The Midlife Rebel Podcast
Welcome to Midlife Rebel , the podcast for women in their 40s and 50s who are done playing by the old rules.
Here, we redefine what it means to thrive in midlife—where health, purpose, and freedom meet.
Each week, we explore the intersection of body, mind, and spirit through honest conversations about holistic health, emotional healing, and awakening to your next chapter. With expert guests, soulful stories, and practical wisdom, you’ll find the tools and inspiration to live with more vitality, authenticity, and joy.
Whether you’re reinventing yourself, reclaiming your wellbeing, or simply craving deeper meaning, Midlife Rebel invites you to embrace your evolution and design life on your own terms.
Contact Nadine: https://lifehealththeuniverse.podcastpage.io/contact
The Midlife Rebel Podcast
Hot Saunas, Cold Showers, And Fewer Doughnuts - Dr. Bill Bruno’s Longevity Blueprint
A routine scan changed everything....
When Dr. Bill Bruno, a world-renowned plastic surgeon, discovered significant coronary plaque at 49, he didn’t just rely on prescriptions—he rebuilt his life from the inside out.
In this energising conversation, we explore the Longevity Pyramid Bill now teaches: sleep, nutrition, and movement at the base; targeted testing in the middle; and social health, stress management, smart supplementation, and—only at the top—medications and advanced therapies.
We dig into why sleep is the keystone habit for fat loss, muscle gain, and stable mood—and how simple circadian tweaks can transform energy and recovery. Bill shares his nutrition guardrails (whole foods, enough protein, real fibre) and the training formula that preserves muscle and extends healthspan: 2–4 days of strength work, zone 2 cardio for endurance, and short bursts of intensity for vitality.
You’ll also learn about smarter lab testing—from ApoB and particle numbers to fasting insulin—and when to consider calcium scoring, AI-enhanced CT angiography, DEXA, or full-body MRI for prevention.
Beyond the biomarkers, Bill highlights the underestimated pillars of longevity: social connection, purpose, and stress regulation. We talk air and water quality, evening light hygiene, and device boundaries—practical tweaks that quietly improve sleep, hormones, and metabolic balance.
Finally, Bill outlines his minimalist supplement stack (magnesium, vitamin D3, omega-3, creatine, and whey) and explains when tools like sauna, cold therapy, red light, and peptides can elevate results—once the foundations are solid.
If you’re ready to trade quick fixes for a lifestyle that sustains you through midlife and beyond, this blueprint is your roadmap to lasting vitality.
Subscribe, share with a friend who needs a nudge, and leave a review to help more people find Life, Health & The Universe.
You can find Bill's full profile in our Guest Directory
https://lifehealththeuniverse.beam.ly/person/bill-bruno
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Welcome to Life, Health, and the Universe. Bringing you stories that connect us, preventative and holistic health practices to empower us, and esoteric wisdom to enlighten us. We invite you to visit our website where you can access the podcast, watch on YouTube, and find all of our guests in the guest directory. Visit life, health, the universe.podcastpage.io. Now let's get stuck into this week's episode. Today I'm joined by Dr. Bill Bruno, a world-renowned plastic surgeon whose career has taken him to some of the finest medical facilities on the planet. Nearly a decade ago, Dr. Bruno faced a wake-up call. A coronary artery calcium scan revealed signs of heart disease. And rather than relying solely on pharmaceuticals, he chose to overhaul his lifestyle focusing on nutrition, fitness, and stress management. His experience sparked a profound passion for preventative medicine, wellness, and longevity, which he's going to share with us today. Welcome. Can I call you Bill or do I call you Dr. Bruno?
SPEAKER_02:No, Bill is fine. Thank you, Nadine. I appreciate the opportunity.
SPEAKER_00:I'm really looking forward to this conversation. As I said, offline, this is a real passion of mine as well. Something that I'm super interested in. I'm interested in the practices myself. Um, and just um I love the fact that you're sharing this message because there are so many simple things that we can do that can have a massive impact on our health and on our health span, right? Which is something that you talk about. Do you want to start with um your story, your experience, and how you got to um got to this place where you're promoting um this stuff?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, just you know, a brief background about me. You know, I'm a I'm a practicing plastic surgeon here in Los Angeles. And uh about eight, nine years ago, I discovered I had high cholesterol on a routine blood test, which led to some testing, which led to, as you mentioned in the intro, a coronary artery calcium scan. And for the viewers, that's basically a CAT scan of the heart where they don't have to inject any contrast, and it gives you an image and they look for calcifications, which are sign of signs of atherosclerosis or plaque in the coronary vessels. And at the time I was, I believe, 49 years old. I had a very high amount of plaque, which led to another test called the CTN geogram, where they do inject some contrast, and that gives you a really good image of any degree of blockage in the vessels. So essentially, instead of just taking, you know, um a statin to lower my cholesterol, I decided to do lifestyle changes and I took a deep dive into nutrition and exercise. And I became, I guess you'd say, vegan or like 99%, you know, plant-based uh at that time while I was reevaluating everything and just tried to do more lifestyle interventions. I guess you'd say it was I wasn't really overweight, but I was like cardio metabolically unhealthy, almost like skinny fat, I guess what you or the listeners might identify with. And um yeah, so over this past eight or nine years, I started sharing these uh strategies and tactics with my plastic surgery patients because I realized, at least here in America, a lot of patients they're not getting this from their primary care doctors. They're not getting advice about nutrition and sleep and exercise and stress management. So I started doing a lot more wellness posts on this. Then I created a digital course on how to create your own longevity blueprint, where it's like pre-recorded content of videos that goes into it. And then I created a coaching program to help people with their body composition. I call it the body recomposition formula. So that's just a quick sort of summary of how I got to where I'm where I'm at now. And I still I love doing plastic surgery, but I realized, you know, people come to me, they want to look good. But what they really also probably need is how do I live better and live longer? Because, you know, it's one thing to look good, but I I also couldn't help but give them advice because I'm a doctor first and foremost, and a plastic surgeon second. I want to give them advice on how to, you know, extend their health span, as you mentioned earlier, which is the quality of your life, along with your lifespan, which is the length of your life.
