Hypermobility, Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, and Beyond - Health Connections You Need to Know
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Kara Wada, MD: Welcome back everyone to this episode of the Becoming Immune Confident Podcast. It's Dr. Kara here, and I am thrilled to welcome our guest for this week. I have been wanting to connect with Dr. Linda Bluestein for some time and we finally were able to connect. She is board-certified in anesthesia, an integrative pain medicine physician.
She's dedicated to alleviating the burden of hypermobility disorders. With a background in ballet, she brings a unique perspective to her practice as the founder and host of the popular podcast, "Bendy Bodies with Hypermobility MD", Dr. Bluestein provides invaluable insights and support to individuals grappling with hypermobility disorders.
Her expertise is widely recognized, evidenced by her contributions to key publications, including two chapters in the influential book, "Disjointed β Navigating the Diagnosis and Management of Hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and Hypermobility Spectrum Disorders."
Dr. Bluestein serves on the Allergy and Immunology working group for the International Consortium on EDS and HSD, the Medical Advisory Board for Standing up to POTS, the Board of Directors for the Bridge Dance Project, the Resources Committee for the Dance Healthy Alliance of Canada, and the pain Management Committee Chair for the non-profit, EDS Research Foundation. She also serves on the Advisory Board for the Doctors for Dancers. For more information about Dr. Blustein's work, you can visit her website at www.hypermobilitymd.com and we'll have that linked in the show notes. And thank you, thank you. Thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to talk with us today.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Oh, I'm so happy to be here. I've been wanting to chat with you for a long
Kara Wada, MD: Oh, I would love to hear how, how you ended up doing what you're doing. Love to hear a little bit about your story.
Dr. Bluestein's Journey: Ballet, hypermobility, and a passion for medicine.
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Linda Bluestein, MD: Sure. So, so I grew up a highly allergic kid. Actually. I, as an infant had terrible asthma and uh, you know, all kinds of allergies migraines and eczema and all kinds of other gastrointestinal problems and things like that. But, you know, made it all the way through my medical school training. I did want to be a professional ballet dancer, but because of my own joint pain and I kept getting injured. My injuries weren't healing properly, so I had to take plan B, which was to go into medicine and practiced as an anesthesiologist for over 20 years when my health kind of caught up to me again, and I had to make a different shift.
I ended up actually writing an article about pain management in people with symptomatic joint hypermobility, and that kind of led me into actually finding ways to help myself feel better, and then ended up opening a practice and treating people, and then starting the podcast as a way to provide free information to people who, you know, cannot afford to come see me or don't, don't have the ability to travel to come see me.
Kara Wada, MD: That is incredible. And as you kind of think back, where along the way did you realize that your health was not, quote unquote a normal, you know, "normal experience."
Linda Bluestein, MD: Yeah, that is a great question because as a kid, you know, I didn't realize that other people didn't deal with a lot of the things that I was dealing with. Although I remember my allergies being so bad, like I wanted to die. I mean, I was so, so miserable. And of course, you know, I'm old enough that we, we had first generation antihistamines.
We did not have second generation. So I had the choice of either exactly. I had the choice of either being incredibly sedated and not sneezing my head off or being just like out. I did have immunotherapy when I was a teenager, and that made a huge, huge difference. So after that, my allergies actually got a lot better.
And my asthma, like, you know, when I was pregnant my asthma got worse and then better. And then, you know, and I had postpartum thyroiditis I had all these like autoimmune, yeah. So I had all kinds of things, but I still, I think it was really not until later that I started to think this isn't does not seem like this is, uh, normal, and I know for a fact that I was, mm, it would probably be around 2010 that I said to my PCP "Something is wrong me"
Like I do not feel like I heal like a normal person. And he was like, "you're fine, you're fine". So I've, I have had a lot of frustrating experiences that of course our patients have had as well, where, you know, they go in to see people and they say, "Oh, no, no, no. This is in your head, or everything's okay." You know, and it's, and it's hard. It's really, really hard when you know that your body is not functioning as well as, as it could.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah. And I look back in my own story of like times where I was kind of gaslighting myself of like, "Oh, this must be normal, right?" And then you're like, "oh, actually no, it's not." and yet here we are on other side.
