Episode 24: Six Hours With One Patient — Dr. Datis Kharrazian on Fear as a Motivator, the Case-Review Filter, and Why Clinical Skill Is the Whole Business

Erik and Davin have had physicians, recruiters and founders on this show. This week they have the first chiropractor — who also holds a PhD, a Harvard postdoc, and a master's from Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Datis Kharrazian is a clinical research scientist, Associate Clinical Professor of Preventive Medicine at Loma Linda University School of Medicine, and the founder of the Kharrazian Institute. His books Why Do I Still Have Thyroid Symptoms? and Why Isn't My Brain Working? reframed how a generation of clinicians approaches thyroid and brain care.

Ask him what drove all of it and he doesn't say curiosity. His family left Iran in 1979. His mother was severely ill for most of his childhood — psychiatric admissions, electroconvulsive therapy, drug after drug, no response — until a chiropractor working with nutrition made a difference nobody else had. Decades later he would learn she had neurological autoimmunity: antibodies to her own serotonin and dopamine. "I don't think I was just curious," he says. "I think I was just a scared kid that never stopped being scared, and was just trying to figure out how to help someone who wasn't getting help."

The business conversation is unusually concrete. He ran a small practice three days a week, scheduled six hours for a new patient, and priced a filter at the front door.

In this episode

• Leaving Iran in 1979, and a childhood spent watching the healthcare system fail his mother
• Finding Jeffrey Bland's literature reviews as a student — checking out five years of them and flow-charting every one to learn how he was thinking
• Taking over Harry Eidenier's blood chemistry seminar series in his mid-twenties: "You're a kid, what are you doing here?"
• Brain dissection at Bastyr — twelve brains, three weeks, pulling pathways apart "like string cheese"
• The PhD in Aristo Vojdani's lab: how chemicals can change the configuration of albumin, create a new antigen, and cross-link to neurological autoantibodies
• Harvard as a research fellow, then a master's in clinical investigation — going back to school because he felt intimidated when someone cited a study he couldn't evaluate
• The practice model, in numbers: a $1,500 case review (raised from $500, because $500 didn't filter), a $5,000 exam and workup including four hours in the chart, and $500/hour follow-ups — three clinic days a week
• Why 10–15% of case reviews get sent somewhere else first: chronic patients who gave up on medicine and still have undiagnosed disease
• The expectations conversation — "the minute I'd hear cure or reverse, I'd have to have that discussion" — and the Parkinson's patient who was furious about it
• Home runs are 10–15% of a practice. Erik's breakdown of the rest, and why nobody tells new practitioners this before they burn out
• Time as a clinical skill: reading how long a patient actually needs, and refusing to charge when he ran late
• Practitioner bias — "whatever helped them is what they think everyone has"
• Filming his own patients for two years, including the partial responders and the failures: "It wasn't theoretical anymore"
• Why the seminar junkies never grow, and what he tells master-class teachers to do instead
• Cash practice reality: "if you're not top dog, you're irrelevant"
• An introvert who taught almost every weekend for fifteen years — and hid at lunch
• Where he thinks it all goes: individualized medicine, or no career

About Dr. Datis Kharrazian

Datis Kharrazian, PhD, DHSc, DC, MS, MMSc, FACN is a Harvard Medical School–trained clinical research scientist and Associate Clinical Professor of Preventive Medicine at Loma Linda University School of Medicine, where his research centers on autoimmune molecular mimicry and environmentally induced immune reactivity. He is a Fellow of the American College of Nutrition and of the Royal Society of Medicine, and a two-time Researcher of the Year of the International Association of Functional Neurology. Through the Kharrazian Institute he has trained more than 5,000 clinicians across some thirty countries.

Links

• The Kharrazian Institute
• Dr. K News
• Why Do I Still Have Thyroid Symptoms?
• Solving the Puzzle with Dr. Datis Kharrazian — his own podcast

Creators and Guests

Host

Dr. Davin Lundquist

Dr. Davin Lundquist is a board-certified family physician, innovator, and healthcare leader with over 25 years of experience integrating medicine, technology, and holistic wellness. A graduate of the Keck School of Medicine of USC, he has held senior leadership roles at CommonSpirit Health, Dignity Health, and Augmedix, where he advanced the use of technology to enhance patient care. Driven by a passion to move beyond symptom management, Dr. Lundquist founded the Quantum Advantage Method™, a science-based, holistic framework designed to help individuals restore vitality and reverse dysfunction. His approach blends functional medicine, advanced diagnostics, and principles of quantum science to empower patients to achieve optimal health and lasting transformation.

Host

Dr. Erik Lundquist

Dr. Erik Lundquist, MD, ABFM, ABoIM, IFMCP Dr. Erik Lundquist is the founder and medical director of the Temecula Center for Integrative Medicine, where he blends conventional, holistic, and functional approaches to help patients achieve lasting wellness. Board-certified in Family and Integrative Medicine, he specializes in endocrine disorders, chronic fatigue, migraine management, cardiometabolic health, and chronic pain. A graduate of St. Louis University School of Medicine, Dr. Lundquist completed his Family Medicine residency at Naval Hospital Camp Pendleton, where he served as chief resident. He spent eight years on active duty with the U.S. Navy, including service as a battalion surgeon in Iraq and at the Naval Hospital in Naples, Italy. Certified by the Institute for Functional Medicine, Dr. Lundquist is passionate about empowering patients to take charge of their health and teaching fellow clinicians integrative approaches to chronic disease. Outside of medicine, he enjoys the outdoors, singing, dancing, acting, and spending time with his wife and three children.

Guest

Dr. Datis Kharrazian

Datis Kharrazian, PhD, DHSc, DC, MS, MMSc, FACN, is a Harvard Medical School–trained clinical research scientist, academic professor, and one of the most widely taught clinicians in functional medicine. He earned a PhD in Health Science with concentrations in immunology and toxicology and a Doctor of Health Science from Nova Southeastern University, completed post-doctoral research training as a research fellow at Harvard Medical School, and earned a Master of Medical Science in Clinical Investigation there while researching in the Department of Neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital. He also holds a Master of Science in Human Nutrition from the University of Bridgeport and a Doctor of Chiropractic from Southern California University of Health Sciences. He serves as Associate Clinical Professor of Preventive Medicine at Loma Linda University School of Medicine, where his research centers on autoimmune molecular mimicry and environmentally induced immune reactivity, with 24 peer-reviewed publications spanning thyroid autoimmunity, gluten ataxia, neuroinflammation, and viral cross-reactivity. His book Why Do I Still Have Thyroid Symptoms? When My Lab Tests Are Normal reframed thyroid care around autoimmunity and became an international bestseller; Why Isn't My Brain Working? did the same for functional neurology. Through the Kharrazian Institute he has trained thousands of clinicians worldwide. He is a two-time Researcher of the Year of the International Association of Functional Neurology and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine.

What is The Root Cause - Business of Medicine Podcast?

The U.S. healthcare system is at a breaking point—soaring costs, worsening outcomes, and widespread physician burnout. The Root Cause – Business of Medicine podcast, hosted by brothers Dr. Erik Lundquist and Dr. Davin Lundquist, charts a different path: one where healing, fulfillment, and business thrive together.

Each episode shares powerful stories of medical professionals who stepped away from the traditional grind to embrace integrative, functional, and alternative approaches to care. Through candid conversations with practitioners who have redefined success, listeners gain insight into navigating their own transitions, reclaiming a sense of purpose, and reshaping the way they practice medicine.

Erik: Welcome to another fantastic episode of the Root Cause Business of Medicine podcast, where today's guest, Datis Kharrazian.

Erik: uh is gonna just blow you away.

Erik: His academic prowess, his his background, his educational prowess

Erik: uh is unmarveled and unmap and unmatched um uh except for maybe by Dr. Bland himself.

Erik: But Davin, what were some of the takeaways that you got from our visit with Datis today?

Erik: I just loved his process.

Davin: I think um it it felt a little bit like a throwback to what you almost imagine a a doctor would would be like, which is

Davin: um just carefully gathering as much information as possible from from the patient.

Davin: You know, the history of the super detailed physical exam, which he takes a lot of pride in.

Davin: and I think is is a rare thing these days.

Davin: And then just um the way that he would sort of assimilate all of that information and and kind of throw it up against his understanding, which is incredibly deep, of

Davin: you know, physiology and biochemistry and getting to the true root cause uh was just uh fascinating to me.

Erik: Yeah, I mean here's here here's somebody who has you know gone to uh get multiple degrees.

Erik: Uh he has a master's in nutrition besides being a chiropractor.

Erik: Uh he has a PhD

Erik: uh in in health sciences.