SPEAKER_00:Amazing. I yeah, I think that that's a really interesting uh point that you made. Um uh just about people going in for, you know, coming to you for for their aesthetics, but that you actually started to see that there was a need for for the other side of things. Um, because really to get the the most benefit out of those things, um you need both, right? Well you might you might argue that you don't need plastic surgery, but no.
SPEAKER_02:Well, I think you know, I would say this if someone can improve their health, they will also end up looking better.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
SPEAKER_02:If someone loses fat, gains muscle, sleeps better, the aesthetics will follow the healthy life. Although some people come to me and they're like, look, I just want a tummy tuck. I get that, but along the way, I'm like, yeah, I think you should be doing this, or you could think about eating this way. So it's it's it's something where some people they don't necessarily say, I want to live longer, but I think most people do. They're just not thinking those terms.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and I think it's really interesting that we that uh well, I love the fact that you have chosen this path because often people don't realize that they have this um myriad of options to take control of their own health. When you had your um all of your tests and you found that you had calcification, um no doubt there was a little bit of well, shock, fear, worry about what was happening. And the option that you were given was medication. Was there yeah, was there any indication that lifestyle, like did you were you given any recommendations with that?
SPEAKER_02:You know, not really. I think the traditional recommendations like limit your red meat consumption, you know, eat less um salt. But beyond that, no, not really. And and I'm not saying that there isn't a role for medication, because depending on your degree of disease, I think there is a role for um cholesterol-owing medications in the right cases. But um yeah, I mean, at least in the United States, there's really little to no education in medical school on nutrition as it's and I went to medical school 30 years ago, but even now, I believe it's about 20% of med schools have, and it's only a few hours, it's like four or five hours on strange things like scurvy, how to prevent you know, these diseases that we don't really have anymore, but you just have to know them for a test question or like a weird, you know, vitamin deficiency. So um hopefully that's changing or is about to change, maybe, um uh in the United States uh, you know, medical education system. But no, to your question, it was just really here's a drug or here's a class of drugs, and that was it. And I just really took it upon myself and sort of went really deep into the nutrition. And, you know, even more recently, just the more I learn, I've evolved, I've reintroduced like pasture-raised eggs, I think are okay. Grass-fed beef, I feel is okay for me. But you know, I get my blood checked every quarter. So I'm looking at these things, and that's something I would share with people is don't guess, test, right? That's the saying. Like, don't just go to the doctor once a year, get your blood work done. They say it's quote unquote normal. See you next year. I think if you're making changes and you're adding foods, you're adding anything to your program, reevaluate and just, you know, be proactive. Go to your doctor, bring this information to your doctor and say, hey, what about this medication? What about this blood test? Or, you know, should I be getting a calcium artery, you know, CT scan? Which I think everyone, anyone over 40 should be getting that because just to remind the audience, heart disease is the number one killer of men and women in the US and in the world. So I'm sure in Australia the same. So sorry to ramble on like that.
SPEAKER_00:No, no, no, it's great. Um, can you share with us before we sort of kick in, and we're gonna go through some of the recommendations that you give in your um free ebook and in the course that you've created? Uh, we're gonna kind of dive into some of those practices and and how we can start to take control of our lifestyle and our health. But can you give us a kind of a comparison? Where you were at, what was your lifestyle like when you found out you had coronary artery disease, if that's or calcification, um, compared to what you your your practices are like now and how you feel and what the results have been. So just a big question, but I kind of want to you know give give people the this uh you know this sense of what we're actually capable of.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I mean, at that time, you know, I guess I was eating a typical standard American diet, you know, lots of ultra-processed food, um, lots of um high sugar starch food, eating out a lot, um, wasn't really doing any structured, you know, exercise or you know, weight training, or wasn't even thinking about tracking steps or anything like that, would wasn't taking sleep seriously, would go to sleep, uh, fall asleep at midnight or one in the morning watching television, um, and just those those basics there of nutrition exercise sleep, just totally disrespecting all of them. And I wasn't getting testing done. And it was this this one cholesterol test at the age of 49 that led me to the calcium scan, that led me to the CT angiogram. And but prior to that, I probably had my blood checked in over 10 or 15 years, because as they say, you know, doctors are usually the worst patients. So I just was neglecting it. Um, but yeah, to answer your question, that's kind of where I was, and now it's completely different, you know, wearing an aura ring, being mindful, tracking sleep, tracking steps, you know, weight training three or four times a week, you know, being really mindful about my food, even though I'm not vegan anymore. I'd say I'm probably 80% plant-based, and eating more whole foods and trying to avoid a lot of the ultra-processed foods that we have here, as well as I'm sure you have in Australia as well, and uh trying to now minimize seed oils and vegetable oil, you know, things that weren't even on my radar eight, nine years ago that are now uh routine. And I think it's those daily choices that I made that became habits. I think that's really what longevity is. It's not fancy technology, it's the daily choices you make. And we can all do this, and a lot of it is um relatively inexpensive or free, you know, getting morning sunlight. Like I didn't know that was a thing. Um, increasing your step count, walking after for 10 or 15 minutes after each meal. These are all things that like we can all do now that are easy to implement. It just takes a while to develop those habits. But yeah, to your question, that was a transitional period where I was like just eating and eating, like I was eating, you know, sweets and eating chicken tenders and you know, eating the diet of a child at times. And you know, being a doctor, you know, you're eating uh in hospital cafetiers a lot as a resident, late hours, you know, horrible eating practices, which is sort of bled over into my late 30s and into my 40s. But um nonetheless, now that I'm aware of that, I've changed it. I hope that helps answer the question.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, definitely. And in terms of the results that you have uh from a health perspective, have you reversed that calcification?
