll tell you two options, two ways
of treating type 2 diabetes,and then your listeners can decide
which way they want to do it.
The Stand Type 2 diabetes isan abnormality of blood sugar metabolism.
You know, we hear diabetes and all.
(14:19):
And type 2 diabetes is themost common type.
90% of diabetes is type 2 diabetes.
And it's driven by somethingthat I mentioned before called insulin
resistance.
Insulin is a hormone thatcontrols blood sugar.
And anyway, type 2 diabetes,the problem is, the acute problem
(14:42):
that will kill you instantlyor very shortly is when your blood
sugar gets out of control andgets very high.
This hyperglycemia can be fatal.
And so doctors have come upwith things like insulin that can
keep you from dying fromhyperglycemia and allow you to survive
type 2 diabetes.
(15:03):
And the problem is that type 2diabetes isn't just hyperglycemia,
high blood sugar, but if youtreat it with insulin, it continues
to progress down the road.
What does that mean?
Well, there are other thingsthat happen, things like what's the
number one cause of surgicalamputations in the United States
(15:24):
today?
It's diabetes, footamputations and everything.
What's the number one cause ofrenal failure, kidney failure and
dialysis?
Type 2 diabetes.
What's the number one cause ofretinal blindness?
Type 2 diabetes, and on and on.
It's a risk factor for allthese diseases.
So the problem is modernmedicine treats diabetes with drugs.
(15:49):
You know, initially metforminand some other drugs, and then later
on insulin.
The problem is that when we dothat, we control the disease, we
don't reverse it.
And by controlling thedisease, it continues to progress.
And even though you don't dieof this hyperglycemia, these progressive
(16:10):
changes occur down the road.
And your Lifespan is still shortened.
Okay, that's one treatment option.
That's the option the AmericanDiabetic association recommends,
and that's the option thatmost people are offered.
There's another option that,that people can do diabetes.
The reason people getdiabetes, it's an abnormality of
(16:32):
blood sugar, and it'sabnormality of insulin, which is
the hormone that controlsblood sugar.
There are three macronutrientsthat your audience may be aware of.
There are three basic foodtypes, fats and proteins which are
required for life.
If we don't eat those, we die.
We have to eat those in our diet.
And then the third group iscalled carbohydrates, and they're.
(16:56):
Interestingly, they're notrequired in our diet.
In other words, there arehuman populations that eat very few
carbohydrates and they do just fine.
As it turns out, thecarbohydrates, which contain things
like sugar and starch andflour and these kinds of things,
are actually the primarydriver of insulin and insulin resistance.
(17:19):
In other words, protein andfat don't really affect insulin much,
but the carbohydrates do.
And driving the insulin upwith carbohydrates is one of the
root causes for type 2 diabetes.
So much to the point that ifyou take a type 2 diabetic, you take
a group of type 2 diabetes anddiabetics, and this has been done
in controlled studies, and you.
(17:41):
You restrict the amount ofcarbohydrates they eat in a significant
proportion of them, most ofthem, they will be able to not control
their diabetes, but they willbe able to reverse it to the point
that they get off the medications.
And importantly, diabetesdoesn't become a chronic, progressive
(18:04):
disease like it does when wecontrol it with medications, you
know, leading to amputation,blindness, all that.
It goes to sleep, it goesaway, it kind of.
It goes into what we call remission.
So in most cases, it doesn'tprogress like that.
So.
So we have two options there,two ways to treat it.
(18:24):
But the problem is the today,the mainstream accepted way to treat
type 2 diabetes, and, youknow, for a number of reasons, is
through medications and the diet.
The diet approach isn'temphasized enough and in some cases
isn't even communicated wellas an alternative to patients.
(18:47):
So they, you know, they don'tknow that.
That it's, you know, cut anddried like that.
And that's just one of thechronic diseases, you know.
Yeah.
If I'm not mistaken.
Excuse me.
I also have heard that type 2diabetes is a precursor oftentimes,
and I could Be wrong.
I'm not.
My degree is that in medicine.
(19:08):
But.
But it's a precursor to Alzheimer's.
So it's somehow connected, thetype 2 diabetes.
Is that what the studies areshowing as well?
Yeah.
All of the diseases Imentioned share a root cause, share
these root causes of metabolicdysfunction, which include insulin
(19:29):
resistance and all these things.
So type 2 diabetes in itselfis a risk factor for obesity and
vice versa, and hypertensionand Alzheimer's disease.
In fact, Alzheimer's diseaseshows abnormal blood glucose metabolism
in the brain, and somescientists refer to Alzheimer's as
type 3 diabetes.
(19:50):
So by having this, youincrease your risk at all.
But the point is they're alllinked together.
So adopting a diet which ishealthy for type 2 diabetes will
also improve.
The same thing improves yourchances for Alzheimer's disease,
(20:10):
mental illness, cancer,hypertension, heart attack, stroke,
all those things.
And it's interesting, we wantto pay attention to these chronic
diseases because they'reexploding, right?
Everybody's getting them now.
But, but the other thing,these chronic diseases are the diseases
(20:32):
that you and I and most ofyour listeners are going to die of,
statistically.
I mean, let's face it, we allhave to die of something, right?
No one gets out alive, so wecan't not have anything.
But if you look at the list ofdiseases that people die of, it's
(20:52):
a very short list, and itincludes basically heart attack and
stroke, cancer, Alzheimer'sdisease, and a couple other things
after that.
But statistically, most of usare going to die of one of those
chronic diseases that aredriven by lifestyle.
So if these are the diseasesthat we're absolutely going to get,
(21:13):
there's no way to avoid it.
Why not take a lifestyle nowthat will push that back?
I mean, I don't want to get itwhen I'm 55.
I don't want to get it whenI'm 85.
I don't want to get it whenI'm 105.
You know, let's, let's push it back.
I love that.
You know, it's interesting.
I'm glad I had you on nowbecause the talk in America right
(21:34):
now is really focused onmaking America healthy again.
And there's so much talk aboutchronic diseases, there's so much
talk about what's in our food systems.
