Coach Lorenz had an enlightening conversation with Dr. Tro, a board-certified physician focused on internal medicine, obesity medicine, and metabolic health. Dr. Tro shares his weight loss journey on a ketogenic diet, shedding 150 pounds and leading to a profound impact on his approach to patient care. The discussion also covers various aspects of low carb diets, combating obesity, and the critical role of medical professionals in individualizing patient care for better health outcomes.
On this Episode:
00:00 Introduction & Dr. Tro's Background
00:54 Dr. Tro's Personal Weight Loss Journey
01:04 Establishing the Metabolic Health Team
02:36 Unraveling Dr. Tro's Passion for Metabolic Health
35:27 Redefining Health: Challenges to Conventional Techniques
32:03 Breaking Down Barriers in Treating Chronic Illness
38:10 Power of Personal Weight Loss Journeys in Patient Care
Connect with Dr. Tro
Follow Ketones and Coffee Podcast
~~~~~~
Estrella by Audiorezout is licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
~~~~~~
Save yourself that trip to the market — Instacart delivers groceries in as fast as 1 hour! They connect you with Personal Shoppers in your area to shop and deliver groceries from your favorite stores.
Instacart - Groceries delivered in as little as 1 hour.
Free delivery on your first order over $35.
Go to ketocoachlorenz.com and use the contact form to get your Free Consultation!
Coach Lorenz had an enlightening conversation with Dr. Tro, a board-certified physician focused on internal medicine, obesity medicine, and metabolic health. Dr. Tro shares his weight loss journey on a ketogenic diet, shedding 150 pounds and leading to a profound impact on his approach to patient care. The discussion also covers various aspects of low carb diets, combating obesity, and the critical role of medical professionals in individualizing patient care for better health outcomes.
On this Episode:
00:00 Introduction & Dr. Tro's Background
00:54 Dr. Tro's Personal Weight Loss Journey
01:04 Establishing the Metabolic Health Team
02:36 Unraveling Dr. Tro's Passion for Metabolic Health
35:27 Redefining Health: Challenges to Conventional Techniques
32:03 Breaking Down Barriers in Treating Chronic Illness
38:10 Power of Personal Weight Loss Journeys in Patient Care
Connect with Dr. Tro
Follow Ketones and Coffee Podcast
~~~~~~
Estrella by Audiorezout is licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
~~~~~~
Save yourself that trip to the market — Instacart delivers groceries in as fast as 1 hour! They connect you with Personal Shoppers in your area to shop and deliver groceries from your favorite stores.
Instacart - Groceries delivered in as little as 1 hour.
Free delivery on your first order over $35.
Go to ketocoachlorenz.com and use the contact form to get your Free Consultation!
so excited for this. TAke around. Today we have Dr. tro joining us on the show. Dr. tro is a board certified internal medicine and obesity medicine physician. He is the medical director and founder of Dr. TROs medical weight loss and direct primary care in Japan, New York. He's therapeutic focus spans critical health areas such as diabetes, obesity, hypertension, hyperlipidemia. Metabolic syndrome and PCOS. But what sets him apart is not just his extensive medical knowledge, but a deeply personal journey. He himself has shed an incredible 150 pounds on a ketogenic diet, and his approach to patient care is not just rooted in science, but in the practicalities of real life challenges. I'm so excited for this. I'm here with Dr. tro. Dr. tro, welcome to the show.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Hey Lawrence, thanks for having me.
Track 1:Dr. Tro, it's really an honor to have you, man. I also had a couple of your team on the show and their stories have been incredible. So I've been waiting for this moment to just have this conversation with you, brother.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah, I mean, look what can I say? I, if people don't know, um, about me I'm happy to talk a little bit about it, but I think you hit the nail on the head. I have an amazing team. Me is just part of the story. I work with a team of 13 people, and each one of them are amazing. Brian Wiley, our, one of our lead health coaches, has lost a hundred pounds, kept it off for nearly a decade and a half. He's truly an Atkins og. Amy Agus, who you had on your show is our program director. She lost 220 pounds and, she's kept it off now for five, six years. And, wE have Dr. Laura Buchanan and she's seen the impact of metabolic health. She's changed her whole career to sort of focus on metabolic health. Um, and she's, just amazing. And we got Vic,
Track 1:Yeah.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:who's a, our health coach. She's lost a hundred pounds, kept it off now six years, do an exercise. I mean, it's just Mary Ganzis, our pa. She wrote a paper with me on Keto and Cushing's. Um, just, Cushing's Disease is a medical condition of, we just have a awesome, awesome team. And the work we do, we work with large companies who want to. Get their employees healthy, And they hire our team to go in and make their, help inspire their company to focus on metabolic health. It's, I have the best job in the world, literally the best job in the world.
