Fit As A Fiddle

It’s a hush-hush topic in most cultures, societies, religions and more. But this podcast is meant to bring light to difficult subjects and help people improve the quality of their life. So on the show today is Emily Sauer, the founder of Ohnut, who chats with us about a product she developed to help herself and others overcome pain with intercourse. 

Emily reflects on her own journey struggling with the psychological and physical implications of painful sex and how the medical field & society at large often had little to offer as help other than being told, “have a glass of wine.” Emily dives into the empathy that comes with Ohnut in understanding and affirming people’s emotions and how everyone’s enjoyment has to be a priority. Emily and I also have a lively conversation on the issues around sexual health in the medical field and the work that needs to be done to shed more light to patient care.

Emily is a spritely entrepreneur who has always been passionate about creating catalysts that spark human connection. While developing Ohnut (an intimate wearable designed to help women and couples who experience deep dyspareunia) she co-founded the Lady Bits League, founded the Pain Perception Project, and is now launching Pelvic Gym to connect people and professionals from all over the sexual and pelvic health world, through education and story. Emily has redefined her life as a proud entrepreneur, maker, community leader, and pelvic health advocate.

Connect with her at www.ohnut.co

It seems simple enough, right? Just breathe? But there is so much to the science of breathing, and particularly breathing in specific and calculated ways with the appropriate mindset. Today we have Elan Gepner-Dales joining us to share his story with Sudarshan Kriya Yoga (SKY). Elan serves as the US Director of SKY Schools, an initiative of the International Association for Human Values (IAHV). On the show he talks about how these programs have catapulted his own life and the lives of people from all walks of life and all over the globe, including school children, veterans, and prisoners. We discuss how ancient complex practices from traditions that date back thousands of years can be applied to the modern world to manage stress, improve quality of life, and overall enhance the productivity of our entire world. 

For nearly a decade, Elan has overseen the creation of a sustainable and scalable program that has now been taught in 228 schools in 28 states across the US. He has also delivered youth leadership programs at Wharton Business School, Harvard, Yale, Stanford and UCLA. Elan has presented on the power of meditation for individual, school, and community transformation at conferences such as Learning and the Brain, National School Board Association, NY State Conference for School Superintendents, Mindful Life, the Association for Recovery Schools Conference and the International Bullying Prevention Conference. The intersection of all of Elan’s work is alleviating stress and violence in the lives of youth, leaders and communities in need. Elan graduated Magna Cum Laude with a BA in Art Semiotics from Brown University, with a focus on documentary film.

Connect with Elan: facebook.com/ElanGepnerDales 

Connect with SKY Schools: linkedin.com/company/sky-schools-usa/

@elan_gd

@skyschoolsusa

While a healthcare professional’s main job is to provide excellent patient care, there’s a lot more that goes into creating a successful healthcare practice. Today we have Millen Rastogi joining us to tackle some of the important facets of running a practice. Millen Rastogi is the visionary behind UniversaCare, a family-run, accredited, and licensed home care services agency serving the NYC and Nassau areas since 2008. 

In today’s show, we discuss the micro-changes that health care practices across the board can make internally to improve administrative tasks. He talks about “5-minute-saves” which can revolutionize business operations. We also dive into the importance of thinking about home care for our own families as it often becomes an inevitable part of life. 

As COO and CFO, Millen oversees the company’s ongoing expansion efforts to lead the organization to a national platform. Millen is also the co-founder of UniversaVolunteers, a 501(c)(3) organization born out of the COVID19 pandemic. 

Connect with UniversaCare at universacare.com.

Nobody wants to be hospitalized or plans for it to happen. Especially with the pandemic, we have seen incredibly high numbers of hospitalizations. In many cases, you get discharged and leave the hospital. But what happens afterward? Does life just go on as usual? Well, it depends! 

Joining us today to tackle some of these difficult questions is Dr. Vignesh Doraiswamy, an Internal Medicine and Pediatric hospitalist at Ohio State University and Nationwide Children’s Hospital. He talks about the importance of post-acute care/rehab and inpatient therapy evaluations. He dives into how patients want to go home as soon as they're ready for discharge, but this can inevitably prolong their recovery. He also discusses the lived experiences of physicians in hospitals who handle care. Finally he touches on the inequities in receiving the vaccine, the booster shot, and projections for the future. 

