In this episode, Ryan Khanna, MD, MBA co-hosts a discussion with Robert Eastlack who runs a premier surgical spine practice in San Diego, CA and is a GP in a venture capital fund. Dr. Eastlack shares the background of how he got into angel and venture investing and offers some insights on how they execute their fund.

Dr. Robert Eastlack was born in Wyoming, and grew up primarily in Alaska, before attending Stanford University.  He majored in Human Biology with focus on Neurophysiology, and while there was on the Stanford Men’s Swimming Team, serving as captain in his senior year.  After finishing his undergraduate studies, he stayed and joined the research team in the Cardiology Department before attending medical school nearer his family in Texas.  Following graduation from Baylor College of Medicine, he returned to California, where he and his wife both matched at UCSD for their residency training.  The Orthopaedic Surgery residency was combined with a year of research fellowship, and under the tutelage of Dr. Steven Garfin, he decided upon undertaking a spine fellowship at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.  Upon completion of the fellowship, Dr. Eastlack returned to San Diego, working with both UCSD and the San Diego Spine Foundation fellowship programs, as well as the UCSD Orthopedic Surgery Department as a Clinical Instructor.  

In 2008, he moved to Scripps Clinic in the Division of Orthopedic Surgery, and continues to serve as a Consultant there.  He also acts as Co-Director for the spine fellowship training program that is managed by the San Diego Spine Foundation.  He is a member of the International Spine Study Group, focused on adult deformity and minimally invasive research, and undertakes clinical and basic science research at Scripps Clinic as well.  His clinical interests are in cervical reconstruction, minimally invasive spinal reconstruction, and complex deformity surgery.  His wife Jennifer Eastlack is a Dermatologist in San Diego, and they have five children.  His personal interests include coaching various sports teams (baseball, soccer, and basketball) on which his children play and playing golf, as well as co-managing a life science fund and medical device development.

Petra Capital Properties is a mission-based real estate investment management company dedicated to serving their clients with high quality real estate investment opportunities with a special emphasis on leveraging 1031 exchanges.  

They combine the experience of a seasoned investment team with the quantitative analytics of a proprietary real estate technology platform.  The result is optimized portfolio construction with risk adjusted returns. 

In this 30-minute episode, Tobin Arthur talks with the firm founder (Brad Watt) about his background, an overview of 1031 exchanges and who this strategy is designed for.

[Note: Brad Watt is Registered Financial Representative.  Securities are offered through Saxony Securities, Inc., Member FINRA/SIPC.]

Beam Wellness was born out of the CEO's experience as a marketer in the cosmetic industry. It's now being incubated at Health Wildcatters in Dallas after launching within the SMU MBA and incubator programs.

The company is leading with a blanket housing two variations of red light frequencies. They are appealing to spas and others who know the benefits of red light therapy and want to apply the same technology to a full body experience. Pre-orders are underway with a commercial launch coming soon.

Torque3 is developing a neurorehabilitation solution that has shown in early testing to result in significantly better recovery outcomes. 

 A wealth of research over the last 30 years has strongly indicated that stroke recovery can be significantly improved through immersive stimulation and robotic assistance. 

The Torque3 system leverages this research with an approach of uncompromising design and implementation combining a robotic chair and virtual reality.

In this episode, Founder/CEO David Ellzey shares some of the science behind Torque3 and insights into where they are headed.

Richard Lehman, MD does not let moss grow under his feet. As you will hear in this episode, he is involved in the whole spectrum of sports, but has a special focus on track & field and hockey. 

He is also an author with a new book underway and a previous book: How to Raise an Athlete (available on Amazon).

Dr. Lehman grew up in Miami, Florida. He completed his training at Washington University and the University of Pennsylvania, and completed a sports medicine fellowship in 1986. He was a part owner of the National Hockey League Florida Panthers and has been the team physician for the Florida Panthers, Tampa Bay Lightening and St. Louis Blues. He has been a consulting physician for UCLA Track & Field and has covered four Olympic Games, as well as seven Track & Field World Championships.

Dr. Lehman was inducted into the St. Louis Sports Hall of Fame and the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame Class of 2012 and was on the Board of Directors of the Jackie Joyner-Kersee Youth Foundation, the medical director of Webster Surgery Center and the medical director of the U.S. Center for Sports Medicine. He has served on the Board of Governors for the National Hockey League and is on the St. Louis Sports Commission. His practice encompasses taking care of professional athletes at all levels and all sports, as well as Division college athletes.

Dr. Lehman has revolutionized cartilage regeneration techniques working in conjunction with Biomet to further growth and reconstruction of articular cartilage. He has written and lectured extensively on the subject, and has written three books on tennis injuries. He has published extensively in orthopedic literature and sports medicine. He is licensed in Missouri and California. He actively takes care of Track & Field athletes from all over the world and professional athletes from North America.

PathKeeper is an innovative robotic company founded in Israel.

The company's disruptive, proprietary technology provides laser-like accuracy for spinal procedures. The unique technology tracks the surgical tools and vertebrae independently to guide accurate implant positioning for  positive clinical outcomes.

In this episode we visit with Erez Lampert the Founder of Pathkeeper and Ryan LeBlac who heads up their US Operations.

Learn how this device reduces radiation exposure in patients and physicians, provides better guidance and does all of this while being a fraction of the cost of current systems and with an implant vendor agnostic approach.

In this episode, we visit with Christopher Furmon who leads Vitro based in Colorado. Christopher doesn't come from a traditional biopharma track. Instead, he spent decades helping build the financial juggernaut Janus.

Vitro Biopharma has a goal to become a leader in developing differentiated product candidates in a rapid and efficient manner for the immunology and inflammatory market; and ultimately, to address well-established multi-billion-dollar commercial markets.

The team has over 30 years of drug discovery and development experience that has enabled them to identify and advance multiple product candidates from preclinical studies into clinical trials. Specifically, their extensive knowledge of immunology and inflammatory conditions informs their decision making to advance the scientific and clinical path to demonstrate proof-of-concept, with the goal of achieving an efficient timeframe and cost-effective budget.  Visit them at www.vitrobiopharma.com

Hippo Health was founded by experienced emergency physicians who wanted to ease healthcare frustrations and make tele-health and excellent care coordination accessible to all.

Hippo Health is now offering providers the ability to build out their own personalized care networks to improve the modern day care experience for patients and providers.

Founder, Kevin McGarvey, MD shares some of the latest updates on this rapidly growing tele-health platform including the recent addition of a seasoned CEO.

Kimberly Hutchison, MD is a neurologist who specializes in Sleep Medicine. While there is expectation that someday the CPAP will be replaced as a sleep aid, it remains the Gold Standard. for now. Even though it's the best way to treat many patients, compliance remains a problem. To help with compliance, Dr. Hutchison has developed the SomnoSeal to provide a better fit for CPAP machines. Learn more about this product and about an entrepreneurial physician working to provide better outcomes for patients.

Kerry Curran brings a career in medical device technology to a nimble startup leveraging student engineering skill to design products addressing post surgical Pulmonary Atelectasis and Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT’s). While in it's early stages, this company is demonstrating how creative use of student skill and ingenuity, combined with a strong clinician feedback loop, can lead to useful innovation.