SPEAKER_02:The the so I did get the study repeated about seven years later, the CT angiogram, and it's all stabilized. Okay. So when they did these CT angiograms eight years ago, they didn't have the advantage of AI. So now they it's called a clearly scan. So it uses AI and it can actually tell you with a lot more um certainty what degree of stenosis you have, like 28% blockage of this particular coronary vessel. And my soft plaques, which are the unstable plaques, a lot of them have converted to hard plaques, which are more stable. And I have to credit the plant-based diet and the lifestyle changes for that. And this is a test I'll probably repeat in another, you know, uh four to five years. But um, a lot of my inflammatory markers and things like that have improved and have come down. And, you know, as far as body composition, I get a DEXA scan a couple times a year. So looking into that, you know, increasing muscle mass, decreasing uh body fat and visceral fat. So yeah, there are tests and markers to assess that. But also, yeah, the way I feel is much better, sleeping better. Like, so there's subjective things and objective markers that have all proved that these are having benefits. And yeah, I feel at 57 I feel and look probably as good as I have in, I don't know, a long time.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, amazing. Um, okay, let's talk about lifestyle. I'm just looking at my notes. What will I go? Where will I go? And genetics. Because I think also uh, well, I've certainly had this messaging from my GP when I was in my I like got into my mid-40s and they were like, oh, well, your mum had heart disease, your dad's had a stroke, you're high risk. Is that true?
SPEAKER_02:In most cases, no. I will say there is, yes, there are a minority of familial, you know, um, genetic disorders that you may get um obviously from your parents, but you know, things like high cholesterol. Well, there's familial hypercholesterolemia, but that only affects one in 250 people. So it's pretty rare that you're gonna have that. I think what most people do get from their parents are habits, good or bad. Like you grow up in a household, I was Italian American. So we had a lot of pasta, a lot of, you know, breads and that kind of thing. So I inherited those habits, and a lot of people inherit practices and traditions, I would say more than actual diseases from their family. Um so to that point, you know, you're not a victim if your parent died of a disease or if they had dementia. It doesn't mean you're gonna get it. Based on studies, we now know about 80% of your longevity is under the control of your lifestyle. So let's say 20% roughly. Some people say 10, some people say 30. I would just say to think in big numbers, like 20% of your lifespan, the quality of your life may be genetic, but you have a big control over that 80%. So this is where epigenetics comes in. Like if you're eating well, you're not smoking, you maintain the good body weight, you're not drinking alcohol, you can control the expression of those genes. And maybe you were dealt a bad genetic hand, but you can control how that hand is played out, so to speak, by eating well and sleeping and reducing stress and so on. So that's how I would respond to that. Like, don't don't feel that you're um you know bound to get whatever disease that your parents or grandparents may have succumbed to.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Uh uh that's pretty much what I told my GP at the time. I was like, I think I'm okay. Like my lifestyle is completely different to my parents. So, like, and yeah, I was pretty happy with where I was at. So I'm I'm glad that you've affirmed that for us.
SPEAKER_02:Well, you know, the saying is genetics loads the gun and lifestyle pulls the trigger.
SPEAKER_00:Oh, okay. Yeah, that makes sense. Okay, you talked about um heart disease, coronary artery disease, and that's one of the biggest killers. But you also just mentioned dementia. Before we get stuck into like some of the practices that that you recommend that can help people to improve their lifestyles, can we can I just want to kind of bring it to people's attention? Like these are the things that we can prevent. So heart disease, but dementia, is that something that is a lifestyle-related disease?
SPEAKER_02:Dementia is one of the, I'd say, top four chronic diseases that are the top killers probably here in the US and in the world. And yes, there is a component of that that might be genetic, and people can get their ApoE, you know, alleles checked. But you can, again, you can with lifestyle control how that's gonna be expressed or how early you might, let's say, succumb to Alzheimer's by exercise, by nutrition, by sleep, and all the other lifestyle changes I mentioned earlier. Absolutely, you can, you're not at the mercy of your genes. Like, well, I'm gonna get Alzheimer's, nothing I can do. For example, exercise is very well known to increase the size of your hippocampus, which is an area of the brain responsible for memory. So, whether that's cardio training, whether this is resistance training, you can improve that. Uh, dementia is felt to be it's called type 3 diabetes. This is poor metabolic control of our blood sugars. So, if you can control your blood sugars and not uh develop, say, type 2 diabetes and later in life, and maybe you're eating more whole foods and you're not eating these refined sugars where you're gonna have high blood sugars running, you can uh say prevent or maybe just delay the onset, maybe that's a better way to say it, of Alzheimer's. So, yeah, I absolutely think you can control that, and along with dementia, and I mentioned type 2 diabetes and even some cancers you can control with exercise, with proper diet. And of course, heart disease is the first one. And those are probably the top four, let's say, chronic diseases that at least in America are the cause of like most deaths that people barring accidental injuries, overdoses, car accidents, those are kind of what we're talking about, really, is how do we prevent chronic disease? And it's funny that if you do these lifestyle basics of eating mostly whole foods, let's say more plants than meat, if you're exercising, sleeping, well, that's going to treat all of the chronic diseases, not just it's not there's like a heart diet or a diabetes diet or a dementia diet. They're all kind of similar.
