Head to Total

Having Pain in your Back or Spine? This is the Podcast for you! w/ Rasheed Abiola, MD

August 31, 2022 Synergy Episode 4
Head to Total
Having Pain in your Back or Spine? This is the Podcast for you! w/ Rasheed Abiola, MD
Show Notes Transcript

We have another super fascinating guest for you today on this latest episode of Head to Total! Dr. Rasheed Abiola, MD joins our host, Colleen Young, to discuss how we can keep our spine in good shape, what to avoid for spinal health, and when you should consider seeing someone about a spinal injury. We hope you enjoy this informative episode of Head to Total, talking about your body from head to toe!


#Spine #Doctor #Practice #posture #Injury #MedicalDoctor #Medicine #Medical #Synergy

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00:00:08:01 - 00:00:28:29
Colleen Young
Hi, team. Welcome to head to Toto. I'm Colleen Young. I'm your host. We have an exciting guest today. We always have exciting guests, but I was really excited to hear that. Dr. Rashid Abiola from Mendelssohn, Kornbluth Orthopedics is going to be with us today. I have got to tell you, I met Rashid a few months ago. Fascinating guy.

00:00:28:35 - 00:00:41:26
Colleen Young
Fascinating guy. First of all, wickedly talented, but what a story. And I can't wait to talk to him today. Without any further ado. Dr. Rashid Abiola, welcome to Head Teetotal. How are you?

00:00:41:32 - 00:00:43:02
Rasheed Abiola
Fine, thanks. Thanks for having me.

00:00:43:13 - 00:00:51:10
Colleen Young
It's great to have you, Rashid. I am so excited. Congratulations. You've been with Corn Bloom for a few months now. How is everything going?

00:00:51:16 - 00:01:03:46
Rasheed Abiola
It's been going great. Getting a chance to meet the staff. So it's nice. And then obviously the patient volume going up, it's pretty good. So I'm very excited with the way the practice is shaping up.

00:01:04:10 - 00:01:19:47
Colleen Young
Absolutely. I'm happy for you. We're excited that you're a part of that team. I can't wait to talk to you. I want our audience to know who you are. Give us the story of your fascinating background and how you came to Mendelson. Gorman Just give us the whole story. Rashid Well.

00:01:20:29 - 00:01:50:02
Rasheed Abiola
In short, I am I am the son of a Chief MKO Abiola. He was actually the first democratically elected president of Nigeria. And I was fortunate enough that I was born in London, England, and then moved to Nigeria. And due to circumstances involved in this presidency, my mom and my father sisters moved here to the United States and Maryland.

00:01:51:07 - 00:02:25:08
Rasheed Abiola
Unfortunately, my dad passed away two years after moving here. So we made a family decision to stay in the United States. And following this, I decided to finish my high school and then end up going to University of Maryland in College Park. I did a neurobiology physiology major, then went on to Chicago Medical School, completed my medical degree, and then from there matched to into orthopedic, say, University of Wisconsin, and then a fellowship at the University of Utah.

00:02:25:25 - 00:02:39:16
Colleen Young
You getting into orthopedics? Was it something that you wanted to do lifelong, or did your father's passing inspire you to go into medicine? Can you talk to us a little bit about that?

00:02:39:28 - 00:03:09:13
Rasheed Abiola
My dad, passing away from a heart related condition, made me interested in medicine. Initially, I thought I was going into cardiology, and when I took my my step one, I started to look at other specialties. And it wasn't until I think about that summer, the American Academy of Surgery had a conference in Chicago, and a buddy of mine was staying with me as much and started to save money.

00:03:09:33 - 00:03:33:03
Rasheed Abiola
And he said, You know, why don't you come to this conference and listen to a bunch of orthopedic surgeons talk about why they like the specialty? And then from there, I kind of got interested and then I just realized that, you know, these surgeons reminded me of myself. I was very into sports. I was very athletic. I enjoyed the lifestyle of making patients feel better.

00:03:33:24 - 00:03:57:37
Rasheed Abiola
And then I kind of decided to turn my attention more to which orthopedics at the time I did not have. I had a research, but it was more related to cardiology. I have a publication in older static hypertension, but I really wanted something that would introduce me to the field of orthopedics. So at the time there was a new clerkship that just started.

