Internist/pediatrician and social media influencer Dr. Tommy Martin shares his perspective on challenges in medical school, the importance of authenticity as a content creator, and the unexpected controversies of medicine in the world of social media. In this episode, he dives into the biggest misconceptions about doctors, the importance of work-life balance, and why filling your own cup makes you a better doctor. 

How does social media shape public perception of medicine? Why do people expect doctors to have no life outside of work? And what’s the deal with the great peanut butter debate? Dr. Tommy Martin unpacks these topics while sharing insights on health, wellness, and medical education. Tune in for an honest, insightful, and sometimes surprising conversation about life in and beyond the hospital. 

Here are six takeaways from the conversation with Dr. Tommy Martin:

1. Authenticity and Humanity in Medicine Matter

Dr. Martin emphasizes that doctors are more than their profession—they are human beings with passions, families, and personal lives. He challenges the misconception that physicians should be solely defined by their work, arguing that embracing life outside of medicine actually makes doctors more effective and compassionate.

2. Social Media Can Be a Force for Good in Healthcare

Dr. Martin uses social media to educate, advocate, and combat misinformation. He believes physicians have a responsibility to engage online, given the vast reach and influence of digital platforms. His content is grounded in evidence-based medicine, and he relies on a trusted network of peers to maintain accuracy and integrity.

3. Adversity Builds Resilience and Empathy

Dr. Martin shares deeply personal struggles during medical school, including family crises and academic challenges. He credits his faith, mentors, and support network for helping him persevere. These experiences shaped his empathetic approach to patient care and his belief in the transformative power of suffering.

4. Work-Life Balance Is Essential for Long-Term Success

He advocates for maintaining personal well-being through sleep, exercise, nutrition, and meaningful relationships. Even small daily habits—like five minutes of doing something you love—can help prevent burnout and sustain joy in the medical profession.

5. Misinformation in Health and Wellness Is Rampant

Dr. Martin debunks common myths, such as the dangers of creatine, artificial sweeteners, and seed oils. He criticizes influencer culture for promoting unproven products and stresses the importance of physicians stepping into the digital space to provide trustworthy information.

6. Medical Education Needs Structural Support for Wellness

If given control over medical training, Dr. Martin would implement protected time and facilities for physical and mental health. He believes that institutional support for wellness—like on-site gyms and scheduled fitness time—would significantly improve the well-being and performance of medical trainees.

Transcript

Tommy Martin:

I love that you said that. I was gonna say that, like, I hope this isn’t too controversial.

Ned Palmer:

No, I mean, look, as three pediatricians, I think we can all probably say measles vaccines might be right down the middle of the pipe for us.

Michael Jerkins:

Welcome back to another episode of the podcast for doctors by doctors. I’m Dr. Michael Jerkins joined by the one and only Dr. Ned Palmer. Dr. Palmer, how is life?

NP:

Life is good, Michael. Life is good over here in Detroit. How is life with you?

MJ:

It’s fine. You know, I’d give it like a seven.

NP:

Seven’s solid, it’s a passing grade. So, you’ll graduate onto the next level of life.

MJ:

Yeah, you know, there is a saying—I’m not saying I said this—but there is a saying of “C equals MD” in medical school.

NP:

Okay, what was your saying? What was your version of that? You’re never known to pass up an aphorism.

MJ:

I just wanted it to equal MD. That’s all.

NP:

Okay. So technically “greater than or equal to D equals MD” is your personal talisman then.

MJ:

Yeah, it’s a little more complex formula because, you know, obviously you want to match and you want to pass boards and you want to do that type of stuff. So that’s a simplified version.

NP:

What do you think—so we haven’t gotten a chance to speak about this yet—but you know, Florida passing a regulation that there’s no more pass/fail med school criteria and it’s only ordinal. Have you been following that?

MJ:

That’s like a whole other podcast episode. We can’t do that in a podcast intro.

NP:

Okay, alright, alright.

MJ:

But I think it should be a great podcast episode because I know we are due for a Q&A from our audience members. We have a lot of questions. I think the inbox—[email protected]—to answer that we’ll do shortly. But that’s not what the focus of today’s episode is.

We have a very special guest with us—a very energetic fellow med-peds physician who is well known across the globe for lots of different good things. I’m really excited to have him join us so we can ask lots of interesting questions. We’ve known him for a very long time. Dr. Tommy Martin is joining us today.

