Evolution of Medicine Podcast

Biological Elegance and Relational Healing

In this episode, host James Maskell sits down with Dr. Zach Bush to explore the concept of biological elegance and what it could mean for the future of health and healthcare. Zach begins by describing what he calls "nature deficit disorder"—the growing separation between humans and the natural world through industrialization, technology, convenience, and increasingly mechanistic systems. He connects this separation to a broader loss of connection with the biological systems that support human health. The conversation then turns to one of the biggest blind spots for practitioners: the belief...

Holistic Psychiatrist Presents Season of the Witch

Evolution of Medicine Podcast

In this episode, host James Maskell sits down with holistic psychiatrist Dr. Ellen Vora to discuss her new book, Season of the Witch: The Psychiatrist's Case for Magic. Dr. Vora's first book, The Anatomy of Anxiety, directly translated her functional medicine approach to mental health. This book came from a deeper, more spiritual inquiry. She describes it as part grief memoir, part cultural commentary, and still a prescriptive functional medicine book. Her central argument is that many of us learned to perform a left-brained, rational type of intelligence while suppressing our mystical,...

Postpartum Depression: The Hormone and Nutrition Connection

Evolution of Medicine Podcast

In this episode, host James Maskell sits down with Kirkland Newman, founder of MindHealth360 and Executive Director of the IMMH (Integrative Medicine for Mental Health) conference. Newman's path into integrative mental health began with her own experience of severe postpartum depression after both of her pregnancies. Offered only antidepressants by her psychiatrist — with no explanation for why she was suddenly experiencing panic attacks, anxiety, insomnia, and depression — she sought answers from an OBGYN, an endocrinologist, two GPs, and multiple psychiatrists, none of whom investigated...

The Pathobiome: Stealth Infections and the Brain

Evolution of Medicine Podcast

In this episode, host James Maskell sits down with Nikki Schultek, founding director of the Pathobiome Research Center at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine and founder of the Alzheimer's Pathobiome Initiative, a global research consortium. Schultek's path into this work began with her own illness 11 years ago — a multi-system chronic condition driven by a tick bite and co-infections including Chlamydia pneumoniae, which went misdiagnosed by 12 specialists for a year before Dr. Charles Stratton at Vanderbilt identified and treated the underlying infections, restoring her to...

The Neuroscience of Awakening

Evolution of Medicine Podcast

In this episode, host James Maskell sits down with Dr. Helen Lavretsky — integrative and geriatric psychiatrist, neuroscientist, and professor of psychiatry at UCLA, where she directs clinical research on integrated mental health and serves as research director for UCLA's Integrative Medicine Collaborative. Her path into the field began through Kundalini Yoga, sparking 20 years of studying mind-body practices with rigorous neuroscience. Despite initial pushback in academic psychiatry, her evidence ultimately gained widespread acceptance. She details her clinical model: a partnership where...

The Forgotten Medicine: Community, Dance & Song

Evolution of Medicine Podcast

In this live episode from the Institute for Functional Medicine's Annual International Conference, host James Maskell sits down with Dr. Geeta Maker-Clark, who opened the conference that morning with its keynote address. The conversation begins with something unusual: conference attendees — mostly, as Maskell puts it, "type A, cerebral" doctors — got up and danced during her talk, a rare sight at a medical conference. Dr. Maker-Clark, who is part of a West African dance company, explains why: drumming and dance tap into something deeply primal in all of us, tied to ancestral rhythm, grief,...

2026 Pauling Award Winner Reveals the Truth About Hormones & GLP-1s

Evolution of Medicine Podcast

What does it take to earn functional medicine's highest honor? In this live episode from the Institute for Functional Medicine's 33rd Annual International Conference, host James Maskell sits down with Joel Evans, MD, FMCP-M, recipient of the 2026 Linus and Ava Helen Pauling Award in Functional Medicine — awarded to Joel Evans, MD, FMCP-M in recognition of his career-long contributions to the field. Joel Evans, MD, FMCP-M shares the story of his journey from OB-GYN to functional medicine leader, crediting Jeff Bland and Bethany Hayes for pulling him into the field early on. He discusses why...