What is Hypermobility? Understanding joint flexibility beyond the norm.
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Kara Wada, MD: Can you talk with us about, you know, kind of what, what is hypermobility?
Linda Bluestein, MD: So hypermobility in and of itself just means that a joint or a group of joints has greater than expected range of motion. So that's literally all it means. So you could take what we use a what's called a goniometer, and if anyone's ever been to physical therapy, they've probably seen these plastic device. I wish I had one. Like I need to have one right here on my desk to, to show you.
We'd use that to measure because like up to 10 degrees of, um, extension in like the elbow and the knee is considered normal for an adult now. We know kids are more flexible than adults. So the norms for range of motion vary depending the joint and depending on the age.
So it's very important to take all of that into consideration when we're looking to see is this person hypermobile or not?
Types of Joint Hypermobility: Peripheral, localized, and generalized β what's the difference?
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Linda Bluestein, MD: And there's different types of hypermobility. So you could be hypermobile in just your hands and feet, and that's called peripheral joint hypermobility. If you're hypermobile in, let's say just your hips, your hips and your shoulders, that's called Localized joint Hypermobility.
Generalized Joint Hypermobility is when you have joint hypermobility in your core and your limbs. So you have it in a number of joints. It doesn't have to be every joint, but you have it in quite a few joints.
And then Historical Joint Hypermobility, that's what I have. It's when you were hypermobile in the past, but you're not anymore so I mean, I guess I do still have some joints that are hypermobile, but I'm 58 years old, so I've had a lot of surgeries, a lot, a lot of surgeries. So those joints have generally become a lot stiffer, and so we have to also consider those different types.
Causes of Joint Hypermobility: Genetics, Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS), and other factors
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Linda Bluestein, MD: The important thing to know is that there are genetic and non-genetic causes of joint hypermobility. There's a lot of different reasons why someone could be hypermobile, but one of the really, really important ones to be aware of are the Ehlers-Danlos Syndromes, and that's a group of disorders. There's actually 14 different recognized types, one of which is we think probably quite common.
There's two that are fairly rare or rare I should say, and then the rest are like ultra, ultra rare. So those are hereditary disorders of connective tissue. And if we think about our connective tissue, right, that's present all throughout our so that can impact how everything in our body feels and functions.
Kara Wada, MD: We were just talking before I hit record about how we're recording this you know, about a week out from the National big allergy meeting, and one of the big topics of discussion and the theme of the meeting was the interaction between the nervous system and the immune system.
But in particular, that conversation was surrounding the fact that these cells are in close proximity to one another within the connective tissue. , and trying to better understand what those relationships are and, you know, and on a normal basis, but then also trying to understand what, you know, connective tissue disorders and hypermobility may mean for these interactions too.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Mm-Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. I'm, I'm actually really, really happy to hear that that was a topic of at, at this meeting.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah. I Think what I walked away with though, um, you know, going to some, I, I kind of had starred some of those sessions because of my particular, particular interest. I think we're still at a point though where you go to those sessions and you maybe get like a little hint of an answer, but then you walk away with like 10 more questions in a place of like, "Okay, well maybe there we don't see a correlation between, for instance, a condition called Hereditary alpha-tryptasemia and POTS and Hypermobility".
Okay, well that's okay. Sure. But what else?
Linda Bluestein, MD: Yeah. And it's really, really, hard because, you know, people are suffering. They are really, really suffering, and they're struggling to get answers. And our conventional medical system is so poorly designed to help people with chronic complex problems. You know, we're pretty good in the US especially at dealing with acute problems.
We're pretty good at that. We are not good at these chronic problems that a lot of us, you know, have difficulty wrapping our brains around. I did it first with the mast cell activation syndrome. It's what, what is this? And the lab testing is particularly challenging because we know that tryptase especially is very thermal labile, so it's really, really hard to get confirmatory results.