Track 1:Man. Man, you're doing God's work there, brother. So before we dive into the intricacies of your expertise, I'd love to explore the source of your passion, man, and what you do, right? It's all about that. You have this incredible energy and commitment. Could you share with us where the, that passion comes from, right? And what ignited that spark that led you to this path today?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Um, yeah, I, well, it depends on how far you want to go. Back. When I was, 13, I was the same weight I am now. Um, and I stepped on a scale in my primary care office on my 13th birthday and after waiting for about an hour and a half to be seen, um, I remember sitting there in the waiting room thinking like, why the hell am I waiting this long? and, and he got me on the scale and he looked at me and he said you're just gonna be like your whole family. You're fat. And And he's like, you gotta lose weight. And I remember my gut instinct was a little bit of shame, a little bit of guilt. I remember turning red in the face,
Track 1:Mm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:and I remember at that point I wanted to be a doctor because I was like this fucking shithead. Okay. Just told me to lose weight. He's got a TV in the fricking, waiting room. He made me wait two hours sitting on my ass, excuse my language, sorry. And he could've put a bike out in the waiting room for me at least, or something, a treadmill, he wants me to lose weight. He told me I gotta go lose weight. I have to eat less, count my calories and move more and exercise. I was like, why do you have me sit on my ass for two hours? So that was my moment where I knew I wanted to become a doctor, um, because Dr. Tis inspired, uh, Dr. tis showed me what not to do.
Track 1:mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Don't shame and blame. Don't be lazy as a doctor. Don't be uninspiring as a doctor. So, um, I. I went off and I went to med school and residency, I, I gained weight. I couldn't, even though I wanted to prove Dr. Tis wrong, I had gained weight 10 pounds per year. Um, and I got up to three 50 pounds. And
Track 1:Wow.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:my wife, at the time, my loving wife, she asked, she was worried about my overall health and she wondered if I would have a heart attack. and she was right to worry. And so my wife really prompted me to think things through a bit, right. And think and she's, I was the chief resident. She's like, you're the chief resident. She's like, you, you told the program directors and the Yale system that you know, what was gonna happen with hepatitis C and what was gonna happen in certain other fields. Like, she's like, can't you figure out obesity?
Track 1:Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:so she really challenged me in my mind to academically understand obesity. And so I academically understood obesity. I went to the literature, read studies, read books, read 300 books, all the three textbooks on obesity. Um, and then you see the truth, when you do that, you see like the whole picture and that our nutrition guidelines are built on a house of cards.
Track 1:Mm
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:and they're essentially all lies. And, um, and that's where I started. So I went like fundamentally, I was like, okay, what diet should I do? Well, what works best? And you go into the literature and you see that low carb always did better. So I didn't start with low carb because I wanted to I, I, I I really had never cooked a steak in, in until, after that point, which was like eight or nine years ago.
Track 1:Mm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:I had no affinity for meat or anything like that. Um, but I just wanted the best approach and that was low carb. So that's, that's was a big turning point when I started to fix my own health. aNd I started to take all that rage from my childhood, that inspired me to go into medicine
Track 1:Yeah.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:and, that's, that was sort of the tipping point, I guess, of everything coming together.
