Back to School as a Health Reset

Transcript Generated by AI.

Announcer: 0:00

Welcome to the MedEvidence Monday Minute Radio Show hosted by Kevin Geddings of WSOS St. Augustine Radio and powered by ENCORE Research Group. Each Monday morning, dr Michael Koren calls in to bring you the latest medical updates with insightful discussions. Medevidence is where we help you navigate the real truth behind medical research, with both a clinical and research perspective. So sit back, relax and get ready to learn about the truth behind the data in medicine and healthcare. This is MedEvidence.

Dr. Michael Koren: 0:31

The back-to-school advertisements have started and I saw a couple of advertisements for parties to celebrate the end of summer and going back to school and it certainly got me thinking about what my schedule is going to look like as the season's changed. Do you have a situation where going back to school affects your day-to-day schedule, Kevin?

Kevin Geddings: 0:51

I'd say the big change, at least here in Radioland, is traffic. You know, here in St. John's County our traffic is almost more dictated by school than it is office work hours. It's interesting.

Dr. Michael Koren: 1:02

Yeah, I'd agree with that. My commute in the morning is definitely impacted by the start of the school year, no doubt.

Kevin Geddings: 1:07

Yeah, yeah. But it is kind of the time when people say, okay, this is a reset button, if you will, and the start of school coming up next week, it points to a lot of different ways that people should think about this. Right, even if you're way beyond the going back to school era, it's a time to maybe think about maybe learning some new things and looking at some things differently, right.

Dr. Michael Koren: 1:25

For sure, yeah, so I always like to tell my staff and others that things don't happen automatically.

Dr. Michael Koren: 1:33

Things happen because they're on a schedule and when you go back to school, of course your schedules are changing and you're being put into a more disciplined approach to your day-to-day both for the students and for the parents and for the other people who are affected by the students and the parents.

Dr. Michael Koren: 1:48

So I think that's true, and part of this is in the week that we have in St. John's County before the back-to-school season officially begins, it's a good time to look at your schedule and think about what am I going to do for my health care over the course of the next year? And I think you can argue that the back-to-school transition is even more important than the year-end transition. You know we talk about New Year's resolutions, but actually I think you can make more of a difference by thinking about your schedule now, during the back-to-school season, and I would certainly encourage people to think about that from a health standpoint. Not to mention the fact that when you go back to school, all of a sudden you're now indoors more, you are congregating with other people that could spread viruses, and certainly a big part of our mission ENCORE is is to help people prevent the complications of virus spread. So, as you know, kevin, we're doing studies right now to help people with that concept.

Kevin Geddings: 2:40

Yeah, absolutely, and you can learn more about that too by going to EncoreDocs. com. Encoredocs. com, you can also call and talk to a live human being who will answer any of your questions about participating in a clinical trial by just calling locally, 904-730-0166, 904-730-0166. Dr. Koren, we laymen have this perception that once the kids start going back to school especially the young ones who are in elementary school years that they come home and spread all these viruses, that we catch a cold. We caught a cold because Johnny brought it to first grade. Is that really true?

Dr. Michael Koren: 3:18

Yeah, it's much more than a perception.

Dr. Michael Koren: 3:19

It's a reality and, as you and I have talked about, the cold and flu season starts earlier in Florida, so the back-to-school scheduling has a big impact in the way viruses are spread. And, as we've talked before, we have a really fascinating study right now that's sponsored by the Department of Defense through a group called BARDA, which is actually responsible for protecting the US from bioterrorism, and they're super interested in this new vaccine platform that we're working with. That is actually an oral booster. It works by giving people a pill that elicits an immune response against COVID, and it's a fundamentally different type of treatment than the mRNA vaccines, and we'd really encourage people to learn about it for a number of reasons, including the fact that this is actually a priority of the government. This is a vaccine that was originally put on hold because of DOGE, but it's so important to the government, despite budget cuts, that it's being funded now as we speak, so it's an opportunity for people to get protected against viruses and to support bioterrorism approaches to hopefully protect all the citizens.

