This Saves More Lives Than ANYTHING Else I've Done As A Doctor! - Dr. Boz

Welcome to the Plant-Free MD podcast with Dr. [music] Anthony Chaffy, where we discuss diet and nutrition and how this affects health and chronic disease and show you how you can use this to [music] optimize your health and happiness both mentally and physically. Hello everyone. Thank you for joining me for another episode of the PlantFree MD podcast. I'm your host Dr. Anthony Chaffy and today I have a very special guest Dr. Annette Bosworth aka Dr. Bos who is joining me today to speak about her work. Dr. Ros, thank you so much for coming on. It's a pleasure to see you. >> Absolutely. You know, we have ended up on the same stages over the last few years, but every time we're in the same space, a whole bunch of people end up between you and me. So, I am so happy to make your acquaintance and just come on your show and have a real normal conversation. >> Hopefully conversation. >> Yeah, absolutely. you know, and and and say, yeah, I think that as we said before we came on, um first time I I saw you in person was at at Hack Your Health 3 years ago, but then um yeah, it was just everybody every time you try to talk to somebody, there's there's always um things going on, so wasn't able to get to speak to you then. So, I'm glad we were able to do this now. >> Absolutely. So I I'm I'm sure you you need no introduction, but for those who haven't come across you or your work before, can you please tell us a bit about you and what you do? >> Right. Well, I am one of those uh physicians that thinks a lot and get paid a little. when you when you risk stratify uh for being a physician uh and you get into the place where you make a decision. I chose to be an internal medicine physician and uh I loved it because it's a great place to uh really dive deep into problems, manage chronic illnesses with patients. And um what I learned many years later is it's a great place to think, but that is not where that they do neurosurgeons like what you did if you want to make the big bucks. >> So I'm an internal medicine. Yeah, exactly. It's a business. Absolutely. Uh [clears throat] I'm an internal medicine physician. I've been um a physician for 25 years and I come from a dynasty of hog farmers. Uh so when people say why did you want to go to medical school? I said I really hated hog jars. But I do love people. Uh I grew up in a town of 800 people where uh K through 12 is in one building and you start kindergarten with 21 students and you graduate uh 13 years later with the same 21 students. Uh it's more like a family than a classmate. Uh but I think what that really ingrained in my home of origin is a sense of community, a sense of connection and really knowing people. Um I mean I could tell all those classmates in the class above and below me. I could tell you who'd been divorced, who was sleeping with the preacher, who was the one who ran the, you know, [laughter] it's a small town, you know, all the stuff, right? Right. Welcome to small town. U, but that that connection is something that, um, I spent a lot of energy trying to get away from that small town and my heart really is in a place where I am connected to people and I know them. >> [snorts] >> Um, so even though the first 50 years were in South Dakota, the last uh four four years have been in Tampa, Florida, where I have a medical practice. Uh, my it says internal medicine at the top of the top of the door, but what the real um mastermind behind the door is we take peak brain performance. Uh, so we're looking at chronic diseases, managing them, and how to get people healthy enough to not need the doctor anymore. And that's kept me pretty busy. That's kept me pretty busy. >> Um, I got really tired of answering a couple of questions in 2012, 2013. Um, that had to do with sleep because if you're going to heal somebody's brain, you should uh start with their sleep and what time they go to bed and they sleep through the night and don't use uh opiates and don't use benzo and how do you have this conversation? And when they're sleepd deprived and they can't remember, it's like Groundhog's Day. And you keep having the same conversation with that patient over and over. And I'm like, I cannot go to step two until you do step one. And finally, I got really ticked off and said, I'm going to make a video and I'm going to do something that my preacher does. Uh I go to a church where they have you take notes and they leave the blank and if you're not paying attention to the preacher, you forget to fill in a little blank. And so I'm like, we are going to do that for the patient. We're going to do third grade notes where uh if you have gotten to minute nine in my sleep video on YouTube and you haven't filled in the blank, you might have fallen asleep during my sleep lecture and need to start over. that I put this thing on YouTube and I said, "I am not gonna see you again until you have filled out the notes >> for this lecture and if you come back in in 3 weeks and it's not filled out, you're going to sit in my front office and you're going to fill out the notes for the sleep lecture because I can't do step two until you do step one." >> And it's kind of a business thing that I can't sit there and teach you about sleep for the third time for 45 minutes if you're not going to remember. So I took this really difficult problem and I was I I really felt freedom the first time I did a YouTube lecture that I was saying patients have got to learn this. I don't have the resources to teach it that many times. I'm tired of teaching it to the same people that asked me the same question. And I think that video got a million views within like it was an hourong sleep lecture and a million views by in a year and a half was >> it was mind-blowing. M. And >> so obviously it wasn't just my patients. It was people saying, "Here's a doctor trying to sleep." And there's a link to a PDF. You could download it and take your own notes and some people are filling out the notes and they were getting better from their sleep. And I thought, "Wow, [gasps] that's something." >> And so then I kept adding little videos to how to stuff that chronic disease management should be about. You should teach the patient better. You you can't get me to teach you in a 20 minute visit. And I still have payroll. I still have a nurse to I still have to pay the bills and uh so I can't see you for an hour and a half for the same subject three times in a row because you're not remembering it. And it was brilliant, Anthony. It was just the best freedom to say, "Okay, we are moving on to step two for your brain problem." And then I, you know, started adding other videos to YouTube. So now I'm an influencer. And just I think >> about 3 weeks ago I hit a million subscribers. >> Yeah. Congratulations. >> Wow. Right. They sent you a gold plaque. >> My kids think I'm [clears throat] cool. [laughter] >> More importantly, >> right? Yeah. I got teenage I have boys that are 19 uh 22 and 24. >> And do you have kids? >> Uh no. Step kids. >> Step kids. Well, when boys get to be about 12 or 13, they stop hearing their mother's voice and they drop all verbs and they seem to come back in their early 20s, [laughter] but if you get a if you get a gold plaque from YouTube, they totally talk to you. [laughter] >> So, note to self. