Preventive Healthcare for a Healthier Future with Dr. Charles Svendsen, MD, MBA (Ep. 10)

Most people don’t think much about their health until something feels wrong. By then, many of the decisions available years earlier have already disappeared.

In this episode, Jon Meyer sits down with Dr. Charles Svendsen, MD, MBA, Chief Medical Officer of Astride Health, to discuss how preventive healthcare changes the way we think about aging, chronic disease, and long-term wellbeing. 

They explore why today’s healthcare system often rewards treatment instead of prevention, how advanced testing can identify risks years earlier, why lasting behavioral change takes time, and how investing in your health today may reduce physical and financial costs later in life. The discussion also covers practical first steps, evidence-based testing, and the importance of building habits that support health for decades.

Key takeaways:

• Why preventive healthcare focuses on identifying health risks before symptoms or diagnoses appear
• How advanced biomarkers can reveal concerns years before traditional medicine intervenes
• Why long-term coaching and accountability often matter more than annual checkups alone
• How investing in healthier habits today may reduce future medical costs and complications
• Why consistent behavioral changes create meaningful improvements over months instead of days

 

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Watch us on YouTube at https://youtu.be/eyY6fbRCUpU.

 

Resources:

• Die With Zero by Bill Perkins
• Atomic Habits by James Clear
• Thinking in Bets by Annie Duke

Connect with Jon Meyer:

• BGM
• LinkedIn: Jon Meyer
• Email: jmeyer@BGM360.com
• Schedule a Call

Connect with Charles Svendsen:

• LinkedIn: Charles Svendsen
• Website: Astride Health

About Our Guest:

Dr. Charles Svendsen, MD, MBA, is the Chief Medical Officer of Astride Health, where he focuses on preventive medicine, longevity, and helping patients reduce their risk of chronic disease through proactive, evidence-based care. His approach combines advanced diagnostics, personalized health strategies, and ongoing coaching to empower individuals to take ownership of their long-term health. Passionate about education and sustainable lifestyle change, Dr. Charles Svendsen works to help people identify health risks early and build habits that support healthier, longer lives.

 

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Transcript

Jon Meyer: One of the biggest things I think that people kind of lose sight of is when to flip the switch from spending their health and their time to make money, and then starting switching that back to, okay, it’s time to spend money on my health and buying time

Charles Svendsen: We save all our money and then we try to buy that health back or try to buy that time back, and you can’t do that.

Charles Svendsen: What you have to do is spend that money upfront.

Welcome to Mastering the 360 Mindset with Jon Meyer from BGM. Join us as we explore ways to make the most out of your wealth, health, and time, unlocking opportunities for balance and lasting success. With insights from Jon’s years of experience and guest experts, you’ll gain the tools to design a life that works on your terms.

Now, onto the show

Jon Meyer: Welcome to today’s episode of Mastering the 360 Mindset. I have Dr. Chuck Svendsen today. I’ve been excited about this episode. Throughout the episode, I’m gonna refer to him as Chuck, not Doctor. Let’s make sure everyone knows that. But Chuck, could you introduce yourself and Astride Health a little bit?

Charles Svendsen: Absolutely, Jon. First off, thanks for having me on. I think I’ve been just as excited or more excited than, than you have about this. I’ve really been looking forward to this conversation. We have so much to talk about and so much in common in our industries, I think. I am currently the chief medical officer of Astride Health.

Charles Svendsen: It’s a company we started about a year ago. I… Of, of all things, I have an rather unique background. I grew up as a surgeon focused specifically on general surgery and bariatric surgery, so weight loss surgery. And through it, I saw patients that needed more than just surgery. We developed an aftercare program dealing with kind of all aspects of their health, and that’s really where the Astride Health company came from, so focused on preventative care.

Jon Meyer: And I think that’s why I was interested in having you on because in the intersection of health, wealth, and time, you and I have had this conversation. One of the biggest things I think that people kind of lose sight of is when to flip the switch from spending their health and their time to make money, and then starting switching that back to, okay, it’s time to spend money on my health and my t- and buying time.

Jon Meyer: And one of the things that I’ve been intrigued with is this idea now of how the healthcare system is shifting more away from the way it used to be, Health 2.0 to Health 3.0. So can you talk to us a little bit about what is our… what is the state of our current healthcare system? You know, is it doing anything well?

Jon Meyer: And why should people start thinking about, “Okay, I gotta actually spend money on Health 3.0”?

Charles Svendsen: Absolutely. The US healthcare system on one hand is top in the world. If you have an acute injury, if you have a heart attack, if, God forbid, you’re in a motor vehicle crash, I don’t think anybody does it better than the US healthcare system.