Track 1:Yeah. And man, thank you for telling that story and just gives a lot of people some perspective there. We got a lot to discuss Dr. Tro, because I'm glad just to have somebody with that credentials that you have and that combined own experience, um, gives you that unique perspective, right, in terms of weight loss and health in general. It's such a great opportunity for us to debunk, right? Some of these, um, age old beliefs that frankly are hindering a lot of individuals. My close family included, um, adapting this low-carb lifestyle. So maybe we can help, people transition here from our
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah, I mean, well, so, so that's the thing. So the, uh, I'll tell you, term in terms of like credentials, I'm a board certified internal medicine doctor. I'm a board certified obesity medicine doctor. I'm a medical health practitioner. Medical, sorry, metabolic health practitioner. I have a certification in personal training. I have certification as a health coach. I don't think, and I've lost 150 pounds myself, my patients lose on average, more than 45 pounds over a year in our program. I don't think there's many people out there more qualified than me. And I'm not saying that, like, I'd say there's less than a thousand people more qualified to talk about this than me.
Track 1:hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:And not as a, not as like a I'm not like And not to toot my horn, but I don't think I can get more credentialed
Track 1:Mm-Hmm. That, that's the passion that we're talking about. Right? That's the passion. And you, you, you don't, you won't get there without your experience, without your passion because, before we get into these discussion here, I can't imagine how difficult it was, implementing that low carb protocol since it goes against your traditional studies training as a medical doctor. And I'm curious about like the hurdles you encountered and how you navigate these It's still going against that low car protocol. It goes against to everything that you've come to know, right?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Um, well, yes and no. All the guidelines say, eat more grains, eat more fruits. Right? Which is basically not helpful, right? But, um, but if you look at the head-to-head studies,
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:low-carb always does better. So it was very easy to, for me to pick it. It was like, okay, if this was an antibiotic, which antibiotic would I pick? I'd look at the guidelines and see what they say, and then I'd go look at the studies and see if it matches up. So, I went to the studies and low car did better, so it was quite easy for me to do it because I went to the literature.
Track 1:Mm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:I didn't just trust the guideline. I went to the primary literature.
Track 1:Mm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:So, yeah, it was very easy for me to start the diet, Because also I, I'm a physician, like I, I, I'm trained into understanding guidelines and being able to read some basic literature, Right. And I understand easily how to debunk, like common, misconceptions like ketos gonna ruin your kidney or Your protein's gonna kill your kidney or something stupid, or it's bad for heart health,
Track 1:I wanna talk about that
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah. I mean, these are just not, um,
Track 1:Yeah, man,
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:It, it was easy for me,
Track 1:We're lucky today to have somebody with your credentials, man.'cause like you said, and I, I believe it's true because that not a lot of people, not a lot of, medical practices can say that they lost 150 pounds and has all your credentials. I mean, um, that's why, we are lucky to have Dr. tro today to answer some of these questions because I have a lot of questions for you actually,
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah. Hit me.
Track 1:we, we align with these things because, I'm frustrated, right? Just because, I see at my, my mom and my dad, they're both, um, mom's, pre-diabetic, dad's full on, and they are, just a conventional medicine, conventional practices just, hinder them from making that change. So I'll, let's start with, with just conventional practice. I want you to get, I want to get your perspective on this as somebody who, you know. We're actually you giving that advice. And this is, absolutely before your transformation, right? So I wanna ask for your patients, right? When you, when they follow the conventional way of calorie restriction and increased physical activity, in and out, calories, in and out. When you contemplate on this, in your opinion, why was that such a disaster? Why is eat less, exercise more? All of that jazz just doesn't work for some people.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:I mean, that's a, that's a very long answer, so I don't know how much you want to go into it, but fundamentally, Most people coming to me know what to eat,
Track 1:right?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:right? You ask them, what's a healthy plate? And they say, vegetables and protein, right? So they know what to eat, right? Um, but they have a hard time doing it, right. They have a hard time implementing it. So, um, focusing on calories, it's like saying pump more air in your tire than you let out. It's a true statement. If you get a flat tire, what do you want?
Track 1:Right.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:want to have more air in your tire than you let out. It's a true statement, but does it help anybody? No. Right. If you have a problem with your bank account, right? Is it a true statement to say, make more money than you spend?
Track 1:mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:It's true.
Track 1:That's
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:But does that help anybody?
Track 1:That's true.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:No.