The Blueprint for Functional Medicine in Big Health Systems

Evolution of Medicine Podcast

What does it actually take to build a functional medicine program that thrives inside a conventional health system? In this live episode from the Institute for Functional Medicine Annual Conference, James Maskell sits down with Laura Sandquist and Kate Otremba, who've spent six years building a large integrative and functional medicine program within Allina Health, a conventional health system in Minnesota. Laura and Kate share the infrastructure they built to make it work — smart phrases, practice guidelines, and templates that help clinicians translate their functional medicine training...

The Bioage Reversal Breakthrough

Evolution of Medicine Podcast

What if the best way to live a long life isn't a longevity hack — but preventing chronic illness in the first place? In this live episode from the Institute for Functional Medicine Annual Conference, James Maskell sits down with Dr. Kara Fitzgerald, a naturopathic physician and longtime functional medicine researcher, to talk about her groundbreaking work on reversing biological age. Dr. Fitzgerald shares the story behind her 2018 clinical study, which found that a diet and lifestyle intervention reversed biological age by over three years — a result that stunned the field, since even...

Why Whole Health Starts With This One Question

Evolution of Medicine Podcast

What does it really mean to practice "whole health" — and how do we keep it from becoming just another buzzword? In this live episode from the Institute for Functional Medicine Annual Conference, James Maskell sits down with Dr. Tracy Gaudet to unpack the evolution of whole health, the growing risk of paradigm "veneers" masking real transformation, and why the patient-practitioner relationship remains central to any lasting healing. Tracy explains how true system change begins with a different kind of conversation — one that starts with a person's purpose and meaning rather than their...

More Episodes

In this episode, host James Maskell sits down with Dr. Zach Bush to explore the concept of biological elegance and what it could mean for the future of health and healthcare.

Zach begins by describing what he calls "nature deficit disorder"—the growing separation between humans and the natural world through industrialization, technology, convenience, and increasingly mechanistic systems. He connects this separation to a broader loss of connection with the biological systems that support human health.

The conversation then turns to one of the biggest blind spots for practitioners: the belief that they must find and deliver the solution for the person sitting across from them. Zach explains how even approaches considered "alternative" or "natural" can become another form of intervention and symptom management when they are treated as isolated solutions. Instead, he emphasizes the complexity and interconnectedness of biological systems.

James and Zach also explore what intelligence actually means. Zach distinguishes biological intelligence from artificial or abstract information, arguing that true intelligence requires embodiment, context, relationship, and connection to the living world. They discuss AI and why organizing information is not the same as understanding the context in which that information exists.

A major theme throughout the conversation is that health is relational. Zach recalls being taught in medical school that if you listen to a patient long enough, they can tell you what disease they have, why they have it, and potentially how to heal it. He believes practitioners should move from being the person who "fixes" the patient toward becoming a witness, listener, and guide who helps the patient recognize the intelligence already present within their own experience.

James and Zach explore the role of groups in healing and how relationships can reveal patterns that may remain hidden in traditional one-on-one healthcare. Zach describes his work with groups of six to eight people and explains why friction and interpersonal triggers can actually be valuable: they can expose experiences and patterns that create opportunities for deeper self-understanding.

The conversation also touches on aging, longevity, and the importance of connection. He challenges the idea that biology can be effectively understood or controlled through isolated interventions and emphasizes curiosity, connection, and listening to the intelligence of living systems.

They close by discussing the future of healthcare, the breakdown of increasingly abstract and mechanistic systems, and the possibility of communities becoming the foundation through which new forms of healing and collective intelligence emerge. Zach also shares his vision for The Origin, a global gathering centered around human interconnectedness and biological coherence.

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About the Guest:

Dr. Zach Bush is a physician whose work explores the interconnected nature of human health, biology, and the environment. In this conversation, he shares his perspective on biological elegance, biological intelligence, nature deficit disorder, relational health, community-based healing, aging, and the future of healthcare. He challenges conventional ideas about controlling biology and emphasizes curiosity, connection, and listening to the intelligence of living systems.

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