SPEAKER_00:Let's get into this the pyramid. So, in your online course, you've created a pyramid that helps us to um determine where we need to start and some of the things that can help to contribute towards improving our lifestyle and taking control of our health span, our health and our health span. Um, you've just mentioned the the top three, although they're at the base of the pyramid. Um nutrition, exercise, and sleep. Out of those three, what would you say is the number one? And how would you go about approaching that with someone?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you know, it's it's a hard question to rank those three. So again, if you visualize the pyramid, you say, okay, here's the base of it nutrition, exercise, and sleep. Um would you like to think are they all equally important? You know, I I guess I would say this sleep might be the most important because think about it. How long can you go without eating? Well, you could go several days. You could go many days without exercising. How long can you go without sleeping? One day, two days, you're ruined, right? You you cannot kill you, right? Right. It could kill you. I think on record, the longest person may want 11 days and died. So you could go weeks and weeks, right, without eating, generally speaking. And people, many people go months without exercising. Lifetime. Um yeah, but no, I would say sleep is probably the most um underestimated, it probably gets the least respect. It is getting more attention these days. Like uh Matthew Walker has a great book out there, he has a podcast. Um and I think if people even focused on that and they said, Well, I want to optimize my sleep, I want to protect it, I want to get seven and a half to eight hours of sleep, what you'll find is you're better able to perform in exercise, you're better able to be more productive in work, you'll make better food decisions, and those better food decisions will lead to better performance and exercise. And if you exercise, then you're gonna sleep better. You know, it's all sort of interrelated. But yeah, if you asked me, I guess I would say sleep is the most important. But I guess I should say that they're equal along the base of that, and not to dive too deep into each one. Like in the course we go into these in a lot more depth. But you know, nutrition, try to eat mostly whole foods, um, single ingredient foods. Uh, try to eat optimize your protein intake. Most people are under eating protein. Try to eat about a gram of protein per pound of ideal body weight. Try to eat about 30 grams of fiber a day. Most people, I know in America, are way under eating fiber. They're not even close. And that 25 to 30 grams is the minimum. And I think it's like two to three percent of Americans are hitting that. Try to eat a couple fermented foods a day. This is good, right, for the microbiome. Um, along, you know, exercise. Um most people aren't doing enough strength training, right? We now know, or now learning, right? Uh, having more muscle mass leads to a longer life. The more muscle you have, the longer you'll live and the better you'll live. So weight training two to four times a week, some, you know, the steady state cardio, so-called zone two cardio, maybe an hour of that a week, and then maybe you're doing some sprinting or high intensity in there. If I could only pick one there, weight training for longevity and for and for weight management as well, for weight loss. And then the sleep, you know, I mentioned that before, but I think most people, because they're on their tablets, they're on their phones, they're on their computers, they're watching TV late at night, this disruption in their circadian rhythm is really a big cause of a lot of the disease that we have, the chronic disease, the the the weight gain that we see, and which leads to other things, type 2 diabetes. I think if we could just I wear like these blue blocker glasses at night. I've been wearing them for maybe seven or eight years now. Try to go to bed at the same time, wake up at the same time. But not to go too far into each one, I think that's where I would begin with someone, and the the course tries to walk someone through that. Like you could almost create your own longevity blueprint of sorts, and then moving up that pyramid, I'd say, well, which diagnostic tests should you get based on your age or your family history? And we talked about the the um test for cardiac disease. I would say number two killer is cancer. Think about maybe a full-body MRI. Kind of expensive, it's not covered by insurance, but it can detect tumors at an early stage. Here in America, they're about$2,500. Um, you could also get a blood test by uh it's called a gallery blood test, and this is a test that screens for 50 types of cancer. And these are cancers that are not tradition traditionally screened for, like breast cancer with mammograms and colonoscopies for colon cancer, and that's great, and you should do that. But there are things that you could do, you know, beyond that. And there's other forms of testing, genetic testing and things like that, but I won't go too deep into it. But that's sort of the base of that pyramid, and then the next level up would be let's rule out things that could kill us, which would be heart disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes, amen dementia, and try try to minimize those things.
SPEAKER_00:So the diagnosis, so so we've got the nutrition exercise and sleep at the bottom. And by the way, I reckon sleep would be pretty important too. Um, it's I I always say that it's like the most underrated thing and the thing that we will always sacrifice for the sake of trying to get more done. Um, but it's just like the cornerstone of everything when we've slept well. Not only are we having all those regenerative processes that happen during a good quality sleep, but it makes us more motivated, we can think clearer, so we're gonna make better choices when it comes to our nutrition and exercise as well. So, yeah, I've sleep is like I'm I'm a bit of a sleep Nazi.
SPEAKER_02:You know, absolutely, I I agree with that. And the one thing I didn't mention, you know, certainly to your to your audience, if you are on this journey of like losing fat, building muscle, and improving your body composition, that fat loss happens in your sleep. And muscle building happens, growth hormones release in your sleep, and specifically in your deep sleep, which is happening between 10 p.m. and 2 a.m. So it's really important to be asleep before midnight because those hours sort of count more, so to speak. So you'd hate to be working out in the gym, having a great diet, and you're sleeping four or five hours a night. You're just undermining all your efforts outside of sleep. So I thought I would just add that to underscore yes, the importance of sleep as foundational to your health.
SPEAKER_00:And not to mention the fact that you'd probably t tap into more of a stress response if you're not getting enough sleep. Um and we re release different hormones. The hunger hormones get out of whack as well, don't they, as part of our circadian.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. All the hormones will get dysregulated: cortisol, um, melatonin, leptin, so many things when your sleep is off. And again, you mentioned circadian, yeah. Our our light dark cycles are completely deranged, and that's really adding to poor sleep, which is adding to poor health.
SPEAKER_00:The diagnostic testing that's the next level up.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:If those if there was do you recommend across the board, like you said, you know, if you if you can afford it, potentially getting a whole body scan, blood tests for um like seeing if you're at higher risk of cancer, heart disease, are there any other specific blood tests that you would say these are the benchmark tests that someone should get done, or is it really a case by case or what you what you feel like?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I mean, I think depending if you have symptoms or you're you're at higher risk, let's say, for something based on your current lifestyle, smoking, high blood pressure, obesity, I would say, you know, cardiac disease is the number one killer. A lot of people are giving attention to uh your lipid panels. Now, most people in America, they'll just get like a regular lipid panel. But what you could do in request is a um an expanded lipid panel where they're looking at particle size and they're looking at the number of lipid particles you have. And a lot of people are talking about APOB, apolipoprotein B. This is a type of protein that carries cholesterol in it. So most people know like LDL is bad, cholesterol, and say H cell is good. And it's good to know those, but it's not as valuable as knowing how many LDL particles do you have. What are the sizes? Are they big? Are they small? You want to have bigger particles and a smaller number of particles? And you can get that in a simple blood test. There's one called a cardio IQ panel that's done by a quest. Um, Lab Corp has one. It's called an NMR panel. And these will give you and your doctor a much better look at your cholesterol instead of just saying, here's my total, here's my HDL, and here's my LDL. So, like APOB is something you follow because all the particles in the cholesterol carried in APOB are the ones that are more likely to cause clots and to cause plaques. So, I guess from a cardiac standpoint, I would go there. From a metabolic standpoint, in America, most people just look at glucose or they might do a hemoglobin A1C now, which becomes More popular. This gives like a three-month snapshot into what's your blood sugar been for the last 90 days. But what most people don't test is a fasting insulin. But your glucose could be normal for decades before it gets abnormal. And by that point, it might be too late. Whereas if you could look at a fasting insulin, which is one of the blood tests I check on patients in my program to see where they're at. And if your insulin is very high, this is a sign that you already have type 2 diabetes. When your insulin's high, you cannot burn fat. And these patients are stuck and they're storing fat. So like if you wake up in the morning, your insulin should be very, very low. It shouldn't be at a high number. So that's one other thing to look at. You know, metabolic. I mentioned the gallery test for screening for cancer. Those are a few just that come to mind if we're thinking about the top killers, which is say metabolic disease, cancer, heart disease, and then other tests sort of based on, you know, a case-by-case basis. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. What do you think of the continuous glucose monitor as a way of assessing your insulin response and your blood sugar?