*Please note that this episode was recorded before the rise in cases of Omicron, so while certain numbers may be different at the moment, the general concepts are largely the same.  

Dr. Doraiswamy is an assistant professor at The Ohio State College of Medicine where he works with medical students as a Portfolio Coach and Applied Health Systems Science Coach. At The OSU James Cancer Center, he is the Quality and Patient Safety Lead for the James Hospitalist service lines and he is an Associate Medical director at OSU’s University Hospital. He completed a combined Internal Medicine and Pediatrics residency and was the Med-Peds chief resident at Penn State Health. Dr. Doraiswamy is actively involved in medical student and resident education with interests in health equity and advocacy, health systems science, curriculum design and clinical reasoning. 

Connect with him:

IG: @vigneshd

Twitter: @DoctorVig

If you are a healthcare professional who is experiencing any sort of overwhelm (which is many of us!), then tune into this episode. Today we get to chat with Dr. Joe Sherman, a pediatrician, coach, and consultant to individuals and healthcare organizations in the areas of cross-cultural medicine, leadership, and provider well-being. He dives into what burnout is and why it happens. We discuss how to stay healthy and emotionally supported in order to provide excellent patient care. Dr. Sherman also touches on the ideas of compassion fatigue and how burnout can lead to depression, anxiety, and even physician suicide. 

Dr. Sherman is a group facilitator with the Center for Courage & Renewal, a certified Physician Professional Development Coach, and trained in Mindfulness and Mindful Self-Compassion. Joe has been in medical practice for over 30 years concentrating on healthcare delivery to underserved and medically complex children. After struggling with professional burnout himself, he is now passionate about helping other healthcare providers find joy and fulfillment in their careers. He holds an appointment as Clinical Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Washington.

Connect with him at joeshermanmd.com

Should men open the door for women and pay for dates? Why did that even come about? How do you feel about a man making less than his female counterpart? Does that make him less of a man? What does being a man even mean? 

Today we have a thought-provoking conversation with the renowned Cleo Stiller, an Emmy Award and Peabody Award-nominated television journalist speaker and television host. Cleo is the author of the #1 New Release on Amazon book, Modern Manhood: Conversations About the Complicated World of Being a Good Man Today.

In our conversation, Cleo and I discuss the inspiration behind her new book and how it is of utmost relevance in today’s society. We dive into the the Me Too movement through the lens of anthropology, neuropsychology, finance, relationships, and more. The best part of the book, personally, was that it finally brings men into the conversation in a way that I haven’t seen before. It’s not just a history book on gender roles, but a stimulating and action-oriented guide to understanding your own belief systems and why they came about. 

Cleo Stiller is on a mission to encourage health, education and positive social action around the world. Harvard University's Nieman Foundation for Journalism named Stiller and her work as a 2021 Trend to Watch. She is an Emmy Awards judge in the category of News & Documentary. And works with passionate, mission-driven individuals on getting their projects out into the world. 

Disclaimer: This episode was recorded on 11/9/21 and dates information about paid family leave policies accordingly. 

It has been truly an incredible year. Sneha Physical Therapy, our in-home & telehealth PT practice, has cared for more patients in 2021 than any year before. Dr. Sneha Gazi proudly serves NY, NJ, and MD and treats across the age spectrum: 1-week-old babies with developmental delay, elderly individuals with gait and balance issues, and everything in between. Dr. Gazi is known for her specialties within dance medicine, pelvic health, and chronic pain conditions.

Fit As A Fiddle is a leading health and wellness podcast with nearly 100 episodes of free content from top experts in various fields. This year alone we have released 47 episodes. Dr. Gazi hosts and produces this weekly show and it is available on all major podcasting platforms. Join our community!

PTIS is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit founded by Dr. Gazi. Currently, we have four virtual programs and support any underserved community that has a need for our resources. This year alone we have served a few hundred individuals with health-related programs. All of our programs are conducted free of charge by PTs, students, and movement experts who graciously donate their time. You can show your support for our work by donating any amount that helps us maintain our administrative costs. 

Sneha Physical Therapy's website has a plethora of health resources for anyone interested in gaining more knowledge about their bodies. Check out our blog page and our education page for fun articles and videos!

