#1237 Limited Access

Radwa is an ophthalmologist whose son and husband have type 1. 

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Scott Benner 0:00
Hello friends and welcome to episode 1237 of the Juicebox Podcast.

rodeway is an ophthalmologist from Egypt who son has type one diabetes her husband, a surgeon also has type one. Today we're going to talk about access to technology costs around type one diabetes, and much more. Please don't forget that nothing you hear on the Juicebox Podcast should be considered advice, medical or otherwise, always consult a physician before making any changes to your health care plan or becoming bold with insulin. When you place your first order for ag one with my link, you'll get five free travel packs and a free year's supply of vitamin D. Drink ag one.com/juice box. Are you a US resident who has type one diabetes or is the caregiver of someone with type one if you are please go to T one D exchange.org/juice. Box and complete their survey. Doing that helps in so many ways. It's hard to list them all here right now. takes you about 10 minutes. T one D exchange.org/juice box you will be helping people with type one. Probably be helping yourself, and you'll definitely be helping the podcast. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you guys do that. Let's get to run one. This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by the only implantable sensor rated for long term wear up to six months. The ever since CGM ever since cgm.com/juicebox. Today's episode is also brought to you by touched by type one and they have a huge in person event coming up soon that is completely free for you to attend. Check out touched by type one.org For more information and get your absolutely free tickets to the event that's happening very soon in Orlando, Florida that I'll be at and so will Jenny

Radwa 2:10
I'm Rodwell. Okay from Egypt. This is how I would like everyone to know me. I've been following your podcasts for about a couple of years. I'm an ophthalmologist practicing one and I teach in Korea University. My husband is an orthopedic surgeon and a type one diabetic for around like for my son's elderly sons ages from 15 years. And I have a five year old type one diabetic has been diabetic for almost four years now. And definitely my look at although I'm a healthcare professional, I'm an ophthalmologist. So I'm really oriented with diabetes and its complications. But I've looked at diabetes differently since my son's diagnosis. Like it's been an eye opener for me about what we're missing here in our country, the things that we need to have, but we're not having the proper management of diabetes, you know,

Scott Benner 2:56
let me ask you a couple of questions and we'll and we'll dig into all of it. Okay. Okay, go ahead. So you and your husband have been together for how long?

Radwa 3:03
We've been like together for almost 20 years, like five years before we got married, or four years before we got married. And then we've been married for like 16 years. Okay.

Scott Benner 3:14
And did he have type one when you met him? Or did he develop it after you were married?

Radwa 3:18
No, after we were married while I was pregnant with my first son. I don't know why it was a shocker for him because they have a strong history of diabetes in their family like his mom had this. She's a type one diabetic when she was like 27. This is what we call the maturity onset diabetes of the young moody. And then he had his both siblings are diabetic, like his younger brother had had him since he was two and his sister since she was 10. But he was like, the only one in the family who didn't have diabetes. I think he thought he passed that, you know, you got away with it. Yeah, but he was like, seemed like his mom, you know, like he had the exact same gene.

Scott Benner 3:57
Yeah, in the mid in his mid 20s. He

Radwa 3:59
got it. Yeah, okay. Yeah, he was 26. Okay. All right.

Scott Benner 4:03
And I want to ask you, when he's diagnosed, and you're, you're pregnant at that time. Yeah. And then you look at the rest of his family, do you think, Oh, my kids are gonna get diabetes?

Radwa 4:17
Not really. No, actually, I, we always have that in the back of our minds, even before his diagnosis, you know, like, it's in their family. So they definitely might pass it on. And we always had in mind, like, you know, my elder kids, they don't have diabetes. I have a 15 year old and a 12 year old girl and a 15 year old boy. But whenever, like, for example, they had an accident during sleep, or we think they're drinking too much water, or the pee a lot. We immediately like, check them at home. So it was always in the back of our minds, you know?

Scott Benner 4:50
Yeah. Have you ever had them checked for antibodies? No. And I

Radwa 4:54
don't know why, but I don't want to do that. I'm like, if it happens, it happens. You know, like, well We have to have a healthy lifestyle in general, we don't overdose on sugar as much as we as much as possible. But I don't want to go and check them for antibodies and just make them live with it in the back of their mind. Like, you have the antibody. So we're gonna get diabetes at some point, you know,

Scott Benner 5:14
I hear so. Okay, so he he's diagnosed, what's his care like? And are you involved in it at all?

Radwa 5:22
No, I wasn't really that involved. You know, he's a doctor. His mom is an endocrinologist actually, but an auditor in the criminologist. I don't know why I didn't give it much thought back then. Like he's an adult. He knows what he's doing. His hemoglobin agencies were around six and a half to seven and a half. So yeah, he's doing okay. And his mom is like, all over him. So I thought that was enough. But you know, after my son's diagnosis, no, it wasn't enough. And I'm all over him now.

Scott Benner 5:48
His mother was on him about it. How was her management and her kids even the

Radwa 5:55
went MDI, okay with, he used Lantus and overwrap it and it worked fine for him. And he didn't have a sensor, continuous glucose monitor that didn't have one. He's like, he blood checks his blood sugar like five, six times a day. He can feel the hypose. And he can feel when it's high, but he just checks it five, six times a day. And to be fair, we don't have CGM in Egypt. We just had the FreeStyle Libre two years ago, and only the first generation

Scott Benner 6:24
Oh, really? Just two years ago, just two years ago, you got three generations old leave rice. Yeah,

Radwa 6:29
I know. And we still up till now we only have the first generation. It's not even available all the time. Like anyone. I mean, when I started to get him the labor, when I heard about it, I got it from from another country. You know, like, I have a friend. I'm like, can you bring me this with you when you're coming? And he brought him like two, three. And they were like, eye openers for us? Yeah.

Scott Benner 6:48
So did he learn that those five checks a day are not telling the whole story? Yeah,

Radwa 6:53
he knows. He actually knows. But you know, he's a busy surgeon. He doesn't give it much thought. If I would say that. He just likes to eat healthy. He goes to the gym. He checks his blood sugar, five, six times a day. And he thought it was like it's okay. But definitely when he had the liver, he had much, much better control for her blood sugar for his blood sugar.

Scott Benner 7:16
Yeah, just just wearing a few of them helped him. Okay, but you know,

Radwa 7:20
at that point we never heard like he never thought about he thought having a pump would be a bit handicapping to have it stuck on him most of the day, because also in Egypt, we only have Medtronic and like the older virgins. Okay. Yeah.

Scott Benner 7:32
So there is an access issue for everything. Yeah.

Radwa 7:37
access issue. I tell you, we I flipped over backwards to get my son to Omnipod. You know, you're not going

Scott Benner 7:44
to be the first person I've spoken to, from, oh, wait a minute. I was gonna say from Egypt, but maybe that person was from Saudi Arabia, who told me this story about like, they actually get on a plane and fly here and buy it then fly back again. Oh,

Radwa 7:57
yeah. It's basically like, I didn't even have a prescription for my young. Yeah, my, my husband still MDI till now is like, because you know, we have to pay everything out of pocket, we bring the Dexcom from London, okay, because we have him registered there. And we have several friends who live there. So I just buy it online, send it to their home, and then they I buy like six months altogether. And then whenever they're back on vacation, they bring us the stock. So the Dexcom is easy. The problem is with Omnipod because usually you need a prescription for it anywhere. Okay. There are some few like websites in the states that outsource them. So we found the trusted website, and this is what we've been using for a while. I also order online and sent to my friends and I have several friends who live in the States. But recently, we were on the dash, okay, the low on the stock of that she doesn't have any dash. That was a big problem for us. Until eventually I found that Omnipod have a couple of months ago in Turkey in Istanbul, they have a company that is called Med salads, I think that outsources the Omnipod from the company itself, and they can work with an Egyptian prescription. So this is what we're doing right now. I fly to Istanbul to bring the stock can come back how

Scott Benner 9:12
far of a flight is that? No, it's just a couple of hours. Yes, a couple of hours. You know, you're gonna be extra mad when your kids older and doesn't appreciate anything you did for them.

Radwa 9:23
It's okay, like I take it as a chance to go and have a like a three day vacation.

Scott Benner 9:30
And come back. I have to go get your palm some buy.

Radwa 9:34
Get away from this for a couple of days. But yeah, you do have to bend over backwards. Bring his stuff. Yeah.

