The Get Healthy Tampa Bay Podcast

E106: Creating Joy and Healthy Aging with Dr. Seetha Lakshmi

• Kerry Reller

Share episode

Welcome to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay Podcast with Dr. Kerry Reller! This week, I’m joined by Dr. Seetha Lakshmi, a physician specializing in infectious disease, functional medicine, and contemplative medicine. We discuss how to rewire the brain, create joy, and reverse aging through mindfulness, movement, and human connection. Dr. Lakshmi also shares practical tips on healthy aging and tools like biofeedback to improve focus and reduce stress. Tune in for simple, actionable steps to enhance your health and well-being!

Dr. Seetha Lakshmi is a board-certified physician in Infectious Disease and Internal Medicine with advanced fellowships in Anti-Aging and Functional Medicine, as well as Contemplative Medicine. As the founder of My Direct Physician, she integrates mind-body medicine and metabolic health to promote healthy aging.

Dr. Lakshmi’s approach goes beyond traditional healthcare, focusing not only on the length of life but also on the breadth—cultivating joy and connection in a fast-paced, cortisol-driven culture. Her innovative practice incorporates tools like point-of-care EEG biofeedback, mindfulness techniques, and the measurement of inflammatory markers to rebalance the body, mind, and spirit.

Outside of medicine, Dr. Lakshmi is an artist who works with acrylics, pastels, and alcohol ink. She is also a proud single mom of three boys, embodying resilience and creativity in every facet of her life.

0:28 - Introduction to Dr. Seetha Lakshmi
1:45 - Journey from Infectious Disease to Functional Medicine
3:14 - What is Contemplative Medicine?
5:24 - Rewiring the Brain for Healthy Aging
8:24 - Tools for Stress Management: EEG and Biofeedback
11:26 - The Role of Human Connection in Happiness
17:43 - Promoting Healthy Aging: Body, Mind, and Society
24:49 - Understanding Inflammatory Markers in Aging
29:42 - Starting MyDirectPhysician and Patient-Centered Care
33:14 - Final Takeaways: Creating Joy and Balance in Life

Connect with Dr. Seetha

Connect with Dr. Reller
Podcast website: https://gethealthytbpodcast.buzzsprou... 
My linktree: linktr.ee/kerryrellermd
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kerryrellermd/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ClearwaterFamilyMedicine
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/clearwaterfamilymedicine/
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@kerryrellermd
Clearwater Family Medicine and Allergy website: https://sites.google.com/view/clearwa...
Podcast: https://gethealthytbpodcast.buzzsprou...

Subscribe to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay Podcast on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Amazon music, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Pandora.

Kerry:

All right. Hi, everybody. Welcome back to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Kerry Reller. Today we have Dr. Seetha Lakshmi. Welcome to the podcast. Hopefully I did okay with your name.

Seetha:

Yes, you did great. Thank you.

Kerry:

Well, Dr. Lakshmi is a board certified physician in infectious disease and in internal medicine and fellowships in functional medicine, anti aging, and contemplative medicine. She is the founder of MyDirectPhysician, a practice dedicated to integrating mind, body, medicine, and metabolic health to promote healthy aging. You also are in addition to your medical expertise, you are an associate professor at University of Central Florida, has previously held prestigious roles at Tampa General Hospital, including director of the Global Emerging Diseases Institute, and beyond medicine, you're an artist working with acrylics, pastels, alcohol ink, and a proud mom of three boys. So, welcome to the podcast. I hope I did some justice on your introduction and we're so excited to have you here and have you tell us all about how you got from being in infectious disease to kind of what you're doing now. You've achieved so much across all these different fields. So how do they, how do these different roles influence each other in your life?