Track 1:Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Right. So when you're looking at nutrition, there's a metabolism problem, right? There's a potentially this psych bio-psychosocial problem, okay? Metabolics psychology, all of this inter human behavior all intertwined in one. Encompassing sleep movement, dietary choices. Right. So is telling somebody to count their calories and eat less, eat more than they expend? Is that helping anybody? No, not really. And this, this idea of, budgeting calories like you, it's all about calories. While it's true, it's very complicated because if you eat low carb, and you have higher protein, all of a sudden you can eat more calories,
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:right? You can actually eat more. If you're in increasing your protein and decreasing your carbohydrates and you're keeping fat fairly high, what happens? You spontaneously increase your metabolism by 200 calories a day
Track 1:mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:if you increase your, if you replace carb calories for protein calories. for every 400 calories you're eating that you swap, you can have a hundred more calories of protein, right? So, so the problem is, is that the, the metrics when it comes to calories, they're moving. The lower the carbs go, the more the metabolic adaption, impr, the metabolic advantage sort of improves the energy expenditure increases, the higher the protein goes and the lower the carbs go. You not only get that, energy expenditure benefit, but you also get the benefit from thermogenesis. And on top of all of that, you get the hormonal benefits of being low carb and ha and eating fat, which means your grill and your hunger hormones stay low. Your satiety hormones go high, your GLP one hormone goes high, which everybody wants. Now, um, your endogenous, hormones increase. And improve. So, the calorie model is just a shitty model for managing weight.
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:It's, it's, it doesn't help, what do you do? If you want a flat tire? You wanna have a little meter on your car that says the, the, the air pressure's low, right? wanna have a service to call when you need help, right? You want to, uh, maybe have a jack and a, and a thing to, to. A jack and a a a, lug nut wrench to be able to change the tire, right? And it's no d you don't want somebody to tell you, ah, you need more, you need more air in your tire than you let out and wag their finger. Right? Or an app to tell you, wagging your finger like, Hey, you need more, air in your tire than you let out. That doesn't help. Right? What do you want? You wanna service the call that's gonna help you. want a real time assessment of that, of the tire pressure. You wanna have the tools needed embedded in your life so you can manage the issues you're facing, right? Fix a flat or whatever, so, I think medicine can just ditch and nutrition can just ditch the calories model, and if they ditch it, they will improve.
Track 1:You did say it doesn't help people, but for some people it does work. That's why there's so, such a confusion, right? Um, with, with, with the fitness industry, using that model, right. And people seeing that saying, hey why, why does it,
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:the fitness industry growing or decreasing?
Track 1:Hmm. That's a good question.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Is the, is the fitness industry growing and are fit people increasing or decreasing?
Track 1:Right, right. Obviously it's increasing. Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:fitness industry is increasing and
Track 1:Obesity is increasing.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:and obesity is increasing, which means fit. People are decreasing, so they are making money
Track 1:right?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:and we're getting less healthy, so to say pragmatically, right? Like are they, it works for some people, I mean, chemotherapy works for some people.
Track 1:Yep.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:We don't give chemotherapy to everybody, right? So the problem is, is systemically it doesn't work.
Track 1:Mm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:know, if it worked, people would do it. Do they? How many people know about calories? 99% of people know about calories.
Track 1:exactly.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:And I, the problem with the, the fitness industry is, um, These people are are oftentimes very low carb. They're very low carb. If you are watching fitness influencers on TikTok or whatever, if you look at what they do, they eat keto products. They eat Quest chips. They have keto bread, sugar free condiments.
Track 1:Yeah.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:They are all lowering their carbohydrates all the time. Right. Okay. And they rarely eat processed foods, right? Except if they're bulking. If they're bulking, they'll eat anything,
Track 1:Right?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:right? They'll eat anything, right? And what do they do? They gain fat, but they're also experts at dieting, which means eliminating carbohydrates, processed carbohydrates, sugar from their diet, and increasing protein.
Track 1:mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:They're the prototypic example. Right and only take in as much as carbs. They need to facilitate their workouts.
Track 1:Hmm
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:They are experts at lowering carbohydrates. So when you say the fitness industry, well, if you look at like Sam Selic, TNF, all these fitness influencers, right? They are low carb people, whether they like to admit it or not, not when they're bulking up, but certainly when they're cutting.