Scott Benner 9:39
Tell me why doing that was so important for your child. I hear what you're saying about your husband. Well, I guess maybe the question is, could you afford to do it for both of them if you if he if your husband was interested? This episode of The Juicebox Podcast is sponsored by the only six month where implantable CGM on the market. and it's very unique. So you go into an office, it's I've actually seen an insertion done online like a live one like, well, they recorded the entire videos less than eight minutes long and they're talking most of the time, the insertion took no time at all right? So you go into the office, they insert the sensor, now it's in there and working for six months, you go back six months later, they pop out that one, put it in another one, so two office visits a year to get really accurate and consistent CGM data that's neither here nor there for what I'm trying to say. So this thing's under your skin, right? And you then wear a transmitter over top of it, transmitters got this nice, gentle silicone adhesive that you change daily, so very little chance of having skin irritations. That's a plus. So you put the transmitter on it talks to your phone app tells you your blood sugar, your your alerts, your alarms, etc. But if you want to be discreet, for some reason, you take the transmitter off, just slip comes right off. No, like, you know, not like peeling at or having to rub off at he's just kind of pops right off the silicone stuff really cool. You'll say it. And now you're ready for your big day. Whatever that day is, it could be a prom, or a wedding or just a moment when you don't want something hanging on your arm. The ever sent CGM allows you to do that without wasting a sensor because you just take the transmitter off. And then when you're ready to use it again, you pop it back on, maybe you just want to take a shower without rocking a sensor with a bar of soap. Just remove the transmitter and put it back on when you're ready. Ever since cgm.com/juicebox, you really should check it out.

Radwa 11:37
No, no, he's interested. No. But, uh, yeah, I think it will be like, it will be very tight. And we don't want to go there. Because you know, we buy everything in dollars. And to give you some perspective, we're having a major economic crisis in Egypt nowadays for the past couple of years. And like $1 was around 15 Egyptian pounds. Now it's at 50. I understand. Well, yeah. And it's just and it might get worse, like, there's no stability there in the horizon. Up till now. So we don't want to like get stuck with being having both of them on Omnipod. And then we have to remove him from it. If we go into like a final financial, you can't afford it, you know, so he doesn't want to start there. And he doesn't want to go there. So

Scott Benner 12:24
make sure I understand correctly. If something cost $600. American, that's 600 times 50. For you for 30,000 Egyptian pounds, my currency. Yeah, and your currency. And I'm sorry, this is a weird thing to ask. You can say I don't want to tell you. But I mean, you're a doctor. He's a doctor. How much do you make a year in dollars? Do it? Do it? Do it in pounds? I guess you're not you an average?

Radwa 12:52
Yeah, I can't tell you by year I can give you by month and average. In Egypt. Also, you need to know that the medical field, like most of it is a private. Yeah. Like your work is a private sector. I mean, it's not like in the States, you don't work for a hospital and you have a paycheck every month. No, you work in several hospitals. And it's all depends on your flow. So it's really variable between a month and the other. You know, okay.

Scott Benner 13:16
So yeah, just give me an average month for a doctor. For

Radwa 13:21
a doctor. No, it varies a lot. Like, I could be like, I'm not I'm not working. I stopped doing any surgeries since the diagnosis because we can't You can't have both of us, like scrubbed in, and then the school tries to reach out and nobody answers, you know, so since my son's diagnosis, I've decided I'm not going to scrub in anymore. I'm working only as a clinician, like medical retina and ocular inflammatory diseases. Like I can make like around only this is so embarrassing. The number in dollars is like really embarrassing, but like $1,500 for example, a month, a month. Yeah.

Scott Benner 13:59
Oh my gosh, and that even but my

Radwa 14:02
husband is definitely like, it really varies like it depends on how many surgeries you have this month, but he can be like 10 times that or five times that you know, at that

Scott Benner 14:11
1500 number that 75,000 Egyptian pounds. And, and then the pumps alone and the decks coms could I mean, you could work all month to buy supplies for him.

Radwa 14:23
Yeah, my my husband asked the covers that it's funny. Yeah, we can afford it. Like it exactly costs us around. $3,000 a year. Okay. Are you at $3,000? A year for for the Omnipod? Right. Okay. And $3,000 for the Dexcom okay. Yeah, this is this is what it costs a year for us. Wow, an average. So

Scott Benner 14:45
at the current Jesus, is that right at the current exchange rate? It's 6000 times 50. Yeah, don't go there. No, I'm going to this is kind of fun. Oh my god. Okay,

Radwa 14:56
you can do it like, actually, we have also it's very cool. complicated. It's like in the bank, it's times 30. But in the black market, it's times 50. Because the bank doesn't give you dollars because they have a defect in it. It's very complicated. Like the difference between the banks and the black market is almost 20 pounds. Yeah. All

Scott Benner 15:14
I heard was that you're a doctor, and you made $1,500 in a month. And I think, I

Radwa 15:20
think you need to edit that.

Scott Benner 15:22
I think, Listen, I'm not kidding you. I can't talk my friends listen to them. Well, they know, they listen, they know you can be doing the other work and making more money. But you're doing this thing for your kid, which is lovely. But I'm just saying that people here should like here in America, and they should have some perspective is what I'm saying. You don't I mean?

Radwa 15:42
Yeah, but on the other hand, like definitely, the cost of living here is cheaper. You know? Like, I mean, if you come from America, and you have like, $2,000 on you, you could like, live well,

Scott Benner 15:54
wait, wait for how long? How long? Can I make it on two grand? It depends

Radwa 15:57
on where you go out and what you eat. And it's very complicated. First of all, yeah,

Scott Benner 16:02
my my way. I mean,

Radwa 16:06
you don't have to live you. But I mean, if you come here on vacation, it will be a really cheap vacation for you.

Scott Benner 16:10
Really? Yeah, I'll be I'll finally be able to live like, I'm Rich for a couple of minutes here saying, Yeah, man.

Radwa 16:17
But, but overall, you know, I mean, the cost of living in Egypt is definitely cheaper. We don't we all owe most of the people in Egypt, we own our homes. We don't have mortgage. Okay, or rent? Most of us, what's the home cost? Sorry,

Scott Benner 16:32
what's a home cost?

Radwa 16:34
You know, it's like, went like 10 Times up in the past three years. So also don't go there. Like, right now. You can't afford to own point. But yeah, it's very variable. It depends on how big the home is. And the area. We I understand

Scott Benner 16:49
there's a lot of all about economics. There's a lot of I'm super interested in this. So there's a lot of variables, but what do you think an average person lives in a home that cost them what? Like,

Radwa 16:59
you might have bought the home for only like, I don't know, you do the math for like, you bought it for 1 million, for example. But right now, it's worth six, you know, Oh, okay.

Scott Benner 17:09
And 1 million. 1 million British pounds. Egyptian. Excuse me. Yeah. And so that would be divided by 50. For 20 grand?

Radwa 17:21
Yeah. But you would have bought it for more than 20 grand because $1 was actually seven when you bought the home.

Scott Benner 17:30
But then that's 100 it's very complicated. Don't go there. But then that's $140,000. Basically, I'm telling you right now, you can't buy a box with a broken window here for under $300,000. Exactly. I know. I know that in New Jersey, where I live, like I'm sure it's different in other places. Don't get me wrong, but so I can bring $2,000 I'm just planning for myself. I could bring $2,000 to Egypt and have 50 times that I could have 100,000 Egyptian pounds, I would feel do I carry it in paper in my pockets like Scrooge McDuck or how do I do it? Does that a reference? You know?

Radwa 18:05
I think we could we should start this podcast. No, I'm having such

Scott Benner 18:09
a good time. So we'll get past that. But it's okay. No, love. Okay, go ahead. I just wanted to paint the picture, because somebody who's not a physician is not flying to Istanbul to get on the pots. Right. So most people there are living with MDI. And if they're lucky, a libre one, but probably not. Is that pretty accurate?

Radwa 18:31
Yes. Okay. Yes. If you're talking about the myth, the average human in Niger, in my country, you don't have we don't have insurance. Or actually we like we pay medical care and schools out of pocket. Most of the people that have money, people who don't have money, go to public schools, but they're not really getting like that good education. And they're the insurance would only cover the MDI, not even deep

Scott Benner 18:56
enough to keep you alive. And then what about the care? What are people because if doctors are cash pay, then most people are probably just going getting their insulin and their needles and then they're going off and there

Radwa 19:09
are people who are come like multinational companies are in good companies and they have insurance. We as doctors, we don't have insurance. We have the Syndicate, but the just the cover very little of whatever costs you go through. A lot of people they have insurance companies covering for them, but I think most of them will only cover MDI, okay, we didn't cover a pump or only if you have like a really, really good insurance, they would cover a pump.

Scott Benner 19:34
Is the insulin expensive there are no no it's very cheap, very cheap, okay?