Seetha:

That's a great question. And I think in one word, the answer is curiosity. So, being a curious person and things spark my interest and the journey of curiosity has taken me to very interesting places. And I would say most recently was a fellowship in contemplative medicine and the and the anti aging and functional medicine and it kind of ties through. So. When we look at, I think, our medical journeys in general, we want the best for our patients, we want to heal and, you know, help with suffering ease the suffering to the best we can. Sometimes there is not much, sometimes there is plenty to do. So I found that, Infectious disease is very, is a specialty where you are very curious in terms of what the interaction is between the pathogen and the body, right? And then a continuum of that is what happens once the pathogen is killed. Our body is still there. It's still inflamed. It still thinks something crazy is happening. So that kind of took me to the journey of let me look more into this inflammation. Let's look more into the. cells and metabolism of the body, and that's where the functional medicine came in.

Kerry:

No, no, that definitely makes sense from, you know, everything. And I've learned from functional medicine, but what is contemplative medicine? Cause I haven't heard of that one. And I didn't know there were any fellowships available in that. So what is that?

Seetha:

Contemplative medicine is essentially medicine for living in the moment. And it's really about now we know with neuroscience that we can actually rewire our brains because a few years ago, we didn't think that was going to be possible. We're like, you're older, you're done. You can't teach an old dog new tricks. Right. That was the going statement. But now we can learn and actually rewire the brain. And when we look at what are the things that really help us rewire the brain. There is new experiences, being curious, being open. There is meditation, there is mindfulness. In fact, I saw one of the studies that came out that you can reverse the aging of your brain by 10 years. Reverse if you do 20 minutes of the mindfulness based practices in your day, and it doesn't have to be sitting practices, right? Some people cannot sit still, and for some people, it's not. For some people, it's walking. For some people, believe it or not, it's like tai chi or it's karate. It's like A lot of body movement. Some people, it's dance. So contemplative medicine brings all of these philosophies of how do you bring your brain to the present and rewire it so you can actually this idea of I can't find joy to, like, can I create joy? It is empowering to know it's not something you find, you create. And contemplative medicine really does bring it to the focus of how do we bring joy, how do we create joy in being in the moment?

Kerry:

How do you, I guess, go about working with like a patient on, you know, Helping them, you said, reduce the aging by 20 years. Is that what you said?

Seetha:

Ten years, ten years, yeah, yeah. Twenty would be great.

Kerry:

Yeah. 10 even sounds amazing. Right. So I guess I'm especially thinking of this as like aging family members right now. Right. So how, how does that, that's able to rewire the brain and kind of make it form new pathways. And how does, how does that work? Or how do you work with your patients on putting in these measures to do that?

Seetha:

So great question. It depends really on where the patient is in their journey of mental health, right? We know as physicians, there are many things that contribute to aging of the brain, So your neurons are surrounded by the supporting cells and the supporting cells when they get either inflamed irritated and think they have to do autoimmune stuff, attack their own neurons, or there is decreased blood supply, right? So there are many different ways how you get to that real aging of decrease in the size, decrease in the neural networks. So there are many different pathways. You really have to look what is the cause first of that aging process, and then you address the cause. Now, what I find in practice, most often, and the most easiest, I think, to really best bang for the buck to start off is really to bring your mind to the present moment. And it's not easy. And most of my patients often it's, you know, right now it's the era of disruption and distraction. The focused attention is really a privilege. And I wanted to make it the norm. How do we do that? So the first parts of it is, of course, the eating healthy. They're exercising, there is no I think that is really no no better thing than the exercise. In fact, one of the studies that came out was the size of your calf muscles, the circumference correlates with the degree of onset of dementia. So the delay in the onset of dementia. So exercise is that important. The second most thing in there, right? That's, and then the other one is, believe it or not, as people age, it's the hearing. If there's one thing we can correct is the hearing piece. So those are like the, the basics, eating well, exercising, correcting your hearing and correcting your sleep apnea. And there are some things that I do with supplementation, which is really around the omega 3 fatty acids that are more neuroprotective, and that we don't really get enough of in our diet. So that's, some studies have really shown that you can help with brain health. And there's plenty to be said about nutrition, but you know, that's one of the harder pieces. It'll take probably an entire hour to talk about nutrition that promotes brain health. And the last piece that is in our control is like the ones I said, the mindfulness based practices. And in my clinic, I have a clinical program that actually you use a little headband and it measures your brain waves. And it gives you feedback to say, Hey, you are in The theta waves, you're in the alpha waves and how often you're getting lost and can you bring yourself back to this moment and it'll show you in the graph, So that's data, real time feedback and people like, Oh my gosh, this is incredible too, because our brain has always been an enigma. But then you put the band and you're like, Oh my gosh, I can see my brain working or not sometimes.

