The Intersection of Facial Recognition and Longevity - Episode 277

1
00:00:02,609 --> 00:00:05,491
Welcome everybody to this edition of the Gladden Longevity Podcast.

2
00:00:05,491 --> 00:00:06,342
I'm your host, Dr.

3
00:00:06,342 --> 00:00:09,765
Jeffrey Gladden, and I'm here with Charles Ndewka.

4
00:00:09,765 --> 00:00:10,706
Did I get that right?

5
00:00:10,706 --> 00:00:11,906
Am I close?

6
00:00:12,239 --> 00:00:12,667
All right.

7
00:00:12,667 --> 00:00:13,228
Good.

8
00:00:13,228 --> 00:00:14,228
All right.

9
00:00:14,309 --> 00:00:21,934
So Charles, tell us a little bit about how you got into facial recognition and joy.

10
00:00:22,936 --> 00:00:27,139
I like this joy span as a term for longevity.

11
00:00:27,540 --> 00:00:32,037
I don't know if you've seen any of the work that we've done, but we're really big on the
life energy.

12
00:00:32,037 --> 00:00:34,630
elements, one of which is joy, of course.

13
00:00:34,630 --> 00:00:37,303
So tell us a little bit about that.

14
00:00:37,303 --> 00:00:39,534
How do you how do you happen into this space?

15
00:00:39,534 --> 00:00:42,616
Well, thanks very much for having me on.

16
00:00:42,616 --> 00:00:44,027
My name is Charles Nduka.

17
00:00:44,027 --> 00:00:52,763
I'm a plastic surgeon in my background and I've been specializing in facial reconstruction
and plastic surgery for the last 25 years.

18
00:00:53,364 --> 00:00:59,839
I specialize in facial palsy, facial paralysis, which can be due to Bell's palsy, you may
have heard of.

19
00:00:59,839 --> 00:01:02,931
Also many causes, tumors, accidents, strokes, et cetera.

20
00:01:02,931 --> 00:01:07,554
And it causes tremendous devastation to patients, not only physically,

21
00:01:07,958 --> 00:01:19,303
unable to smile, close your eye, just do normal things we expect to be able to do like
speaking clearly, interacting, eating, but also just that natural thing you do when you

22
00:01:19,303 --> 00:01:22,104
meet somebody for the first time, you smile.

23
00:01:22,344 --> 00:01:26,866
And being unable to smile causes tremendous distress to patients.

24
00:01:27,686 --> 00:01:36,647
The surgery I do is to help to restore patients' expressions, help to restore their
movements as far as one can, and to help...

25
00:01:36,647 --> 00:01:37,147
do that?

26
00:01:37,147 --> 00:01:40,187
How do you, how do you restore that if they have a nerve palsy?

27
00:01:40,187 --> 00:01:53,447
Are you actually kind of working with the nerve itself or are you kind of restructuring
the face to where it hangs in a more useful emotional state or a functional state?

28
00:01:53,447 --> 00:01:53,934
Yeah.

29
00:01:53,934 --> 00:01:55,935
So it depends on the cause.

30
00:01:55,935 --> 00:01:59,077
Facial paralysis can be due to an accident.

31
00:01:59,077 --> 00:02:01,378
So a surgeon has cut the nerve by accident.

32
00:02:01,378 --> 00:02:08,402
In those cases, we would aim to find the cut ends and repair them quickly and accurately
as possible.

33
00:02:08,582 --> 00:02:12,964
Sometimes we don't get referred to patients early enough, in which case the muscles have
wasted away.

34
00:02:12,964 --> 00:02:19,007
And so you have to then restore movement by transferring nerves and muscles from
elsewhere.

35
00:02:19,188 --> 00:02:20,649
And it really depends on the cause.

36
00:02:20,649 --> 00:02:23,670
If the patient is very young, they often do much better.

37
00:02:23,726 --> 00:02:34,046
if the patient is very elderly, nerve regeneration is less reliable in those cases so you
tend to use more local techniques either static or dynamic.

38
00:02:34,046 --> 00:02:43,871
So you can for example move the muscle that moves the jaw, the temporalis muscle that's on
the temple and reroute that and turn it into a smiling muscle so you can give patients.

39
00:02:43,871 --> 00:02:46,511
So do you, do you work with pediatrics as well?

40
00:02:46,511 --> 00:02:51,602
Like people of all ages or is it, is your practice more 18 and above or how does that
work?

41
00:02:51,602 --> 00:03:01,226
so I do see children, most of my practice is adults because the larger surgeries, we don't
have a dedicated pediatric unit.

42
00:03:01,226 --> 00:03:10,829
So I often get consulted with younger patients and very often, especially these days,
patients are actually often choosing to have surgery and be involved in decision-making,

43
00:03:10,829 --> 00:03:12,510
which often is when they're older.

44
00:03:13,115 --> 00:03:13,776
Mm-hmm.

45
00:03:13,776 --> 00:03:14,777
Got it.

46
00:03:14,777 --> 00:03:15,617
Well, that's interesting.

47
00:03:15,617 --> 00:03:22,994
And you're noticing that younger people heal faster, heal better, heal more completely
than the elderly people is what you're saying, right?

48
00:03:22,994 --> 00:03:26,807
So do you have any strategies to help the older people catch up?

49
00:03:28,258 --> 00:03:34,642
Well, I mean, this is one of the big failings of healthcare because we often try to
address things after the fact.

50
00:03:34,803 --> 00:03:46,742
And obviously you know well, but it's not that commonly known amongst many doctors how
much difference lifespan and sorry, lifestyle has on patients' abilities to recover.

51
00:03:46,742 --> 00:03:53,877
So things like smoking, such as metabolic diseases, diabetes, for example, have a big
impact.

52
00:03:55,086 --> 00:03:57,346
Obviously, I'm quite strict about smoking.

53
00:03:57,346 --> 00:04:03,906
I don't let patients smoke in the lead-up to surgery because it does have a very bad
effect on wound healing and recovery.

54
00:04:04,146 --> 00:04:11,186
And they shouldn't give up smoking too soon before surgery because otherwise they can
often have a rebound respiratory infection.

55
00:04:11,386 --> 00:04:15,128
So it's important to give a good deal of time to get over the...

56
00:04:15,128 --> 00:04:18,465
for all forms of tobacco or predominantly smoking?

57
00:04:19,214 --> 00:04:22,854
Predominantly smoking, be honest, probably smoking.

58
00:04:23,294 --> 00:04:30,274
So, yeah, and so the surgery is really to try to help patients reintegrate, to help them
to do that one thing that we do every morning, go to the bathroom, you look yourself in

59
00:04:30,274 --> 00:04:34,014
mirror and you see what you're expecting for patients with facial paralysis.

60
00:04:34,014 --> 00:04:37,894
They often see something that they find distressing.

61
00:04:38,594 --> 00:04:42,534
It often makes them feel embarrassed, shy to go out.

62
00:04:42,534 --> 00:04:44,374
They often isolate themselves.

63
00:04:44,374 --> 00:04:47,694
And I did a study just about a dozen years ago.

64
00:04:48,202 --> 00:04:59,793
looking at a series of patients in our service and just found a really high incidence of
depression and anxiety as measured in standardised assessment scales, hospital and anxiety

65
00:04:59,793 --> 00:05:01,085
depression scale.

66
00:05:01,522 --> 00:05:05,124
And that really led me down this pathway to see, you know, what can we do to help these
patients?

67
00:05:05,124 --> 00:05:14,368
Because it's not just about restoring muscles, it's not just about restoring nerves, it's
not even just about restoring smiles, it's about helping patients to express themselves,

68
00:05:14,368 --> 00:05:18,630
to interact with each other and to socialize essentially.

69
00:05:18,651 --> 00:05:20,041
Mm Yeah, absolutely.

70
00:05:20,041 --> 00:05:23,792
It's yeah, the face is it's critical.

