Speaker 1: 0:01

Welcome to the Healthy Matters podcast with Dr. David Hilden , primary care physician and acute care hospitalist at Hennepin Healthcare in downtown Minneapolis, where we cover the latest in health healthcare and what matters to you. And now here's our host, Dr. David Hilden.

Speaker 2: 0:19

Hey everyone, Dr. David Hilden here. And today we're gonna wrap up the year with a fun one. I was recently a guest on the Knock Knock High podcast with none other than Dr . And Lady G Gfl . We had them on as a guest in our bonus episode of season two, and now they've returned the favor or paid me back, however you wanna look at it. We're rebroadcasting that episode here, but check out their podcast as well, will and Kristen . Were really good partners through all of this, and so be sure to give them a look, especially if you haven't yet seen Will's, TikTok videos. They're a riot. We'll put a link in the show notes. But before we get into that, I wanted to address a particular question we recently got from one of our listeners. Of course, if you've got a question for me or any of our guests, give us a shout. You can email us at Healthy matters@hc.org or do as this listener did , and give us a call and leave a message at 6 1 2 8 7 3 TALK . We'll have all of this in the show notes as well. So here's that question.

Speaker 3: 1:19

Hi, Dr. Hilden . You don't know me, but I feel like I know you. I've listened to you since you started with Denny Long, how many years ago? Seeing you at the fair? I mean, you just do a great, great job. Podcast is great. Dr . John Cole's podcast was fantastic about emergency medicine as were all the others, but he was certainly a personable person. My question is, for a future episode, I've been hearing that the government recommendation for salt intake , uh, we should have two to three times more than what the government says . Um, if you could address that, that would be great. If , if that is something of concern, I , I don't understand for so long, you know, decrease your self intake . Now they're saying salt intake should be increased two to three times more. Thanks. Bye-Bye .

Speaker 2: 2:04

Hey, Carol, thanks for being a long time listener, and thank you for this question. It's really a good one. What you're asking, I think, is how much salt is healthy for the average person. There is a recommendation, and it is 2,300 milligrams of daily intake of salt. Now, it is also true that most of us get way more than that, and salt in excess has a lot of harmful effects on your body. It's not good for your heart, it's not good for your blood pressure saying it's not good for your kidneys, for instance. So, no, it is not usually recommended that people ingest as much salt as we do. In fact, we are almost always telling people to get less. And that advice has not changed for many, many years . Now, there are some exceptions. There are people with exceptionally low blood pressure who get dizzy and have some other symptoms. And for those people, their doctor might be putting them on an increased amount of salt in the, the diet. But that's a very small number of people. The vast majority of us get too much salt. And it , it's from places you might not even expect. It is from canned foods. It is from boxed foods. It is from prepared foods. It is added to things that you might not think of. That bagel you're eating, it has a load of salt in it. And maybe you didn't even think of that. So what we tell people is minimize added salt for your , in your diet. Taste your food before you try it. Maybe you don't need salt. Maybe there's some other spice you can use. So don't add much salt. And then read the labels. Stick to the out outsides of the grocery store where they don't add so much salt in the poll unprocessed foods. And , uh, the, the recommendation is a pretty good one, 2,300. It's a good amount for most of us to shoot for. Again, thanks Carol for being a longtime listener and for sending in this great question. If you've got a particular question for me or any of our guests, feel free to reach out and we will do our best to answer it in a future show. But now let's get on with our conversation on the Knock Knock High podcast with Dr . And Lady g Flecking . I hope you enjoy it.

Speaker 4: 4:07

All right . We have Dr. Hilden here. Can I , can I call you David? Is that okay? That'd great . Go David. Yep . Or do you wanna do more formal? I mean, you are a No ,

Speaker 2: 4:15

David's good. David's

Speaker 4: 4:16

Good. You are an internal medicine doctor. You're, you're fancy, you're smart. But

Speaker 5: 4:19

He's

Speaker 4: 4:20

Also, you're also dressed much nicer than me wearing a coach .

Speaker 5: 4:22

He's also a Minnesotan, so I feel like, you know, very friendly.

Speaker 4: 4:25

Is that what they're , they're called , they're Minnesotan.

Speaker 5: 4:27

Minnesotan, yeah. Is

Speaker 2: 4:28

That, yeah . Oh yeah. We're very , yeah. First of all, that was a good o that was a really good, oh , we gotta get that straight right now. It's been a souly . Thank

Speaker 5: 4:34

You. I've been practicing

Speaker 2: 4:35

And we go out in a boat and you can call me David. David's good. Although internal, internal recipe , people are a bit nerdy, but , uh, but , uh, but we can keep it casual. You

Speaker 4: 4:44

Are, I like your aesthetics <laugh> . So people who are just listening, you know , you got the coat on , you got you dressing down a little bit. No tie, just an open collar . And you , but you got the nice glasses. I'm always, I'm a big fan of , of a good pair of glasses. So I , I applaud you on your choice of frames there,

Speaker 2: 5:01

You know. Well, I appreciate that coming from a guy who like, takes care of people's eyes and I have, I have really, really bad eyes. So this, these glasses, if I were to go on the side view, it's just like one of the bottom of a Coke bottle. It's pretty bad. Yeah.

Speaker 5: 5:14

Can you guess the prescription? Uh , this is his party trick.

Speaker 4: 5:17

Let's see. He's kinda looking at me a little bit dead on . Turn your head a little bit to the right. Uh, uh, you're , you don't have a real strong prescription actually. Well, in

Speaker 2: 5:26

One eye I do. This one I do. Oh , okay . I've got multifocals. I got the whole, the whole shooting match.

Speaker 4: 5:31

<laugh>, you got it all.

Speaker 5: 5:33

He's

Speaker 4: 5:33

Stumping you, but I, yeah , I think he's hyperopic. Are you hyperop? Are you farsighted? You look a little farsighted on that left eye. Like a plus.

Speaker 2: 5:40

That could be my left eye. Is everything sighted ? <laugh> ? I think the eye not shaped right. It's, you know, I've got a refractory problem. I had a surgeon .

Speaker 4: 5:48

It's just all messed up. Alright .

Speaker 2: 5:50

I had a surgeon work on my 18 month old lateral rectus muscle. And I know you can be impressed that I know what a lateral rectus muscle is. That's

Speaker 4: 5:57

Pretty good. That's pretty good because I

Speaker 2: 5:58

Forgot about it in med school. <laugh>,

Speaker 4: 6:01

You know, there's others . Do you know all the , uh, extraocular muscles? Are you familiar with? With how many are there? Do you know?

Speaker 2: 6:07

Uh , do you remember? Oh , there's, there's , um, um, there's six of them .

Speaker 4: 6:10

That's pretty good. Yeah. Is that

Speaker 5: 6:12

Right ? That's pretty , yeah .

Speaker 2: 6:13

That's good's pretty . That's perfect . And when I do patients, I , I like, I make an H in front of, aren't you supposed to make an H in front of 'em ? See if they all work.

Speaker 4: 6:20

That's really, that's

Speaker 2: 6:21

Or extra ocular

Speaker 4: 6:22

Movements. That's better than most people. That's, that's fantastic. There

Speaker 5: 6:25

You go. But

Speaker 2: 6:25

I've told you the sum total of what I know that day . <laugh>

Speaker 4: 6:29

Well, now I compliment you on your glasses. You're an internal me . Can you compliment me on, I guess my what? My liver function? Or is it ,

Speaker 2: 6:35

Yeah, I was gonna say, your liver looks really good. I can't see the, the lower edge of your liver.

Speaker 5: 6:39

<laugh> <laugh> . Let , let's not tempt fate, shall we? <laugh> his internal organs haven't really been kind guess .

Speaker 2: 6:48

And your , your A1C looks terrific. Both of your A one Cs look really good. I , I can see , see it from here,

Speaker 4: 6:54

<laugh> . Well, I wanna, I guess if you, if you're, if you weren't talking to us, would you be in, in on the wards right now? Do you , how much clinical medicine do you practice at this point?

Speaker 2: 7:04

So I'm about 20 or 30% only now. Uh , okay . 'cause I have an administrative job, so I'm the chair of the Department of Medicine of somehow or the other , uh,

Speaker 5: 7:13

My condolences.

Speaker 2: 7:14

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Kristen . You know that , that's been like six months I've had that job. And , uh, so I, I have a couple hundred doctors I have to corral, but I see patients in the clinic here at a big county hospital in downtown Minneapolis. And then I am in the wards just two or three weeks a year. That's

Speaker 4: 7:30

It . Now, how was that? Was it an agonizing decision to go , uh, the administrative route or were you , uh, was that something you wanted to do? Was it , uh, um, were you coerced?

Speaker 5: 7:42

How did this happen to you and do you need help <laugh> ?