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. So, my boys all thought I was really cool for at least a week. >> That nice. Well, you know, it's it's better than um better than nothing. Yeah. Better than not a week. Yeah. [laughter] Yeah. Those boys are uh they love their mother, but they are typical boys and they've got their own lives and agenda, but to be the coolest mom for one week, I'll take that. >> Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Well, I I I sort of experienced this very similar thing when I was speaking to my patients and trying to talk to them about inflammation and and and chronic disease and how um you know their pain syndromes could be affected by their diet and how um many other aspects of their of their health could be affected by this as well. And I I sort of, you know, you have, especially, you know, when you're not when you're sort of in in like the hospital setting. Um, you may have 10 minutes max with someone and that that's a stretch. And especially if you're at the bedside, I mean, you may just have to find time and come back and try to talk to them about it. And so I remember having um doing sort of, you know, clinic hours and things like that. Um, you know, seeing new patients and it's just like, you know, all all your problems could just be sorted out if you just changed your lifestyle. and and so I try to educate them and and I would do that again and again and they were you know they they be very receptive and I found a lot of people being helped by that but at the same time I'm supposed to have 10 minutes with this person and it's taking half an hour 45 minutes to to educate them on these things and I've got a whole bunch of other I've got a whole waiting room of patients uh to see as well and so I just looked at this and I I started it was very stressful because it was I was always behind and I was always always late for people. So, I finally figured out, okay, I just need I need to make some videos as well and just be like, okay, look, I mean, here here are the broadstrokes and now watch these videos. >> Um, yeah. And that's because it's it's so much easier to just say like, look, I've already said it. >> It's on it's on tape. Just just watch it. I I have some, you know, pe when you work with people's brains that aren't working well. Um, and you see it, you're like, you see the one that's capturing and the one that's not, and then you say, "All right, I'm even going to draw you a couple cartoons, and I'm going to do a couple of slides, and I'm going to have like this image of that I have in my mind that I want you to see >> and then connect. And then the patient changes behavior." And they come back and say, "Oh, I got healthier. I did better." And I'm like, "I like that formula. Let's do it again." No, really. I mean that um that first few years of medical school where they say, "Yeah, that the physician is thy teacher." I mean, it means teacher in Latin. And and then you say, "Damn, it looks like matchmaker to me." You take a symptom, you give him a drug. You take a symptom and give him a diagnosis. You give him another diagnosis, you give him another drug. Oh, it didn't work. Switch the drug. Like, this is the stupidest game. I I did not spend all that energy trying to get off the hog farm for this. Mhm. >> And >> well, oh, sorry. Go on. >> Go ahead. No. >> Oh, I was I was just saying that remind me I had a conversation yesterday where I I was sort of talking about this and and and really that's all it was. I mean, literally when you when you look at like the o overseas medical programs where it's straight out of high school, like a six-year program straight out of high school. I' I've seen some of these people's curriculum and and and it was literally a matching game. They had they had an issue on this just a list of issues and they had a list of medications and you literally drew a line from one to the other like a second grade vocabulary test or something like that and it was just like >> don't they know that chat GBT can do way better than that? >> Well, there's that too. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Like that's a job that you're going to be hoisted right out of. There's no value. I mean that >> Yeah. >> blah. >> Yeah. And um and that was the thing too. I was thinking about it and we spend so much time on pharmarmacology looking at you know these these are the mechanisms this is the pharmacology this is this is how this works and interacts with these sodium channels and these calcium channels and it does this and it does that so we think we're like wow we're real scientists we're really learning the science but really at the end of the day you're just like here's the problem here's the pill and but it it fools us into thinking that we're such elite educated people while I really know I have never in my life applied the calcium ated channel nonsense in my practice. I just never have. And so I I think it's honestly as um sort of a distraction to us as medical students and doctors to think that we're actually getting some real education that we can apply when in fact we're just matching problems with pills for the pharmaceutical companies. >> Yeah. The emperor has no clothes. Somebody say it out loud. That's this is a fake game. This is not a game I want to play. And I sure as he suck didn't spend all my you know you know energy not just like in I broke a tradition in my family. I did not become a farmer. Okay that is a black sheep. You can call it a doctor in another family but it's a black sheep in everybody in in my family that you left the farm. You did this crazy thing. You went off and got educated. >> Not just for that. I'm not doing that. I'm not I'm not going to be stuck with the matchmaking. There's got to be more to it. And >> you know and I enjoy it. I enjoy the teaching. I enjoy explaining it like I would to my parents. And I think um the freedom of bridging what medical education should u be doing to from physician to patient. Oh, that's really fun. That's really rewarding. Uh the model doesn't pay for that. It's a terrible mess over there. They only pay if I talk about the drug or I start the drug or I stop the drug or I say something about a drug. if you're gonna talk