71
00:05:23,792 --> 00:05:28,174
It's for better or worse, it becomes part of people's identity.

72
00:05:28,174 --> 00:05:28,504
Right.

73
00:05:28,504 --> 00:05:28,924
In a way.

74
00:05:28,924 --> 00:05:40,597
And so when it's disfigured in their eye, I suppose other people's as well, particularly
their eye, then it's something that they're very self-conscious about.

75
00:05:40,597 --> 00:05:45,879
So do you have a psychological team that works with these folks as well?

76
00:05:46,222 --> 00:05:48,162
Yes, I'm really lucky.

77
00:05:48,162 --> 00:05:52,982
have a fantastic team, psychological therapists who sees all patients before I see them
actually.

78
00:05:53,502 --> 00:05:55,282
And that's something that we set up at the very start.

79
00:05:55,282 --> 00:06:02,142
I set up the service in 2007 and it was always very important to me to have a
multidisciplinary team.

80
00:06:02,142 --> 00:06:08,882
The unit is in a hospital called the Queen Victoria Hospital, which was made famous
because of the work done in second world war.

81
00:06:09,062 --> 00:06:14,286
The burnt airmen who oftentimes again were disfigured.

82
00:06:14,286 --> 00:06:23,806
often themselves away from life and the surgeon that's also called a mechander, plastic
surgeon, he set up a service where he very much worked in partnership with his patients

83
00:06:23,806 --> 00:06:25,486
and it's something I try to do.

84
00:06:25,486 --> 00:06:32,849
So I have a great team of facial therapists, psychological therapists and then we
collaborate with other surgeons as well.

85
00:06:32,849 --> 00:06:33,719
Nice.

86
00:06:33,880 --> 00:06:34,680
Yeah, that's great.

87
00:06:34,680 --> 00:06:43,046
think integrating, treating that the whole individual as opposed to just the anatomy,
right, is really the key.

88
00:06:44,267 --> 00:06:50,072
And so with that sort of team approach, how does it work out?

89
00:06:50,072 --> 00:06:58,938
What percentage of your people kind of get restored to a point where they feel like
they've reclaimed, let's say, 90 plus percent of their life or 85 percent plus of their

90
00:06:58,938 --> 00:06:59,188
life?

91
00:06:59,188 --> 00:07:00,459
How does that work?

92
00:07:01,186 --> 00:07:12,456
Well, one of the things that was really quite surprising for me was, so in 2012 we did
this study, we found this incidence of depression and anxiety, which we kind of knew

93
00:07:12,456 --> 00:07:17,480
intuitively, but it's good to document that in a rigorous peer reviewed study.

94
00:07:18,181 --> 00:07:23,505
But as a doctor, patients don't always tell you how they're doing, how they're feeling.

95
00:07:23,505 --> 00:07:28,669
They feel often very grateful, sometimes with the operations that take four or six hours.

96
00:07:28,782 --> 00:07:30,322
sometimes in two stages.

97
00:07:30,322 --> 00:07:35,242
And so you don't really get a good impression by asking patients, know, how was it?

98
00:07:35,242 --> 00:07:47,722
You know, I set up a charity, Facial Palsy UK with colleagues, and that gave me the most
valuable insight that I could get around the role of facial palsy in patient interactions,

99
00:07:47,722 --> 00:07:54,062
because very often patients would have surgery, but they wouldn't necessarily...

100
00:07:54,136 --> 00:08:01,696
go out in the world and interact, they still felt that there were issues they weren't
dealing with and this is why we have this peer support group.

101
00:08:01,777 --> 00:08:02,568
And that's the charity.

102
00:08:02,568 --> 00:08:08,101
Its focus is to actually help those people reintegrate or work through the trauma, so to
speak.

103
00:08:08,101 --> 00:08:08,722
Yeah.

104
00:08:08,722 --> 00:08:09,286
Okay.

105
00:08:09,286 --> 00:08:13,058
So I discovered that, and this is what's been really, really valuable.

106
00:08:13,058 --> 00:08:22,202
There was, we did a further study, which we found the correlation between the degree of
severity of the paralysis and the patient's psychological impact wasn't that well

107
00:08:22,202 --> 00:08:30,367
correlated because, and I'm sure you've seen it in your own life, some people have a very
high degree of focus on their appearance and other people, not so much.

108
00:08:30,708 --> 00:08:34,189
have two patients, one patient with a very dense paralysis who,

109
00:08:35,534 --> 00:08:40,779
you know, they said, okay, well, doctor, does help me to stop dribbling or help my eyes
close.

110
00:08:40,779 --> 00:08:48,746
Another patient with a very smart, very subtle asymmetry in their smile for whom they feel
their life is over and they can't go out.

111
00:08:48,746 --> 00:08:51,828
So that's an element that was really, really important.

112
00:08:51,828 --> 00:08:58,614
And it made me realize really that as doctors, we don't really get trained around
understanding what matters to patients.

113
00:08:58,691 --> 00:09:06,497
This is why we set up the company and the strap line is measuring what matters because
ultimately it's what matters to patients that we should be focusing on, not necessarily

114
00:09:06,497 --> 00:09:08,490
what's important to the doctor.

115
00:09:08,572 --> 00:09:09,322
I think that's right.

116
00:09:09,322 --> 00:09:10,574
I think there's a couple of levels there.

117
00:09:10,574 --> 00:09:14,438
I think it's a question of what matters and then why it matters to them, right?

118
00:09:14,438 --> 00:09:15,978
To go a little deeper.

119
00:09:16,279 --> 00:09:21,137
So, Yeah, no, it's exactly right.

120
00:09:21,137 --> 00:09:26,920
It's very rich, sort of fertile ground to kind of go into, particularly with something as
sort of obvious as this, right?

121
00:09:26,920 --> 00:09:27,690
So.

122
00:09:27,962 --> 00:09:36,790
Yeah, I often say to patients or certainly to colleagues who sort of, they sometimes
consider it as being a cosmetic subspecialty, but actually it isn't, you know, because the

123
00:09:36,790 --> 00:09:39,011
face's form is its function.

124
00:09:39,252 --> 00:09:40,793
Its function is its form.

125
00:09:40,793 --> 00:09:42,775
So the two are together.

126
00:09:42,775 --> 00:09:52,513
And unless you've experienced facial paralysis, you really can't comprehend what an impact
it has to lose your identity to literally overnight in some cases, to not recognize

127
00:09:52,513 --> 00:09:53,584
yourself in the mirror.

128
00:09:53,584 --> 00:09:56,326
And they say if discover water last,

129
00:09:56,398 --> 00:10:03,050
you know, until you've lost the ability to express yourself as you intend, it's hard to
fully comprehend it.

130
00:10:03,251 --> 00:10:05,311
Yeah, no, it's I agree.

131
00:10:05,311 --> 00:10:06,691
I'm sure it's stunning.

132
00:10:06,691 --> 00:10:07,731
Absolutely stunning.

133
00:10:07,731 --> 00:10:11,931
Depending on the level of disability and your perception of it.

134
00:10:12,451 --> 00:10:19,011
So, again, back to what percentage of people end up making good progress here.

135
00:10:19,011 --> 00:10:25,291
it with the team approach, are you able to get the majority or minority or how does that
actually work out?

136
00:10:25,474 --> 00:10:32,299
So thankfully the majority of patients make a good recovery both in terms of their
self-perception.

137
00:10:32,320 --> 00:10:41,026
We do obviously objective assessments using scoring systems, but also we ask patients as
you'd expect.

138
00:10:41,287 --> 00:10:50,730
There are patients who despite objectively having significant improvements, they still
want to get...

139
00:10:50,730 --> 00:10:52,131
back to where they were before.

140
00:10:52,131 --> 00:10:55,073
And sometimes, know, one way street, you can't do that.