Charles Svendsen: We are absolutely fantastic at acute care. Where the system falls down is chronic care or reducing chronic disease, I, I guess, or chronic disease risk. If you look, the statistics in the market are that- People change healthcare insurance about every 1.4 years, I think is the churn in the market currently.

Charles Svendsen: What that leads to for the health insurance companies is more of a short-term horizon thinking and not the long-term horizon thinking. And I think that’s really, for Stride Health, where we’re focused. We’re looking out decades, not, not months, not years. We’re really focused on decades.

Jon Meyer: So to that extent, people talk about preventative medicine, but they don’t really get it.

Jon Meyer: They wait until they’re sick because that’s what insurance will pay for, as opposed to spending money proactively. So tell us a little bit about what does preventative medicine actually look like in a practice like yours?

Charles Svendsen: It really is about focusing on the long-term chronic disease prevention. And one of my favorite health books is Die With Zero.

Jon Meyer: Mine, mine too. Mine too, yep.

Charles Svendsen: I think it’s, it- it’s such a great book because Bill Perkins, right? And he, he talks about spending the money now and not hoarding it for later. And currently, the healthcare system is very back-loaded financially. So we, we save all our money, and then we try to buy that health back or try to buy that time back, and you can’t do that.

Charles Svendsen: What you have to do is spend that money upfront, and it’s, it’s really hard for people to get their head around, right? Like health- healthcare should be free But healthcare isn’t free. Uh, you know, heal- healthcare costs a lot of money, not just from the employer. It’s taken from your paycheck. You pay costs if you don’t avoid those problems further down.

Charles Svendsen: You pay deductibles. You pay co-pays. So there, the costs are really hidden in the current system. We’re a little bit more upfront about it. We’re saying, “Yeah, this is a cash pay business. It’s all fee-based. We don’t make any money on selling you supplements or treatments.” It, it’s, I, I guess I’d like to call ourselves a, a health fiduciary would, would be the, the best way to describe it.

Charles Svendsen: So you’re, you’re, you’re spending money knowing that I have your best interest at heart, and I’m only making decisions based on what’s best for the individual. I, I’m not beholden to an insurance company. There’s no financial incentive to me to recommend a procedure or a test, and it gives me the power to say no.

Charles Svendsen: Like, you don’t, you don’t need to have that, and you do need to have this other thing. So preventative care in, from how I see it, is really having the long-term perspective and taking care of the problems way in advance. One of the measures we’ll use is ApoB or hemoglobin A1C. I don’t wanna watch your hemoglobin A1C go from 5.5 to prediabetes at 5.7 and have to wait for your A1C to get to 6.5 before I can make an intervention.

Charles Svendsen: And in the current healthcare model, that’s exactly what we have to wait on. I wanna check your fasting insulin. I wanna know when you’re showing any sign of insulin resistance. I wanna get on top of that years or decades in advance. The same for your lipids. I don’t wanna control your lipids after you’ve had a heart attack.

Charles Svendsen: I want to control your lipids and prevent you from ever having that heart attack. So in a sense, you’re spending that money upfront when you have, when it’s worth more. It, it’s, there, there’s so many, I think, analogies between finance and, and health when you, when you think about it from this, this perspective.

Jon Meyer: Something you said on the front end of that I wanna jump into, and then I am gonna jump into the other question, which is about testing. But

Jon Meyer: So many people don’t know how to find someone like you who will help proactively fight stuff, and they see the word integrative medicine all over the place now.

Charles Svendsen: Yeah.

Jon Meyer: But depending on your definition, a lot of those places are, to your point, just saying, “Take more vitamins.”

Charles Svendsen: Right.

Jon Meyer: So how do, how should people look at the difference between the different providers?

Jon Meyer: How do they find the right provider? What are they looking for? ‘Cause it seems to me like a bit of the Holy Grail is probably having an MD like yourself in the m- in the process who will also talk about some of that more esoteric stuff.

Charles Svendsen: Absolutely. So upfront, I want to make sure that everyone I work with has a good primary care physician.

Charles Svendsen: So we are sort of a stack on top of your general physician What I want to do with all of it is really look at the preventative aspect. So I think what, what you’re asking, Jon, is what’s the difference between preventative medicine, integrative medicine, functional medicine, and all of the bu- buzzwords that you hear, hear out there, there these days?

Jon Meyer: Yeah, ’cause we’ll get to the podcast on functional medicine.

