Luxury Wellness vs Real Prevention: Why Expensive Health Trends Are Not Always Better

We're talking about luxury healthcare on today's episode, luxury wellness, and wellness as a status symbol. I think this is something we kind of talk about a little bit here and there on the podcast, but this is really being taken over by social media, by influencers, by digital media. And there's this whole subsection of healthcare that is at a heavy price, considered very luxurious in the healthcare world. So, we're going to dive into it and kind of give our perspective and what it means and is it really worth it. So, with that being said, welcome to the Men's Matrix Method podcast where we talk about everything health and functional medicine. Today's episode is called buying the Porsche of healthcare. Wellness should not be a status symbol. And we've been looking forward to talking about this because wellness has become one of the biggest cultural conversations online, but also one of the most confusing. So, it is Thursday if you're listening to us live, so that means today is going to be a provider discussion with myself and my esteemed colleague here, Dr. Sasha Rose. Together we're going to talk about luxury wellness, social media trends, influencer health advice, biohacking, longevity clinics, supplement stacks, and how functional medicine can separate real prevention from expensive marketing. We also want to be honest about something important. Functional medicine is not always covered by insurance, and we understand that access matters. We are not here to advocate for a model that only some people can afford and reach. We want preventive, personalized, root cause care to become more accessible, more understood, and more supported over time because healthcare should not only step in not healthcare should not only step in one in once Sorry. Healthcare should not only step in once someone is already sick. Here's how today's episode is going to work. We're going to start with our discussion, and as we go, if you're listening to us live, if you have questions, please make sure to drop them in the comments. Also, we'd love to hear from you where you are. If you're listening to us live, you can let us know where you're um listening from, whether it's locally to our clinic or anywhere in the world. After the discussion, we'll answer your questions during our live Q&A towards the end of the podcast. And just a quick reminder before we get started, this episode and all of our episodes of the Men Matrix Method are educational only. This [clears throat] podcast and all of our podcasts are not meant to be personal personalized medical advice, and it should not replace care or advice from your own medical providers. If you are interested in receiving personalized medical care and guidance from one of our providers like myself or Dr. Rose, you can go to our website www.menmatrixme menmatrixusa.com, book a discovery call and start the process of becoming a patient. So, before we dive in, let's get started and do a quick intro. So, ladies first, Dr. Rose, if you want to introduce yourself to our to our listeners, and then I will go, and then we'll get started. All right. Um I'm Dr. Sasha Rose. I am a naturopathic doctor. I am also a licensed acupuncturist. And I am one of the lead providers here at Men Matrix. I've been practicing functional medicine for just about 21 years, and I sit on the Forbes Health Advisory Board. I am a published author. And I have to say I love when we do topics like this. Um I would say I like it when we kind of step back and kind of look at look at the bigger picture, and it's not necessarily just focused on one health condition. I feel like what we're talking about today applies to almost everybody, and um I think it's important It means a lot to me to talk about things like access, and I'm glad that we have the opportunity to do that. Yeah, I agree. I think this is fun. It's not as clinical and cerebral. It's more cultural um and sociological in perspective and I think that's fun, the psychology of healthcare. Um I'm Colin Renard. I'm one of the other lead clinicians at MedMatrix. Uh I have been practicing functional medicine for a little over 10 years. I have a pretty unique healthcare background. I have um um I have experience as in chiropractic medicine and natural medicine. I practice medicine at MedMatrix as a PA. Um I am multiple board certified in anti-aging and natural medicine and I hold a fellowship in functional medicine. Um I specialize in all kinds of things from hormone replacement therapy to gut health to complex chronic illness to Lyme disease. So, uh functional medicine is really a way for me to kind of extend how I live my own life to patients and I know um that's kind of how we all do things as clinicians at MedMatrix. So, like I said, as as we get started, um if patient if people either listening, if you have questions, please feel free to drop them in the comment box to where you're listening to us live. We'd love to answer any questions you have about this topic or something related. And also, we'd love to hear from where you're listening. If you're listening to us live, drop us a uh a a location. Are you in Maine? Are you in New Hampshire? Are you in New England? Um we'd love to hear from you. So, to get us started, Dr. Rose, you you mentioned this, you know, access and kind of talking about luxury healthcare from a cultural perspective. When we talk about the Porsche of healthcare, luxury, what is it that we're What is it we're going to talk about today? What does this mean for people listening? Yeah, I think I mean, I really a lot of it I think has come back to social media, but I would say when we're using the terms like luxury healthcare or the Porsche of healthcare, it really is kind of this wellness movement and it's really often about aesthetics. It's about kind of you know, the influencer who's driving it. There's a there seems to be a bit of a status piece to it [clears throat] and it's a lot of It's it there's there are some I think really valid health tools that are being discussed and offered, but it because it's kind of influencer driven, I think it's not always like accurate information and or it's I don't how should I say that? I think it's kind of can be clouded or you know, colored a little bit by whoever's representing it and but it's being sold as actual like health information. So, it's a I mean, you just mentioned all the the statistics behind it, the amount of money in the wellness, you know, being spent on an estimated to to be spent on this wellness industry and I think it's fascinating, but