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:So, the problem is, is does it work to, so the, what are the, what are the good things about tracking calories? Well, it makes you have to think about what you're eating. So, stopping and think. So, if you look at if you look at diets that compare calorie counting to just eating less fat. Calorie counting works less, works worse than just eating less fat. And eating less fat. Works worse than eating low carb. So when they do head-to-head studies, so to say, it works for some people. I mean, yeah, there's it. It works for some people to neurotically think about what they're eating. They may end up eating less. Maybe it's because of anxiety. Maybe it's because of self-judgment, pressure. I don't know what it is, but fundamentally, if you take a group of people and tell them, cut your calories and compare them to people who cut their fat. versus compare them to people who cut their carbs. The worst, the group that will do the worst is the count your calories group. The next worst will be the low fat group. The next worst will be the low carb group. Now, does that mean that you can do it that way? Yeah, you can track your calories and what you want that way, but you know it's gonna be.
Track 1:mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:I mean, you can, you can have more carbohydrates. You can make it very hard for you in the long term,
Track 1:So if you have, if you have any other, uh, underlying factors like you talked about psychology, the most efficient way is to go low carb,
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah. I
Track 1:say
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:mean, systemically. Yeah, a hundred percent. So if you look at any of those factors, so if you have. Metabolic syndrome lowering triglycerides, low carbohydrate is superior. If for weight in general, weight in general, low carb is superior, right? If you look at the systemic analysis, the only thing that it would not necessarily help going low carbs is the quote, unquote LDL, which may increase modestly very, minutely. So if you're, if you're compare, if you wanna be very accurate with the qualifications, low carb is superior for weight loss.
Track 1:Uhhuh.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Low carb is superior for lowering triglycerides and increasing HDL and reversing metabolic syndrome. Lowering carbs is superior for blood pressure. It's been tested against the dash diet. low-carb is superior for diabetes. It lowers blood pressure and the needs for blood pressure meds more more effectively. Okay. And the bottom line is what? Well, what does it, what's the trade-off? Because everything's a trade-off, it will most likely, along with increasing your good cholesterol, increase the quote unquote bad cholesterol and total cholesterol. So it's not like there is no panacea, there's no, you can't Nobody can eat everything, right? There's always a trade-off, right? If you have carbohydrates, well, what happens? Your cholesterol goes down. Total cholesterol and your good cholesterol. And your bad cholesterol, what goes up? Triglycerides and your blood sugars, right? So bottom line is the calorie counting approach has failed. We have known about calories. It's been promoted. It doesn't work. Right. Does that mean if somebody benefits by stopping thinking about what they're eating, writing it down and counting the calories, does that work on an individual level? For some people, yes. Right, but when you look at it over populations, it works. And, and in randomized controlled studies, it works less well than just telling somebody to cut out fat and cutting out fat works less well than just cutting out carbs. Does that make sense?
Track 1:Yeah. Yeah, because there's a lot of underlying issues that comes with it, right. For somebody who has food addiction, sugar dependency. Right. It's a lot more, it's, it becomes. So for some people from the fitness industry may call it, Hey, you're not, you just gotta be disciplined. You just gotta be, um, you gotta moderate. Right? It's all, it's all about that. But at the end of the day, not everybody can moderate right? And it may not fit someone else's regimen. Right? So, um, but I think that what they're not understanding is that. There's a lot of people who have an undiagnosed food addiction. Right? An undiagnosed sugar dependency. Right. So I wanna talk about that and um, maybe the underlying issues they talk about the root cause, right. For conventional medicine. Because when you do go to your traditional doctor, right, my experience anyway, and what I've heard, they only focus on the surface level solution. Right. Um. What are they missing? But you know, when you go to your doctor, you go, you go to them and they just ask for your symptoms, right? They don't go any further than that. And when you say, Hey, I got a, I got a headache, but why can't they just, ask further than that, right? To know where the root cause is coming from. I've seen this so many times with, with my family members going to their doctors, they tell me, um. They just ask my symptoms.'cause I always ask them, after a visit, what do they ask you? I mean, they just ask for my symptom. They give me a pill, an antibiotic, right? And they hand those things like candy, um, over there. But it just creates more frustration for me. And, and, and obviously, I'm, I'm, I don't have the credentials, like their doctor. But just frustrating. Right? But what are they missing? What, why are they not asking? The root cause. Like if, if you go to your, if you take your doc, if you, you take your dog to the vet, they, the first thing they ask you, what, what do you feed your dog? Right? But when you when you go to your doctor, which is funny, they only ask for your symptoms. What are they missing? Dr. Tro, do you think?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:I think fundamentally most doctors are lazy and don't care.