Erik: He went on to do clinical research uh uh program at Harvard and yet

Erik: Ultimately where he got his education was in the quiet moments when he was researching out what to do for a patient or trying to understand

Erik: the physiology or the background, um looking out different different approaches, uh different um even

Erik: aspects of the way the body functions and then dialing that into the physical exam and seeing how they correlated and ultimately applying that in a patient setting

Erik: where he could then prove whether or not the information he was gathering from science actually was having an impact on his patients.

Erik: I I I just loved his candor in this.

Erik: I thought he he was very

Erik: forthright in sharing some of the things that he struggled with and some the fact that he didn't have fantastic success with all of his patients.

Erik: Uh he had some that he

Erik: totally hit out of the park.

Erik: Um but for the most part was was very forthright in saying, look, the most important thing

Erik: is to make sure that you are giving your best effort for your patient, putting everything you can into helping them get better.

Erik: And then his business model was super interesting, very different than a lot of the the business models that we have had on here.

Erik: And I think you'll really find that beneficial as well as you you hear what he has to say about how he set that out.

Erik: Uh it was just a joy.

Erik: It was so much fun to have him on here.

Erik: And I think you're really gonna uh enjoy this podcast.

Erik: So thanks for listening.

Erik: Welcome to the Root Cause Business of Medicine podcast, where we explore what's broken in healthcare and what we can do about it.

Erik: I'm Dr.

Erik: Erik Lundquist and I've been practicing functional medicine for the past 15 to 20 years.

Erik: I'm excited to co-host this podcast with my brother, Dr.

Erik: Davin Lundquist,

Davin: who's just beginning his journey into functional medicine.

Davin: We come from different points on the path, but we do share a common goal.

Davin: We want to rethink how medicine is practiced and help others do the same.

Erik: The US healthcare system is in crisis, rising costs, declining outcomes, and physician burnout at an all-time high.

Erik: But you know, we found a different way.

Erik: Another way.

Erik: A better way.

Davin: On this podcast, we dive into real stories from medical professionals who've stepped away from the traditional model.

Davin: Kinda like me.

Davin: And have found a new purpose in integrative, functional, and alternative approaches to care.

Erik: These are authentic conversations with practitioners and friends who've redefined success, not just for themselves.

Erik: but for their patients and communities.

Davin: Whether you're a clinician feeling stuck, a student seeking direction, or just curious about what is possible,

Erik: You're in the right place.

Erik: This is the Root Cause Business of Medicine podcast.

Erik: Welcome again to another episode of the Root Cause Business of Medicine podcast, where today we have a wonderful guest.

Erik: Uh Datis uh Krasian.

Erik: Uh he and I met um, I don't know, maybe uh over a decade or two ago uh speaking at a conference together and

Erik: Um we we we have all things thyroid in common that we we just were both super passionate about um helping with thyroid disease and thyroid health and but dece has also been

Erik: an innovator in not just um integrative medicine approaches, but also in uh educational

Erik: uh platforms as well as business ventures and he would be a great guest to have on today

Erik: Um and so Datis, welcome to our podcast and thank you for being on today.

Datis: Of course, thank you.

Erik: Datis, I I thought it would be really interesting to um listen to your story, have people listen to your story and have you tell us your story of

Erik: And first of all, you're you're the first chiropractor we've had on the podcast.

Erik: So uh we're happy to have you here.

Erik: But why why don't you back up and tell us, you know, what what kind of got you into

Erik: uh chiropractic medicine and then and how you evolved through that process of becoming a chiropractor, but then also getting into functional medicine and

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: Integrative medicine, then doing research at Harvard, and and then setting up your education platform.

Erik: There's so much that you've accomplished

Erik: I think it'd be super interesting for our viewers and listeners to hear your story and kind of learn from your successes and some of your mistakes and learning points along the way.

Datis: Sure.

Datis: So basically in nineteen seventy-nine, uh my family left Iran.

Datis: There was a revolution there.

Datis: We came to the US.

Datis: And uh my mom was extremely ill.

Datis: She had like mental illnesses and she had several suicide attempts and she was uh not doing well and she went through the gamut of going to the healthcare system and not getting much help.

Datis: And I could see I mean she got to the point she was doing electrical shock therapy, she tried different pharmaceuticals, and I could just see her as I was getting older and older, not responding to anything.

Datis: So when I was in high school, this is from age four to about age seventeen, eighteen, I just I went with Doctor Coins with the I got to see

Datis: caring doctors, I got to see terrible doctors, I got to see how they treated my mom as a kid as growing up and how things were and I could see her lose hope to the point where

Datis: Like she just didn't think anyone could help her.

Datis: And then she met a chiropractor with nutrition and it made a profound impact on her health and her function.

Datis: And that was like, Wow, what was that?

Datis: And that's kind of what got me sparked.

Datis: And at that time I grew up um just doing martial arts.

Datis: I was doing what we call Hawaiian and Filipino martial arts.

Datis: So I was very interested in the body and how the body worked and

Datis: Uh so I decided, you know, maybe I should go and do this.

Datis: You know, eighteen you were really influential, so that had the biggest influence on me.

Datis: So I went to chiropractic school, very excited to learn about the human body.

Datis: Um

Datis: And then while I was there I got to meet a person who told me about Jeffrey Bland.

Datis: And this is before IFM actually even started.

Datis: And it was under HealthComm and Jeff Bland used to do this manually every year of just a review of the literature.

Datis: And I remember library had each one, I think they were like five five years ahead before I got there, they had each one of them in the library.

Datis: So I checked them all out.

Datis: They basically started reading it and I had to look up a lot of the medical terminology 'cause I was still a student.

Datis: It was a struggle.

Datis: But I'm like, I'm committed to this

Datis: So I started r rewriting and flow charting and diagramming everything and like up all the words to understand.

Datis: And I'm like, it just resonated with me right away.

Datis: So I would just study Jeff Bland and and one of the important things for me was how is he thinking

Datis: I wanted to understand how was thinking as as uh the thought process.

Datis: I didn't really understand it was just functional medicine.

Datis: I didn't know the difference.

Datis: I just knew this guy did nutrition at a really high level.

Datis: He's a nutritional biochemist.

Datis: This is probably the person I should learn from.

Datis: I was so tired of the different theories of nutrition and people have different diets and different things and like I don't want any of that.

Datis: I just want to know what's factual and I really attracted the concept of measuring labs

Datis: and looking at labs and uh we used to have a guy that used to teach blood chemistry seminars, a guy named Harry Eidenier

Datis: And I used to go to all his conferences all the time as a student and then he retired and when he retired he goes, Do you want to take over my seminar series?

Datis: 'Cause that bothered him so much.

Datis: And and and then one that's one young that one didn't mind traveling and I'm like, yeah, I'll I'll take over your series.

Datis: So I started teaching people chemistry all over and uh

Datis: So I was immediately got into that seminar circuit.

Datis: And then in the seminar circuit I was in my mid twenties and everyone was like, You're a kid, what are you doing here?

Datis: I was like, I don't know.

Datis: I'm just gonna teach you what I know.

Datis: So so I was teaching blood chemistry and then at that point salivary hormones started to become

Datis: in you know, introduced.

Datis: So I started doing salivary hormone testing and uh that got me into more and more functional medicine stuff and uh

Datis: Then the IFM became a thing, Institute for Functional Medicine got established and developed and I went to a couple meetings there and uh

Datis: I kind of s she started joined that community a little bit, but I was really just on my own, kind of just reading stuff and uh just trying to

Datis: learn as much as I could uh about the time, but really the importance of the thought process of dissecting a case, hearing a case, looking at the mechanism, then dissecting the mechanism, then doing a literature review for the mechanism, and then looking at applications for how to make the intervention.

Datis: was like the most important thing for me.

Datis: The thought process has always been the most important thing for me.

Datis: I didn't want to memorize protocols.

Datis: I just wanted to understand how people think.

Datis: And uh you used to meet clinicians, I always ask

Datis: Well how you how are you in trip how are you doing your workup?

Datis: What are you doing?

Datis: I think along the way I got relationship and functional neurology

Datis: This is a special thing in chiropractic.

Datis: It's like a three-year program once you be once you get your DC degree.

Datis: So I did that program and uh just made sure I own my neuroanatomy, even top immune brain dissection the best year for

Datis: four years with so I can have access to the human brains.

Datis: And that was the deal.

Datis: They're like, yeah, what happens to the brains after the class?

Datis: They're like, you can have them for three weeks.

Datis: I'm like, perfect.

Datis: And then I'll teach it.

Datis: So

Datis: And uh you know 'cause with brains, once you do a cut, you you sacrifice a piece you can't see anymore.

Datis: So we would have about twelve brains who had small classes at Bastyr University in San Diego and it would just be able to cut 'em and then

Datis: Pull pull the pathway.

Datis: You can actually pull some of the pathways if you like string cheese, you know.