Kerry:

That is

Seetha:

have a clinical program that looks at the point of care, EEG and biofeedback. And my patients that I've enrolled, they love it. They just, you know so that's really around stress management, refocusing. It's like going to the gym. If you go to the gym, you build your muscles. It's the same thing for the brain. You look at your brain waves and then you refocus it, refocus it, refocus it. And then. You know, you see the changes.

Kerry:

Yeah, I don't think I'd want to see my brain on there when I'm trying to do certain things. It would be overwhelming. Yeah. Briefly, you mentioned supplements. I just wanted to ask what it, because I mentioned, I was talking earlier about, you know, mental health for, you know, aging population, but What do you think about creatine? Does that also help with in addition to, you know, obviously omega threes.

Seetha:

Yeah, so still lots of studies, I think, conclusively have to prove that piece of it. And really it comes down to how much you are able to get in your diet and not, you know. So it's I'm waiting for more data. It's I don't think right now is really that much mainstream. I'd much rather go with the omega threes in the beginning because it helps cardiovascular health all around, you know, anti inflammatory. And creatinine, there is a role in the population that's really looking at. Enhancement of their performance cognitively. So it'd be nice to see a little bit more data on that. And going back to the idea of do I want to see my brain in the, in the biofeedback, it's really like you do EKG, you see the electrical impulses, right? And the same thing with the biofeedback, you just see the electrical impulses. And The key indicator is your alpha peak waves and it just kind of tells you how, if you think of your brain as a computer, what is the operating speed, you know, so it's really very mathematical, but very accurate.

Kerry:

I feel like it's also something that could be scary to know if it isn't working right or something like that.

Seetha:

Oh, I see. I see. I see. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Sometimes, you know, what we don't know is really scary. I can, and do I really want to know? And the great thing about the biofeedback is. It is not one time you get the result and that's it. The biofeedback is essentially, it's a moving, living document because it changes, it changes with one day to the other day and there are few consistent patterns that you can recognize but it changes with you, like where you are mentally in your space, it goes up and down, so it's not like a performance grade, you know, like A B F, it's not like that. So it just changes. And that's life, right?

Kerry:

is life. Yeah. Very interesting. Okay. So I've seen that you've quoted or this quote before. So the quality of our mind determines the quality of our life. Can you elaborate on that and how this perspective shapes your practice and your life?

Seetha:

Yeah. Carrie, that's, that's a really great question. And some of the, some of the things I think that have been transformational in my life and really kind of tying the journey of curiosity comes down to those aha moments, right? Or inspirational folks, you know, somebody like you doing the podcast, like, oh my gosh, how cool is that? Right? Right. So This is one of those things. It's by Sam Harris, the neuroscientist. I believe he's from Stanford, and he has an app called Waking Up. And one of the beginning parts of the course is essentially, he says, The quality of your life is determined by the quality of the mind, right? Like the operating system. If you think about our brain as the operating system, everything gets regulated there. And we are scattered in our brain, we're scattered in our day. Right. And it doesn't take a lot in the current environment. Just everyday life, you know, is very, very much disruptive in terms of our social media, our phones all the time. And it's sometimes necessary to like, you know, we can go through work without not having to look at our phone. So how do we then in the present day world with all the distractions, How do we then still keep the humanism, the joy of being human, and the joy of connection, right? What are the things that truly bring you joy, and how do you create it? There is a beautiful study, you've probably heard of this, it's the, the longest study on human happiness. By Dr. Robert Woldinger, and it's an NIH funded study. So this is one study where we actually, you know how we are in medicine, we like to look at things when they go wrong. We're like, okay, we'll study stroke, we'll study heart attacks, but we're not often studying Prevention that much and really a study that looks at what makes humans happy. I think that was like a really great study. So one of the key findings of their study was the human connection. A single thing is that having that human connection is what predicts. Human happiness. So in an era where things can be pretty siloed, you know, and there is a sense of anonymity on commenting on the forums and things like that to actually have the skills to connect to actually make the time to intentionally connect. It's, it's a beautiful thing, but that's supposed to be one of the biggest predictors of key to happiness. And now in fact, to longevity to anti aging and longevity, the human connection.