00:03:57:37 - 00:04:26:35
Rasheed Abiola
It was a route, Jackson STEINDEL Clerkship, University of Iowa. So I applied for it, not thinking I was going to, to get it. So rejection was the first female surgeon in the United States and she trained at the University of Iowa. And Iowa wanted to kind of celebrates inclusion and by inviting female medical students and they actually invited myself as well to be the first class of the rejection.

00:04:26:35 - 00:04:53:30
Rasheed Abiola
STEIN Taylor clerkship. So when I got there, they had actually lost my application, so I had applied to do joints, so they had lost my application and the only rotation that was available was spine. So no medical student wanted to do spine surgery rotation, which I found kind of interesting. But I did like, you know, I like neuroscience and I didn't really think about it, but I said, sure, I will, I'll do it.

00:04:53:30 - 00:05:23:29
Rasheed Abiola
You know, it was a clerkship. It was supposed to be research based, but they wanted me to do more clinical. So my first ever or it's pretty procedure that I saw was a 16 hour scoliosis surgery. And I actually had 6 hours. I actually had dress shoes on. So I had a back pain, no pun intended, literally for a good two months because I was wearing dress shoes.

00:05:23:44 - 00:05:54:04
Rasheed Abiola
That was incredibly uncomfortable. And that was my first introduction to spine surgery. And then from there, I went to Johns Hopkins and I did the pediatric orthopedics surgery rotation under Paul Swan Cellar. And I just love them. I love everything about them. I love the way he took care of patients. I love the way he explains the spine, more choice, pediatrics.

00:05:54:34 - 00:06:13:23
Rasheed Abiola
And then I you know, I had a a little brief moment with them and I said, Hey, Dr. Spine Cellar, why did you do your residency? And he said, I did my residency at Wisconsin. And he said, You should strongly look at it as an amazing place. So from there, I pulled up my application and I checked off Wisconsin.

00:06:13:47 - 00:06:38:20
Rasheed Abiola
And I knew at that point that that's where I wanted to go. And fortunate enough for me, I matched that University of Wisconsin, which had an extremely strong spine division. I mean, I had no idea what I was walking into. I mean, you had pretty much pioneers of spine surgery and in palsy that Blake Clifford should be, you know, Paul Anderson, who was on the Becker spine, lists the spine surgeons.

00:06:38:42 - 00:07:09:31
Rasheed Abiola
And then also we just had a younger spine surgeon called Seth Williams. So I was fortunate enough to have such a great group of spine surgeons that I can call my mentors. And so during my fourth year, I it was a no brainer. Everybody knew, you know, they saw the enthusiasm that I had about spine. So the first president to do a spine fellowship from Wisconsin in was Darrell Brockie and who's the current chairman at University of Utah.

00:07:10:31 - 00:07:31:14
Rasheed Abiola
So for me, it was I mean, at that point I said I want to interview a Utah. I would love to see what it's about. And when I interviewed at Utah, a lot of his mentors were also my mentors because a lot of his mentors are still operating still today. So the interview was just organic. It was just a beautiful time there.

00:07:31:14 - 00:07:48:13
Rasheed Abiola
And at that point I knew for sure that I wanted to go to university of Utah to do my spine fellowship and and fortunate enough for me and thankful to Darrell Brockie, Brendan Lawrence and the guys there I matched and I did my fellowship encompassed spinal surgery. University of Utah.

00:07:48:22 - 00:08:14:33
Colleen Young
First of all, you and I have had several conversations offline. And for those of you who are listening, if you are someone who wants to get into orthopedics, spine, spine surgery, I can't say it strong enough. If you have the opportunity to meet Rasheedat before you have to, because as you as you can hear, he is just so well versed in all the education.

00:08:15:09 - 00:08:41:23
Colleen Young
Plus, I got to tell you, Rasheed, everybody talks about it. You are probably the coolest spine surgeon. We have met because this is this is the only snowboarding spine surgeon you can find at Rasheed. Can you just and we're going to go into more professional stuff, but would you please tell the audience what's what's a weekend look like for Dr. Rasheed Abiola?