it's all these it is it's very much of like, what are you doing? What tools are you using? How do you look? So, that's what I hear when I hear luxury healthcare and I guess I think of it a little bit more as like wellness as opposed to healthcare, but that's probably my own bias. Yeah. Yeah, and that's I think a question we have to kind of answer is is this healthcare? Mhm. You know, because wellness, the way I look at this is wellness has become such a status symbol amongst other things we have in our culture. Um, you know, celebrities creating wellness brands or wellness products. Um certain supplements that people buy, uh certain devices, you know, whether it's red light therapy or it's some sort of aesthetic device. Um everybody's doing cold plunges now, IV therapies. And um people are spending thousands and thousands of dollars on these sort of social wellness memberships for clubs where you go and you go in a sauna or you have a $20 smoothie at the bar and you hang out with people that have money cuz they're also there cuz that's the only people that can probably afford it. Um [laughter] so it's sort of it it's it's I think it's an interesting sort of culture cuz as as humans, especially in a Western culture, what we do is we find ways to show off wealth. And I think this is just another way we're doing that, right? It used to be big houses and car I mean, it still is, but like have a very expensive home, a very expensive luxury car, designer clothes, you know, an Hermes Birkin bag if you're, you know, to show off your status, jewelry, right? Gold, diamonds, furs. Yeah. You know, that was a big thing in the '80s, right? Fur coats. I mean, that's not really a thing anymore. So I think this is just another extension of a certain subset of our population to to show how much money we have. Um and right, like you said, is this actually healthcare? Is it What is it? Um and what's kind of the science behind it? So I think it's really important. And you you mentioned the social media piece. Um what are what are some of the biggest social media wellness trends that patients are seeing right now or or patients bring to you and ask you about? Yeah, so the biggest social media wellness trends that I'm hearing about from my my would include, I would say a lot about cortisol and we've you and I have talked about this on this podcast before and kind of people suspecting that cortisol is kind of, you know, at the root or elevated cortisol in their minds is a kind of at the root of a lot of metabolic issues and um issues in general. Parasite cleanses, that's a big one. Um I know that MedMatrix in general gets a lot of phone calls about parasites and parasite cleanses. Um some people are asking about GLP microdosing, a lot about peptides and peptide stacks, um green powders, do they work, do they not work, um various gut protocols, gut detoxification protocols, as you mentioned, red light, cold plunges, and usually the questions are like, is it worth it or um you know, I have a friend who's been doing who swears by cold plunging, like, what do you think about it? S- cold plunges as well as saunas, um you again, some of these you've already mentioned, continuous glucose monitors, wearable sleep scores, NAD, um the biological age testing, and then various supplement stacks. So those are that covers probably most of the questions that I'm getting from my patients. How about you? Yeah. Um I would say the same. I think a lot of what I hear is just who popular people online or what popular people online are doing. Mhm. And that's really we've said this on the podcast a lot that the health care system, whether it's us or the conventional health care system or whoever's practicing health care, needs to recognize, whether they want to or not, that people are getting their health care advice from influencers and celebrities. Is that a good or bad thing? I'm I don't know. Mhm. But it's a thing. So you've got some person who has millions of Tik Tok followers that looks a certain way, right? They're maybe running around a beach in a bikini or something, and they're you know, it's very visually appealing, it's very sexy, and at the bottom of the video is a little link for like a supplement, fat burning or glutathione, NAD, pick something, whatever it is. And that is That is health care for people. It really is, and that's kind of like how these things I think spread so quick. You know, you've got this really, really visual cue from this video, you know, a very sexy person or a sexy place or something that looks very good. It's very aspirational, it's very emotionally appealing, and it and it pulls you in. So, there's this sort of there's this um there's this part of the social media piece and the influencers that um they look the part, they they talk the part, they're giving you cues about what your life should be essentially, you know, especially for things I see for men, right? You need to be strong, you need to be jacked, you need to be good at sex, you need to get a beautiful woman, you need to It's like all these kind of very biological, instinctual drives of like our evolution as humans. And you know, things with women, you know, being thin, being beautiful, being having you know, a great body or beautiful skin or beautiful clothes. I mean, it's all these kind of cultural grabs. And um that's that's where people are getting health care. Um and like we said, is it good or bad? I don't I don't know. I mean, what do you think? Do you think it's Well, I think it's I I think it's fascinating. That that the role that influencers are playing in our health care system right now, and as we've talked about in the past that a lot of people are putting more trust in those influencers than they are in their own doctors. Yeah. And they're so they they, you know, and this circles back to kind of distrust in the conventional, feeling let down by, dismissed by the conventional providers, and so feeling and there's this whole wealth of information, Mhm. true or not true, valid or not valid, but on you can you can just be on there forever and get all the information you need about what what to take, what to eat, what how to exercise, and then you too can look like this person, and it's very appealing. Um, and it, you know, so it it it makes sense, and I think, you know, you you know, you and I have talked about it a little bit that we kind of sit in the middle as functional medicine providers, right? Because we are medical, um, but we are also very like well versed in a lot of these wellness trends, and um, we're not practicing conventional medicine, but we have a lot