Dr. Kristin Oja — Founder and CEO — is on a mission to reshape healthcare via her clinic. STAT Wellness. Conceived from a yearning of wanting to change the way people live, the Atlanta and Roswell-based one-stop wellness center staff functional health experts who concentrate on medicine and movement. STAT Wellness strives for clients to leave feeling better than when they walked through the clinic’s doors.
Aside from being a successful entrepreneur, Dr. Oja is a doctor of nursing practice, a personal trainer, a group fitness instructor, a lifestyle medicine guru, and a lover of all things health and wellness. However, with two children, Kristin’s most proud to be called Mom.
Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:
- Dr. Kristin Oja talks about her background in medicine and wellness
- What inspired her to open STAT Wellness
- Gut health and recommended supplements
- Foods rich in prebiotics to maintain a healthy gut
- Healthy supplements safe for children’s immune systems
- How to lower your child’s LDL cholesterol
- What Dr. Oja puts in her smoothies
- How does STAT Wellness virtual and telemedicine appointments work?
- Dr. Oja discusses Crohn’s disease and menopause case studies
- Dr. Oja’s secret to managing a busy, fulfilling lifestyle
In this episode…
Every day, Americans who suffer from illnesses have medicines pushed upon them without knowing how the medication is supposed to benefit them. Additionally, these same patients leave the hospital or doctor’s office without understanding the root of their illnesses. So, how can we, as medical consumers, stop the cycle?
Entrepreneur and medical expert Dr. Kristin Oja suggests finding medical professionals who educate their patients in addition to diagnosing the problem. Patients, however, have to take ownership of their wellness. How, you may ask? By advocating for yourself. If you are tired of suffering from a medical issue that’s only pacified with medication, stay tuned to find out how Dr. Oja is transforming healthcare.
In this episode of the Rising Entrepreneurs Podcast, host Dr. Jeremy Weisz welcomes the Founder and CEO of STAT Wellness, Dr. Kristin Oja, to the show. Together, they discuss overall health and wellness and getting to the root of illnesses. Furthermore, Dr. Oja talks about recommended supplements for gut health and children’s immune systems, how to lower LDL cholesterol, two case studies regarding Crohn’s disease and menopause, and much more. If you are someone who suffers from immune illnesses, this is one episode you don’t want to miss! Let’s get started.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
- Dr. Kristin Oja on LinkedIn
- STAT Wellness
- Dr. Jeremy Weisz on LinkedIn
- Rise25
- Grain Brain: The Surprising Truth About Wheat, Carbs, and Sugar–Your Brain’s Silent Killers by David Perlmutter, MD and and Kristin Loberg
- Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy
- Unicorn Superfoods
Special Mentions:
Related Episode(s):
- “The Power of Regenerative Medicine With Dr. Scot Gray of Gray Marketing Enterprises”
- “Mastering the Ancient Art of Jun Kombucha With Holly Lyman, Founder of Wild Tonic”
- “[Sweet and Snack Show Series] How To Improve Your Health and Wellness With Diana Stobo Founder of Truth Bar”
- “How To Restore Your Gut Health With Rusty Jones and Tom Bushkie Founders of Hello Water”
- “[One Question] Discover a Delicious Fiber Drink With Rusty Jones and Tom Bushkie Founders of Hello Water”
- “A Business Built on Full Transparency With Roy Krebs Co-founder of Natural Stacks”
- “How To Reverse Aging With Dr. Michael Fossel, M.D. PHD. [Health Longevity Series]”
- “The Engine Behind Growing From Nine to 60 Healthcare Clinics With Peter Cunningham, Founder and CEO of Evolve Healthcare Marketing”
Sponsor for this episode…
At Rise25, we’re committed to helping you connect with your Dream 100 referral partners, clients, and strategic partners through our done-for-you podcast solution.
We’re a professional podcast production agency that makes creating a podcast effortless. Since 2009, our proven system has helped thousands of B2B businesses build strong relationships with referral partners, clients, and audiences without doing the hard work.
What do you need to start a podcast?
When you use our proven system, all you need is an idea and a voice. We handle the strategy, production, and distribution – you just need to show up and talk.
The Rise25 podcasting solution is designed to help you build a profitable podcast. This requires a specific strategy, and we’ve got that down pat. We focus on making sure you have a direct path to ROI, which is the most important component. Plus, our podcast production company takes any heavy lifting of production and distribution off your plate.
We make distribution easy.
We’ll distribute each episode across more than 11 unique channels, including iTunes, Spotify, and Google Podcasts. We’ll also create copy for each episode and promote your show across social media.