00:08:41:42 - 00:09:07:32
Rasheed Abiola
Weekends during the winter, I am obviously focusing on during the week. They obviously focus in on my profession making sure everything's going well, but obviously I'm keeping an eye on the weather patterns typically on the West Coast or the mountain west. And if there is a snowstorm, come in. I'm at that point, I'm looking at how I can safely get there and get a couple of days of riding.

00:09:09:00 - 00:09:36:46
Rasheed Abiola
So typically, my my Fridays are typically half days. And if I'm not on call, as soon as I'm done with clinic and I'm doing my clinical duties, I typically I'm on a plane by six, 7:00, and I'm pretty much in a city destination close to the mountains by the evening. And the good thing is the time difference helps actually, because you can leave here at 6:00 and you can get there quicker almost at 6:00, six, 7:00 as well.

00:09:37:19 - 00:09:48:19
Rasheed Abiola
And most of these ski destinations, especially in Salt Lake City, is about 20 minutes away. So by Saturday morning, gearing up and I'm hitting the slopes.

00:09:48:30 - 00:10:17:24
Colleen Young
So this is what this is what I love about you, because in all honesty, when somebody says to you, you have to go see a spine surgeon, it's terrifying to a patient who doesn't know the ins and outs. But when we when we walk into your office, you have this way about you. And if you if you you know, in doing my homework to prepare for this interview, I did a little quick Google and you have these reviews saying he's just so easy to talk to.

00:10:17:41 - 00:10:37:47
Colleen Young
He explains absolutely everything. I left there feeling better. I know I'm in good hands. Can you talk to us what it's like when a patient comes to see you and what that experience is like and how you walk them through the process of, you know, I've got a spine or a back injury.

00:10:37:49 - 00:11:08:03
Rasheed Abiola
Great question, Colleen. You know, the spine care involves all facets of the spine. And obviously, as a spine surgeon, I do the surgical aspect of it, but also the spine surgeon. I also initiate some of the non operative modalities. A lot of times when patients come and see me especially, they haven't had anyone evaluate their spine. The first thing I'm thinking about is how I can get their symptoms controlled with the easiest way possible without having to talk about surgery.

00:11:08:35 - 00:11:28:19
Rasheed Abiola
So majority of the time when I see patients in my clinic, I'm actually not discussing surgery at all. My main my main focus is to try to investigate what's going on and control their symptoms. And I find it amazing that a lot of patients tell me that this is the first time they've seen their own x rays or they've had MRI's in the past.

00:11:28:19 - 00:11:54:45
Rasheed Abiola
And this is the first time that they've seen their own MRI's. And I think that's picture speak a thousand words that it's important to sit down, educate patients. And I feel that a well-educated patient, in addition to the spine surgeon, becomes a team. And at that point, decision making process becomes easy. But it's it's important to stress that majority of the patients I see are actually non-surgical.

00:11:55:07 - 00:11:57:34
Rasheed Abiola
And even the surgical things can be treating on operatively.

00:11:57:49 - 00:12:28:47
Colleen Young
When you're treating somebody. And they unfortunately do have to have a surgery. And and I understand that there's many types of surgery, but I think most people, when they think spine surgery are large incisions, hours on the table, recovery time, there's a lot of intimidating things. What some you know, and again, I understand that there's many different types of surgery, but the surgeries that you're performing on average, what's it like?

00:12:28:47 - 00:12:32:38
Colleen Young
What's the incision like? What's what kind of tools do you use? Can you walk us through?

00:12:32:39 - 00:12:57:01
Rasheed Abiola
Yes. So majority of the procedures I do are one level procedures, whether they are in the cervical spine or whether they're in the lumbar spine, there are typically about one level procedures. And that in turn means that it is not as complex as a majority of them are routine procedures that are typically performed throughout the country hundreds of times.

00:12:57:48 - 00:13:19:22
Rasheed Abiola
So typically when I approach a problem, I try to see what is the most minimal way possible that I can approach the problem. And obviously treating the problem still perform the goals of the surgery, which which is to alleviate the patient's symptoms. And a lot of times those things can be accomplished with the tools that we have at our disposal.

00:13:20:11 - 00:13:48:07
Rasheed Abiola
In addition to that, spine surgery is always involving the old ways that spine surgery used to be done, where typically midline incisions pretty long, but now a lot of spine surgery can be done through a minimally invasive approach through lateral incisions that are relatively small. In addition to that, we're actually not doing the muscle stripping. We actually just splinting the muscle, which leaves the insertion of the muscle and allows for an easier recovery.