Track 1:Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Okay. I think most doctors are lazy and don't care. And, um, actually I, I think that, they, they, just don't, they don't know. They've never seen it either.
Track 1:Mm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:A lot of'em have just never seen good care.
Track 1:Right.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:know if that makes sense, but they, they, like, it's tough for me saying that they, they're lazy than no care. It's also, they have never seen it. They have never seen exceptional medical care. Right. They don't know what it looks like. right? Nobody's ever shown them how to be exceptional.
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:It's mainly how to be a cog in a wheel.
Track 1:Yeah,
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:So if you look at, like, if you look at it, right, if a and they also discount the ability of the person in front of them,
Track 1:right.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:right? So a doc, Yvette. It's like, what are you feeding them? Because that's something they can improve. They view it as something they can improve. I can get this cat or dog to eat something better, and maybe some of the symptoms will get better, right? Maybe they're being fed chocolate, right, and or maybe they're allergic to whatever. I don't know. Whatever. It's,
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:when it comes to diet, doctors automatically say, well, people can't sustain diets, so why am I even gonna bother?
Track 1:Right.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:So I they have given up before they've started. They're probably lazy and don't care. Right. Because if they cared, they would try a different way, right? Or, and maybe a combination of all these, they probably have never seen exceptional care before, right? They've never seen what it looks like to be amazing. And I think that's, that's, that's something that, in my clinic I have like, I have strived for, it's, I want the patient experience to be amazing. I want the, I, I wanna make sure when people leave, there's a, there's, they're gonna go review me and hit five stars, right?
Track 1:Yeah.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:I wanna make sure we're doing better than other than the guy next to me, the guy down the street.
Track 1:Mm
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:right? So I track how well we do and I try to improve. I, I want to understand the values of my patients, right? What it is they're trying to accomplish, and try to help them attain the goals that they have,
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:my goals for them aren't necessarily their goals. So coming back to the example where you said they're just pushing pills, right? That's usually an example of a doctor pushing their goals. Maybe they get paid more if they Write certain pills, maybe they, maybe they think that, a high number needs to be treated, but that's your goal. That's not to pay the patient's like, I want to be healthy. I wanna not need that pill you're writing.
Track 1:right?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:So I think, um, it's tough because docs, I think that they I don't, I don't, I don't mean to say that they I don't care. I think it's, they don't care enough. I, that's, I, they probably care. I think they're in general caring people,
Track 1:Yeah.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:right? But they just don't care enough to say, well, wait a second. Taking this money from insurance is making me be a worse doctor. Wait a second. This system is preventing me from being the best I can be. Wait a second. What are the things I need to do better? How do I implement those things into my, into my practice so I can do better? I. Um, and they've never seen it. They've never seen somebody do that. Change the system, make change happen. So that patient care improves. It's just, it's not done.
Track 1:Yeah, I believe that they have a great point about they haven't seen it. Um, most of the doctors that I've come across that changed their practice is, they most, they usually have their own experience. Um, I wanna ask you, have you seen a doctor that didn't have any experience or their own health journey? They didn't have any. Aches and pains like that, that change like on their own,
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah. Eric Westman. Eric Westman, definitely Is one of those, I think, not, not that a huge health experience. Yeah. My my partner who's amazing, absolutely amazing, Dr. Laura Buchanan, she didn't have this massive health journey, although she did see her blood sugars improve on the CGM, and she's seen it in her family, but she's like, more than anybody knows the value of metabolic care,
Track 1:Yeah.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:right? So I'd say, it's a, it's a, I know what you mean. Like, it's e in some ways it's easier for me,
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:right? Because I've seen it myself. I've seen it in my family. I know the power. I mean, you say it yourself, you see your parents suffering and you wanna do something about it. I mean, here's, you are on this podcast. I bet the purpose of this podcast is really so mom and dad listen and change, right? So mom and dad, if you're listening, your son wants you to change, right? If you're a family member, you know of Lorenz, he's doing this. So you take your health into your own hands and stop being disempowered. Stop letting your, your doctors put you on a lower place. Let them, let them. If they're not raising you up, replace them. Get a new one. Right? I think most doctors, um, it's easy for me because I felt it myself.