Charles Svendsen: Right. So the, the, the functional, functional medicine is great in that they’re looking at root cause, but they’re a little… You get into a little bit more of the esoteric when you’re looking at their treatments, and there’s n- it’s not as data-driven.

Charles Svendsen: What I wanna do is make sure that anything that I do is driven by good data, and that there’s a measurable outcome when I do it. I don’t wanna make an intervention that I can’t tell whether it’s, it’s actually helping. I, I want more than, “Yeah, I feel better.” Yeah. I, the, I wanna be able to measure a biomarker, and that could be laboratory, that could be strength, it could be VO2 max.

Charles Svendsen: But I wanna make sure that there’s some measure for, for, for what I’m looking at. So I like to use those principles of functional medicine, of what’s the root cause, but I want my interventions to be very data-driven. I, I wanna have more than a big supplement stack. So I, I, I’m not afraid of using pharmaceuticals, right?

Charles Svendsen: One of the hot topic ones obviously are the GLP-1s. They’re an absolutely fantastic medication, but there’s a middle ground between saying, “No, we, we need to stay away from anything that big pharma does,” versus, “Here’s a telephone call. I’m gonna put you on a GLP-1. You, you need to have some support with this.

Charles Svendsen: You need to make sure that you’re getting your protein in, that you’re doing strength training, that we’re doing a DEXA scan and a VO2 max and making sure that you’re not losing muscle mass with it.” So I think of what we’re doing as sort of the confluence between functional medicine and more of the medicine 2.0.

Charles Svendsen: So it’s, it’s, it’s very data-driven, and looking at root cause, and being preventative and proactive.

Jon Meyer: So when you say it that way, how long should people realistically expect it to take to feel that proactive change? You know, when do they see results?

Charles Svendsen: Yeah. I, I think the very earliest you’re gonna see results is probably the three-month range, right around there, and I think it’s more realistic probably six months in before you’re really gonna say, “Wow, I, I feel better.”

Charles Svendsen: So let me talk about some of my other favorite medical books. One would be Atomic Habits by, by James Clear. Doesn’t, doesn’t sound like a medical book on the, from, from the description, right? It’s not what you think of as a medical book. I think of it as a medical book because I’m in the business of behavioral change- It’s not uncommon for people to do an executive physical and get handed a nice stack of papers.

Charles Svendsen: But where’s the program? What do you do with that over the next year before you go back and you have that next executive physical? And I think that’s where Astride Health shines. We’re the accountability portion. We’re giving you the guidance. We’re giving you the accountability. We’re helping you, helping you make those interventions.

Charles Svendsen: And that’s why I say Atomic Habits is, is a, a favorite medical book, because I’m trying to help you make those small behavioral changes that develop into big lifestyle changes, into big health changes. But that doesn’t happen overnight, and it’s probably sticking with your program for at least six months to, to really see those differences.

Jon Meyer: So let’s talk for a second about some of those things. From your perspective What is the, what, what are the, I don’t know if you’d call them treatments or preventative measures that you think have the m- strongest evidence behind them versus the ones that you think right now are just kind of fluff or, you know, someone trying to sell something?

Charles Svendsen: Great question. What’s, what’s the signal, what’s the noise, right? It- ’cause this is, when someone starts talking about preventative medicine, they start talking about health span, longevity, it’s easy to get into the snake oil, and that’s what we’re really trying to help people avoid.

Jon Meyer: So really, Chuck, the question is do you do hot tubs and cold plunges, right?

Charles Svendsen: So that’s, that’s a loaded question for me as a Scandinavian, Jon, because I love my sauna and I love my cold plunge. Yeah. Yep, yep. Do- Are, are there health benefits to sauna, to saunas? There absolutely are. Are there any health benefits to cold plunges? Ah, it’s a hard one. The data, the data doesn’t really seem to show it.

Charles Svendsen: Doesn’t mean it doesn’t feel good, doesn’t mean I won’t do it. I, I’ll, I’ll turn the question around a little bit on, on you. I’ll say NAD infusions, vitamin infusions, and, and red light therapy, right? That, that’s, that to me a little bit more where it, it gets a little, uh, little mushy, and I’m not sure about the data in those areas.

Charles Svendsen: So we’re trying to help patients really find the, the signal in all of this. And, and I guess that’s, yeah, that, that’s the important part to me, ma- making sure just, like, again, the financial analogies. Am, am, am I a broker or am I a fiduciary? And, and I, I like to think of us as a fiduciary.

Jon Meyer: Mm-hmm.

Charles Svendsen: So the, the things that are, you can get traction on, number one has to be exercise.