about blood pressure, you just say it lifestyle stuff, they don't pay you for that. You got to talk about a drug in your note. And I'm like, you're kidding me. That's how this game is played. I was just heartbroken like >> what did I do? >> Yeah. [laughter] >> Yeah. Well, you know, to that end, so what what is your practice focused on now? And and how do you uh typically um you know, what sort of patients are you seeing and and how are you addressing the the root cause life, you know, sort of issues? So you get people off drugs as opposed to on more. >> Yeah. So peak brain performance is where I um I I was in corporate medicine for the first 10 years. I left corporate medicine in 2010 and worked on finding a way to do peak brain performance as an internist. >> And then I had the most stubborn patient I'd ever taken care of. Uh Orry old broad 71 years old. She'd been she'd had cancer for 10 years and the cancer was in her white blood cells and um she was getting great western medical care uh cuz I was taking care of it. Um and that great great western medical care had led her through two rounds of chemotherapy and she walks through the clinic door one day and this is where my practice changed is this day is that woman looked gray >> and even though she was 71 she looked 90. You don't need to be a doctor to know, uh-oh, something's wrong. And if you measure this kind of cancer, it's well, how many uh white blood cells out of the pool are working? And like one in 500 are working. She's got a terribly high white blood cell count again. And she's going to need chemotherapy. And I, you know, look at the numbers and like, yep, you need chemotherapy again. And she says, uh-uh, no way. the last two time the last time you did this. I am a seamstress. I used a sewing machine for the last 70 years of my life, whatever 50 years of my life. Um, and I didn't know what a sewing machine was. And I had been to that chapter of her life. It was terrible. Um, and so I'm like, "Well, you got a six-month life expectancy. You're going to die within six months." She's like, "Don't care. Better than that you gave me." Mhm. And so I am standing in the hospital uh with her and there's a pink slip which says go get chemotherapy and it's probably it's it's a moment where patients have asked me this question before where they said doc what would you do if it's you and Anthony I've lied. I've told them what the guidelines said and say, "Here's what you're supposed to do." Because that's a really emotional question when you're talking about six-month life expectancy. >> Yeah. >> But this patient was my mom. >> Hold on. Have to cut out. >> Yeah. That patient was my mother. And when your mom asks you, "What would you do if it was you?" Well, you can't lie. >> And over the last six months, I had been researching the ketogenic diet because do you know who Domino is? >> Yeah. Yeah, I know Dom. He's a >> Yeah. Right. Okay. >> Yeah. >> Right. And so I had heard a podcast with him and Tim Ferrris about Dom was taking care of brains in fancy South Florida and I was taking care of brains in South Dakota. And I was so cocky and proud that I was doing the same stuff he was doing. And he's got a hyperbaric oxygen, I got a hyperaric, he's got a TMS machine, I got a TMS machine. But his patients were getting better way faster because they were using a ketogenic diet. And honest to God, I was like, "What? What? keto acidosis. What? >> And so I literally, you should never do this if you're a really good business person. I close the clinic for like three days to go to the medical school library and say, "What the hell is he doing with a ketogenic diet?" And so I power through and decide I'm going to learn about the ketogenic diet. And I tell nobody because I'm like, it sounds like the craziest thing I've ever like, "What do you mean a highfat ketogenic keto acidosis? I can't get the words right at the beginning." like but he's got these amazing stories of how severe brain injury I mean people with Parkinson's you know he didn't have all those stories at the beginning but what he was saying and what I was doing I'm like oh and as I'm reading through this there's several papers that say boy if you've got a cancer that's built on high insulin I mean at this point it was most the cancers at that point we can you know dice that out a little better now but this is 2015 I'm reading these papers going what do you mean cancer uses glucose and it doesn't know how to use a ketone for most cancers. >> Mhm. >> And I'm reading through this and of course I know that my mom has a terrible cancer in the background but it's fine right now. And then she walks through the door and it's not fine and she looks terrible and she will not let me give her chemotherapy again. And we're standing there in the in the the center of the foyer for the hospital and one hallway was to go schedule the chemotherapy and the other answer the other place was the door. And I said, "Mom, do do you trust me?" And she's foolish. She said, "With my whole life, honey." And I said, "I think we should walk out of this hospital, leave my car here, drive a hundred miles to our family farm, and I'm going to teach you about a thing called a ketone, and we should do it for 6 weeks, and we are not going to tell my friend who's your oncologist that we're doing it cuz I don't even know how to explain it right now." And so I drive to the farm, and I live in this old farmhouse that's full of like all the canned goods. And if you want to have peaches from you're going to can them and then you're going to have there there's so many carbs in our house that we have to remove all the carbs because I don't trust you mom. You're going to feel crabby in a couple of days. And so we clean out the cupboards. We clean out all the pantry. We take it to town and donate it to the church and say, "All right, let's start a ketogenic diet." And we did kind of the worst version of me teaching the ketogenic diets that I've ever done. Um, and this is 2015, so I didn't have FaceTime or anything. I just had the ability to hear her on the phone, and we live a 100 miles apart. So, I knew I was on to something because she has those looking white blood cells that cannot fight infection. And she's been on antibiotics for 50 out of the last 52 weeks. >> Wow. >> And she didn't call for any refills of her antibiotics. And when I talk to her on the phone, I can't I'm trying to tell myself that it's is it placebo? Do I want her to be healthier? Do I want her? She sounds better. She sounds better. Like, okay, okay, try to be a scientist. You're like, be objective. And so she comes back for the six week checkup and I'm really nervous. I've read a bunch more and she's done great. She's pe ketones the whole time. hasn't really lost much weight, but holy