SPEAKER_02:I I think I think it's a good tool if someone wants to use it for a couple of weeks or a couple of months to see how they respond to certain foods or even certain activities or when they're eating at certain times a day. I think it's great. I think if you have a history of type 2 diabetes, or you're metabolically off, or you have other symptoms, you have brain fog, you have fatigue. I think it's something worth looking into and talking to your doctor about. I know here in America, a lot of people are starting to use them, like a lot of non-diabetics, a lot of like athletes and performance. I think it gives you more information. And I think again, like an aura ring tells you about sleep or you're you're counting your steps. I think it's nice. I don't think it's necessary, but I think it's a nice addition to someone who's really trying to dial in how do I respond to carbs? How do I respond to proteins and fats and things like that?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, cool. The the testing that you have talked about, are there things that sometimes, I mean, I don't know, I don't know exactly how it works and how it compares in the US and Australia, like some standard tests that your doctors will suggest, some tests that you can request from your doctor, but there's also now you you can request tests without a GP. Um is there any like are there any limitations with when you can request your own compared to going to a GP? Or are you basically able to access any of those kind of tests through independent?
SPEAKER_02:You could request them through your doctor, but if it's not covered under your health insurance plan, it might not be covered. Um but you alluded to, yeah, there are independent companies out there where you can do an at-home blood test. Some are finger stick, some you go into a lab, like here are the common ones requests and lab core, where they'll draw your blood and send you the results. Um, those are becoming more and more popular because I think people are trying to take more control of this. And they're like, well, my doctor isn't gonna check my fasting insulin, or I'm not gonna get an expanded lipid panel. So I'm just gonna, you know, I might pay$100 or$200 and just get this done. Um, I myself, I've been working with a company, it's called Life Force. I don't know if you've heard of it. This is a company, um, Tony Robbins works with uh several longevity doctors on this company. And what they've created is uh a system where they'll come to my office, they draw my blood every three months, and then I review those labs with uh one of their physicians via telehealth. And it's a very comprehensive blood panel. It's expanded lipids, it's hormones, it's thyroid, um, you know, vitamin D. It's it's really comprehensive. And then I get this opportunity to review those. But the fact that I'm looking at that every three months, then we can make little tweaks and changes and add things and subtract things. And I think that trend is becoming more popular. Unfortunately, it's just not a lot of it isn't covered by health insurance yet. So there are limitations there.
SPEAKER_00:But I have to be prepared to invest in doing it yourself.
SPEAKER_02:You have to be prepared a little bit and you have to just be proactive and just talk to your doctor, find out, say, what does my plan cover? What can we get? And I would say the lipid one is like the most important one to know again, because it's the number one cause of death here.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, cool. All right, let's move up the pyramid. Social connection and stress management. I'm surprised this doesn't come before the diagnostic testing, but I'm not here to uh I'm not here to assess your your Yeah, not to say that um social connection isn't important.
SPEAKER_02:I think I put the test there because sort of the saying is you know, you don't want to die of something stupid, so to speak. Something that you could that you could rule out. Yeah. So I I put that there because there's one thing you could have everything else in line, and you'd be like, hey, I want to live to be a hundred, but you have this tumor that you didn't see that could have been detected, let's just say. Um, but yes, so not to undermine like social connection and stress, right? We've learned so much about the blue zones in the world, right? Where people are living to be a hundred with uh a lot more frequency than uh you know other parts of the world. And what do these places have in common? They have strong social connections, they have um a faith, faith-based or religion-based. Um, they volunteer a lot, they um they have communities or these tribes where they help out each other when someone becomes sick. And I think it's something that unfortunately technology has hurt us a little bit, you know, especially in like younger adults or teens. Like technology has caused almost more social isolation. And people are like, they say social media, but people are sitting in their basement and they're gaming, let's say, or they're playing video games and they're not having that social connection, which is a part of having a thriving life. So, I mean, the people who live to be a hundred, they're not doing it alone. Let's just say that. I mean, I guess you could find someone who's a hundred hiding out in their basement somewhere, but that's unusual or rare. And, you know, along with that, yeah, they're they're they're trying to lead uh uh more of a stress-free life and you know, having community, eating together, um, being close to their family, um, so going to church, going to you know, uh religious services together, contributing back to the community, all these things are helping. And they've done studies where this can help, you know, lengthen your telomeres, right? Prevent the telomeres of our genes from getting shorter. So lots of value there. And I think sometimes, you know, I guess it's it's viewed as like the softer science. And as you say, like maybe it should be lower on like pyramid, which is higher priority. But um, yeah, I sort of have that there, and I think it's it's it's it's critical and just fostering the relationships we have, not having thousands of relationships, but the quality of your relationships, whether it's friends, family, co-workers, etc.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, connection. Stress, stress management. Can you talk a little bit about stress? Like, because I feel like stress is a bit of a silent killer. What are some of the impacts of stress and how can we manage them?