Charles Svendsen: I, I, I just think that’s irrefutable. If you look at what is the most closely linked to increased lifespan, increased health span, strength and VO2 max have the strongest signal of anything out there. And it’s not sexy, right? To, to tell somebody you need to, to eat right and exercise. And, and that, that’s really not what I’m saying.

Charles Svendsen: I, I’m, I’m saying you need to have a plan. I think there’s a difference between exercise and training. So exercise, a lot of people will say, “Yeah, I, I already exercise.” But o- okay, that’s fine. What are you doing for exercise? Are you doing the same thing that you did when you were 20 years old and 30 years old?

Charles Svendsen: Because that, that’s not what you need when you’re 50, 60, 70 years old. You, you need a plan. You need to worry about your mobility. You need to worry about your balance. You, you really need to have a plan in place. So yes, exercise is the overall topic, but you have to get a little bit deep into that, right?

Charles Svendsen: Devil’s in the details. And the same for VO2 max. Okay, I run Two miles every day. Well, that’s great, but is that really changing your VO2 max? Are you challenging yourself? If you’ve been running two miles every day for the past 20 years, I, I would postulate you probably need to do something a little bit different.

Charles Svendsen: You need to change it up.

Jon Meyer: Yeah, no, I, I think as we age, we all start figuring out that if we’re gonna keep doing the same stuff 10 years down the road, we gotta change something now, and I don’t think enough people think about that.

Charles Svendsen: Right.

Jon Meyer: So can you give me a scenario or an example where advanced testing in your world did meaningfully change someone’s life?

Jon Meyer: Like, what exactly are you looking for that a regular doctor’s not looking for?

Charles Svendsen: One of my favorite examples is one of the men in our practice. He is by all measures fit. And what I mean by that is he’s a competitive cyclist, does cross-country skiing, he’s got a low BMI, and from the outside you would think, “Wow, what does this person have…

Charles Svendsen: At 50 years old, what does he have to gain from working with, with us at Astride?” It turns out that his bone mineral density put him in osteo- osteoporosis. So here’s a 50-year-old male who looks very healthy who needs to be on a medication for low bone mineral density. And I, I don’t think that’s something that any of his r- regular physicians would have ever checked, and we, we picked that up from a, a DEXA scan.

Charles Svendsen: And it really is not only a life-changer, but it also informed some other decisions. And what I mean by that is he’s got a thyroid that’s sort of sputtering. So if you saw his primary doc, his primary doc would maybe say, “Oh yeah, we need to get you on some thyroid replacement.” Well, the problem is his thyroid replacement is then going to increase his bone turnover and decrease his bone mineral density.

Charles Svendsen: So instead, we held off on treating his thyroid and added in some testosterone and made sure he was doing good strength training. So I think that’s a not only very personalized, but also a great example where that’s something that wouldn’t have been found for decades with his, with his general practitioner.

Charles Svendsen: And it’s, it’s not a slight on the general practitioner. They’re just not set up to do what we’re doing. They’re… It- it- it’s just the difference in focus is, is what it is.

Jon Meyer: He- help me understand that a little bit, because people go to their doctor, and it’s no different than me. When people come to me, they, they say, “Well, I’ve been working with a financial advisor for years,” and they don’t recognize the difference between what we do and what maybe a broker at some big firm does.

Jon Meyer: And then once they work with us for a year, they’re like, “Oh my God, this is life-changing.” And I suspect it’s like you. So what are… Like, what’s missing? Why is the, call it your average doctor, I hate to say it that way, but your average doctor not doing what you’re doing? Is it just because they don’t have time?

Jon Meyer: The system doesn’t pay them for it? They don’t learn it in med school? I, I just don’t understand.

Charles Svendsen: I, I would… The, the answer is D, all of the above. You… They’re… They don’t have time. A quick question for you. On average, how much time do you think you spend with your clients each year?

Jon Meyer: Well, that’s… Well, that is a point.

Jon Meyer: Like, we spend dozens of hours with the people on the front end.

Charles Svendsen: Right.

Jon Meyer: And then as they go on, it’s, it definitely can decrease a little bit, but you, you spend hours with them, not 12 minutes.

Charles Svendsen: Right. And I think even if someone does a good history and physical each year with, which frankly doesn’t reveal very much, they’re maybe getting 30 minutes with their, their doc each year until they develop a health problem.

Charles Svendsen: And just like you guys, they’re spending hours with us on the front end. It probably decreases over time as they get more familiar with the program. I, I, I’m, I’m sure our, our chief growth officer will, will hate me for this statement, but I, I, I really, I hope that patients work with us for a few years, learn what we have, and go out on their own.

