This episode is a recording of a live event with Indie and Integrative MD Dr. Vesna Skul. Indie and Dr. Skul have a dynamic discussion on living vibrantly, through your health and beyond.
About Dr. Skul:
Dr. Vesna Skul is a founding partner and the Medical Director of the Comprehensive Center for Women’s Medicine, a multispecialty holistic medical practice for women. Dr. Skul is a graduate of Rush Medical College in Chicago, is a board-certified specialist in Internal Medicine, a Fellow of the American College of Physicians and an Associate Professor of Medicine at Rush University. She is also fellowship trained and board certified in Anti-aging and Regenerative Medicine. Her career has been devoted to caring for women in all phases of their lives.
Indie and Dr. Skul will be chatting about topics like:
- relationships with doctors and how they shouldn't be solely disease based
- positivity and the immune system
- achieving beauty from the inside out
- The most important practices to maintain during a pandemic
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Welcome back to coming clean with Indie Lee a podcast series about living with passion, acting with purpose and being fully present. I'm your host, Indie Lee. I recently had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Vesna Skul on a simulcast. And I thought you know what, this would make an incredible podcast episode as well. So, without further ado, take a listen to how to live vibrantly with Dr. Vesna Skul. All right, so I see so many people in the house from Chicago and Raleigh, New Jersey, California, York, and I could not be more excited today to talk about vibrant living as you can see, I don't know if it's my left or your left, depending I have people on the screen, but I have such a pleasure to have with me. After Vesna Skul, who is my doctor? Well
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We were talking yesterday today has completely changed my life. And
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I'm your host in the league because you weren't surprised you weren't sure who I was. But
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I just was going to be my co host and we're really going to share with you you know her take on integrative functional medicine and the role of it in today's society and certainly with what's going on in endemic COVID-19 and I took notes so I made sure that I properly introduced you Dr. Skul. So for those of you who don't know Dr. Skul, She is the founder and the medical director of Comprehensive Center for women's medicine, which is a holistic medical practice for women located in the Gold Coast of Chicago. She's a graduate of rush Medical College Board certified specialist in internal medicine, a fellow of the American College of Physicians and Associate Professor of med men
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at Rush, my gosh. Also a fellowship trained and board certified in anti aging and regenerative medicine, which I didn't even get to talk to you about which is so fascinating. And you've really spent your career devoted to caring for women in all phases of their lives with expertise and lifestyle medicine, auto immune, which is how I came to contact with you. hormonal balancing menopause management, and this is what I think is fascinating. What I think a lot of people are going to love is learning about the integration of functional medicine and mainstream practices. So Dr. Skul.
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Thank you, thank you, indeed. I'm going to add something else which my CV does not talk about, but it's the most fun part of my, my bio, I think is that I love to get my hands dirty. And I love to garden so I'm
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Winner and also a certified raw organic chef. So, so yeah.
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Okay, is there anything you don't I was reading your CV, I'm like, Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, it's so it's so fascinating. But what I love is that you really have spent your life helping to empower women to to live their healthiest life, which obviously is, you know, so important to us as a brand, but you will, that's what your career is dedicated to. Well, you know, it's been really a blessing to
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to have chosen the path which really did not come to me I was not born with a stethoscope around my neck. When I came to this country as a foreign exchange student in the mid 70s, and then met my husband
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who actually was a reason for my permanent exchange and
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He's still my husband, which is actually
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kudos to him.
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And when I decided to choose a career,
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it was really not to pursue journalism and in English, which is how I came to this country, and you may not even know that.
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I found that for women in the 70s there were two most challenging career paths, law and medicine and my dad was a lawyer, and I embarrassed him at his 40th birthday party when as a child, I responded to his judge friends question about what I was going to be what I grew up like saying anything but a lawyer because you're so dreadfully boring.
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I guess I was left with medicine, but I actually have to say that my dear mother in law who is still with us in 93, vibrant and one
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was an internist and
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had to redo her career of Internal Medicine all over when she and my father in law, so physician 95 year old, functioning and vibrant
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came to this country in the 60s. And I thought that, you know, looking at her and her achievements at the time really made me realize this is a beautiful profession. And it is one which is always going to allow me to look at every person in a different way and event explained, and even though by education was in a traditional internal medicine, you know, disease based model, where, you know, internal medicine was so brilliant and beautiful, because it's like a big puzzle and you're putting the pieces together, and you're creating diagnoses and the better diagnostician you are, the better doc you are and you can help the patient more
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But there was a flaw with that educational process because it was looking for disease entities, yes. And diagnoses and looking at patients as diagnoses. And it never really sat well with me. So people knew me in medical school and residency as the granola doctor.