And I tell patients all the time when the results come back negative. For me, it just means we didn't capture anything It doesn't rule anything out. It just didn't rule anything in.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah. That I think we have a similar conversation and you know, increasingly I'm like, okay, this is just helping us frame what bucket we think, you know, are kind of what category we think that your condition is, um, falling in line too. You know, like if your tryptase, baseline tryptase isn't super high, then I'm much less worried about mastocytosis.
That's great. And if you are responding to medications, awesome. I'm glad we're making headway. The reality is that our current guidelines and diagnostic criteria don't account for all of the people that we're seeing. And the lived experiences of those of those folks, which is hard.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Right, right, right, And that's why we, I wrote, I was one of the co-authors on the Consensus-2 paper with Dr. Lawrence Afrin, if you would be willing to link that in the show I think that would be fabulous. So people can see that, because that's basically what we said in this paper is that following this really, really restrictive guideline of, you know, the tryptase being elevated by, you know the 20%, what is it again? It's a double plus 20%.
Kara Wada, MD: There's, actually a website you can go to, plug in the numbers to do the calculation for you.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Okay But it's, you know, it's so unusual that you capture that and people ask me all the time, like I'll give them a lab slip to go in when they're in a flare state to get their tryptase checked with just a tryptase on it. And they're like, how do I know when I'm in a flare?
'cause I feel like I'm always in a flare. You know, it's, it's really hard when they, when they are so poly asymptomatic, it's so hard to make those connections between maybe things in their environment or things that they're eating or things that they're exposed to because they're just always experiencing such a range of miserable symptoms.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah. The other thing that I think I am still learning to navigate with with my patients too, the line is really blurry when it comes to symptoms that you may attribute to mast cell and their physiology, and maybe dysautonomia too. There's a lot of overlap. It seems that most folks likely have both going on and, you know, in, in what ways do we then like, kind of do our next steps with trials of treatment?
And it, it's, it's hard 'cause there is no one size fits all solution for any, you know, for this group of folks. Everyone is very unique.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Right.
Right, At the same time though, there is some low hanging fruit so it's great that you do this podcast and so that people can be aware of what all they can potentially do on their own. And you know, as you're saying that, I think right before you hit record, you mentioned something about Venn diagrams with autoimmune conditions and it's really interesting because I think exactly what you just said, you can take EDS, dysautonomia and MCAS Venn diagrams of like you know, overlapping symptoms and you're gonna get a lot in that overlapping area. So it makes it very, very difficult to sort out what's coming from what, but if you think about it, when the mast cells de granulate, right, they cause the vasculature to be more permeable and that can contribute to dysautonomia.
So the connections are just like all over the place.
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah, it's, it's like a inter, it's a web rather than, you know, a cause and effect.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Right, right.
Kara Wada, MD: And then we add in the microbiome, which is the other piece of the you know, how that comes into play into all of this and there was a talk by Dr. Laura Pace, who's a neuro gastroenterologist, who's doing some phenomenal work, but looking at you know, some of these localized immune reactions in the gut too, that frankly, most of us, vast majority of us don't have access to kind of some of those capabilities yet to fully explore. One moment, extra optimistic and excited and the other like, "Okay, already" like frustrated and patient.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Mm-Hmm. Right.
MENS PMMS: Dr. Bluestein's holistic approach to pain management
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Kara Wada, MD: Talk a little bit more though about some of those low hanging fruit, you know, especially with the hypermobility but maybe have some overlap with these other conditions too.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Sure. So, so my practice is focused on pain management. Although I do address a lot of other symptoms as well. So a lot of the things that I like to, use are incorporated into an acronym that I, uh, actually my husband, who is also a physician, kind of helped me come up with this it's MENS. MENS PMMS, and the letters stand for movement, education, nutrition, sleep, psychosocial, modalities, medications and supplements. And if you notice there's three m's. The first M is movement because that is the most important part. And then the last M is medications. Medications are very, very important. But a lot of times what happens is when we hurt so much, we move less and less and this happened to me, by the way.
This happened to me around that 2010. Oh, you too.