Kerry:

Do you think our youth are doomed

Seetha:

Oh my goodness. What I think, what the way, because. That's a good question, because I got three boys at home, too, right? Like, so, you know, I see I see the, and it's hard not to compare. It's hard not to compare our childhoods with our kids and the clan. One thing that me and my partner, when we speak, and he mentioned this and really stuck with me, is that they're preparing for a different future. Then we can never envision, right, then the ones we prepared for, they're, they're preparing for something totally different. Might be an era of flying cars and who knows, you know, like, we have no idea. However. From what we know now, how do we nurture the peace about time in nature, time in human contact? And will the technology actually allow us to have more time? We don't know. So I always try to have this like now open mind and curiosity. Yes, this is very different. Then also, like, wonder where it will take us. We try, at least in our household to have the scheduled time for everybody, adults and kids, offline times, and then game nights and things like that, so we, we try. But you're right, right? It's, it's a very interesting question, we just, we have to be curious and see where it takes us.

Kerry:

hmm. Yeah. I mean, I just think that with the more devices and the lack of you know, human connection and some of the outcomes from everybody isolating and siloing, you know, we don't know how that's going to affect us long term. Clearly it affected people acutely but yeah, it was just a funny question too.

Seetha:

No, I have, I do have a key insight, now that when you mention it, it, Came up for me is that we think our younger generation right there like so much on the phone. They're like, you know, they text each other from in sitting inside the room from the bathroom. They're texting you. So I was talking to my oldest in team. And he goes, Well, you know, I just learned that changing the color to gray scale on your phone. Decreases the amount of times we want to look at it. And I'm like, that's interesting. And I'm like, that's what I'm gonna do. I changed my phone color to grayscale after 5 p. m. So, right, like, after 5 p. m. And it actually works for me, at least this is the end of one. But they are curious and they're also interested in Knowing, understanding and acclimating to this new, it's a challenge to them too, you know, that's, that was really interesting for me to listen from my, you know, kid to be like, yeah, I'm glad that you are already looking into this, you know, it's just

Kerry:

very interesting. Yeah. I know they have dark mode. I didn't know about grayscale. So I'm going to have to look into that too.

Seetha:

Yeah, yeah, it makes your phone a little bit boring so that visual cues are not as strong to like, let me go back to something more fun and interesting instead of focusing on something else.

Kerry:

So you talk about, and you mentioned you did, you know, an anti aging, I think, fellowship and everything like that. So how do you promote healthy aging in your practice? Can you explain what healthy aging means to you?

Seetha:

