At The Diet Doctor Podcast with Dr. Bret Scher, we just released our fourth episode. It has been a fantastic voyage thus far. We received tremendous feedback regarding our episodes with Gary Taubes and Dr. Peter Attia. Plus, Dr. Jeffry Gerber and Ivor Cummins are always crowd favorites. I personally enjoyed those interviews and enjoyed reading the positive feedback.
All that positivity came to a halt, however, with episode #4 with Dr. Joseph Antoun.
At first that surprised me, but now in retrospect, it makes perfect sense.
My intention with Dr. Antoun was to interview a physician and businessman who has tremendous knowledge on the science of fasting and longevity. As CEO of a company producing a fasting mimicking diet (FMD) product, he also has a job to do promoting his product. My challenge was to strike the balance so that our interview was mostly about the science and less about his specific product. After all, the science is remarkable and that is what I wanted to relate to the listeners.
Judging by the initial response, it is clear I did not do an acceptable job. For that I am sorry.
After I listened to the podcast, I realized one of my glaring mistakes. In my mind, I equated the science of fasting with the science of the fasting mimicking diet, but I never explicitly said that. As a result, the entire episode was about the FMD, and not about true fasting. That was not my intention, but that was the end result.
My first and only obligation is to you, our listeners and I let you down. I know you would never want to listen to a podcast that felt more like an infomercial. I certainly wouldn't! In the future, my promise to you is that I will strike that balance better. I will be an advocate for the science and for information that helps you, not that promotes someone else's agenda.
I also understand many people have an issue with the Prolon FMD product itself. That is something I regrettably did not explore with Dr. Antoun. I did try to point out that a water fast should always be the first choice, and an FMD reserved for those who have trouble with water fasts. But what I didn't explore was how the Prolon FMD product is processed food. You can read my blog here where I comment how my kids were amazed to see me eat something that came from a box and a bag, something they have never seen me do before!
I would never promote that someone eat processed, industrialized food on a regular basis, so why was I ok with it for the five-day FMD? Now I realize that I should have pushed harder about how people can create their own real-food FMD, a much healthier choice than the processed product.
In the end, this was a wonderful learning experience for me as a podcast host, as a representative for Diet Doctor, and as an advocate for you, my listeners. My promise to you is that in the future I will be more cognizant of the intentions of my guests and of striking a better balance between science and product promotion. Most importantly, I will make sure every single podcast episode is one that you will enjoy, you will learn from, and you can use to improve your health and your life today.
At Diet Doctor, our goal is making low carb simple. But it is also doing that with integrity and honesty. I want to live up to that and make sure each episode is one that every team member at DietDoctor.com will be proud of.
Thank you for listening and thank you for your comments. Please keep them coming. Your comments help me improve the podcast so that you get the information you need in a way that helps you most.
Thanks for reading,
Bret Scher, MD FACC