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Back then you knew and your calling was much bigger than just conventional, as we call conventional medicine work ethic, Pat and Yeah, well, I in the 70s I cooked organic food for my dogs still Need I say more. But as soon as so my passion for healing.
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It really has been lifelong and and it stems from love and abundance of my two grandmother's who are healing everything with with oil of oregano or camomile tea. I grant
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I can't really promise that I can do the same for my thing. But I really came from an environment where there really wasn't an approach to health, as is we are teaching, it's still to this day in the United States and the Western world and that is there is a pill for every ill the results. That's why I came to you and first so I was very lucky that my friend and mentor introduced me to Dr. Skul, when I was at the point where I thought I was going to have to go back on you know, heavy pills for my arthritis. And, you know, I struggle with auto and I wanted someone to is going to look at me as a whole and get to know me and not just try to give me a pill for that one thing. And what I realized through working with you is, you're looking at me, and I mean, which we'll go into
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Really looking at this person and and it wasn't it's not as easy as its lifestyle based. It's my History Prior to even being born, but it's everything and how that all fits into who is in delay and what is going on. And as a result of working with you I am and why I'm so excited for you to share your approach is why I'm on medicine right now at all and I'm driving with towards medicine. I have my flare ups every once in a while, of course, but just working with you, I've never felt better. So thank you so much for sharing. In the end it is really very empowering
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to hear from patients and to patients to know that even though they may have a predisposition towards a certain disease state or an illness, that um you know, there's so much we can do
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The science of epigenetics a study of changes in the
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organism caused by modification of expression of certain genes, rather than alteration of the genetic code itself, in the last 1015 years, has brought about so much hope for patients who have
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you know, even a
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genetic deck that is even far more serious than an autoimmune illness that you are living with. And, and knowing that there are certain lifestyle practices, we can suppress those bad genes and promote the expression of good ones. To live our best vibrant lives is is really remarkable, and until you really experience it, and it does not have to have a bad illness, but just the quality of life.
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vibrant life.
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Once you complete a cleanse, for instance, and how much clearer your thinking is and how much better you feel, you realize that there is really a lot you can do or we can do to live our, our best health. So maybe you can share with everybody what the difference is between functional medicine, integrative medicine, conventional, because I know there's a lot of confusion when people say functional medicine or they'll say, Well, I just go to a regular internist, you explain for for our viewers and I know this is a live stream on Facebook. I know this is also going we're taping this so we can share this on YouTube for those people who have typed in later or perhaps drop off but that is something that people still struggle with and don't understand. So I think that you know, the, the functional medicine is getting totally get gaining traction and
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Has in the last decade or so is the way of approaching healthcare.
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That conceptualizes health and illness on a continuum and looks at a patient and or patient's history, perhaps even before they were born, because it's the behaviors and environment. And our parents and their ancestors that shape are clearly genetic destiny but then, you know, putting that in, in the perspective and relationship which is ongoing with our environment, that changes all the time and has in our life lifetimes. Unfortunately, not for the better.
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But knowing that we are in a constant,
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dynamic relationship with that environment that are it's Texas City and
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changes and EMF and and a variety of factors can influence expression of those genes and or suppress them gives us the
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way to look at the components of the human biological system that are interacting with one another all the time, not to forget the psychosocial aspects, not to forget the stress that modern society imposes on us. Medicine looks at all of that, not just, you know, India's blood pressure is high today, so let's give her a pill for her blood pressure. Let's look at the reasons why that is or somebody's thyroid hormones are off and let's give them the thyroid pill. Well, maybe we should look at you know, where did they live? Did they have you know, procedures like radiation
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for acne years ago, and then their thyroid is now transforming or possibly even transport forming into a malignancy.
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Are they getting enough nutrients, selenium, zinc? And could we maybe look at the immune system that's, that's going awry and creating that sub optimum state of the endocrine functioning and then put it all together as opposed to making the diagnosis and then
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prescribing that pill for that vase? In other words, that's really how right medicine as I know it has been more disease based and how do you absolutely is not looking at what systemically what's causing it and what can we do to change it in case in fact, I think that health care is a real misnomer.