smokes does she look good. She looks She's not gray. She walks through the door. I get goosebumps when I tell the story. She walks through the door and the foyer has this light that comes in from the top window. And she walks into the light and I I just think it's a it's an angel >> because she looks like my mom again. And I'm like, "Oh Lord." And so this is the kind of oncology visit where you walk in, you get your blood drawn, and they run the blood and then you sit there and wait till the doctor and he's not going to see you till the blood's back. And it's a, you know, it's a white count, right? It's not that hard. But now they're coming in to draw your blood again because something must have happened to the white count. So it's either really good or really bad. >> And the best we had ever had projections for the chemotherapy was to lower that white count by about 30%. And so we're waiting. We're waiting. And I can hear my friend um on the other side of the door yelling at the nurses because he can't find the chemo notes because she lives 100 miles away. So she goes to the satellite place to get her chemotherapy and he can't find the notes cuz she didn't go shut up. [laughter] >> And I'm like, um, mom, if he asks you any questions, just shut up. I don't know what to say. I'm really nervous right [laughter] now. [gasps] I mean, he's the professor of the med school. He teaches the med students with me. So we are we're colleagues. we and I just am like just be quiet. >> So he walks in about 3 minutes later and he looks at her and he he also doesn't see the zombie that he's seen the last few visits >> and he looks at the labs and he's like, "What have you been doing?" And she's like, she looks at me and I'm like, "Hold the line, girl. Hold the line. Don't say anything. >> [laughter] >> And so we both are quiet and he speaks first. He's like, "Well, you dropped your numbers by 70% whatever you're doing. You look amazing. You haven't been on antibiotics once in six weeks. So whatever the hell you're doing, keep it up." >> I grab her hand and raise her out of there [laughter] like, "Oh my god." >> [gasps] >> And that's that's the first four chapters of a book I wrote. I lost a bet to my husband because as I'm telling my mother this, her brain doesn't work right at the beginning. And so I have on our mirror in our bathroom, I'd have these sticky notes of has mom mastered this test, this part of the thing. And so if the sticky note was on the right side, she does not know how to explain a ketone or whatever. She does not know what a ketone is. Okay. So, and I move it to the left side when she mastered the like, oh, she's getting better. But we got a lot of stickies on the other side. And I am happily married for 30 years. But at this point, my husband's saying, "You should write a book. >> You should write a book." And I'm like, "I don't have time to write a book. I I'm doing this thing." >> Yeah. >> And then we have a we have a typical marital spat and we make a bet and whoever loses the bet has to do something. And I was really sure I was right. But I lost a damn bet. And my husband said, "If I win this bet, you got to take the next four months and write a book." And I was cocky. I thought I was not going to have to write a book, but I lost. [laughter] And so I surrendered. You know, I blocked out the kind of time it takes to write a book in four months, which was not easy. But I wrote a book. I self-published it. I put it on Amazon and for like four months I think seven people bought it like my mom, my sister. But one day a whole bunch of I went from you know 20,000 people on my YouTube channel to 100,000 people. >> Mhm. >> It just took off and now that book has sold over a million copies because that story >> has >> it's a it's a story. I mean it's like it's not a fable. It's my mom. It's a story. And in between the story, I'm kind of explaining what the heck does a ketogenic diet have anything to do with cancer or her brain or other people's brains. And I it was it's that that story has saved more lives than any medical practice I would have ever had. And I had I put it on Audible. I I read it out loud, you know, did the audio book and it's a great story. It's a just I mean the part I told you about the physician that is like the first four chapters. There's a whole bunch of messes we make after that and we figure it out and and she goes from being a 90year-old 70-year-old she's only 71 but she looks 90 and by the time she's 72 she is like a 40-year-old. She is living her best life. It was it restored so much health in my mom that I had guilt for not teaching other patients how to do it. Like, oh my goodness, look at how many other people could have been healthier if I was teaching them. So my practice now, so I so this story happens this, you know, crazy weekend where all the book sales start to happen and then that's escalates to um, you know, a chapter of being a being an author, right? And I I have so many people trying to get into my clinic that it's ridiculous. Like I'm going to have a coup from my staff if I take on one more patient. Mhm. >> And so I have this woman who is I'm picking up my kids from middle school at this time. And in South Dakota, it's normal to have 30 below weather when you're picking up your kids from middle school. And this woman takes the book that I've written and she comes to my, you know, you got the scraper in the really cold. And so there's this part that's scraped out and she slams the book onto my windshield and and then she looks around it and says, "Did you write this book?" She's yelling because she's yelling at me through the window. And I'm looking at her like, "Do I know you?" [laughter] >> I mean, it's South Dakota. I think I know the whole state, but I don't think I know this lady. And I said, "Well, you know, get in. You can't roll down the window because they're frozen shut." So, I said, "Well, get in." So, here's this big Brazilian woman hollering in the strong accent that she uh just got out of hospital and she's shaking the book at me and she's so passionate. Just got out of hospital. Do you know what they fed me? [laughter] And I'm like, what did they feed you? Pudding. I need to be your patient. And I'm like, oh, no, no, no, no. If there was a chance of you being my patient right now, you look like a crazy lady. I'm not going to put you in my practice. [laughter] My staff would kill me. >> And I'm like, I Who's your doctor? And he she says her do I'm like, they're my friends. They're good doctors. Just tell them you don't want to have carbs. M >> and she's arguing with me and and then she says something where I can't argue with her and she goes, "Well, then you need to have a class where you can teach it." >> And and and everything in my brain said, "You should