The Top 5 Ways Andrew Huberman Changed My Medical Practice

From the door of my busy primary care practice I can walk to multiple Microsoft, Google, Amazon and Meta offices. And the people are back in the office.

This means my practice, in comparison to most primary care offices is full of young people. Well educated, high earning and technically proficient people who are no stranger to problem solving -- and what is the common approach to problem solving? Well, I'm sure it varies but undoubtedly a "data-driven" approach is as the heart of any problem solving strategy.

In the exam room, when gathering history, evaluating and then discussing a treatment plan for any given complaint I will often hear the request to gather more data.

X-rays. Blood work. CT scans. Urine tests. MRI scans. Hormone testing. DEXA scans. Colonoscopies. Echocardiograms. ECGs. Stool tests. Mammograms.

The training approach, entrenched methodologies and ethos in the art and application of the practice of medicine is very different from the journey that brings a person to being a top performing computer scientist.

Many of my patients are listening to a relatively new cadre of voices in the medical-media-blogosphere. Andrew Huberman, Dr Peter Attia and Tim Ferris, to name a few.

Here are the top 5 ways this new perspective of medical care and health optimization has changed how I practice medicine.

Number 5

With most other lists and thoughts on the overall state of healthcare here in the US one might see this particular thought much higher, here it serves as an underpinning of what may be a revolution in how medical care is delivered.

Our current system is broken and the foundations have been eroding (this is too passive of a take -- I should be more specific in preaching in no uncertain terms, that the wolves are in charge of the hen house and there ain't many hens left. Profit driven policy, railroaded through CMS and the other legislative bodies by industry pundits leaves all of us in peril when it comes to accessing basic care in an an affordable and time sensitive manner) and the structure is in danger of being condemned.

While the medical offices continue to be woefully understaffed, I'm spending more and more time with paperwork and "scut" work while I'm continuing to still see patients with any and just about every complaint one can imagine -- from potentially life and limb threatening conditions to spending 20 minutes reassuring someone they are not at death's door.

In the past few years, however, I'm having patients seeking guidance in how to optimize their health in ways beyond what I can provide -- beyond how my medical training taught me. They want to know how to maximize their physical, cognitive, emotional and of course, sexual performance. While there are doctors who specialize in these things, they are generally not at the local publicly owned hospital group -- which is where I work.

While anatomical, physiological and metabolic basics are known to me, I don't have the training, the time or even the ability to charge private insurances for a program like this. And, billing private insurance companies and Medicare or Medicaid is the only way I can generate income outside the random self-pay patient.

The 5th most impactful way Andrew Huberman has changed my medical practice is allowing me to see, even more vividly than before, that our approach and healthcare delivery system is woefully outdated and has been taken over by ruthless wolves.

Number 4

Number 3

On a personal level, I identify with Andrew Huberman, PhD in that we share a background in skateboarding. We are roughly the same age and his experiences and impressions from 90's skateboarding feel like my own. The path to becoming a PhD and having his own laboratory and professorship at Stanford University mirrors my own in terms of length and intensity. While I was never a skateboarder of any note or success, the lessons gained from efforting to be such a skateboarder provide the resilience and at times, raw stubbornness to achieve the goals I set forth for myself. Andrew Huberman has said the same on many different podcasts.

A mindset that allows the throwing one's self down a stair set over and over is surprisingly similar to persevering a 36 hour shift in the hospital while trying to figure out how to keep patients alive. I will always be thankful for what ended up being mental fortitude that was shaped in the kiln of the skate-rat years of my youth.