more training and information and Yeah. experience, and we're we're medical people, and so it's kind of a funny I don't mind it, I like it, but it's an interesting place to be sitting. Yeah. We have to it's like the best of both worlds, and we have to try to weed out all the noise for people, and hopefully they can trust what we're saying. Not that they we blatantly should be trusted, but it's sort of because we have that experience as you're saying in both the wellness world and conventional medical space, we can piece out the good in all of it, try to make sense of it for people. Um, and that's how I think we as functional medicine practitioners can kind of split the difference between like real prevention and like marketing, you know? We we really can understand how prevention should um expose a patient's potential risk for certain things, you know, talk about symptoms, right? That's a very medical thing. We talk about labs, that's a very medical thing. Um their health history, their medications, their their um chief concerns. And we can kind of bridge that into what is being marketed and how we can kind of bring that in a little bit, right? Are we talking about peptides as something that is appropriate for a patient based on their medical history. Um we can kind of understand some of the science, right? What do these products do? Is what is being marketed actually um appropriate for the patient? Um and often times it starts with the product being exposed to the patient and then I think it's good when the patient brings it to the clinician, but then the other issue is whether the clinician is going to say, "Oh, you know, don't read anything don't believe anything you see online." It's like, "Well, that's not always true, right? There's got to be a middle ground." Um so it it's really I think we do a good job, like you said, of kind of bridging that gap. Um What are What are your thoughts on when when the sort of dangers of wellness becomes uh uh something more of like an identity of wellness versus a potential positive outcome, like wellness is a status symbol and how does that How does that breed into actual health and improving symptoms? How does that gap get bridged? Yeah. So, why is it dangerous when when wellness is more about identity and how you look, how you appear to your friends and your family rather than actually what your health outcomes are or really what your actual health status is. Mhm. It's a really good question. Um I think when wellness does become, as you said, more of a status symbol, and the and you're just so focused on what you look like, like how you're how you're appearing, or um presenting to other people, and there there's this tendency to chase what appears to be healthy, what looks healthy, and not kind of what for the And this is an And it's needs to be more personalized, right? Because what makes one person look healthy, or actually be healthy, is going to be different than the other person. And so, you know, as opposed to what's actually making you feel better, having more energy, regulating your blood sugar, improving your sleep, your strength, your gut health, your hormonal balance, your blood pressure, inflammation, all of those things, it's kind of like those are the things that really, in my opinion, really do matter, and not so much like what you look like on, you know, on the outside. And when the outside reflects inner health, great. Then, that's like that's fabulous. But when it's really about these status things that we've been mentioning, and not so much what your actual metabolic markers look like, what your visceral fat looks like, what your physical strength is, what your cognitive health is like, um and the and the focus is kind of been lost on that, then that's I think that's dangerous. Yeah, I agree. And I think that's why I think that's why people think expensive is better. Mhm. Because most of the time in our culture, and it's been this way for decades, people with money, or people that look like they have money, look a certain way sometimes. And they're expressing to the world a vision of something good and nice and healthy and happy. So, it's almost like uh the high price tag means that it's good for me. Because this person that's a celebrity that has a lot of money that looks this way is marketing it, so it must be good. And we sort of had that adage, like you pay you get you get what you pay for. Mhm. But a high price tag does not mean that something is personalized for that patient. It doesn't mean it's evidence-based. It doesn't mean it's safe or even necessary. Um some high-end tools can be right in the right context, but we talk about all the time on the podcast, right? The basics, you know, your sleep, your nutrition, all these things. So, that's I think what I'm getting a lot from patients, too, when we're talking about what patients are asking us. Patients are asking about wellness trends and things that could benefit them. And and I kind of the way I kind of answer it is, well, sure, but I'm sorry to say your diet's not good. You don't sleep. Mhm. Like, yeah, take all the supplements you want that you buy from X celebrity on Instagram, but it's not going to do anything if you're missing some of the basics. And I think that's where um the the expensive is not always better because we can't we can't miss the basics. Um that's just kind of fundamental of health care. And that's something we can never give up. And I and I do see a lot of social media expressing those things, talking about some of the basics of you you mentioned working out and nutrition, but I think it's also being sold as a very, very high-end luxurious thing that may not may not need to be, right? Do you need to spend thousands of dollars on wellness coaching with some online fitness guy? Maybe you don't, right? Cuz is it is it going to be right for you? Is there a medical piece that's probably missing? Yes. So, there's a lot There's a lot involved in that luxury part and the expensive part. Um we've talked about social media a bit, Dr. Rose. How does How does social media really make people feel like they're not doing what they're supposed to with their health or their health is failing essentially. I would say social media often makes people feel like they're not doing enough, like they're failing at health and it's because of what's marketed, right? These perfectly curated routines, these stacks of supplements, the you know, very expensive groceries, as you mentioned, these luxury wellness memberships and that if you don't have these, if you're not doing these various biohacking tools, that you're not