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Should be disease scare, right? Um, and actually
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20 some years ago when
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I was working with, at my as an academic physician at my alma mater, one of the best universities in the country and quite frankly, you know, if you're ill with a with a major problem, you need to have heart surgery, you need to have orthopedic surgery, you need to have neuro surgery. There is no better place than a modern medical center academic medical center equipped with the best of the best surgeons and physicians, but they become paralyzed and actually quite frightened when the word wellness pops up. Yeah, years ago when I started the Russian center for women's medicine from the wellness perspective and brought in practitioners who are not MDS, but you know, cranial sacral therapist and acupuncture is done nutrition
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He was still very scary for the powers that be because he didn't know what to do with that.
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But they were very well equipped to deal with disasters like what we are seeing on the front lines right now and patients who are occupying I see us with COVID and related complicated circumstances and there's no better place to be under care of such physicians. But fortunately, our lives are not a crisis like that at all times. And and it is great that society as a whole is beginning to look at wellness and health and and understanding it and it is all of you there. There's a bunch of you on this call. I am sure you know very well informed very well educated and, you know, presenting your physicians with what we need to be presented with concerns questions.
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information. But you know, where do we get that information? Dr. Google can be pretty over.
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Don't ever go to Web MD. That's what I always say. Because
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I think what's interesting is a point that many people don't realize is integrative medicine, functional medicine does not mean and going coming from a place of wellness doesn't mean that if you're sick if you if you need surgery, that you're going to give them oil of oregano, if you know if you have an ear infection, and we're still going to use the modern sciences when needed, but you're going to look at really what's systematically causing it, correct. Absolutely. And you're absolutely correct. But on the other hand, you will not you know, we will, the functional practitioners will not reach for the prescription pad and write up an antibiotic for every level.
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little ear ache that little Johnny has, which is 99% of the time, viral and it will not will go on to resolve on its own in a single course of antibiotics can cause wreak havoc on little Johnny's microbiome and his level of gut in future consequences of this, that dysbiosis. So, you know, we will try to look at other ways of dealing with non life threatening and non urgent circumstances, but recognize that, like I said before, there's not a better place than a major medical center with all of its technological
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resources when we're dealing with a life threatening emergent illness. So I'm from what I know what's working for you, you're really about helping to build an immune system or you're trying to build wellness. So that the
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The Times that patients come in disease or disease or for an illness, or foreign few between I mean you and I have had the conversation you're hoping that people are just coming for their once a year checkup but you work with them to build their wellness practice so that they're living vibrantly. And how do you do that? Like why does that start for you and where does it start?
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So I think that information and education is empowerment so I really work with my patients to to ascend them to resources to teach them myself, and encourage them to look for information so that they can really become self sustainably healthy in and really make me obsolete. Oh, more time is you and I talked you know, once a year well woman visit or actually I do have about five to 10% of my patients are men and brave men. They are who dawn there.
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down when they come to the Comprehensive Center for medicine, but you know, once a year so we can assess the state of your health and
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the rest of the time it really is about how we take care of three major systems in the bodies. How I like to think of the cornerstones of vibrant health, our neuro endocrine system, our immune system and our our gut. And if those are in balance, you know that they're so interconnected. You not only feel great you look vibrantly wonderful and you know you know in your
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area of expertise and and and work
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lights go off I
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notice they didn't guys I have energy efficient light
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I noticed
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gonna happen
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so in your in your work and your beautiful products that you've developed for vibrantly looking skin you know you can you can put all the natural products all the beautiful serums all the moisturizers and topicals if the body's not vibrantly healthy from the inside, they are going to have limited efficacy
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you know communication of our second largest organ, our skin with with the internal organs and the largest one our gut incredibly important in there in you know is communication with gut associated lymphoid tissue or our outwear. Two thirds of our immune system resides to having the the appropriate balance of those three, the brain, the pituitary, the gut, and the
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immune system is really, you know, all we have to do. And believe it or not, you know, I like to I'm a foodie and I like my food. I like to grow it, I like to cook it, I like to eat it.
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And the the old statement that is ascribed to and there's actually controversy in medical history and medical historians are not quite sure if he poverties coined the phrase, Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food. But, you know, when we think back to this was almost 2500 years ago, and when when you pay attention, and I tell that to my medical students, as they're finishing their educational process, and before they're about to take the Hippocratic oath, Listen to what it says Hippocrates was really a functional medicine guy. He was a lifestyle medicine guy.