Charles Svendsen: I, I don’t, I don’t really wanna see somebody for decades. I, I want to educate them, get them into good habits, and it’s a little bit of a catch and release program, right? I, I want them to, to go out and, and do a lot of this stuff on their own. So number one, the- their regular doctor doesn’t have time.

Charles Svendsen: Number two, it’s the system constraints. Insurance is not gonna pay for a DEXA scan on someone they consider, quote unquote, “healthy.” And insurance is really reactive, not proactive. Because again, that churn rate in the market is 1.4 years. Why should I care about what’s gonna happen to you decades down the road when you’re no longer one of my insured members?

Charles Svendsen: And your last point of we didn’t learn it in medical school, I can say the sum total of hours that I got on nutrition, exercise, and sleep in medical school was zero. And so unless the physician has a specific interest in this and want, wants to learn it on their own, they’re not gonna pick this up.

Jon Meyer: You, you said something to…

Jon Meyer: Let’s set off the time bomb ’cause I know your chief growth officer. So- Right … if you’re gonna play catch and release, is it that simple that people, once they learn a, the basics of their body, that it just stays that way for life and they can, you can release them to the wild and they can take care of themselves?

Charles Svendsen: I, I think it’s more back to the atomic habits, right? It… When you, when you make exercise a habit, you feel miserable when you miss it. So it really is about- Learning what’s important. And, and like I said, I think so much of my job is education. Because if, if you, you… Everybody has to be their own advocate with their physician.

Charles Svendsen: So if they, if the person can learn that, “Well, I’m at risk for cardiovascular disease, so I need my ApoB, not just the regular lipid panel. I need to know what my LP little a is to make sure that I’m not at increased risk. I need to make sure that I know what my fasting insulin is. I need to make sure I know what my A1C is,” they can ask for those tests when they go see their, their general physician.

Charles Svendsen: And if they have their exercise habits in place, if they have the other habits in place, you know, I hope- hopefully they don’t, they eventually don’t need us. That, that would be… I, I… That would be great. Now, if they wanna stay with us for a decade, that’s fantastic, too. I like long-term relationships. But I, I don’t think people have to think of this like luggage.

Charles Svendsen: You purchase it, and it’s with you for, for life. I think you can rotate it out eventually.

Jon Meyer: I, I don’t know what luggage you have. Mine breaks constantly. So, so you’re bringing up a point, and this is where my world and your world come together a little bit d- ’cause it is that intersection of, of health and money.

Jon Meyer: If you have money, you can, you can pay cash for some of this stuff. So talk a little bit about the money side. You know, when someone works with someone like you, typically what does it cost? What are they, what are they paying for? What should they expect when it comes to added testing costs, whatever?

Charles Svendsen: Great question. It’s not inexpensive. A- and, you know, I… Is this for everybody? It, it’s not. If you’re 20 and 30 years old, you, you probably don’t need what I’m doing. One, one of the things is I, I guess what I’ve often said is this is for people who have one life. You know, your, your wealth is in place, your family’s in place, your career’s in place, but what you’ve often done is made trade-offs to get to that position in life.

Charles Svendsen: And so we’re kind of helping you buy back that time a little bit. And unfortunately, it’s gonna cost money that you, you can’t do this in the traditional medical system. So we, we, we charge on a yearly basis. Like we talked about earlier, it’s probably gonna take six months to see the difference. I, I want you for at least a year.

Charles Svendsen: And we have remarkably low turnover. It’s, it’s… Patients tend to love us. All of our growth is by word of mouth It is something that you’re investing in yourself. And again, those health costs tend to be back-loaded. I would much rather that you get in that exercise routine now and you don’t have to do cardiac rehab later on, right?

Charles Svendsen: Who, who… No one wants a $100,000 bill from cardiac stenting. Heart disease is theoretically completely preventable, controlling your lipids, not smoking, controlling your blood pressure. So we’re helping you make that investment upfront, but the current system isn’t set up for that. And yeah, you have to go outside the system and pay for it.

Charles Svendsen: But like I say, there’s a lot of hidden costs in the current system. There’s a… I can tell you just about everybody I see is on a number of supplements they don’t need. I would rather get you on supplements that make a difference and spend that money a little bit more wisely. I wanna help prevent people from paying for that snake oil.

Charles Svendsen: I wanna help them pay for the things that are really gonna move the needle. That’s, that’s the whole goal for us.

Jon Meyer: Well, the reason I ask the h- money question is because my take on it is that people rely on insurance, and particularly in the Midwest-

Charles Svendsen: Yeah …

Jon Meyer: we’re a little more I don’t know what word I wanna use.

