https://youtu.be/GHzka5J3NoQ

Show Notes:

Speaker 1: (00:00)
Welcome to the simplified integration podcast. This is episode number 21 how regenerative medicine fixed my Knee.

Speaker 2: (00:09)
Leonardo da Vinci once said that simplicity is the ultimate sophistication and I agree. You see the problem with the way that most consulting groups approach medical integration is anything but simple. In fact, it's the exact opposite. It's expensive, it's complicated and quite frankly it's exhausting. Enough is enough. There are far too many amazing integrated clinics that are struggling. Well, I'm on a mission to change that. What I've come to find from over five years working with integrative practices is that simplicity really is the secret. The old saying of less is more is true. Through a streamlined approach, I was able to create multiple successful seven figure integrated clinics and now I'm going to show you how you can do the same. Join me as I share with you the secrets to successful medical integration and practice growth. Join me on a journey to greater sophistication through innovation. I'm Dr. Andrew Wells and welcome to the simplified integration podcast.

Speaker 1: (01:07)
Hey, what's going on, doc? Welcome back. It's great to have you here on the simplified integration podcast. My name is Dr. Andrew Wells. If I sound a little bit different on this podcast, it's because I'm not in my normal podcast studio. I'm actually on a pontoon boat in the middle of Lake lure in North Carolina. And uh, I'm here, uh, because, um, it's actually the mid, I'm recording this in the middle of the Corona virus epidemic. Uh, my wife and I both work from home, so we decided to come out to the Lake and spend our time here, um, because it's a much nicer place to spend, a lot of time being quarantined, uh, rather than being at home. And we're very fortunate, fortunate enough to be able to work from home and, and be in this amazing spot, uh, during this really crazy time in, uh, in history here.

Speaker 1: (01:50)
So, um, so if I sound a little different, that's why if you've never listened or watched this podcast on YouTube, check out my YouTube channel. You can actually see where I'm sitting right now. It's a really cool view. I'd love to share this special place that, uh, I get to call a vacation home with you guys to show you where I go, to have fun and go to relax. And this is a really, really fun place to record a podcast. I'm just really lucky and blessed to be out here. I hope you can hear me okay. There is a pontoon boat, another pontoon boat actually cruise and buy right now. So you may hear some boat traffic in the background. There's not a whole lot of boats out here today, but anyway, I want to share with you the story of how regenerative medicine fixed my knee.

Speaker 1: (02:28)
So I've been a a long-distance runner for a long time. I started when I was 10 years old. Um, I just turned 40 years old, so I've been running long distance for about 30 years. So that's 30 years of hard impact on my joints. So about four, maybe it's five years ago now. Um, I was working out in our office and we used to do these Wednesday night workouts where we'd have patients come into the office every Wednesday night and we'd work out together. I'm going to pause here for just a minute cause there is a, a ski boat going by right now. It might be hard to hear me. I dunno how much that, uh, that vote traffic noise is coming through the microphone, but I'll, I'll wait.

Speaker 1: (03:10)
All right, cool. Anyway, it is a gorgeous day. It's sunny. It's about, it's the end of March and it's about 80 degrees here on the Lake, so it's a really fun, a nice time to be here. But anyway, uh, I was working out in the office, I was jumping up and down and doing burpees. I landed on the ground. I felt a pop in my left knee, didn't really hurt so much, but my concern was, Oh shoot, I just tore my meniscus. And so I didn't think much of it. I was hoping it would, the pain would go away and it would heal. I had like a dull pain in my left knee. Um, after the act, after that injury, I couldn't quite flex my knee all the way and um, but it wasn't really painful. I can still work out, I could still run, but it was just a nagging pain that was there and it never resolved itself.

Speaker 1: (03:51)
So this was around the same time we started. Uh, we introduced regenerative medicine into our clinic and I'd always wanted to do it and I never got around to actually doing it. So, um, you know, we had helped a lot of patients with their joint pain. And then one day, uh, I got a call from, from our doctor and he was getting ready to inject the STEM cells into our, into one of our patient's joints. And so he had all, he had the, the, uh, amniotic tissue thought out it was Ray to inject and he was looking back at the patient's information and he said, uh, on his information he had listed that he, he took us a turmeric supplement and the doc said, well, how much turmeric are you taking? And he goes, Oh, I take a lot. And it was actually like a therapeutic dose of turmeric.

Speaker 1: (04:37)
So he's taking these really, really high levels of turmeric, which you probably know is an anti-inflammatory. And when you're doing regenerative medicine, you want to be off of your anti-inflammatory medications because you need inflammation to help your body heal. And so right before the doc was going to do the injection, he's like, Nope, we can't do it. You need to be off your turmeric before we do this injection so that you get the best results. So here's the patient sitting here, totally bummed out because he couldn't have his injection. And we have this like this vial of cells ready to be injected. And the doc's like, well, we can do two things. We can either throw these out or we can use them on ourselves. And so, so I raised my hand, I said, yep, put those cells in me, doc. And so he did the injection in my left knee.