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He recommended food as medicine, he recommended walks after your major meal. And we have put so much meat on those bones and the skeleton of that understanding now that clearly, you know, if you want to not be leptin resistance and not get all your calories to go on your hips, get up after dinner and go for a walk. If you have the need to neutralize free radicals, you know, drink an antioxidant drink, eat a lot of berries, you know, the darker the skin, the better. So there really is so much that can be done by right lifestyle choices from nutrition, to exercise to stress management, especially at a time like this. And let's not forget the sleep, which is so so important. I mean, that's a pandemic
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and of itself, the lack of sleep for people, not just here in the States, but worldwide people are why I really think that technology has kind of gotten in the way of that. Because we're scrolling and we can be connected at all hours. And I don't think that people as the importance of it, that's what the UN is about, because I know I wasn't getting enough sleep. And that, of course, was impacting my immune system. You know, I know if I don't get at least two days of sleep, I'm not going to feel well, like I'm going to start feeling sick. Absolutely. And, you know, again, this is you listening to your own body. So believe it or not, there are people out there who just misinterpreting or block the the loudly spoken messages that our body is giving us every day and they just block them because there's a deadline and I have to work and I have to work at my computer and I have to be exposed to all the EMF and in
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I am a super woman because I worked all day and then I came home to my second job and dealt with screaming kids and and Braley husband and I did all the housework and now I'm doing emails before I go to bed and I can I can manage all of that with four hours of sleep, aren't they great? Well, you know, after burning your candle on both ends like that, it catches up with you. And my aha moment was in my mid 40s. When I realized that no, I am definitely carving out six to eight hours of sleep every night. You know, sleep hygiene became really something that I had to work on because I was that person. And, you know, that's one of the things that I teach my patients from the very first encounter as we go and explore that longitudinal history and did you sleep as a child
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Or what was happening in your youth and and and how are you incorporating stress management and I'm paying attention to your spirit and your spiritual needs and love that so, I mean, anybody here from my team knows I'm Lulu ish. I admit it. I'm very spiritual. But I also believe that positivity
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plays a role in my health and I believe it plays a part in everybody's health, but certainly for my health. I know having that optimism that positive Spirit helps. And there are people my family go, that's not true. And we were saying there's like, absolutely, that does play a role. It's not Frou Frou it's actual science neuro psycho immunology actually is is a real science, that, you know, hardcore scientists can sink their teeth in their tests that we can markers that we can measure.
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You know, they've looked at a school performance. So starting from childhood adolescence and adulthood performance and tests on the scores of psychological functioning. And a number of biomarkers can be actually measured and it is found that laughter and good predisposition and positive thinking actually transform some of those markers into the ones that promote good health versus the ones that can create more stress or cortisol, which has a devastating effect on on one's health in many cases, and it's just one that I mentioned because most people are aware of it but there are many other markers that can be so measured, so you absolutely right. Positivity translates into good health and creative
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See that team? This is why I'm always so happy.
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And I do I know that exercise plays a part into this. Obviously, we've talked about diet and sleep.
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And I know that so many people have actually asked questions which I will get to but if you had to say before we get to questions, and by the way, I should mention, anybody has questions, there is an ask question
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box on the bottom of the screen, so you can ask the questions there and we will absolutely get to those. But um, what do you think are some of the most important practices to maintain right now during this pandemic? Like what could people start to think about now as we start to re enter the world pretty much? Well, I think that
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clearly
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is the stay at home.
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Orders are being lifted. You know, we're seeing it's high time for people to emerge and and we're social beings. It's very
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Difficulty even among the loved ones or in isolation to function
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properly.
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But it many people have actually had the opportunity to acquire a new habit which takes, you know, from two to six weeks, typically six to acquire. So I talked to a lot of my patients, in fact, we are just next week are going to softly see two patients two days a week in the office, we've done telemedicine, so thank you, good technology and modern technology for that ability. So not all technological things are bad.