Speaker 2: 7:44

Yeah. Um, uh, I don't know. And yes, <laugh>

Speaker 5: 7:47

<laugh> ,

Speaker 2: 7:48

No. I, I was, for the last few years I was in a hospital administrative job. You know, we we're a , we're a a , you know, of this big hospital, but we're just a single hospital. We're the county hospital. We have, we're like this big, huge dysfunctional family. And I thought, well, I'll be the, I'll be on the, on the administrative team. But that got to be meetings and meetings and meetings. And I, I swear to God, we would have meetings to plan the meetings. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> . And it was agony. Oh , I, I shouldn't say that in case my, my bosses might be <laugh> might be listening to this. But , um, I loved that job. Yeah. No . Uh , but so now, then I got back into it . I took a year long breather where I just saw patients in primary care and I, I just did a one CSS and heart failure and all that. And that's what I did. And then , uh, I do tend to talk a lot. I do tend to do a lot of public relations for the hospital. So now as the chair of the department, it's much more of a people job and less meetings. So I've canceled all the meetings to plan the meetings. And it's much better

Speaker 5: 8:42

<laugh> now how don't forget the meetings to debrief about the meetings.

Speaker 2: 8:45

We have those too . Oh, yeah.

Speaker 4: 8:46

Mm-Hmm, <affirmative>

Speaker 2: 8:46

Exactly. On the other end . It's like this , it's like, it's like this, this problem we have, it's pathologic. We have a meeting to plan the meeting, and then we have the meeting, and then not the right people are at the meeting. So then you have a meeting to debrief the meeting. Mm-Hmm.

Speaker 5: 8:57

<affirmative> . Yes. I'm a recovered academic. So I, I feel like this resonates with me. I

Speaker 4: 9:01

Have no idea , you know , how goes , I have no idea what either of you're talking about <laugh>. You don't have to do that. I, I am private practice. We , uh, we all equally loathe meetings. I feel like in , maybe in an academic setting. There's some people that maybe kinda like the meetings. I mean, I'm just throwing that out there. It's

Speaker 5: 9:18

A , a strong, strong statement.

Speaker 4: 9:20

I , I , I don't know. I mean, you , you're , I could tell by the look he's a look of disguise .

Speaker 2: 9:26

Oh ,

Speaker 4: 9:26

I face here. Exactly.

Speaker 2: 9:28

And then , you know, I'm , he does not

Speaker 4: 9:29

Agree with me . No,

Speaker 2: 9:30

Not, I'm on the , I'm on the faculty of the medical school. And so then we have that , we have meetings to talk about promotions, and then we have, oh my goodness. It's ridiculous.

Speaker 4: 9:38

So how long have you been at the, this , uh, Hennepin Healthcare, which is the safety net hospital you mentioned?

Speaker 2: 9:44

Right, right. I've been there about 25 years. And we're , um, it used to be called Hennepin County Medical Center. Before that, you know, about a hundred years ago, there was like a giant house in downtown Minneapolis, which is a dirt road, I assume. And it was the city hospital that was like in 1890 or something that grew into the general hospital, which grew into this county hospital. And now we're down here on eight city blocks in downtown Minneapolis. And , uh, we have two helicopter pads on the roof. It's this big sprawling campus. But deep down, we're just this county hospital, sort of the , uh, staffed by a bunch of Dr . Martyrs down here who are caring for , uh, uh, lots of vulnerable patients. And it's actually the best place to work. I absolutely love it.

Speaker 4: 10:25

Is it the only county hospital in Minnesota? I mean, was is it I probably the largest, I have to assume,

Speaker 2: 10:33

Right? Yeah. Yes and no. You know, there are lots of little critical access hospitals, but we're, we're mostly a state of one big city. Yeah . Mayo Clinic, a little ways south of us, and then a bunch of trees and lakes and deer. That's all we across

Speaker 4: 10:45

That place . Yeah . You've

Speaker 2: 10:46

Heard of them. Yeah . You maybe heard of

Speaker 5: 10:47

Them , you know about that. It's kind once or twice maybe rings

Speaker 4: 10:50

A bell . Yeah . I I've never been to Hena . I I have been to Mayo and I , I don't, I I went to interview for residency there and , um, the one thing I really remember the most is just walking in and it's just marble as far as the eye can see. <laugh> , I assume Hennepin's similar, is that

Speaker 2: 11:07

Yeah, we're just like that. We give art tours as well. <laugh> . No , that's a funny thing though. 'cause here's the , I actually love , um, art and he art as part of healing. And so you go to Mayo and I love Mayo. I love mayo. Nothing , of course we all do . Yeah. But they like literally have Picassos and things like the originals. It's

Speaker 4: 11:24

Incredible. Oh , wow . It's

Speaker 2: 11:25

Beautiful. Yeah. You can get an art tour and a history tour. You come to our hospital, we don't have that. We have like two dogs, you know , a velvet dog thing, and they're , they're drinking out of a hose. But we have hundreds of pieces art here.

Speaker 5: 11:37

<laugh> not even a proper bowl <laugh> .

Speaker 2: 11:38

No, exactly. It's like, it's just one notch above dogs playing poker and <laugh> . But we do , um, when we built our new clinic building, it's six stories high. It's beautiful. It's this nice glass building. It's the only new building we've built in years. We have 4, 5, 600 pieces of artwork that people donated. And they're lovely. They're just not Picassos, but they're done by employees and local people. So it's, you know, I really think the , the power of art in healing is something that even here at the county hospital that we need to have.

Speaker 5: 12:06

Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 4: 12:07

What is it that kind of just keeps you, I mean , I guess what, what fascinates you, I don't know what the word is, but what, what is , uh, what is it about the county hospital, the, the working there, being in that environment that is so appealing to you?

Speaker 2: 12:21

Yeah. Uh , that one I think about a lot because, you know, and I do this to the people in my department. I go, why do you work here? You know, hospital <laugh> .

Speaker 4: 12:29

I was gonna just say that. Yeah .

Speaker 2: 12:31

Why , why do you

Speaker 4: 12:32

Work here? I thought it <laugh> ,

Speaker 5: 12:34

That sounds like you can only say internally, right? Like, you can't make fun of someone else's brother. Only that person can make fun of their brother.

Speaker 2: 12:40

Exactly . That's right. Mm-Hmm , <affirmative> that is exactly it. Because, you know, I do literally say, you know, and everybody knows this. I'm not telling them what they don't already know. The hospital down the street's paying a lot more than we are. They really are. And , um, and they don't have some of the , uh, more challenges that we have. But, but our patients are generally lower income, not all, but generally lower income . There's a lot of immigrant population, non-English speaking people. We see a ton of people who are experiencing homelessness. And I, you know, I can look out the window and see some of our patients un unfortunately. And, but at the same time, our patients are kind and they're grateful and they're wise and they're forgiving of our frailties, you know, and our, our healthcare systems . Frailties is maybe a nice way to put it. <laugh>

Speaker 4: 13:24

Sure.

Speaker 2: 13:25

They're , they're forgiving of that. And, you know, and I have patients, I have a Muslim patient who, he goes, I'll pray for you today. You know, so I got a lot of people praying for me, which is probably a good thing. Um, and we have people that

Speaker 4: 13:35

That's, that's gotta be a, a , a perk that you probably sell to , to people coming in to, to get Exactly.

Speaker 2: 13:41

It's very mission driven and it's, and frankly, it's a riot. I mean, it's fun to work here. It really is. There's never a dull minute. Our patients do the weirdest things and they, they're , um, uh, not for any fault of their own. Uh , they're just, we just have a cross-section of humanity, and it's a wonderful cross-section of humanity. And they don't look like me. They're not northern Europeans, Scandinavian, Minnesotans, you know, they look like the world. And I love that. And so that's what most of our people here are like. And I did my training here all the way back to my training. So I've been here all time . Oh, really?

Speaker 4: 14:14

Wow. Is it , um, you , you mentioned, you know, other hospital systems being able to pay more, you know, so I feel like all of us in healthcare, you know, we're always thinking about like, staffing issues. I'm sure you more than anybody else, you know, in your role as an administrator. Is it, have you found it hard to recruit people, either physicians , uh, nurses, you know, support staff, whoever it is, is it, is it more challenging in this environment?

Speaker 2: 14:42

To some degree, it is . Uh , first of all, if people aren't from Minnesota, it's , um, I've even been told this by physician recruiters. It's really hard to get people to come here <laugh> , because all the , to Minnesota. Yeah. I ,

Speaker 5: 14:53

Well, it's quite cold there.

Speaker 2: 14:55

There's ,

Speaker 4: 14:55

Everybody thinks lakes there. Yeah . It's , there's a

Speaker 2: 14:57

Bunch of lakes beautiful out. It's beautiful. But it's also, it's beautiful. Also , they tell me it's hard to get people to leave then . So it , so it's hard to get people to come here, but then it's equally hard to get 'em to leave. 'cause they found out that, oh my God, we're in God's country here. This is, this is where you wanna be. <laugh> <laugh> . Uh , but to come to the hospital, I, I come straight out. I hire a lot of people. I hire doctors all day long and, and, and nurse practitioners and the whole ch match. And I say, I , I'm just blunt about it. Um, if, if maximizing your income is important to you, there's no judgment. I , for me, I get it. You might have medical student loans. There might be lots and lots of reasons, but we do pay a competitive salary. So I just set it aside. I put that part aside. I go, here's why. Here's why we might be the place you wanna work. You get to teach students, you get to teach residents. You get to care for a broad swath of humanity that needs you. And that really does resonate with a lot, a lot of doctors. And many of 'em say, oh , that's kind of why I went into medicine. You know? And, and yeah , that's okay with me. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> .