Jon Meyer: Sometimes we probably should just use the word cheap. And, and we don’t wanna spend cash on anything if it’s not covered by insurance. And I’ve run into this in a different spot. The different spot is when you run into someone older who bought long-term care insurance, and they’re like, “Should I drop it?”

Jon Meyer: My first answer is, “Never drop it,” because it actually gives you permission to get treatment, which will probably keep you alive longer.

Charles Svendsen: Right.

Jon Meyer: Because with people that don’t have long-term care insurance, they oftentimes will say, “Well, I can’t afford to do X, Y, or Z,” and they die faster.

Charles Svendsen: Exactly.

Jon Meyer: Even though they have millions of dollars.

Jon Meyer: It makes no sense to me.

Charles Svendsen: Right.

Jon Meyer: But that’s why I ask the money question, ’cause I really think people should be spending money on this stuff.

Charles Svendsen: I agree. I, uh, obviously I have an incentive in that we have a, a company focused on this. Our, you know, our, our yearly fee is around $10,000. So what, what are you getting for your $10,000?

Charles Svendsen: You’re getting access to me. You’re getting access to our PhD exercise physiologist. You’re getting ongoing accountability and training and guidance. When you look at it, most people these days have somewhere between a 3 and $10,000 deductible. Everybody hopes they’re not gonna spend it each year, m- but the majority of people do end up spending through their deductible.

Charles Svendsen: So how about if you actually spent some of that money on prevention and not having to spend it on the deductible? I also look at things like gym memberships. It’s not unusual for someone to spend 2 to $5,000 a year on a gym membership that they, they don’t use. It, it can often be a, little bit like a country club.

Charles Svendsen: With us, you’re kind of getting a gym membership because you get access to our gym, you get access to the trainers So when you start looking at some of the hidden costs that go away when you’re working with us, I, I actually think we’re kind of inexpensive. I think, I think the money that you’re saving, the money that you’re spending now and saving in the long term is, is really where, where the benefit is.

Jon Meyer: Interesting way to look at it. So let’s, you’ve, you’ve mentioned the word snake oil, so let’s talk for just a minute about who’s putting out good stuff right now on this. You know, who are the good podcasts, the good books versus the ones that are ugh?

Charles Svendsen: So my favorite exercise podcast is, is probably Andy Galpin.

Charles Svendsen: I, I think I, I enjoy him more as a, a guest than a podcaster, but when you look at exercise, it- it’s hard to come up with, with somebody better. That being said, the next name out of my mouth is gonna be Layne Norton. He’s got a, a PhD in biochemistry, and he is great about looking at the actual science behind anything, seed oils, exercise, fad diets.

Charles Svendsen: He really goes to the literature and does a good hard look at the papers. I, I trust his opinion implicitly I like Rhonda Patrick’s podcast of Found My Fitness. Mmm, I think she does a great job of looking at some of the science. I… The hard part for Rhonda just is that she’s not dealing with patients on a day-to-day basis.

Charles Svendsen: So if you’re really looking for a physician who deals with patients and has sound information, I think the… Uh, you know, he’s become a bit controversial, but the information from Peter Attia, I, I think is absolutely fantastic. Barbell Medicine is another one, two physicians, very focused on exercise. I think that’s a, a great podcast, too.

Charles Svendsen: So I, I… Anything, any of the podcasts that I recommend, I really want to, wanna keep it grounded in science. So I, I… Those are probably the top ones that come to mind.

Jon Meyer: You didn’t name any of the big guys.

Charles Svendsen: Which, which ones are you, are you looking for Joe Rogan and Andrew Huberman?

Jon Meyer: Huberman and, uh, who’s… Gary Brecka and-

Jon Meyer: I’m trying to think of all the ones, you know, that everyone talks about.

Charles Svendsen: I, I, I think I lose IQ points every time someone says Gary Brecka’s name. I’m, I’m not a fan. The, the hard part with Gary Brecka is I think there, you’re, you’re seeing a lot of sales pitch, right? He, he will talk about things like methylated vitamins.

Charles Svendsen: You don’t have to pay for methylated vitamins for Gary Brecka. You can get methylated vitamins much cheaper. You can do better genetic testing than you can get for the expensive stuff that, that he’s doing, and I do not think you need a $100,000 red light therapy bed. The hard part with him is 20%, mmm, is probably accurate, and you just don’t know what 20% unless you’re really grounded i- in, in the literature, I don’t think.