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I'm grateful for that. But I've worked with some of my patients and helped them
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develop some of the new behaviors, such as you know, structuring your day around exercise, just because you're near the refrigerator doesn't
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I mean you have to open it 10 times a day and and reach for the wrong foods. So creating a
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healthy lifestyle. I'm doing the cleanse. You know it's great to to do a 10 day vegan cleanse which I recommend to people on a seasonal basis. We rearranged our closets in our homes about 17 times over in our pantries. Why not attend to this temple with cleansing it to becoming a vegan even if you're you know, Eastern European carnivore and can't live without meat for 24 hours, has proven very easy for many patients. And when they see how much better they feel, they really I think we'll be able to continue that practice as we move forward. So be kind to your gut. Because really gut is where half of our more than half of our immune system
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This system resides,
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there 90% neurotransmitters, particularly serotonin
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are produced there, there is a gut brain connection. And clearly, you know, people are feeling anxious and stressed and somewhat depressed. But it is not just the butterflies in the stomach in the gut feeling, it really is true that if we are attending to the gut, the brain is going to be functioning better. So doing the cleanse and not forgetting to do some self help through sleep, we talked about mindfulness you know and write, to journal
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in pray, if, if that's what you want to do meditate and people are like, how do I meditate? I've never meditated
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Just find a quiet spot and do some breath work. It has so many phenomenal physiologic benefits but it also clears your head and it just aligns everything and go for a walk. Here in Chicago as many of folks who are here on line with me, you all know a week and a half ago we're wearing down coats now the weather's turned. In winter to summer we jumped, go for a beautiful walk. I was walking in my own neighborhood here in the in the downtown of Chicago and hyacinths were in bloom at the cultural center. I always love to see them every spring. For the first time, I was able to smell them. So this horrible time that has sort of sequestered us and created a new paradigm of, of URI living has also shown us that the planet as a whole
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cleansed. Oh, for sure we're seeing birds all over the place. We're seeing, you know, animals back in the of the fish back in the canals. I mean, it's on jars. Nice, vibrant, it's just see the smog levels are down the ozone layer is is repairing. It's just It's incredible to see how through this pause, Mother Nature is starting to heal itself. Yes.
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I absolutely love that. I think there are a lot of silver linings that have come out of this if we take the time to look for them. But I do know that people are very nervous to go out. And they're they're nervous. They're scared rightfully so and I mean, we've talked about this, you're smart, you know, wear a mask, listen to what they're saying. But and just by strengthening your immune system isn't going to necessarily mean that you're not going to get it but you've seen even your patients who have
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You share with? Oh, absolutely. Indeed That is so true. And this is just because we're allowing ourselves or the states are reopening. And we can go out and eagerness to be in large groups is is tremendous. And we're seeing that I'm just hoping that we won't see the re emergence of cases. But unfortunately, we probably will in some places where the social distancing is not being honored. Because this is an invisible
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enemy, if you will, and you don't really know if the person next to you is spreading it. asymptomatically so we have to assume that all of us have the virus and be respectful of others by facial covering when in proximity of other people. We have to really only slowly
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I get into social situations, keeping that in small groups with distancing. And over time, hopefully, you know, things will things will change. The questions I get a lot are about testing and antibodies and what does that mean? Very confusing and and not an exact science because there isn't a test that is specific enough and sensitive enough to assure us that we have had the illness. And even if it were, we wouldn't quite know how long that protection of antibiotic protection would last. So I think hand washing and respecting all of the things that we've talked about is very important, but it is also important to get out and to be in the nature to you know, go take a hike in the woods. I'm I can't wait for the Chicago
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lakefront to reopen because the
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is healing and it is our biking trails and hiking trails
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and getting close to nature getting barefoot in nature doing some earthing and grounding and getting the positive energy from the Mother Earth which is continuing to renew herself and just look around and see how beautiful it is. So I think enjoying that will help us all and you know, keep those three systems in in appropriate alignment at nourish our, our neuro endocrine cognitive system help our, our gut with its vast beautiful microbiome through appropriate clean green and rainbow colored diet.
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Go man male valence our immune system which then allows us to
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Deal with anything including our nasty virus like this, as as had been evidenced by dozens of my patients and doctors were my partner's patients who we were able to keep out of the hospital. And I believe there were only two that spent a short period of time, hospitalized, but they're all recovering. And depending on their own body's innate wisdom, to heal and repair itself, when we give it what it needs. I really strengthen your immune system, coming from a place of wellness. It's allowing our body to
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to get ready. So that if something like this does come into contact with us, we're able to fight it off a little bit better than other people who aren't taking care of themselves, is what you're basically saying. in your favor. Absolutely.
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Really, again, you know, this is that choice and that science of epigenetics and or
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a robust and strong immune system and robust and strong gastrointestinal system allowing us to take on whatever we need to take on. Okay, so we have nine questions people already asked. So if your permission, I would love to ask some of these so that people can get some of their answers. I know they're, they're so excited. Some were written into us on social media, so I'll address those. So one of them was, let's see, where am I going? Okay, um, regarding epigenetics, what can we do to help turn on and off certain genes that might that may lead to disease? I've definitely heard of nutrition choices, as well as getting exercise and being out in natural vitamin D.