Datis: If you it's so cool.

Datis: So I pictured everything and I I made sure I had that down and then uh

Datis: You know, the most important thing about functionality is like you do an exam on someone looking for soft signs, like maybe they have hyperreflexia, maybe they have a positive Babinski, maybe they have saccadic hypometria, maybe they don't gaze properly to one side.

Datis: And those soft signs really do matter what you're looking at

Datis: doing triangulated and figuring out what part of the brain may not be functioning well.

Datis: So you can find like early head injuries or areas of the brain that's starting to generate early.

Datis: And then you can disactivate those areas with maybe

Datis: spinning in one direction to activate the vestibular system or having count backwards to activate the areas of the peripheral cortex or you know various things you can do and see if you can see exam findings change and that like blew me away.

Datis: Like in real time you could see exam findings change.

Datis: If you activated a neuron, increased the frequency of fire pathways, and then see an outcome on the exam.

Datis: So I'm like, this is amazing and then that blended with functional medicine became remote.

Datis: So

Datis: And eventually I ended up writing a book on the thyroid and a book on the brain and uh was then working with a nutriosurgical company called Apex Energetics.

Datis: Uh they were a homeopathic company and they were they came up to me uh and said, Hey, we want to develop a nutritional line and uh

Datis: Um we don't know where to start.

Datis: Do you want to help us formulate stuff for them and teach them seminars?

Datis: I said yes.

Datis: So then I got to f formulate products.

Datis: had access to whatever I wanted to be put in a formula, we would be able to test those.

Datis: And then we started teaching seminars all over the I started teaching seminars all over the country.

Datis: And then I built a team of about twenty f twenty I think at the most we had about twenty five speakers.

Datis: And they were teaching my material all over the country.

Datis: And we did that for about fifteen years and built the company up.

Datis: And then I started my own institute called the Kharrazian Institute.

Datis: And along the way I realized I need to learn research.

Datis: and I need to understand research.

Datis: And I remember just feeling intimidated when people I was teaching a lecture and someone brought up a research study.

Datis: I didn't really understand it.

Datis: I didn't understand different stats or data analysis and methods.

Datis: And then I'm like, I'm never gonna feel intimidated by this.

Datis: So I went to go for research.

Datis: At that time, uh uh I went to Nova Southeastern University to have a Patel College of Medicine where they had a PhD program to help people that were practicing.

Datis: So I did that.

Datis: I got to do part of my research in Aristo Vojdani's lab.

Datis: So we got to do some immunology testing.

Datis: And my f my PhD was on recognizing that proteins can change the configuration of albumin.

Datis: that makes it a new antigen and then we crosslink that to neurological autoantibodies and really show like a new model of how uh autoimmunity can develop from chemicals that are not related to chemical load

Datis: Then that got me into uh meeting some people and I did got to do my postgraduate at uh Harvard Medical School as a research fellow

Datis: And then I was able to while I was there to do a Master of Medical Science and Clinical Investigation, which is which is a the Master of Medical Science I World Medical School.

Datis: is a postdoc program.

Datis: Like you have to be a PhD to then attend it.

Datis: It's all high level statistics.

Datis: You know, so then I got to learn really like complex statistical analysis, longitudinal analysis, multivariate analysis.

Datis: study designs, all the various clinical trials.

Datis: I was able to, you know, then we published lunch papers that way.

Datis: So I had a second career as

Datis: a researcher, which then helped me like formulate uh information and uh and then kind of look at it from a functional medicine lens.

Datis: And uh

Datis: My my application's always been dietrition lifestyle, so I never really you know, I never went down the physician route of prescribing.

Datis: So you know, s that's that was my focus.

Datis: But of course there's times when people need that and so I would have my teens and friends and

Datis: and connect when I needed to, but I always try to look at it from a functional perspective and try not, you know, upregulate their system through the non-pharmaceutical interventions.

Datis: And that's the patient population that I that I attracted.

Datis: And uh that's what helped me kind of build my clinical skills using that model.

Erik: Wow.

Erik: Nothing.

Erik: You did you did hardly anything.

Erik: The T still still has like, you know

Erik: Something really important that he did.

Erik: That's amazing.

Erik: Thank you.

Davin: Is that it seemed like every sort of next venture or next um opportunity was almost sprung from a curiosity that you had about, you know, there was some aspect

Davin: of the science or the medicine that, you know, you didn't fully understand and that that curiosity, I think for most of us we might, you know.

Davin: do a little search on it and you went and did like a whole degree uh on on each of these things.

Davin: But um but I think it was founded in that curiosity.

Davin: I'm curious

Davin: I'm curious if that's something that uh Well I'll tell you what happened to me.

Datis: I was in I was in did you get in if you know Mike Stone, he's you know one of the top functional medicine guys on his seminar.

Datis: I was in Mike's with Mike Stone in Dublin teaching a seminar at or at a conference together.

Datis: And we just we all we're great friends.

Datis: We love to sit together and just talk.

Datis: And we actually talk about the physical exam.

Datis: We just have these long hour discussions about the physical examination.

Datis: It's a passion of both of ours.

Datis: And uh

Datis: We started talking and we realized that what motivated us was actually our family member that was sick.

Datis: So I've been learning how to treat my mom my whole career.

Datis: Person who I later found out had neurological autoimmunity.

Datis: She had uh serotonin antibodies and dopamine antibodies that R.

Datis: A.

Datis: Vojdani found doing this immunology specialized testing.

Datis: And I remember asking Aristo, what is this?

Datis: Because this isn't a disease.

Datis: This is autoimmunity.

Datis: It's not a name.

Datis: It's just autoimmunity against your neurochemicals.

Datis: I'm like, oh my goodness, that could happen?

Datis: He's like, yeah.

Datis: I was like, okay.

Datis: So I think my whole life I've been chasing learning how to treat a person that has neurological immunity.

Datis: 'Cause the anything that excited me that I was just passionate about was that.

Datis: So I I don't think I d was just curious.

Datis: I think I was just a scared kid that never stopped being scared and was just trying to figure out how to help someone who wasn't getting help.

Datis: Now that patient that was my mom had walked as walked into my office hundreds of times, and they've been able to really make a profound impact on their health

Datis: with things I've learned through functionality, functional medicine.

Datis: So I think it was not really curiosity.

Datis: I think it was just out of fear.

Datis: That was like a deep deep inside.

Erik: Fair enough.

Erik: Well, but I I mean it you know, it's sometimes fear drives us into hiding.

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: We just want to we wanna escape, we want to

Erik: um, you know, try and make make it go away or put up a wall or something so we don't we can't we can't see or be exposed to our fear and

Erik: Other times fear drives us to have courage and and try and accomplish things that we normally wouldn't have if there wasn't a I mean I think fear is a healthy driver

Erik: in becoming productive, right?

Erik: Um and so I think that's I I think that that was a great

Erik: tool for you, um a great motivator for you to then ask the right questions.

Erik: become curious to try and to try and satisfy that desire to um figure out what you could do to satisfy that fear

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: Um of losing your mom and uh of not being able to help your mom.

Erik: And and I think that's I I think that's great.

Erik: I think the other thing that really kind of struck me in your your story was that

Erik: You were really interested in the process of the disease, right?

Erik: Instead of it being like, okay, oh, somebody said that

Erik: you know, if I if they foreclose of garlic in one day that that would be, you know, helpful at least curing their situation, right?

Erik: If you aren't looking for a quick treatment fix that would resolve some symptoms.

Erik: You wanted to understand the ideology, the process, the dynamics, in order to really

Erik: get to the root cause and then reverse that, utilizing the tools that you had learned about from a diet, lifestyle, and nutrition standpoint.

Erik: W what did what did you discover about yourself in that process as you were as you were seeking after finding these answers in the in the in the process

Erik: It it seemed like early on you established a pattern for learning for yourself.

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: And then you then repeated over and over again.

Erik: What what can you share with us about how what you learned about yourself and and your your way of learning?

Datis: What I learned was that the other people weren't doing that.

Datis: I just thought everyone was doing that.

Datis: And then when I was teaching seminars, that became really clear to me that people weren't doing that.

Datis: And I remember teaching whole seminar of like this is the physiology, this is these are the clinical things that tell you about this part of the physiological pathway that's involved.

Datis: These are the things you would consider.

Datis: This is the literature on these single pathways for this.

Datis: And then at the end of the day, I would have someone come up to me with a laptop and go, so what do I do with this?

Datis: And I'm like

Datis: Did you not like pay attention to anything?

Datis: Or they would just say, What's the protocol then for this?

Datis: And then like, no, point is you don't do a protocol.

Datis: You do your work up and I remember just feeling very, very frustrated.

