Speaker 1: (00:00)
Hey everybody, what's going on? Doctor Chad Woolner here and Dr Buddy Alan, and this is episode two of Health fundamentals podcast. On today's episode we're going to be discussing the question should you get stem cell therapy? So let's get started.

Speaker 2: (00:14)
You're listening to the health fundamentals podcast. I'm Dr Chad Woolner and I'm Dr Buddy Alan. And this show is about giving you the simple but powerful cutting edge tools you need to change your health and your life. So sit back and enjoy the show as we show you the path to your best life down to a science.

Speaker 1: (00:38)
So, hey everybody, hope you guys are having an awesome day. Uh, what we wanted to dive into on this episode is a discussing stem cell therapy. It's a really hot topic right now. And, uh, we wanted to kind of dive in and perhaps give you a little bit more information and lay of the land. Um, you know, uh, in general, uh, we'll kind of start by talking about regenerative medicine kind of step. Step up just a little bit. We'll talk a little bit more broad and kind of dive in a little bit more specific, but, um, you know, it's, it's no mystery or surprise to people that any more these days, there's a lot of information that people have to filter through. And when it comes to stem cell therapy, it's a really hot topic right now that, that people are discussing. And a kind of a, when it comes to the information that's available to us, it's kind of a double edge sword, right?

Speaker 1: (01:26)
There's a, you, you had said, uh, you know, the issue back in the day was not enough information. You know, nowadays it's kind of information overload. And so where do we even begin with all this information that's in front of us? I'm sure, uh, unless you've been living under a rock, if you've looked up stem cell therapy, you've probably seen all sorts of things that have been said about it. You know, stem cell therapy is good. No stem cell therapies bad. It works, it doesn't work. Uh, it's even dangerous, you know, so, so where do we even begin this process of filtering that information? Um, it kind of goes for me, it kind of goes back to one of our very first seminars that we did when we were talking about stem cells. And it Kinda goes down to, um, there was this medical doctor, this retired, I think he was a neurosurgeon.

Speaker 1: (02:10)
He had said he was there with his girlfriend and he basically had mentioned at the end of the, the talk that we did, he was like, man, you guys need to sell this way harder to people because the days of cutting out joints and replacing. And he's like, that's archaic. This is, that's old medicine. And, and it Kinda caught me off guard cause this, we were fairly new into this and I was like, really? You know, so again, talk, you know, you're talking about these varying degrees of belief in it. You know, this doctor had, had it done himself and he was, I mean, he was such a huge presence and uh, and, and then all obviously, you know, he's seen over the years, both the good and the bad that maybe comes from surgery. And the, the beautiful thing with regenerative medicine in general is it is we're tapping into one of those fundamental things that we talked about as our bodies innate ability to heal itself.

Speaker 1: (03:01)
And we're just, we're using something to help accelerate that or focus that attention in one area, two or multiple areas in, at times. So, um, to kind of dive into that and really figure out where, my goodness, how do you, how do you do it? You know what I mean? Cause you start going and you look at, um, you look at research, you know, we, we always like to go to the tried and true, what does the research say? Yeah. And, and the, the sad part of that is, um, well in just recent days, literally in the last few weeks, there was Duke University, Duke University settling some hunt, $114 million settlement for falsifying medical research for their, you know, so they could get grants and what have you. And the sad part is, is I'm sure they did lots of good research and I'm sure that very valid research and there's lots of other people doing the same thing, but now we have this gross breach of trust.

Speaker 1: (03:56)
Yes, absolutely. Huge breach of trust there. And so the, the problem there is that, uh, you know, w w what do you believe? Who Do you believe, you know, and that, and that can be kind of a frightening prospect for a lot of people because I think for a lot of people, they take their cues from the academic circles or the traditional medical circles and a, and again, this isn't to say that all research, uh, is bogus or it off or fraudulent or anything like that. But the simple fact is that so long as human beings are conducting research, there's always the potential for bias to enter laws. There was one key that I cued into, in our research methodologies class years ago. It was that you can find bias in just about everything, right? And so, uh, it's, again, don't misunderstand this, this isn't saying you can't believe the research.