I think the most important predictor of how our quality of life is going to pan out is really our ability to move and connect as we age, right? Mobility and connection. And those are the two things. Two things that just get fall off to the side with less, less mobile because we have devices with us all the time. And then we are very poor at creating that human connection because we think it's too much work as a study from Johns Hopkins that came out and said, just going out to get a cup of coffee, right? Increase the amount of rather than just, I'm going to do it here, right here. And I don't feel like going out to actually pushing through and going out, make people more happier. So in my practice, I divide it into physical aging, mental aging, right mind, physical mind. And then I societal the connecting piece. So there are three elements to aging your physical body, your mind, and then the social. aging, Because as we age, the interactions decrease, we retire, we're not as engaged in things. So it can be a huge shift for my patients. The physical aging involves a lot of data. The way I practice, we collect a lot of data in terms, we know what single nucleotide polymorphisms you carry the snips that code for high amount of cardiovascular disease or aging or the warrior warrior gene, which is a COMT. So there's a lot of genetic information I gather. So people when I say these are the things that I think will help. We're actually doing it based on your genes. Right. What your genes are coding for high risk. So there's genetic information that we gather, and that also helps me optimize nutrition. For example, if you have a MTHFR SNP, the methyl gene, you're not methylating enough, and you have high homocysteine, and then you have cardiovascular disease. I'm pushing on getting more of that glutathione, more of that methyl donors. So your spinach. So that's very specifically geared towards let's address the genetic risks that you're caring is involves nutrition that involves supplementation, sometimes also a lot of it. Also, mobility and movement also kind of attached that piece. So there's that physical piece. And then the mental portion of it. We're huge on mind, body medicine practices, just because of my background. And I have people in the program. Thank you. where we do use biofeedback and then people can do it on their own pace too. And like I said, it's not just sitting and meditating for everybody. It's different. But when you do the program, you see, you get insights onto where you're slipping, where you can be better. And the social connection piece. And that's the piece that my patients are encouraged to text. So we have text based platform to the social engagements that brought them joy or things that brought them joy today or this week or insights they learn. So there's accountability throughout as to what, you know, what is the growth happening? Where is the self growth? Where is a piece of connection that's happening? So we do it in different the three different pillars. And the last pillar in lifestyle medicine, you probably know the spiritual growth as well, right? So many of my patients faith is an important part of, you know, their growth journey and We're all in support of that.

Kerry:

Yeah. So did you, do you practice lifestyle medicine as well? I mean, you mentioned that I didn't know if that was another.

Seetha:

Yeah. So functional medicine incorporates really a lot of nutrition and lifestyle. And it's just more customized because we do the genetics and we do the metabolic health. So yeah, foundationally it is really lifestyle and nutrition with genetic input and metabolic input.

Kerry:

I think that answered my question, but maybe you can elaborate. It was basically what role does metabolic health play in the aging processes? And how does your approach differ from conventional medicine? I mean, you kind of just said it, but anything to elaborate.

Seetha:

yeah. No, these are really thought provoking questions. Anti aging, think as a culture, there needs to be a shift in from our cortisol culture, right? So it's cortisol and achievement driven culture, to what is supportive and conducive to quality of life. And in that realm, right? Yeah. Accepting that with the science we have today, we are able to reverse the biological clock by 10 years. No problem. Just lifestyle medicine, nutrition, optimization of metabolism. 10 years. For most patients, we're able to reverse or at least For those with chronic diseases, try to reverse, right? So the science is already there. Of course, does it take effort? Yes. Does it take commitment? Yes. Does it take a good doctor that is going to guide you through the journey? Yes, but it's doable. my hope is that Anti aging is not going to be viewed as like, Oh, I want to remain young forever and it's just all about the looks. No, it's about the quality of life, right? It's about the quality of our connections and life. So that's the emphasis, whether we do it with medications. Of course, you've heard metformin, statins, GLP ones, you know, there is a role for some of them in some places. So can we do it through medicine, exercise, nutrition? But with the advancement in science, I think you read the, you heard from the Peter Atiyah, the book Outlive, that medicine 3. 0 concept is really geared towards quality as we age and how, you know, we're looking towards the hundred years. And is it, it's possible to do as a, as a culture and policy, do we have the resources? Probably not yet. But that's the shift in mindset. So there's definitely a lot of Lifestyle medicine and nutrition along with your genetic risk factors and how you can optimize it to age. Well,

Kerry:

It's funny you mentioned the book. I think it's been sitting in my audible queue for a long time, but it's such a long one that I just haven't been able to push the button on that one.