141
00:10:55,213 --> 00:11:00,216
Added to that is the fact that people are often experiencing secondary issues such as
aging.

142
00:11:00,257 --> 00:11:14,747
if they are, so one patient, know, she had a terrible accident when in her twenties, I've
been seeing her for 15 years because as the face ages, the side that wasn't affected will

143
00:11:14,747 --> 00:11:15,047
age.

144
00:11:15,047 --> 00:11:19,682
And so the reconstructed side needs to kind of be adjusted to keep up.

145
00:11:19,682 --> 00:11:23,083
because it doesn't act in same way because it's not moving as much.

146
00:11:23,083 --> 00:11:32,005
So it's important to kind of recognize that and tell patients upfront that your face will
change over time and there will necessarily be some balancing procedures that are

147
00:11:32,005 --> 00:11:32,456
required.

148
00:11:32,456 --> 00:11:43,509
I'm really glad to say that many patients, not only are they, they end up being happier,
but certainly those who carried on by getting involved in the charity, they actually can

149
00:11:43,509 --> 00:11:48,730
pay that forward by helping those new patients who've also been affected to help them to
realize that.

150
00:11:49,966 --> 00:11:50,635
Right.

151
00:11:50,635 --> 00:11:57,664
in your face, that yes, the face is important, but it doesn't mean that you aren't a whole
person.

152
00:11:57,905 --> 00:12:12,338
Yeah, I was involved peripherally with a charity called in the US here called Oscar Mike,
which is basically devoted to military veterans who have been, you know, could have

153
00:12:12,338 --> 00:12:15,671
suffered any injury, but they have some sort of disability.

154
00:12:15,671 --> 00:12:24,618
And they put together this charity and it's saved the lives of many people, because as you
probably are aware, it's probably true in the UK.

155
00:12:25,553 --> 00:12:33,149
Well, military service personnel who are damaged have a very high rate of depression and
suicide, and they have over a thousand members.

156
00:12:33,149 --> 00:12:39,113
And to date, the last I checked, which was a few months ago, nobody had committed suicide.

157
00:12:39,393 --> 00:12:49,681
And it's all yeah, it's all built around social engagement with each other playing games
like they're playing wheelchair rugby and they're playing, you know, checkers and whatever

158
00:12:49,681 --> 00:12:50,181
they're playing.

159
00:12:50,181 --> 00:12:50,352
Right.

160
00:12:50,352 --> 00:12:51,833
But they're they're going outside.

161
00:12:51,833 --> 00:12:52,633
They're.

162
00:12:52,711 --> 00:12:54,632
They're climbing a mountain in the wheelchair.

163
00:12:54,632 --> 00:13:02,534
They're doing all kinds of things that stimulate the ability to participate in life with
people that get you, right?

164
00:13:02,534 --> 00:13:04,454
And that are cheering for you, right?

165
00:13:04,454 --> 00:13:07,655
And that's such a strong thing.

166
00:13:07,655 --> 00:13:17,068
And so I just wonder in the charity that you have, if it mirrors some of those same
principles where you get people up on stage and they tell jokes and other people laugh and

167
00:13:17,068 --> 00:13:20,930
things like that, is it that kind of charity or, yeah?

168
00:13:20,930 --> 00:13:24,110
we had a comedy diet just before the pandemic.

169
00:13:24,110 --> 00:13:25,370
had a comedy dinner which was great.

170
00:13:25,370 --> 00:13:27,570
We have family days when we get kids.

171
00:13:27,570 --> 00:13:30,870
You've never met anybody else affected in the same way.

172
00:13:31,390 --> 00:13:38,310
And many of them become, know, bosom buddies, pen pals, you interact beyond that day.

173
00:13:39,490 --> 00:13:49,370
you know, lot of people, you know, there's a psychologist called John Cassioppo who sadly
passed away quite recently, who did some amazing work.

174
00:13:49,568 --> 00:13:54,232
actually initially on facial EMG, which we'll probably come to later on, but he did.

175
00:13:54,232 --> 00:13:57,162
EMG for the audience, just describe EMG.

176
00:13:57,378 --> 00:14:07,805
yeah, EMG stands for electromyography and you can consider it like an EKG for the face,
yeah, muscles.

177
00:14:08,226 --> 00:14:15,090
So he was a researcher psychologist, but he did some really interesting work on the impact
of loneliness on health.

178
00:14:15,831 --> 00:14:26,508
And if you get asked to have a watch of his TED talk on loneliness, you know, he showed
that loneliness has a bigger impact on your longevity.

179
00:14:26,682 --> 00:14:28,804
then smoking, high blood pressure.

180
00:14:28,804 --> 00:14:30,475
It's extraordinary.

181
00:14:30,475 --> 00:14:36,670
yeah, we're social beings.

182
00:14:36,711 --> 00:14:46,359
So there are people who are not ill, they're not service people, but who will take their
own lives because they just feel desperately lonely.

183
00:14:47,060 --> 00:14:54,471
And even if they're not doing it directly like that, they can do it indirectly through
behaviors, through drugs, alcohol, et cetera.

184
00:14:54,471 --> 00:14:56,072
Yeah, that's right.

185
00:14:56,072 --> 00:15:04,856
So it comes down to a question of, think, acceptance, self-acceptance, acceptance by a
peer group on some level and then finding meaning, right?

186
00:15:04,856 --> 00:15:08,677
A way to contribute, a way to participate, a way to learn and grow.

187
00:15:09,078 --> 00:15:13,899
These are all vital to us as humans throughout our entire lives, quite honestly.

188
00:15:14,700 --> 00:15:20,142
It's just that they've been put into a situation where the typical avenues don't
necessarily always work for them.

189
00:15:20,142 --> 00:15:22,003
And so the charity is focused on

190
00:15:22,003 --> 00:15:23,235
creating those avenues, right?

191
00:15:23,235 --> 00:15:28,865
Where they can reclaim that ability to live and grow and have meaning in relationship,
right?

192
00:15:28,865 --> 00:15:30,619
So, yeah.

193
00:15:30,619 --> 00:15:31,439
Yeah.

194
00:15:31,576 --> 00:15:40,575
it was really interesting, because as a surgeon, didn't set out to do a charity, but it
made me realize that surgery is inherently unscalable.

195
00:15:40,575 --> 00:15:45,189
You I love surgery, but you help one person at a time.

196
00:15:45,570 --> 00:15:49,873
You have a charity, you're able to help multiple people over time.

197
00:15:49,887 --> 00:15:50,947
That's right.

198
00:15:51,687 --> 00:15:53,047
Yeah, no, that's very cool.

199
00:15:53,047 --> 00:15:54,367
It's very cool that you did that.

200
00:15:54,367 --> 00:15:57,487
I think you also developed a set of glasses.

201
00:15:57,487 --> 00:15:59,007
I saw something.

202
00:15:59,007 --> 00:16:00,247
Tell us a little bit about that.

203
00:16:00,247 --> 00:16:01,267
I see you're wearing glasses.

204
00:16:01,267 --> 00:16:05,626
I'm wearing glasses, but I don't think these are the glasses you're talking about.

205
00:16:05,626 --> 00:16:08,826
aren't the glasses, actually I have a pair down here to show you.

206
00:16:11,806 --> 00:16:22,926
One of the things that we all are affected by as clinicians, as doctors, is that you can
help the patient within this thin slice of time, that consultation, you know, you're with

207
00:16:22,926 --> 00:16:26,646
them for whatever, 15, 20 minutes, 60 minutes even.

208
00:16:27,306 --> 00:16:33,303
But very often, even though the patient knows what they need to do, they sometimes just...

209
00:16:33,303 --> 00:16:34,524
don't do it for whatever reason.

210
00:16:34,524 --> 00:16:42,789
And I found with facial paralysis, patients, when they've restored the muscles and nerves,
they need to do the exercises to rehabilitate those muscles.