doing enough and that you're not, you know, you don't have what other people have and I think that's social media marketing in a nutshell and that and this and it of also includes health and wellness. It's So, it's like there's always more. You're never quite There's always that feeling of like you're not enough, you're not doing enough and if you only did this or if you only had that you too could look like this and feel like this. And so, there's this this constant like need for more and that That's what they're selling. They're selling products and that's how they get you to buy it. Yeah. It It's kind of always been that way Mhm. with with um celebrity and media cuz before social media there were magazines, right? That was a big thing. Shiny ads, yeah. Ads and Vogue and Cosmo and everybody was beautiful and you put models on the cover and you know, it was like, "I have to look like that." But now it's sort of it's almost the same thing. You know, you have celebrities and very sexy people advertising wellness products. It's almost like a whole 'nother niche market. Like, "Oh, I I work out. I look really good, so I can sell people a product. They'll buy it from me." Um and you could probably translate in that into anything, whether it's a wellness product, a supplement, a food, uh an experience, a place, cuz I guess sex sells, right? And that sort of doesn't like health care is not immune to that. So, yeah, it's a it's a very interesting concept. It's so fascinating, I think. It is. It is. It's still advertising. It's just kind of done in a way that people might not realize that they're being marketed to. Like now when we see ads on TV, or especially older advertisements, it's so blatant. Yeah. think that this is doing the exact same thing and pulling at you in the exact same way, but it's done in a way that you feel like it's more genuine somehow, when it really isn't. Yeah. Yeah, like you said before, showing you this life that you're supposed to have. You know, the things you're supposed to have, the car you're supposed to drive, or the aesthetics of Yeah. your apartment, or anything. I mean, it kind of it all boils down to the same kind of message. Um just a reminder people, if you're listening to us live on any of our streaming platforms, if you have questions or comments, please drop them in the comment box. We'd love to answer questions toward the end of the podcast, so please ask away if you have questions. Um let's move on to sort of what luxury wellness gets right and what it gets wrong. Let's be a little bit specific. So, in your opinion, Dr. Rose, what when we're talking about this luxury wellness market, what is it doing right? We want to give some credit here, cuz it's not all bad, and there is a lot of good things. So, what it what does it get right, in your opinion? Yeah, luxury wellness uh definitely gets right that people are looking for prevention. They're looking for ways to kind of get ahead and They get ahead of things before before there is a disease. So they want more time with their providers. They want more personalized individualized care. They want better labs and a better evaluation or interpretation of their labs. Definitely nutrition. Nutrition is really big. People want a lot of support in that area. They want to have conversations about their hormones and overall metabolic health. Definitely longevity. And they want these conversations like before they're severely sick. I do think that luxury wellness does get that right. Yeah, I agree. And I think even if you're not buying something from an influencer or sort of dialing into what an influencer is the message they're selling. I think it's really exciting that people in the in our culture through heavily through social media and also celebrity culture is basically saying uh we have to take care of our bodies and medicine may not be doing that really well for people. And I don't think it's a blatant healthcare is bad message cuz that doesn't sell products. If you're an influencer and you're trying to sell something, you're going to try to sell your product. You're not going to talk about healthcare, but I do think it's a really cool thing that a lot of these influencers are starting and just the social media trends are starting to look at this as prevention like you said. And And people are looking for well, how do I stay young, right? Like these celebrities, they're 80 years old and they look like they're 40. Like how are they doing that, right? Can I do that? I don't have the money they have, but can I do that in some way, right? Is there something I could do? Is there pills, meds, whatever it is? Um but then that kind of flips on its head when luxury wellness can become dangerous. I mean, it can turn health care, like we've said a a couple times already on the podcast, into a consumer performance, into this huge money uh media industry. Um it can make people think that they need all these expensive fancy things to make themselves look or feel a certain way, when as we've said, they might be missing all the basic stuff, right? They're not sleeping, they're not eating well, they're not moving around, they're really stressed, they drink all the time, their relationships are poor, they're not consistent. So, I really think that the the social media piece of luxury wellness and just social media in general makes things look really easy. Mhm. You know, you come in for you know, you spend $1,000 a month on some social wellness club, is that going to improve your health? Maybe in some way it might improve your relationships, social connection, which is really important, right? We have this whole loneliness epidemic that's post COVID. People are really lonely, um which is causing a lot of mental health issues and depression, so maybe that, but there are a lot of things that it's not giving people, and I think it almost kind of masks a lot of things that people struggle with to a point where, you know, patients could actually use a really personalized care plan to make them feel better. Um And that's really the the next question I I want you to kind of addresses how do we how do we keep functional medicines separate from just another luxury wellness category? And how do we kind of bring some of the luxury wellness into functional medicine but keeping its authenticity? Yeah, this is kind of the crux of the matter, isn't it? So, how do we keep Yeah. functional medicine from becoming, like you said, just another luxury wellness category or product and I think it's something well, it is something that we all need to have a good understanding of because I think that