Speaker 1: (04:45)
What we're simply trying to say is that you can't necessarily put your entire, just one piece that has one only one piece. Yeah. Uh, you don't want to put all of your proverbial eggs in, in that single basket. You know, in terms of looking at the literature, literature is certainly important. You want to at least maybe begin there and kind of look and see what it says. What you're likely to find, um, is to some extent a mixed bag. I think it's pretty rare that you would find a, a universal consensus. Sometimes you find more general consensus is that the pro is that the fluorophore consensus consensuses consensus. Um, you'll find kind of these general, uh, uh, uh, beliefs or GE general conclusions, but it's pretty rare that you would find any sort of a universal statement. And again, that's kind of an implied in the nature of science itself, right?

Speaker 1: (05:35)
It's ever, ever learning, right. Ever. And unfortunately we're always very skeptical to new and changing things because, uh, you know, we've been doing something for so many years and we consider this to be the, this is what you do. This is the one that all of a sudden when that's challenged are, are, I would say our human responses. Whoa, wait a second. You know, we're going to, we're going to of put up a little barrier there and until we have ample and maybe even, um, excess, yeah. Overwhelming, uh, research or evidence that that's the case. We're going to kind of dig our heels in just a little bit. Absolutely. So if we're not going to put everything all into that basket of, of the literature, what else do we look at? Uh, frequently? Um, in fact, you've said this lots of times and I really, I 100% agree is you gotta have to, you have to look back at history and, and, and kind of look what are some, is there historical precedents that, is this something that's been done in the past?

Speaker 1: (06:31)
Is there, and, and, and even beyond that is, does it make sense? Does it make sense? Is there a historical precedent? And then don't ever discount or dismiss clinical evidence right in front of us. You know, especially if it's a clinic or a procedure that has been used for quite some time. Um, there's, there's merit to that. You know, and especially when we look at the idea that, that hopefully you're starting to get from this is that we want to look at multiple sources of evidence to then start to see a pattern emerge is really the whole idea. You know, when a patient comes through the door, we'll use the same analogy. One of the things that we were taught in terms of developing a diagnosis for a patient is you don't want to rely entirely on one single test, whether it be an orthopedic or a neurological test.

Speaker 1: (07:17)
That's not the way it's done. If you go to any doctor who's doing it right, be it a medical doctor, a chiropractor, a physical therapist, uh, for heaven's sake, a dentist, you know, um, you're typically going to find at least the ones that are doing a thorough job. They're going to run a series of tests. They may look at blood work. They may do an evaluation of your muscles, your bones, your joints, your nervous system. They might look at a variety of these things and do these tests and then ultimately look and see kind of what pattern has emerged as a result of that. And that's what's going to ultimately going to steer them in that direction. Then obviously it goes without saying the patient history is going to be a big part of that puzzle as well. Right? So, so the idea being is that we don't want to put our, uh, entirely put everything into one.

Speaker 1: (08:03)
One thing we want to look in look for the pattern is really what we want to do. So, so that's at least a good place to kind of start. Um, and so we kind of already introduced this, this concept of regenerative medicine. Um, you know, the, the, the, the premise behind regenerative medicine is that what we're trying to do is tap into and allow the body to heal itself. Uh, something that, that you had said prior to prior to us doing this show here, you know, is it's been our hope for quite some time now for patients to understand the true nature of procedures like stem cell therapy. Far Too often. What do people think of stem cell therapy that we find, right? They, they think and actually more hope that it's like that magic bullet. Yeah. All right. They hope that it's just this, this is the missing piece that I've been missing for all these years and as soon as I plug it in, everything's going to be better.

Speaker 1: (08:53)
Yeah. How should patients view, uh, procedures or, or, uh, options like stem cell therapy? What should they ideally be focused on? The reality is, is while they are incredible and they, you know, from my own, it's my own personal experience, um, I, it made a huge difference for me. Um, but more, more often than not, or more appropriately, they should be looking at as more of a catalyst to again, help their body start healing, ignite that spark and then in a very localized area to focus that, attend our body's attention to healing. And I think most people can, can get on board with this idea that barring those few rare exceptions where a, and I shouldn't say rare, but, but less common, we'll say a exceptions to where it's been an acute injury, right? They slip, they fall, sports injury, et Cetera, et Cetera, things like that.