Speaker 5: 15:53

Right. Yeah. I would imagine in a place like that, it's easier to see , um, the difference that you can make in somebody's life. You know, like the , the, the , the difference that you are able to make in their life is maybe larger than for a population who's a little more, you know, affluent or homogenous.

Speaker 2: 16:10

Yep . I think that's exactly right. Um, you're, you're a hundred percent right. You know, and, and we try, I always tell people, you know, when I'm hiring them, I don't want to hear any excuses about why you couldn't provide good care. Uh , I don't wanna hear that. They were, well, they didn't take their meds well. Nope . They sure didn't. And I don't want to hear you . Oh , they were poor. They didn't speak English. Well , those are all true. Nonetheless, do your best and do everything you can. And I think you really can make a , a really big difference. Um, yeah.

Speaker 4: 16:37

Now who, who is it that , uh, you mentioned students, is it University of Minnesota? Yeah . Like who all comes through oppe ?

Speaker 2: 16:45

Yeah. Yeah. So when I, when I, it's University of Minnesota. We're an affiliate hospital at the University of Minnesota. And so it's, it's maybe several dozen of them here on any given day. I can see the university from here. I'm away to them. But we're , and then we have our own residency. And then, and that's what I did. So like, when I did residency here, it was, you know , we didn't have work hours. It was 110 hour work weeks . And I'm not even kidding. We did walk uphill both ways to and from work. And it was snow , doing snow .

Speaker 4: 17:10

Were you doing your own gram stains? Doing your own gram stains?

Speaker 2: 17:12

We did our own gram stains of spinning our own urines down. Oh yeah. We did all that. But it is true. I came into my first day as a trainee from the university. And you know, I come in on a Monday morning at seven in the morning, I'm doing a surgery rotation. I'm terrified of that. I'm still terrified of scalpels and all that. And I, they said, okay, your shift ends tomorrow night at dinnertime. I'm like, are you kidding me? It's like seven in the morning on Monday. And I call my wife and I said, I'm coming home tomorrow night,

Speaker 5: 17:39

<laugh>,

Speaker 2: 17:40

Like, and she said like 36 hours from now night . And that's what training was. And that was it. I didn't have a toothbrush. I had to steal one from one of the patient, you know , rooms. So that was our training here. And then I just never left. And so we have students, we have residents, and then I just stayed on the faculty.

Speaker 4: 17:55

You're a lifer.

Speaker 2: 17:56

I am a lifer. That's kind of dorky, isn't it? <laugh>, you've been all over.

Speaker 4: 18:00

Yeah. Yeah. Uh , we've, it's taken us all over the , all over the place. Yeah . So , you know , Texas,

Speaker 5: 18:06

New Hampshire, we've a big circle around the perimeter of the country, essentially.

Speaker 4: 18:10

I feel like we've always tried to get out to where we are now, though, Oregon. So, you know , we, we , we moved from Texas to New England. Like we knew pretty quickly. It wasn't for us long term . Um, uh, just the snow, my god, the snow <laugh> . Um , you didn't

Speaker 2: 18:26

Pick it up too . You were like New Hampshire or something, or you

Speaker 4: 18:30

Were in New Hampshire. Mm-Hmm.

Speaker 2: 18:31

<affirmative> . Just , you didn't pick up ice fishing or

Speaker 4: 18:34

Seriously? Come on, <laugh> ice fishing. Yeah . This

Speaker 5: 18:37

Texas boy is not gonna be out there ice fishing. I

Speaker 4: 18:40

Walked out the first day at snowed and sneakers and , um, and I was, I was not ready for it. So, but then we wa we got to the Midwest and we tried to stay in Iowa after my training.

Speaker 5: 18:52

It's similar to what you just said. He told me that, you know, there's a good chance that we were gonna be moving to Iowa for residency. And I was like, why? You know? Yeah, exactly. The only thing I knew of Iowa was like corn fields and I don't know pigs. And so,

Speaker 2: 19:07

Which actually is accurate,

Speaker 5: 19:09

<laugh> it , right? I'm not

Speaker 2: 19:11

Wrong. You're not wrong. It's

Speaker 5: 19:12

Just, there are little, you know, there's, there's , uh, pockets of Iowa that I did not know about. And so we ended up really enjoying Iowa City and, and yeah. Did our best to stay there, but it didn't work out well . Her,

Speaker 4: 19:24

Her Kristen's parents lived in Illinois at the time. So we were, I was, I applied to a bunch of Midwest programs. I applied at , uh, university of Minnesota. In fact, what happened?

Speaker 2: 19:35

You turned us , I did not get ,

Speaker 4: 19:36

Did you come

Speaker 5: 19:36

Across his resume?

Speaker 2: 19:38

Didn't I was not

Speaker 4: 19:39

Offered an interview. I didn't, I didn't play up my , uh, my love of Minnesota enough. I, I think, thank you .

Speaker 2: 19:45

That was all you needed to do was talk about, you know , the ice fishing. You should have said, you know what, I can't wait to take that big. I was gonna , that big drill bit. What do you call those things then ? Auger . And you know, like you go through two feet of ice and talk about the walleye, God , you would've been their top choice. Yeah.

Speaker 4: 20:00

I have a feeling you have that a similar conversation with patients often. Do you ? Is that a big topic of conversation around the wintertime is

Speaker 2: 20:06

Oh my gosh , my gosh, yes. Come on. Yeah, all the time. You know what , you we're fish fighting out there and you know , that's what we do . There's, you know , um, and you're from Texas, right? You guys are from Texas? Yeah . Yep . Oh, you just haven't experienced it that yet. You know, the going out in the, in the snow in your sneakers is not a bad idea. It's not problematic until you literally can't feel them in your toes. <laugh> . And then, then you'll get over it.

Speaker 4: 20:32

So ice fishing in the way , what do you , what do you talk about in the summer? Yeah.

Speaker 5: 20:35

What do you have against summer fishing?

Speaker 2: 20:37

Well, I actually don't do much fishing at all, which makes me not a very good <laugh> , but I , I talk about it a lot. You know, I , I talk about lot . No, but no, that's what they do. There's lakes everywhere. There's , there's lakes, it's beautiful. There's deer, there's hunting, there's the twins, there's, you know, there's all that stuff. Mm-Hmm, <affirmative> .

Speaker 4: 20:51

I did get one time I was invited to come up to Duluth to do a thing. Oh,

Speaker 5: 20:55

Duluth is really pretty, but it , but it's very far north,

Speaker 4: 20:58

But it , it was in like February. Yeah . And I , and I was scared. I I did . I was. And so I was like, I, I don't think I can do it, you

Speaker 5: 21:05

Know ? Do you know that , you know , you want me in with this a lot, but this is your issue really? The snow and the cold.

Speaker 4: 21:10

It's Mm-Hmm .

Speaker 2: 21:11

<affirmative> . Kristin , you're okay with it? It's cold.

Speaker 5: 21:12

<laugh> . I mean, it's not my favorite, but he has like PTSD from it. I say I'm not that bad.

Speaker 4: 21:18

Oh , let me ask you, David, do you have, do you have tunnels and underneath, like underground?

Speaker 2: 21:24

We morely , we have Skyways

Speaker 5: 21:25

Like sky bridges. Yeah. Skyways .

Speaker 4: 21:27

Okay.

Speaker 2: 21:27

Skyway. Okay . The correct term is Skyway. Excuse me, sorry . I don't know where I came up with that <laugh> , but No , you can get around downtown Minneapolis and never see the outdoors. And then you go over, you know , there's all the Yeah . So you can, but we're hardy , you know, if it's, if it's above like five you , you're good to go shorts

Speaker 4: 21:43

Weather.

Speaker 2: 21:44

Yeah, exactly. If it's above 40, it's shorts weather for sure. Yeah . That's a for sure thing. <laugh>.

Speaker 4: 21:50

Well, I wanna , I wanna talk with you about , uh, radio. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 21:54

Because

Speaker 4: 21:54

You have , uh, some experience here that I think a lot of people don't have, I think is fascinating. You are the radio doc.

Speaker 2: 22:02

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah.

Speaker 4: 22:04

Te tell us your background and radio, how that started. I'm , I'm fascinated by this.