Radwa 19:38
Like, come and buy like Could your stock of insulin and fly with it and you will believe how much it costs. Well,

Scott Benner 19:45
wait a minute, maybe now I'm coming. I come with my 2000 I get 100,000 Egyptian pounds. I spend 500 Egyptian pounds on insulin. I come back here and I'm kept enriched with the insulin I sell it on the black market over here. This is what you're telling me I should do?

Radwa 20:00
You might do that I can't I do that a pen of novel is around was 100. Now it's 160 Egyptian pounds. So you do the math. It's like $3. Right? Damn,

Scott Benner 20:10
that's something else. Okay, now you piss people off now that now they don't feel bad for you anymore. Nevermind.

Radwa 20:17
It's very different to your like the story of my son's diagnosis. I think this would be one that will tell me. That's not a common story. But it was a COVID times he was diagnosed on the seventh of April 2020. And, like I told you, we always had the diagnosis of diabetes in the back of our minds. We had just like, we had the lockdown on 17th, the weight of on 17th of March here in Egypt. And he had a party at his nursery the day before. I think he called the hand foot and mouth disease. Yeah. So we the first week of the lockup, he like had a fever and the vesicles in his mouth, and he lost weight. And it was okay. And it passed. And then the week after he was just so agitated, most of the time, he lost weight, but I'm like, yeah, he wasn't eating for a week. We're locked down. It's a different situation for him. And he's only a year and a half. He can't express himself. So maybe that's why he's not himself. But then what caught our attention was like, his diapers were filling really fast. I was sitting with my husband, I'm like, I can change his diapers like, enough, like, every three hours, and I think he's just full like a balloon. And he's like, Okay, why don't we doing him a test? You know, like we did with his siblings. Like when everybody had an accident, just come in, do a blood sugar, and usually comes out fine. And we're good. So we did that. And oh, my God, his blood sugar was 400. So I'm like, No, something's wrong. Let's like wash his hands and do that again. And it's like, 450 We tried his toes. It's still high. So when you like, yeah, he has diabetes.

Scott Benner 21:54
How did that strike your husband? Do you recall?

Radwa 21:56
It strike him really bad? Like, yeah, I thought it would strike me worse. But no, yeah. I mean, he was he didn't like fall apart. He was very helpful. He was there with me and every step, but no, it hit him really bad. Like he we had a bout a long bout of depression

Scott Benner 22:12
after it. Do you think he feels like it's his fault? No, no, it's not that he's

Radwa 22:17
just look, I'm a very religious and faithful person. And he is to like, he believes in God and everything. But he just like, why did this happen? You know, I have like, in my back of my mind, like, everything happens for a reason, and you just have to live with it. And God will be with us. You know, he's like, no, why did this happen to my son? You know, like, he's too young. He shouldn't this shouldn't be happening to him. You know, this. He was struggling with that, more or less,

Scott Benner 22:44
but he didn't feel that way for himself. What had happened? No, no, no. For him. It was good. God has a plan. I'm okay. That kind of stuff would have happened to his son. He was out. Yeah, yeah.

Radwa 22:55
Yeah, I understand. So what we did was like, okay, his blood sugar is high. So he has diabetes. Should we go to a hospital? What should we do? And then I called my dad and I'm like, No, I called my friends. Do you know a good endocrinologist? I have a friend whose son is a type one diabetic. I asked her who's his following with? Long story short, somebody sent me this pediatric endocrinologist number that they think she's really good. I called her over the phone. And she's like, No, you don't need to go to the hospital. I think you can manage him at home. Check his acetone, he did not have acetone at the time. So she's like, I think you're really early in the diagnosis. So you can do this at home. And I kept texting and talking to this endocrinologist over the phone and on WhatsApp for like, two weeks, she was like living with us. But she didn't see him like the first time she saw him was like six, seven months after his diagnosis, when, like everywhere, it's opened up and I took her took him just for a regular check. She told me all the labs that he needs to do and we had like the lab come over at home and we did everything. But you know, we did not have this dramatic experience of going to the hospital and being admitted with we just did everything at home. She's like, go on by the receiver and the Nova rapid give him blah, blah, blah, do him like a diabetes diary, what he eats, how many carbs and so on. And she started to tell me what a carb insulin ratio is and how I should like try to calculate it. And we did all this at home. Like definitely, us being locked down at that point was very helpful. Yeah. Yeah. I imagine you had nothing else to do. You know.

Scott Benner 24:32
We'll just focus on this since we're just bored out of our minds. Does the insulin need a prescription? Like she said, just go get insulin? Was it that easy? No,

Radwa 24:41
we don't we don't like most of the drugs in Egypt. You don't really need the prescription for them. Okay.

Scott Benner 24:45
I could just roll in there and be like, hey, I want to try this. I want to try this. ozempic make me thin Give it to me. Is that easy?

Radwa 24:52
Yeah. XInput because we're low on stock. You might get the prescription but it's not because you have to have a prescription for it. It's because they're low on stock, so they don't want people abusing it. I

Scott Benner 25:03
am coming to Egypt to be skinny and rich. This zyk you

Radwa 25:07
think that but that's not

Scott Benner 25:10
how it works? Works. I'm making it work that way. That's what I want. Well, yeah, yeah,

Radwa 25:15
you can get Yeah, like, there's this other drug. I can't remember its name right now. That's like those Olympic but came out before

Scott Benner 25:22
it Manjaro No, no trulicity

Radwa 25:27
trulicity Yes. And there's this other one that's cheaper I can remember. Gosh, this one is available, and you can just go and buy it.

Scott Benner 25:34
Okay. All right, I'm coming. I'm on my way. Like, seriously? I mean, what the heck, why you live in? So what's the downside of Egypt? That I don't know what like, what's gonna happen when I get there? I'll be like, Oh, this wasn't worth it or No,

Radwa 25:48
lovely place. Like, if you come on vacation or like, come to live here?

Scott Benner 25:52
I don't know, whatever. What do you think there are definitely a

Radwa 25:55
lot of downsides. Like, I'm telling you, I'm a doctor, and I make $1,500 I'm

Scott Benner 26:00
gonna have to bring all my money outside to bring all my money.

Radwa 26:04
But there's, there's other downsides. A lot of other jobs like, definitely. cooling system, for example, you have to go take your kids to a private school to get a good education. So you have to pay for it. And like, for example, in your in the States, when we went there, if you want to go to a good school, a good public school, you have to live in the area where the allow you to go to the school, and usually this area, the rents are higher, the houses are more expensive, you know. So like, instead, you have to pay for the school here in Egypt, you can go to any school you want, but you have to pay for it. I see. Because the public schooling system is not very, I don't want to go there. Let's focus on type one diabetes.

Scott Benner 26:51
I gotcha. All right, I have to ask, are you expecting your children to be doctors?

Radwa 26:56
No, I don't want them to be How come? I come from a family of doctors, like my both my parents are doctors and my husband, my husband's too. But recently, even in the states, like I mean, everywhere in the world has become very challenging to become a doctor. I mean, you were the working hours, the expectations. I don't know if you're feeling this around. But lately, doctors are not given the respect that they should be having, like the day before, like 20 years ago. No, I don't know if you feel that in your country. But there is a lot of problems with the health care system everywhere. Like in Britain, they're struggling with it in the States, the doctor, our friends, they're struggling like everybody is. So I think to be a doctor, you have to really want it to love it. It's like I don't tell them you, you can't be a doctor. I tell them it's your choice. But they have to really, really want it and ask for it to be able to do the work because it takes a lot of work to be a doctor.

Scott Benner 27:51
What other like professions, like when you think of your kids do you hope for like because here I think kids now I think there's this study that says that young people in America, if you ask them what they want to do for a living, they say they want to be a social media influencer.

Radwa 28:06
Most of them. Yes, like, my son at some point. He's like, Okay, I want to be a YouTuber. I'm like, No, this is not a job. This is something that you can do on the side.

Scott Benner 28:16
I said to my son, at one point, I'm like, if we're all influencing everybody who's making money, I hate somebody, somebody needs to do something.

Radwa 28:23
Yeah, it's something that's going wrong with the world that since the social media opened up that big, and it's definitely frustrating for the kids to watch. Like, okay, my, my dad is a doctor, but this football player, or this influenza, they make, like, they live a more luxurious life, and they make 10 times more money, you know, so it's, it's not very intriguing for them to become a doctor anymore. Like my dad works 18 hours a day. And he's always scrubbed in, and he's not available. And now I can be a YouTuber from the comfort of my home and make more money. You know, eventually that won't work out. Yeah, I think this is what gets into them. But no, I think there's a lot of professions like I'd love for my son to, for example, become an architect. Okay. I think they do. Like he's an artist. He's an art. Yeah, he likes to draw. And I think it's nice that, you know, like designing homes and designing buildings. And I think that's an interesting profession. But whatever I'm not, I'm not giving it much thought right now. Like, I just want him to get good grades. And then we can see what do we do?