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:And it's harder for other doctors who haven't had that opportunity. You're right.
Track 1:It's just, um, my, my goal is to just, my ideal thing is just to have them all these patients have options, right? Including educating them, trying to reverse it, right? Mm-Hmm. um, how far are we from that? Like the conventional'cause I mean, that's the only way that it's gonna happen is when the conventional medicine changes, right? Um, how far are we from that, do you think? I. Or how is it gonna ever gonna happen in your opinion?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Um, that's a hard question,
Track 1:Hard question. I know. Hard question. Just There's a lot of biases, right?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah, I, I don't think, I think it's gonna be a long time, I think it's gonna be a long, long time.
Track 1:Yeah. Yeah. With biases and just agendas, you really have to go back to history to really explain to people and why red meat, fat has been vilified like that. Right. You really, you can't explain it without explaining history and where it started. It's, it's really hard to explain because it's so ingrained in, um, in our beliefs. Right. And it's really hard to, um, That's why I wanna ask you like, there are a lot of factors with lifestyle. I get it. It's not easy, especially with, undiagnosed food addiction, right. Plus the traditional way of treating them makes it impossible for a person to overcome. How would you address this situation with the patient though? How do you learn, how do you learn about a patient's history about sugar dependency? Because again, some might not be aware that they may have them. Like, if somebody comes into your office, um, wanna lose weight, but doesn't know they have this dependency, obviously they have this preconceived, conceived idea of dieting, right? But comes to your office, how do you, make them aware that they, they have it, or, um, in any situation.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:yEah, I think it's getting them to, to start to understand I think you have to have a deep understanding of what addiction is.
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:And I think you need to understand how it affects, basic human, uh, traits, that how it affects human emotions, how it affects human logic, how it affects reasoning and outlook and self. How you advocate for yourself, and how you blame, self, self-blame. So if a provider understands those things, then um, then they can help a patient understand. Their human experience with that substance. If they fundamentally don't have insight into what it is, what is addiction like, what does that mean? Right? I mean, it's not just you keep using something despite self-harm. It's more than that. It's the, it's emotional responses you have. It's the. Psychologic, the shame and the guilt, the, the deep, the way that you change your behavior, hide and sneak, lose control of, use it only in, in private. Um, I. If you, if a person doesn't understand that, if a provider doesn't understand it, I, I think it's very hard to explain it to a patient, right? If they don't have insight into what is the human experience of addiction, how are they gonna help build that insight into a patient? So I think fundamentally, there's some screens that can help. There's screening tools that can help. Um, and we use them in our clinic. But I think fundamentally it's that, again, bio-psychosocial, connecting with somebody and helping them understand. And a lot of times I use my own struggle, my own emotional responses from that, from a dark period in my life, my own logic and reasoning from a dark period in my life and my own, the way I didn't advocate for myself and the high degree of self blame I had. Right? How I, by using myself as an example and letting my patients relate to it, um, I think I'm able to, one, make them not feel alone right in their struggle, and then begin to understand that this thing that they're fighting against has a way that it, it affects them a very systematic way that it manipulates, has a manipulation in their life. aNd this is a really metaphysical sort of conversation, but, at its base level, we just help them understand what food addiction is, and we even built it into our app. Our app, the Dr. TRO app has, um, has a, a area devoted to relationship to food. So, yeah.