Speaker 2: 22:08

Yeah. So I was minded my own business as a primary care doctor, you know, stamping out all

Speaker 5: 22:15

The best stories. Start that way. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 22:16

Mind my own business, once upon a time, stamping out diabetes, wherever I could find it, I'm doing that. And so the hospital put out an all points bullet and we're gonna do this radio show. It's on am talk radio. Who wants to do that? And I have two friends still. They're still my friends. They go, well, you never shut up <laugh> . You should audition <laugh> . And I don't shut up very well. I'm working on it. I'm working on my listening skills, <laugh> . So I go down there and I did some, some made up thing about colonoscopies at the radio station, and I got this job, and it's on what's WCCO Radio, which is an upper Midwest kind of a big deal. WCCO is the precursor of General Mills who makes Cheerios that's here. And so they had a radio station a hundred years ago. It's this giant radio station that everybody listened to. I listened to it, you know, growing up, if your school's closed, it's on WCCO. So I go on this radio station and I talk to people every Sunday morning live about their medical problems, and they'd call in with everything. And I, it was an older audience as you maybe could expect. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> because who listens to AM radio on a Sunday morning. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> . So I went over there and I did that show, my first show in January, 2009. And it's unscripted. It was an hour long of live radio. And people would call and I would just answer their questions. And, and it got, it went for 13 years. And I did 676 shows every, every Sunday morning live. And , um, it was really fun. I'd get farmers calling in, like they'd call in. One guy called in a lot, and I can't remember his name or I wouldn't use it even if I could, he would say, well, you know, it's seven in the morning. Seven in the morning. I've been up for a few hours. And , um, you know, I'm having a little chest pain, but I had to feed the cattle <laugh> . And , you know, so this guy's out there, he just imagine this little guy. He is like he eighties , he feeds the cattle, but then he has some medical question, but he had to feed the cattle first and he would call me and to get advice. So I , I really got a conversation with good folks in the upper Midwest. Let's just put it

Speaker 4: 24:11

That way. Yeah. Yeah. That sounds , uh, I, I could've used that to do research for my videos

Speaker 5: 24:16

Like a farmer hotline. Right. Because the , they don't wanna leave 'cause you know, the Right, the cattle need fed or the crops need come in in , or whatever needs to be happening. So if they had a hotline to call Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> , maybe you could direct them in the right way.

Speaker 4: 24:28

That's, and so you just recently stopped then You said it went for 13 years. So what,

Speaker 2: 24:34

It did go for 13 years. And, and, you know, did you

Speaker 4: 24:36

Just , did you fix our , did you answer all the

Speaker 2: 24:38

Questions? There were no other problems. You know, there was no other problem . It's funny, it's funny you bring up Duluth though. You brought up Duluth. Do you know Duluth is gonna be the one climate change safe city . So you're gonna love Duluth in about 15 Kristen years.

Speaker 5: 24:49

Yeah . I'm into that.

Speaker 4: 24:50

Kristen's a a , um, a uh , am amateur doomsday prepper <laugh> . Are you

Speaker 2: 24:54

Well , no

Speaker 4: 24:55

Say that because there are professional Doos Day preppers , but she's not quite that bad. I'm

Speaker 5: 24:58

Not. Yeah. But

Speaker 4: 25:00

She

Speaker 5: 25:00

Knows places . I like to think of myself as a rational, future oriented thinker. I

Speaker 2: 25:05

Think it's just, that's exactly what you are. You're just thinking ahead and planning for what's gonna happen. Well, duluths, you know , know it's got it all. It's gonna be like the climate of Kansas City and it's gonna be , uh, not that this, any of this is good, don't get me wrong, <laugh> . None of this is good. But they've got a big lake there. It's gonna be beaches, you know, it's gonna be Duluth. And one time on the radio show, you know, I was new in the radio show and some woman calls in and says, I have this sound in my ear. Sounds like a, you know, and she's describing tinnitus. She's, I've got this, this thing, it sounds like a foghorn in my ear. And I was new at this thing. It's live radio. I didn't know what the heck to say. So what , just, what came outta my mouth is, well, you don't live in Duluth, do you? <laugh> ? And because Duluth has ocean going ships. And I was just trying to say , well, maybe you're actually hearing a foghorn. And so , um, I , and so <laugh> , I said , well , maybe, maybe you don't have tinnitus. Maybe you're just living in Duluth. But I was just, I was just tap dancing on live radio. 'cause I Yeah , I saw what she was talking about. But that's , um, that I stopped it. You asked why I stopped it. Well , you know, 13 years at seven in the morning. Mm-Hmm . And although we had a pretty decent audience, you can imagine what the, the audience for am talk radio is. It's right . It's not exactly growing. And as much as I loved the listeners, it was probably the same Yeah . Listeners each week. And we decided to try different things. So now I have a podcast, it's called Healthy Matters. And it is , uh, mostly for the lay public, similar to the radio show, but it's produced now . And so I, I can't have live call-ins. I do miss the live call-in part. But we, we try to give trusted medical information to the community via the podcast. And all of this has led to all other kinds of media stuff where I go on the news locally just to give Yeah . Sort of in the age of misinformation. Give a little good information.

Speaker 5: 26:48

Yeah. That is so desperately needed. So I'm glad you're doing that.

Speaker 4: 26:52

And it all started just because you, you said Yeah, I'll try, I'll try this. I'll try it . Sure , sure. I'll

Speaker 5: 26:57

Go talking to a microphone.

Speaker 4: 26:58

Just say yes to some opportunities. And you never know of you , you could end up on AM radio. You never could . That's

Speaker 2: 27:04

Right. You could . And you know, it's, it's really ballooned. Um, you know, just from that, I remember the , you know, so the Super Bowl , the Super Bowl came to Minneapolis on a few years ago, 2018. It was pre pandemic. So flu was what all everybody cared about was flu. There was no such thing as Covid . No one had heard of . Everybody was definitely afraid of flu. And so I was on national news, you know, standing outside the stadium, which I can see also from my office here where the Vikings play and where the Super Bowl was. And I had a BC World news tonight. You know, talking to me, do you think it's a good idea that all these people are coming together because they could get flu <laugh> ? I'm like, so the radio show has led to some funny things like that. Like I'm, I'm literally , uh, I talk so much to so many people about flu and then obviously it switched to covid. But it, it has resulted in things that I never, ever, ever dreamed I'd be doing.

Speaker 4: 27:54

You mentioned you tried out for this , uh, who did you beat out for this job as an AM radio host?

Speaker 2: 27:59

So I think, I'm not sure, but I understand there was a psychiatrist and a gastroenterologist who tried out for it. And uh, I'm not sure you can make years a decades worth of stuff out of the GI tract though. Yeah, pretty .

Speaker 4: 28:14

That'd be tough .

Speaker 2: 28:15

So think that I could have been the best one in the whole wide world, but I got it because he's gonna talk about your intestines, you know , how much can you go with that? Right . I mean , that's ,

Speaker 4: 28:21

I think it was smart to go with someone with a little bit more broad, you know Yes . Spectrum of, of expertise. Like what if I had gone for that? Like I would've been a terrible choice for that. Oh yeah. Like how often can you, I can kind of talk for, I can talk for maybe a couple hours, you know, about the ,

Speaker 2: 28:36

Could you like, like one, one woman calls in and she says something like, I, I swear to God she was having a stroke. I know she was having a stroke. So I have this little lady call in and she's, well, I woke up this morning and I can't talk very well in my arms , weak and all this stuff. And , and God , and I said , oh honey, you need to not call the radio and you need to be calling 9 1 1. And so we did, we called 9 1 1, but I'm not sure. Oh my goodness . Y'all , I know that ophthalmologists are smart. Yeah . That's , I'm not sure that the whole breadth of, of, of medical topics <laugh> ,

Speaker 4: 29:06

I would've, I would've fumbled the tinnitus , uh, question for sure. Like that's ,

Speaker 2: 29:10

It's in the neighborhood. You aren't ears , eyes , it's

Speaker 4: 29:12

All it's , but don't give me too much credit here. Uh , I I could handle the stroke stuff though. I could , I can recognize if someone's having a stroke. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 29:20

Kristen could handle the stroke thing better

Speaker 5: 29:21

Than I could , could . Oh yeah . You know, I was thinking that. But not saying like , even I know those are stroke signs. <laugh>

Speaker 4: 29:27

Slurring your speech. Absolutely. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 29:28

Well, no, but Kristen in general, I think you could handle that show better and , and all due respect better than the ,

Speaker 5: 29:35

Than Will . Oh yeah . Well, yeah. Probably so. Pretty good . That's

Speaker 4: 29:38

True. So did people , um, when , whenever they came in to see you as a patient, like, did you ever get recognized for your voice? Has that , has that happened all the time ? Yeah .

Speaker 2: 29:46

Yeah . Well that still happens to this day. I'll have , um, well, during, during the pandemic , um, I had many of my colleagues say, I had this patient who just simply said, I'm gonna get this, this covid shot because you told 'em to on the radio. So that happens all the time. All the time. All the time. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> . But many times , um, uh, I'll have another colleague saying, can you, can you come down to this inpatient room? Because Mildred is here and she's a big fan and she listens to you and she visited you at the live show, at the state fair. And she would love to have, and I'm thinking, oh, you're gonna be so disappointed when I show up. He is just, just some guy showing up. I'm like, nothing. You know , I'm not bringing eight by 10 glossies, <laugh> , you know, <laugh> to to side . I'm just like this local county doctor that , but she listens every week. And she used to come out to the state fair. I did a lot of state fair shows, you know. Yeah. What what's the I that's a Minnesota thing .

