Protecting Your Heart with Proven Strategies

Narrator: 0:00

Welcome to the MedEvidence Monday Minute Radio Show hosted by Kevin Gettings 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 health care.

Kevin Geddings: 0:30

On the studio line right now, our resident cardiologist and research scientist, medical doctor, Dr. Michael Koren, is with us a big part of our family here at WSOS and, of course, leads the efforts at ENCORE Research Center. They do leading edge medical research right here in St. Augustine and St. John's County with clinical trials that you can participate, indeed trials that deal with heart health, right, Dr. Koren.

Dr. Michael Koren: 0:57

As a cardiologist, we are very, very focused on keeping people out of the hospital, preventing heart attacks, preventing strokes, and with the breakthroughs in our research, I think we've been successful.

Kevin Geddings: 1:09

Yeah, I've meant to ask you this before, but so we are both baby boomers and so you get to that certain age and of course, you're an expert in this field. Every time you get a little indigestion, do you start thinking hmm, I wonder what's going on in that old ticker of mine.

Dr. Michael Koren: 1:24

Oh, no doubt. We all know that heart disease is the number one killer in the United States and other Western European countries and in all parts of the developed world. We know that heart disease can sometimes present itself in unusual ways, so you don't always get the classic tight feeling in the chest. Sometimes, it present itself as jaw pain or something weird in your shoulder. So sure, there are ways of determining whether or not you're having a heart symptom, but your best protection is to make sure that you're on the proper therapy to treat your cardiovascular risk factors.

Kevin Geddings: 1:59

Yeah, and of course that leads into dealing with lipid issues, statins and all that. A lot of folks out there listening, myself included take a statin every evening. That's proven to be very effective, correct?

Dr. Michael Koren: 2:14

Absolutely, s tatins are. I call it the mother's milk of cardiology.

Kevin Geddings: 2:20

Right.

Dr. Michael Koren: 2:21

You can't get anything better than that in terms of reducing your risk of heart disease and stroke, and there are some people that have some tolerance issues with statins. There's stuff that circulates on the internet about statins maybe not being as great as the doctors say they are, but the truth is the data support them really, really strongly, and if you are somebody that has a high cholesterol, if you're somebody that has heart disease or stroke risk, I would strongly advocate speaking with your physician about being on statins. And then there are some people who are on statins and still aren't where they should be in terms of their cholesterol, and those people should consider alternative therapies like the ones we're studying in research as we speak.

Kevin Geddings: 3:03

Yeah, and indeed if you are someone who perhaps has some form of heart disease or you have high cholesterol or you just want to get screened, you can reach out to ENCORE Research Center. They're located really close to UF Flagler Hospital here in St. Augustine and right there in the Whetstone building. Go to ENCOREdocs. com for more information. ENCOREdocs. com and before we wrap things up with Dr. Koren, I will give you a telephone number. A lot of mixed reviews about the $7 million apiece for TV commercials l ast night. Some didn't really seem to smack of a lot of market testing, but maybe somewhere over tested. Who knows what were your thoughts?

Dr. Michael Koren: 3:41

It's interesting you bring that up. So as I was watching it, I was noticing that the predominant theme was just highlighting celebrities. There's so many commercials that were just about the celebrities, and this gets into the concept of what influences people. Are people more influenced by other people or are they influenced by ideas? So, for example, the couch potato commercial was clearly an idea, and then you have other commercials that show Travis Kelce and Tom Brady. So what is it that will influence people? So, based on last night. I think that the advertisers of the world think it's people that influence people, but I think it's actually a combination. I think people can also be influenced by ideas and right now, for the reasons we're in a place where the influencers think it's other people that will influence you, rather than ideas.

Kevin Geddings: 4:39

Yeah, and at the bottom line of all this, of course, is that what you're engaged in, especially when it comes to clinical research, clinical trials and various medications and procedures it's all fact-based Right.

Dr. Michael Koren: 4:52

It is, and I think that's really important. So the downside of being influenced by other people is how do you know they're telling you the truth? How do you know that they don't have some vested interest of their own? And that's why you have to set up experiments, you have to look at things critically, you have to do hypothesis testing to see when in fact it's the truth, and then, once you do your testing, then you have to put it together and then maybe have a human being help you understand what the implications are. So this concept of being influenced by ideas versus people is a really interesting one. At the end of the day, it's a combination of the two that gets you in the best place. And we believe that our system of doing healthcare testing is really extremely powerful to help people get on the right track and really discover the truth in healthcare.

Kevin Geddings: 5:46

Speaking of getting to the bottom line of the truth, of course you can participate in these trials that are fact-based and trying to find the truth, just like Dr. Koren was mentioning. But truth overall in terms of healthcare information is hard to find. Really can't trust just Dr. Google, but go to this website, MedEvidence. com and if they do, Dr. Koren, what are they going to find there?

Dr. Michael Koren: 6:07

You can find a series of podcasts and other educational presentations that break down issues. We like to just have two knowledgeable physicians talking about an issue and, instead of hearing a sales pitch, you're going to hear a discussion and then people can come to the conclusions that they want to come to in terms of the credibility of the people who are speaking. And I've led a lot of these podcasts and I encourage all of our guests to talk about the facts, to talk about the science, to talk about the research that's been done and also to be frank about the things that maybe aren't so great about their ideas. I think that's a very powerful concept that is underutilized. When we write a scientific paper, kevin, there's always a part of that scientific paper in the middle. We haven't talked about the limitations of the study. What we know that other people should know about why we may not be accurate, and that really pounds ideas into shape. So if an idea can withstand the scrutiny of other people looking at it through the peer review process and self-reflect, then you know that that idea is solid. If the idea can't stand up to it, well so be it. Then you move on to the next idea. So I think that's a very important principle that we like to talk about in mid-evidence. That I think is very valuable for the listeners and very valuable for people in general when they try to discern what's real and what's not.

Kevin Geddings: 7:32

Now two websites we'd love for you just to consider and, once you get in front of a screen, check them both out MedEvidence. com that's MedEvidence. com to get what Dr. Koren was just now talking about. And then also, if you're interested in potentially participating in a clinical trial on any sort of it there's so many issues out there that they're working on too many for us to mention. You really need to check out the website ENCOREdocs. com. That's spelled E-N-C-O-R-E, docs. com. Or you can call this number here locally 904-730-0166. Punch that into your cell phone 904-730-0166 for ENCORE Research Center right here in St. Augustine, in St John's County. Dr. Michael Koren, we appreciate your time this morning. We hope you have a great day and a great week, okay.

Dr. Michael Koren: 8:21

Take care, Kevin, and enjoy Heart Month.

Narrator: 8:24

Thanks for joining the MedEvidence podcast. To learn more, head over to MedEvidence. com or subscribe to our podcast on your favorite podcast platform.