Kevin Geddings: 4:47

Now this is critical stuff. It's a great way to experience amazing health care and also that sense of hey, I'm, I'm participating, I'm contributing to overall societal health and improvements. You can be a part of the whole learning process right as we get ready for school and improvements.

Dr. Michael Koren: 5:05

You can be a part of the whole learning process right as we get ready for school. Absolutely, and the other thing that you alluded to is that the whole back-to-school concept is also kind of getting out of that lazy mode of the summer and getting back to thinking again and to studying again, and certainly that's part of your mission. And I have to say, is that again, and certainly that's part of your mission, and I have to say is that, you know, I'm kind of a notoriously cheap person. So you know, these, these bathing trunks that I had my eyes on since April have finally gone on sale this week. So I'm going to go ahead and buy them this week and then celebrate the one week of summer that I get in my bathing trunks.

Dr. Michael Koren: 5:40

But it also is a reminder that things move quickly, the seasons move quickly and really to enjoy your best health requires you to be more in advance than I was in terms of buying these bathing trunks. So now is the time to think about the cold and flu season. Now is the time to think about how you're going to keep your weight under control. Now is the time to think about how you're going to control your cholesterol. So these are all programs that are on at ENCORE. I'd love people to give us a call and figure out if they fit into what we're doing.

Kevin Geddings: 6:10

Yeah, no, absolutely. With this reset comes a re-examination of your health status and what you want to do about obesity issues and things like that, and they can help you. They have clinical trials ongoing on more topics than we can possibly mention. Go to EncoreDocs. com. Encoredocs. com and of course all of us, just about every couple of days, are going online and looking up something on the Google machine relating to healthcare. Or somebody else has been diagnosed with something, or we hear something in the news about vaccines or whatever, and we Google it and that information, I would argue quite honestly, more often than not is not reliable. But there's a great place on the Internet where you can get reliable health information Right, Dr. Koren.

Dr. Michael Koren: 6:49

Yeah, our MedEvidence platform is really taking off. I'm so proud of the group that's put that together. We're about to launch actually a national initiative, so we'll be reaching out to multiple communities around the United States and helping people understand the truth behind the data. As you point out, when you do a Google search or an AI search, more often than not you're getting information that serves some advertiser, and one of the policies of MedEv idence you'll find this interesting, Kevin is that we don't accept random advertisement. We'll only accept advertisement that has a net positive health benefit in the view of our board of advisors.

Dr. Michael Koren: 7:29

So before we would actually advertise anything, we run it by the board of advisors and say do you agree that this has a net positive benefit? So if you're trying to hawk some funky health treatment that doesn't have any data behind it, we're not going to accept it. On the other hand, if you have studies and really good science to show that something is helpful, and including things that are not necessarily medicines like exercise, going to the gym, healthy foods then we're going to be all over it. So hopefully this resonates with advertisers that really want to show that they do want to make a difference and they want to prove also that there is a truth behind the data. There are ways of knowing that something is truly beneficial for people, and there's a lot of stuff out there that's just fluff that we want to avoid.

Kevin Geddings: 8:11

Yeah, absolutely Well, and that's exactly the tagline, the truth behind the data you can trust. Medevidence. com, medevidence. com. Check out that website. We would strongly request if you will, or help us out by spreading the word about it. So when you talk to friends and family and they start talking about researching different health issues vaccine health, things like that say, hey, take a look at medevidence. com. That's medevidence. com, Dr. Michael Koren. Any closing thoughts?

Dr. Michael Koren: 8:40

No, again last week before school starts in St. Johns County. So think about your schedule, moving ahead and enjoy this last wonderful week of summer.

Kevin Geddings: 8:49

There you go, Dr. Koren. Be safe out there. We'll speak with you next week.

Dr. Michael Koren: 8:52

Have a great week, Kevin.

Announcer: 8:53

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