Speaker 5: 30:39

Big in Minnesota. Yeah.

Speaker 4: 30:40

Huge . I mean, huge . All over the Midwest. They got like , yeah, the Iowa one is there . Iowa State Fair was , Minnesota was a huge thing. They got the butter cow .

Speaker 2: 30:46

Yeah . Yeah. So you guys are from Texas. I happen to notice because I did a lot of the state fair things. The country's biggest state fair is indeed in Texas.

Speaker 5: 30:54

No , of course. Yeah .

Speaker 2: 30:56

But Texas cheated. 'cause the number two state fair in the country is Minnesota's. This is facts . Really? Yes. And more people go to the Texas State Fair. But it's like 24 days long in the Minnesota. Minnesota State Fair is like 10 days long. And it's almost the same number. So a quarter million people all pack into this fairgrounds and, but all the radio stations are there, including ours. Yeah . So I'm sitting there on this little porch. It's very porch like , it looks like a veranda of a cottage. And I'm sitting out there with a microphone like this, and people come out at seven in the morning and, and, and I do the , the show live from there. And, and there's like goats walking by <laugh> because it's an agricultural affair . Like somebody's walking their horse. And, and, and then I'd have 20 or 30 people sitting right in front of us drinking their coffee, egg coffee. You know, you make egg coffee. That's a Swedish thing. And what is egg coffee?

Speaker 5: 31:46

I don't know about egg coffee. Oh,

Speaker 2: 31:47

Egg coffee. You put eggs in there. I don't know . You know , they're eating raw eggs and drinks . Yeah . And they're their coffee and they've got cheese curds at seven in the morning. And there's like 40 people I like who comes out at seven in the morning.

Speaker 5: 31:59

Maybe that gastroenterologist would've been a good idea after all. I don't know . He

Speaker 2: 32:02

Would've been a good idea there. Like completely , you do need your stomach pumped after going to the Minnesota State Fair. I mean, it , it's just, it's actually , um, not fit for polite company to talk about what you eat at the Minnesota State Fair. It's disgusting. <laugh> . Oh, it's , it's , and they do, they have butter sculptures and all that. But anyways, I'm sitting out trying to talk about healthcare and often it was the little old ladies in my, my , my radio listeners in their showing up in wheelchairs and their , in their , and so I had a pretty loyal following. And I met them just twice a year at the state fair. And many of them would be here in the hospital. And so I would come visit them for that.

Speaker 4: 32:36

Oh , that's so great. What did I , I know it's, it's Minnesota and everyone is like, nice. It's like Minnesota. It's like, you know, people are, my , my point of what I'm getting at is <laugh> . Did people ever get mad at you? Like, did you ever make any, you know , have any difficult conversations live on the air? Or

Speaker 5: 32:53

Is it more like, well I'm not angry, I'm just disappointed in you. Is that more a Minnesota style? Yeah , people

Speaker 2: 32:58

Do . Yeah . Yeah . We're very , so they , there is a term called Minnesota Nice. Which other people call passive aggressive . Right.

Speaker 5: 33:05

<laugh>. <laugh> . They have that in Iowa too. Iowa. Nice. It's , I think very similar. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 33:10

Oh yeah. But yeah , people I know that are from other places. I had a friend from Colorado, born in Alaska, went to Colorado. She said , I can't get to know anybody here. You guys talk about how nice you are, but you're just a little bit hard to warm up to. That's what, that's what she said. Mm-Hmm . But people are very, of

Speaker 4: 33:23

Course, it's like minus 20 half the year

Speaker 2: 33:26

Anyway . Exactly. You know ? Yeah . Is

Speaker 5: 33:27

That a pun?

Speaker 4: 33:28

I don't know . Yeah,

Speaker 2: 33:29

Exactly. People do get angry. Um, I've had patients do that. I had like a , I had this one time, this, you know, and maybe she was a little confused, I don't know. But she said, this is no way to run a hotel. And she takes the phone from the hospital room and throws it across the room at me. Oh no. But I'm like ducking, you know , ducking it . And , but that was <laugh> . She was, well, she's

Speaker 5: 33:48

Not wrong . Wrong .

Speaker 2: 33:48

No, she's not wrong. You know , and, you know, and, and because I don't know what I had done to , uh, what my transgression was, but the phone came flying across me at the hospital. Oh my goodness. I from it. But that isn't a typical , uh, Minnesota nice thing. Yeah. Generally. Yeah .

Speaker 5: 34:02

That sounds like maybe there were some other things going on in that case. <laugh> ,

Speaker 2: 34:04

I think. <laugh> , I think maybe there were some other things going on. You know , I had another patient, she, I think it was, she, you know , we're gonna protect the innocent here. I'm not gonna say anything about patients. 'cause patients are , um, the reason I'm here. I just love our patients. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> . But I had , I had a patient call, you know, the local TV news station to the , to the investigative reporters to say how we weren't feeding patients at this hospital. And well , she was having a surgery done . So she was, you know, NPO and she couldn't have had a surgery. But the patients here are, like I was saying earlier, are absolutely positively the reason I'm here. And we just, we do attract kind of an eclectic group of doctors. You know , uh, we're all just a little bit , um, maybe a little earthy, crunchy 'cause we're at the county and could, could work elsewhere just as easily, but choose to come here. Um, and , um, the patients, I would say are, if anything more grateful, they're more kind. They're um, they're just lovely. And frankly, the reason I'm here, I think

Speaker 4: 35:03

That's awesome. I , it makes me wanna move out to Minnesota. Should

Speaker 5: 35:07

We go to Duluth?

Speaker 2: 35:08

It's still quite Portland. We'll be fine there . I'm sure. Is that you're out in Portland, right? That's , it's very

Speaker 4: 35:12

Similar. That's , I dunno . So

Speaker 2: 35:14

I was out in Portland. I came out to Portland just like last year to visit some friends. I have a friend who's a colleague on the faculty of the university of, of Portland in the business school. And we go out there and it's freaking rainy. It's, it's, oh yeah . And they wanted to go for a bike ride. And we said, well, it's too bad we , you can't go for that bike ride. And they looked at us like,

Speaker 5: 35:31

What are you talking about?

Speaker 2: 35:32

What are you talking about? Yeah. So I've got an umbrella. I was the only guy in Portland with an umbrella. Uhhuh . <affirmative> . Yeah . No one else. 'cause they said it's just misting or whatever. Yeah, yeah ,

Speaker 5: 35:39

Exactly. You go out in the, in the mist, in the drizzle,

Speaker 4: 35:42

You don't even feel it . You don't even feel it. It's just kind of Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> accept as you're just gonna be a little damp <laugh> .

Speaker 2: 35:46

Yes . It's all right . Here's the deal though. Does the sun shine ?

Speaker 5: 35:49

I've some of the months, right?

Speaker 4: 35:51

Kind of. It's

Speaker 5: 35:52

Like trying to, right now, <laugh>

Speaker 4: 35:54

You get, you get much more sunshine. I'll say that. I think

Speaker 2: 35:57

We do.

Speaker 4: 35:57

You do.

Speaker 5: 35:58

We get the extremes. We get like, no sun just clouds for a few months. And then no clouds, just sun. This is for the whole summer. This

Speaker 4: 36:07

Is turning into such , this is a very

Speaker 5: 36:08

Weather based , this is

Speaker 4: 36:09

Such a episode. A Midwestern type of episode. We're talking about the weather. Yeah .

Speaker 2: 36:14

Oh, do you wanna talk about the haw prices ? <laugh> <laugh> ?

Speaker 5: 36:17

No . How was some hot dish? Do we have any I do .

Speaker 2: 36:20

Oh, you actually used the correct term. Duck

Speaker 4: 36:23

Duck , gray duck or whatever the heck it is . Oh

Speaker 2: 36:25

Yeah.

Speaker 4: 36:25

Isn't there? That's like a , instead

Speaker 5: 36:27

Of duck, duck use duck,

Speaker 4: 36:28

Duck , goose. It's like duck duck . Gray duck,

Speaker 2: 36:29

Gray duck . I'm in awe. I'm in awe of your knowledge. <laugh> . Thank

Speaker 4: 36:35

You . Thank you very much. Because

Speaker 2: 36:36

The correct, I know this is probably exactly what listeners want to hear about, but, but, but you are correct that the, the name of the, of the children's game is Duck Duck , gray Duck . Yeah, that's right . And all of the rest D are wrong. <laugh> . <laugh> . On what ?