Datis: And there's a point where I remember telling my wife, like, I don't want to be around

Datis: practition there's a time I took a break from teaching and taught for a very long time and it's just because I just got frustrated.

Datis: So like I teach in the studio, I made the Kharrazian Institute, we taped stuff, but I just was like so frustrated with the concept of it but

Datis: I just think I dunno I don't understand why you wouldn't do that.

Datis: That's the most efficient way.

Datis: Because, you know, cardi patients have everything wrong with them.

Datis: Right.

Datis: I mean y mean when I say everything wrong with them.

Datis: They have like a blood sugar issue, they have fatigue, they have depression, they have exhaustion, they have nutrition deficiencies, they have bad guts, they have

Datis: hormone imbalances, right?

Datis: And then what I saw was the trend is that the trend was the practitioner would have their own bias.

Datis: So whatever helped them

Datis: is what they think everyone had.

Datis: So if they got help with like a detox, they think every person was toxic.

Datis: If they got help with supporting their adrenals and adrenal fatigue, they think everyone had adrenal fatigue.

Datis: Or they became the hormone expert and you're like, wow, like don't do that.

Datis: I was just that's just my own thoughts, not that I've seen this album.

Datis: So I just remember thinking like you just have to be the toll generalist for human physiology and then ultimately y there's a big web and how do you pull on the web with having the greatest effect on throughout the whole thing?

Datis: So, for example, you could have a person coming with thyroid brain, gut symptoms, and all these issues, and then maybe you find out they have autoimmunity, those target proteins, and really your goal is to treat the autoimmunity.

Datis: And you figure out what the choice are for the autoimmunity.

Datis: And then like that complex case with all these symptoms really becomes one mechanism.

Datis: So you maybe go after that.

Datis: So

Datis: I think it just made it more efficient.

Datis: I think at the end of the day, like when people learn functional medicine, the f or integrated medicine are going to call it, but I'll just use it for functional medicine.

Datis: this kind of my background, is people are just trying to like first learn, oh, these are all the different tests.

Datis: These are all the tests I can do and these are all the different ways you can treat and these are all the nutraceuticals.

Datis: And then there's a point where people learn all that.

Datis: But that's not really even a clinical skill.

Datis: The clinical skill is how do you prioritize?

Datis: How do you figure out what is where you start?

Datis: And that's like the lifelong, you know, balance the goal all of us have is how to become more efficient.

Datis: of hearing a complex case that it's gonna have multiple things wrong with it, but where do you start?

Datis: Then how do you monitor it?

Datis: Um and that became just a goal of trying to help patients.

Datis: At the end of the day I was just trying to go to my office to still just to help a person at a time, you know?

Datis: And uh

Datis: Um I always had a small practice.

Datis: Um and uh I would spend about uh I would schedule six hours for a new patient.

Datis: I would have uh two hour history and uh about another two hour exam, then an hour follow up.

Datis: Um and uh I just wanted to not miss it.

Datis: Most of my patients ended up being like people from seminar

Datis: of doctors uh referred patients to me from seminars from parts of the country.

Datis: So I had this one like spot to really figure out what's going on.

Datis: So I'd have them send me all their medical records ahead of time so I would look at their file.

Datis: If I didn't know anything, I would look it up.

Datis: I didn't have a really good idea of what's happening with them.

Datis: I would spend a you know, each case would sp I was probably spending three or four hours going through the file.

Datis: and then and then figuring out what questions I need to ask and what I need to fine tune, have a general idea and then fine tune stuff in the history and and uh in the paperwork I sent them I would get to medical history all beforehand, like typed out.

Datis: Like every all the questions I want to ask anyways already typed out for me.

Datis: So then I could just focus in when they came in to fine-tune it.

Datis: And I would do a headset, I would do a very thorough exam.

Datis: Like I really pride myself on my examination skills.

Datis: Um

Datis: So, um and then I would try to put together a protocol and plan.

Datis: So the Google's always just been try to how to think, how to get through the process, how to be efficient.

Datis: And uh, you know, I don't know.

Datis: You know, for the the most stressful thing and I think the most realistic thing that happened to me is when he built the Kharrazian Institute and put together all these courses, but then we realized people weren't learning

Datis: the next level, which is just not s PowerPoints.

Datis: So I had a filming crew in my office for two years.

Datis: And we taped my patients.

Datis: That would allow us to th th share their case.

Datis: And we'd tape their history.

Datis: We'd tape their physical exam.

Datis: All the findings.

Datis: We would then show treatment.

Datis: We do follow-ups over some some patients for a year, year and a half, exactly how they responded to care.

Datis: And we were doing this in a real um open timeline.

Datis: Like uh

Datis: Patient would come in and go, hey just saw this patient last month.

Datis: And they could, you know, let's just then people that were on our program could see us see see the progression over time, how they're responding and not responding.

Datis: So I felt confident enough, like I could take on a complex case

Datis: and show everyone how I do it.

Datis: And no problem.

Datis: Have a crew in it.

Datis: Show the whole thing.

Datis: It wasn't theoretical anymore.

Datis: Do you know what I mean?

Datis: And all the in the street period, not like not every case was a home run.

Datis: We had some cases that had partial responses, some cases that had mono responses, some cases that had no responses, but maybe had some slight improvement of the quality of life.

Datis: I mean, everyone could improve the quality of life a little bit.

Datis: You know, but uh some some were there's a spectrum which was real.

Datis: So I really to show people that.

Erik: That's an important part that sometimes gets lost at the conferences, right?

Erik: Because you you you get up, somebody's, you know, we're presenting.

Erik: We obviously want to demonstrate from a clinical

Erik: perspective that the things that we're teaching.

Erik: This is how you apply this in a clinical setting.

Erik: And then we we usually show a home run case, right?

Erik: Because everybody feels good about that.

Erik: It's motivating.

Erik: It's exciting.

Erik: And but the reality is that the home run cases are only maybe 10 or 15% of the practice.

Erik: And then you have about the a good 50 to 60% of the practice is just

Erik: mediocre type, you know, improvements like you were saying, but but not like the home run.

Yeah.

Erik: And then you have another fifteen, maybe sometimes even twenty percent

Erik: where there's you're just not making a a a lot of progress, right?

Erik: And and that could be for a variety of different reasons.

Erik: But that's reality.

Erik: Right.

Erik: And so you you you don't you don't walk into a practice and think that every one is going to be a home run um because it's not reality.

Datis: Right, and people don't understand that and they get burnt out and they go, Well, I didn't I gave this guy methyl donors, he had a m and a slip, he didn't have the miracle, he still has methino depression.

Datis: It's like it's not like that

Datis: So yeah, I think it's really important to see that.

Datis: And I think for all of us that do personalized medicine, functional medicine, irregular medicine, we end up seeing chronic patients.

Datis: And some many chronic patients have uncurable conditions.

Datis: and have complex vicious cycles.

Datis: And if if our goal is just to improve their function and they they're okay with that, I mean people I mean, I don't know how it is with you, but it I've I've seen like old patients at the airport where I haven't had much success with and I'm like, oh my God, I don't want to see them.

Datis: I totally sucked and failed on their case.

Datis: And then they see you and they're so happy to see you.

Datis: And they say, oh my God, you changed my life.

Datis: And you're like, oh, I just remembered you as a failed case in my head.

Datis: You know what I mean?

Datis: But I think over time you have so many of those experiences you realize

Datis: It's changing someone's function is a big, big deal.

Datis: If you can improve their twenty percent, if you can have them like uh sleep better, if you can have them be about more good days and bad days in a given month, that has a profound impact in someone's life

Datis: So I think for people that do functional medicine work with chronic disease patients, they have to understand that or they will completely burn out.

Erik: Yeah.

Datis: You know, and I think the

Datis: For me, what I would do with my practice is when when you get a new patient, I'd always do what's called a case review.

Datis: I'd look at their questions.

Datis: I would look at their case we do a feel for I would do a fee for reviewing their file

Datis: And we would charge like a thousand this is like a thousand dollars to review their file.

Datis: And it was uh it was just a quick review, not the deep dive I would do it for before they came in.

Datis: But I would spend a good hour on it, review their file, and then get and then we'd ask them the questions.

Datis: One of the questions is what are your expectations from us?

Datis: And like the minute it would hear a cure or reverse, I would have to have that discussion.

Datis: Like we don't do that

Datis: All we can do is like the best effort to try to improve your physiology and function and see how things go.

Datis: Like we can't any we can't offer you anything besides an attempt.

Datis: And uh reverse and cure is just not in our in our thought process.

Datis: We're and some people would be like, that's not for me.

Datis: I'm like, okay, that's before you fly in.

Datis: What do we no you know?

Datis: So most people were just just happy to have someone try.

Datis: People are chronically sick.

Datis: If that someone can really take a look at their file and listen to them

Datis: and go through it.