say no." >> But like God took over my vocal cords and he would not let me say no. I like I couldn't say I couldn't get the word no out of my mouth. >> And I said, "All right, I'll do a free support group on Friday mornings at 8 o'clock. go up and I'll I'll teach you. And so in this part of my building where I would see where my clinic was, there was an aband section that nobody had. It was not rented. And so it didn't have heat. It's in the cold of South Dakota. We I set up 10 folding chairs. She and about four of her friends show up and I start doing this support group for saying, "You see, your insurance isn't going to pay me to teach you the damn ketogenic diet. That's not a thing. But I'll teach you the ketogenic diet. You show up for a support group once a week. I'll answer your questions. I'll give you assignments every week. And a couple of other, you know, people come, people here, and they show up for this support group every week. And it's kind of like aa but for carbs. Like you show up and you say, "No, you need to keep your carbohydrates 20 or less. No, you need to prick your finger and show that there's ketones present if you want to get results." And so I just do the teaching that I was teaching with people that were in my practice, but the people in the group are getting better faster. And I think it's because you don't learn from a doctor one-on-one. You might learn in a YouTube channel. Like that's possible, but I don't think you really learn from a doctor chirping at you saying, "You should do this in a 15-inute visit where I'm trying to get as much out as I can." And I think it's like one of the biggest sins that medical practice has done is this. You know, it's HIPPA. It's protected. You can't talk about it. And I'm like, "No, you guys can talk about it. I can't tell them about your stuff, but you guys can talk about it >> and you should talk about it. You should ha have conversations about how are you getting your blood pressure to be better? How are you working on these lifestyle problems? How are you saying no to a carbohydrate diet or a low carbohydrate diet?" and the people in the group were getting better faster. And during that time, I wrote another book which really was what's the steps to not be my patient? How do you do this without being um so that's the keto continuum and um it it's got a workbook and it's got a story of one of the guys that came to this support group and he was never my patient. He was always just somebody in the support group and he got healthy. He made every mistake out of the book. So, he made a good guy for doing a book about it. And Anthony say it again that that you don't need to see me. You do not need to see a doctor to learn how to do a ketogenic diet, but there are some really important steps that you should follow. And what that's morphed into is I moved to Tampa. I still do that damn support group. We meet at the bowling alley now at the birthday room at 8 o'clock in the morning. And this support group comes and asks me questions about a ketogenic diet. And I think of it as part of the service that I think physician I know physicians do should do, but who the hell has time for that when you're trying to see patients 15-inut slots and I teach classes online and I I see patients but it is a very select patient that I can't figure out the other way before I I select who comes into my clinic because they >> they took the class they couldn't I and they take the class, they get better. You don't need to see a doctor across the globe for a ketogenic diet. You need to get healthy, go back to your doctor and show them, here's what a ketogenic diet does. And that's how we can get doctors to lean in and say that same curious thing that I did. Keto acidosis, ketosis, what are you talking about? This woman just lost 80 pounds in the six months that you haven't seen her. And she did it with a ketogenic diet. Let me show you. So that's my practices. >> Very good. I I think um that's very similar. Do you know Dr. um Unwin in the UK? >> Yes, I met him. >> Yeah. So he he very similar. He had a sort of a ketogenic support group. He had a he had a patient of his that changed his his outlook on life where she basically didn't take her metformin for a year and he was bringing her in to give her a stern talking to about taking her diabetes medications and she gave him a talking to and just said you know I have diabetes and that that's a problem with high blood sugar. You never told me that all these carbohydrates turn into turn into sugar and and elevate my blood sugar. You're like are you even a doctor? You know that you didn't even know that. Oh, and so and um and she said, you know, I haven't taken my metformin in a year because I haven't needed to take my metformin for a year. You know, why why didn't you tell me this? Why didn't you tell me there was >> Oh, that's such a good Oh, I love that woman. I She's a firstborn female. I can tell from here. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. [laughter] And and he Okay. Wow. All right. And so he he started um you know, same thing. You know, it's very difficult to do this sort of one-on-one with people. So he started a class like that. same thing. Um, outside of office hours and started teaching people and and people were getting better and people in his community, the doctors at his practice, people at his at conferences basically ostracized him for for going against the the status quo. And um and so he was he he would get yelled at, people would turn their back. They'd find out who he was and they just turn their back on him and walk away. It was really nasty. >> And um >> welcome to humans, right? >> I know. Yeah. and you know just challenge their their worldview and and that's it. It's over. And so he ended up publishing his results and saying, "Hey, look, this is what I'm getting. These are the results. This is what's happening." And now people had to take him seriously and went like, "Oh, damn it." Okay. So now everyone's um all interested in him now. But at first it was it was really fighting against the tide. But he did the same thing because you can just reach more people. you know, if you have a if you have a room, you know, group of people that you can speak to, you're giving the same information out just like and then graduating up to the YouTube channel where you can reach millions of people potentially where you can say that same thing or you can talk to someone like, "Hey, this is what I think would really help you. Watch this video." Um, that can really help as well. So, I think that's that's a great thing that any doctor can do is to to reach more people is is have those little class sessions that you don't have to just spend so much time uh with each individual patients. We had that at my