As you are writing this book,what kind of response are you getting
from people who are now all ofa sudden maybe paying a little bit
more attention to their healthand saying that there are other ways,
(21:56):
more natural ways to deal withsome of the Chronic diseases that
we're having.
Yeah.
I mean, I, I, I love the factthat on a, on a national level that,
that national levelpoliticians are suddenly talking
about chronic disease.
They're talking aboutcarbohydrates and they're talking
(22:16):
about seed oils, they'retalking about lifestyle and junk
food.
And, you know, it's so greatto see that.
I'm disappointed that it'sbecome politicized almost.
I mean, you know, it's becauseour health is not a political thing,
really.
It doesn't matter whetheryou're a Democrat or you're Republican.
(22:38):
It all works the same.
These diseases don't.
They don't matter.
You know, it doesn't matterwhat your political affiliation is.
They don't pick party linesand go to attack.
Exactly, exactly.
So, but it is great.
I mean, it's coming up in theconsciousness that people are being
more aware because a lot of it is.
(22:59):
People just don't know that.
I mean, if I walk into schoolat my daughter's elementary school
and I light a cigarette andhand it to her, 15 parents will jump
me and wrestle me to the floor.
But if I hand her a bowl ofsugar cereal and pour chocolate milk
(23:21):
on it and give it to her forbreakfast, everyone will smile and
nod like, what a great dad.
When they realize, you know,that this is, this is really harmful
stuff.
And, you know, you're startingon a lifetime of junk food that does
have metabolic consequencesfor all the diseases we mentioned.
(23:44):
Yeah, that's exactly right.
I'm curious, how are yourcolleagues taking your findings and
researching your book?
Yeah, it's a great question.
Well, I still have my job as aprofessor at the medical schools,
at least last time I looked.
(24:05):
But, you know, part of it isit's hard to get above the noise.
Like, you know, nobody, youknow, you think you've written something.
You know you're going to notchange the world, but you're going
to get, everyone's going tojump on you.
Well, it's very, very hard toget, to break away from, you know,
(24:26):
get above the thing.
I mean, we were fortunate.
We were very lucky.
This book became a New YorkTimes bestseller, which, which is,
you know, unexpected and very,very lucky for us.
That got us a lot of attentionthat we wouldn't have gotten otherwise.
But, but to your question,most of my colleagues, I think, I
think reasonable people canagree to disagree.
(24:48):
And that's, you know, that'sthe kind of thing, because these
are not my ideas in the book.
I just present the researchthat I've seen it.
I show the scientific articlesand I tell you why I'm interpreting
it this way and what theevidence to the best that I can do,
it shows.
And if somebody disagrees withmy interpretation of the evidence,
(25:11):
that's okay, you know, that's,it's not personal.
And I know over the years I'vechanged my thinking, you know, so
many times.
I'm probably going to, youknow, hopefully I'll continue to
change my thinking will evolveas we learn new stuff because I mean,
wow, the knowledge in thisspace is accelerating like never
before I've seen in my career,which is a long career but in the
(25:34):
last 10 years, the last fiveyears, it's only getting faster and
faster and faster.
Part of it's, you know, ofcourse the Internet and then AI on
top of it and just ourknowledge is exploding.
It's, it's harder and harderto keep up with everything.
No, it's, you're right about that.
And I wonder how much this is.
(25:55):
Again, my observation fromafar is because there's so much,
so much pharmaceutical dollarsin the treatments that we have.
It's also hard to get that outof medicine when that's such a part
of it.
Like I was just, I just sawthe doctor who talked about the danger
of statins when you'retreating high cholesterol.
(26:15):
And you know, he's talkingabout, you know that that's our automatic
go to thing is let's givepeople statins.
And it may not be the bestroute because it doesn't really,
doesn't really reduce.
That was his, his is his study.
It doesn't, doesn'tsignificantly reduce the risk of
heart attack.
The statins actually didn'thave much impact at all on most people.
(26:36):
It was a very small percentagethat were actually impacted.
So he was talking about weneed to be careful of how we.
Going back where you said, howdo we treat the chronic underlining
issue, not just dealing withmanaging the chronic disease.
Yeah, the whole thing onstatins, I've got a whole chapter
in the book on that.
But you're absolutely right.
(26:57):
The benefits of statins aregreatly exaggerated by the pharmaceutical
companies.
They use relative risk insteadof absolute risk and different sort
of statistical alchemy theyuse, but they exaggerate the benefits
and they minimize the sideeffects which are not insignificant.
(27:19):
But to your point about theinfluence of pharmaceuticals, I mean
back to your question, thereare only two countries in the world
that allow pharmaceuticals toadvertise directly to patients for
prescription drugs.
And the reason that there areonly Two countries is because of
the harm that it does.
And the two countries are NewZealand and the United States.
(27:40):
And interestingly, this newwave of healthcare reform, one of
the things that they've talkedabout doing is outlawing pharmaceutical
ads in the United States,which would be a huge step that no
Republicans or Democrats havedone for 20 years or so because it
corrupts the news services.
(28:02):
You've got CNN running allthese ads and then they're basically
paid for by the pharmaceutical companies.
And then the pharmaceuticalinfluence is pervasive in medical
education.
They say dietitians, whodetermine our food choices and our
(28:22):
nutritional advice.
Dietitian education is paidfor by junk food makers, basically.
My mom was a dietitian.
She goes to her conferencesand it's sponsored by McDonald's
and Coca Cola.
And you know what, what couldgo wrong?
Right?
Well, in medical education,it's even worse.
It's sponsored bypharmaceutical companies.
(28:43):
So, you know, it's.
The influence is really, isreally pervasive and it's difficult
to untangle it and get to the science.
It's interesting too, youmentioned that, because I've had
arguments with.
Not arguments, but we've haddisagreements with my doctor about
(29:04):
numbers are here, so we shouldautomatically do that.
I'm like, no, I don't like thescience of what you're suggesting.
And so we debate back andforth of there's gotta be a different
way than just getting on 17different drugs for marginal test
results.
And so we, we respectfullydisagree oftentimes.
(29:25):
But as a patient, when you'regoing into your doctor and you say,
I don't want to go down themedical rabbit hole.