Kara Wada, MD: Really I'm not hypermobile, but with my Sjogren's. Yeah, absolutely.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Right. Yeah. Yeah. And so then you end up, when you end up like on the sofa for a month at a time, which is basically what I was doing. Then you end up getting actually more sensitivity to the pain signals in your body and it really contributes to dysfunctional, uh, fascia and, you know, musculature and neuromuscular patterning.
And it's really, you know, you start getting more deconditioned, which of course contributes to dysautonomia. And so moving the right amount and in the right way is just crucially, crucially important. So a lot of my podcast episodes are surrounded by movement type topics. So talked to a lot of physical therapists, Pilates instructors, you know, athletic trainers, et cetera on my podcast to give different ideas of ways that people can incorporate more movement in their life in a safe way or in a way that is gonna be most effective.
Because I think what happens, a lot of times I hear this, and I imagine you do when you're talking to patients as well. You know, they'll tell you, I used to be a triathlete to be able to do this. I used to be able to do that. And so they, they kind of had this like all or nothing mindset. And had that like I didn't realize moving some is better than not moving at all.
And moving some plus is even better yet. I mean, we humans, we are designed to move. So that's really important. The E stands for neuroscience education, so specifically understanding the neuroscience of pain and pain transmission. It was, yeah, it's, it was really huge for me when I understood that pain does not equal damage in the setting of chronic pain because in an acute situation, like, yeah, okay, it makes more sense, it's a more straightforward problem. But when you've been in pain for a long time, things can hurt a lot. But there's a lot of other variables that are at play, and we know that actually the mast cells.
Believe it or not, contribute to this tremendously. They contribute to sensitization of the peripheral nervous system and the central nervous system. So by getting the mast cells under better control, we can really help with our pain. And of course, mast cells are inflammatory. So I mean, we need them, they're essential for life, right so like I don't want anyone to go thinking I'm gonna find someone that can remove my mast cells,
Kara Wada, MD: Heaven forbid we run into a parasite. We want them there.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Exactly. Exactly. But it's really important to realize that, um, there's psychologic factors associated with pain and it's physiologic, it's not psychiatric, but there are things that we can do to help with that.
So like I was catastrophizing a lot. I'm very good at catastrophizing, you know, believing that the worst thing is going to happen. And when I found out that that was making my pain worse, I realized, "Okay, by just changing what I'm thinking, I can probably help myself feel a little bit better." I'm not gonna a hundred percent like cure things.
But I can help myself feel a little bit better. So I think that's a really, really important piece. And then the nutrition, of course, we don't have time to go into like all the incredible nutritional biochemistry things, but I, I talk about this a lot on my podcast also, um, because everything that we eat influences the chemistry in our body.
So we wanna make sure that we are fueling our body the proper way. And then the S that first S stands for sleep. So people about pain, insomnia, such a huge problem. Such a huge problem. So we are in pain so we don't sleep well, and then that makes our pain worse, and then it makes us sleep less well.
So that turns into this vicious cycle that is just really, really hard to break. So. If we can get people sleeping better, that alone can help with their
So we wanna address like, do they have sleep apnea? Because we know that people that have hypermobility are at increased risk of sleep apnea. Their tissues are more floppy, so their airway can collapse even if they're, you know, normal body size.
So we wanna assess for those kinds of things. And then the P stands for psychosocial, which is, you know, addressing are you having anxiety, depression, you know, PTSD, a lot of people have had trauma. And that basically primes the nervous system for the processing of pain signals and, and tying more into that emotional center for pain in a way that's not helpful.
And so it's important to address those things as well. And I tell people all the time. You deserve to have a counselor or a therapist. It's not punishment. You deserve this. The next M stands for modalities. So that might be using a tens unit or and some people might be like, tens. I tried that. It's having the right set of expectations. I think a lot of times people use these modalities and they think that it is, I did this, it is going to be the thing to fix the problem. No.
Kara Wada, MD: Magic wand.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Yes, yes, exactly. We are looking for a bunch of things that are each going to make 10% difference and then we add in the tincture of time and the changes that can reverse in the nervous system and eventually we can make some improvement.