Scott Benner 29:27
Well, I just realized I'm never coming because the flight is like 14 hours. So I'm not doing that.

Radwa 29:35
Several times, like, we just I'm jet lagged right now when I'm talking to you because we've just came back from our like, we had a Christmas vacation. Dozens in New York and the flight is not bad. Maybe the jetlag is

Scott Benner 29:49
the problem. I'll definitely throw a clot and drop that on that flight.

Radwa 29:53
And you don't have to take like, you can do transit flights, like if you go through Europe make so you'll have a Seven, eight hour flight and then another one that's like three, four hours and you're here.

Scott Benner 30:04
Okay. All right. I don't know. Practically close. This feels like when people asked me to come to Australia, who seems very far away, I'm not doing that. Like if I could fall asleep in a pod and wake up in Australia, that might be different, but I don't know. put me to sleep. I want to understand when your son's diagnosed. And how do you get from where you described with your MDI and learning at home to I need to find a CG like, where do you even learn about those things? First of all,

Radwa 30:34
first of all, ask for the CGM. We have a friend who was on the Dexcom. So I was like, Yeah, you need to have that for your son. And we had a friend who's in London, and he he mostly did it all for us. He like, registered him. And he brought us the Dexcom like, months later when he was coming. The doctor told me it's preferable to have a CGM. The only thing that we have in Egypt right now is the FreeStyle Libre. But I was like, No, it's not good enough. And then our friend suggested the Dexcom. He was on it. He will he used to bring it from London. Like we had him and duck on Dexcom, like just a couple of months after his diagnosis. And we only stayed on the Dexcom for two years. Dexcom with MCI, with the first week of diagnosis, what I did is like, I sat there and started to search for Facebook groups like Facebook support groups. Like I told you, I wasn't really involved with my husband. And I wanted to know more. I wanted to listen to people talking about it. I wanted to ask some questions. So I just started searching for Facebook support groups, I found several ones I didn't find actually the juice box, Facebook group at that point. But then people kept bringing up the Omni pod. And then one of them said, there's this Juicebox Podcast that's very useful. The podcasts kept coming up, like in the comments from different people. I didn't ask any question. I just kept reading questions and comments and questions and comments, trying to educate myself a bit. So I put that in the back of their mind. But I was at home. And at that time, I usually listen to like audiobooks or podcasts during commute during going to work. So I didn't think about listening to the podcast at that point. But I put it in the back of the mind. I went there and followed the podcast, but I didn't start listening at the point. And then when people started bringing up the Omnipod, I'm likely I need to know more about that. So that's when I started looking into the podcast, because people kept recommending it if you if you're going to put on an Omnipod you

Scott Benner 32:30
know, it's funny, I'm so happy that that worked out. But I don't think of it that way. I don't think I talked about anything on this podcast that you couldn't do with MDI, a T slim pump or Medtronic pumper, or anything else. Yeah, I

Radwa 32:45
know. But they said that it's useful like, because I

Scott Benner 32:49
have those pro tip episodes from Oh, so this was like, two summers ago, like August of 2022. Is that about when you found me?

Radwa 32:58
I found you before, but I started listening in 21. Okay, I guess by the end of 2001. Started like listening randomly. At that point, I didn't want to put on a pump on a two year old who's running around, because the pumps we have available here are the ones that you have to like, have an inner pocket for it and with him, and it's cannulated. And I was like, No, I can't do that. I feel very uncomfortable. If it got stuck in something or hung up on something it would be handicapping for him. So I went along with MTI. And then when I read about the Omnipod, and I felt that he can like go to swimming class with it that there is no cannula involved. And I was like, Okay, this is what I want for him. But I don't want to change the system that his nursery has been used to, like they give him injection in the nursery and everything. And I just keep following with the Dexcom and giving them instructions. This is how it's working like that. Like in the nursery. It's very, it's an open community, you can call at any time it's not like the school premises. So I can drop off anytime I want. And I if I need anything, I just call the teacher and tell her like, Oh, he's going Hi, give him blah, blah, blah, he's going glow, give him juice and so on. And

Scott Benner 34:09
we'll do all that and that nobody fights you about it or says that's not my job or anything like that. No, there.

Radwa 34:14
His nursery was very helpful. The teachers were amazing. And then we have to go to school. And that's when I was like, he can be on MDI in school. He can keep going back and forth between the doctor's office and his class for every injection or for every whatever. The summer before he went to school was like, No, I have to get the Omnipod Oh, I actually did is like I ordered the Omnipod and I had it like since April. I've had like a six month stock that we bought. And I kept looking at it. I'm like what I'm gonna do with that. Like, how I'm gonna do this. So okay, I'm just going to postpone this to the summer. I don't want to change his system right now. And I shut it off. And then when I talked to his endocrinologist, he's like, yeah, the Omnipod is ready. Good. I've tried to help one patient before with it, but I can't really remember all check it out and come back to you. I'm like, No, I can do that. You know? Yeah, yeah. I

Scott Benner 35:10
don't need your help. Yeah, if she's going

Radwa 35:12
to have to check online and ask around and then come back for me, like, if you're

Scott Benner 35:17
Googling I can Google. Also, I'm a doctor, too, by the way,

Radwa 35:22
is exactly what I did. Like a friend. Like she pushed me to do it. She had a, she's somebody I got to know because her her kid is diabetic, too. So we have like the small community, we communicate with each other. So she told me, like, we did the Omnipod at home, her her husband was totally in charge. And he was able to do it. So I'm like, if you can do it, I can do it. So I took a week off, I stayed with him. Totally at home, I read all about it. I watched all the videos. I'm like, Okay, I'm doing that. So I kept him at home. Even my husband wasn't available at the time, he was like, in a conference. And it was only me and my kids at home. I decided to put it on, I put it on. And I had already listened to several video, like several podcasts, and I watched several videos and the instructions of how to do it. And it just it just took me like three days to get his basil. Right, right. I think the most of the struggle was in the basil. It's the dash. It's not the Omnipod five. So there was no algorithm involved. Yeah, and and we got our we got there, and I watched his numbers getting really good. I was like, I kept telling my husband, you have to get some for yourself too. Well,

Scott Benner 36:35
that's what I was gonna ask as soon as you start seeing the benefit of it to turn to your husband and go, Hey, what are we doing here for you? Yes,

Radwa 36:41
exactly. But up till now, he's still resisting. And he's like, just let's keep all the money to like, a steady supply of Omnipod. Because it like, right now, if he doesn't have the Omnipod on him. I don't think I'll send him to school. You know? Yeah, it gets scary,

Scott Benner 37:00
doesn't it? Yeah, it's scary.

Radwa 37:03
And his teachers won't honestly in school, his teachers won't give him the injection. They're not allowed to. So I wouldn't feel comfortable him going back and forth to the clinic every time but his teachers, they would use the Omnipod. Easily your trouble. You have a WhatsApp group, me and the teachers. Yeah. I keep giving there. I told them, I'm totally in control. I'm gonna give you all the instructions whenever I need to. And this is what we do like, right? Yeah, I just send them on the WhatsApp right now he's going a bit low. Can you give him a biscuit or we have his supplies and in class, or Skittles, or juice box or whatever. And if he's going high, I send them like, give him 10 grams of carb or whatever. So it's easy for them to just press Bolus, put a number press OK. And that's it.

Scott Benner 37:49
Is it hard for you to know that you guys are making a financial decision that I don't want to say it's hurting your husband, but is it hard to know that you're making like, like a Sophie's Choice decision? You're like, we're gonna give it the I mean, I guess most people, definitely.

Radwa 38:03
Yeah, definitely. But you work with what you have. You know,

Scott Benner 38:07
they your husband sounds like a good guy. I'll tell you right now this this. You're not supposed you're not able to get mad at him now, because of this. This is very selfless.

Radwa 38:17
Yes, selfless. Honestly.

Scott Benner 38:18
It doesn't work that way. though. You're married, you can still be mme, it's fine. It's not this one. Generally,

Radwa 38:25
like, yeah, it's it's a choice. But like you said, it doesn't feel like we're harming him. It's just like, he has better options that we're not using right now. You know, no, I

Scott Benner 38:35
mean, he sounds like he's on top of his situation. So I don't think he's being harmed. But not I'm not saying you can't do well, with MDI. And testing. You certainly can. It? I mean, it makes the point really, that you're having to make a decision, there's a thing you'd like to do, and you can't and that it's not just, you know, it's not just in one country, there's problems exist everywhere, for the most part. Exactly. Yeah. And they're happening to you to doctors, which is not a thing people would expect, you know, yes.