sometimes it can it can feel like that depending on I don't know, the functional medicine clinic or the the area of the country or you know, what somebody's being sold but ideally functional medicine really should not be about selling the most expensive plan and it really should be about what we say it is which is identifying root causes and prioritizing what really matters. Uh we talk a lot about the individual nature and the personalizing of care and that's crucial. And doing whatever we can for that individual patient to make sustainable changes. Lifestyle changes and that right there means that it's not it that should be the focus in and not really of like, well, how much money are we going to get out of this person and that you have to have the most expensive plan and do all the tests in order to get these answers cuz 99.9% of the time you do not need that. Yeah, I was just going to I was literally just going to ask you that. Like what I'm not a big fan of our functional medicine colleagues or integrative health care colleagues, whatever we want to call it just kind of putting this huge kind of slew of stuff. You know, you need all this stuff. You need testing. We need to test your cortisol. We need to check all that this and that and you need to spend $10,000 for us to do all this specialty testing on you to kind of get where your your your baseline is and then you're going to need another $5,000 worth of supplements. Then we're going to have to put you on a this kind of whatever, and it just becomes so much, right? It's It's almost too much, and I think that's a real key is when you're starting to become it's becoming too big, it it it it becomes too much. Do you think so? I do, and I think, you know, we're all different in how we practice. Um and I think that, you know, you and I can agree that there are some very important and useful advanced functional medicine tests out there, but I do think that there can sometimes be this tendency in this field of medicine to offer those or or really kind of stress that a patient that most of your patients need this whole slew of testing, and that that's to really practice root cause medicine, you need to do thousands and thousands of dollars of tests to get to the root cause. And I personally don't find that in my own practice. I don't find that you that every single person needs that whole list of testing, and I also don't feel that people need, as you mentioned with the supplements, you know, 40 supplements a day in order to have true wellness. I just don't see that I just don't see that in my own practice. Somebody else might have a different experience in their practice, but um I find that sometimes, you know, the simpler the better, and the less overwhelming the better, and that you can continue to kind of look for root causes, but it doesn't necessarily have to be complicated. Yeah. I think, and this is maybe a little bit crass, but I think our functional medicine colleagues who try to sell patients extensive extensive um testing and work-ups and 40 supplements, I just don't think they know what they're doing. So, I think they're trying to sell this experience of all this complex and, you know, root cause testing. I just don't think the provider knows what they're doing. I think they're trying to sell this experience of, "Oh, wow, look at all this stuff you're doing and methylation testing and this and that blah blah blah." It's like, "Okay, yeah. Where where does it end, right? Do Do we all need to do that?" No. I think it becomes a bit gimmicky, to be honest, and I think this is an important point um a part of the podcast to really talk about why functional medicine access it it people do look at us as luxury. It is. And we can't lie about that, you know, we have to be very transparent. The care that we offer is not covered by insurance. Um you know, we we provide patients with longer appointments, you know, hours long. We do deep, very deep history taking. We do a lot more advanced labs than they're used to with other other providers. Uh we're talking about nutrition, which is not talked about. We're talking about lifestyle strategies. We're talking about prevention. And insurance doesn't cover this type of health care. Um if you need surgery, if you have an infection, if you were in a car accident and your arm's hanging off on a limb, yes, go use your health care insurance in a hospital, in an acute care setting to get the care that you need. If you need help with uh your longevity, with health care prevention, with feeling good and living longer, your insurance that's not what insurance pays for. Insurance pays for you not to die in an acute setting. It does not pay for this. And I think that's just a message that health care needs to share, and that's kind of the culture I think that we need to adopt as clinicians of yes, health insurance prevents you from getting really sick and dying. It doesn't prevent uh anything. That's just not what health insurance does. Um and is there anything you want to add? I mean, it's just kind of a full philosophical approach. Yeah. It really is. And, you know, we always joke like, you know, if you're in a car accident, don't bring me to my naturopathic doctor. If you're in a car accident, don't bring me to to your to my acupuncturist, right? [laughter] Um Nope. There's a reason No offense. There's a reason that emergency medicine, you know, they're they're amazing at what they do. And same as you said for a lot of acute conditions and surgery and um you know, it's not a it shouldn't be an either/or, but I think that the tendency is to go to conventional medicine for a lot of these things that you've mentioned, like prevent, you know, help with prevention and chronic disease, um things that often times conventional care doesn't really do a great job with. Um and I do feel also that our goal at MedMatrix really is for this kind of care to become more accessible. And that in an ideal world, it would not be this exclusive. So, it is the way that it is right now, and that's largely because of the reasons that you just listed, the broader the broader insurance-based model of conventional care. But the long-term goal is that we do provide greater access, not less. Yeah. Yeah. And it's almost like health care should be split into two sections, right? You have emergency acute care, which includes like urgent cares, ERs, surgical intervention, infections, all that, you know, cancer care, all these things that are life-threatening. And then in another pod of health care, it's it's run by people like us that are experienced in prevention and wellness. When