So modalities, it could, could also include bracing. I was showing you a brace before we started, like things like that can be very, very helpful. And then the next M stands for medic medications. A lot of people have, of course, tried a lot of medications by the time they get to me. And I'm sure by the time they get to you, right, and for the, they, they've will have tried them for their allergy problems and their MCAS.
So it's, it's looking to see, well, what have they tried? What have they not tried? We have very few medications that are specifically for pain control, but what we can do is we borrow from other conditions. We use a lot of things off-label, of course. So there's a lot of different things that we can use.
Medications and then supplements. There's a lot of supplements that can be helpful, a lot of people, for example, are deficient in vitamin D and a lot of people are deficient in magnesium. There's a few like easy things that we can do to score some quick wins. That's kind of how I approach at and at every visit I think through that pneumonic and I think, okay, what area can we take some action that maybe is going to lead to some improvement?
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah, I mean, just as you were going through that list, I'm thinking through my own, you know, kind of journeys with stiffness and pain and absolutely those, and that's been my lived experience. 10% here, 10% there, and it just, it really does add up over time. It's like. You know, the idea from Atomic Habits where you adjust the plane's trajectory by 1% and then over time you end up in, you know, San Francisco as opposed to Los Angeles,
Linda Bluestein, MD: Right,
Kara Wada, MD: it really is. It's huge. And for me, vitamin D, sleep, stress levels, learning kind of of the tools from therapy and coaching, goodness, all those things, they really do move the dial.
One of the other areas that I am, I'm interested to learn a little more about is, you know, you've mentioned that EDS is, you know, this big group of conditions and, you know, focusing a little bit more on hypermobile EDS and kind of how where we're at in this idea of kind of the phenotype versus maybe genotype and yeah, because it's not an easy diagnosis for a lot of folks to officially get.
Hypermobile EDS: How diagnosis goes beyond genes
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Linda Bluestein, MD: Yeah. And I think it's really, really important for patients to understand that while you get very little time in a conventional medical setting with your doctor, at the same time you, you don't want to go in and say, I think I have X and, and specifically want them only to address X because otherwise you might be missing Y you know, you might be missing a different condition.
So the phenotype of hypermobile EDS is the triad that we see in all the Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome which is the hypermobile joints. We see hyperextensible skin, then we also see weak tissues. So there's a whole set of complicated criteria that we won't go into, but there's that's kind of the three things that we look for in those Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome. And with hypermobile EDS, we see subluxations and dislocation. So we see joint alignment problems. We see tendinopathies or tendinosis. We see frequent injury and difficulty with healing. We see a lot of gastrointestinal problems.
We see definitely MCAS, dysautonomia a whole range of things. And that's what we call the phenotype.
The genotype. We don't know what the actual genes are that cause hypermobile EDS, but I think that probably a lot of people that fit that phenotype of hypermobile EDS, probably a fair number of them have hypermobile EDS, but then there's gonna be people that have other conditions.
You know, there's gonna be a large percentage of people that later are explained by some other thing that gets figured out along the way.
I think it's really, really important not to be settling. Either settling on a diagnosis too soon or stopping the diagnostic journey when perhaps there's another explanation.
I'm sure this has happened to you where, you know, somebody will come in for an evaluation and that they think that that's what they have as hypermobile EDS. And I'm like, you fit a lot of the criteria, but like, I'm thinking of this one gentleman who used to be a construction worker. So very, very physically up on roofs and things like that and now he can't walk across a room and I mean, he had profound muscle and profound muscle loss. And I'm like, there's something else going on Like this is, yeah, you need to see a neurologist. This is neurologic.
So. It's very important not to blame everything on a condition that you think that you have.