Radwa 39:02
Yeah, it's not common. But but the healthcare system, like as well, we hear so different. Like, it has a lot of privileges. Like if you want to do an MRI, you just go into an MRI, you know, you like if you know, you need one, you can just go and do it.

Scott Benner 39:16
Are they financially, like, difficult to get? No, no. Health care? So it's not monetized the same way?

Radwa 39:24
Yeah, health care here is very different. It's a lot cheaper. You don't have to, like ask permission, and wait, like, for example, if you don't have an elective surgery bypass, for example, to lose weight. The next day, like I know, the waiting list, and for example, in the UK is around a year and a half to do that. Or if you want to do a hip replacement. You might have to wait for your turn here. You can do it just the next day, even through insurance, you know, because

Scott Benner 39:53
there's availability of doctors or because Why do you think that is why do you think there's that Instant Access,

Radwa 40:01
doctors are much more available. It's not like that where there's a lot of doctors, but the doctors are available. Like I told you, I handled my son at home, and I had my doctor on WhatsApp. And my patients can reach me on WhatsApp anytime. Like if they have an emergency, if they need to ask about something, they can just text me and I answer back. No, it works really differently here. Like, you could just go and book an appointment and go, Yeah, you don't have to go for example, through our primary care doctor, we don't have that here. And then he decides if you need to see an endocrinologist or not, I think there's an episode I was listening to a few days ago. And she was talking about the struggle to, like diagnose her kid. And they kept in the ER, sending her back home with COVID Sending her kid back home with COVID. But like here, you would have not just an ER doctor, you would have like whole specialists available. If you go to the ER at any time, you know, you

Scott Benner 40:59
know, I found myself laughing earlier when the doctor offered to Google on the pod for you and look it up. But I actually thought later, I should.

Radwa 41:07
She knows Omni pod. And she worked with it like once but a couple of years before. So she's like, I can't remember what we did back then I need to recheck. Yeah,

Scott Benner 41:16
but um, I laughed and I shouldn't have because what I should have saw was a person who was willing to tell you, I would like to help you. I don't know what I'm doing. Let me go find out about it. And I'll get back to you. Whereas I think that I hear a lot of doctors here just either pretending they know what they're talking about, or just ignoring you if you ask something that they don't or say. Or they would say something like, Oh, don't use that pump. I heard it's no good. Wouldn't what they really mean is I know how to use this one. So let's stick with that.

Radwa 41:44
We definitely have like, like this person was saying before podcast, doctors are humans, like you can find the mean one and a kind one and helpful one and an egoistic one, you know. So what I was like referring to here, and each of the doctors are more available for the patients like they're not somebody that you have to go through a whole lot of system and people work to reach. You could just

Scott Benner 42:10
call them up. Yeah, call them up and say my ankle hurts. Could you look inside of it and find out what's wrong with it? Yeah,

Radwa 42:14
not all the doctors, of course, are that reachable. Some, some are really more busy. Some, like, their ego makes you go through like his secretary or personal assistant or, like they have a waiting list or whatever. But I mean, you're not. But I mean, generally you can reach a specialist that you want to go to, like, in no time.

Scott Benner 42:37
If I needed LASIK surgery, and you didn't you were still doing it. I call you up and I'm like, hey, I need LASIK. You. Can I come in? You give me the ones over? I definitely need it. We get together tomorrow and do it. I pay cash for that. Yeah, what does that cost?

Radwa 42:53
LASIK is not covered by insurance. I can't tell you that. Okay, very cheap. Oh my god. If you make like, it will cost around 200 to two $50.

Scott Benner 43:04
I spent $99 on dinner the other night. You mean? Oh,

Radwa 43:09
I just came back from New York. I'm telling

Scott Benner 43:11
you, oh, please spend a fortune on food. But a $9 bagel in New York is what you did. That's fascinating. Wow. And can I ask a question? Just please. Oh, head did not. Let's not use the eyes as an example. But am I getting the same level of care as I would somewhere else? And in Egypt? Yeah. versus New York. If I get my hip replaced?

Radwa 43:33
It depends. Yeah, if you get a hip replacement, definitely you're getting the same care. But the doctors here are really good. What we like maybe the fact of intimate is like the nursing, like, you're not always lucky with the nursing staff you have some are really well trained and some are like they're not that well trained. You know, the nursing. They don't have like a system

Scott Benner 43:54
to train nurses. It's almost just a job you get. Exactly yeah. Wow, that's interesting too.

Radwa 44:01
Oh, but the doctors that you like my cousin had a real problem with her back and she she needed to see a neurologist and they gave her an appointment like after eight month I'm like, okay, just come to Egypt I'll book you an appointment with the best neurologist we have go and see him and then go back you don't need to wait eight months to see a neurologist

Scott Benner 44:21
you know I have a friend who needed a just an iron infusion in Canada. And it took like a year Exactly. Yeah. Dragon asked the whole time like exhausted brain fog, you know, blah blah blah. And they just it's just takes forever and the way it was explained to me is that I guess Canada does it on that are you going to die system? So like the the closer you are to dying, the faster you get to a doctor. But then people start with these small problems and by the time they actually get to the doctor, they're in a much worse situation. They're dying like right like it just I was like, that doesn't make sense. Yeah, it's so something else. So access is, it's really great. Yeah. All right, definitely.

Radwa 45:03
Like I think this is a really good thing. Like, if you can see a specialist and if he needs an MRI, he tells you go and have an MRI you can have the next day, and then send him the report the day after, you know, it's that fast.

Scott Benner 45:16
Well, listen, if you have good insurance here, you get treated well to, this isn't going to be a weird example. But I woke up one morning, a couple of years ago, and my toe hurt terribly. Like to the point where I thought did I wake up in the middle of the night and like kick a wall or something and not know it, you know? And I thought it would go away, and it didn't. And it got worse and worse. And I ignored it for a very long time just thinking like, Oh, it's a ligament or something, it'll get better. Who knows. But once I decided I can't take this pain anymore. And this is, you know, stopping me from walking correctly, I have to go do something like that. I called the guy. The guy said, you know, I got an appointment. The next week I came over, he took a look at it, because I can get on the schedule. I had a surgery three weeks after I called him. Okay, that's fine. And that was fine. But it's because I have good health insurance. So when they see my health insurance, they see oh, we're getting paid for this. And now you're on the schedule. You know what I mean? Oh, I wonder what that toe surgery cost? Do? You know, I don't even know. Like, I have no idea what that what the doctor made.

Radwa 46:20
I know any in the States, you don't even look at the bill like the insurance is paying that I don't even

Scott Benner 46:24
know if I got a bill. You know, I already put out enough money with Arden at the beginning of the year that I didn't even know anything for the doctor's visit. Like I just walked. You are out of the deductible. Yeah, it was out of my deductible already. So I'm never bothered. I bet you if I went and looked at that, I bet you that doctor made 40 or 50 grand doing that thing? You don't II mean? Yeah, you gotta come over here. Just do a couple of lasix and go home.

Radwa 46:47
Like I told you live in the States are like a year and a half. Right? Husband has his fellowship there. And in Houston, a Methodist Hospital. And we have good insurance. But thank God within, like, in that year, we're going to use it. Yeah. So we have like limited experience with it. But it was a good year. Like we had a good year.

Scott Benner 47:07
I was gonna say you should come over here do five lasix and go home a king.

Radwa 47:12
Yeah, I guess we should do that. Not

Scott Benner 47:14
that easy. It's not you can't practice medicine outside of Egypt.

Radwa 47:18
No, like in the states to practice medicine. You have to do like what's called the USMLE II, this is what my husband did. And then you have to have like, it depends on the state. Each state has its license, you have to have the state license to practice

Scott Benner 47:32
seems like a scam to me. Basically, you have to come here pay a half a million dollars to get educated so that you can go charge somebody 40 grand to fix their toe. That's what it sounds like. Whatever.

Radwa 47:42
But anyway, this is how it looks here. And I think it's it's been good for us like having his doctor available when we were locked down. And we didn't have to take him to the hospital to give him the care he needed. So I think this was a good thing.

Scott Benner 47:57
Yeah. No, no, it really is. This whole conversation is incredibly. How involved did your mother in law try to get involved when your son was diagnosed?