I heard, I talked to anotherdoctor on my show before, say sometimes
they label you as a difficult patient.
So as a patient, how do youhave this conversation with your
doctor where you.
They don't label you as aproblem, problem child, but someone
(29:50):
who's actually looking formore, more natural or alternative
ways to treat chronic disease.
Yeah, it's a great question.
The tendency is for, you know,if Western sort of allopathic, which
is kind of mainstream medicineis set up is they.
You run a bunch of tests, youfind an abnormality, you prescribe
(30:13):
something that will, you know,palliated or reverse it or surgery
if necessary.
And that's the model.
You give it a name, you giveit a disease, then you prescribe.
There are certain drugs foreach one, and that's the problem.
There's another type ofmedicine or sort of specialty of
(30:34):
medicine called functionalmedicine or integrative medicine
that tends to take a moreholistic approach.
Approach.
So if you, if you find adoctor with that, that sort of approach,
they'll be more likely to lookat, oh, wow, maybe you have toxins
in your environment, you havemercury, you have lead, you have
Lyme disease, you have mold.
You know, these things insteadof just giving you a drug for your
(30:56):
headache or something like that.
I mean, you know, as a doctor,I know even though I'm a doctor,
that doctors don't make.
Doctors don't make me healthy.
Doctors only make me less sick.
And if I want to be healthy,it's on me because it's about lifestyle
(31:18):
and it's the choices that,that I make.
Literally every day when I getup, I'm empowered.
What I'm going to eat, am Igoing to exercise, am I going to,
you know, how I sleep, how Ilive my life, how I, how I look at
the world.
Is the world a beautiful placefull of love and opportunity, or
is it a scary place full ofdanger and threats and harm coming
(31:41):
to me?
All these things matter.
And actually all of these areabout a healthy lifestyle that will
then literally transfer, Ibelieve, into reducing the risk for
all these chronic diseases andin many cases, getting off the drugs.
Like, like I was, like I was doing.
(32:01):
I was on four prescriptiondrugs and I was able to get off all
of them or, or decrease theneed for them in the future.
Even so, it's, it's not easythough, because it's.
Doctors are differentdepending on their approach, and
you have to find one that'saligned to you.
If you're a problem patient,you probably have a problem doctor
and it's time for a new one.
(32:25):
Yes, there's probably time.
I'm curious, as you havereleased this book, Lies I Taught
in Medical School.
How do you hope this bookinfluences the medical community
and just patient care going forward?
Well, it's obviously aclickbait title topic to get people's
(32:46):
attention, right?
But I want people to look atthings that we've just got wrong
and understand, like I saidbefore, that we don't have everything
right.
And we have made mistakes andwe're continuing to make mistakes
in medical practice, and it's okay.
(33:08):
We need to acknowledge themand move forward.
Maybe a low fat, highcarbohydrate diet, which has been
recommended for 60 years forheart disease, is not a good thing
and it's making people sickerand fatter and diabetes, let's admit
it and let's move on.
And you know, and that's theidea just Sort of a mea culpa, you
(33:30):
know, and that, hey, it's okayto admit mistakes.
It's okay, you know, to getthings wrong, as long as we, you
know, work as hard as we canto do the best we can to get them
right.
I love that.
I love to ask my guest thisother, this is my other favorite
question.
What legacy do you want toleave behind?
(33:54):
Wow.
I mean, separate from familyand children and all that sort of
stuff.
I think just what, what I justsaid, sort of the idea that, you
know, that, that it's okay toconstantly be questioning things,
(34:15):
to always ask questions, youknow, as any good student should
do.
And as doctors, we should dothe same thing as patients, we should
do the same thing.
We should constantly questionthings, question the science, because
it will change, it is changing.
And what we think we knowtoday is going to be different, guaranteed.
As we understand realitybetter, we have different models
(34:38):
for reality.
We're going to figure it outand do a better job.
But we have to be open tothose things.
We can't be dogmatic andlocked into our beliefs too much.
So you have any upcomingprojects you want to tell us about?
Any books on the horizon?
Yeah, no.
(34:58):
This book, I still working on it.
I'm enjoying it.
I'm working with a lot ofdifferent companies setting up lifestyle
programs for people where theycan, you know, easily get access
to information.
There's, there, there's somuch available now.
These, these CGMs, which arecontinuous glucose monitors, which
(35:20):
are little things you put onyour arm.
I'm wearing one now, but it,it allows me to read out my blood
sugar on my, you know, on my phone.
And it used to be in theUnited States up until just a few
weeks ago.
Only diabetics could get thesewith a doctor's prescription.
I'm not diabetic.
I mean, since I've changed mylifestyle, my blood sugars are normal
(35:42):
now.
I'm not.
No meds for it.
So my, you know, I'm inremission, but I wear this to track
my metabolic health.
I, I see what foods will spikemy glucose, which is a bad thing.
You know, we want to keep ourglucose at a nice level like that
to avoid those things.
So different things like theseCGMs, anyway, a few weeks ago are
(36:03):
now available for the firsttime the United States in history
without a doctor's prescription.
So you can just, you can orderthem from online and, you know, put
them on.
They last two weeks.
But there are more and moretools that are becoming available.
So I'm I'm super excitedabout, about all these things happening.
That's really neat, Doc.
(36:24):
Anything I haven't asked youthat I should have asked you?
Um, let's see.
No, I think we, we covered well.
Yes, it is.
How could people find outabout me and download my free book
chapter?
There you go.
I, if you, if you're curiousabout this book, I have a.
(36:47):
The first chapter is free onaudio and PDF format.
You can go to my website anddownload it.
It's.
My website is Robert Lufkin.
L U F K I n m d.com I'm veryactive on social media.
My wife says too active, butplease look for me and say hi.
(37:10):
That's great.
As you wrap up thisconversation, are there some key
takeaways you want to leavewith the audience before we wrap
up?
Yeah, I mean, the lifestylematters and it, this, it was a wakeup
call for me.
It probably, probably thesingle most powerful medicine that,
that I will ever use and mostof us will use are the, are the lifestyle
(37:31):
choices we make.
And it's, it's a new era in medicine.