00:13:48:15 - 00:13:54:09
Colleen Young
When you're seeing easy recovery, what is the average recovery time of a surgery that you just described?

00:13:54:36 - 00:14:17:14
Rasheed Abiola
Yes, most patients typically go home either the same day or they go home the next day. There are some surgeries that are staged and those surgeries are typically patients are in the hospital one or two days afterwards, but majority of spine conditions, most patients go home between a day or two of their surgery. If it's not an outpatient procedure.

00:14:17:14 - 00:14:34:08
Colleen Young
I know the Mendelson Kornblum practiced that you're practicing out of. They have access to ambulatory surgery centers. Is that something that has spine surgery candidate could choose or are they primarily done in the hospital because it's a 1 to 2 night stay?

00:14:34:11 - 00:14:56:18
Rasheed Abiola
Yes. A lot of spine surgery is actually done as an outpatient procedures like anterior cervical dissecting means infusions. Typically one levels or one or two levels can be done as an outpatient safely. In addition to this, you can do a one level decompression, which is where you take the pressure of the nerve, said one level of the spine, or you can do a micro disc.

00:14:56:32 - 00:15:00:31
Rasheed Abiola
These are procedures that are typically done on an outpatient basis.

00:15:00:40 - 00:15:17:05
Colleen Young
In your current practice, what are you seeing? What conditions are you seeing the most of in Southeast Michigan? Is there a trend? Is it a stenosis? Is it I I'm using words. I don't even know what they mean. What are you seeing the most of right now or she?

00:15:17:05 - 00:16:00:42
Rasheed Abiola
Well, I have a community community practice. So my practice is typically tailored to majority of them are degenerative conditions. So typically conditions that occur when the aging process starts to encroach of the nerve elements that are through the spine and that could range anywhere form stenosis, which is narrowing of the spinal canal or a situation where you have pinched nerve in the neck or occasionally in younger patients, you would have a herniated disc, which typically happens and a lot of weightlifters and inactive people that do a lot of weights.

00:16:01:29 - 00:16:06:25
Rasheed Abiola
So majority of what I see are typically degenerative and activity related conditions.

00:16:06:40 - 00:16:23:06
Colleen Young
Rasheed Is there anything as we progress in age in in the activities that we're doing, is there any like preventative tips or tricks that you could give us that to help make sure we're doing everything we can to have a healthy spine, to have a healthy back?

00:16:23:06 - 00:16:51:46
Rasheed Abiola
Great question as well. I always encourage my patients. The first thing is to avoid nicotine related products. It's highly important to do that because what that does is that nicotine decreases the microvascular nature to to things in our spine that require and those blood flow sorry, joints are bone cells and the nerves and also nicotine can sometimes accelerate the changes of the spine as well.

00:16:52:14 - 00:17:15:34
Rasheed Abiola
So the first thing that you can do is to avoid chewing tobacco, nicotine, vapes or smoking cigarets. The next thing I would say is to try to have a balance core. And a lot of times when you go to gyms, you see people working on the biceps or they're doing squats, but not a lot of people are actually working on their core.

00:17:16:03 - 00:17:45:37
Rasheed Abiola
And a lot of the largest muscles in our body are actually the muscles that connect that goes from the pelvis in our back all the way and attaches to the spine. So if we have a strong core, we're practically protecting our spine from any of the minor changes that could potentially lead to pain. Another thing that's for people who work in office settings, you can their little balls so you can sit on that to sometimes force you to create an upright posture.

00:17:46:01 - 00:18:07:05
Rasheed Abiola
And it's a passive way that you can work on building the core. Things like yoga and Pilates are important things to kind of include in your activities. And I like to say that and in the five years that I've been practicing spine surgery, I've yet to see a yoga pilates enthusiast complaining of back pain.

00:18:07:30 - 00:18:12:27
Colleen Young
Is there any value to hot yoga versus regular yoga?

00:18:12:34 - 00:18:52:04
Rasheed Abiola
You know, I think that's all personal preference. At the end of the day, what you want is just to have a strong core and to make sure that you are that you are well balanced. And the important part is that if you if you have someone who has central obesity and they have a lot of weights ahead of them, or they're putting a lot of weight forward and their spine is imbalanced, which actually increases the introduced cycle pressure and leads to a sometimes herniated disc or, you know, increase disc degeneration similar to someone who doesn't work their abdominal muscles.