211
00:16:42,789 --> 00:16:47,421
They need to now learn how to synchronize and symmetrize the smile.

212
00:16:47,662 --> 00:16:53,405
Otherwise things become scarred and entethered and they don't get an optimal outcome.

213
00:16:53,966 --> 00:17:00,150
Now, one of the difficulties is that patients after an operation, especially like this,
they don't often like looking in the mirror.

214
00:17:00,150 --> 00:17:01,210
And so...

215
00:17:01,346 --> 00:17:05,208
getting guidance on the expressions as they're making them is very difficult.

216
00:17:05,208 --> 00:17:18,073
actually a patient said this, we use EMG, we use this device in the clinic to give
patients better feedback around what the muscles are doing, because unless you're sort of

217
00:17:18,073 --> 00:17:21,714
walking around all day with a mirror, it's very hard to learn what the muscles are doing.

218
00:17:21,915 --> 00:17:27,677
And he said, well, why can't I have one of these machines to take home with me so I can
practice my expressions as I go around my day-to-day life?

219
00:17:27,677 --> 00:17:30,606
And obviously that's not practical, but it did get me thinking.

220
00:17:30,606 --> 00:17:38,966
You know, what if there was a way of developing a wearable device gives a person the
ability to get feedback on their expressions as they go about their life?

221
00:17:38,966 --> 00:17:43,386
Because in addition to that, the clinician could get information about how the person's
doing.

222
00:17:43,386 --> 00:17:46,446
If they're not making progress, they could call them in earlier.

223
00:17:46,446 --> 00:17:53,146
You know, very often as doctors, whatever specialty, I think you're a cardiologist and you
you to be able to understand the patients.

224
00:17:53,166 --> 00:17:56,586
They tell you that they're feeling a bit tired, fatigued.

225
00:17:56,586 --> 00:17:58,526
You think, what may have they got AF?

226
00:17:58,526 --> 00:18:00,662
Are they having arrhythmias and you know,

227
00:18:00,662 --> 00:18:01,062
It's great.

228
00:18:01,062 --> 00:18:01,913
You can give them a device.

229
00:18:01,913 --> 00:18:09,707
They can take a whole two months at the blood pressure or a, sorry, look at the ECG or, or
ambulatory blood pressure.

230
00:18:09,707 --> 00:18:11,227
But we don't really have that for the face.

231
00:18:11,227 --> 00:18:15,809
There is nothing that you can use to get real time, real world information.

232
00:18:15,930 --> 00:18:16,771
And so, yeah.

233
00:18:16,771 --> 00:18:18,146
America.

234
00:18:19,020 --> 00:18:24,088
Yeah, and because patients wouldn't look in the mirror, they weren't making more progress.

235
00:18:24,088 --> 00:18:32,911
And so we started down this pathway of developing a system for measuring facial
expressions in a real world setting.

236
00:18:32,911 --> 00:18:35,124
And that was the beginning of the company.

237
00:18:35,175 --> 00:18:36,255
That's awesome.

238
00:18:36,255 --> 00:18:36,625
Yeah.

239
00:18:36,625 --> 00:18:41,717
Because what you're really doing is lowering the threshold for somebody to be able to
participate in their own rehab.

240
00:18:41,717 --> 00:18:46,999
Because even if you have a mirror, even if you're willing to look in the mirror, you don't
always have a mirror.

241
00:18:46,999 --> 00:18:47,879
Right.

242
00:18:47,939 --> 00:18:57,702
And so with the glasses, I assume you can walk around and live your life and then sort of
monitor yourself in your daily activities, which would be like, okay.

243
00:18:57,702 --> 00:18:58,232
This is cool.

244
00:18:58,232 --> 00:19:01,703
I can say hi to somebody in a grocery store and I can

245
00:19:01,809 --> 00:19:04,772
you know, smile a small child, can do, whatever you would do, right.

246
00:19:04,772 --> 00:19:07,645
And you're getting feedback all the time, which is reinforcing.

247
00:19:07,645 --> 00:19:09,037
that's, yeah, that's fantastic.

248
00:19:09,037 --> 00:19:09,678
Yeah.

249
00:19:09,678 --> 00:19:22,898
One thing that's really interesting about facial paralysis is that because patients don't
want to express asymmetrically, they'll very often suppress their expressions of the core.

250
00:19:23,218 --> 00:19:27,658
And in doing so, they're actually having a negative impact on their mood.

251
00:19:28,058 --> 00:19:39,234
So a series of studies done in the 1980s and later replicated a few years ago that
demonstrate this facial feedback process, whereby if you make an expression,

252
00:19:39,234 --> 00:19:42,256
you'll reinforce the emotion that it's portraying.

253
00:19:42,376 --> 00:19:44,478
So the original research is quite funny.

254
00:19:44,478 --> 00:19:49,681
So what the researchers did was to get people to put a stylus between the teeth and
between their lips.

255
00:19:49,681 --> 00:19:59,718
So between their teeth was to trick them into activating the smile muscles because the
stylus was going across their teeth or held it between their lips as if they were blown

256
00:19:59,718 --> 00:20:00,348
through a straw.

257
00:20:00,348 --> 00:20:04,431
And they told me it was a study on human computer interaction for the disabled.

258
00:20:04,451 --> 00:20:08,896
But what they were doing is tricking them into activating their smile muscles and then
showing them

259
00:20:08,896 --> 00:20:18,575
some videos that were ambiguous in terms of whether they were positive or negative and
they found that basically, and this is replicated numerous times, when viewing something

260
00:20:18,575 --> 00:20:24,779
that was ambiguous but while smiling he tended to interpret it more positively than
negatively.

261
00:20:25,341 --> 00:20:33,357
Then subsequently they did a subsequent study where they got people to, they glued golf
tees onto their foreheads and asked them whether they could bring them together.

262
00:20:33,357 --> 00:20:36,610
Again they were tricking them into furrowing their eyebrows.

263
00:20:36,651 --> 00:20:37,016
right.

264
00:20:37,016 --> 00:20:42,021
suddenly they found that when you follow your eyebrows, you tend to interpret ambiguous
information more negatively.

265
00:20:42,021 --> 00:20:48,907
this study has been replicated multiple times and it's backed up by the work that's been
done with Botox.

266
00:20:48,907 --> 00:20:54,341
So for example, it's been used to manage depression.

267
00:20:55,223 --> 00:21:02,489
And you know this, that patients, people who express negatively, they often will
experience negativity from those around them.

268
00:21:02,489 --> 00:21:03,660
And again,

269
00:21:03,714 --> 00:21:07,807
this person that was part of the feedback system with those around them in the society.

270
00:21:08,403 --> 00:21:09,583
Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it?

271
00:21:09,583 --> 00:21:17,643
I mean, you sort of think of that it starts in the brain, the brain's perception, but
there is a direct link to the mechanics of what we do, right?

272
00:21:18,323 --> 00:21:20,843
Yeah, that's an interesting feedback loop.

273
00:21:20,843 --> 00:21:24,623
So you're starting with the face and then looping it back into the brain.

274
00:21:25,883 --> 00:21:27,603
Yeah, very, very cool.

275
00:21:27,623 --> 00:21:30,263
So do you have a prescription?

276
00:21:30,263 --> 00:21:34,803
Are these like prescription lenses that somebody can walk around and read a book and see
where they're going?

277
00:21:34,803 --> 00:21:35,639
Is that how it works?

278
00:21:35,639 --> 00:21:36,250
yeah, yeah.

279
00:21:36,250 --> 00:21:41,449
So I mean, our systems are quite, they are still prototypes.

280
00:21:41,449 --> 00:21:44,054
And so we're doing some studies with them, I can show you them.

281
00:21:44,054 --> 00:21:46,919
They don't look too dissimilar to regular glasses.

282
00:21:46,919 --> 00:21:49,141
There's a slight thicker on the

283
00:21:51,694 --> 00:21:53,214
There we go.