SPEAKER_02:You know, I think you know, there's different forms of stress, you know, physical stress, mental, emotional stress. I think um one thing I would think about is like our environment, the stressors in our environment. You know, without going into too deep into toxins and microplastics and mercury, heavy metal mold, like we have these constant and EMF, right? Electromagnetic frequency, we have all these stressors in our lives that we can take certain measures to limit them, whether that's an air purifier in your home, water filters, EMF blockers, or you know, taking measures like that. But yeah, you mentioned a silent killer. Yeah, certainly this stress leads to uh high blood pressure, leads to obesity, high stress leads to high cortisol levels. This is a hormone that leads to more visceral fat deposits in the abdomen, which leads to a host of other diseases, autoimmune diseases leads to certain types of cancer, heart disease. And I think a lot of people, you know, again, getting that five hours of sleep, that's a big stressor. We don't think of it that way. It's a huge stressor. And that's gonna just, you know, flow into the rest of other parts of your life where you sleep five hours just because you need to work more and you have this deadline at work and you have to get something done. Well, your health is suffering. And I think people need to try to manage that. And, you know, everyone has work and everyone has families and everyone has commitments, but you have to make you know your health a priority, and you have to think of ways to reduce that stress. Whether that's ironically, exercise is a good way to reduce the stress, sleeping better, eating better. Um, you know, a lot of people do meditation. I think it's a hard, sometimes it'll be a hard skill for people to learn, but it's something like anything you have to practice at that. Um, breath work, um, again, a skill, but people can do that to try to, you know, minimize stress, journaling, you know, things like that, practicing gratitude. I think there's a place for all of that. But um, some of the easier ones are like, yeah, let's filter the air and the water and some of these toxins. I think toxins are stress too. Yes.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:But that's kind of how I would view it.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, great. I I love that because I think when we hear the word stress, it's easy just to think hard work and you know, trying to get too many things done. And we don't really think that toxins and chemicals and um mold are stressors. Right. Um, but they're yeah, they're a really um huge uh contributing factor to stress on our system, aren't they? And how our body processes um stress as well.
SPEAKER_02:And as you mentioned, you said these are like silent killers because all those things are invisible.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_02:You don't think about the air, you don't think about electromagnetic frequency, you don't you know, you just don't see it. So you're like, well, I'm okay. But yeah, if it's all accumulated, it's like accumulating in our bodies. And again, unless you test for certain things, you'll never really know the degree of toxic uh burden, I guess you'd say, that we all have.
SPEAKER_00:I want to move up to the next part of the pyramid, but I just curious if there's anything that you do to reduce EMFs in your own. I do.
SPEAKER_02:I have a I have a blocker. I have two of these EMF blockers, um, one at home and one on my phone. It's on the back of it and on my um tablet. It's from a company I have no affiliation with. It's called Aries A-I-R-E-S, Aries Tech. And uh I've been using it for a year or so. It's like a little disc. It's the size of a nickel, it goes on the back of your phone or your computer, and it helps block the frequencies. And you know, I'll put my phone on airplane mode most of the time, especially if I'm charging it. Try not to keep the phone next to your head. You know, ideally keep the phone out of your bedroom at night and try not to sleep with your head next to your Wi-Fi router. Some people would suggest turning off the Wi-Fi at night. I guess those are some measures there. Um, but no, yeah, yeah, that's kind of what I'm doing. I live in a big city here in Los Angeles. It's hard. I mean, I live in a high-rise and I work in an office building, so I'm I'm constantly bombarded with it. So you try to do what you can.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, definitely. Um, and just having an awareness around it, I guess, and doing what, as you said, doing what you can is is um important.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:I'm super curious about supplements and alternative therapies, which is up towards the top of the pyramid. So I think that this is um interesting because we've because this is the place where often people will potentially go first.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_00:And you're like, no, no, no. Let's get all of these other things dialed in and then let's talk about supplements and alternative therapies, which I think is is um yeah, really important, actually. Because we think that we're gonna get the solutions that we're after through those external things, those supplements and alternative therapies. But they're all gonna have the best impact, aren't they? Sorry, they're always gonna have the best impact when you've got all of those other things dialed in.
SPEAKER_02:You're exactly right. When you have, you know, the the base of the pyramid again, as we were talking about, the exercise, nutrition, the sleep, the stress, then these supplements will help you more. Um, or cold plunge and hot sauna.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I get so many questions, patients come in, they're like, what about this peptide? Or I want to do an NAD infusion, or what about this red light panel? But then you ask them, well, they're sleeping five hours a night, they're not eating well, and they don't exercise. Well, the supplements aren't going to save you from a poor lifestyle. Right. So, right, now we're getting close to the top. I'm like, okay, let's say you're the person you're doing all the right things. And when it does come to supplements, yeah, I think there's a role for them. And it could move the needle one, two, three, four percent, let's say. And um I guess my advice would be if you're deficient in something, that's probably something you need. Like, do you need vitamin D? Probably most Americans do, but you can get a there's an easy blood test for that. Same for magnesium, but sure, I'd recommend magnesium as a as a foundational supplement. Vitamin D3, I would recommend creatine for people for not only for muscle health, for cognitive brain health, you know, five grams a day. Omega-3s, omega-3. Most people, at least in America, most people aren't eating enough fatty fish. So uh I would supplement with a good quality fish oil, you know, two or three grams, getting the DHA and the EPA essential omega-3 fats that we need. And then maybe, you know, a good, well-rounded, let's say a multivitamin. And maybe some whey protein if you're not hitting your protein goals. I would sort of think of those as maybe say foundational supplements. And then you can experiment with other things. Like people are like, well, what about NAD or L-carnitine or you know, it's endless, right? You could just you could take 20 or 30 supplements. But I think if you think of what you need and what your goals are, for is it focus, is it athletic performance, and sort of tailor it that way. But the foundational ones that I mentioned, I think can benefit like most people. Um, as far as alternative therapies, again, um, yeah, there's a lot of value. Probably the most data is on uh hot saunas. You could reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease by what, like 50 or 60 percent if you're doing a hot sauna, say four to seven times a week. And this comes from the data from Finland, right? Where it's like commonplace to do it there. Um, whole plunge is popular. I think there's less data on it. I think it's coming out. I think it's fine. I don't know that it's gonna extend your life to the degree hot saunas will. Maybe that data will come out in the future. And then other things like red light therapy is very popular. I use a red light machine almost every day, like 15 minutes in the morning. I think there's value for skin health to activate your mitochondria, right? Improve your mitochondrial health, cell energy. Um, so I think there's value to that, but let's not skip the base of the peer. A lot of people like almost turn it upside down, like, hey, I'm gonna do supplements and forget about sleep. So it's sort of a uh that's the way I would kind of look at the those alternative therapies, which a lot of people talk about the concept of hormesis, which is sort of what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. So, you know, it's okay to be a little hungry, like fasting. It's okay to be a little hot or a little cold. Um, and then your body will adapt and you'll become more resilient. So I think there's a role for those things. Like I personally don't do cold plunges, I do a cold shower at the end of my shower, and it's hard and it's uncomfortable, but it's good to be uncomfortable. You have to be uncomfortable in order to grow, right?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah. There's a couple of things I wanted to ask you about. Um, some of the things you've just spoken about. Um, one is you've mentioned that sauna is um highly beneficial for people to reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. However, I feel like the recommendation might be might oppose that if if, for example, um my dad has had a stroke quite some time ago, but he would be very averse to getting in a sauna because it sounds too risky and that perhaps that messaging has been provided to him. You know, don't don't do anything that's stressful. What is your um outlook on that sort of thing? Like recommending it to someone who already has a pre pre-existing condition.