00:18:52:04 - 00:19:21:33
Colleen Young
And they have very tight backs and they're not quite flexible. That can sometimes overload the part of the spine called the forceps. So it's it's important that anytime you're looking at activities, you want to be well balanced. So if you do a lot of extension type exercises the next day, do flexion exercises like crunches. So if you do those things, I think that it will lead to a strong muscles around the spine and lead to hopefully less back pain.

00:19:21:37 - 00:19:38:11
Colleen Young
It always amazes me, you know, when you mentioned nicotine, how bad all of that is on the body in so many different ways. I'm glad you didn't mention not drinking whiskey, because, you know, I think that's key to some of my good health.

00:19:39:06 - 00:19:52:43
Rasheed Abiola
You know, it's important. Everything everything in moderation. It's especially on the alcohol side. Obviously, with nicotine, you don't want any part of it. But on the alcohol side, obviously, anything in moderation will be will the best.

00:19:52:49 - 00:20:07:20
Colleen Young
Another fun fact about Rasheed. He enjoys cooking, which is just amazing. And then he plays the drums. How goes the drumming? Are you are you having a chance? Because I know you're busy in your practice. Are you having some chance to do some drumming?

00:20:07:34 - 00:20:31:16
Rasheed Abiola
I am planning on buying a drum set, but I am currently renting a condo so I am not quite sure my neighbors should be excited about that. But I'm hoping that once I purchase a small house or our townhome, I'll likely get one in the basement and then I can get back to what I love doing, but I love playing the drums.

00:20:31:16 - 00:20:57:22
Rasheed Abiola
I played for the choir when I was growing up. I also played in the band in high school and because of that, my variety or my music tastes is as vast. I listen to a variety of music all the way from heavy metal to electronic chill music to jazz. This just name it as long as they play the drums and they have a good, good beats associated with it.

00:20:57:22 - 00:21:01:46
Rasheed Abiola
I'm always thinking about how I could potentially play it when I actually play the drums.

00:21:01:46 - 00:21:25:17
Colleen Young
Rasheed I know that you spend a lot of time in the gym and a lot of people nowadays are eating higher protein, you know, less, less carbs. We're lifting more weights. We're trying to build muscle, especially those of us that are aging way too fast. And it helps with all that. But is there anything that we should be doing as we're lifting heavier weights, or is it more repetitions to save our back and make sure that we're staying healthy?

00:21:25:28 - 00:21:56:12
Rasheed Abiola
Yes, I would say start gradual. Definitely with heavy weights, try to use your legs. And it's always important to realize that extension is your friend when it comes to the spine. They've done several studies that looks like what increases a lot of pressure on the disc. And the disc is the are like the shock absorbers between the bones of the spine that allows you to absorb any energy on uneven surfaces.

00:21:57:09 - 00:22:17:14
Rasheed Abiola
And the study that I'm quoting the noted that what puts the most stress on your spine is if you're leaning forward with weights in your hand. So you can imagine a lot of things that we do that that involves that as if we're not using our legs and we go down to pick up a kit. We're putting a lot of pressure on the disc.

00:22:17:35 - 00:22:40:05
Rasheed Abiola
If you're taking groceries out of the trunk of the car, when you lean forward and you don't, you're not using your legs. You're putting a lot of pressure on the disc if you're doing kettlebells, kettlebell swings, you're you're putting in a lot of if you don't use proper posture, making sure you're stacked, making sure your spine is an extension, you're putting a lot of pressure on your disc as well.

00:22:40:25 - 00:23:01:40
Rasheed Abiola
And any time that you're not stacked over your spine, you put your spine in a little bit of a vulnerable and weak position. And that's typically where unfortunate at least some of my discrimination patients come from. In addition to that, having a strong core also protects you for those moments that you're not quite paying attention to your posture.

00:23:02:05 - 00:23:35:42
Rasheed Abiola
Having a strong core at baseline protects you from that little chance that you might injure your spine. So obviously with lifting weights, build gradually, make sure that you're paying close attention to your posture and your technique. You check, make it sound. They can build stronger off those techniques. If your technique is not sound, then I would highly recommend that you go down in weight, build on your technique, make sure your core is strong, and then you're stacked over your spine in any activity you're doing.