Speaker 4: 36:51

Well, let's take a break. We'll be right back with Dr. Hilton. Alright . We are back with Dr. David Hilton and , uh, Minnesotan extraordinaire. No , Minnesota. Minnesota. Oh ,

Speaker 5: 37:05

That was better. Minnesota. Minnesota. No , he needs some work. Wouldn't you say

Speaker 4: 37:09

He pronounce the T Do you like enunciate the T? So ,

Speaker 5: 37:11

No, it's softer,

Speaker 4: 37:12

It's softer , softer , soft. T

Speaker 2: 37:14

Minnesotan . Yeah ,

Speaker 5: 37:14

You go . There

Speaker 4: 37:15

You go. Anyway, <laugh>. So what I thought, what I'd like to do with you , um, is , uh, do a little , a little activity, a little game that , um, I actually don't have a really good name for this. We're just gonna rank organs because one of the things I find so interesting about , um, internal medicine doctors actually, so I will say impressive, is that you just, you know so much about all these things that you can't see. You see, like, I can look at the eyeballs. I can actually see exactly what I am

Speaker 5: 37:48

Treating. Oh , at the front though.

Speaker 4: 37:50

No , I , I can look at, I can see everything.

Speaker 5: 37:51

Oh, yeah. You have the torture devices. Yeah,

Speaker 4: 37:53

We can, we can , uh, anything we diagnose for the most part, unless you're like a neuro-ophthalmologist, but they're like unicorns in ophthalmology. Uh, I, I can, I can see everything that I'm diagnosing and treating, unlike you who can't. And there's, there's so many things inside the body. And so I just, I , it sounds , it seems really hard what you do, I guess is what I'm saying. Like, why did you choose such a hard job?

Speaker 2: 38:15

Yeah. You I appreciate that because it allows us to sit around, drink coffee, and eat donuts and talk about stuff. <laugh>,

Speaker 6: 38:22

<laugh> ,

Speaker 2: 38:25

Because that's

Speaker 4: 38:26

Doing that reason . Right ?

Speaker 5: 38:27

Got your egg coffee . Make

Speaker 2: 38:29

School all day long. A club . You drink coffee and talk about what we can't see. Well, you know, the differentials really long on that will , you know ,

Speaker 5: 38:36

<laugh> .

Speaker 4: 38:37

Let's go through it. Okay. Um, all right . So, so what I thought we could do, I I wrote down , um, 10 different internal organs, okay. Right here . Now these are all things that I don't have , uh, a lot of knowledge about, just what I remember from med school. Uh, and , uh, but since we're talking with a bonafide internal medicine doctor here, I thought we could do something that this is actually a variation of a game that's, that's done on TikTok , believe it or not. So you are going to rank these, we're going to draw them randomly, and you have to slot them one to 10. All right ? Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> not knowing what's gonna come up next or what's gonna come up later.

Speaker 2: 39:14

Oh, okay. Okay. Do I get CME credits for this? That's what I wanna

Speaker 4: 39:18

Know . Yes, you do. This is definitely, you get all your CME, you can just, whatever. Yeah, sure.

Speaker 2: 39:24

Okay. I think , okay, I'm ready to go. Is it gonna be like the optic nerve, the lateral rectus

Speaker 4: 39:29

Muscle ? No . Muscle . No . These are all I didn't cheat. These are all things that are in the inside the body that you can't see. Okay . I'm getting nervous . What would be considered internal organs? Okay.

Speaker 5: 39:40

Okay. Are we ready?

Speaker 4: 39:41

And you say , and the , the criteria is whatever you want it to be. It's, it's your personal ranking. What, just define that however you want. Got it . All right . This is very scientific. Yep .

Speaker 2: 39:50

Alright .

Speaker 4: 39:51

One, one being your favorite. The best. 10 being the worst. All right , here we go. And Kristen's gonna draw these randomly.

Speaker 5: 39:57

Ooh , let's go. It's ones that's a heck of a one to start on the heart.

Speaker 2: 40:03

Oh, number one, <laugh>. Ooh .

Speaker 4: 40:06

Alright . Do

Speaker 2: 40:07

I have to tell you why or is it, you know ? Yeah . And I don't change my answers later.

Speaker 4: 40:11

Absolute . You cannot change your answers. No,

Speaker 5: 40:13

We're And Will's writing 'em down, so you're not gonna do that . Yeah ,

Speaker 4: 40:15

I'm keeping track.

Speaker 2: 40:15

I think our art is number one and , 'cause I kind of wanted to be a cardiologist. Oh, did

Speaker 4: 40:20

You?

Speaker 2: 40:20

Oh , yes. It's so cool. It's got, it's, it's a , it's first of all a chemical reaction. It leads to an electrical current, which leads to a mechanical pump. It's like the full package of engineering dorkiness.

Speaker 5: 40:32

That is true. I have never heard it . Never heard presented that way.

Speaker 2: 40:35

But it's what , it's it's pretty good . It's very cool. Very

Speaker 4: 40:37

Cool. Number one. I'm almost buying that. Okay. Yeah . All right . So we have one out of the way. Let's go. Let's,

Speaker 5: 40:43

All right . Just a single lung <laugh> . If you didn't say lungs.

Speaker 2: 40:50

Well , a , a single

Speaker 5: 40:52

You just says lung <laugh> .

Speaker 2: 40:54

I'm gonna go with number four. Oh , okay. All right . A single lung is number four. <laugh> all

Speaker 4: 41:00

Number four is lung. I , I do. Just for the record, I do know that there are , I do know that there are two lungs. I don't know why I just wrote lung , but lung is what I wrote. Alright .

Speaker 2: 41:10

Is there another sheet in there? Chris ? Is there another sheet in there that says

Speaker 5: 41:13

Don ? So the other lung ? No, I think it was just a Freudian slip.

Speaker 4: 41:17

I just wrote down one lung . Just one . Whichever lung is your favorite. If you had to choose a right or a left lung to hold onto , you know ,

Speaker 2: 41:24

You choose you . It's gotta be, it's gotta be the , um, the, the right one. 'cause it has three lobes and the left lung only has two. And so it's the better lung . And I've actually held a lung and they're kind of gruesome. So I, I don't think that's why it's only number four. I know it's important,

Speaker 4: 41:35

But it's okay . Gotcha . Yeah . Oh , that doesn't matter how important. It's , it's, it's up to you. Yeah , exactly . It's whatever your criteria

Speaker 5: 41:39

Are . Exactly . Your subjective opinion. That's right . Okay. Okay. Omentum,

Speaker 2: 41:44

Omentum , <laugh> . You did study something in med school. <laugh> . So omentum, I'm gonna have to go with like number eight.

Speaker 5: 41:53

Alright . You're gonna have to tell our non-medical listeners. Yeah . What is an momentum?

Speaker 2: 41:57

It's , it's part of your guts. It's, you know, it , it slides around in there. It kind of holds all the guts together and it's kind of, it's kind of at a high effect , like

Speaker 5: 42:04

Sausage casing.

Speaker 2: 42:05

Uh oh . Yes. That's kind of , that's

Speaker 5: 42:08

Kind what ,

Speaker 4: 42:10

It's something you might find at the Minnesota State Fair. Exactly.

Speaker 2: 42:13

You could , you could probably eat that if you, if you deep fry it.

Speaker 5: 42:16

Oh yeah. Also put some eggs in there. Perfect.

Speaker 4: 42:19

Oh my. Um , <laugh> . Yes. The omentum. It's like a, isn't it like a fat curtain? That's what I always It

Speaker 2: 42:25

Is . It is like a fat curtain in there. Your surgeon has to cut through it when they're, you know, when they're operating in you and it kinda holds things together. Yeah . It's connective tissue, sort of, of your gut,

Speaker 4: 42:36

But also seems extraneous.

Speaker 2: 42:38

Mm-Hmm .

Speaker 4: 42:39

It really does to certain extent. Extent. It really does. You

Speaker 5: 42:41

Know what, if you didn't have it, would you have a problem? Good

Speaker 4: 42:44

Question. You

Speaker 2: 42:45

Know , I don't, you know , I think you , things would slosh around in there a little bit. <laugh> . And if you

Speaker 5: 42:49

Don't Yeah , if you it provides a little, a little firmness, that might be helpful. It

Speaker 2: 42:54

Does. That's right . It kinda holds, it kind of holds your bits together in there. <laugh> .

Speaker 5: 42:58

Hey , don't look at me like that. You're the one that put it in there. I did.

Speaker 4: 43:01

<laugh> . I can't believe you

Speaker 2: 43:02

Put that in there. <laugh> .

Speaker 5: 43:04

Okay. And again, a single kidney. Oh ,

Speaker 2: 43:07

Kidney . I'll say kidneys are very cool. So kidneys. Kidneys are very cool. So I'm gonna have to go with number two. Okay . Ooh . Two on the kidneys. Kidneys . It's another internal medicine dorky thing, but kidneys do like 10 things and most of us think they just make urine, but they do like 10 other things. That's what I thought. So , oh , oh no, they're very cool. Um, and, and yeah, that's number two. So

Speaker 4: 43:30

Cardio , uh, the heart and is takes the takes.