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So sure that that those observations are absolutely accurate and great and vitamin D is, you know, actually a lot more than a vitamin it It acts as a hormone.
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We need a lot of it. And in the academic environment infections that actually high dose vitamin D help are clearly antiviral, but there are many other things. So, so
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stemming
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in the core of epigenetic transformation is really looking at our metabolism, our gut microbiome, feeding on you know, eating foods that are naturally rich in probiotics and prebiotics, fermented foods. Our gut is the largest organ in the body. And there was actually no
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some
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confusion about the size of the gut if we were displayed out and small intestine and large intestine and we now think it's a little smaller than what was originally that, which was the size of a tennis court, we now know it's probably a little smaller, like a small studio apartment still very large. So its absorptive surface needs to be healthy to absorb nutrients, it has to have ability to actually produce things like vitamins, certain B vitamins, vitamin K, that facilitates absorption of vitamin D among other things. And in so doing, we have to populate it with good bacteria that come from dietary sources that I've mentioned kimchi kombucha, you know, fermented if you dairy, fermented dairy and and frankly, my recommendation about dairy is
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I only eat fermented dairy, because milk and is typically pro inflammatory. So keeping inflammation down. Also epigenetically helps, you know favors expression of the better genes and good genes. Because inflammation
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leads to something called glycation. Think of it as like searing the meat or caramelizing things on that may be good in a gourmet meal but very rarely, it's not good when you think about yourself being carmelized and age, though something called Advanced glycation end products or age is is to be avoided and we avoided by ingesting anti inflammatory foods the rainbow of color and thus supporting that
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process of turning down the genes that would just be exploding if we if we provided them inflammatory stimuli, but by you know drinking things like anti inflammatory and antioxidant beverages that derived from dark skin berries, green tea and green tea extract, Pycnogenol endure at the time of covid substances that contain quercetin or rainbow of vegetables again and including onions etc. are containing
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a products that act as I own a force and allow other substances into the cell where they can in the case of viral replication stuff in the replication So, again, you know, you
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The foodies answering the question
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in lifestyle has a tremendous impact on that epigenetic expression. and rightfully so. So even even one cleanse can have a tremendous benefit that lasts for several months. But one plus is not enough. You know, when people come to me and say well, I want to do a cleanse a year, I don't think so because you know, the air we breathe the water which we shower with, unless you filter out the daylights out of it is is providing a toxic assault on our bodies. And every so often in my recommendation is do it seasonally, just like we clean our house, big spring cleaning and you know, then rotate the winter, where we all look at it. Yeah, make sure you're awesome here expired this year.
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And do it do it seasonally, so detoxes support you know with food and and your genome may not be as expressed even if your deck of cards genetic cards is not as good as you'd like it to be. Okay, so then there's a lot of auto immune, but this one I thought that was really interesting.
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I find that sometimes it is hard to get straightforward answers from my doctor. What is Doctor Skul's advice for getting more detailed and in depth answers from our doctors? I really I love that question. Because I had that issue when I was sick. I had so many doctors said this is this is your life sentence you have a few months. I'm sorry. There's nothing you can do for you. And I'd say why can you you know, and I trusted my gut but I had to find on until I found a doctor who would talk to me and and take a chance. But I find so often that doctors give you just that. They want to get you out. They
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15 minutes that they have you for and they get you out. So what how do you create this relationship? You just added me I think the key was they hit the 15 minutes and actually I think a national average is 12 minutes in a health care system that's broken, and has the potential to be the best health care system in the world because of what we talked about. We have the the brainpower, we have the technology, we have the facilities, but we have something fundamentally broken in our healthcare system which pushes you through an office of the conventional doctor every you know, four patients an hour or more. It is difficult to even say hello in 12 minutes long to hear and register what a patient has to say. So you know, in with all respect to colleagues who are would like to and and have the ability to
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But don't have the time. You know, that may be a problem that's inherent to our system. Now.
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Because of the system being so broken, there is the economy and more and more practitioners are leaving the conventional way of practicing, becoming, you know, concierge actors or membership doctors where time can be rewarded, but then a patient can also be heard.