Seetha:

yeah, yeah, no, yeah, no, I hear you. It's,

Kerry:

nine hours or something. Maybe it's 16 actually. Whatever it is, it's definitely more than I've been able to motivate myself to push play for that one.

Seetha:

it's really what we know already. It's just packaged really well.

Kerry:

Yeah. Well, I'll get there at some point, I'm sure. Yeah. So you mentioned some other things. You mentioned the EEG and the biofeedback that you use in the office. And then you mentioned inflammatory markers as precursors to accelerated aging, right? So what are some of these markers? Why are they so important at detecting and preventing age related issues?

Seetha:

Yeah, no, great question. The premise really in functional medicine and metabolic health is that our body has a lot of wisdom. Whether, you know, we figure it out with science or whether the ancient, you know, the cultures of the East already believe in the wisdom of the body. So our bodies try anytime there's an insult. Whether it be environmental toxins, whether it be you went through a bad bout of flu, whether it be you had a really a bad stressful period, your body is going to use a finite number of inflammatory responses to patch it down. That's what it does, right? It will try to patch it down. Sometimes those inflammatory responses can go unchecked and then it increases your oxidative stress. I know I'm using a lot of medical jargon but the idea is that anytime the body faces an insult, it tries to fix itself up. And most of the time it is, sometimes those things go unchecked. And in that case, you are going to find that A lot of the lipid deposits that happen in your blood vessels or even like dysregulation of the immune system, right? All those things become a byproduct of the unchecked inflammatory responses or oxidative stress. In the, much of the times when we measure these markers for patients, it's really geared towards individual. Like, I think really good example is patients who have Gluten sensitivities or food allergies, If they have chronic, if you eat something continuously that you're allergic to, be it IgG allergy or IgA allergy, whatever the type of allergy you might have. These are hard to pick up. Your allergist will be like, yeah, this is really hard to pick up. But sometimes the patient have a sense, I'm eating something that is causing me problems. And then when you actually check, it is true, right? It is actually happening, right? Many of the most epidemiologically dairy and gluten are like the top on the western part of the hemisphere, interestingly different than other parts of the world. So when you do that, the inflammatory responses in the gut are triggering continuous inflammation in the blood. And then you're like, you have the fatigue, you have things that you can't explain. I'm crashing in the afternoon. So I feel if you are able to identify that with a good, good test, along with a good history, we can take those allergens out and the patients really feel better. So in that case, I would use a lot of inflammatory markers that are related to the gut. And if you have a patient who has more cardiovascular risk, I would use inflammatory markers that are more related to the cardiac, right? So your MTHFR, your homocysteine, so things like that. So it depends on what you're presenting with or what your active complaints are. If your patient is doing really well, you know, your basic markers of CRP. Basophilia, eosinophilia, or even an MPV, the mean platelet volume. These are all good markers. Your urine pH. These are all good markers of the extent of inflammation in the body. And the other biggest is the blood glucose. You know, now we know that, you know, every time you, your numbers jump up from that fasting blood glucose, your increment risks goes up. So there are multiple markers that we can use for metabolic health, glucose being a big one. Then we just subdivide it to cardiac, immune system, your HPA axis. Cortisol is a big one, right? In terms of the the stressors that are in the current society. And then we expect to be like, ah, just it's going to be fine, you know, but the caffeine and cortisol, we're so, I feel many of many of the things that I see are a result of chronic stress. There's not really time for that recovery and rest. I feel like in our culture, rest is kind of like a bad thing.

Kerry:

Rest and digest. We don't

Seetha:

yeah, there's just no even when I look at the heart rate, right, the nighttime dip in the heart rate. Some of them is non existent. Like, that's really when your body relaxes and actually heals. So deep sleep, decreased heart rate at night, all those things, just get, so, I'm all a proponent of rest.

Kerry:

Yes. Rest and restore. Rest and digest. These are all like super important things that

Seetha:

Yeah, how do we normalize it?