It's not that doctors aren'timportant and they don't matter.
You know, certainly, you know,if I have a serious disease like
I talked about, they canmanage it.
But as far as improving mychances of getting those disease
and my overall health andwellness, I'm in charge because no
(37:52):
doctor could do my lifestylefor me.
And as I said, it's, it's anew day.
Every single morning when Iwake up, I get to decide what I'm
going to eat, when I'm goingto exercise, when I'm going to sleep,
what I get to do.
And it's an empowering time.
I think the idea of me as apatient being the CEO of my own health
(38:15):
is a really empowering thing.
We have agency now and doctorsare important, but they're a little
bit less important now.
They're more consultants forus as we take control of our own
health and there are more andmore tools to make this possible
for all of us.
Well, Robert, thanks so muchfor coming on and sharing your journey
with us and your story andhopefully we'll take your book and
(38:36):
we'll all read it and we'lllive better, healthier lives and
lifestyle.
So thank you for sharing whatyou do.
Thanks so much, Keith.
I really enjoyed yourthoughtful questions and thanks so
much for the work you do.
It's been a blast today.
Thank you.
My guest today, Dr.
Robert Lufkin is a physician,medical school professor at UCLA
and USC and a new York Timesbest selling author empowering people
to take back their metabolichealth with lifestyle and other tools.
A veteran of the Today showand USA Today and a regular contributor
to Fox and other news networknews stations, his weekly video podcast
(01:14):
reaches over 400,000 people.
After reversing chronicdisease and transforming his own
life, he is making it hismission to help others do the same.
His latest book, metabolicHealth and Longevity is an instant
New York Times bestseller asreframed our thinking about metabolic
health and longevity.
In addition to practicingmedicine, he is the author of over
(01:36):
200 peer reviewed scientificpapers, 14 books available in 13
languages.
His social media posts haveover 400,000 followers worldwide.
We welcome him to the podcast.
Well, Doctor, welcome to the podcast.
How you doing today?
Great.
Great.
It's so nice, so great to beon your program.
(01:58):
Dr.
Keith.
Well, thank you.
I'm looking forward to this conversation.
Love talking about thesetopics and we all need to get better,
a little bit more healthy.
So this should be afascinating conversation.
Yeah, yeah, can't wait.
So I'm going to ask you myfavorite question.
What's the best piece ofadvice you've ever received?
(02:19):
Wow, that's.
I guess I know, just shootingfrom the hip.
I was going to say pay attention.
Really important if you're a doctor.
(02:40):
I love it.
Yeah.
Just, I mean, seriously,seriously, to be, to be open minded
and realize that at least asfar as science is going, it's a moving
target.
Everything is changing andwhat we thought we KNEW, you know,
five years ago, 10 years ago,may not be, may not be the best way
(03:02):
to approach things anymore.
And just to keep an open mind,a beginner's mind as we look at things
fresh and are open to new waysof looking at things.
I love that.
I'm also curious, just lookingat your background and your years
of experience, are there somepeople in your life who served as
(03:23):
a mentor for you or even aguide in your journey?
Yeah, I mean, other than, youknow, obviously my parents, of course,
but other people there was, mytraining is in radiology.
So one, one gentleman was aradiologist I worked with for many,
many years and he sort of tookme under his wing and I learned a
(03:48):
great deal from him.
His name's William Hanafi andhe just, I mean I learned a lot from
about radiology, but alsoabout life and the way he approached
things.
You know, as with any greatmentor, we oftentimes learn a lot
more than just the subjectmatter, it's more about a way of
(04:11):
being, a way to exist in the universe.
I love that.
So I'm looking at your background.
Can you share some of yourpersonal experience from your time
as a professor at UCLA and uscand what influenced you as you wrote
these great books you have outon health?
Yeah, I mean, the, the mostrecent book, the Lies I Taught in
(04:34):
Medical School, what, whatmade me, what, what compelled me
to write this book was that Iwas, I was going along minding my
own business as a professor,where I got to not only teach medical
students and doctors andoftentimes it's not learn from them
more than I taught them, butalso do research and conduct.
(04:58):
I've written many peerreviewed scientific papers.
My lab has been paid by drugcompanies and device makers and the
nih, National Institutes ofHealth to do research and then also
to literally practice medicineand actually see patients, which
is very fulfilling.
So it is a great job being amedical school professor.
(05:22):
But what changed for me was Icame down with four chronic diseases
that were unexpected.
And I went to my doctor and Iwas prescribed, like so many people,
prescription medicines foreach one of these diseases.
And you know, I said, hey, arethere any other options?
(05:44):
You know, what about lifestyleor anything else?
And they said, nah, thatdoesn't really work.
You know, you're going to beon these pills for the rest of your
life, so get used to it.
And that, that was what reallycompelled me to look closer at the
things that I believed thatI'd been teaching, that many of my
colleagues were still teachingabout, about these chronic diseases.
(06:07):
And that's, that's really thetheme of this, this whole book.
And if I, if I could take amoment and just sort of set the stage
on this, I mean, I, I'm aproduct of Western sort of allopathic
medicine, if you will.
But this book is very criticalof Western medicine.
And I have to say I'm still afan of Western medicine despite the
(06:30):
book.
I mean, if I get hit by a carand I need a blood transfusion and
I need my spleen removed and Ineed surgery, I want the best that
Western medicine has to offer.
And in fact, Western medicinetransformed our lives in the 20th
century.
You know, truly, the pills,the surgeries that were developed,
(06:53):
and also largely throughpublic health measures with infectious
disease and all, it's made theworld truly a better place for all
of us.
But the problem is in the 21stcentury, where we are now a quarter
of the way into it, we'refacing literally A tsunami of what
are called chronic diseases.
(07:13):
And these are diseases thatwere present in the 20th century,
but nowhere near in the almostbiblical proportions.
The numbers that they'recoming now, and these are familiar
diseases.
We've heard of things like,things like obesity.
Today, most people in theUnited States are either obese or
overweight.
Diabetes, type 2 diabetes,most people, up to a half people
(07:37):
are either pre diabetic ortype 2 diabetic.