Radwa 48:07
She tried at first a bit, but right now she's not involved at all. Like in the beginning. She's like, okay, what are you giving him what he's doing? But you know, by that time she's already in pension. I don't know what you retired like, yeah, yeah, she's retired. And she wasn't oriented. Like when I started mentioning Omnipod and Dexcom she's not oriented with these devices at all. Like I told you before, we don't have them in Egypt. And that's very, very interesting topic. Like in the area I live we have like a 13 Starbucks and a 12 McDonald's but we don't have Omnipod in Egypt, you know? Yeah, like how is this more important? How is it more important to franchise Starbucks or and have like 12 just in the block we live and then we can get access to like important medical devices you know, I

Scott Benner 48:57
think that these companies just don't know how to do business in other countries. You don't I mean to go set up somewhere else is a big undertaking I mean, on the pod sent, um, they have an office I think in England now. Yeah, and so you know, but I actually have a number of times Matt, I think I've had dinner once with the person who they who Omni pod sent to England to like set the whole like to get the thing rolling. It's a big undertaking you've got to you know, you've got to move people uproot people send people over there to learn how to do business in another country and then get the entire things it's it's a hell of an undertaking. I

Radwa 49:33
guess the other way would be like, what happened in Turkey where some businessman or whatever, decide to like franchise, the company and be in control of it in his country,

Scott Benner 49:43
you know, on the I've never heard of that before. I'm glad it exists, but I don't know about

Radwa 49:48
it. It does. But but the point is, I think in Egypt, it would be not worth it to invest in something like that because like I told you, most of us will pay out of pocket for it. And by the time we comes here to be even more expensive than the state. So that will be like a financial burden for most of the Egyptians. Yeah. To pay them pay a middleman. Yeah, you need to get the insurance companies on board. So that's when it can, like be financially good for the company.

Scott Benner 50:16
And accessible to people there. Yeah,

Radwa 50:19
exactly. So I think it's a, it's a big thing to do right now. But it's just, you know, it's a struggle for us using the Omnipod. I like I have four or five friends who use the Omnipod for the kids, and we're all struggling together. And whenever we find the source, I keep calling them and I'm like, Hey, I found it in Turkey. So we can go there and get our stock, or we found this website, or that guy who outsources them from the states and whatever. Yes. So it's a real struggle that I feel like, we need to get out of, you know,

Scott Benner 50:50
it's interesting that another country doesn't knock off medical supplies, you know what I mean? Like, copy them, like companies that are outside of like caring about, you know, I'm saying it happens all the time.

Radwa 50:59
I understand. Yeah. But this is like very advanced technology for somebody to just knock it off, because it doesn't work properly. You're killing people.

Scott Benner 51:07
Yeah. Well, I assumed that somebody wouldn't care about that. And they would try it. I just found myself thinking it's interesting that that doesn't happen. Maybe countries stay on top of stuff like that, so that nobody gets hurt. But yeah, there's got to your point, there's got to be a way right. They, they make the damn things they know how to make them. If there was more countries, they could send them to, they could build more infrastructure and make more I'm sure they'd be happy to make more if they could sell more. I guess it's just the Yeah, that's the process of, of actually distributing it. Once you get to the country and understanding all the rules and regulations there and working within them. I guess that's where the hard work comes in. Yes, exactly. Okay. Well, that's something How comfortable are you? A few years later, that you know what you're doing? Like, how's your son's a onesies? Has he does he do better than your husband? For example?

Radwa 51:57
Yeah, definitely. His average is around like 6.2 to six and a half. That's wonderful. But his time and range is not always perfect, because he's really young, and I can stay on top of it. Especially in this last year. He's like, he'd go and eat something and not tell me before, not everything was accessible for him. And maybe when he grows up, he would understand that he has to tell me before he eats, but right now he can just go and grab a biscuit. And not tell me, you know, yeah. So I have to be on top of things. Definitely Omnipod. Five would have helped with that. But it's not available in Turkey. And it would be a more of a financial burden for us right now. So we're waiting on it a bit.

Scott Benner 52:36
Do you ever consider doing one of the do it yourself algorithms?

Radwa 52:40
Yeah, I was thinking about doing it that summer, because I have a couple of friends who has been trying with it. And they did not succeed yet. So I'm waiting for them to succeed. And then they tell me exactly what to do. I didn't have time. Like, maybe in the summer when he's at home with me all the time. We can do that. But it will be very difficult when he's coming and going back. And, you know, like his pens, like half his day in school.

Scott Benner 53:03
Yeah. Yeah, no, I understand. I'm actually aren't using Iaps now. But the truth is, is that if somebody wouldn't have helped me set it up, I wouldn't have known how to do it. It's got so many settings. It's like mind boggling.

Radwa 53:16
Yeah, I heard it's so difficult. So I need to, like take the time off and have them with me all the time. And we can try that.

Scott Benner 53:22
Yeah, I don't even understand like people start are asking me now like to talk about I'm like, I don't even know what to say to be perfectly honest. Because what happened? Yeah, cuz Arden's off at college, and it's working so well that it doesn't need a lot of intervention from us. Wow. And at the same time, you know, I don't know how I got to the settings because somebody Mike who's been on the podcast, he was just like, make this one that make this one that turn this to that make it this number, this this? No, well, let's assess it and it'll work. I think I put it on her and made some changes to her insulin sensitivity. And carb ratio, I think I made her carb ratio weaker and our instance sensitivity, I had to make it stronger. And then it just started working. And I was like, alright, well, okay. But now she's actually using, I don't think I don't know how much I've spoken about this yet. is pretty new. She's using a GLP. So right now it's ozempic. Oh, okay. Yeah, she wants that we want her doctor wants her to switch to Manjaro at some point, but we were having trouble getting it. So she's using ozempic Right now, but not even like a therapeutic dose. She's using like point two, five. I was at milligrams maybe

Radwa 54:35
help her like Did it help? Because I was actually thinking about that for my husband. I was like, You

Scott Benner 54:41
have no idea. Like, I can't wait to do an episode about it to really talk about it. But my oh my god, my rough math tells me that Arden will use over 11,000 fewer units of insulin in 2024

Radwa 54:57
Wow, okay. You know, I have this idea, I used ozempic to lose weight for a couple of months. Okay, and I saw the results, and I went all over my husband, I was like, I think you would really benefit from ozempic. Like, you don't have that his diabetes is not that bad. You know, the one he got a 26. He doesn't go like crazy high. He actually when he started going to the gym, we went very lower with his doses recently. So I was like, if you go on to the Olympics, I think you can just keep up with the Basal and need the noval rapid to a minimum. So I've been pushing him about it. And he's been resisting for a while. But after he said that, Oh, my God. I'm going to be all over him.

Scott Benner 55:39
Her daytime Basal went from 1.1. an hour to point seven. Wow. And her spikes are, you know, when she gets a meal spike, they're much lower. I used to say, I would tell people, right, like, I think of one ad is high. Think of 200 as a spike, we really screwed up. And now I think of 140 as high in one ad is a spike that we screwed up. Wow. Well, she's coming back down more gently, quicker. Like this morning was her first day of college for I don't whatever semester, this isn't some a quarter. This is for her sophomore year. So I watched her. She it's fascinating. She's 700 miles from me. And I knew what time she was getting up and going to class this morning. So while she was heading to class, I sent her a text that said no good luck this quarter. And so I know she's, she's on her way to the building. And I'm watching her blood sugar go from like 110 to 120 to 130. And then the algorithms like oh, what's happening? It stopped her at 149. And it brought her back down in like two hours. So is a pretty big adrenaline rush that she got art and takes school very seriously. So she's like, I think it's stressful for her. So she gets this big push that the algorithm is not expecting it pushed it back down. She went from like 119 to 149 and back down again. And I'm wondering what's going to happen now during the day because schools you know, it's she's back at school, it's different. Now, I don't know what her schedule is like yet, like I gotta let her settle into her schedule a little bit before we can make changes her last 24 hours, I would consider not good. And there's been one spike to one ad, there's been a couple of stretches where her blood sugar's were holding, let me look. So I can really tell you a couple of stretches where they were in the 140s after two different meals. And other than that, it's been pretty much between 120 and 94, actually 120 and 70. For the rest of the time, that's 24 hours. So I would say 20 of her hours are between 70 and 110. And maybe for hours that were up around 140. And then one spike. That was worse

Radwa 58:05
with Omnipod dash with my son, we we don't get these numbers, like he spikes to 220 and 230 sometimes, especially that we can't always do Pre-Bolus thing, you know, I can't be sure if he's going to eat his meal or not. Like he's not that helpful yet, right. So, but definitely having something like the Omnipod five with me with an algorithm will definitely be of much help. I'm looking into it this summer. But those Olympic I'm definitely pushing it in my husband as soon as he goes.