00:23:36:07 - 00:23:45:15
Rasheed Abiola
And then gradually build those weights up. And I think if you do that, there's a good chance that's how you have a healthy spine and injury free.

00:23:45:34 - 00:24:05:20
Colleen Young
How about those of us that sit in an office chair all day long? I have a tendency, Rashid, to, you know, how you kind of curl, you cross your feet, it's your ankles, and then you pull your legs back toward the chair. Is does that affect your spine at all? And is there a proper sitting position that you should be in.

00:24:05:27 - 00:24:27:18
Rasheed Abiola
Any time you you brace yourself against something, you're you're actually not using the muscle. So if you lean back in your chair and you're in a relaxed position, you're not using the muscle. And obviously, if you work quite a bit, there's nothing wrong with relaxing yourself, embracing, bracing yourself against a chair or against an object or what have you.

00:24:27:18 - 00:24:51:39
Rasheed Abiola
But occasionally it's important to sit up and prop yourself up. And what that does said that engages the muscles in the spine. In addition to that, it teaches you a proper posture. So once you're standing up and if you're kind of stacked over your spine, you have a proper posture, which also helps in a passive way, which is kind of active work on kind of building those muscles up a little bit.

00:24:53:09 - 00:25:12:16
Rasheed Abiola
So I would say that's, you know, obviously there's nothing wrong with sitting down in a relaxed position, but once in a while sit up, prop yourself up for about 30 minutes. Maybe every 3 to 4 hours will probably help in making sure that your core is being engaged at some point of that workspace.

00:25:12:28 - 00:25:26:45
Colleen Young
When when I was and I'm like twice your age. But when I was younger, they used to teach girls how to walk properly. They'd put books on our head just to keep a straight. Is that does that bring any value whatsoever? Walking around with a book on your head?

00:25:26:45 - 00:25:53:17
Rasheed Abiola
Well, as long as the books is closer to your core, there's there's nothing wrong with that. But if the books are away from your core, then it puts a lot of stress on your desk. And that goes for activities. Like if you do activities like Olympic lifting, you know, when you pull that weight up, the closer you keep it to your spine or to your overall core, the better.

00:25:53:39 - 00:26:19:28
Rasheed Abiola
So there's you know, you can argue that, you know, what they were trying to do is they were trying to almost teach you to keep your spine stacked by having a book close to your body. It forces you to kind of keep an upright posture and then your spine is stacked and then you're in a balanced position. So obviously, I'm not sure if there's any science to that, but but I actually think that that's actually a pretty good thing.

00:26:21:03 - 00:26:28:31
Rasheed Abiola
It's a lot preferred and if you walk in and class kind of switched over not being in and a good, good posture.

00:26:28:35 - 00:26:47:24
Colleen Young
Rasheed I know that after this podcast that people are going to want to come to see you so it's Mendelssohn, Kornblum Orthopedics. They can go to the Web site. Mendelson Worth Hotels.com, you have your own page. There is a great video of you that people can get to know you even more and then they can schedule an appointment.

00:26:47:32 - 00:26:53:48
Colleen Young
You're both at the Livonia, Michigan location and the Warren, Michigan location. Correct me if I'm wrong.

00:26:54:00 - 00:26:54:37
Rasheed Abiola
That is correct.

00:26:54:42 - 00:27:06:42
Colleen Young
I can't thank you enough for the time today. I know you're a busy guy. I would love to see some snowboarding videos. I can't thank you enough for being here and I hope to have you back one day on head to Total.

00:27:06:42 - 00:27:28:17
Rasheed Abiola
Oh, thanks, Colleen. I'm very happy to be with metals in crumble orthopedics. They're very happy to be working with the staff that we have. We have a great team here and everything from the person that checks you in to the medical assistance to actually get into the privilege to take care of the patients that I see. This is a great team and I'm looking forward to seeing every one of you all.

00:27:28:20 - 00:27:30:09
Colleen Young
Thanks so much, Rasheed. Have a good evening.

00:27:30:27 - 00:27:44:42
Rasheed Abiola
Thank you.