Speaker 2: 43:34

Number one in kidneys are number two. And, and you'll find in internal medicine people, you'll get a cardiologist recommending one thing for the health of the heart. And it's always exactly the opposite of what the nephrologist is recommending for the kidneys. That's why we often say things like, well , it's why the good lord gave you two hands. <laugh> . One of 'em is to get more fluid in the body. 'cause that's what the kidney doctor wants. And the other is to take more fluid off the body. 'cause that's what the heart doctor wants.

Speaker 5: 44:00

That's yours, isn't it? The cardiologist, the nephrologists card that are ne and your skits. Yeah .

Speaker 4: 44:04

Always going at always going at it with each other. Salt . That's

Speaker 2: 44:07

Right. They're , they never agree

Speaker 4: 44:09

<laugh> . That's right. It's

Speaker 2: 44:10

Like, good grief. I have to pick which one of you I like better. And take your advice and hope it's the right thing. You're

Speaker 5: 44:15

Like the child's caught in the middle of you are divorcing parents. You are .

Speaker 2: 44:18

Which I'm sure is great comfort to people listening to the show.

Speaker 5: 44:22

<laugh> . That's right . Exactly.

Speaker 4: 44:24

Alright .

Speaker 5: 44:24

Okay. Gallbladder.

Speaker 2: 44:27

Oh, gallbladder's gotta be like number nine.

Speaker 4: 44:30

Nine. Okay. Oh , my need to ,

Speaker 2: 44:33

Neurologist friends are gonna hate me. <laugh> <laugh>

Speaker 4: 44:35

Because

Speaker 2: 44:36

Know you can live without the thing, you know? Yeah,

Speaker 4: 44:38

That's, yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's, it's kind of cool. It makes these stones <laugh>.

Speaker 5: 44:44

Yeah. I don't , what

Speaker 2: 44:45

Does it , it does make these stones. And have you ever seen the stones? Uh ,

Speaker 4: 44:48

Here's what I mean. I've seen like a , not not in person, but I've seen like pictures of them.

Speaker 2: 44:52

Oh. You know , they got jars of them down in the GI lab, you know, like , that's

Speaker 4: 44:57

Great. Dr. Hilden . Yeah.

Speaker 2: 44:58

<laugh> .

Speaker 4: 44:59

That's fantastic. <laugh> .

Speaker 2: 45:01

They do, they've got, it looks like stones you'd go collecting on the seashore or something. They're these beautiful, colorful stones of various shapes and sizes.

Speaker 5: 45:09

Oh,

Speaker 4: 45:10

Look at that. Like a, like a pearl, but much grosser.

Speaker 2: 45:12

Yeah, very much so. More problem . You problematic . What ? The way you'd think. They're beautiful <laugh> . Alright ,

Speaker 4: 45:17

So gallbladder's nine.

Speaker 5: 45:18

Okay. What else we got? Ooh , spleen.

Speaker 2: 45:22

So , so here's the deal. <laugh> , nobody, nobody knows what the spleen does. <laugh> . See , I mean , like,

Speaker 4: 45:28

That's what I'm saying. Yep . There

Speaker 2: 45:29

Go . Nobody really knows what the spleen does, so , so this is a number 10 right here. Number 10. Thank you . Am I giving you a 10

Speaker 4: 45:34

I think ? No, you haven't. Not yet. We got 8, 9, 10, omentum, gallbladder,

Speaker 2: 45:39

Spleen, <laugh> , spleen. No ,

Speaker 4: 45:41

You're gonna off some , uh, hematologists here . Here .

Speaker 2: 45:43

Oh my God. Well, yeah, seriously. But no, yeah , you can do without it as well. Although I'm sure it has a very important job in your, in your immune system and red cells and all that stuff. But, you know, it's a , it is the often neglected organ, even at internal medicine. <laugh>.

Speaker 4: 45:59

Oh , poor spleen.

Speaker 2: 46:01

The poor spleen. I don't know what it does. Anyway , so,

Speaker 4: 46:02

But then you like the spleen's also weird 'cause they can get like little, they're called spleen . Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> . Yeah . Have you heard about that?

Speaker 5: 46:09

I've heard that word before.

Speaker 4: 46:10

Yeah. It's like, like little baby spleens that

Speaker 2: 46:13

Go , they growing in . Yeah, they can, it it's , it's a , yeah, can , you can have all that , like offshoots

Speaker 5: 46:17

Or like, I don't know inside itself. <laugh> .

Speaker 4: 46:19

It's just, I , they're just there just like little spleens everywhere. It's kind of gross. They

Speaker 2: 46:23

Grow in the eyeball. I think

Speaker 4: 46:25

<laugh>, you know what? I don't know. Eyeball . That scares me though. I think that it might, if

Speaker 2: 46:31

You have a , a lenal in your vitreous.

Speaker 4: 46:35

Nope , we don't want that. I don't think they

Speaker 2: 46:36

Grow there. I don't think they don't want that

Speaker 4: 46:37

Though .

Speaker 5: 46:37

Oh. I'm not sure how to pronounce this one, but I I'm gonna give it a shot . Seek em .

Speaker 2: 46:42

Oh, you're seek em

Speaker 5: 46:43

<laugh> . Oh, did I get it right? You did.

Speaker 4: 46:45

Nice.

Speaker 2: 46:45

Yeah . You , you nailed it . Yeah. Uh , I do have to ask you about your, about

Speaker 4: 46:50

The , the

Speaker 2: 46:51

GI track situation.

Speaker 5: 46:53

<laugh> . Yes. I think it's overrepresented in this game. The GI

Speaker 4: 46:57

Track doesn't overrepresented Well , how many organs are there? I mean, come on. It's like half of it's your GI tract. <laugh>

Speaker 2: 47:03

A lot of 'em . Well now we're down to subunits of your gi tract. <laugh> . I mean, you're se

Speaker 4: 47:07

<laugh>

Speaker 2: 47:08

Your sequins the most proximal part of your large intestine or your colon. So we're , so it's a , it's right where your small intestine hits your, you know , you know your large intestine where , where your appendix hangs off of there.

Speaker 5: 47:20

Yeah. There's a valve.

Speaker 4: 47:22

Yeah,

Speaker 2: 47:22

There is the ileocecal valve.

Speaker 5: 47:24

Yeah. You got it. I remember that. 'cause he , uh, asked our 2-year-old to say that once.

Speaker 4: 47:29

Sequel valve. Yeah .

Speaker 2: 47:30

You're this, I , I like the vocabulary you're going with. Absolutely. Year old . Okay, honey. Say ileocecal

Speaker 5: 47:36

Now. And she did, she was like , she nailed it . Freakishly good at language. And so he gave her that as like a , like a , see she can do it. Stretch one. But yeah, she did it. Well I

Speaker 2: 47:44

Don't even know where I should put this. I don't even know what numbers I have .

Speaker 4: 47:47

You got, you got 3, 5, 6, and seven.

Speaker 2: 47:50

You know, I'm going six because I, I , you know. Okay . I'm hoping to have the gastroenterologist buy me around at happy hour or something. <laugh> . There

Speaker 4: 47:57

You go. Alright ,

Speaker 5: 47:58

Well, <laugh> stomach , <laugh> , <laugh> .

Speaker 2: 48:03

I think we need to talk about the intestinal tract with a certain ophthalmologist.

Speaker 5: 48:07

<laugh> . Yeah .

Speaker 2: 48:08

Okay. Okay. Stomach. We're going, we're going seven. Not quite as high as the cecum . All right . Because it's a disgusting situation.

Speaker 5: 48:16

<laugh>. It's just gross.

Speaker 2: 48:17

But you do need one.

Speaker 4: 48:19

You do need one. Yeah , that's true . But I , you

Speaker 2: 48:21

Need one. But it's just a churning point for Disgustingness. Yeah .

Speaker 5: 48:24

Seems like it causes a lot of problems. You know, you got your Yeah . Reflux issues and ulcers. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 48:32

It does all that stuff. All that's awesome . Although when you look inside of it, it's quite pretty on a , you know , uh, you know, when it doesn't have food in it , you know , it's just beautiful kind of pinkish thing when it's a healthy looking one. So it , it is , it's quite nice.

Speaker 4: 48:44

There you go

Speaker 5: 48:45

To look at , I've never considered what the inside of a stomach might look like. It's ,

Speaker 4: 48:48

It is cool to watch like an upper endoscopy and you, you , you go and you see all the, the things inside of it.

Speaker 2: 48:55

The , it's like when I was trying to watch my, well

Speaker 4: 48:57

No , not by that point. Usually it's all cleared out, but Oh ,

Speaker 5: 48:59

Sure.