practice where if new patients wanted to come in, they had to go to basically like a sat a Saturday seminar and we, you know, build up enough people, you have like 40 people that wanted to be patients. you know, the seminar is like, "Okay, look, we're going to we're going to get all this education out right now so that we don't have to repeat it, you know, spend two hours with each of you. We're going to do two hours right now." And >> it's exactly what I I mean, I I won't see a patient if they haven't I mean, the online class, if you look at the keto continuum, the book, which is really the handouts I was doing for patients in the clinic, >> you know, put it in a book, get it to the Okay, that's fine. Um but then when people's when people are really insulin resistant when they have pathology associated with metabolic disease their brain doesn't work right which is how I got I mean peak brain performance is where I started. So like my mom couldn't read. >> She's a super smart that she just her brain was too mushy to read to comprehend. If I would have said read this book mom she would have she would not have she needed me walking through her lesson by lesson. So, I put it into an online course and I tell patients if you're really suffering, that's the fastest thing to do is go to my YouTube channel, find the beginner's list. If you're curious and you want the don't dump I mean, I've got a thousand videos out there now, so it's a little overwhelming for people. If you want the organized version, this is the list. This is how you do it. And and that that just it's the freedom of somebody saying, "I thought I was doomed. I thought this was forever." And and I actually did um see Dr. Unwin give that lecture um telling his and you reminded me of it where >> he was you know it's a heavy feeling where you're like okay I got this myself into this damn matching game of prescriptions and drugs and diagnosis and then you get this glimmer of hope that says oh I didn't do all this for matching knucklehead game I did this was I wanted to help people and I know that sounds polyiana but it truly is a way where your soul kind of wakes up again and says oh here here we go this is the service that was supposed to come in medicine and and that's priceless. I mean, absolutely. Yeah. Dr. Westman is another person who when I heard I mean I started this support group and I wasn't going to tell anybody because you're like it sounds crazy like who gives a free support group once a week just so you stay out of my clinic. Um but it was way better and when I heard Dr. for Westman, you know, Duke trained, you know, cerebral, got all the plaques and letters and like, oh yeah, um he does that too and it worked and his patients got better when they were in a group and yeah, so I think that's if you're going to say, you know, you get one quick trip on through this trips around the sun, right? Let me be known for educating people on how to undo what the previous physicians or what medicine my colleagues have said you can't you can't you can't and then the healthier the I mean the best advertisement that I have are the healthy patients that go back to their doctors and they never actually saw me one-on-one they took a class they did I do this um this really intense class it'll be the eighth time coming up in January where I have them through Zoom 200 students I take through the protocol I would use if you had seizures or if you had cancer like what is the ultimate ketogenic experience to say you think you can't make a ketone I'll prove you wrong >> and in the class we have them pricking their fingers uh sharing their life uh through a dashboard of data that says what's your blood sugar in the morning and what's your ketones in the morning and by the time you're done with this class you're going to see that that is a you you have the power to heal yourself with the education that comes with that. And most people don't need to see me. I mean, I pick the ones that I think are pretty curious puzzles. And I I don't have a lot of space for more curious puzzles until some of them either get healthy enough that they don't want to see me anymore, which isn't happening at a rate I thought it would. But um you can only see so many patients. I don't want to train a whole bunch of nurse practitioners. I want to train students to go out and be the best grandmothers, the best, you know, coaches for how do you raise young boys to use a ketogenic diet in their athletic training? How do you show um, you know, h how do you have a family that says change the change the course of what your lineage looks like by eating better? You don't need to be a nurse practitioner to do that. You need to be a mom. You need to be a sister. You need to be a dad or a coach. And that leadership should be happening in the next generation if they're taught right. >> And I see it happening from the students. It's my favorite part. >> Yeah. Well, I think I think this is this is basically being healthy is our birthright. And we should be healthy. And so the fact that we're all chronically ill and having all these degenerative problems. I mean, something's going wrong in the environment because genetically >> that shouldn't exist. Not on a populationwide level, certainly in an individual level that can happen. But all life on earth is healthy nominally. And so you know like we we we >> you know life is begotten by life and so you know it's only by the winners that we are here and so if we just came from a sick diseased you know species you know we we that should have just never never happened. We should have [clears throat] generation you know yeah generations ago. And so all life is is healthy at its core. And if something else happens, they can get infections, they can get sick, they can get famines, they get sort of chronic exposures, heavy metal, lead, all these sorts of things. But something's happening to them externally. It's not it's not an internal sickness that that's sort of what we've been fooled is that well, if you live long enough, you're going to get these chronic diseases. Lions don't, elephants don't, whales don't, um tortoises don't. Suckers can live hundreds of years. you know, they're not getting these chronic diseases um except when you feed them the wrong thing and you expose them to something that that is going to disrupt their physiology. And that's the same thing that's happening to us. And so I think that it's it it is our birthright to be healthy and we should just be healthy and active well into late adulthood. And what doctors are there for is to deal with the other stuff, the accidents, the emergencies, the infections, the snake bites, >> yeah, >> the lawnmowers, you know, all these sorts of things that that happened unexpectedly. And that that is an amazing thing