Co-founders Dr. Jeremy Weisz and John Corcoran credit podcasting as being the best thing they have ever done for their businesses. Podcasting connected them with the founders/CEOs of P90x, Atari, Einstein Bagels, Mattel, Rx Bars, YPO, EO, Lending Tree, Freshdesk, and many more.
The relationships you form through podcasting run deep. Jeremy and John became business partners through podcasting. They have even gone on family vacations and attended weddings of guests who have been on the podcast.
Podcast production has a lot of moving parts and is a big commitment on our end; we only want to work with people who are committed to their business and to cultivating amazing relationships.
Are you considering launching a podcast to acquire partnerships, clients, and referrals? Would you like to work with a podcast agency that wants you to win?
Contact us now at support@rise25media.com or book a call at rise25.com/bookcall.
Rise25 Co-founders, Dr. Jeremy Weisz and John Corcoran, have been podcasting and advising about podcasting since 2008.
Episode Transcript
Intro 0:02
Welcome to the Rising Entrepreneurs Podcast where we feature top founders and entrepreneurs and their journey. Now let’s get started with the show.
Jeremy Weisz 0:13
Dr. Jeremy Weisz here, Founder of InspiredInsider.com, where I talk with inspirational entrepreneurs. Today is no different. I have Dr. Kristin Oja of STAT Wellness. And before I formally introduce Dr. KristIn, I want to mention other episodes people should check out of the podcast. You know, Dr. Kristin, both of us geek out on health related topics. I had Dr. Scot Gray talked about the power of regenerative medicine. He’s got clinics across the US. So check that episode out. I have I have some of my favorite products on here. So I had the Founder of Wild Tonic Kombucha. I love Kombucha. That was, you know, amazing episode I add the founder of Truth Bar, which is a bar that has a lot of probiotics in it. Rusty Jones, Co-founder Hello Water.
Also, we’re talking about supplements. Roy Krebs started Natural Stacks, and he talks about his journey of growing that supplement company. So check that out. And there’s so many great healthcare ones Dr. Michael Fossel talked about he wrote talks about telomerase therapy, and longevity. He’s an MD PhD. You know, MD from Stanford taught at Michigan State. Pretty smart dude. And Pete Cunningham is also from the marketing side of things CEO of all healthcare marketing, he basically helps grow clinics by patient acquisition for chains and clinics. So check those episodes out lots of good stuff and inspiredinsider.com This episode is brought to you by Rise25. At Rise25, we help businesses give to and connect to their dream 100 relationships and partnerships. And how do we do that we actually help you run your podcasts are an easy button to launch and run your podcast. You know, for me, Dr. Kristin, you met my business partner John Corcoran, the number one thing in my life is relationships. I’m always looking at ways to give to my best relationships. I found no better way to do that than to profile the people and companies I most admire in this planet and profile them and shout from the rooftops and everyone can learn what they’re working on. So if you’ve thought about podcasting, you should be have questions go to Rise25.com and learn more. I’m excited to introduce today’s guest, Dr. Kristin Oja, and she’s the CEO and Founder of STAT Wellness, and it’s a one-stop wellness shop in Atlanta and Roswell and growing from there. By the time you listen to this, they may have three, four more locations. And they focus on both functional medicine and movement. And she’s an entrepreneur, nurse practitioner, most impressive. I don’t know how you do this. She’s super woman, mom of two right now under two. And her mission is to transform healthcare, putting the emphasis back on health, one patient at a time. So Dr. Kristin, thanks for joining me.
Dr. Kristin Oja 3:02
Thank you so much for having me on here. And I think you just gave me a lot of listening while I run this week, I look forward to hearing those podcasts.
Jeremy Weisz 3:10
So tell us about STAT Wellness and what you do.