And the numbers are growing.
Hypertension, cancer, heartattack, stroke, Alzheimer's disease,
even mental illness.
This whole umbrella of chronicdiseases is exploding and the numbers
are taking off.
And the problem is whenwestern medicine takes the pills
(07:59):
and the surgeries that were soeffective during the 20th century
and really transformed ourlives, they don't really work on
the chronic diseases.
In other words, they may treatthe symptoms and prevent us from
dying in the moment.
But in many, many of thesediseases, I would say the majority
of them, they don't reversethe underlying disease and the disease
(08:23):
continues to get worse andworse and worse.
And that's what I was facingwhen I had four of these chronic
diseases.
So I basically went back tothe, went back to the literature
and did a deep dive not tomake the world a better place, but
more out of self preservation,because I didn't want to die myself,
you know, And I realized that,that, that knowledge has moved on,
(08:46):
that there, there arebreakthroughs in our understanding
that these chronic diseasesactually do respond to lifestyle.
They actually and lifestylecan reverse and push back these chronic
diseases the way no pills insurgery actually can.
And long story short, I begandoing relatively simple lifestyle
(09:09):
changes myself and I was ableto reverse these four chronic diseases
in myself to the point where Iwent off all medications for them.
My doctors couldn't believe it.
They thought the labs werebroken or something like that.
And now I've made it mymission literally, to help other
(09:29):
people take back their lives,their health, their wellness, and
not make the same mistakesthat, that I've made.
And that's the purpose ofwriting this book and help getting
the message out.
So let's dig a little deeperinto some of the root causes.
You mentioned that you hadfour chronic diseases and you had
(09:49):
to get to the root cause of them.
So kind of walk us throughsome of the root causes, some of
the most common illnesses thatpeople are dealing with today.
Yeah, yeah.
This whole concept of rootcause, it sort of goes against a
lot of the way medicine isstill taught today.
In other words, I mentionedthat list of chronic diseases and
(10:12):
they seem like very separate diseases.
How Is diabetes and bloodsugar metabolism related to something
like mental health orAlzheimer's disease or cancer?
But as it turns out, they areall fundamentally related at a basic
root cause.
In other words, there are,there are underlying primary mechanisms
(10:36):
that, that drive all of thesediseases across the board.
These mechanisms are thingslike insulin resistance, things like
inflammation, things like oxidation.
And the, the fascinating thingis when we develop strategies, in
particular lifestylestrategies, to, to reverse these
(11:00):
root causes, then our chancefor all the chronic diseases decreases.
In other words, the samelifestyle that helps me not get obesity
and diabetes also reduces myrisk for Alzheimer's disease and
mental illness and arthritislike gout or osteoarthritis and polycystic
(11:25):
ovary disease if I'm a woman.
And on and on and on.
So it's, it just underscoreshow important it is about addressing
the root cause and then howimportant it is to pay attention
to our lifestyle.
I mean, one other kind of wakeup call I had in writing this book
was, you know, as a doctor, Ithought that, I thought that a disease
(11:48):
starts when I diagnose it.
In other words, as a patient,when I walked into a doctor's office,
the doctor, he or she says,okay, you've got diabetes, you know,
and boom, I have it.
And a week ago I didn't, right?
And a year ago I didn't, butnow I have it.
And that's the way ourhealthcare system is set up.
Insurance has to work that wayand everything.
It's like, oh, you forgot yourkeys and we do some tests and oh,
(12:11):
you've got Alzheimer's disease.
And I'm not trying to makelight of any of these very serious
diseases, but I'm just tryingto help get the message across.
But the wake up call for me iswhat I didn't realize is that even
though the doctor definesthese diseases as starting at a certain
point in time when you, whenyou're in the doctor's office.
(12:32):
If I as a patient wait untilthe doctor diagnoses them, these
diseases don't actually beginwhen the doctor diagnoses them.
The chronic diseases Imentioned, there's very good evidence
for that.
They begin weeks to years toliterally decades before the doctor
makes a diagnosis.
(12:52):
What does that mean?
Well, if I, if I sit aroundand say, hey, I'm healthy, my doctor
says I don't have any diseases.
If I, if I take that attitudeand I wait for the doctor to diagnose
one of these diseases before Istart changing my lifestyle and,
and do these things, I'm, I'mMissing a huge opportunity for prevention.
(13:12):
And, and I have less chance ofreversing them down the line when
I, when, when I finally do get them.
So the idea is that theselifestyle changes are not just for
people when you get thedisease, but there's a benefit for
everyone to begin looking athow they can improve their lives
before they have the diagnosis.
(13:35):
So let's pick one of those for us.
Say you are dealing with type2 diabetes.
What lifestyle changes wouldyou suggest for someone who may be
pre diabetic or has type 2 diabetes?
What kind of lifestylerecommendations would you start with?
That's a great, a greatchoice, Keith.
And actually, full disclosure,One of those four diseases for me
(13:57):
was type 2 diabetes.
It was pre diabetic.
I was diagnosed with that.
So I'm just going to tell,I'll tell you two options, two ways
of treating type 2 diabetes,and then your listeners can decide
which way they want to do it.
The Stand Type 2 diabetes isan abnormality of blood sugar metabolism.
You know, we hear diabetes and all.
(14:19):
And type 2 diabetes is themost common type.
90% of diabetes is type 2 diabetes.
And it's driven by somethingthat I mentioned before called insulin
resistance.
Insulin is a hormone thatcontrols blood sugar.
And anyway, type 2 diabetes,the problem is, the acute problem
(14:42):
that will kill you instantlyor very shortly is when your blood
sugar gets out of control andgets very high.
This hyperglycemia can be fatal.
And so doctors have come upwith things like insulin that can
keep you from dying fromhyperglycemia and allow you to survive
type 2 diabetes.
(15:03):
And the problem is that type 2diabetes isn't just hyperglycemia,
high blood sugar, but if youtreat it with insulin, it continues
to progress down the road.
What does that mean?
Well, there are other thingsthat happen, things like what's the
number one cause of surgicalamputations in the United States
(15:24):
today?
It's diabetes, footamputations and everything.