So it's hard 'cause in some ways I feel kind of responsible for, I wanna spread the word about these conditions, but at the same time, the diagnostic process is so, so important and it's easy to have confirmation bias, right? We look at list of things and we're like, I have this, I have this, I have this and this is what I have, but we don't understand maybe the things that are more specific to those conditions and things that are more common in the population, and therefore could be associated with anything,
Kara Wada, MD: I am thinking of two diagnoses that I see where we actually have kinda the, a little bit of the opposite problem kind of happening too, but overlapping, so Hereditary alpha-tryptasemia it's a problem where people have extra copies of tryptase. And so they have elevated levels of this marker in their blood which is something we may figure out when we're assessing them for mast cell disorders.
Turns out about 6% of the population actually has this genetic quirk, and we know that not everyone who has this genetic quirk is actually symptomatic. So the worry is that maybe, you know, some symptoms are being blamed on that, that are being overlooked for things like dysautonomia or other, you know, underlying or overlapping conditions that may have other treatment options that aren't being offered. They're being attributed to the HAT and maybe not, that's not the best idea.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Very, very similar thing. And I definitely test people for hat also and it's very interesting to see how some people can be highly symptomatic and you really think that they're gonna be positive and they're not.
And of course the converse could be true.
And yeah, there was a recent paper published saying that it doesn't necessarily correlate with symptomatology, so,
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah. We learn something new and then we have a bunch more questions that come about with that realization or that new paper or assertion. And I think we are in for a wild ride in over the next, you know, 15 years or so with all the research that's ongoing.
At times I feel frustrated, but I also am hopeful. It sounds like some other kind of meds in the early pipeline that are looking at, you know, other aspects to where these mast cells and nerves and connective tissues all kind of come together.
Linda Bluestein, MD: That would, that would be great. That that's so, so important.
Kara Wada, MD: Anything exciting kind of, that you're aware of within the hypermobility EDS world that you're...
Future of Hypermobility Research: What's on the horizon?
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Linda Bluestein, MD: That I'm super excited about?
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah. Like that's kind coming up or,
Linda Bluestein, MD: I agree that there's more and more people that are, I think, getting interested in this I think probably a really important thing for patients to be aware of is to really check out very carefully the person's credentials that you are thinking of going to and you know, I feel like it's great that we're getting more awareness, but at the same time, I see this happening more and more where people slap the word hypermobility on their website as a way of making it more appealing to the population, but really look to see if they say that they specialize in 50 different things and one of those happens to be hypermobility, that's really important.
Also, looking to see if they talk about cures. We don't have those yet. So if they're talking about cures or you know, things that, if it sounds too good to be true, probably is. It's not a hundred percent, but it probably is. So just be a really, really knowledgeable consumer and just try to learn as much as you can.
Try to really read journal articles from reputable journals because now you can, you know, there's the whole pay to publish as well, which is which is really, really frustrating. But at the same time, sometimes you have to do that. I mean, I published an article on, , the surgical and anesthesia considerations for people with EDS, with Dr. Pradeep Chopra. And of course we spent, I dunno how many hours writing this article. And in my mind I'm thinking, this is gonna go in the New England Journal of Medicine. Like, I'm like, they're gonna love to talk about this. I'm thinking this is gonna be amazing. Right. We couldn't get it. I mean, he tried so many different journals and they, you know, kept rejecting him.
And of course, every time you submit it to a different journal, you have to change the formatting to match what exactly what they want.
Kara Wada, MD: Pain in the butt.
Yeah. It's a huge pain in the butt. So you spend all this, work all this time and, and then encounter all these barriers. So finally he found a journal and he was like, okay, if we pay, we'll be able to get this in this journal.
Linda Bluestein, MD: And that's what we did. You know, it's not that necessarily if you've paid to publish something that it automatically makes it bad, because of course now there's the whole like open access issue. So, things cost money, as we were talking about before so it costs money to publish these articles.
So, yeah, it's kind of feels like a little bit of a scam for the writer because you're doing the work then you're paying to get it published. And then of course, the company is getting that traffic, but it's really important for people to really try to get their sources as close as possible to the people that are doing the really core work.
And to just really pay attention to what else are those people doing and what is their expertise and what is their training, because sometimes I think it's hard to find that information online.
Kara Wada, MD: You know, and we saw this a ton, you know, during the pandemic where everyone was an immune system expert and you're just like,
Linda Bluestein, MD: Right, right.