Speaker 1: (09:41)
More often than not, most of the cases that we see for a stem cell therapy joint, we'll, we'll say joint pain cases are problems that are chronic in nature, that have developed over time, right? And so most people could, if you really walk through with them, could tell you how they got there. You know, it's just been a slow and steady process. And the problem is that most people would, would know how to get back to a state of health if they could, meaning, uh, well, you, you got to get out and exercise. You've got to get moving. Uh, you gotta eat right. You know, all those things. But unfortunately for a lot of those things, uh, it's a catch 22 in the sense that I would get out run, I would get on an exercise if it weren't for the fact that it would flare it up too much and create more pain and then all of a sudden, you know, they're laid up for another week and that, uh, kills the motivation that much more than they seem to sink that much further.

Speaker 1: (10:32)
You know? So, so in terms of this idea of it being a catalyst, really what we're trying to help patients understand is use this as a, as a, as a golden opportunity, as a window that opens or a new door that opens for you, that would allow you the process to begin, uh, doing those things that will allow your body to heal itself. You know, regular exercise, uh, making those necessary dietary changes in your life and, or other lifestyle modifications that need to be made. You know, there's, there's something that we've kind of left out of here that you frequently mentioned and that is a really critical part about anybody getting better. And it is hope. Yeah. All right. So many people when they've had a chronic condition for, you know, and we see people all the time, this has been here for 15 years, 20 years I've had issues.

Speaker 1: (11:17)
And um, and literally they, they're like, I've done injections, I've done steroids done and nothing seems to help. I've, I've lost weight. And you name it. They're like, I've tried, I've done it. And it doesn't help but to say, listen, what we're finding is, you know, it conditions like yours respond incredibly well to these types of injections. And so literally that little bit of hope and desire is, uh, the capitalists. It's hugely important. It's that initial spark, right? So, so, okay, so let, let's talk, let's dive in a little bit more deep. You know, re under that umbrella of regenerative medicine, what are some of the things or procedures the patients might encounter? Now? Obviously step, let's start listing stem cell stem cell therapy at the top of the list, right? So it in general, but before we dive into that, let's just understand like the way the body, you know more, more specifically, the way the body begins, the healing process is utilizing its own stem cells, right?

Speaker 1: (12:10)
Every cell in your body at one point in time was a stem cell. Think of a stem cell as the template, right? That's the template that your body uses, right? So whether it be your skin, your bones, your cartilage, your eyes, your nerves, your blood, everything starts off as a stem cell. This blank template that then, uh, grows up, quote unquote, to become whatever specific cell type that it needs to be, to be part of, uh, the tissues that make up the various organ systems and or, uh, cells of our body. Right? So, so stem cell therapy, what's that? What's the story behind stem cell therapy in a nutshell, for people to understand? Stem cell therapy is basically getting a cluster of stem cells together, you know, in an injection and putting them into an, uh, like in a condensed area, localized area, localized area to stimulate healing in that spot.

Speaker 1: (12:59)
Right? And so where do, where do clinics that are utilizing stem cell therapy, where do they get stem cells from? So there's a variety. There's a few different ways of, of gathering those. One of those is from your own fat cells or bone or from the, yeah, they'll basically drill into the marrow of the bone and pull them out. And then there's a process of spinning amount and growing. Um, and yeah, exactly. And then the, um, a third way is from like umbilical cords. All right. Cord blood has stem cells in there that are undifferentiated. They're basically, they're there, haven't been marked. So they can be put in anybody without any adverse affects of rejection or things like that. And then again, those, those do an incredible job at helping people to recover from different arthritic conditions. Other, and you're going to find various camps that are going to promote, uh, no, this is the best way to do it.

Speaker 1: (13:48)
This other way you shouldn't do or vice versa, you know, uh, when you, when you're deriving or when you're pulling stem cells from your own body, the term you'll hear or see is autologous, these are the autologous stem cells coming from your own body. That has been a ton of research on those. Um, in fact, I would see the, the, the research is really compelling saying that that's a good way to go. However, there's also a ton of research on the other end using stem cells from say, um, uh, umbilical cord or umbilical cord blood or we'll just say cord related products that had been presented. The, the biggest thing that, that, that really I would tell patients is, is kind of two things. Number one, look at the company that is, that is that they're, that they're using. Um, and uh, looking at, uh, either, either looking at the company and seeing what kind of third party data they have to validate how many life cell live cells.