Datis: They're they're they're just so ecstatic to have that.

Datis: So so it was very rare we'd have some people do be upset about that.

Datis: But it did happen to me.

Datis: I would have Parkinson I remember this one time this Parksons patient was so mad at me

Datis: He's like, what do you mean?

Datis: Like you what do you mean this can't be reversed?

Datis: I'm like, it's it's a progressive disease.

Datis: Like you're not gonna reverse it.

Datis: That's the best scenario.

Datis: We might like you might have your tremor stop for a little bit, your rigidity may calm down for a little bit if you respond, but it's all gonna come back

Datis: Like guaranteed at some point.

Datis: So you may just be slowing down the Z and have a window of like some positive facts, but that's that's like best case

Datis: And he's like, well, you wrote a book on this.

Datis: I'm like, yeah, but I didn't say we could reverse any of this.

Datis: And he was so mad at me.

Datis: Like with different like are you ready now to re and I'm like, no, I still don't know how to reverse But you know, those types of scenarios.

Datis: But I think if practitioners don't know the environment they're getting into and create the right environment with their with their patients that are chronic

Datis: They were gonna completely burn out.

Erik: No, I I I totally agree.

Erik: Well, I wanna I wanna dive in a little bit more about your business model.

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: Um but before before we do that, I I have to say one of the other things that really struck me about your

Erik: story was your persistence.

Erik: And you t you talked about how you you you became such a

Erik: a a nuisance to the one of your early mentors that they end up turning their whole program over to you, right?

Erik: I mean there's there's an element in

Erik: We we we've had this discussion with other uh guests on our podcast and uh particularly with JJ Virgin and talking about becoming the expert, right?

Datis: Yeah.

Erik: But I think

Erik: People don't realize that there's an element of persistence that has to go into becoming an expert.

Erik: Yeah, I don't know what we were talking about this earlier.

Erik: um the imposter syndrome.

Erik: I don't know enough.

Erik: I don't, you know, how can I be quite an expert, right?

Erik: But I think there's there's this threshold where once you get

Erik: You you learn enough that you can start to become an expert.

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: But it's the persistence of learning that allows you really to have the confidence.

Erik: to become an expert.

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: So would you I mean do you do you see that in your story?

Datis: Do you So my story I think is like similar to that.

Datis: I mean for sure I would I remember every single time I would have new patient days and follow up based on new patient days

Datis: I'd always leave going, I don't know why I'm even going.

Datis: Like, what's the point?

Datis: Ever every single time.

Datis: My wife almost like predicted in the morning.

Datis: Here's your coffee.

Datis: I know you're gonna be done on yourself.

Datis: Just do your best.

Datis: I mean, every single time.

Datis: No matter what.

Datis: Yeah, the the times I were caught was cocky was the times I had like totally failure, you know, and so over time I just learned not to be cocky, not to expect anything.

Datis: So I think it's normal to feel that way, no matter how hard you put it.

Datis: But I always picture myself in a room with a person.

Datis: And I'm I'm the person they're they're counting on me.

Datis: Like 'cause I always kind of pictured uh a chronic patient, let's say as my mom would say, she's gonna go see someone and she's gonna give them her file

Datis: What can they do to figure it out?

Datis: So do they have the clinical skills?

Datis: So being very clear with me, your skill set is going to determine if you can make a difference in Zone's case.

Datis: That's really like bottom line.

Datis: I mean there there are practices that are built on people that have great personalities and they have great office staff and they send birthday cards and they all these things and people love the community, the office.

Datis: I've never had that I was always like one person, you're in my office, it's you and me, let's figure this out together.

Datis: And

Datis: The skill set was the only thing that really mattered.

Datis: Like can you can you can you figure it out?

Datis: And there's many times I would like me and my patient go, I don't know what this is, but we'll figure it we'll we'll look this up or

Datis: I've never seen this before.

Datis: I was always honest.

Datis: If I hadn't like something I didn't know, I don't know what this is, but I'll find out.

Datis: And they're just, you know, I just find you when when you're honest and you don't have any expectations, it's so it's so easy to not get burnt out.

Datis: You know?

Datis: It's really true.

Datis: But persistence I think is and also like if you don't learn, you just basically burn out.

Datis: You have to grow.

Datis: The biggest thing practitioners practitioners are always excited.

Datis: They're always

Datis: having huge practices, way in those practices.

Datis: So one of the things I did notice was when I was teaching all over the country, I was teaching almost every single weekend for maybe close to fifteen years.

Datis: Um except Super Bowl.

Datis: Super Bowl weekend.

Datis: And Mother's Day weekend.

Datis: Father's Day weekend we could teach because no one cared about Father's Day.

Datis: So we still taught the first on Father's Day.

Datis: But we No, we couldn't violate Mother's Day for some reason.

Datis: And uh I meet practitioners from all over the country.

Datis: Uh and I get to, you know, go to this like Denver twice a year and you know, whatever.

Datis: Different cities, different years, San Francisco.

Datis: And I would have friends that are over the years developed, you know, and I could see practitioners that were thriving and practitioners that were struggling.

Datis: The ones that were thriving were the ones that were excited to learn.

Datis: It's that simple

Datis: They're excited to learn and then imply imply it to their patient population.

Datis: They were super excited, super jazzed.

Datis: It's contagious.

Datis: Like peop like people want to go see them

Datis: You know?

Datis: And the person who's got a failing practice that decides to come out for a seminar or just to get their continued education hours, you're like, dude, you have no you have no chance.

Datis: You're already you're already cooked and done.

Datis: Just leave.

Datis: Like find a different profession.

Datis: Like you don't you're not good at this, you don't care.

Datis: And those people people when they come into your presence, they're gonna feel that.

Datis: So just like like you can't fix this.

Datis: Like you gotta get excited to learn again and help people or get out.

Datis: Yeah.

Davin: Do you think that is how maybe um you know, cause our podcast sort of grew out of

Davin: Um, wanting to sort of educate these fellows down at UCI to yeah, understand the business, you know, opportunities that

Davin: you know, would sort of be in front of them now that they have an expanded tool set, right?

Datis: Yeah.

Davin: But but like for me, having been in the traditional model for all these years

Davin: and kind of late in my career kind of making a shift and understanding, hey, there's a I think there's a better way.

Davin: I think, you know, throwing pharmaceuticals at symptoms is probably not the best way to

Davin: really change the trajectory of someone's health, right?

Davin: So I so I didn't want to take a more holistic approach, but um it's

Davin: I don't I don't feel like it's realistic for me to get to where you're at who spent a lifetime, right, acquiring knowledge and skills and tools.

Davin: you know, to be able to approach a patient in the way that you do.

Davin: Um, but but maybe that's the balance is I don't need to be there as long as I'm

Davin: Growing and learning and Yeah.

Datis: Listen, I would say my experience has been when I see the scenario talking about where a physician changes careers, their not changes careers, but changes their model.

Datis: is first of all, they don't realize if you go to cash practice, you gotta be in your A game.

Datis: Like they were used in a world where people just uh instantly have patience

Datis: And and be overwhelmed.

Datis: But when your people are paying cash, they have options, like if you're not on your top top dog, you're you're like you're irrelevant.

Datis: Your practice will not make it.

Datis: So you have to be very good at what you do.

Datis: So you have to be tough so I mean you can get away with a good personality and kindness for a while.

Datis: Like that can help but practice get to some level.

Datis: Like you s and usually people that make the transition are very kind, want to do the right thing.

Datis: But there's a point where clinical skill set really makes the difference.

Datis: So so I've seen that, but I think a lot of people they just need I mean, there's there's such a need for what for physicians, c uh conventional MDs,

Datis: that I can step out the box and listen to them and do some integrative approaches.

Datis: I mean that is the biggest market out there.

Datis: You know, for someone to like go through medicine and then go, I give up, and then seek someone like me who's a chiropractor who's not an MD takes like a lot of a lot of uh frustration.

Datis: Do you know what I mean?

Datis: Because we're not people that typically get asked for as an alternative provider.

Datis: People want the allopathic conventional provider to help them.

Datis: There's just not enough of them.

Datis: And then the ones that are out there, I don't know how to say this.

Datis: They suck at it.

Datis: So they eventually do end up seeking people like me or other people because they just never get the skill set because they just have this I don't I don't know how to say this.

Datis: They have this assumption that

Datis: They they they have enough skill set that they need to know what to do, but they don't.

Datis: Do you know what I mean?

Datis: Like uh

Erik: Yeah.

Datis: So I think that's what I've kind of seen, but if that's the scenario you're in, there's there's a demand, such a demand for people to seek you out, um, for that kind of care.

Datis: You know, I mean

Datis: You should have a weight in this practice.