Speaker 1: (05:18)
I didn't feel a whole lot of change in the beginning. Um, it did feel like there was a little bit less inflammation, but, um, a couple days went by and no real change. A couple of weeks went by and maybe it felt a little bit better. And then about four weeks in, I remember like, I wasn't really paying attention, but I remember working on, I'm like, man, I don't feel any stiffness in my knee. I could completely bend my knees full range of motion, no tightness, no pain, no inflammation. It was completely fixed. And, um, I never had any knee pain after that. So I went back to running. I went back to, uh, working out. Uh, everything was fine. So one of the, one of the questions I get from patients is how long does this injection lasts? Will it permanently fix my, uh, what should I expect?

Speaker 1: (05:59)
And of course, as a doctor, like we never want to be, uh, you know, you never really, in my opinion, you want to give, um, like pin yourself down to a time and a date. Like, you don't want to say, Oh yeah, this is going to fix your knee forever. You're never going to have knee pain ever again. When the reality is is that may or may not be true. And there's a lot of factors that affected your weight, affects it, your activity levels affected your nutrition, how much sleep you get affects your results just like any other, um, uh, any other, uh, health care therapy. And so for four years I felt great. And um, and so I w uh, I started running again and actually got back into doing ultra marathons and, uh, it was about a year ago. Um, I did this race as a 51 mile race on the beach and I was a grueling race.

Speaker 1: (06:46)
It was really tough. I really hadn't trained a lot for it. I wasn't really prepared for it. And I ran the race and like a three court, like mile 30 or 35, my knees start, I started to feel a lot of pain in my left knee. And I'm like, Oh, that's just like, this is not good. I hope this goes away. Maybe it's just race day related, it's just I'm running, you know, running 50 miles. So after the race I was totally wrecked. My body was destroyed. This is the first time I ever felt old if my life and uh, you know, my whole body was sore and stiff, including my both of my knees. I remember hoping and praying that, you know, once I recovered from the race that the knee pain would get better. Uh, and it didn't, it actually my left knee went back to feeling like it did before I had the injection.

Speaker 1: (07:28)
And so knowing that my, a torn meniscus had probably, it was just probably acting up again. Um, I had another regenerative medicine injection and now my knee pain again is completely gone. And so for me, it lasted four years. And the thing that set it off again was a 51 mile race. Now most of your patients are not going to be doing ultra marathons like that, but some of your patients may be overweight, they may be inactive, they may be putting stress on their joints that that will aggravate their issue. But for me, I got four years of great activity in my knee without having to do steroid injections, without having to do antiinflammatory drugs, without having to do arthroscopic surgery. So all of the procedures and therapies that your patients are used to are probably gotten already. And so, um, for me, I, you know, you know the injection if you're, if you're paying cash for this type of injection, sometimes it's hard for a patient to say, you know, 4,000 bucks seems like a lot for one joint injection.

Speaker 1: (08:23)
However, for me it gave me, you know, a huge boost in the quality of my life. I didn't have to worry about my knee. It felt great. It was functioning fine and I did for four years. So whatever it did, whether it regrew cartilage repaired, cartilage, reduced inflammation, it worked and it worked really well. And so you can't really put a price tag on that time that you know, your, your body's working, uh, working properly. And I know as if you're a chiropractor listening to this, I know you know the value of health because we teach that and we preach that everyday in our practices. So you can't put a dollar amount on it. But, um, I can tell you from experience, from someone who not only teaches this, but also as a patient, I had amazing results with regenerative medicine. It's going to be a part of my lifestyle choices till the time I die.

Speaker 1: (09:11)
Uh, some of you know, I was also in a really bad car accident, so I have, uh, had three fractures in my neck and unfortunately had to have, uh, two levels of my neck fused, um, for instability issues. And so as of now, I'm 40 years old, my neck, you know, to roughly two years after the surgery. My neck is fine. I don't have any pain, I have no stiffness, a little bit of loss of range of motion, obviously. But right now my neck is doing really well and I want it to stay that way. So as part of my plan, as I get older, I will absolutely be doing regenerative medicine. To make sure that my next days, like it does, it gets better and doesn't get worse over time. Cause I really, I don't want to be like all the hundreds of patients I've seen with neck fusions that are in pain have numbness and tingling and neuropathy down their arms and hands.

Speaker 1: (09:56)
So, um, so anyway, I guys, I want to share that story with you. Um, as a, as a practitioner, as a patient, as a STEM cell advocate and regenerative medicine advocate, uh, it absolutely works. It's life changing stuff. And uh, so if you're listening to this and you have a joint issue, you should really look into it for yourself and to, and for offering this to your patients because, uh, it works. It's a fantastic therapy and I hope that you and your patients can benefit from it. So hope you're having a great day. Uh, I hope this by the time you're listening to this, the Corona virus epidemic and scare has, uh, has passed and we're back to life as normal. But if you're, if we're still in the middle of it, keep your head up doc. Uh, keep moving forward. And God bless. Talk to you soon. Bye. Bye.

Speaker 2: (10:39)
Hey, innovators. Thanks for listening to the simplified integration podcast. Fact that you're listening tells me that you're like me, someone who loves simplicity, and the truth is those who embrace simplicity are some of the greatest innovators. So hope you got a ton of value from what we covered on today's episode. Be sure to subscribe and share with other docs that you feel could benefit from greater sophistication through simplification and innovation. If you've got specific questions that you'd like answered on this podcast or you've got specific topics that you'd like me to discuss, just shoot me an email at info@simplifiedintegration.com that's info@simplifiedintegration.com.