you've When you When you're not in this I'm going to die pod, come over to this other one and we'll teach you how to live better. We'll talk about your lifestyle. We'll talk about your diet. Um but that's just not how the health care system is trained, right? Medical doctors and any medical provider, they're all trained the same. So, it's all about identifying pathology, but not everybody has a pathology and we want to live well. So, who do you see for that, right? How do I get help with that? And I think that's where the functional medicine space is really good at providing that kind of care. Um and that's That's really why the the health care system is better at like the sick care, right? We talk about this all the time and and conventional medicine and and like you said, emergency medicine and acute medical care, it's essential for procedures and emergencies and when patients need life life-saving medication and, you know, acute disease treatment, but the system and the health insurance system does not reimburse for a patient when they don't have a diagnosis of something. So, that health optimization just doesn't get covered. Um So, how do we When we're talking about this a little bit more and I don't want to spend too much time on the topic, but how do we explain the difference between something not being covered and it's not really valuable? Cuz patients often that we see sometimes, they they don't understand the value because they don't they almost feel Again, this is a cultural thing, philosophical thing in our culture in our health care culture, "Well, you should be covered. I don't understand why you're not." So, how do we express our value and how do we share the difference between when something is not covered and not valuable? Right. So, you and I as providers, how do we explain what this person has for their insurance and what they don't. What's covered with their insurance plan and that's not the same thing as what is value what has value and what doesn't have value. So, just because there is a preventive strategy, a certain service, or a certain lab test that your insurance doesn't cover, that doesn't mean that it doesn't have value or that it wouldn't actually be very helpful for you at this time in your health care journey. The flip side, which we've also been talking about, is that it does not mean that every out-of-pocket wellness tool that you may be seeing on social media is worth it. So, where we come in often is is just kind of helping people prioritize that. So, most people don't have unlimited funds and, you know, what is there is something that that you could use go through your insurance? Is there some kind of route that, you know, we can refer you so that you can use your insurance to do that? Great. Is there another test that your insurance is saying no, it won't cover, but we really feel like it would be very valuable right now? Or a certain medication that your insurance is saying that you don't need, but we feel and are based on our experience and the research that we've done that it actually is worth trying? That's often times where we kind of help, I think, differentiate for an individual at that time what's important and what isn't. Yeah. Yeah, and I think this is where um you know, the conversation leads to how we make the health care system better for patients and I think patients want a better health care system, but it's just so driven by health insurance and pharmaceutical companies and things, so it it it could be better if if insurance plans covered more nutritional support or earlier lab testing or gave all providers in any setting, right? Healthcare, like primary care, internal medicine, whatever. It'd be great if they could all spend an hour with their patients, but they can't, right? You're You're waiting 6 months sometimes to get a new primary care doctor or a year to get into the specialist. So, there's not enough people to take care of everybody and everybody's getting sicker and sicker and you know, it's just there's not enough to go around. So, it would be great if we had this whole subsection of healthcare that did all this stuff, you know, talked about root cause and movement and stress support and sleep support, which is us. We are doing that. It's not part of the It's not part of the health insurance system. So, that's where it's it's it's really difficult and in this podcast talking about sort of the Porsche of healthcare, I think we're the Porsche of healthcare. I think we change people's lives every day, but yes, it does come with a cost. We see patients every day that can't afford our care and it's it's For me, it's tough sometimes because it's like the patients really need this care, but we also have to be able to keep the lights on, right? We have to pay the amount of staff that we need to keep this machine that we have running and the amount of time that we need as clinicians to see people and do these large intakes and full medical histories. So, it's um it's it's tough. We have to kind of find that middle ground that really makes it worth it for patients, but also we Like I said, we have to pay the bills. So, it's it's a it's a balance. Um What are In your opinion, Dr. Rose, what are the When we're talking about cost, what are some of the lowest cost foundational things that we can talk about, whether it's in the luxury home well wellness space or just functional medicine healthcare in general? What are the lowest cost foundational things that actually move people in a positive health motion? Mhm. The lowest cost foundations that actually move health might not be the sexiest. So, they would include [laughter] walking, strength training, uh good sources of protein, fiber, adequate hydration, consistent sleep, um getting morning light, so waking up at a time where you can, you know, expose yourself to natural morning light, balancing blood sugar, stress regulation, sometimes easier said than done, but crucial, reducing ultra-processed foods, which we've talked about on this podcast, awareness of alcohol consumption, kind of a regularity. I talk to people a lot, I know you do, and it's not always not only about what you're eating, but what your schedule is, and are you eating, you know, kind of at the same time around the same time every day. As you also mentioned earlier, social connection, and then, you know, just having some idea of what even your basic lab results look like. And some of our listeners might be surprised that a lot of people haven't had labs in years. They're They may go to their annual visit with their primary care doctor. They may or may not get labs um done