Datis: If you don't have a weight in this practice, if your physician can't integrate medicine, you have a personality problem, you have an office staff problem, you've got something wrong with something in there.

Erik: Yeah, that's really cool.

Erik: Well let's let let's dive into a little bit of the nuts and bolts of how you set up your business model.

Datis: Yeah.

Erik: So you you you mentioned a little bit that you, you know, patients says, okay, I want to be be seen by you.

Erik: You're like, okay, good.

Erik: It's gonna be a thousand dollars just to review your medical record, your chart, just to kind of get a sense for whether this is gonna be a you know, a good fit.

Erik: And then Yeah.

Erik: You know, then what what was the rest of the process?

Datis: So my scenario was I was uh I was uh teaching all over the country.

Datis: So when you teach all over the country, you meet practitioners and so my the practitioner base I was teaching to became my referral source.

Datis: You know, everyone has a different referral source.

Datis: So I had that wind that had maybe a different window of uh accessing patients.

Datis: And then most of the patients I would see would would fly in because I was fluttering all over the country, so it would meet people in different areas.

Datis: and I had this opportun one window of time.

Datis: So I realized really quickly like people would fly in and we were not on the same page and they would be upset and I would be upset and I was like, this isn't working out.

Datis: So I wanted to do a case review first.

Datis: So

Datis: The case review process was I'm sorry, a case review was fifteen hundred dollars.

Datis: A case review process was fifteen hundred dollars.

Datis: They would send in all their labs, we'd ask them a series of questions, they would fill it out, do a detailed history.

Datis: And we used to st we started at five hundred dollars for doing that, but we didn't get enough commitment.

Datis: Once we made the paperwork like as detailed as we needed it for a thorough history

Datis: Like I would go, let me give me every medication you've ever taken in a timely fashion, give every diagnosis you've ever had in a timely fashion.

Datis: What do you think is going on with your history?

Datis: Tell me step by step how your health felt or from when you first felt healthy.

Datis: Like just these questions.

Datis: Then our then our staff would have them fill these out.

Datis: They would review it, make sure it was thorough before they sent it in.

Datis: And part of the process was like if it's not thorough enough, we're not gonna even go into the case review.

Datis: And it was that immediately filtered out all the patients that were motivated

Erik: So this was just a questionnaire you would send out to them first.

Erik: So it would have like in and and how how many pages was this?

Datis: It was like maybe like fifteen, twenty quite questions.

Erik: Like tell me your tell me your medical diagnosis or it was just like uh

Datis: It was a series of questions I would ask in the medical history.

Erik: Any questions.

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: It was your screen your way of screening your patients.

Datis: It was a way of screening them, but also it was a way for me to see like where they were and how dedicated they were and you know and uh

Datis: And also I was working with a lot of uh neuro neuro compromised patients and try to get a medical history out of them and it's a set appointment when they flew in was very difficult at times

Datis: So if they had weeks to work on it and get it fine-tuned, right, it would really help.

Datis: So we found that the case review process was effective in filtering out people, and then we figured out five hundred was not enough.

Datis: Well that fifteen hundred was like the point

Datis: where we could access the most amount of people without uh getting people over motivated.

Datis: So it was really a filtering process.

Datis: We wanted to you know what

Datis: I only have s I only had so many new patient days and I wanted to have an impact on patients too.

Datis: So I w I wanted to bring in people I knew would make me feel like I had a sense of purpose because I was to help them.

Datis: I didn't want to bring in people that weren't motivated and cared because it would impact

Datis: my sense of purpose and what I was was what I was in this for.

Datis: So we would do this case review we would do a case review process and I would I would uh go through their case.

Datis: I spend about an hour.

Datis: I could uh uh read through their case histories, get the big gist of it without getting, you know

Datis: really detailed.

Datis: I would look at their labs, kinda get an idea of what's going on.

Datis: And then for myself I would write like a one-page summary of this is my impressions and this is what's going on, blah blah blah.

Datis: And then I would do a Zoom call with them for 30 minutes.

Datis: And I explained what my first impression is and that sometimes I was like, hey, you need to go rule this out first before you come in.

Datis: Like I think you might have this.

Datis: This needs to be ruled out.

Datis: So something up here, you you see in the chronic population a group of patients that have given up on medicine.

Datis: They don't want to see their physicians anymore.

Datis: And then sometimes they have

Datis: Frank disease that needs to be ruled out.

Erik: Right.

Datis: Yeah.

Datis: So it was like, hey, go there first and then come back for the case review that this has to be done.

Datis: So I would say a good uh

Datis: I don't know, ten, fifteen percent of people that would do case reviews needed to go somewhere else first.

Datis: And that saved a lot of time and was able to catch some conditions that needed to be diagnosed right away.

Datis: And then um then they would fly in

Datis: I would I would s charge five thousand for the exam and work up.

Datis: But that would include me spending about four hours reviewing their file in detail, doing my literature, doing my history, and then doing the four hour exam and then their first uh

Datis: follow up phone phone call.

Datis: That was all included in the 5000, which was like here's the plan.

Datis: And then I would have treatment plans in different stages.

Datis: Like we're gonna first make sure you I don't know

Datis: Stabilize your blood sugar.

Datis: Like this is a key factor here.

Datis: Like your blood sugar is all over the place.

Datis: So the first month all we're gonna do is get you to stop crashing in the afternoon and then like stage two, stage three, these are the labs we're gonna do.

Datis: And then we would have like a structured plan and then I would I would see my patients um uh once a month.

Datis: I do a follow-up with them once a month with Zoom.

Datis: and or if they needed to fly in, we'd have them fly in and schedule an appointment with them.

Datis: The only patients I really need to fly in were a lot of my tra traumatic brain injury patients, my autoimmune patients that we were doing some neurological rehabilitation with.

Datis: that we actually need to see the physical exam findings.

Datis: A lot of pati other patients I could just do follow-up with Zoom.

Datis: And I would charge just $500 an hour

Datis: uh cash.

Datis: So and that was uh so we did a forty five minute appointment, it'd be seven fifty if we did a yeah everything was

Datis: It was usually an you know half an hour or an hour.

Datis: Sometimes I'll do a forty five minute.

Datis: And I was just very strict with my time.

Datis: I like listen, I only have a few minutes left for a time, but we can cover this next time or you know, then one of the other things I learned was don't don't uh

Datis: Learn how to schedule the amount of time you actually need.

Datis: Like don't try to fit an hour appointment in 30 minutes because you think it should be 30 minutes.

Datis: You know, like I like in some patients, you're like, I'm gonna go over this bad, but they talk a lot.

Datis: So I need an hour.

Datis: The people like you need less time with.

Datis: So I'd make sure I got I got better reading how much time I needed with each patient.

Datis: Sometimes I would ask patients, like listen, you normally do a follow-up, it's thirty minutes, but I think

Datis: You ask them like like ask a lot of questions come a lot of clarifications, let's make that an hour.

Datis: So let's do our follow-ups once a month until we really figure this out.

Datis: And then um if they booked an hour and we finished early, we would we still charge them for the hour

Datis: If we went uh uh but you know, sometimes it was like like we had our probably minutes that wouldn't change the whole hour.

Datis: But you know, if we like ended at fifty four, we just had the hour block.

Datis: We said the third time we blocked out.

Datis: And then uh um

Datis: If I had to go over, I would just say, listen, I'm really have you schedule for thirty minutes and have the patient after you.

Datis: So I'd just you know I would give them like I got five minutes left.

Datis: Let's do this.

Datis: And if you want, we can try to connect as soon as right away if we need more time.

Datis: So I would just I wouldn't really make sure I was very conscious of my time for their sake and our sake.

Datis: And the key thing is you gotta be efficient with your time.

Datis: Like practitioners that don't know how to track time, like they're gonna have a failed practice.

Datis: Yeah.

Datis: You gotta know internally what 30 minutes is, 45 minutes is you have to have your clock in front of you, you gotta know how to pace the history.

Datis: And I think I see a lot of practitioners have a trouble trouble with doing that.

Datis: Or they're so they're so like needing to be the patient's friend and be the nice guy and getting to the sister and talk about themselves and what they're doing with their kids and all that.

Datis: And it's like, dude

Datis: That's just like seven minutes of a three minute appointment.

Datis: Like move on.

Datis: Yeah.

Erik: Yeah.

Datis: You can do it quickly and just 'cause they're they're they they will they only care about you figuring out what's going on with them.

Datis: So

Datis: File was like, hey, I've been delivering I've been thinking about your and then what I would do in the morning before their files, I would read their case, have dig very detailed notes.

Datis: I would just transcription so it's very easy to take notes in like uh dragon medical

Datis: Instead of all my questions and follow-ups I want to do really quick, so that morning came up.

Datis: I knew exactly what I wanted to do.