Speaker 1: (14:42)
And then also I think just as important if not more important, is look at the a clinical experiences they've had. Right? This, this is how long is this pump company been around? How long has this clinic been doing a stem cell procedures, one of the patient's experiencing, you know, don't, don't dismiss that. That's huge. That's really, really important. And so, um, so that, that, that's kind of in a nutshell, I think stem cell therapy, uh, what are some of the other regenerative medicine type things like PRP, which is platelet rich plasma where they draw your blood out, spin your platelets, pull them out, put them in the joint, that that kind of creates more of an inflammatory response. That again probably draws yourself. You're your own stem cells or other healing agents to the area. Um, those can be helpful as well. Generally that takes multiple treatments.

Speaker 1: (15:30)
Um, there are things like prolotherapy is, there are other amniotic products actually, which, um, well prolo let's back up real quick. Prolotherapy describe that for patients who may be prolotherapy is basically injecting something into a joint that creates a ton of inflammation, which again, inflammation. It's designed to irritate the joint and there's, there's a method to the madness. There's a reason for that. And that is that ultimately what we want to do is we want to stimulate some new inflammation, uh, to hopefully begin that process of, of, uh, healing, healing. Yeah. That repair process, inflammation kind of takes a bad rap. People think automatically inflammation is a bad thing. Uh, and, and inflammation is such a contextual conversation, you know, chronic longterm inflammation, not a good thing. Yeah. But Acute, localized inflammation with the intent or focus of beginning a healing cascade or that healing process is actually very, very good thing.

Speaker 1: (16:25)
So, so that kind of answers prolotherapy. And then you were, you were talking about amniotic products. Amniotic products are, um, basically kind of like the stem cell injection minus the life stem cells. And how do they derive the Amnio? Where do they get the amniotic products from? So they'll take those from the court as well as the amniotic membrane. Um, listened to, plus sites are derived from a placenta, uh, you know, uh, we're not using any fetal tissue or anything like that. Um, and they, they process these in very stringent, uh, controlled environments to where what you're getting are a, are pure cells that are undifferentiated. They haven't received any sort of marking to, you know, or any sort of, uh, uh, labeling saying that they belong to a specific individual, which means that they're, the term is their immune privilege. That means if you inject them into, uh, any human being, uh, the body is not going to recognize them as foreign and it's not going to create any sort of a, a, you know, a, an immune response or anything like that.

Speaker 1: (17:27)
Create any sort of a reaction to those. And the amnionic product that we use, uh, has been used over a million times. They've had over a million procedures that have been performed with this. So there's a overwhelming evidence they're showing it's extremely safe, it's extremely effective. And for us, one of the reasons why we offer this for our patients here in our community is it's a really affordable option for people. Uh, for a lot of people, stem cell therapy, as amazing as it is, it's just not affordable for a lot of people. And so what we've done is we've kind of opened the door, uh, to provide them with this regenerative procedure, um, at a fraction of the cost of stem cell therapy. And so it, it gets great results. The cool thing, buddy kind of already alluded to, maybe you can tell them a little bit about your experience utilizing cause because buddy is kind of the walking poster child for both stem cell therapy and uh, amniotic therapy.

Speaker 1: (18:18)
So yeah, I initially did an amniotic or uh, uh, stem cell injection. Kali has been a couple of years ago now. Um, prior to that I had injured my need doing something at crossfit and for well over a year, I want to say it was almost a year and a half. I was wearing knee braces. I was, um, you know, I'd leave the gym, just hobbling. I couldn't kneel down. I couldn't pull my heel to my, but I had a limited range of motion and uh, and I, and I had tried other therapies and I was doing other things that just kind of weren't getting me, I wasn't getting anywhere. I'm finally, we, uh, we brought, I got an injection into my knee of the stem cells and after about a month, I was like, I one day forgot to wear my knee brace at the gym. And I'm like, wait, my knee feels pretty good. And, and long story short is, since then I've run two half marathons.