What's the number one cause ofrenal failure, kidney failure and
dialysis?
Type 2 diabetes.
What's the number one cause ofretinal blindness?
Type 2 diabetes, and on and on.
It's a risk factor for allthese diseases.
So the problem is modernmedicine treats diabetes with drugs.
(15:49):
You know, initially metforminand some other drugs, and then later
on insulin.
The problem is that when we dothat, we control the disease, we
don't reverse it.
And by controlling thedisease, it continues to progress.
And even though you don't dieof this hyperglycemia, these progressive
(16:10):
changes occur down the road.
And your Lifespan is still shortened.
Okay, that's one treatment option.
That's the option the AmericanDiabetic association recommends,
and that's the option thatmost people are offered.
There's another option that,that people can do diabetes.
The reason people getdiabetes, it's an abnormality of
(16:32):
blood sugar, and it'sabnormality of insulin, which is
the hormone that controlsblood sugar.
There are three macronutrientsthat your audience may be aware of.
There are three basic foodtypes, fats and proteins which are
required for life.
If we don't eat those, we die.
We have to eat those in our diet.
And then the third group iscalled carbohydrates, and they're.
(16:56):
Interestingly, they're notrequired in our diet.
In other words, there arehuman populations that eat very few
carbohydrates and they do just fine.
As it turns out, thecarbohydrates, which contain things
like sugar and starch andflour and these kinds of things,
are actually the primarydriver of insulin and insulin resistance.
(17:19):
In other words, protein andfat don't really affect insulin much,
but the carbohydrates do.
And driving the insulin upwith carbohydrates is one of the
root causes for type 2 diabetes.
So much to the point that ifyou take a type 2 diabetic, you take
a group of type 2 diabetes anddiabetics, and this has been done
in controlled studies, and you.
(17:41):
You restrict the amount ofcarbohydrates they eat in a significant
proportion of them, most ofthem, they will be able to not control
their diabetes, but they willbe able to reverse it to the point
that they get off the medications.
And importantly, diabetesdoesn't become a chronic, progressive
(18:04):
disease like it does when wecontrol it with medications, you
know, leading to amputation,blindness, all that.
It goes to sleep, it goesaway, it kind of.
It goes into what we call remission.
So in most cases, it doesn'tprogress like that.
So.
So we have two options there,two ways to treat it.
(18:24):
But the problem is the today,the mainstream accepted way to treat
type 2 diabetes, and, youknow, for a number of reasons, is
through medications and the diet.
The diet approach isn'temphasized enough and in some cases
isn't even communicated wellas an alternative to patients.
(18:47):
So they, you know, they don'tknow that.
That it's, you know, cut anddried like that.
And that's just one of thechronic diseases, you know.
Yeah.
If I'm not mistaken.
Excuse me.
I also have heard that type 2diabetes is a precursor oftentimes,
and I could Be wrong.
I'm not.
My degree is that in medicine.
(19:08):
But.
But it's a precursor to Alzheimer's.
So it's somehow connected, thetype 2 diabetes.
Is that what the studies areshowing as well?
Yeah.
All of the diseases Imentioned share a root cause, share
these root causes of metabolicdysfunction, which include insulin
(19:29):
resistance and all these things.
So type 2 diabetes in itselfis a risk factor for obesity and
vice versa, and hypertensionand Alzheimer's disease.
In fact, Alzheimer's diseaseshows abnormal blood glucose metabolism
in the brain, and somescientists refer to Alzheimer's as
type 3 diabetes.
(19:50):
So by having this, youincrease your risk at all.
But the point is they're alllinked together.
So adopting a diet which ishealthy for type 2 diabetes will
also improve.
The same thing improves yourchances for Alzheimer's disease,
(20:10):
mental illness, cancer,hypertension, heart attack, stroke,
all those things.
And it's interesting, we wantto pay attention to these chronic
diseases because they'reexploding, right?
Everybody's getting them now.
But, but the other thing,these chronic diseases are the diseases
(20:32):
that you and I and most ofyour listeners are going to die of,
statistically.
I mean, let's face it, we allhave to die of something, right?
No one gets out alive, so wecan't not have anything.
But if you look at the list ofdiseases that people die of, it's
(20:52):
a very short list, and itincludes basically heart attack and
stroke, cancer, Alzheimer'sdisease, and a couple other things
after that.
But statistically, most of usare going to die of one of those
chronic diseases that aredriven by lifestyle.
So if these are the diseasesthat we're absolutely going to get,
(21:13):
there's no way to avoid it.
Why not take a lifestyle nowthat will push that back?
I mean, I don't want to get itwhen I'm 55.
I don't want to get it whenI'm 85.
I don't want to get it whenI'm 105.
You know, let's, let's push it back.
I love that.
You know, it's interesting.
I'm glad I had you on nowbecause the talk in America right
(21:34):
now is really focused onmaking America healthy again.
And there's so much talk aboutchronic diseases, there's so much
talk about what's in our food systems.
As you are writing this book,what kind of response are you getting
from people who are now all ofa sudden maybe paying a little bit
more attention to their healthand saying that there are other ways,
(21:56):
more natural ways to deal withsome of the Chronic diseases that
we're having.
Yeah.
I mean, I, I, I love the factthat on a, on a national level that,
that national levelpoliticians are suddenly talking
about chronic disease.
They're talking aboutcarbohydrates and they're talking
(22:16):
about seed oils, they'retalking about lifestyle and junk
food.
And, you know, it's so greatto see that.
I'm disappointed that it'sbecome politicized almost.
I mean, you know, it's becauseour health is not a political thing,
really.
It doesn't matter whetheryou're a Democrat or you're Republican.
(22:38):
It all works the same.
These diseases don't.
They don't matter.
You know, it doesn't matterwhat your political affiliation is.
They don't pick party linesand go to attack.
Exactly, exactly.
So, but it is great.
I mean, it's coming up in theconsciousness that people are being
more aware because a lot of it is.
(22:59):
People just don't know that.
I mean, if I walk into schoolat my daughter's elementary school
and I light a cigarette andhand it to her, 15 parents will jump
me and wrestle me to the floor.