Scott Benner 58:35
I mean, not just that, from March to now to January, I've lost 38 pounds with weego, which is those Empik right. And last week, my endocrinologist who's you know, helping me with this is also the same person that helps them with their diabetes and my the rest of my family with their, with their thyroid stuff. She's like, let's get you on Manjaro if we can, and I was like, okay, which is now called zek bound for weight loss. So she wrote me the script, and we took it off. And they were like, Hey, we can get that. I was like, great. So I shot the first zap bound like a couple of days ago. And I'm assuming there's going to be like a period of time where you know, something. I don't know what the hell's gonna happen. The weego V for me was good, obviously. But I had definitely plateaued. I was not going to lose any more weight. I still had some stomach acid stuff. My Oh god, I can't bother. I'm so sorry to say this. I haven't had a nice firm bowel movement in a while.

Radwa 59:35
Yes. I was asking. I was gonna ask you about that. Yeah. Yeah. It's not

Scott Benner 59:39
enough to like make you go well, I don't want to do this because you're losing 40 pounds, but at the same time, I'm just like, I would like that to go back to normal. Yeah,

Radwa 59:46
to go back to normal. The manzara doesn't have the same side effect.

Scott Benner 59:50
She said that uh, I very well might not see the bowel movement side effect. And then it also has something in it that helps with stomach acid. So she's like, I love this for you. Let's do Try

Radwa 1:00:00
this. Yeah, it does. And it's actually like, from what I heard, it helps you, like those Olympic helps you to lose around 12% of your body weight. But the Manjaro helps you to lose 18%. Yeah,

Scott Benner 1:00:10
that's what I'm stronger. I'm hopeful, like, one way or the other. I need something just for management. And this is not about like, I know people who don't understand it would think, Oh, yeah, you have to shoot something to keep yourself from eating a bunch of food. It's not like that. I met the part with the GLP where I can eat fine. Like I don't, I'm not limited about how much i i can physically eat if I want to. Exactly. I am making different decisions. But I think those decisions are more because I like I like better how I feel and how I look. So that's me,

Radwa 1:00:41
like I told you, I'd had an experience with it. And I was like, this is not bad. I don't feel like I'm not depressed. I'm not like, I don't want to eat something that I can't eat it when I want to eat something I do. I do eat it. Yeah. But it just it helps me with controlling a lot of like, the unnecessary cravings that you get. And it helps you to keep yourself in shape. My wife

Scott Benner 1:01:04
says that it stopped the food noise in our head. Exactly. Yeah. She said she'd wake up in the morning. And the first thing she would think is what am I going to have for breakfast? And then she said, while she was making breakfast, she was thinking about lunch. And she's like, she's like, that is completely stopped for me. Now I don't have that. I actually I think I have some sort of a deficiency that that it made up for it. Because my body is, is operating way better right now. And it's got very little to do with what I'm eating being different. So, yeah, pretty, it's pretty great. But back back there for type ones. To be clear for people who are listening, our insurance is not covering ozempic for art and, and our doctor is helping us get it from somewhere else to so we're paying cash for it. But it's very doable, because it's cheaper where it's coming from. And on top of that, she's not really using much of it. So the pens lasting forever for

Radwa 1:02:00
us. So she uses like a very small dose,

Scott Benner 1:02:03
the smallest dose and it's apps and the doctors like we're not going to move this up if we don't have to like look what it's doing for oh, by the way, also is it cleared up her acne by like 80%. Wow. Because we think Arden probably has PCOS. Okay. And so now we're waiting to see this is her. Again, I feel so bad. And I'm sorry if I'm dead and you're listening to this 20 years later. I'm sorry that I'm about to say Arden is about to get her second period since she's been using it now for like over a month. Sorry hours. And I'm hoping that it's a less impactful period because Arden can have heavy painful periods. So if you bet for our than right now Dad, she don't care. And so so if that if that makes that even better? Well, then hell like now it's and we are seeing that online, which I'm going to keep saying over and over again. There are women online who have not been able to be pregnant for their lives who have PCOS who are using we go view ozempic Those Those GLP medications and they're getting pregnant.

Radwa 1:03:04
So yeah, it's not the first time I hear about that there. I

Scott Benner 1:03:08
know there's a group of women talking about it online. I saw a group of people in on Reddit talking about their, their connective tissue disorders. I can never say it correctly. And that slows me down when I'm about to say ears. Hold on a second. It's the danlos Do you know what that is? It's an autoimmune downloas Ehlers Danlos yes, that I actually saw a Reddit thread of a bunch of people with that, who said that they think their symptoms are getting better on GLP now, I don't know if they're losing weight, it's putting less stress on their joints and maybe it feels better because of that. Not sure or if it's actually helping them with it somehow I have no idea but I mean, when you start seeing 25 people say oh my god that's happening for you to like, that's crazy.

Radwa 1:03:58
You know what I mean? So that's crazy. And the first time I hear about it too Yeah, you

Scott Benner 1:04:02
got to pick her out on the internet to hear people talking a little bit about about things but for I 1,000,000% believe that if terrible people with you know money focus is don't get in the way you're gonna see GLP medications that are given to people with type one in great numbers over the next couple of years.

Radwa 1:04:25
I really hope that because what I've been seeing is like the opposite like every like week I find an article about somebody's like oh simply killed my wife and then you read the article and was impeded did not kill his wife well, he just died she was almost eight but she didn't die from was Olympic. You know? No, I don't know what's wrong, but like, articles keep popping up for me like on Instagram, or from us daily or whatever. And it's always about how side effects of Olympic you know,

Scott Benner 1:04:58
I don't want to be consumed AOC theorists are at Roswell, but I'm assuming that that article is planted by like a sugar manufacturer who's like, oh, that's probably Oh god, these people keep shooting this DLP we're going out of business. Honestly, I mean, I, I don't obviously I have no idea. But if people if their cravings are curbed, and they're losing weight and having the, you know, the experience I'm having, which is, you know, I prefer to feel like this than to eat that, or, you know, even just the quantity. I told you, I spent 100 My wife and I went out to dinner the other night I got this really is a beautiful bowl of pasta with shrimp and crab in it. It's a spicy had a red sauce is really good. I really loved it. I did not finish. Exactly,

Radwa 1:05:42
yeah, but that's good. Like, you get to eat what you like. But you don't have to like overstuff yourself.

Scott Benner 1:05:48
Exactly. And this that overstuffing because there's no way I wouldn't have finished that without ozempic.

Radwa 1:05:53
Exactly. Like when I was on it. I'm, I'm a person who's like, my favorite food is ice cream. And like, my kids always make fun of me. If I get a pint of ice cream, I could finish it while I'm sitting on it. You know, like, I don't stop eating ice cream until it's done. But now I get to eat. Like if I crave ice cream, I eat it. But I definitely can't finish the point. It's like, a few spoons. And I'm done. And I'm happy.

Scott Benner 1:06:16
Exactly. Am I and my joints feel better, too. Because I've lost weight, my ankles feel better, my feet feel better. Like, you know, all that stuff that I before would be like, Oh, I'm old. That's why my heel hurts. That it turns out that my heel hurts because I was carrying around an infant with me on my ass in an Amen. I feel much better. Now. My wife looks amazing and feels much better. This whole thing of people like making fun of it and everything. They really don't understand what they're talking about. So that's probably yes, yeah. But I get I also get them feeling past like, you know, imagine you're skinny and you've been like stopping yourself from eating stuff you want for years. And you're like, wait a minute. That's not fair. I had to have willpower. But, but it wasn't willpower, though. Like, I don't know one other way to say it like it's an unconscious thing that happens. Exactly. Yeah. Feels like you're being drawn by your own chemistry. I don't know. Another way to put it. Yeah. Anyway, is there anything we haven't talked about that we should have?

Radwa 1:07:12
I guess not. I just want like yesterday, I was just listening to your wrap up. How sad you were that day. And all I wanted to tell you like you were talking to I'm just helping the top 10% of the top 10%. Believe me, like you're doing a lot like not just in your country, like everywhere for the type one diabetes community. And I just wanted to get that through to you. I know you hear that a lot. But just hearing the wrap up yesterday made me feel like I have to tell you that very nice. Like I thank you really, when I started listening to your blog, I just listened to the first episode, the one where you were talking about the background music that was made by your like, kids friends. And it went from there to here. And you need to remind yourself of that, like, every time.