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If the patient does not have the ability to see such a physician, I think coming prepared with as much information is in Chris in concise way. And, you know, trying to reach out to the physician prior to the appointment if they will accept their email or communication. May, you know, bring some clarity to the encounter rate idea, like, advance it's hard. It's really
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It's a it's a tough situation. I mean, that's why I changed doctors I was tired of how are you possibly going to know what's wrong with me and 15 to 20 minutes, 12 minutes, you know, you know, and indeed that is kind of why years ago, we stopped seeing a managed care patience, because that was the paradigm. And three years ago, we went out on network because my personal approach to patient care is, time is never wasted. The more time I spend with you, the more pieces of that puzzle I can put together, but I can also not just listen, but I hear you and we we can establish that relationship which is so necessary for the appropriate recommendation and the best outcome. So it's, it's not an easy question to do answer. It's not an easy situation to
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To deal with because, you know, most patients are sort of tied to the conventional system that we have but it is it's on its way of changing. And I think you're right coming prepared and and pushing to get the answer you need and advocating for yourself. And that was the
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especially in very serious medical circumstances, I always I actually ask patients to bring someone with them because there is a second set of ears and eyes and you know, so that we can have validation or if there's stress and anxiety and forget to ask the question your significant other your partner, your friend can remind you of that too. So coming as supported by people you trust and love.
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Those who know me when I was going through my before surgery, my best friend came with me to every appointment and
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Was it made? It was just incredible. It was such an important experience. Okay, so I have another question that's got to vote. So a lot of people want to know about this one. A lot of new research has suggested some issues around birth control, and having potentially long term effects to the body. What questions should I be asking my doctor if I'm considering birth control or need to change the type of birth control I'm taking? So um, you know, I am traditionally trained as an internal medicine deck, but I've also done a lot of work in women's gynecology.
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Because I was frustrated is as a medical student didn't know if I wanted to be a gynecologist or an internist. So I ended up being a women's specialist and combining the two.
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It has always bothered me, the notion that you know, in order to achieve one goal and achieve very successfully, namely, successful contraception had to endure
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Fear
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at the very core with a very important aspect of our health, those three things we talked about neuro and decorin and decrease in urine and,
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and digestive. And there was something that I felt and didn't yet have the evidence for. That suggested to me that if you mess with your hormones for a long time, there's something likely to happen in it is the outcome of that so many young women who are on birth control from the moment they virtually start menstruating and a lot of times for reasons other than contraceptive, oh, you have three pimples and let's give you birth control for acne.
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Or, you know, you have very bad PMS and let's give you a birth control for that, too. So there's definitely interference with what mothers
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Nature has designed for our endocrine system to express in function and you know it is not unlikely to expect, then maybe return to fertility is going to be delayed. Combine that with toxic environment and autoimmunity. We're seeing so many seemingly young healthy women in their 30s just having challenges conceiving. So my recommendation to someone who is seeking reliable form of birth control is really these days to go with a non hormonal IUD rather than hormonally base therapies because you never know whether you're going to be one of those people who for some reason, as hidden reasons for infertility introduced decides to start a family you might not be able to the only circumstance where a short term use
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hormonal contraception is deemed helpful. And I have used it in some women myself in women who may have very strong genetic predisposition to ovarian cancer as part of certain syndromes.
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Were even in their mid to late 40s, keeping them on one year on hormonal contraception not so much for contraceptive purposes, but to sort of create a senescence state of their ovaries and has been shown in medical literature to be very helpful. But I would, you know, I recommend to all of my young patients to think through those choices and return to old fashioned non hormonal IUD might be the way to go. Amazing. Okay, so now we're getting into a lot of autoimmune. So here's one I've been told that people this is from Valerie, I've been told that people with autoimmune disorders
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are prone to other autoimmune disorders. My mom has multiple and I have one as of now, what can I do that myself from developing other issues in the future? Great question, Valerie.
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question and I I mean, Valerie has really paraphrase what I often tell patients were one autoimmune diseases, disease lives, there's going to be another. So what do we do to basically strengthen our innate immune system is a question. And you know, again, we're returning back to the gut. The best way to support your immune system is to take an appraisal of your digestive habits, change your diet, make sure that you're supporting the health of your, your gut and dealing with dysbiosis, which is so prevalent
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leaky gut, as you've probably heard many of you, it is very prevalent and does not imply diarrhea it actually is
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refers to a condition where the beautiful Flora of the GI system is upset and disturbed in there are
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breaches in integrity of the tight junctions of the cells they keep the gut together and macro partially digested nutrients leaked into the circulation and the body then recognize them as foreign antibodies to those foreign proteins form and antibodies form very often to tissues that are in our innate tissues. So if we correct the leaky gut, if we improve
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the integrity of the intestinal lining, we are already on the way to recovery of
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the process, which then ignites the immune system that lives in the gut associated lymphoid tissues and supports his inflammatory process. So, um, you know, again, God is at the crux of so many things. So, healthy diet, healthy elimination will translate into improvement in the immune function as well. And then there's some definitely some immuno modulating
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nutritional supplements that we could support the person with and you know, those are more more case to case specific. live broadcasts are never dull, and this one was no exception. While we're on my connection with Dr. Skul went dark and so I
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call back to Skul and continue via cell phone while she was on video. Of course, she picked up without a beat. So let's continue.