Charles Svendsen: Andrew Huberman, he… At the start I, I, I really enjoyed his podcast. Some of his stuff I, I don’t think of as always as, as science-based. So I, I wish he was a little bit more rigorous on the, the science sometimes. So both, both people are entertaining. Ab- absolutely, they’re, they’re entertaining. But they’re, they’re not my…

Charles Svendsen: Certainly wouldn’t be the ones I would recommend for people to listen to.

Jon Meyer: Well, as people listen to this, o- one of the thoughts they are gonna have outside of just g- furthering their information overload with podcasts is, you know, what’s an actual step they can take in the next six months? Give me, give me a step.

Jon Meyer: Here, here’s what I want you to do Yeah Give me a step on three budget levels. Kind of a one freebie, one that’s gonna cost a little something, and then one that’s pretty comprehensive and, and they sh- you know, they’re gonna spend some money on

Charles Svendsen: Right. I, I think the freebie is what can you actually get covered under your current health insurance?

Charles Svendsen: So free is not necessarily free because you… there’s a co-pay and, and a deductible in- involved in all of it. But if you wanna think of traditional medicine as free, there’s a few markers you can get. It would be one, it’s not as popular in the US or as well known in the US, but the advantage of ApoB is that it is the integral of the lipid world, and you can get a lot of information.

Charles Svendsen: Every lipid molecule has to be attached to an ApoB protein molecule to be transported. So with one number, you can get a good idea of someone’s lipids. An hsCRP, high sensitivity C-reactive protein, that gives you an idea of how much overall inflammation you have in your body. A hemoglobin A1C is another good biomarker that’s good to know.

Charles Svendsen: I say, I usually will say glucose is a snapshot, and a hemoglobin A1C is a movie. It gives you information of your average glucose over a three-month time period. So those you can usually get at your, at your standard physical. The next thing to do would be exercise. It does not cost you anything to put on your shoes and walk out the door, and y- you don’t have to go run a marathon.

Charles Svendsen: It’s, it’s as simple as, you know, when you look at Atomic Habits, you start out by putting on your shoes. You might not even head out the door, just put on your shoes every day. Eventually, you head out the door. Eventually, you go around the block. Eventually, you increase the length of that walk. That 1% each, each increase is, is what moves the needle in, in the long term.

Charles Svendsen: So you can do all of that for free The moderate level would be to add in a DEXA scan and a VO2 max. Those are gonna cost you somewhere around $200 each, right, right in that range. But that’s gonna tell you how big your engine is, that’s the VO2 max, and it’s gonna tell you how much visceral adipose tissue you have.

Charles Svendsen: So how much high-risk fat that you’re carrying around your organs, and it’s gonna tell you your muscle mass. And then a big laboratory panel. Those are easy to find these days. Function health levels, a lot of those. The hard part is you’re gonna get your function health tests back with a generic AI readout, and you really need someone to help you interpret those labs.

Charles Svendsen: So that’s where you might have to pay a little bit to find a physician to help interpret those labs. And on the more expensive end, it, it’s us. It’s a Stride Health. It’s a comprehensive program. It’s a personal trainer that you work with a couple days a week. It is a DEXA scan. It’s a VO2 max. It’s a Look at your social connectivity.

Charles Svendsen: It’s look, looking at all of your preventative health measures, looking at your stress reduction, looking at your sleep, getting a wearable such as a WHOOP to help you look at some of your biometrics. So it’s a, a very comprehensive program would be something more like a Stride Health.

Jon Meyer: Interesting. Well, as we come to an end here, what am I not asking you?

Jon Meyer: Like, what, what, what have I missed here in, as, in our conversation?

Charles Svendsen: Oh man, they’ve been great questions. I could go on for hours on most of them. I, I think the main thing to think about is that concept of a health fiduciary. The person sitting across from you, what is their motivation? How are they making their money?

Charles Svendsen: Are they making it selling you IV infusions and supplements and therapies? Are they beholden to the insurance company and restricted from the tests that they can do because the insurance company isn’t gonna let them do that? Or are they really looking at w- what is the absolute best thing for that person?

Charles Svendsen: Because even traditional medicine, we make decisions based on studies of large groups of people, hopefully in the 10 to 100,000 range. But that has to be applied to the individual that’s across from you, and I think that’s really where the art of all of this comes into play. You know, I can… There are great studies out there, and that helps inform my decision But how does that affect the person that’s sitting across from me?

Charles Svendsen: So I’ll, I’ll plug my last favorite medical book, which is Thinking in Bets by Annie Duke

Jon Meyer: I love that book.

Charles Svendsen: So a- again, I think we got a little too much in common, Jon.