Datis: I'm gonna go, hey, we got 30 minutes and I have a lot of things I want to go over with you really to make this the best use of time and we boom jump right in.

Datis: And then they loved it, you know.

Datis: So the conversations to my family and friends and what we're doing would come up here and there, but it was like our focus was to get into it.

Datis: And uh try to be as efficient as possible with their time.

Datis: So build that build that trust that I was not I was uh working with their time.

Datis: I was my time would be respected, their time would be respected

Datis: I would hate to be late.

Datis: It never was it never were be late.

Datis: I always always have little blocks where I could catch up with things if I needed to, but

Datis: Their time is really very important to me.

Datis: So I didn't want to have someone waiting 45 minutes, an hour, or something like that.

Datis: If I ever had a patient wait an hour, I wouldn't charge over their company.

Datis: It was that's my fault.

Datis: Like I just wasted an hour of your life because I couldn't figure out how to time my history.

Datis: You know what I mean?

Datis: Like I think functional medicine, this is an emergency room care.

Datis: Like

Datis: If you're doing a history, a console.

Datis: Sound like you're like someone saving someone on the table or something.

Datis: Right?

Datis: So like you should be efficient with your time.

Datis: So and and there was a few times I'm like, hey, I'm really sorry I waste your time.

Datis: We're not gonna charge you for an appointment.

Datis: And then we just do a thing.

Datis: Because that helped build my trust with them and uh respect of their time.

Datis: And then they would respect my time.

Erik: Yeah, I think that's I think that's really, really important.

Erik: And um it's interesting.

Erik: I found that i in when I'm seeing patients who are paying cash.

Datis: Yeah.

Erik: Um I am much more um tuned into the amount of time, right?

Erik: One, I don't want to I don't want to spend more time.

Erik: than what they've already paid for because then either I've got to have the awkward conversation of saying, okay, we went forty five minutes to thirty, and you just, you know, used up fifteen more minutes of my time, which then is available

Erik: Um and the same token, I I've got another patient typically uh that I need to get to.

Erik: So that's fifteen minutes now that I've got to somehow make up in somebody else's

Datis: I would usually say I would never use more time.

Datis: I would say you say listen, I hate to keep patients waiting.

Datis: I I would never want to keep you waiting.

Datis: I have another person that's a hard stop at this time.

Datis: We can schedule something extra if we need to, but I really take a lot of pride in trying to be an end on time for everyone's schedule.

Datis: And that would immediately like

Datis: Resolve you know, it's just that setting that tone of this is how this is how it is for everyone.

Datis: Where their time is respected and when their appointment's up, you gonna do theirs and

Datis: I understand you need more time for schedule another time as soon as we can ship the follow-ups.

Datis: So 'cause then you know, you also get those patients that are just well take as much time as you give 'em, you know?

Erik: Yeah, you could literally spend all day with that.

Datis: Yeah.

Datis: And I think I think that's what a lot of uh I've seen a lot of practitioners highly skilled, highly compassionate, just have their practice fail.

Davin: Mm-hmm.

Davin: Because of that.

Datis: The time management issue.

Davin: Yeah.

Datis: That's a good step.

Davin: I think it's interesting, you know, you you know, this idea of like, hey, you know, we waste your time or to relate or whatever.

Davin: And so if you

Davin: I think those opportunities where you had to like refund the money or not get paid, that probably helped reinforce your desire to like prepare and be on top, you know, like because

Davin: If you're not getting paid, then you're you're going backwards right in a way, right?

Davin: So you gotta figure that out and be ready.

Datis: Yeah, you know, there's the relationship, the the the patient relationship encounter which is studied.

Datis: And one of the things is is every every point you have with your patient, they're already judging you.

Datis: And if once they see like you're lazy, you don't keep track, you keep asking the same questions, you forget what they told you, they like lose faith in what you're going to tell them.

Datis: And then when it comes to like how they're gonna do an invention, if they already lost faith in you, they're less likely to comply and follow through.

Datis: So for me, I always wanted to be my A game.

Datis: And uh I w I would always read my r chart notes and everything beforehand, know exactly what I was gonna do before I went in.

Datis: To be honest, I would actually have a whole I would wake up my every morning I would have to go work out.

Datis: I have to do I'd do a quick neuro exam myself with the

Datis: Final eyes, sticking pursuits and saccades and other things, see where I was, k make sure I got myself activated.

Datis: Um

Datis: Make sure I had lots of things to taste up and watch get blood flow to my brain.

Datis: Make sure I was fueled.

Datis: Where did you go?

Datis: My blood sugar was stable.

Datis: Like it was it was like game on.

Datis: Each each each day was like uh

Datis: I I perform like high function.

Datis: I took it I took it very I took it very very seriously, but I didn't practice every single day.

Datis: So I practiced three days a week.

Datis: So I needed those times off to to function.

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: Yeah, totally.

Erik: Well let's I I I wanna make sure we we take a little bit of time too to then discuss kind of some of your other business

Erik: ventures, right?

Erik: So you I mean you clearly learned early on that you enjoyed teaching because otherwise you would have just done the research part and let you know s but

Erik: But you you at least had some kind of passion for sharing what you were learning with others.

Erik: Yes.

Erik: And then but how how did you get to the point where you organize that and

Erik: uh fashion where you were y teaching every week of the year except for a few.

Erik: And then and then even turning that into an institute where now you had other practitioners

Erik: coming to learn from you and and learn from other skilled practitioners who had knowledge that you wanted to be able to you know you know impart

Datis: Well I mean when what's some first of all when I had a nutrition company when you're in functional medicine shortups we will formulate anything you want however you want it

Datis: And we'll differ different cement samples, the answer is always yes.

Datis: So so we have to make dream formulations.

Datis: Sometimes they would come back to me like

Datis: this product is gonna cost three hundred dollars a bottle.

Datis: We can't do that.

Datis: And I'm like, okay, well what can we do?

Datis: We like get to figure it out.

Datis: So we do something.

Datis: So that was like a big opportunity I just loved because

Datis: You know I I I was I wanted to be able to have custom things that I wanted and different things.

Datis: So and then be able to do that and then share it with other practitioners and then they can see how their response was

Datis: And then feedback they would get and we would fine-tune product lines and formulations and stuff we did.

Datis: That was just a big joy for me.

Datis: Like it was just fun to do that.

Datis: So I really, really enjoyed that.

Datis: I'm an introvert, so I don't like to be in front of crowds.

Datis: So whenever I teach, I would have to go to my room at lunch and be alone and eat lunch myself.

Datis: And after the summer I'd have to go and be with my wife and h hide.

Datis: But I was excited about sharing information, but I'm not

Datis: I don't get energy from being around big groups.

Erik: So I have to you're you're you're cut the same mold as Jill Carnahan.

Datis: So so teaching was always fun to share, but it was never fun to like the crowds always exhausted me.

Datis: Um

Datis: But uh so it was fun to but part of getting the formulation of everything with Apex mean I had to teach and it was fun to share information and uh

Datis: I would learn so much every time I go to carpets I wouldn't like you or other people, hey, what are you doing for this?

Datis: Or so and go, you totally missed it all missed.

Datis: I learned so much being on the road

Datis: Talk to other practitioners.

Datis: They would give me papers, they would give me ideas, they would like send me stuff on the emails, and then like it was the was the most

Datis: incredible way to get an education in functional medicine by just being around a different group of practitioners every weekend, almost every weekend, you know, and just getting their feedback and information with them.

Datis: So I think that really, really, really helped me evolve.

Datis: Um and uh I think uh at some point I got the Ape like I was working with the Apex and they were doing seminars, but it would take forever to do a seminar with them because they had to

Datis: do their reviews and I just go, I'm not I go, I don't want to work with you guys anymore.

Datis: Just wanna do my own thing.

Datis: Not that it was bad.

Datis: They were great people.

Datis: I still like them.

Datis: They're still

Erik: friends, we still have to create people have to deal with all the readers that are aspect.

Datis: Yeah.

Datis: Like they would send it to the review guy and like, I don't really care what the review guy says.

Datis: This is my name on it.

Datis: Like

Datis: Leave me alone.

Datis: I don't k like I don't need to worry about your FDA issues are not selling supplements, I'm just teaching education.

Datis: Leave me leading so

Datis: So I was able to put together 200 hours.

Datis: So I I put together 200 hour courses, 19 courses, which is our foundation of courses.

Datis: Then we had a filming crew in our office for two years.

Datis: And we did a like 20 modules of clinical round ground rounds with chronic patients

Datis: And then we so we tr I try to think well how do I how do people learn functional medicine well?

Datis: So I said we need the foundational courses, they need to see real cases in practice, they need to see real case studies, they need to see like real ground rounds versus the rah-rah thing

Datis: And then like we need to bring in experts.