Speaker 1: (19:08)
I've done a couple, I've done three Spartans actually. And um, basically, you know, in the Spartans you're crawling around on your hands and knees under Barb wire on rough, rocky soil and is like, and I did just fine. Right. And like, um, my knees, I mean I can kneel down, I can touch my yield and my, but like, it's good. It's really good. Um, loved it. Yeah, no, it's been amazing for me. And then, um, just, you know, and not, not too long ago, four months ago, and I saw, I injured my, again at crossfit doing pull ups, I hurt my, um, I actually had a, I call it a slap tear, which is basically kind of a, a labral tear wear of the cartilage in the shoulder. Exactly. So that, and again, that was well over a year of dealing with that and I tried the amniotic product that we're using now and I've have every bit as good a results from that as I did with the stem cells.

Speaker 1: (20:01)
And that's honestly what we're seeing with our patients as well is, is they're getting pretty darn comparable results, uh, using the amniotic product. Uh, maybe describe kind of how the amnion product works. A amniotic product. The beautiful thing about it is it, it comes dehydrated. There are a bunch of different growth factors in there. And so when the doc, um, basically they, they rehydrate it with céline, they draw it up in the syringe and then they put it into the joint capsule. And, um, and then, you know, for the first day, the first 24 hours for me, my shoulder was real sore. Yeah. But within, you know, with, with just, and that's you, you prepare yourself with a lot of these regenerative therapies. One of the common things is because inflammation is the factor is the kind of secret are key to this process. There is going to be some soreness for the first day, sometimes even as many, we've seen patients for the first week, sometimes that can be pretty sore.

Speaker 1: (20:54)
Um, but the, the way that the amnionic product works is it really acts like the term that we use to help describe it as, it acts like a stem cell magnet, even though we're not injecting a live stem cells to that area, what's happening is the process that takes place in that joint is such that it begins attracting the body's own stem cells to begin that repair process. And so it was pretty, pretty incredible. That's awesome. Yeah. Awesome. So, so hopefully the answer is clear. The conclusion originally, the, the question that we pose is, should you get stem cell therapy, uh, assuming you're a candidate for this procedure? Uh, the answer is a resounding yes, absolutely. It is such an incredible option with a, you know, such a, a heavy skewed, uh, you know, risk to benefit ratio, skewed in favor of the benefits, the benefits far outweigh the risks.

Speaker 1: (21:43)
Um, huge in this area, you know, and especially if you're somebody who's on the fence considering the possibility of, of surgery, either joint replacement or some other type of surgery, uh, explore this procedure first before you do that. See if you're a candidate, see if it's a viable option for you. And if it is absolutely incredible. Anything you want to add? Uh, no, other than the fact that like, I would do this again and again with the results I've had. And I think it's, like you said, because of the, the benefits far outweigh the risks that are involved here. Um, there's no, you're not causing any longterm trauma of any kind. Yeah. So I would do this again and again and again and again. We're going to kind of, I want to circle back on one subject that we kind of just hit on, but I want to just end on this emphasis that the idea again is this, this isn't a magic bullet.

Speaker 1: (22:31)
It's not intended to be some, you know, Harry Potter Wizard rehear that you can rely on to just fix everything for you. At the end of the day, the, the, the operative process is that the body heals itself. There are certain things that we do or need to do to assist and help the body in that process. Obviously we talked about it. Most of these are our lifestyle factors that aren't really, shouldn't come as a huge surprise to people, you know, uh, consistent, regular exercise, consistency with fueling yourself properly. You know, the things that we talk about as these five fundamentals of health that we talk about, those are the things, and so view regenerative medicine as the catalyst that's really kind of the bottom line. View it as the catalyst in allowing you to really get to the best place possible for you to live your best life ever. That's really the hope. You know, obviously this show is helping you kind of showing you through an evidence based Lens how to live your best life possible. So, uh, hopefully this has been valuable to you guys. Any final thoughts that you wanted to add in the shell? So join us on our next episode. Yeah, we're excited to share it with you guys and we'll talk to you later.

Speaker 2: (23:36)
Oh, thanks for listening to the health fundamentals podcast. Be sure to subscribe so that you stay in the loop and in the note with all of the cutting edge health information that we share, if you know other people that could benefit from this information, please share it with them as well. Also, be sure to give us a review. These really help us to ultimately help more people. Last but not least, if you have questions that you want answered live on the show, or if you have ideas for topics that you would like us to cover, please shoot us an email and let us know at info@thehealthfundamentals.com.