Dr. Kristin Oja 3:14
So we opened in 2019. So right before the pandemic, and at our one year party, I found out I was pregnant with baby number one. So you can imagine opening in 2019, having two kids and doing a pandemic life has been crazy the past few years, January will be our fourth year open. But we started as the nation’s first as you mentioned medicine and movement practice. And my big goal of starting sat wellness is to really build relationships with my patients outside of there once a year, twice a year medical visit. So under our roof, we have health coaches, we have dietitians, we have physical therapists, we have personal trainers, we do IV therapy, we do sick visits, we do well visits. So you know we really get a lot of these touch points with our patients throughout the year. And we do ala carte, and we do memberships and our ala carte is just pay as you go. So we have some patients that just come in when they need us. And our bread and butter is our memberships. And so our memberships are based on a one year time period. And our goal is that we really want you to look at your health as a journey and a marathon and not a sprint. You know, we never want to put false, you know, expectations with our patients that like hey, it’s going to be two visits and you’re going to be the best version of yourself. Our goal is you want we want these little by little a little becomes a lot changes that are going to make you the best version of yourself over time. So that’s kind of a little bit about us and we want to stay our big mission to is to really stay you know, I know the word affordable is relative, but we want it to be something that is accessible to the masses. Because there’s a lot of great concierge providers out there but you know, some people can’t
afford that, and then primary care, we know those visits are less than seven minutes with your healthcare provider. And you cannot get through a whole health timeline in a seven to 15 minute period. So our new patients are one hour long with a provider, not you know, a nurse working you up, and then the provider coming in like we are with you for an hour, and we started your birth, we want to know, Are you a vaginal delivery or a C section? What was your mom’s health? Like when she was pregnant? Was she going through a traumatic divorce while she was pregnant? You know, what was your upbringing? Like? What was your diet, like, at a young age? How many antibiotics were you on? You know, these are the things that we ask and want to know, in our visits, because that’s how we get to know you. And that’s how we started to uncover what some of the root causes to your imbalances are.
Jeremy Weisz 5:45
I want to talk about memberships and how you came up with this model. But I do want to talk about your background, how’d you get into this?
Dr. Kristin Oja 5:52
So I actually started as a personal trainer, and I just was going to be a personal trainer for the rest of my life. I loved motivating, encouraging cheering my patients or clients on at the time, and my parents were like, Christian, you need a degree, like just go to school and get a degree. And everybody told me, you know, do nursing, you can always find a job in nursing. So I became a nurse in the ER, and actually loved it because I got 13 miles and a shift. You know, I’m a personal trainer, I’m really into my steps. And I got my Fitbit on and I’m tracking everything. And I love the adrenaline. I’m an adrenaline junkie. But what we were doing was we were treating and streeting in the ER right, we’re getting them stable and sending them home and having them follow up with their primary care. And I called it the brown bag, people came into the ER with this brown bag on their chest on a gurney. And in their brown bag was 20 pills that they had no idea why they were taking each one of those medicines. And at the time I was a nurse. So I was responsible for lining up all of their medications, putting them all into their chart, asking them why they were taking each thing. And my patient was like, I don’t know, my cardiologist prescribes that my pulmonologist prescribes that my endocrinologist prescribes that my gastroenterologist prescribes that. And as you can see, you know, what in the world is going on? Why are we on these 20 pills? who’s managing your care and uncovering what is the root cause of these things. So I quickly realized as much as I loved the adrenaline as long as as much as I love the steps, I needed to become a nurse practitioner to be able to sit down with my patients and actually make recommendations on their health journey. So I became a nurse practitioner ended up doing great through my program ended up getting a scholarship where they paid for me to get my doctorate. So then I went in and studied, my whole dissertation was on gut health. So I, you know, had 100 patients in my study, and I looked at functional gastrointestinal disorders. So those of you guys that don’t know what those are, and they’re like, hey, everything is fine. We did colonoscopies, endoscopy is bloodwork, everything is fine. We don’t know why you have these symptoms that you have, here’s a medication to manage your constipation, your diarrhea, your heartburn. And I put my patients and an eight week study. And all I did, I didn’t even change their diet, which I think is so critical. I didn’t even change their diet, because that’s a hard thing to, you know, make sure we’re being very consistent with. So all I did was put them on probiotics, digestive enzymes and glutamine for eight weeks, I did nothing else. That was it. And 88% of my patients have statistically significant improvements in their digestive symptoms, which makes you know that there is a cellular component of what’s going on there is a physiological component to IBS. This is not just in our head, right. So, you know, and then from there, I realized again, you know, I’m seeing these patients and integrative and functional medicine, but I’m seeing them for 30 minutes, twice a year, am I really making a difference? And so I started going back into my mind, like now I’m doing exactly what I want to do. But am I really transforming my patients life? I want to see more often. How do I see my patients more often, I put a gym into my medical practice. Now you’re coming in and you’re moving and you’re exercising, and you have unlimited health coaching in this membership. So now I can see you multiple times coming in the door, we can do a quick some of our patients are like, I just need a 15 minute health coaching phone call on my way to work. I’m falling off the grid, and I need the accountability. And that’s why our membership was created.
Jeremy Weisz 9:18
I love it. I want to talk about the membership, but you’re on you know, talking about gut health and supplements. What supplements do you recommend or that do you take?