Datis: So we started bringing master classes, which we're fortunate to have you teach a class for us, or two classes for us.

Datis: So then so you kept experts that knew things better than I did in various topics and the holes in our education program and just have them come in or even at times the same topic taught by someone with a totally different perspective.

Datis: So we have a very rich library of master classes that our people get to learn from.

Datis: And then in our group we have what's called a mentorship program.

Datis: Once a week we do a Zoom call.

Datis: We answer clinical caches.

Datis: go over cases together, we have a forum, discussion forum, we go over things and then we'll have a meeting once a year.

Datis: Well the people in our group get to meet and go over clinical stuff together, talk about cases and uh have a social event.

Datis: So I think goal no my goal right now is this was trying to create the best way a person to learn functional medicine.

Datis: I just don't think that basic taking like six courses

Datis: Getting a certificate means much.

Datis: Like you have to really dive into real cases and do ground rounds and you have like see those and you have to interact with people to have discussions as you're learning new things.

Datis: So the Kharrazian Institute, we've had about 5,000 practitioners join courses through our program now.

Datis: And uh we have uh I think certified people in, I don't know, 30 countries now

Datis: Uh, but I've learned it.

Datis: So it's been growing.

Datis: We're growing every year.

Datis: And uh it's been very exciting to see how that grows.

Datis: So I realized developing an education still was the most rewarding thing for me.

Datis: And I realized like uh yeah, I don't have to go to the I don't have to go to a different city to teach a seminar.

Datis: I can just teach it once and then it could be online.

Datis: So that changed, you know, I was teaching the same seminar in different locations, but it got really exhausting.

Datis: So

Datis: It was nice to not have to do that.

Datis: And uh it's nice to have it all in the platform and uh so that's what started the Kharrazian Institute for me.

Datis: Now that's my biggest uh sense of uh I know, we all have to have a sense of self-worth and significance.

Datis: So

Datis: I I think for me I I I I I always had some of that from working with patients, but uh being able to teach practitioners and see them grow has been much more significant for my own self-worth and

Datis: You know, feeling like you're contributing to the world.

Erik: Yeah, and I think you're your foundation of education, right?

Erik: It wasn't there were some formal aspects of education in there, right?

Erik: You you you went through the

Erik: The chiropractic program, you went through an undergrad program, you got a PhD.

Erik: But most of your learning

Erik: happened outside a formal institution.

Datis: Yeah, absolutely.

Erik: That's such an important point because I think that

Erik: when people only rely upon institutions to teach them.

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: They're not learning on their own.

Datis: Yeah.

Erik: The depth or the breadth.

Erik: Yeah knowledge incorporation into your ability to practice clinical medicine.

Datis: Yeah.

Datis: And I think uh yeah, uh you know, I always say the best learning is when you go to a conference and you talk with friends and they tell you, what are you actually doing for this?

Datis: And they tell you, what are you ordering?

Datis: How are you doing your follow-ups?

Datis: What are you using?

Datis: So actually when people t when people come in to teach master classes I try to tell 'em, just pretend like you're talking to someone at a conference in between and telling them

Datis: So I think that's where a lot of learning comes in.

Datis: And then, you know, people have to actually implement it, you know?

Datis: Like people have to make a st uh a goal to like

Datis: On this week, we're going to add this new lab test into our clinical practice.

Datis: We're going to start running these on people and we're going to start using whatever.

Datis: Or adding a new nutraceutic or something.

Datis: There has to be like new things added to the model each each each each week or uh at least each month or something.

Datis: A lot of people don't do that.

Datis: A lot of people are the seminar junkies, they just go to seminars and conferences all the time.

Datis: They hear things but they never actually implement, so they never grow

Datis: It's very common to see that.

Davin: Because um I think in some ways it's kind of the scientific method, right?

Davin: You sort of have to test so I mean even if

Davin: Someone else has already proven it.

Davin: You know, um for you, you have to like try it out, right?

Davin: You have to actually implement something, see how it sort of lands.

Davin: see how you're gonna understand it, implement it, and and make it make it happen in in your own practice and and I think uh Yeah.

Davin: Yeah, absolutely.

Datis: I mean I think people have to realize you're supposed to feel uncomfortable

Datis: That's normal.

Datis: Like if you're not uncomfortable, you're not growing.

Datis: Like if you always have to be comfortable, you're not gonna grow.

Datis: Just like anything else.

Datis: If you're comfortable with your physical activity, you're not growing.

Datis: Like you have to

Datis: Make your heart pump more or or make your muscles work more.

Datis: So it's the same thing in practice.

Datis: You have to feel sweet.

Datis: So you know, you have to overlap test you've never done before, getting it back and then figuring out how do we interpret this?

Datis: What does this mean?

Datis: And then doing that over and over again all the time.

Datis: Like so I see people with this need to constantly education, learn and learn, but never implement

Datis: 'Cause they just feel like that they're not comfortable yet.

Datis: It's like then you're not really 'cause what's normal is you feel uncomfortable and you're doing something.

Erik: Well they say right there's no comfort in the growth zone.

Erik: Yeah.

Erik: There's no growth in the comfort zone.

Datis: There you go.

Datis: Get activate hormesis.

Davin: Well, I you know, I think uh th it's uh that's such a good lesson, not just I think for um

Davin: you know, new practitioner, but even even, you know, those of us that have been practicing for a long time, I think you just have to you you have to sort of approach life, you know, in the space of a question to some extent, right?

Davin: And

Davin: Um and so I I think um our patients are I mean, they're they're they want us to try new stuff in a way, right?

Davin: I mean they they want us to help them

Davin: you know, grow and and you know, we don't have the answer.

Davin: I think that's the other thing that, you know, I it kind of bugs me with like social media these days.

Davin: It's like

Davin: you know, someone will throw something out there that probably didn't work for them or that one person, but then it doesn't mean it translates to everybody, right?

Davin: And yeah.

Davin: So, you know, you have to be I think honest with people and say, hey,

Davin: This works for most people, but you know, we need to to validate that it's gonna help you.

Davin: And so let's measure, you know, what's happening.

Davin: We're gonna, you know, we're gonna, but in a way, you're kind of testing it out.

Datis: Yeah.

Davin: One by one.

Datis: N of one.

Datis: Everyone's an N of one.

Davin: Yeah.

Davin: Yeah.

Datis: Yeah, that's for sure.

Datis: And I want to say one other thing.

Datis: I think the worst practitioners I ever met in my life

Datis: are new practitioners because they just know what they're doing and people they've been practicing for a very long time.

Datis: And once they're very long time, they just stop growing.

Datis: They were stuck in stuck in that way.

Datis: And they just think they know everything and then at that point it's like, okay, you you're you're not good to anyone anymore.

Datis: It's time to quit.

Erik: Yeah, hang up the white coat.

Erik: Well this has been this has been awesome, Datis.

Erik: Did you have any uh questions you want to ask before we close things up?

Erik: I think go ahead with the final question.

Erik: I think it's good.

Erik: So Datis, one of the things that we love to ask as we come to a close is where do you where do you see the future of integrative and functional medicine going, say in the next five to ten years?

Datis: Oh, well it's for sure gonna go individualized medicine.

Datis: General information is gonna be available to everyone.

Datis: If you can't do individualized personalized medicine, you're not gonna have a career.

Datis: Like you have to be able to or you can have a very like low income, poor, poor career, but there's gonna be uh there's gonna be people that are highly focused on their health, uh, which is where we're seeing that trend.

Datis: that will definitely you know shift out of has to be covered by insurance, invest in their health as part of their care for themselves, and they will seek out personal into people that can do personalized individualized medicine

Datis: And I think uh that's what it's going.

Datis: Uh it's already happening now.

Datis: I mean people have huge personalized concierge practices and but people are demanding.

Datis: So uh and if you don't do that you're just gonna be there with an AI doing your thing, people wanna search everything up and it's not gonna be that useful for you.

Erik: Yeah, exactly.

Erik: Well thank you again for taking the time to be on the podcast today.

Erik: Uh so much valuable information.

Erik: Loved hearing your story.

Erik: There's parts of it that I

Erik: I knew a little bit of, but uh so much that I didn't know and I learned so much from and so appreciate the body of work that you've contributed to

Erik: the growth of Integrated Frontal Medicine and so appreciate you um being such a wonderful mentor and how you

Erik: You've you've become the kind of mentors you've learned from, which is great.

Erik: And we thank you for that.

Erik: And thanks for being on the podcast.

Datis: Yeah, thank you so much.

Datis: And thank you for teaching classes for us at the Kharrazian Institute.

Datis: Really uh appreciate your expertise as well.

Datis: So thank you.

Erik: My my pleasure.

Datis: Thank you.

Datis: Wonderful.