Kerry:

We don't have time for essentially.

Seetha:

Yeah. And in a way, it's like look down as a bad thing, right? Like 20 minutes other cultures have the siesta time. 20 minutes, 30 minutes, you know, such a restorative area for sleep. That and it's helpful too, but here, like, nope, bad thing.

Kerry:

So what inspired you to start my direct physician, which is the name of your practice and how has that shaped your vision for patient care?

Seetha:

Gosh, this is the heart of the matter. Carrie, you are really good. So I'm going to be turning 40 this year. And I think it's that season of life where I've been in academic medicine. I love the aspect of teaching and I'm still in academic medicine. I still teach medicine in medical school. However, there was a part of me that. I kind of felt I needed more time to really know the journey of my patient. Because it is, like Oliver Berkman says, Once we come to accept there is finite time and there is not infinite number of things I can do, I want to make sure that I'm really intentional about my time and the quality of that time with the people I spend. So my idea is to really Create a rose garden of people that I nurture and care for as their doctor, like old school. I'm their doctor, you know, like the country old school, like, you know, something goes wrong. I'm there or talk on the phone, you know it's, it's given me that giving me that time to know my patient's journey and meet them where they are in their journey. Rather than I feel like often in traditional medicine, we are like, do this, this and this. If not, just, you know, don't forget. Don't waste my time. But what if it's not the right time for them, you know, they're in a different season of life and different journey different point in the journey. So in, at my direct position, the key is quality time. With the patients to meet them where they are and support their journey where they are.

Kerry:

Yeah, I mean, I definitely think we're, you know, hopefully moving toward that in medicine, but who knows where things are going to take us and how long it will take to get there. And I mean, I think it's very commending all the doctors like you guys that are starting these, you know, direct Practices because it really gives you that time with the patient. I think that's super important. Well, I try my best to operate in an insurance model. It is not easy, you know,

Seetha:

No kudos to you. Kudos to you for being being there and I wanted my practice to be affordable, right? So the difference I think with a direct primary care and at least my clinic is that the membership is between 57 a month to 77 a month or 97 a month. So just depending on how young you are or your complexity, but I wanted it to be affordable. Like, you know, you wouldn't go get a haircut, a 5 haircut, right? Like that's the, you wouldn't do that. So even I think health should be somewhere where people can afford it. And there is quality and Like I said, yeah, I've tried to keep it affordable and you're right. Operating an insurance model, I, I have so much respect for you that you're doing it and doing it well. So kudos to you.

Kerry:

it's hard. So what else would you like to share with the listeners today before we close? Anything? I

Seetha:

No, I think you did a great job. You asked all the important questions. The key piece for me If there's anything we can take is that piece of joy is not found. It is created. Balance is not found. It's created and you can do it. You can do it. And you have the support of, you know, the community, your doctors, your healers, your guides with you to do that.

Kerry:

love that. Yeah. Thank you. I mean, I think this was a great conversation. I think people are going to get a lot out of it. And then how can they find you if they want to work with you?

Seetha:

Ah, great question. So just, you know, everybody's great friend here google. But I also have a phone number that is textable. So people that are just more preferred texting. I have a phone number that you can just text and that's 813 502 1250 813 502 1250. So people can text me there too. See, they're interested, just do a meet and greet.

Kerry:

All right. Yeah. We'll put all the information that you gave us on how to find you in the show notes. So everybody will have that, but thank you so much for your time today. And, you know, I know everybody's got busy schedules, so I really appreciate you coming on and Sharing your story and given expertise for us and everybody tune in next week and I hope to maybe have you back on sometime. Okay.

Seetha:

Oh, it'll be a privilege. Thank you, Kerry, and a wonderful job doing this. Thank you for spreading the right messages for health across the Bay.

Kerry:

Thank you. I appreciate that. All right. Have a good one.

Seetha:

You too.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Dr. Kerry Reller

Host