that that the medical community and establishment can do for people. But we we've sort of been overwhelmed with the chronic disease aspect of it and and we're treating it wrong because if it's an environmental exposure, a pill is not going to be the right solution for that. You have to remove the environmental exposure. And once you do that and people just start getting healthy again, then you can focus on the tough cases and the difficult ones that that you are actually needed for that they don't just need to look just just change a few things and you'll just you'll just be healthy for the next 50 years. Yeah, you look at the, you know, the tip of the iceberg in medicine, uh, now is the, you know, the snake bites and the acute stuff that you can fix and okay, you know how to do it. That's fun. You do a surgery and then you look at the pyramid and you get to the bottom layer and it is like [clears throat] you're in the internal medicine world, like this is a chronic disease. You're going to be with me forever. We're going to have 15 medications if you're under my practice for six years. It's just what happens. and and the [clears throat] exit path, there isn't one. Like, I can remember the moment I learned that autoimmune diseases are actually reversible. And I'm like, >> wild. >> Why? Why did nobody tell me that? How come I don't know that? How come you go to the book and it doesn't have anything that is cure? What shouldn't you You should be teaching this. This is terrible. I cut out people's colons because their ulcerative colitis had boring big holes and ulcers in it. They died and you're telling me if I would have changed the freaking menu? That's the answer. I mean, that's a guilt that I'll hold for the rest of my life is the some of the deaths. I mean, specifically this ulcerative colitis death where you're like, dang, he died. >> He didn't need to die. I didn't even give him that option. I didn't know it. >> I I don't want that to ever happen again. there should be there should be cure rates saying if you want it especially when there's enough pain in their life they say oh the ketogenic diet is not sustainable that's a bunch of hoie that's not true especially when you've had the kind of pain most patients have had by the time they get to us like hey you can say what you want but if you're trying to live with a healthy brain and a a purpose- driven life for the last few decades of your life it's in the menu people it's in the menu Yeah. And you and you've at this point you've had patients on ketogenic diets for quite some time. >> 10 years. Yeah. I've been on it since 2015. So we're I'm at 10 years. And there's patients who started with me who still do it. I mean, they're in South Dakota, but uh they are uh they write me a Christmas letter each year saying, "Can't thank you enough for teaching me that." >> Yeah. Oh, very good. Yeah. >> And and I think that's that's an important that's an important lesson for people as well that this isn't this doesn't have to be just a temporary thing. Well, like well we just shortterm and and heal some issues then go back to doing the thing that gave you all those issues in the first place. No, this you can just do this for your entire life. There's actually no requirement for carbohydrates or sugar. >> Yeah. I mean, uh, one of, one of the things that accidentally happened to me over the years was I was taking care of peak brain performance. And you hear Parkinson's and that makes sense. And you hear, okay, bipolar. Okay. Yep. And then what you don't realize is some of the most difficult brains to come into my clinic, the most damaged brains were post drug addiction. >> And so, you've got a brain that's got some injuries. And when you try to tell that alcoholic who's been boozing for 25 years that he's going to spend the rest of his life not drinking, they can't think. They can't see that far. When you start to tell that guy with alcohol with alcoholism, look, I need you to get through the next week. The judge has sent you to me and you're going to go to jail. You've got your third DUI. Whatever the reason he's in my clinic, I just need you to get through the next week. And here's the secret to getting through the next week is you got to be around people with the same problem. You got to be in a community of learning how to do this differently. And oh, Anthony, I learned so much from those patients who they'd been to five rehabs and this and they all the things money could buy. And when you plot out who was able to stay sober the longest, it was the people who would show up to the support groups. And the same thing happens when you're trying to change behavior for somebody saying you think that carnivore diet is the cure all the first three weeks you're on it and it feels awesome and then things morph and change and you say well I had to add a little something here and then they're back they're not as they never hit ketosis anymore. Their carnivore diet might still be the word carnivore but they have too much insulin resistance for the way they're eating and oh it doesn't work. But in a support group, you're sitting there in the first few weeks and your carnivore diet's working. But you're looking across a room of people who have had a relapse, who their ketones are no longer are as easy to produce as yours are. And you learn that there's something more to this. And then you see the happiness. I have a 95year-old who drives an hour and a half to be there at 8:00 on a Tuesday morning. >> And he is the envy of the room. to be 95 and driving his car to and from a support group it's like brain envy like he's living his best life like he has his he's kind he loves to argue about the physiology >> and you say you don't think you can sustain this? No, you got to pay attention to the data. You can't kind of wing it. You can at the beginning, but if you want to stay the course, you got to use some 21st century stuff like you got to measure your glucose and your ketones. And then you should probably show up to a support group because most human beings are going to have to look at themsel see themselves in the people that they're learning from. And to me that's the best part anyway is those human stories of struggling and getting through and trying to forgive yourself and have enough grace for yourself and for your neighbor to say try again. Try again. Don't be discouraged. >> Yeah. >> That's what I do. >> Yeah. Well, I really like that and and I I agree. I think having that support system in place in person is fantastic if people don't have that in-person support group online and they don't have to pay for it. I mean I have teaching groups and things like that where I I spend my time working with people you know so you know we charge for that but I always tell people like you