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I have RA,
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and I'm on
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a roll. Can I get off on that? As?
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Well, you know, I think that the desire of all patients who are on series immunomodulating drugs is probably to take fewer of them or not at all. I think it's a very individual question and immuno modulating drugs do play a role. I would never recommend
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blanketly to a person to stop their medication. But I think through nutritional assessment, introduction of mantle in a modulators dietary supplementation, we can transition
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patients and often keep them off medication for a long period of time indefinitely and
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while keeping the inflammatory process at bay.
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Okay, there's another
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for Parkinson's and gut health is all milk.
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regular milk is pro inflammatory. So I think that not milks in general are a better alternative. And as I mentioned before, the only dairy that I recommend patients a consume is fermented dairy, such as ether or Greek yogurt. But
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there is a very important point that has been made with this question and that is, there's definitely an association between gut health and microbiome and neurodegenerative diseases.
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That Association transcends the gut brain connection in that it is now recognized, recognized in allopathic traditional medical literature and neurology literature that there is a clear
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correlate correlation between exposure to environmental toxins and neurodegenerative diseases. So again, cleaning the environment
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and that means you know for things from household cleaners, two personal products that we use and that's where you know in these products come into place because again skin is our largest, our second largest Oregon and what you put on your skin is important what you clean your kitchen and bathroom with and your wooden floors which is important is to environment of Windsor.
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Environmental toxicity, regular cleanses and then specific support of the neuro endocrine system with antioxidants with
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dietary choices and nutritional supplements that help neutralize the reactive oxygen species and reduce the oxidative stress can definitely bring about great improvement in patients with neurodegenerative diseases and movement diseases such as Parkinson's disease.
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For me,
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okay, so it goes out. It's a little after eight. So I know there's a couple of questions about
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what
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to do and cetera and I would suggest that they reach out to you and perhaps you could share
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how
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people are on this can reach out to you and learn more about what you do.
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Maybe they can connect with you for help. I'm sure I would be more than happy to take those questions individually. We have, as I mentioned, been doing telemedicine now for two and a half months and I certainly would welcome new telemedicine patients or even, you know, a
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brief consultation
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without a formal appointment if people so desired. Our website is www CCW m.com Comprehensive Center for women's medicine. And um, you know, I would certainly be happy to individually discuss the approach to cleansing and nutritional supplementation with people who are still interested because it is a it is a complex income
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complicated subject and an industry that is highly unregulated. And even the best informed individuals who researched the benefits of certain ingredients are not nutritional scientists. So, you know, it took me years to to master some of that and find
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supplements that are actually robust, comprehensive, and deliver and are not costing an arm and a leg or not causing you to have to take a suitcase full of them. So we'd be more than happy to address those questions individually.
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Amazing. And I see that my team already put a little thing on the bottom that says contact the Skul directly. Okay, thank you. I
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have no idea why this happened with my audio and visual, but you know me I roll with things and I figured out a way to do it.
1:01:00
did write.
1:01:02
I was like, okay, there's another way to do this. But I do want to say thank you to everybody who joined us today. I hope you found this as informative and empowering as I did.
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And I really want to thank you that for giving up your time, and really coming out here and helping others to learn how they can really embrace by when living. Well, indeed, The pleasure is all mine and I am delighted that you've invited me and would certainly welcome future opportunities, because I think the need is out there for people to express their concerns and for us to provide them with science based answers. To learn more about Dr. Vesna Skul, visit the Comprehensive Center for women's medicine at cc wm.com. Thanks again for listening to this episode of coming clean with indie Li and be sure to
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the subscribe button if you'd like to listen to more and of course, we'd love to hear your thoughts so leave a review. If you have ideas or comments for upcoming episodes please be sure to email me at coming clean at indie lead calm
Transcribed by https://otter.ai