Jon Meyer: Yeah, but you’re not reading, you’re not reading any medical books. That’s what everyone doesn’t understand. These are not all medical books, but-

Jon Meyer: I love that book.

Charles Svendsen: But they are, they are medical books because you, you have to make decisions with limited information. That, that’s all of medicine, is making decisions based on limited information. I… My, my daughter is a, oldest daughter’s a third-year surgical resident. I had her read Thinking in Bets by Annie Duke.

Charles Svendsen: I said, “This is one of the best medical books you can read because you’re gonna have to make decisions with limited information.” And she also talks about back casting, and that’s the other thing that we do, right? It’s like, okay, if you want to be… The average age people are done traveling is about 75.

Charles Svendsen: Well, if you’re working till you’re 70, you only have about five years of travel. The average life expectancy in the US between, if you average men and women right now, it’s 79. That is, that’s a pretty short runway for that travel. If you want to extend that out, if you wanna be traveling when you’re 80 and lifting luggage into an overhead bin in the airline What do you have to be able to lift now when you’re 50?

Charles Svendsen: What do you have to be able to lift when you’re 60? Can you run across the airport to catch that flight? I- if you’re gonna do that when you’re 80, what do you have to be doing now when you’re 50, 60, 70? And that’s the other thing that Annie Duke talks about is back casting, and I just think that’s, that’s so important.

Charles Svendsen: Looking, and, and I, I’m sure it’s the same thing you’re doing, right? It’s like, okay, here’s the financial goals that we have at the end of life for you. What maneuvers do we need to be making today to make that happen 10, 20, 30, 40 years down the road? So there’s so many analogies between, between our two industries.

Jon Meyer: Yeah. Well, something you said in there, by the way, struck a chord in me ’cause you said it’s gotta be personalized. Yes. You take these big studies of hundreds of thousands of people, and then it’s gotta be personalized. And, and what struck me in that is the conversation you and I had once about hormone replacement therapy.

Jon Meyer: Because forever everyone said it was wrong for women to have hormone replacement.

Charles Svendsen: Yep.

Jon Meyer: And it’s become probably in the past few years more acceptable. But for a long time, the study said not to do it.

Charles Svendsen: Correct. Yeah.

Jon Meyer: And that’s probably put a lot of women in r- in not such a good spot for the last few decades.

Charles Svendsen: The… One of, probably the, the, the biggest travesty in, in medicine in the past 20 years is what we’ve done to women and hormone replacement therapy, and that all came from the Women’s Health In- Initiative, the WHI. Came out in 20… I, I think is when they, they made the, the announcement on the WHI. That year, there were approximately 30% of women were on hormone replacement therapy.

Charles Svendsen: The lowest recorded year for hormone replacement therapy for women was last year at 3.4%. So it has continually gone down, and hormone replacement therapy leads… does not increase your risk of breast cancer. It’s, it’s, that is 100% incorrect. It does decrease your risk of heart attack. It does decrease your risk of stroke, your risk of dementia, and your risk of, risk of hip fracture.

Charles Svendsen: So I’m a huge proponent of hormone replacement therapy for men and for women. It, it’s just, if we had done that to men, it wouldn’t have gone on for 20 years, frankly. I’ll try to not stand on my soapbox for too long, but it’s a little bit of a… I, I get a little passionate about this one.

Jon Meyer: Yeah. Well, and that’s why I advocate people get personalized medicine ’cause sometimes the averages don’t work in your, in your favor So with that, I wanna thank you for coming on, Chuck.

Jon Meyer: I’d love to have you back and dig into some of these treatments and stuff a little bit. Quite honestly, it’d be fun. But as we go, could you leave us with your contact information or however you want people to get ahold of you? Because I’m sure someone will want to get ahold of you.

Charles Svendsen: Absolutely. Our website is Astride Health, A-S-T-R-I-D-E H-E-L-T-H.us.

Charles Svendsen: So that’s the, the one that you have to remember, or you can just do a web search under Astride Health. You can send us a note through the website. I think you can even sign up to have a chat with me through the website. My, my calendar is out there. Feel free to put your name out, sign up for a time. We’ll have a chat.

Charles Svendsen: I’m not looking for any, any money from you. I would just love to talk about your health, and I’m happy to do that with whoever’s interested because, again, this is individualized, and what your issues are are different from what everybody else’s issues are.

Jon Meyer: That’s great. Well, thank you for your time today, Chuck.

Jon Meyer: It’s always fun talking to you. And for those of you that wanna watch more of these podcasts or see anything else here at BGM going on, please visit us at bgm360.com. Thanks a lot, and have a great day

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