Speaker 2: 49:00

No . Yeah. Yeah. We make people clear it out and then it's as beautiful as the day we're born that inside of this thing that looks lovely and, and you know, Katie Couric watched her own colonoscopy on the , on the Today Show once. And so I tried to do that, you know . Oh . And , and I of course, you know, I'm in my own facility and so I know the nurse, I know the doctor about to do . Yes . Awkward do thing . And I said, I'm gonna watch this thing. I'm , I'm gonna watch this thing. And so they there said , okay, count backwards from a hundred , you know, 'cause we're gonna give you some, some anesthesia, some sedatives. I didn't even get to like 97. I, I was asleep for the whole thing so I didn't

Speaker 5: 49:31

<laugh>. You're like , okay, sure. You'll

Speaker 4: 49:33

Hopefully they recorded it for you. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah .

Speaker 5: 49:36

Okay. I think we're escaping GI tract . We got

Speaker 4: 49:38

Two more. Yes. You got three and five

Speaker 5: 49:41

We're , I think I getting

Speaker 2: 49:42

Them right.

Speaker 4: 49:43

<laugh> actually you're doing quite well to be honest .

Speaker 2: 49:45

It's the definitive list.

Speaker 4: 49:46

<laugh>,

Speaker 5: 49:48

She's getting them right. It's his own opinion. <laugh>. <laugh> . Alright . Okay. Liver

Speaker 2: 49:53

Number three. Number three. So we got heart , kidney , I was said kidney

Speaker 5: 49:57

Confidence

Speaker 2: 49:58

Kidney . Oh yeah. With confidence. That's the other thing. 'cause the liver, you know, the whole Prometheus story and all that, you know, Prometheus and his liver regenerated and it was eaten by birds and all that. And the liver can kind of regrow and it does also about six or seven things. And so anything that does like multiple duties like that.

Speaker 5: 50:13

Sure. When the spleen can regrow, no one likes it, but

Speaker 2: 50:17

No one cares about the , the liver

Speaker 4: 50:18

Does it . The cares about the poor . Did you , did you know the liver could regrow? Did

Speaker 5: 50:22

You know that? No, I don't think I did .

Speaker 2: 50:24

Yeah , it can, I mean it's not like you're supposed but that's what happened, happened to , you know, in mythology Prometheus Yeah . Steals fire from Zeus and his liver. You , he gets a lifetime of his liver. But it is an actual true thing that your liver can be partially transplanted and it can, the cells can regrow unlike your heart and your kidney when they're done right . Your liver can do that. And it does so many things. I think a little bit of it's my own practice here. I see a ton of liver disease and so I see what happens when your liver doesn't.

Speaker 5: 50:51

Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 4: 50:52

I mean I'm on the record saying we should have two livers instead of a spleen. I'm just,

Speaker 2: 50:56

We should have two livers and there's space over there in the left side of the body. You know, the liver's over on your right side. They could,

Speaker 4: 51:01

That's insane . Yeah, I

Speaker 5: 51:02

Think you're right . There you go. You're right. What, what is the liver the only one that can do that?

Speaker 2: 51:06

That can

Speaker 5: 51:07

Regenerate. Regenerate.

Speaker 4: 51:08

Yeah . Yeah.

Speaker 2: 51:08

Yeah. It can actually grow back pretty well. I'm trying to think of, well your intestinal walls can , here's a a a , anything that can get cancer basically are things that can regrow because their cells are, are growing. You don't hear about heart cancer very much do you? Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> because you know, the cells aren't really growing that much, but you hear about liver cancer, intestinal cancer, colon cancer, so the intestines can Mm-Hmm .

Speaker 5: 51:30

<affirmative> . Interesting. There you go. Alright . Alright . Last one. This

Speaker 4: 51:33

Is a doozy

Speaker 5: 51:34

Pancreas.

Speaker 2: 51:36

Oh, pancreas. Yeah . So that's whatever what number I got left slot

Speaker 4: 51:39

Slotted into slots into five to five for you.

Speaker 2: 51:41

Yeah, I think that's probably pretty good since we have like five things in the GI tract and the pancreas is too , I think it comes in top among the gi tract organs.

Speaker 5: 51:51

Alright , perfect.

Speaker 4: 51:52

All right , so here's your list. Heart, kidney, liver, lung, singular, pancreas, seum , stomach, omentum, gallbladder, spleen. There you go . There you have , it's a good list . That's a good one . He stands by it. The definitive rankings here.

Speaker 2: 52:12

I know. And I'm gonna have to, with apologies to all my gastroenterology colleagues, including the eight of 'em who work for me. <laugh> . You know ,

Speaker 4: 52:19

<laugh> . Oh , ask 'em . I bet they don't even care about the omentum themselves. Come on. Like, they don't, let's be honest.

Speaker 2: 52:25

They don't care about the omentum. So have you taught your kids about the omentum? You taught

Speaker 4: 52:29

Them about ? I don't think I

Speaker 5: 52:30

Has . I don't think we've done that one.

Speaker 4: 52:31

That's, it's high on my list of parenting things to do . We'll

Speaker 5: 52:34

Talk about it tonight at dinner. Yeah, that's ,

Speaker 2: 52:36

They can slip it into a sentence. You know, that would be really good if you're, I can't even slip it into a sentence and you ask me about it, but if you can get your kid to, they're , they're well on their way really

Speaker 5: 52:45

Looks like momentum Dad, <laugh> . Yes ,

Speaker 4: 52:47

That's right . Exactly.

Speaker 2: 52:47

They're well on their way to a fulfilling life if they can do that at age two . <laugh> .

Speaker 4: 52:52

Oh man. Well, we should probably wrap things up. All right . All right . Um, although I, I do want to hear more , um, stories from Minnesota at some point, so we'll have to have you come back sometime , David .

Speaker 2: 53:04

Great. Hanging out with you guys, you know. Yeah . And , and you should come to, if you come to Minnesota, I'll show you around. You need to ice fish. I think

Speaker 5: 53:11

You'll have to go ice fishing, I think.

Speaker 4: 53:12

Okay . All right . Fine. Maybe I will come to Duluth in , in in

Speaker 5: 53:15

February.

Speaker 4: 53:15

In February. Yeah ,

Speaker 5: 53:16

I bet that's the best ice fishing in the world.

Speaker 4: 53:19

What kind of , what are we, what are we catching when we go ice fishing? Walleye

Speaker 2: 53:22

Walleye . It's the state fish of Minnesota. Okay ,

Speaker 5: 53:25

Come on

Speaker 4: 53:25

Now. Alright . Jesus . <laugh> <laugh> Union

Speaker 2: 53:29

So much . It's good . You lightly bread it, you fry it up. It's really good. Yeah,

Speaker 4: 53:32

<laugh> . Well , um, uh, so you're , the podcast is , uh, healthy Matters Matters

Speaker 2: 53:38

Just matters. Healthy Matters . And you can find it@healthymatters.org. Um, and , uh, or the proverbial wherever you get your podcasts. That's

Speaker 4: 53:46

Right. There you go . Healthy Matters. Check it out. I , I've been on We do that together, right? Yeah, yeah , yeah. We did. Yeah. We were on Healthy Matters. That's right. That was when we first met.

Speaker 2: 53:54

Loads of people have listened to the two of you and I appreciate you being on the , uh, being on the Healthy Matters Time podcast and for having me on here. That

Speaker 4: 54:02

Was a great time. And uh, also you're on Twitter or

Speaker 2: 54:05

X called I am Dr. David Hilden . Yeah, I think it's called X

Speaker 4: 54:08

Dr. David Hilden . Anything else you wanna promote? Uh, uh, just Hennepin County Hospital in

Speaker 2: 54:13

General. Yeah. If you ever in Minnesota, you know , uh, I would like to tell people, you know, look out for your county hospitals. You know, we have a hashtag around here that we just all kind of know. We with a wink, you know , hashtag county. Um, you've got loads of people not just in this city, but in every city. Mm-Hmm . <affirmative> across the country who are doing , um, really wonderful work for people who deserve the best care that this country can offer. And people are doing great healthcare everywhere, but just a big shout out to those who are doing it at a safe hospital .

Speaker 4: 54:40

Absolutely. That's right . Alright , well thanks a lot, David. Good talking to you.

Speaker 2: 54:43

Good talking to you both. Thanks. I'll see

Speaker 4: 54:45

You next time.

Speaker 2: 54:49

These two crack me up and it's been a real treat getting to know both of them. If you'd like to hear more, be sure to listen to the bonus episode from season two. We're there on our show. That about wraps it up for the show and this year, I really want to thank you all for listening. Thank our fantastic guests and all who make this podcast happen. Happy holidays and Happy New Year. And as always, be healthy and be well.

Speaker 1: 55:12

Thanks for listening to the Healthy Matters podcast with Dr. David Hilden. Got a question or a comment for the show, email us at Healthy matters@hcme.org. The Healthy Matters Podcast is made possible by Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and engineered and produced by John Lucas At highball Executive producers are Jonathan, CTO and Christine Hill . Please remember, we can only give general medical advice during this program, and every case is unique. We urge you to consult with your physician if you have a more serious or pressing health concern. Until next time, be healthy and be well.