284
00:21:54,014 --> 00:21:54,714
Yeah.

285
00:21:56,854 --> 00:21:59,294
yeah, yeah.

286
00:22:00,074 --> 00:22:02,874
They're a little bit thicker on the side there.

287
00:22:03,354 --> 00:22:08,229
Lenses pop in and out, so we have prescription lenses for them.

288
00:22:08,229 --> 00:22:10,565
So is it the frame that's actually doing all the sensing?

289
00:22:10,565 --> 00:22:12,689
Nothing to do with the lens, is that the idea?

290
00:22:13,283 --> 00:22:24,871
We developed some new sensing technology called Optomyography, which essentially allows us
to sample facial movements with very high fidelity, high sensitivity, but using very low

291
00:22:24,871 --> 00:22:28,693
power and with a very small sensor footprint.

292
00:22:28,693 --> 00:22:30,234
So it's pretty small.

293
00:22:30,294 --> 00:22:41,546
It's modeled a bit on how a fly sees basically what's called optical flow, where the tiny
texture changes across the lens, sorry, across the sensor are detected.

294
00:22:41,546 --> 00:22:43,450
across in the xy plane.

295
00:22:44,591 --> 00:22:45,412
Okay.

296
00:22:45,412 --> 00:22:48,234
And is there a little battery then in the frame?

297
00:22:48,234 --> 00:22:49,234
Okay.

298
00:22:50,415 --> 00:22:52,497
So do you charge up your glasses at night?

299
00:22:52,497 --> 00:22:53,267
Is that what happens?

300
00:22:53,267 --> 00:22:53,958
Okay.

301
00:22:53,958 --> 00:22:54,958
Got it.

302
00:22:55,519 --> 00:22:56,179
Very cool.

303
00:22:56,179 --> 00:23:07,747
And so is this something that's, you know, you go to a website and buy it, or is it
something that's being studied in research only now, or how does that work?

304
00:23:08,040 --> 00:23:16,678
So we did some research published in Frontiers in Psychiatry where we demonstrated that
you can detect differences between depressed versus non-depressed people just purely from

305
00:23:16,678 --> 00:23:29,990
their facial data which was fascinating and we see this in future as being a way to enable
psychologists to study mood disorders in the wild and say you can do with you know a CGM

306
00:23:29,990 --> 00:23:35,014
or but looking at glucose or or amblytric ECG.

307
00:23:35,758 --> 00:23:41,261
In terms of the glasses as they are now, we're using them mostly for research and we're
working with some partners.

308
00:23:41,261 --> 00:23:51,905
So the main use case we're using just now is around diet monitoring because we see that as
being a potential to help a lot of people.

309
00:23:52,231 --> 00:23:54,395
Diet monitoring.

310
00:23:55,099 --> 00:23:58,146
tell us about diet monitoring with facial expression.

311
00:23:58,146 --> 00:24:01,092
So if you're laughing, you eat less or you eat more.

312
00:24:01,262 --> 00:24:06,422
Well, actually, one of our developers, whilst he was doing some debugging, was having his
breakfast.

313
00:24:06,422 --> 00:24:09,502
And he noticed that every time he took a chew, he could see the signals very clearly.

314
00:24:09,502 --> 00:24:18,162
Now the glasses weren't designed to measure eating behaviors, they're designed to measure
emotional expressions, but because there are sensors in the temple that are there to kind

315
00:24:18,162 --> 00:24:24,382
of calibrate for different movements of the glasses, they were picking up the muscle
activations at the temples.

316
00:24:24,562 --> 00:24:31,262
And so I got talking to one of our colleagues who's a researcher, but he's also a
bariatric surgeon.

317
00:24:31,374 --> 00:24:41,474
He said, well, that's amazing because, dieticians, they're big bug players and they try
and get people to change their eating habits before they undergo bariatric surgery to

318
00:24:41,474 --> 00:24:43,374
reduce the stomach.

319
00:24:43,434 --> 00:24:48,634
We try to get them to eat smaller amounts, to chew more thoroughly and to give a gap
between mouthfuls.

320
00:24:48,634 --> 00:24:57,054
They call it 20, 20, 20, where it's 20 pence piece, a piece of food, chew at least 20
times and have a 20 second gap between.

321
00:24:57,514 --> 00:25:01,026
But patients often don't do it because a lot of you are overweight.

322
00:25:01,026 --> 00:25:03,538
actually grown up just learning how to eat very quickly.

323
00:25:03,538 --> 00:25:06,030
They get it from their parents.

324
00:25:06,030 --> 00:25:08,511
So retraining that is very, very tough.

325
00:25:08,511 --> 00:25:18,218
And he said, well, you know, taught some dieticians, which we did, and got really positive
feedback and said, well, here's a way for us to produce something that's relatively

326
00:25:18,218 --> 00:25:24,002
simple, will be quite low cost to enable people to, first of all, to log their food.

327
00:25:24,002 --> 00:25:26,724
So the glasses contain a downward looking camera.

328
00:25:26,724 --> 00:25:30,407
So you start eating, capture the image of what you're eating.

329
00:25:30,407 --> 00:25:31,094
Mm-hmm.

330
00:25:31,094 --> 00:25:35,136
AI, food analysis of the calories, macros and micros.

331
00:25:36,037 --> 00:25:38,618
And then the glasses measures your eating rate as you're eating.

332
00:25:38,618 --> 00:25:44,420
And if you start eating quickly, it gives you this subtle vibration feedback to slow down
your eating.

333
00:25:45,141 --> 00:25:52,364
It also can monitor when you're eating while distracted, because we know that people who
eat distracted tend to eat more.

334
00:25:52,364 --> 00:25:58,168
So you're watching TV whilst eating, or if you're team scrolling on social media whilst
eating.

335
00:25:58,168 --> 00:26:04,028
you're not really focusing on the food and eating mindfully, which we know is important
for weight management.

336
00:26:04,028 --> 00:26:08,935
people choose their level of electric shock?

337
00:26:10,475 --> 00:26:12,631
Yes, it's a subtle vibration, but yes, absolutely.

338
00:26:12,631 --> 00:26:15,779
It's configurable within the app.

339
00:26:15,779 --> 00:26:18,106
Some people might need a little stronger nudge.

340
00:26:18,106 --> 00:26:18,406
right.

341
00:26:18,406 --> 00:26:19,169
Yeah.

342
00:26:19,169 --> 00:26:20,027
Right.

343
00:26:20,027 --> 00:26:20,788
absolutely.

344
00:26:20,788 --> 00:26:28,032
And actually, we know that if somebody is very, very active, as measured by the, so it has
an IMU, it has a motion sensor as well.

345
00:26:28,032 --> 00:26:34,475
And if you're very active, then obviously you would likely require more of a, more of a
feedback buzz.

346
00:26:34,475 --> 00:26:39,339
We actually have done some user testing about it to work out what level was satisfactory.

347
00:26:39,959 --> 00:26:42,611
And it does vary from person to person.

348
00:26:42,611 --> 00:26:44,762
But what was really interesting that we found that

349
00:26:45,198 --> 00:26:46,630
by lowering the threshold.

350
00:26:46,630 --> 00:26:57,730
So if a person has an eating rate of say, you know, 1.7 chews per second, you can, you can
lower it down by 80 % and the person will slow down their eating.

351
00:26:57,831 --> 00:27:03,577
And by doing so you're actually having a direct impact on the GLP ones in the stomach
because we know that.

352
00:27:03,577 --> 00:27:04,413
Yeah.

353
00:27:04,413 --> 00:27:07,513
slower, slower chewing increases GOP one.

354
00:27:07,692 --> 00:27:14,104
So, so one of the mechanisms by which GLP-1s are released are through the stretching of
the stomach.

355
00:27:15,144 --> 00:27:23,326
and so one of reasons why people often struggle with their weight is that if you eat
quickly, you're going to ingest more calories per unit time.