But if I hand her a bowl ofsugar cereal and pour chocolate milk
(23:21):
on it and give it to her forbreakfast, everyone will smile and
nod like, what a great dad.
When they realize, you know,that this is, this is really harmful
stuff.
And, you know, you're startingon a lifetime of junk food that does
have metabolic consequencesfor all the diseases we mentioned.
(23:44):
Yeah, that's exactly right.
I'm curious, how are yourcolleagues taking your findings and
researching your book?
Yeah, it's a great question.
Well, I still have my job as aprofessor at the medical schools,
at least last time I looked.
(24:05):
But, you know, part of it isit's hard to get above the noise.
Like, you know, nobody, youknow, you think you've written something.
You know you're going to notchange the world, but you're going
to get, everyone's going tojump on you.
Well, it's very, very hard toget, to break away from, you know,
(24:26):
get above the thing.
I mean, we were fortunate.
We were very lucky.
This book became a New YorkTimes bestseller, which, which is,
you know, unexpected and very,very lucky for us.
That got us a lot of attentionthat we wouldn't have gotten otherwise.
But, but to your question,most of my colleagues, I think, I
think reasonable people canagree to disagree.
(24:48):
And that's, you know, that'sthe kind of thing, because these
are not my ideas in the book.
I just present the researchthat I've seen it.
I show the scientific articlesand I tell you why I'm interpreting
it this way and what theevidence to the best that I can do,
it shows.
And if somebody disagrees withmy interpretation of the evidence,
(25:11):
that's okay, you know, that's,it's not personal.
And I know over the years I'vechanged my thinking, you know, so
many times.
I'm probably going to, youknow, hopefully I'll continue to
change my thinking will evolveas we learn new stuff because I mean,
wow, the knowledge in thisspace is accelerating like never
before I've seen in my career,which is a long career but in the
(25:34):
last 10 years, the last fiveyears, it's only getting faster and
faster and faster.
Part of it's, you know, ofcourse the Internet and then AI on
top of it and just ourknowledge is exploding.
It's, it's harder and harderto keep up with everything.
No, it's, you're right about that.
And I wonder how much this is.
(25:55):
Again, my observation fromafar is because there's so much,
so much pharmaceutical dollarsin the treatments that we have.
It's also hard to get that outof medicine when that's such a part
of it.
Like I was just, I just sawthe doctor who talked about the danger
of statins when you'retreating high cholesterol.
(26:15):
And you know, he's talkingabout, you know that that's our automatic
go to thing is let's givepeople statins.
And it may not be the bestroute because it doesn't really,
doesn't really reduce.
That was his, his is his study.
It doesn't, doesn'tsignificantly reduce the risk of
heart attack.
The statins actually didn'thave much impact at all on most people.
(26:36):
It was a very small percentagethat were actually impacted.
So he was talking about weneed to be careful of how we.
Going back where you said, howdo we treat the chronic underlining
issue, not just dealing withmanaging the chronic disease.
Yeah, the whole thing onstatins, I've got a whole chapter
in the book on that.
But you're absolutely right.
(26:57):
The benefits of statins aregreatly exaggerated by the pharmaceutical
companies.
They use relative risk insteadof absolute risk and different sort
of statistical alchemy theyuse, but they exaggerate the benefits
and they minimize the sideeffects which are not insignificant.
(27:19):
But to your point about theinfluence of pharmaceuticals, I mean
back to your question, thereare only two countries in the world
that allow pharmaceuticals toadvertise directly to patients for
prescription drugs.
And the reason that there areonly Two countries is because of
the harm that it does.
And the two countries are NewZealand and the United States.
(27:40):
And interestingly, this newwave of healthcare reform, one of
the things that they've talkedabout doing is outlawing pharmaceutical
ads in the United States,which would be a huge step that no
Republicans or Democrats havedone for 20 years or so because it
corrupts the news services.
(28:02):
You've got CNN running allthese ads and then they're basically
paid for by the pharmaceutical companies.
And then the pharmaceuticalinfluence is pervasive in medical
education.
They say dietitians, whodetermine our food choices and our
(28:22):
nutritional advice.
Dietitian education is paidfor by junk food makers, basically.
My mom was a dietitian.
She goes to her conferencesand it's sponsored by McDonald's
and Coca Cola.
And you know what, what couldgo wrong?
Right?
Well, in medical education,it's even worse.
It's sponsored bypharmaceutical companies.
(28:43):
So, you know, it's.
The influence is really, isreally pervasive and it's difficult
to untangle it and get to the science.
It's interesting too, youmentioned that, because I've had
arguments with.
Not arguments, but we've haddisagreements with my doctor about
(29:04):
numbers are here, so we shouldautomatically do that.
I'm like, no, I don't like thescience of what you're suggesting.
And so we debate back andforth of there's gotta be a different
way than just getting on 17different drugs for marginal test
results.
And so we, we respectfullydisagree oftentimes.
(29:25):
But as a patient, when you'regoing into your doctor and you say,
I don't want to go down themedical rabbit hole.
I heard, I talked to anotherdoctor on my show before, say sometimes
they label you as a difficult patient.
So as a patient, how do youhave this conversation with your
doctor where you.
They don't label you as aproblem, problem child, but someone
(29:50):
who's actually looking formore, more natural or alternative
ways to treat chronic disease.
Yeah, it's a great question.
The tendency is for, you know,if Western sort of allopathic, which
is kind of mainstream medicineis set up is they.
You run a bunch of tests, youfind an abnormality, you prescribe
(30:13):
something that will, you know,palliated or reverse it or surgery
if necessary.
And that's the model.
You give it a name, you giveit a disease, then you prescribe.
There are certain drugs foreach one, and that's the problem.
There's another type ofmedicine or sort of specialty of
(30:34):
medicine called functionalmedicine or integrative medicine
that tends to take a moreholistic approach.
Approach.
So if you, if you find adoctor with that, that sort of approach,
they'll be more likely to lookat, oh, wow, maybe you have toxins
in your environment, you havemercury, you have lead, you have
Lyme disease, you have mold.
You know, these things insteadof just giving you a drug for your
(30:56):
headache or something like that.