at that time, and they're often not They're usually not reviewed with the patient. Um unless there's something that's glaringly, you know, outside of the normal um reference range. So, like I said, not Nothing I said there was like super sexy, being sold on social media by your favorite influencer. They're kind of things that you maybe already kind of know about, but the way that you and I both practice, like that that's the foundation, right? And if those things aren't in place, getting the most expensive supplement uh is not going to really move the needle. Um if these things that are honestly take more work and take effort and they take consistency. You don't just do it one day and then you're good. Um it those really have to be foundational before you might add on peptides and fancy supplements. Yeah. I I do think though some of the things you mentioned are becoming a bit more sexy. Um and I think there are some amount of influencer and social media um proponents of some of these things that maybe make it kind of sexy. Like I think I think alcohol consumption is becoming far less sexy. Mhm. Um Well, yeah. The numbers The numbers Yeah, the numbers are telling us that. Yeah, the the If you look up Yeah, if you look up sort of alcohol um profits by generation or decades, it's dropped significantly. Yeah. A lot of younger generations aren't drinking cuz probably they probably can't afford it number one. I mean, you can't go out with a you know, for a few drinks with your friends anymore unless you're going to spend $300 on something. People just can't afford it. Um but there is this huge push I think in the younger generation that is glued to social media kind of showing like oh, alcohol, you know, it's going to make you puffy and it's going to make you bloated and it's going to make you feel terrible and you know, oh, well, you have acne? Well, you need to eat good food. You need to eat your protein and you need to, you know, eat you know, you don't want to be eating all this fast food and there is I I see it a lot. So, I think there is some of it. Um I think it's being really targeted at the younger demographic, which is really cool cuz maybe they'll take all this information and be much more preventive about their health as they get older. Um But yeah, a lot of this is not, you know, blood sugar regulation and is not probably not very sexy. [laughter] So, what what can, you know, as we kind of wrap up the episode of the podcast, what what can MedMatrix do for patients without turning wellness into a status symbol? How do we do this in a balanced way? MedMatrix I think does turn wellness into what we what we offer is like as we've been saying, it's like beyond just wellness as a status symbol. And so, specifically what we're doing is helping patients identify what actually matters for their body. We talk a lot about things being personalized. So, specifically for this person in front of me in my office, their metabolic health, their hormonal health, their gut health, inflammation, nutrition status, sleep, stress, movement, all that, you know, some advanced testing if and when appropriate, and then coming up with a plan that makes sense for that person at this time in their journey. What makes sense for them now probably won't make sense for them a year from now if we do our jobs right. Um and it's not about kind of chasing every thing that you see on social media, every parasite cleanse, every detox protocol, but it's really a personalized plan that that is actually also realistic for that person. And that I think is where we kind of shine. Yeah, well said. I think that was that was really really well said. Um let's play a quick game, little something fun before we end um in the last few minutes of the podcast. And like I said, if anybody has any questions, please ask away. We'll get to them before we wrap up. So, a little kind of like true/false game around this topic that we've been talking about with wellness trends, social media trends, just to kind of bring the point home. So, we might have differing opinions on some of these, so maybe we can see if we agree on some of them. Um Quote-unquote cortisol face, Mhm. which you talked about a little bit before, is a recognized medical diagnosis caused by everyday stress. Is that true or false, do you think? I'm going to say false. I would say so, yeah. Mhm. You mentioned it when you mentioned it before, and I'm I'm glad you did because we cortisol is all over the place, um and it's all about your cortisol. A lot of my patients ask me about that. Oh, my cortisol, my cortisol. Chronic excess cortisol can affect fat distribution, fluid retention, sleep, appetite, but the sort of viral concept that a puffy face automatically means you have high cortisol is a very much oversimplification. Um that is not necessarily a a true thing. Um cold plunging immediately after lifting weights can interfere with muscle growth. What do you think? So, I actually think that cold plunging serves male and female bodies differently. Yeah. And so, I I'm glad you said that. Yeah. So, I think that that's I don't know how to answer that question because I think it depends if you're a man and a woman a man or a woman. Um Yeah. but um the question is does it I mean does it stop muscle growth? May interfere with muscle growth. Yeah. That's what I was doing some research on. false, but I think it really has to be specific to the individual. What do you think on that one? I think I from the research I've done, cold water, cuz this is kind of big in like the bodybuilding athleticism world, and you know, it's all over the in the all the wellness clubs, they're putting those cold plunges in. yeah. Yeah, regular cold water immersion immediately after resistance training may blunt some of the inflammatory and anabolic signaling involved in hypertrophy. Was kind of what I I learned from some of the research. So, it's not necessarily bad, but I agree with you. It depends on time. It depends on the goal. It depends on your your your sex. So, I think it depends. Yeah. Um Walking for 10 minutes after eating can improve blood sugar control. True or false? True. True. True. Yeah. That or that or squats, right? Or yeah, or that. Yeah. Um post-meal movement increases muscle skeletal muscle glucose uptake. So, that's a huge one that's I see all the time. Um Creatine is useful for more than just building muscle. True. Yeah. I see creatine all the time. Um it has established benefits for strength, exercise performance, but it's also been shown to improve cognition, healthy aging, and preserve lean muscle mass. Um I did a podcast on