Scott Benner 1:07:57
Well, I got a lovely note this morning from a gentleman. And that said something similar. He said he heard an episode recently that just really changed how he thought about his own health and that he was doing better. And it's because of the podcast. And he heard me. So for people who don't know, like at the end of the year, I always do like some episode where like think like last year I talked to Jenny like I realized that never talked to Jenny like she was a person we always come on and talk about like management stuff. And this year, I wanted to just kind of do a wrap up because it's been a kind of a difficult year. Like behind the scenes, Apple made some changes to their, their podcast app, it impacted downloads of back catalogue stuff, which is going to impact my, my overall number and I don't know, it took away my I don't know another way to put this, I need something to get me up in the morning. We all need something to get us up in the morning, right? And so I use helping people and reaching people as my measurements, right? If I'm helping people good. That's our goal. That's our only goal. Actually, that's if anybody needs to know the The Secret to Building something successful. I only focus on helping people. If they give if I help them, it'll grow on its own. I don't have to worry about that. And then but the other side is the growth. And if when I plant toe, or if the growth slows down, I don't see it as Oh, I'm not succeeding. I see it as like, oh, it's not working. Like I have this information that I know helps people How am I not figuring out how to better get it in other people's hands? And I don't know another way to explain it other than winning feels winning makes you feel like playing, if that makes sense. So yeah,

Radwa 1:09:43
but believe me, you're reaching a lot of people even if you can't see it, and when you talked about like for somebody to listen to your, to your podcasts, they have to be educated well, people have to look for it. You know, it's not like people have to really care to start aren't looking and listening to a podcast about their health or about how to do things better. Or, you know, like, we have a lot of diabetics here in Egypt after my son's diagnosis. As an ophthalmologist, I use I used to get a lot of people to check the fundus, for example, regularly because they're diabetics, and I'm like, Yeah, hi. And how long have you been diabetic? I checked the funders. They're good. And I just let them go. Now whenever I see a diabetic in my clinic, I just keep educating them. Like, do you have a CGM on? Do you have a pump on? What was your last moment? Anyone? See, I think you should listen to the, to this podcast. Like if the they have good English. I keep recommending your podcast to them. Like sometimes stuff happens that you can't see.

Scott Benner 1:10:44
No, I know. And the crazy thing is, right, well, I know what that's happening. Like, I'm really aware of it. To be clear, so everybody knows what I'm talking about. They average this is gonna sound ridiculous. The average download for the, how do I say this, I get a certain amount of devices every day that come on to the podcast. They are now downloading, I think it's point seven fewer episodes per device per day. But I have a lot of people listening. And point sevens add up pretty quickly. And so it's the same amount of people listening, that hasn't changed. They all you know, if they're subscribed, they get the they get the latest download episodes, everything works, they don't see the back catalogue as much and and that's going to hit my overall number. Like it won't hit my new some, like, new downloads for new episode number, like advertisers are still going to be happy, is what I'm saying. But I'm not like leaping forward the way I was before and that you're not where you want to be. It was exciting for me. Like, I don't know, another way to put it like it keeps me like it gets me up in the morning. Like I'm gonna go. I'm gonna go win. Like that's how it feels when I get up in the morning. Like, you know, as crazy as it sounds. And I do hope this doesn't sound too. It's not callous. I don't feel callous about it. But when four people a day tell you they saved your life, you save their life. You don't get the same jolt out of it anymore. I really don't know another way to say that. Like I do you understand me irregular. Like yeah, like how many people look at have you in your life and said, Oh my god, I can see again. Thank you. All right. And the first time someone says that to you like you took their cataract out, for example, you're probably like, I'm a goddamn miracle worker. You're welcome. And, and then the 1,000th time somebody says, Yeah, I know I moved the cataract you're fine. You can see now and like, and but it's not dismissive. I don't feel dismissive about it. I'm thrilled. Every time somebody tells me. It's just it's almost like gambling. Like I don't get as much of a telly.

Radwa 1:12:51
It's almost like drugs. Like you have to get a higher dose. Drug.

Scott Benner 1:12:56
Yeah, right. Right. Basically, my I don't get jacked up the way I used to when somebody says my agency was this and that I cry more now. Than then I the excitement. I used to get excited, like I'm doing it. And now it makes me sad. But like, it's almost like I'm feeling their emotions more. Now, when it happens. Like I got a note this morning that you know what I can probably, I'm not going to identify the person, obviously. Okay. And it was from a man which actually, it was interesting. It struck me differently, because guys are not usually very emotional. Yeah. So if you hear this, sir, please just know, nobody knows it's you. But it says, Hey, Scott, I don't normally do this. But I thought I needed to privately message you. When I'm all caught up on new episodes, I scroll through past ones that I haven't listened to before. I happen to randomly click on 1030 to loss of liberty. And I just wanted to drop you a quick line to say that I appreciate everything you do. For me as a type one diabetic, Liberty story of her husband was eerily close to mine. I recently got my health back on track that insulin pump and started listening to your podcast a little over three months ago. Although I don't have nearly as many health issues as he did before he passed away. The mental health issues almost losing my family and some of the medical issues are identical to my story. This episode hit me like a blow to my head of what could have happened to me. And then as I'm reading this right there in bed this morning that made me cry. Like I was I like emotional. I know you must get tired of doing this sometimes. But I just thought I'd let you know that what you do helps me every single day and hearing that episode today gave me more motivation to continue on my path. Thank you again for everything you do. It's much appreciated that made me cry this morning. Before I would have gotten like as like, it would have felt like I don't know what I'm assuming cocaine feels like. Like, you know, like I would have been like, Yes, I did it. I said a thing. It helped the sky. I would have been excited by it. Now I'm just touched by it. I was using the numbers to get my Joel. And anyway, Tim Cook.

Radwa 1:15:02
I hope this year is much, much, much better for you.

Scott Benner 1:15:05
I also want to point out that I did 5.6 million downloads list. So it's not like it was. I feel I feel stupid. I'm not complaining. But, uh, you know, I feel that that's just how I feel like so I got on and that episode and I started talking about it. I wanted to do this episode at the end, it was like, we did 5.6 million downloads this year, and everything was great. And I just I felt solid, and it's how it came out. So I feel bad, because everybody's reaching out to me to tell me, it's okay now, but you're very nice. Thank you.

Radwa 1:15:37
This year is gonna be a lot better. Oh, my God,

Scott Benner 1:15:40
if Tim Cook gets out of my way, is damn Apple app. You know, I mean, what are you doing? Cut me a break China trying to reach people. And by the way, this serious like taking the numbers out of it for a second. The real problem is that I need people to hear those back catalogue episodes so that they're helped. So they have a success, like this person who wrote to me did, and that they see a benefit for their health. And then they tell somebody else about the podcast. If you never get helped, then you won't have the success. If you don't have the success you won't pass it on. And word of mouth. Word of mouth is how this works.

Radwa 1:16:17
A year and a half ago, this is how I came across the diabetes pro tip episode. Like I had tons of episodes in front of me and I didn't know where to start. And then when this popped up, I listened to it. I'm like, oh, there's a diabetes pro tip. So I kept looking for them and listening to them. Like, you really helped.

Scott Benner 1:16:33
Oh, I'm glad that series is. I mean, I know it's out of my head and Jenny's head. But I it's one of the things I'm more proud of like I know you listen to that series, you can get an A one seeing the low success. No problem.

Radwa 1:16:46
It's really good. And it's to the point. So ya

Scott Benner 1:16:51
know, it's just conversational enough, but it's technical enough. It strikes strikes a good balance. It really does. Exactly. I appreciate I'm glad it helped you. And thank you for telling me. Thank you. Yeah, if you would have wrote it to me, I would have cried in my bed. Just so you know. Well, I can at idiot. Anyway, hold on for me for one second. This was terrific. Thank you. Thank you.

Hey, don't forget to check out touched by type one.org. Go to their programs tab and find out about that huge upcoming event. It's an in person event in Orlando, Florida. It's absolutely free for you and anyone else you know who would like to attend touched by type one.org. And if you can't come to Orlando, still check them out on Facebook and Instagram. I want to thank the ever since CGM for sponsoring this episode of The Juicebox Podcast and invite you to go to ever sent cgm.com/juicebox. To learn more about this terrific device. You can head over now and just absorb everything that the website has to offer. And that way you'll know if ever since feels right for you ever since cgm.com/juicebox. If you're not already subscribed or following in your favorite audio app, please take the time now to do that. It really helps the show and get those automatic downloads set up so you never miss an episode. Thank you so much for listening. I'll be back very soon with another episode of The Juicebox Podcast. If you're living with type one diabetes, the afterdark collection from the Juicebox Podcast is the only place to hear the stories that no one else talks about. From drugs to depression, self harm, trauma, addiction, and so much more. Go to juicebox podcast.com up in the menu and click on after dark. There you'll see a full list of all of the after dark episodes. The episode you just heard was professionally edited by wrong way recording. Wrong way recording.com

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