Kara Wada, MD: I think that that is, it's really helpful. And you know, one of the things that I always say too is, you know, it is helpful to ask questions, to kind of follow the money to some degree too. And not to say that, you know, exchange of money or thing there are many instances where we do need to go outside of insurance, like it, especially with chronic conditions.
I think it's always helpful though to ask and I advocate for transparency and I think that, you know, sunlight is the best disinfectant. So you know and just kind of saying, "Hey, you know, this is, I have these relationships, these may influence our conversations and at least it's out there."
Kara Wada, MD: You know, I think that's one of my biggest frustrations at times, you know, with kind of some of the folks that are out there that are kind of the self-proclaimed experts of selling these magic cure type situations that they're benefiting significantly off of.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Mm-Hmm.
Kara Wada, MD: It's all shades of gray.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Right, right, And there and for some it's very become very commercialized,
Kara Wada, MD: Yeah. Yeah. Thank you so much. This has been so enlightening. I have learned so, so much. And I am gonna go back and listen and write down the acronym because I think that with, I might have a little bit of tweaking kind of from the allergy, you know, immunology kind of lens of things. But, and it's so fun.
I am just so thankful for your time, your expertise, the work you're doing in this area. And I'd love for you to share, you know, a couple places where people can find you. We're gonna make sure to put all of your links in the show notes along with those guidelines as well. But where can people connect and where can they listen to you too?
Linda Bluestein, MD: Sure. So the website for the podcast is bendybodiespodcast.com and from there, they can access the YouTube channel. They can access the podcast on numerous different podcast players. They can also look by categories so they can see if they're interested in particular topics. I do, because I was former ballet dancer, I do have some dance related topics. I have of course mast cell episodes and so the categories, I'm still working on categorizing like some of the middle episodes, but they can access it there. And then my website is hypermobilitymd.com and I am very active on social media.
I'm on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, all @hypermobilitymd and I'm on Instagram and Facebook @bendy_bodies on Instagram, and then bendybodiespodcast on Facebook.
Kara Wada, MD: Awesome. Thank you so much.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Of course. It was so great to chat with you.
Kara Wada, MD: I hope you have a great rest of your week and I look forward to future conversations.
Linda Bluestein, MD: Me too.
Kara Wada, MD: Take care.
Linda Bluestein, MD: You too.
Kara Wada, MD: If you are loving this mix of self discovery and science found here on the Becoming Immune Confident Podcast, I'd love to invite you to sign up for my email list. Hop over to drkarawada.com and hit subscribe to ensure you don't miss out on any insights into new immune system science or how we can harness healing through our daily habits.
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Hey there, amazing listeners. Before we wrap up today's episode, I want to take a quick moment to ask for your support. If you're enjoying the content of the Becoming Immune Confident Podcast, we're bringing you week after week, there's a simple, but incredibly impactful way you can show your appreciation.
You see, leaving a review is like giving us a virtual high five and it helps our podcast to reach even more people who could benefit from the valuable insights, entertainment, and inspiration we strive to provide week after week. So if you're finding value in what you hear, here's what you can do. Open up your podcast app, whether you're on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or any other platform, and give us a glowing five star review we're dedicated to bringing you the best and your feedback helps us fine tune our content to suit your interests and needs.
But, hey, don't stop there. If you have a moment leaving a few kind words in the review section goes a long way too.
Share what you love about the podcast, your favorite episodes, or how it's made a positive impact on your life. Your words, not only brighten our day, but they also encourage others to join our incredible community.
Remember every five star review and every word of encouragement counts, it's like fuel to keep us creating, innovating and striving to make your listening experience even better. So if you're up for it, show us some love by leaving us that virtual high five in the form of a five star review today.
And a huge shout out to all of you who have already taken the time to do so.
You rock!
Thank you for being a part of our podcast journey and we can't wait to keep bringing you more amazing episodes in the future.
Until next time, keep shining and keep listening and keep on building that confidence in yourself and your immune system health.
Take care.
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