Five F’s Series – Health and Fitness with Dr. Ryan McWhorter

After I had established myself as a family care physician I lost my father figure due to heart disease. He was too young for this to happen and, like everyone, I thought there has to be a better way to predict, and try to prevent these conditions. It was a real turning point in my career, leading me to seek advanced cardiovascular training. One conference led to another, and I realized new and better therapies that make a real difference, do exist.

Insights & Inspirations

Five F’s – faith, family, fun, fitness, and finance that I believe you need to measure so you can manage them. And as you manage them, then you get the benefit of them being multiplied. – John Marsh
“Half of what we teach is not true, we just don’t know which half.” – Dr. McWhorter
Medicine’s just fantastic. I mean, it’s just very, very similar to how your cell phone’s changed. Just in the past few years, we’ve gone from a terrible bag phone, flip phone, and now just … We don’t even go to our desktop computers anymore hardly, and that’s exactly how medicine has changed. – Dr. McWhorter
Blue zones are places on the world that had been circled with a blue pen by a guy who studied, where do people live to be a hundred most frequently – Dr. McWhorter
There’s only one in the United States in Loma Linda. But Okinawa and just various islands, usually they’re associated with the coast and outdoor activity, shoelessness, strong sense of community. – Dr. McWhorter
What’s really funny is that the more I study and the more I try to solve people, the more I realize it’s really about getting back to that existence of being outdoors and lowering our stress. Because I think everybody on a stress level might be … if 10 is horrible stress, we all might all be living at a seven or eight if we’re not careful. – Dr. McWhorter
I read a study recently this last week that they were just checking for some variable in children, but only 33% of the children were considered neurologically normal out of 1,000 kids born the last few years. – Dr. McWhorter
“Are you healthy?” They’ll normally say, “Yes.” Or, “No.” And it’s based on is there any current chronic thing attacking them they can put their finger on. It isn’t that, the absence of sickness is not the presence of health. – Dr. McWhorter
Every cell of our body has two different nerves that go to the cell and the cell is either told to, “Run for your life.” Fight or flight experience, or, “Rest, repair, slow down, uptake nutrients, detox, and get ready for when the lion does chase us.” – Dr. McWhorter
One hour outdoors lowers your perceived stress 800%- Dr. McWhorter
Just walking a short distance through woods changed something about their biology. The Japanese have a translation for their word for that is forest bathing.- Dr. McWhorter
The difference is so huge between ideal health and just terrible health, and it’s just a few key things that can make such a difference. So sleeping eight hours, making sure you’re taking vitamin D, you’re getting good sun exposure. – Dr. McWhorter
And sun exposure as a myth-buster does not cause melanoma, it’s actually sun exposure as a teenager. Blistering sun at that age and only that age increases your risk. Otherwise, sun avoidance causes more melanomas interestingly.- Dr. McWhorter
Another key thing … You asked for 10, and I’m coming up with them as I think. But I’m not eating huge meals at bedtime, which is so different from the typical American. We want a bigger breakfast, medium lunch, small dinner. I’ve asked my 90 plus-year-old people what are their secrets as a habit. – Dr. McWhorter
Sleep or sex or now the two best vital signs I think. – Dr. McWhorter
Oh, another thing to raise your lifespan, raise the head of your bed six inches. So put some two bricks under the head bedpost and your brain will get out 50% more toxins in the night.- Dr. McWhorter
That’s another thing, you take up gardening, you’ll just live longer. If you floss, you’ll live seven years longer. – Dr. McWhorter
If you have heart disease and they can’t find a cause, I recommend seeing a biological dentist because they have different mechanisms for detecting that trigger for your heart disease. – Dr. McWhorter
If you have sex twice a week, you drop your heart attack risk by 50%. – Dr. McWhorter
So to me functional medicine means trying to solve the root of the problem. . – Dr. McWhorter
So go cane pole fishing, take your kids.- Dr. McWhorter
Good, slow sex is empowering. Better than yoga, better than cane pole fishing. It really does something. .- Dr. McWhorter
Because most people don’t do good, because they don’t feel good. – John Marsh
Car cleaners, air fresheners, number one risk factor for breast cancer .- Dr. McWhorter