Track 1:Yeah. Awesome. We'll link it down to the description box below so you guys can check that out. Um, yeah, I wanna ask you about coaching. Dr. tro, you've mentioned you're focused on just intensive lifestyle changes, right? Patients encompassing diet, exercise, all of that. How do you approach guiding individuals through all these facets of changes? Because again, um, how do you steer them into that way of, low carb eating too? Like how do you. Because are they aware that they're coming into your office? Um,
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:People know what they're getting before they, so it is very clear what we do and my staff makes it very clear what we do, what we are. We're a food first organization. We are trying to get patients off drugs. We liked, we, we are low carb supportive.
Track 1:Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:And so when a patient signs up with us, they know what they're gonna get. So a lot of times, if somebody's not ready for change, they're not coming to us. Right? So a big part of coaching, which I'm sure is, is, um, assessing readiness to change. If somebody's not ready, they're not signing up with us. Right. So if they're not ready, they're gone seeing their doctors and just following us on social media, listening to our podcast, using our app, and when they're ready, they're calling us.
Track 1:Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Right? So a lot of what we do in terms of we're getting them before they ever walk in, that's it, where they're, they're pre-contemplative before they walk in. They're contemplative when they sign up, and we're already on our way.
Track 1:Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:We're already on our way. Right. And the minute they sign up, they have a whole curriculum. Here's what you need to do to get started. So they went from pre contemplated before they signed up to contemplated when they signed up, and now they're ready. They're getting the information needed to execute action.
Track 1:Mm-Hmm. Mm-Hmm.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Um, yeah. And that's an art that's taken years to, understand. Um. And, and it's, it's, but I, like I said, we have an amazing team and we do this every day for a living, which is awesome. We get to see people reverse disease, reverse cushings, reverse diabetes, reverse obesity, reverse blood pressure issues on a daily basis. So it's awesome.
Track 1:that's what people need to understand. These are all lifestyle, the lifestyle intervention. You can reverse most of these chronic illnesses. Um, that's what I wanna, just the message, just simple message that wanna tell people. But yeah, you talk about your health coaches and you have, they all have experience, um, a Health struggle and then significant weight loss themselves. Right? How, how does having a team with, personal weight loss journeys co contribute to the support and understanding that, you can offer to these patients?
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah, I think, um, I think everybody has their own journey. You know, whether it's a mental health journey, a physical journey, a journey against the medical system, a journey towards optimal health, and those are the people that we really like to hire, know, people who've had those journeys and those are the people we like to work with because that, again, it comes down to that human experience. You have to be able to relate to people if you're going to expect wild results. We can't just tell people, eat less and move more and expect wild results. It didn't work, hasn't worked, right? We can't just tell people anymore, Hey, count your calories right, because it's not working. So if we intend to have amazing results. We have to be able to do more. And part of that is being able to relate to people and people who have struggled are in a great place to sort of, um, relate to people,
Track 1:Yeah. Personal
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah. Yeah.
Track 1:personal. They know. They know how to navigate the intricacies of just how to navigate the world, right? Obviously the society that we live in now, it's not, doesn't operate to their advantage. Right. Obviously, um, with. You walk into the grocery store, what, what do you see? There's a lot of, box items. And I call'em fake foods too. Right.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Yeah.
Track 1:Which is, it's, if you're somebody on a health journey, it's, it makes it difficult for you to overcome, right? But with a support with coming from somebody who has really gone through it, gone through the struggles, it really helps somebody and. It gives them hope, right? What, what you're doing, everybody in your, in your team has had that experience where Whatever it is, you can help this patient. Right. So amazing, um, amazing work that you guys are doing. I really appreciate you coming on, sir sharing your story here with us. Um, you had such amazing message to, I I love your passion, man, on social media and all of that jazz. And, um, you, you've, you've done well so far, sir So I, I'm a fan of you and a fan of your practice and hopefully, we can can, connect one more time.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And you, you know how to contact our whole, whole team now. It's nice connecting with you, Lawrence. Thank you.
Track 1:Awesome. Awesome. Thank you so much. And to everyone who wants to listen to the Low Carb MD podcast, you can, I'm gonna link it down to the description box below. Um, to who? To everyone who wants to connect to Dr. tro. It's, it's linked in the description box, but also you guys can check that out. Dr. tro, thank you so much.
tro--carb-free-_1_12-02-2023_110622:Thank you.