356
00:27:23,906 --> 00:27:31,928
The mechanism by which this, satisfaction or fullness signals, get signals is not through
neural, but it's from hormonal.

357
00:27:31,928 --> 00:27:36,810
So it's often takes like a 20 minute lag between eating the food and signaling that you're
full.

358
00:27:36,810 --> 00:27:37,550
And if you eat.

359
00:27:37,550 --> 00:27:43,511
quickly, you're going to stretch the stomach and it's too late by that stage you've
overeaten.

360
00:27:43,511 --> 00:27:43,772
it.

361
00:27:43,772 --> 00:27:47,679
Yeah, can out can out eat the response to the feedback loop, so to speak, right?

362
00:27:47,679 --> 00:27:50,383
as if you interesting.

363
00:27:50,596 --> 00:27:57,660
By slowing down your eating, you give a chance for the brain to recognize that it's full
faster.

364
00:27:58,185 --> 00:27:59,826
That's fascinating.

365
00:27:59,947 --> 00:28:06,404
So have you done some weight or body composition studies to kind of demonstrate what
happens for people like this?

366
00:28:06,404 --> 00:28:10,890
Is it done in conjunction with bariatric surgery or is it now standalone or how does that
work?

367
00:28:10,890 --> 00:28:12,972
So this, our work on diet is ongoing.

368
00:28:12,972 --> 00:28:20,837
So we have just completed one clinical study on patients just to prove that technology
works in the wild where people are using the app.

369
00:28:20,857 --> 00:28:24,239
It's capturing all their, all their meals, giving them feedback.

370
00:28:24,239 --> 00:28:28,722
And it was quite surprising how patients were finding it really valuable.

371
00:28:28,722 --> 00:28:39,749
So one, one of the patients she had been seeing a dietician for years, or for months, I
should say, with a really bad heartburn and her dietician had told her to

372
00:28:40,224 --> 00:28:50,288
stop eating tomatoes and these acid rich foods, eat more bread because it can soak up the
stomach acids and the like, and her symptoms weren't getting better.

373
00:28:50,288 --> 00:28:56,361
But because the app was showing her what she was eating and she was able to relate to the
symptoms, she realized actually it wasn't that at all.

374
00:28:56,361 --> 00:28:57,801
The bread was the thing that causing it.

375
00:28:57,801 --> 00:28:59,702
She had a wheat intolerance.

376
00:29:00,723 --> 00:29:08,015
And so we see the glasses as having this role in weight management, which almost certainly
will be beneficial.

377
00:29:08,015 --> 00:29:09,666
We know that logging food,

378
00:29:09,678 --> 00:29:12,503
by whatever mechanism will help people to lose weight.

379
00:29:12,503 --> 00:29:17,151
But being able to identify the causal relationships between what you've done, i.e.

380
00:29:17,151 --> 00:29:21,888
what you've eaten, and your bodily symptoms later on, will be really powerful.

381
00:29:22,411 --> 00:29:22,971
Cool.

382
00:29:22,971 --> 00:29:25,071
So it's really an educational tool, quite honestly.

383
00:29:25,071 --> 00:29:27,851
It's also a training and educational tool in a way.

384
00:29:27,851 --> 00:29:28,671
Yeah.

385
00:29:28,671 --> 00:29:29,491
Very cool.

386
00:29:29,491 --> 00:29:30,731
Yeah, that's awesome.

387
00:29:30,851 --> 00:29:32,431
So what's, what are the plans for this?

388
00:29:32,431 --> 00:29:37,951
Do you plan to make it generally available or, um, mean, is there's, doesn't sound
dangerous.

389
00:29:37,951 --> 00:29:40,811
It doesn't sound like there's, you know, contraindications to it.

390
00:29:40,811 --> 00:29:43,531
I suppose there's a contraindication to everything, but

391
00:29:44,118 --> 00:29:49,939
Yeah, I mean, it's a very low risk technology because it's just providing you with
information.

392
00:29:49,940 --> 00:29:54,281
And the idea being that if you can empower people with better information, they can make
better decisions.

393
00:29:54,421 --> 00:29:58,522
you know, it's glasses and so glasses are there to help you to see.

394
00:29:58,522 --> 00:30:04,903
In this case, you're seeing better what things you're doing today that will lead to a
negative outcome tomorrow.

395
00:30:06,504 --> 00:30:13,866
The route to market will likely be via dietitians or through platforms who are managing
people's health.

396
00:30:14,835 --> 00:30:26,199
To be honest, given the scale of metabolic diseases, given the impact of what people are
eating on their health, I think people would be quite surprised.

397
00:30:26,199 --> 00:30:34,431
I when I was wearing the glasses myself as part of the testing, it's really interesting to
find out how often I was snacking without realising because you do it mindlessly, you

398
00:30:34,431 --> 00:30:37,272
know, are the things that...

399
00:30:37,272 --> 00:30:37,812
Yeah.

400
00:30:37,812 --> 00:30:42,764
So there should be somebody outside of every all you can eat at a restaurant and it's
handing them out.

401
00:30:42,764 --> 00:30:43,174
Right.

402
00:30:43,174 --> 00:30:48,265
So, yeah, we'll probably get probably chased away by the proprietor, though.

403
00:30:48,265 --> 00:30:50,556
So maybe not.

404
00:30:50,556 --> 00:30:52,893
Maybe they're going to pay one price and eat less.

405
00:30:52,893 --> 00:30:54,557
So everybody wants.

406
00:30:57,038 --> 00:30:57,938
Right.

407
00:30:58,678 --> 00:30:59,698
That's funny.

408
00:30:59,698 --> 00:31:00,429
Very cool.

409
00:31:00,429 --> 00:31:01,419
Very cool.

410
00:31:01,419 --> 00:31:02,193
So

411
00:31:02,193 --> 00:31:07,016
How do people find out more about you and what you're doing if they'd like to connect or
learn more?

412
00:31:07,016 --> 00:31:08,579
What's the best way to do that?

413
00:31:09,390 --> 00:31:15,015
So our company is called M-Tech Labs, that's E-M-T-E-Q labs.com.

414
00:31:15,015 --> 00:31:21,581
And basically we have a lot of information about our technology, our research, our
background.

415
00:31:21,581 --> 00:31:26,685
We've done a lot of work on the various health parameters that can be measured via
eyewear.

416
00:31:26,685 --> 00:31:37,198
You one of the things that I'm really passionate about is that we enable people to have
better information around what they're doing and how it can impact the future.

417
00:31:37,198 --> 00:31:48,458
And also the fact that some of the things that we measure in medicine and in longevity
science for that matter are the after effects of some kind of behavior.

418
00:31:49,178 --> 00:32:01,578
So, you you can measure blood biomarkers or you can measure assays or imaging, but very
often what you're looking at are the net effects of an accumulation of behaviors.

419
00:32:01,858 --> 00:32:06,286
And that is very, very interesting because it gives you really unique data.

420
00:32:06,286 --> 00:32:09,917
Apart from around mood and emotions, which obviously is pretty powerful.

421
00:32:09,917 --> 00:32:20,454
You know, we know this from studies published by Harvard and others about the impact of
various factors on longevity and the most important one being about being grateful and

422
00:32:20,454 --> 00:32:20,954
sociable.

423
00:32:20,954 --> 00:32:31,120
And obviously you can measure all those things with glasses because people who are
sociable tend to interact more, they smile more, more positive and people want to be

424
00:32:31,120 --> 00:32:32,040
around them.

425
00:32:32,040 --> 00:32:36,042
But also on things such as subtle things such as one's posture.

426
00:32:36,174 --> 00:32:37,974
uh, once gates.

427
00:32:37,974 --> 00:32:46,814
So being worn on the head means that you actually can measure gates in ways you can't do
for a risk-based device, such as an Apple watch or a FitBit.