SPEAKER_02:You know, in interestingly, you mentioned having had a stroke, you know, even in patients who may have heart disease, who let's say they don't have that aerobic capacity to exercise very much. Studies have shown that hot saunas can sort of simulate, if you will, exercise. So I would maybe think about, you know, after consulting with you know your physician or your dad's physician, maybe going into the sauna for maybe just five minutes, maybe six, eight minutes at a lower temperature, building your way up to let's say a lot of people go in there for 15 or 20 minutes, which I can do like that, 15, 18, it's hard. Um, and then the temperature, like some would suggest it needs to be 170 or 180 Fahrenheit. Well, you don't have to. Like I also use at home like one of these sauna blankets. Oh, yeah. You get in and your head is outside of it, it's much more tolerable. So it's like an infrared sauna blanket, which might only get up to 140 Fahrenheit. So I think there are ways of sort of uh gradually dipping your toe, so to speak, into the hot sauna for the benefits of it, which are sort of simulating exercise, increasing blood flow, increasing nitric oxide, things like that. But um you mentioned the stressor. Yeah, it's a stressor, but you know, these stressors will help us to grow, but it's the dose, right? Right. You're gonna start out with a short, brief exposure, whether it's cold, heat, or fasting, recover, then try it again. And maybe you go a little longer and you go a few more minutes in a hot sauna, or maybe at a higher temperature, and eventually you can build your way up to, let's say, the more optimal doses. But that's how I would think of stressors like that. But certainly, yeah, if you have a you know, a history of heart disease, like there have been studies, people going to cold sauna, and that can cause vasoconstriction, and that could be a problem for someone's heart. So certainly consult with your doctor if you have a history of heart disease.
SPEAKER_00:Cool. Thank you. Um, you mentioned very briefly peptides, and I'm curious about this. This is something that I wouldn't say is mainstream in Australia, like you know, we hear about a lot of the other supplements that you've talked about. But peptides, how what role do you see? Can you explain what they are and what role do you see them playing? I know you can get them prescribed through independent, you know, sources here with a consultation with a doctor. Um, yeah, yeah, but I don't think that they're widely used, but I do believe that they can be quite beneficial.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I mean, certainly peptides, um, these are small amino acid sequences, like small chains of amino acids, which are like small, tiny proteins, you could think of it that way. And I'll give you an example, like insulin is a peptide, osempic, right? Ozempic is a peptide a lot of people are using all over the world, injecting themselves, right, to lose weight. So they're short-acting molecules that send signals throughout the body. And these are molecules that are already existing in our body. Um, in the United States, um, most of these you don't need a prescription for. Very few are FDA approved because they're molecules in the body. And I don't think the FDA likes that because they can't really profit from these. So you can get them now online. I myself have bought and uh purchased a few of these online from uh trusted sources where you can buy a peptide online. Most of these, by the way, are injections, a subcutaneous injection, let's say in the abdomen. There are some that are taken orally, some are nasal sprays, but most are injected. Um, some are daily, some are once a week. And a lot of people are using peptides depending on what their goals are. There are peptides to improve your cognition and your focus, brain function. There are peptides to improve muscle mass and to decrease body fat. Again, Ozempic with the body fat and Mundara. Uh, some people are taking peptides to improve the quality of their skin. Um, you could take peptides to help with sleep. So basically, it's almost this category of it's somewhere, I guess you'd say, between a supplement and a drug. It's an injectable, you know, molecule, let's call it, that short-acting, and it sends signals to your body uh as receptors in different parts of the body, whether it's going to the brain, the muscle, the heart, wherever, and it's going to perform a certain function. But they're very short-acting, and most of them very, very safe because they'll only last like a day most of them in the body. Some have longer half-lives, but um, they become quite popular here, let's say, for recovering from training, from sports, athletics, decreasing inflammation in the muscle, uh, increasing uh, let's say, muscle mass. So instead of someone taking, let's say, steroids or growth hormone, you can take a peptide that signals your pituitary gland in your brain to release more natural growth hormone instead of taking exogenous, meaning out-of-the-body growth hormone, which is gonna, through negative feedback, shut down your body's normal growth hormone. So they're in there really interesting clouds, and I think honestly, that's probably the future of medicine, or it's gonna be a big part of it, is people doing this, and you just have to find a source, and it's a good source, like a company where that you can trust. There's a lot of gray market out there where you don't really know where you're getting it from. There's some really good compounding pharmacies, and there's some pharmaceutical grade places that are making it. I don't know what it's like in Australia if you can buy them online, but I know in the US and I think in parts of Canada, a lot of people you're just buying them online without prescription.