don't have to pay for this. There are Facebook groups that have been going around for 30 years talking about this and they have and they're free. and you just show up and then you talk and people are very interactive and they're very helpful and you'll there's nothing new under the sun like you just search in it's like well what about this like put it in the search see you'll see 50 threads >> absolutely >> talking about exactly that and you and you'll see exactly what what's going on >> and the empowerment yeah so one of the things that we do at that end of that 21 day is they're they're in small groups of 10 students and we tell them at the end one of you is going to have to pay the 40 bucks for a Zoom link and you're going to meet once once a week and we're not going to keep track of that. You're going to be in char because uh one of the major issues that I see in healthcare is that those patients come to you and they'll say, "Now doctor, take care of me." >> Yeah. >> And at first, you do need to probably do that, but you need to get to the point where you're well educated enough that you have to take ownership of how to manage this next step. And when we say these support groups are you have all been trained by I think the best class on the globe on how to do the ketogenic diet. You 10 all know each other's stories by now because you've been through some stuff like sardine challenges and fasting and in the next year one day a week and it's nobody's cost but now it is your responsibility to keep going to do that and boy the empowerment that I mean they have to take charge of that. The people who are the healthiest are the ones that they're the leaders because they keep the group going and they keep meeting people saying, "Okay, I need to get back on my game. I need to get back on my game." And they really they really do change their health in the span of a year. Amazing. I I've had some people take that course a few times because I mean they were 180 pounds overweight and so they lose the first 80 and they kind of stall and then they they're gonna need some new they're going to take that class again and they're going to learn something new that they could have learned but it was too much they could only level up to here and you know now they're got a BMI that's in the green zone >> and they're the best teacher in that class because they've been coming once a week not because they paid anything because they just said, "No, this is your responsibility to get healthy. This is how you do it." >> Yeah. Oh, very good. >> Well, that that that's great. And it's um it's really nice that you're able to to affect so many more people and then and then that sends out ripples because they're helping other people and they're sort of making their own little support groups and people in their life are being influenced by that as well. And um and it's it it it I think it's been it's been a very much a grassroots movement, but I think now we have, you know, um national figures and things like that now talking about it like maybe we should think about this for the dietary guidelines and things like that. We've obviously made a big enough impact through that grassroots movement that you know that people can um you are starting to pick up on it and you and as we were talking about earlier you you just came out on the diary of the CEO. So you have these huge platforms that are now saying, "Hey, what exactly what exactly is going on here and um that I think is is just a testament to how powerful this is because it's just gone through word of mouth up until now. Now it's starting to get that national international attention and um >> yeah, I mean absolutely. I mean I do think there needs to be a policy change. I think there needs to be leadership that understands this. But you can't go chirp about that. You got to send healthy people that are in the life of that politician that said, "Mom, how the heck are you so healthy?" >> I mean, that that's how you change. I mean, that's the community of culture that you're going to see it. It's going to be downstream of politics. And when that uh politician's mother got better on a ketogenic diet and he says, "What in the heck did you do?" Now, now you've got that politician's attention. And I I truly think you look in the history of mankind, that's how this changes. You don't come up with some smarty pants saying here's how you do it. I mean, you may have had some seasons for that. But if you want people to lean in and say, "Huh?" Best advertisement is a bunch of healthy people out there saying, "I don't eat those carbs. That processed food is not for me. I keep my I prick my finger and look at my glucose and ketones in the morning." >> No. >> Yeah. Let's Let's Let's hold on tight for the wave of the next 10 years because I think it's going to be fun to watch. >> Yeah, definitely. Um, well, Dr. Bos, I I would love to keep talking to you. Um, but I I I don't want to um monopolize your time, but thank you so much for coming on. Please let us know uh where we can get your book and where we can can find more of your work. >> You bet. Well, Amazon really like it does a good job of promoting my book. Uh, it's on Amazon, self-published, so there's not a a publisher out there. If you've bought my book, please leave a review. That's the best thing you need to say if you're ever trying to sell a book is reviews matter and there's a whole bunch of good ones behind that book. Um, but then bosmd.com is my website. But you know the best place every Tuesday I do a live show, a real live show and I tell patients if that's the only support group you can lean into, come. Uh, I don't turn on the commercials on YouTube on that live show until it's over. So, I do it every Tuesday and uh we try to, you know, have a finger on the pulse of what's what's in the community, but also just one of the basics. How are how do you get back on the wagon? Um and join me there and you can ask your questions and I'll answer them if if we get to your question. >> Absolutely. Well, I will put u links for those down in the description so people can check that out. And people should also check out uh your interview with Dire CEO that just came out today as we're filming, but will obviously be out for a little while when this comes out, too. So, people should definitely check that out as well. Dr. Ross, thank you so much for coming on. It's been an absolute pleasure speaking to you. >> You bet. Thanks for trying to make this connection from across the globe. It's really nice to meet you. >> It's absolutely my pleasure. Thank you. Thank you everyone for joining. Please do share this with someone you think would uh enjoy it or benefit from it and leave a comment to help the algorithm get this out there. Thank you all. We'll see you next