428
00:32:46,814 --> 00:32:50,374
You're getting, you're getting much better information around asymmetries, for example.

429
00:32:50,374 --> 00:32:57,534
So before you, develop problems in your hip or your knee, it may well be in the data as a
digital signal.

430
00:32:58,134 --> 00:33:03,910
Um, people's posture changes very, very slowly so much so they don't notice it.

431
00:33:03,938 --> 00:33:11,315
And so you can measure these things over time and actually give an indication that this
person is no longer as upright and as upright as they used to be.

432
00:33:11,315 --> 00:33:18,355
It seems like I might have a general application in any physical therapy setting and
almost any psychological setting as well.

433
00:33:18,355 --> 00:33:27,115
If you're sort of training people on this, you know, smile and you'll feel happier kind of
thing or, you know, pay attention to your gait or whatever it is.

434
00:33:27,115 --> 00:33:27,394
Right.

435
00:33:27,394 --> 00:33:29,875
So it seems like it has broad application.

436
00:33:30,895 --> 00:33:37,795
You know, you had a you had a statement about I think was the longevity of joy or or
something.

437
00:33:37,795 --> 00:33:38,727
Tell us a little bit about.

438
00:33:38,727 --> 00:33:40,835
Tell us a little bit about your connection to joy.

439
00:33:40,835 --> 00:33:43,086
What's your thought there?

440
00:33:43,086 --> 00:33:53,890
So one of the things that was quite interesting to me is that there's an old saying, I
think it was Peter Drucker who said, we can manage what we can measure.

441
00:33:53,890 --> 00:34:00,043
And for a long time in medicine, and actually most hospitals today, they focus on making
people live longer.

442
00:34:00,043 --> 00:34:10,937
As a plastic surgeon, I often get involved in managing people who are very elderly, not
only doing facial paralysis, but doing things such as skin cancers, et cetera.

443
00:34:12,810 --> 00:34:18,752
Sometimes people are being kept alive, but have no quality of life.

444
00:34:18,752 --> 00:34:20,353
And that's a terrible thing.

445
00:34:21,813 --> 00:34:25,865
And so, you know, the focus on health span, think is great.

446
00:34:25,865 --> 00:34:27,055
It's wonderful.

447
00:34:27,055 --> 00:34:34,758
But then you see some people who are going at this, this health span drive, but they're
living miserably.

448
00:34:34,758 --> 00:34:48,053
they spend four hours in the morning, you know, sort of having to prepare specialized
meals, have a routine that is so arduous and tedious that, you know, it may not be that

449
00:34:48,053 --> 00:34:52,027
they live longer, but they may feel longer because of the difficult work.

450
00:34:52,027 --> 00:34:53,600
a calorie deprivation, right?

451
00:34:53,600 --> 00:34:54,838
It's chronic.

452
00:34:54,838 --> 00:34:55,498
exactly.

453
00:34:55,498 --> 00:34:55,999
Exactly.

454
00:34:55,999 --> 00:35:08,642
So, so if we could think about how can we optimize for not just the length of life, not
just the length of healthy life, but the length of healthy and joyful life.

455
00:35:09,082 --> 00:35:11,623
And that will hopefully make life worth living.

456
00:35:11,623 --> 00:35:12,743
And how do you measure that?

457
00:35:12,743 --> 00:35:22,966
Well, you can measure that by looking at things such as emotions, things such as
interactions, that decisions that are perhaps a little bit more informed.

458
00:35:24,723 --> 00:35:27,063
Yeah, I think that's think that's fascinating.

459
00:35:28,443 --> 00:35:31,123
You know, in the book that I wrote, 100 is a new 30.

460
00:35:31,123 --> 00:35:33,383
I was about living young for a lifetime.

461
00:35:33,383 --> 00:35:41,603
And we've kind of gone on to really the target for us with longevity is when we're 100,
we're going to have a 30 year old body, but we want to have a 300 to 3000 year old mind,

462
00:35:41,603 --> 00:35:51,003
right, which is all the equanimity, all the joy, all the love, all the perspective and,
you know, the ability to actually suffer a trauma and.

463
00:35:51,003 --> 00:35:56,044
be minimally impacted by it because of the perspective and sense of wellbeing that we have
innate to us.

464
00:35:56,044 --> 00:36:00,037
It's not external validation, it's internal assurance, if you will, right?

465
00:36:00,037 --> 00:36:11,963
So yeah, so we love that because we find that so many people not only destroy their health
with stress and worry and things like that, but they also are just exceedingly unhappy.

466
00:36:11,963 --> 00:36:17,447
And so if you're not addressing that, what I call the life energy circle to talk about all
those different.

467
00:36:17,447 --> 00:36:26,932
and healing traumas and all the things that go on there and feeling safe and feeling loved
and having great relationships and and also being open minded, right, to grow and learn.

468
00:36:26,932 --> 00:36:30,514
Then, you know, it's it's what's the point really.

469
00:36:30,514 --> 00:36:31,765
And I think you're right.

470
00:36:31,765 --> 00:36:32,385
What's the point?

471
00:36:32,385 --> 00:36:41,640
But beyond that, the flip side of the what's the point conversation is if we step into
this new concept of longevity where we truly are youthful and can do whatever we want, but

472
00:36:41,640 --> 00:36:44,181
we also have this wisdom and perspective.

473
00:36:44,252 --> 00:36:47,163
my gosh, I think humanity could really elevate itself.

474
00:36:47,175 --> 00:36:56,469
beyond this kind of binary thinking that we seem to be caught in, Kind of move into more
of a quantum perspective on where are the best solutions as opposed to we're right and

475
00:36:56,469 --> 00:36:59,307
you're wrong kind of thing, which leads to all kinds of conflicts.

476
00:36:59,307 --> 00:37:03,331
So anyway, that's kind of where we're pointed.

477
00:37:03,331 --> 00:37:03,851
Yeah.

478
00:37:03,851 --> 00:37:04,061
that.

479
00:37:04,061 --> 00:37:05,632
I mean, you we can see it today, can't we?

480
00:37:05,632 --> 00:37:11,454
We can see, you know, some of the richest people in the world, and I'm not mentioning any
names here, but clearly are not very happy.

481
00:37:12,215 --> 00:37:14,375
So money won't buy happiness.

482
00:37:15,496 --> 00:37:25,001
And the research backs it up, you as you all know, the research that showed that, you
know, the household income required for people to feel happy, it tops out at this level

483
00:37:25,001 --> 00:37:27,341
that's much lower than people would imagine.

484
00:37:27,470 --> 00:37:28,238
I think

485
00:37:28,238 --> 00:37:33,414
study was published it was $80,000 it may be higher now but the fact is that

486
00:37:34,872 --> 00:37:42,365
you know, I see this in impatience of mine, having more money isn't necessarily the route
to being happier.

487
00:37:43,706 --> 00:37:47,267
so, if you can't measure certain things, you can't make decisions.

488
00:37:47,267 --> 00:37:52,969
So if you're going on your journey on a map, you've got two routes to go by.

489
00:37:52,969 --> 00:37:57,031
One route is going to go via the freeway and the other one is going to go via the
countryside.

490
00:37:57,211 --> 00:38:04,726
If you have no way of being able to judge the value of that journey in terms of what it's
going to give to you.

491
00:38:04,726 --> 00:38:07,787
You may just choose one or the other based on time.

492
00:38:07,867 --> 00:38:18,162
But if you knew that journey along the countryside is going to be useful and you'll see
lovely fields and nature, you may choose a journey that may take longer, but it's filled

493
00:38:18,162 --> 00:38:19,392
with more joy.

494
00:38:20,453 --> 00:38:26,535
But it's actually quite hard to measure that because there aren't the tools there to,
enjoy in the wild.

495
00:38:26,535 --> 00:38:33,038
We have systems that we can use to kind of past experiences of other people, rating
systems.