SPEAKER_00:Okay. I think that you can you can buy them online, but there needs to be some kind of like health check. Um and then it gets processed through a through a a doctor that's associated with with the company. I I I think that's how how it works. All right, the top of the triangle. We're we're very close to the end of our um our conversation. Um so the top of the pyramid, drugs, recommended drugs. I've got it in small print, so I'm kind of squinting to see it on my screen. So it's right at the top. But it's the last port of call, you would say. And is this prescription medications that you're referring to?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you know, pharmac pharmacologic interventions. For example, if you have high risk and you have a lot of coronary artery disease, you might need to lower your LDL or your APOB, so-called bad cholesterol, to prevent a cardiac event. And there's a lot of data out there saying that if you lower your LDL, you can lower your risk of heart disease. There's a lot of conflicting data where people are like, nah, cholesterol is not a problem. But like in my case, I have this. I've recently instituted a very low dose statin just because of my level of risk. And I recently had another test of my neck. It's a scan, it's called the CIMT test, carotid intimate media thickness test that tells you if you have soft plaques or hard plaques, which is a predictor of what's happening in your heart, is what's happening in your neck. So there are some cases where if you want to just reduce your risk, I'm all in favor if you need to be on that, if you need to be on um, you know, a drug for diabetes, like let's not forget osempic and all those, those are type 2 diabetes drugs, which are now used for weight loss. Um there are, let's, I'd almost put in that category maybe stem cells too, stem cells to you know, maybe reverse an injury for back pain, for nerve pain, for you know, things like that, which again, not many are FDA approved. You can go to a stem cell clinic. Most people are going out out of the US, they're going to Panama or Mexico or somewhere where it's more readily available. But yeah, at the top of the pyramid, I put you know pharmacological interventions there because I think everything else below that can maybe in most cases do 90 or 95 percent of the movement and the change in your life. Um, some people would say, well, you know, a baby aspirin a day can help prevent colon cancer and prevent you know cardiac events. Um but yeah, that's where I just I have it there, and not to say the top of the pyramid means it's the least important or the smallest, but to show that everything below it, lifestyle-wise, is more important and maybe more impactful. But there are people who look, if you need a if you need a drug for your heart, then so be it. You you have to in certain cases.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Um if someone is taking medications as their first port of call, and then they come to decide that they want to do the lifestyle, all of the lifestyle stuff that's in the rest of the pyramid, can they then reduce the amount of pharmaceutical interventions having?
SPEAKER_02:For example, if someone is on, let's say you're on a blood pressure medication, your blood pressure is very high, but you're overweight and you're not sleeping and you're not eating right, you could potentially get off of that blood pressure medicine. I I see patients who are on like three blood pressure medications. Well, maybe we can get you down to one, you know, or maybe we could get you off, you know, your there's some oral, you know, uh, agents people take for type 2 diabetes, although most people are taking Ozempic now. You know, yes, you can get people off certain medications by correcting these other chronic diseases because most I didn't mention this really earlier, most of these chronic diseases, most of them are preventable. But in the US, most of our funding and money goes towards treating the symptoms, right? Spending five four or five trillion a year. We're not really getting at the root cause. And the root cause really seems to be lifestyle.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah. Thank you. You've been so generous with everything that you've shared today. I'm just, as I said, I'm conscious that we've kind of hit our hour, but just as we do head towards our close, um I I think that many people would probably think, well, you had a great career, you have a great career as a plastic surgeon. Um why is this so important for you right now? You've got your online course, you're supporting people in their lifestyles. What's the what's the driving force behind this?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you know, I just trying to reach more people, trying to help more people with this message that it's something that everyone can do. Like you could start today or tomorrow and say, Yeah, you know what, I am gonna walk for 15 minutes after dinner. I am going to try to increase my steps. Maybe I'm gonna start lifting weights. Like, and that's gonna prevent things. Because I think at least again in the United States, there is not a focus on prevention. We're very good, we have great. Acute care, we can treat trauma and late stage disease and heart attacks, but we're not very good at early stage. And I think if you can reach people maybe in their 20s, 30s, and 40s and give them a much longer health span, right? A better health span. Like in the United States, most people they make it to their early 60s and then they spend their last 15 to 20 years in poor health. So they might live to be 78, but the last 15 years is very low quality. But whereas we now know we can improve that health span and lengthen it to you live quality years into your 70s, 80s, and hopefully 90s, and not have this period of debilitation that lasts for a decade or longer. So you can live to be 100 and be in good health. And you know, people are doing that. So, and I love plastic surgery still, and you know, I always will, but I think this is sort of in tandem with that. And I try to help my plastic surgery patients like just to be healthier, because a lot of them are, you know, middle life for in 40s, and although they want to do something aesthetic to look better, they kind of should be thinking about how can I live longer, you know, live to see my kids and my grandkids and you know, so on. So I think that's where the passion comes from is just helping people as a as a physician, yeah, even before I'm a plastic surgeon.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. How old do you uh want to live too? Do you have a number on it?
SPEAKER_02:No, I don't have a number on it. I just want to live again back to the health span versus life span. Yeah. Just a good quality of life. And you know, the older you get, the more you think, well, 57 is not that old. And I think when I was a when I was a child, I'm like, wow, that seemed old. But as you get older, you think, well, you don't have you could you feel younger and just have the capacity to do more, live more. And you know, I sort of tell patients, you know, it's it's not about just looking better, it's about feeling better and living longer. I mean, you can do all those things primarily through lifestyle changes. So, you know, I don't have a number. I just I just want to uh have a good quality of life.
SPEAKER_00:Love it. Thank you. Brilliant. I've loved this conversation. Thank you so much for your time. Um, yeah, I'm looking forward to sharing this with our audience. Oh, final note we're gonna share all of your information in the guest directory so people will be able to find you there and access your online course. Um, is there anything you want to say about that just as we do close?
SPEAKER_02:No, you know, my um my what my website is William Bruno MD.com, and I have that's my plastic surgery website, but I have a wellness tab there, and that's where the two ebooks are. Uh the free ebooks and the course is there. There's a little webinar. Patients can watch it for free and just get a sense of what the course is like. And then the the coaching program, they can reach out to me through that. Or I'm fairly active on Instagram, also at William Bruno MD. But um, yeah, if someone's interested in that or just has a question, they can send a direct message via Instagram. I usually respond to those myself. But um yeah, you know, I just tell people take action. You know, whether it's anything through me or anywhere else, like a lot of times people hear a podcast like this and like, oh, that sounds interesting, but they don't do anything. And I think if you make one small change, whether it's steps, whether it's you know, starting a new exercise program, that's the way to longevity. Don't rely on technology or expensive interventions, it's really simple things that we can do uh on our own.
SPEAKER_00:Great, amazing. Thank you. Um, yeah, loved it.
SPEAKER_02:Oh, thank you. Thanks for uh having me.
SPEAKER_00:Before you go, can I ask you a small favor? If you've enjoyed this show or any of the other episodes that you've listened to, then I'd really appreciate it if you took a couple of moments to hit subscribe. This is a great way to increase our listeners and get the word out there about all of the wonderful guests that we've had on the podcast. If you'd like to further support the show, you can buy me a coffee by going to buymeacoffee.com forward slash Life Health the Universe. You can find that link in the show notes. Thanks for listening.