As a faculty member of the International Academy of Orthopedic Medicine, Dr. Gazi will be teaching a course on pelvic health to clinicians in 2022. Click to receive 20% off the course registration price with promo code NEXTPELVIC20. 

I hope you and your loved ones stay safe this holiday season. Lots of great stuff coming up in 2022 as we keep charging forward with our mission to serve in every way we can.

To 2022.

Dr. Sneha Gazi, PT, DPT

Why do you exercise? To check something off your to-do list? To look a certain way? To feel a certain way? To get stronger? To get more flexible? To win a race? Because someone told you to?

Regardless of how you “workout” and why you do it (or choose not to), you’re in for a treat on today’s episode. Our guest today, Danielle Friedman, is an award-winning journalist whose writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Cut, Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, Glamour, Health, and other publications. Her first book, Let’s Get Physical: How Women Discovered Exercise and Reshaped the World, will be released from Putnam (Penguin Random House) on January 4, 2022. 

Today she chats with us on the history of exercise and delves into how we got to the place where women populate gyms, athletic competitions, the Olympics, and more. Spoiler alert: this wasn’t always the case in the past, and guess what? Sports bras were only created in the 1970s!

What seems like just a history book on exercise turns into a call to female empowerment and raising the consciousness of female strength. I highly recommend the book!

Connect with Danielle:

Instagram: @DanielleFriedmanWrites

Twitter: @DFriedmanWrites

Have you ever felt like you are sacrificing your originality and identity for stability and security? Have you found it difficult to let go and do something risky or follow your gut instinct when it sounds crazy? Today we have a celebrity guest on the show who is going to walk us through what it means to be your true self. Dr. Reef Karim; a double board certified humanistic psychiatrist by day and an actor, comic, and host by night; joins us to chat about his work on neuroscience, performance training, business strategy, psychology, creativity, and existentialism. 

Dr. Karim dives into his journey through med school and how he chose to live a fulfilling life by combining his performance background with his scientific background. He discusses the purpose of shifting one's internal madness from chaos to creativity and how he founded the Mad Genius Incubator to help people do just this. Dr. Karim breaks down the neural networks and frameworks in our brain that guide our creativity and how we can tap into these to maximize our potential in all facets of our lives. 

Dr. Karim specializes in upgrading the minds of entrepreneurs with a rebellious spirit. He founded the powerful and highly successful Mad Genius Business Incubator and the Master The Madness self-exploration platform. He served as an Assistant Clinical Professor at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience for over a decade, published in prestigious medical journals like the International Journal of Neuroscience, and now speaks on stages all over the world. As a creative artist, Reef acted in lead and supporting roles in many feature films and television shows, performs improv and sketch comedy, does stand up in popular comedy clubs, and danced on tour with headlining artists.

Reef’s innovative work on redefining madness, thinking like a mad genius, and shifting human

pathology to human potential, has been profiled in Time, Forbes, Business Insider, Oprah.com

and many other media outlets, and he’s been interviewed by Oprah, Larry King, Deepak Chopra, Anderson Cooper and others for his forward thinking methodology and experiential wisdom.

Connect with him at:

MadGeniusIncubator.com

ReefKarim.com

GetMentalClarity.com

When your passion for dance meets your passion for exercise, you get 567BROADWAY! Today’s show is fun and energetic with Joseph Corella walking us through how movement has inspired him to create his brand. Much like myself, Joseph loves the stage and knew that his life’s work always had to incorporate elements of performance. I hope our listeners today are moved by his journey and hope you get a chance to move with him in one of his classes!

Joseph has appeared from the stage to the screen with such credits as: Broadway's All Shook Up, National Tour of Grease, West Side Story, Wizards of Waverly Place and the Walt Disney musical film Geppetto starring Usher. As well, Joseph is a choreographer with his work appearing on the MTV Video Music Awards, MTV Dance Marathon, Lifetime's Dance Mom's, 98 Degree's music video "Microphone" & many musicals. Joseph’s proudest accomplishment to date is creating 567BROADWAY! an all-levels dance fitness class that is for everyone. This idea was born out of Joseph’s desire to create, encourage, and provide an inclusive sense of community where everyone could have a safe space to dance it out!

Connect with Joseph at www.567broadway.com