I mean, you know, as a doctor,I know even though I'm a doctor,
that doctors don't make.
Doctors don't make me healthy.
Doctors only make me less sick.
And if I want to be healthy,it's on me because it's about lifestyle
(31:18):
and it's the choices that,that I make.
Literally every day when I getup, I'm empowered.
What I'm going to eat, am Igoing to exercise, am I going to,
you know, how I sleep, how Ilive my life, how I, how I look at
the world.
Is the world a beautiful placefull of love and opportunity, or
is it a scary place full ofdanger and threats and harm coming
(31:41):
to me?
All these things matter.
And actually all of these areabout a healthy lifestyle that will
then literally transfer, Ibelieve, into reducing the risk for
all these chronic diseases andin many cases, getting off the drugs.
Like, like I was, like I was doing.
(32:01):
I was on four prescriptiondrugs and I was able to get off all
of them or, or decrease theneed for them in the future.
Even so, it's, it's not easythough, because it's.
Doctors are differentdepending on their approach, and
you have to find one that'saligned to you.
If you're a problem patient,you probably have a problem doctor
and it's time for a new one.
(32:25):
Yes, there's probably time.
I'm curious, as you havereleased this book, Lies I Taught
in Medical School.
How do you hope this bookinfluences the medical community
and just patient care going forward?
Well, it's obviously aclickbait title topic to get people's
(32:46):
attention, right?
But I want people to look atthings that we've just got wrong
and understand, like I saidbefore, that we don't have everything
right.
And we have made mistakes andwe're continuing to make mistakes
in medical practice, and it's okay.
(33:08):
We need to acknowledge themand move forward.
Maybe a low fat, highcarbohydrate diet, which has been
recommended for 60 years forheart disease, is not a good thing
and it's making people sickerand fatter and diabetes, let's admit
it and let's move on.
And you know, and that's theidea just Sort of a mea culpa, you
(33:30):
know, and that, hey, it's okayto admit mistakes.
It's okay, you know, to getthings wrong, as long as we, you
know, work as hard as we canto do the best we can to get them
right.
I love that.
I love to ask my guest thisother, this is my other favorite
question.
What legacy do you want toleave behind?
(33:54):
Wow.
I mean, separate from familyand children and all that sort of
stuff.
I think just what, what I justsaid, sort of the idea that, you
know, that, that it's okay toconstantly be questioning things,
(34:15):
to always ask questions, youknow, as any good student should
do.
And as doctors, we should dothe same thing as patients, we should
do the same thing.
We should constantly questionthings, question the science, because
it will change, it is changing.
And what we think we knowtoday is going to be different, guaranteed.
As we understand realitybetter, we have different models
(34:38):
for reality.
We're going to figure it outand do a better job.
But we have to be open tothose things.
We can't be dogmatic andlocked into our beliefs too much.
So you have any upcomingprojects you want to tell us about?
Any books on the horizon?
Yeah, no.
(34:58):
This book, I still working on it.
I'm enjoying it.
I'm working with a lot ofdifferent companies setting up lifestyle
programs for people where theycan, you know, easily get access
to information.
There's, there, there's somuch available now.
These, these CGMs, which arecontinuous glucose monitors, which
(35:20):
are little things you put onyour arm.
I'm wearing one now, but it,it allows me to read out my blood
sugar on my, you know, on my phone.
And it used to be in theUnited States up until just a few
weeks ago.
Only diabetics could get thesewith a doctor's prescription.
I'm not diabetic.
I mean, since I've changed mylifestyle, my blood sugars are normal
(35:42):
now.
I'm not.
No meds for it.
So my, you know, I'm inremission, but I wear this to track
my metabolic health.
I, I see what foods will spikemy glucose, which is a bad thing.
You know, we want to keep ourglucose at a nice level like that
to avoid those things.
So different things like theseCGMs, anyway, a few weeks ago are
(36:03):
now available for the firsttime the United States in history
without a doctor's prescription.
So you can just, you can orderthem from online and, you know, put
them on.
They last two weeks.
But there are more and moretools that are becoming available.
So I'm I'm super excitedabout, about all these things happening.
That's really neat, Doc.
(36:24):
Anything I haven't asked youthat I should have asked you?
Um, let's see.
No, I think we, we covered well.
Yes, it is.
How could people find outabout me and download my free book
chapter?
There you go.
I, if you, if you're curiousabout this book, I have a.
(36:47):
The first chapter is free onaudio and PDF format.
You can go to my website anddownload it.
It's.
My website is Robert Lufkin.
L U F K I n m d.com I'm veryactive on social media.
My wife says too active, butplease look for me and say hi.
(37:10):
That's great.
As you wrap up thisconversation, are there some key
takeaways you want to leavewith the audience before we wrap
up?
Yeah, I mean, the lifestylematters and it, this, it was a wakeup
call for me.
It probably, probably thesingle most powerful medicine that,
that I will ever use and mostof us will use are the, are the lifestyle
(37:31):
choices we make.
And it's, it's a new era in medicine.
It's not that doctors aren'timportant and they don't matter.
You know, certainly, you know,if I have a serious disease like
I talked about, they canmanage it.
But as far as improving mychances of getting those disease
and my overall health andwellness, I'm in charge because no
(37:52):
doctor could do my lifestylefor me.
And as I said, it's, it's anew day.
Every single morning when Iwake up, I get to decide what I'm
going to eat, when I'm goingto exercise, when I'm going to sleep,
what I get to do.
And it's an empowering time.
I think the idea of me as apatient being the CEO of my own health
(38:15):
is a really empowering thing.
We have agency now and doctorsare important, but they're a little
bit less important now.
They're more consultants forus as we take control of our own
health and there are more andmore tools to make this possible
for all of us.
Well, Robert, thanks so muchfor coming on and sharing your journey
with us and your story andhopefully we'll take your book and
(38:36):
we'll all read it and we'lllive better, healthier lives and
lifestyle.
So thank you for sharing whatyou do.
Thanks so much, Keith.
I really enjoyed yourthoughtful questions and thanks so
much for the work you do.
It's been a blast today.
Thank you.
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