496
00:38:33,038 --> 00:38:38,998
For example, can say, okay, well, that restaurant is good because it's got the ratings,
that hotel's good, good ratings.

497
00:38:39,158 --> 00:38:48,758
What if we could map emotional experiences across the map that we can actually work out
based on the crowd?

498
00:38:49,671 --> 00:38:51,451
Yeah, it would be great to be able to measure joy.

499
00:38:51,451 --> 00:38:58,976
don't know if you can do it just with facial expressions or if you need to look at, you
know, dopamine and oxytocin levels or what exactly you need to be measuring.

500
00:38:58,976 --> 00:38:59,176
Right.

501
00:38:59,176 --> 00:39:03,579
But certainly, you know, for me, joy is really becoming North Star.

502
00:39:03,579 --> 00:39:10,192
It's like if if I'm not feeling joy, then maybe I need to rethink how I'm approaching this
or maybe I shouldn't be doing this.

503
00:39:10,192 --> 00:39:10,512
Right.

504
00:39:10,512 --> 00:39:13,043
So those are my two things.

505
00:39:13,524 --> 00:39:14,964
Yeah, for sure.

506
00:39:15,005 --> 00:39:19,067
Now, I think, yeah, we're we're we're

507
00:39:19,237 --> 00:39:25,431
You know, one of the insights I've had recently is that when we were born here on planet
Earth, we're actually born into a giant escape room.

508
00:39:27,463 --> 00:39:27,823
Yeah.

509
00:39:27,823 --> 00:39:34,346
And the goal is to actually work our way out of all the constructs that we're laden with,
right?

510
00:39:34,346 --> 00:39:40,976
Epigenetic and social to find our freedom where we're actually unencumbered by these
things.

511
00:39:40,976 --> 00:39:48,113
And we actually connect to source energy and we're actually just self actualized, if you
will, where we reference against source.

512
00:39:48,113 --> 00:39:53,125
There's no external validation required, and yet we're free to have many loving
relationships and

513
00:39:53,171 --> 00:39:56,531
And we're not attached to outcomes, which is really the source of stress, right?

514
00:39:56,531 --> 00:39:57,851
We identify with an outcome.

515
00:39:57,851 --> 00:39:58,951
We attach to that.

516
00:39:58,951 --> 00:40:01,451
It's like, there's no need for that, quite honestly, right?

517
00:40:01,451 --> 00:40:04,671
What if I just love and care and connect, but I don't have to be attached to it?

518
00:40:04,671 --> 00:40:06,071
I can, it frees you up.

519
00:40:06,071 --> 00:40:07,831
All of a sudden you're emancipated.

520
00:40:07,831 --> 00:40:10,091
It's like, okay, now this is joyous, right?

521
00:40:10,091 --> 00:40:12,891
I want to live this life for a long time, right?

522
00:40:12,931 --> 00:40:15,991
Instead of like all the drudgery of, you know, am going to lose my money?

523
00:40:15,991 --> 00:40:19,391
Is my, you know, this or that, you know, all the things that people worry about.

524
00:40:19,671 --> 00:40:22,227
So anyway, that's to give you a little bit of a taste to kind of.

525
00:40:22,227 --> 00:40:23,470
we're up to over here.

526
00:40:23,470 --> 00:40:25,250
No, that's fascinating.

527
00:40:25,250 --> 00:40:31,410
It's funny, I'm actually reading a book at the moment called, I am a strange loop by
Douglas Hostader.

528
00:40:31,410 --> 00:40:43,010
And there's a section in there, he talks about the relationship between us as individuals
and our place in the world and how we are, you the optimal position is that we become one

529
00:40:43,010 --> 00:40:44,690
with the world ultimately.

530
00:40:44,870 --> 00:40:52,898
Because there is no mechanism by which one's actions can't have an impact on the whole
universe.

531
00:40:52,898 --> 00:40:55,108
if you think about it to its extent.

532
00:40:55,108 --> 00:40:58,447
So yeah, it's a really...

533
00:40:58,447 --> 00:41:01,048
more powerful than we realize, quite honestly.

534
00:41:01,048 --> 00:41:02,449
That's other thing.

535
00:41:02,649 --> 00:41:04,530
So it's an escape room.

536
00:41:04,530 --> 00:41:08,021
The idea is to work your way out of that to get there.

537
00:41:08,021 --> 00:41:13,154
So anyway, so let's see an analogy I'm using at the moment.

538
00:41:13,154 --> 00:41:14,590
Well, I love the work that you're doing.

539
00:41:14,590 --> 00:41:23,878
I think it's really refreshing to meet any physician that's really thinking about things
from a greater perspective, if you will.

540
00:41:24,977 --> 00:41:27,479
You know, no pun intended, but particularly a surgeon, right?

541
00:41:27,479 --> 00:41:35,705
So you have your reputation still live up to like interventional cardiologists or not, you
know, we're kind of in the same boat, but yeah.

542
00:41:35,705 --> 00:41:38,878
So anyway, that's, that's really lovely to see the work you're doing.

543
00:41:38,878 --> 00:41:40,249
So what's next for you?

544
00:41:40,249 --> 00:41:45,691
Do you have other, other devices, other plans, other charity activity?

545
00:41:45,691 --> 00:41:47,351
the main plan is to get this technology.

546
00:41:47,351 --> 00:41:56,395
So this is going to be Sensei where we're launching a dev kit for developers to get access
to technology to build apps on top of our platform.

547
00:41:56,775 --> 00:42:12,291
Imagine that, for example, someone who has a specific issue, it perimenopausal health,
somebody with a specific gut disorder who may need to manage it with a specific kind of

548
00:42:12,291 --> 00:42:13,202
diet.

549
00:42:14,100 --> 00:42:24,415
or somebody who has lifestyle related issues, it can really provide them with information
they need to make actionable decisions.

550
00:42:25,096 --> 00:42:29,739
More information, the right kind of information will hopefully lead to better outcomes.

551
00:42:29,739 --> 00:42:31,840
so that's Northstar.

552
00:42:32,000 --> 00:42:43,348
So we're looking forward to partnering with organizations, companies, clinics who want to
take this technology to their clients to give them this really

553
00:42:44,982 --> 00:42:47,023
previously unavailable information.

554
00:42:47,023 --> 00:42:47,983
Mm hmm.

555
00:42:47,983 --> 00:42:50,424
Yeah, we're building a longevity coaching app right now.

556
00:42:50,424 --> 00:42:55,686
It might be great to actually collaborate with you and bring the glasses into that arena.

557
00:42:55,686 --> 00:42:57,327
That would be super cool.

558
00:42:57,987 --> 00:42:58,887
yeah.

559
00:42:59,548 --> 00:43:01,448
Yeah, awesome.

560
00:43:01,508 --> 00:43:03,889
Well, Charles, thank you for taking the time.

561
00:43:03,889 --> 00:43:05,930
think where are you speaking to us from?

562
00:43:05,930 --> 00:43:08,013
Are you in England or someplace close?

563
00:43:08,013 --> 00:43:10,966
I'm in Britain on the south coast of the UK.

564
00:43:10,966 --> 00:43:14,709
yeah, so it's, what time is it now?

565
00:43:15,642 --> 00:43:17,978
I don't know, it's 20 past 10.

566
00:43:17,978 --> 00:43:18,495
past 10.

567
00:43:18,495 --> 00:43:22,205
OK, well, you need your sleep, so I'll let you go.

568
00:43:22,427 --> 00:43:23,598
Thanks for taking the time out.

569
00:43:23,598 --> 00:43:24,410
Really a pleasure.

570
00:43:24,410 --> 00:43:25,391
Thank you.

571
00:43:25,634 --> 00:43:26,116
No problem.

572
00:43:26,116 --> 00:43:26,870
Thanks, Jeffrey.

573
00:43:26,870 --> 00:43:28,198
Love to talk to you.