creatine in women last week. You did. Yes, you did. Um you need to drink a gallon of water every day to feel optimally hydrated. False. Uh water intake really depends on your weight. Mhm. Body size, activity, climate. right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. Um This is probably a little controversial, but we see this a lot on social media about time of day eating and eat True or false, eating protein at breakfast may help control appetite later in the day. Uh I'm going to say true to that one. Yeah. I agree. I mean, there's a lot of things I think back and forth about fasting, right? Not eating breakfast and But um higher protein breakfast can help improve satiety, help reduce subsequent food intake in some people. There's also a difference now. know saying the same thing, but there's a difference with men and women on that. Men and women. On fasting. Benefit of fasting. Yeah, and there's a difference between when what stage of life women are in. I find I find perimenopausal and menopausal women do terrible with fasting. Um Continuous glucose monitors or CGMs can be useful even for people without diabetes. True. I I agree. I think there's a catch though. I think CGMs can provide very interesting feedback about how people respond to meals and exercise, sleep and stress, but I think people that are overtly healthy sometimes become overly focused on these normal glucose fluctuations and start creating this fictitious issue. Um and then getting sunlight in your eyes shortly after waking can help regulate your circadian rhythm. I see that on social media all the time. True, yeah. Morning outdoor light is a strong environmental signal for the circadian system and can help anchor sleep time wake sleep waking time. Um you don't need to stare directly at the sun. We don't recommend that. Um but simply being outdoors in the daylight is really important. So um before we end Dr. Rose, what kind of takeaways should we be giving our patients and our listeners when we're talking about this whole portion of health care topic that we've been talking about. I think we did a pretty good job, I hope. Um I think we hit a lot of really good points, but what are your some what are some of your biggest takeaways for someone that is kind of overwhelmed by the wellness culture right now or just social media culture around health care? It's very easy to be overwhelmed by the wellness culture. Especially like you said, the social media wellness culture. I think it is almost inherently overwhelming. Wellness should not be a status symbol. It really should be about better health and that that does not mean that you have to go to some luxury grocery store. You do not need to follow the routine of some celebrity that you, you know, see online. You do not need a biohacking membership. Ideally, functional medicine is helping patients kind of separating these trends from actual tools that work, focusing what will actually move the needle for that individual's health and then come up with a personalized plan that is both sustainable and, as we've been talking about, rooted in prevention. So, all of that in that context that we've already talked about, which is that we really all do want true preventive care to become more accessible. Yeah, I couldn't have agree more. I think one of the biggest things is trying to find a clinician or provider that you really trust to have these conversations with, uh, whether it's a functional medicine clinician or a really, really knowledgeable, seasoned primary care provider that does a lot of maybe preventive care or someone in the wellness arena, something that someone that you can trust have these conversations. And it's not necessarily that they're always going to be right or wrong, but there's just so much noise out there about how to be healthy, how to be well, what to eat, what to take. Do I need hormones? Do I need stool testing? Do I need a parasite cleanse? I mean, it's just it's endless, right? And we get this all day. We get this all day funneled, fed to us from from patients. And it's and it, um, it becomes second nature to us and I I try not to be overly dismissive. I try to be very open-minded when patients ask me about a lot of things, but a lot of times it's it's like, where did you come up with this? Like, it's kind of out in the weeds somewhere. Um, so I think that's a really good point just to really look at this as better health in general with whatever that means. I think that's kind of the point. Um, so I I hope everyone has enjoyed our episode today. I hope we've really kind of illuminated this topic. I think we're going to talk more about this. I think this was just kind of an introduction to the wellness world. I know I'll speak for Dr. Rose that we find this type of discussion utterly fascinating. I think it's really cool and fun to talk about sort of the the sociology and psychology around the way people approach their health or health care or you know, there's this whole psychology around social media and health care. It's It's utterly fascinating. You have these 20-year-old fitness influencers kind of spearheading health care. It's like, how did this happen? It's really It's really fascinating to kind of watch this happen. But a little frustrating when you're a health care provider. So, if you've enjoyed today's podcast, um, you can check out other episodes of the Men's Matrix Method podcast. Uh, they are available for streaming on our streaming platforms, Apple Podcasts and Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts. Um, we are here weekly talking all things functional medicine and health. Dr. Rose and I are here every week together having a great discussion. We We um try to bring the latest and greatest to our listeners and to our patients. If you are interested in becoming a patient of Men's Matrix, if you want personalized health care, you can go to our website www.mensmatrixusa.com and book a free discovery call and that's how you will start your journey to becoming a patient. A quick caveat that Men's Matrix is only currently accepting patients in Maine and New Hampshire as of right now due to licensing restrictions. That is likely to change in the future. Check out our social media at medmatrixusa for all updates on our clinical practice. So thank you so much Dr. Rose. I think this has been super fun. Thank you to all of our listeners. Again, if you're interested in more of our episodes, you can stream us on our podcast platforms. We're here every week live on YouTube. So until next time, we'll be well and we'll we'll see you on the next one. Thanks Dr. Rose. Thank you Colin.