NP:

He’s also my co-faculty member, which you always forget to include in his bio. You and I are in the same position group.

MJ:

That is absolutely true—co-faculty member of Dr. Palmer. Not my co-faculty member—we’re just friends.

NP:

He’s co-Waffle House member, co-Waffle House friend with the three of us, you know.

MJ:

Yeah, we’ve enjoyed Waffle House together. Well, I’m excited. Let’s dive right into our interview with Dr. Martin, who I think has some very interesting things to say about the state of medicine—especially as it regards social media and where those two intersect.

Today, we are thrilled to have Dr. Tommy Martin on the podcast. Dr. Martin is a renowned physician, fitness enthusiast, and influential voice in health and wellness.

While earning his medical degree and completing his med-peds residency and training, he’s become well known for blending his medical expertise with a passion for fitness, nutrition, and education. Through social media and public speaking, Dr. Martin empowers individuals to take proactive control over their health. Welcome to the podcast, Dr. Martin.

TM:

Michael, Ned, thank you so much. I’m so excited to be here.

MJ:

We are thrilled. Let’s just jump right into it—tell us a little bit about your journey and why you even wanted to get into medicine in the first place.

TM:

Yeah, of course. It’s kind of a long story, but I’ll give you a very abridged version. Throughout high school, I thought I was going to be a teacher and a coach. I wanted to teach math and coach football, basketball, and baseball, and have the summers to go to sports games and coach—something that I loved.

Long story short, I had an encounter with someone who told me they believed God was telling them I should pursue medicine. I kind of thought the person was crazy, didn’t think anything about it.

Then when I graduated high school, my uncle bought me a new laptop. I transferred everything from my old laptop and found a voice recording. I was like, what is this? And it was that same woman—when I was 14—who had me record what she told me. At the time I was still like, “But I’m going to be a teacher and a coach…”

Later, I went on a mission trip before going to Kansas Wesleyan University. It was in St. Louis, Missouri. And like most mission trips, there was an altar call. I went down, the pastor prayed over me, and he said he believed I would become a physician and heal many people in Jesus’ name. That really stopped me in my tracks. He didn’t know anything about me.

From that day forward, I was all-in on medicine. I did a pre-med major and found that the career really aligned with my personality, aspirations, and goals. I think teaching and coaching were interests, but medicine was truly my calling.

I know not all of our listeners are religious, but I am—and that’s my story into medicine. And I’ve never looked back.

NP:

That’s fantastic. Thank you for sharing, Tommy. I think that’s wonderful. And as we’ll unpack throughout the episode, there’s so much overlap in medicine with coaching and teaching. Sure, maybe not always the physicality of sports, but sometimes it is—whether it’s moving patients, doing procedures, or just the nature of the work.

Frankly, the teaching aspect is what really attracted me to medicine too. It’s a similar path to Michael’s, from what we’ve talked about before. I love it.

TM:

And I’m actually a resident coach now, interestingly enough.

MJ:

That makes sense. I was just seeing patients this morning—and honestly, a lot of it is coaching. I have information I’m trying to communicate in a way that modifies behavior and outcomes. It’s not a one-way street; it requires both people to participate. That requires coaching, humility, and the ability to understand someone’s background and communicate effectively.

We doctors are very smart—I’m not even the guest, I don’t know why I’m talking so much, sorry.

NP:

And yet, here we are.

MJ:

We’re very smart, but sometimes we assume everyone else knows what we know. So we talk over our patients’ heads. That’s something I really appreciate about you, Tommy—especially on your social media. You’re able to communicate clearly and accessibly, not just to doctors, but to everyone. That probably scratches the same itch that drew you to medicine in the first place.

TM:

Yeah, I think so. Social media has been an incredible avenue to do just that—to talk about medical topics that need to be distilled in an understandable way. One of the big pros is that around 7 billion people are on social media. You can reach all of them with just a phone in your hand. It’s pretty incredible.

NP:

It’s amazing what’s possible. And we’ll dive more into social media soon, but first I want to stick with your personal journey.

I love your openness in sharing the divine inspirations you had. That’s not a story we hear often about getting into medicine. But along the way, there had to be people who helped keep that spark alive. Who were your key influences during the tough times in training?

TM:

Yeah, goodness… So in undergrad I went to a small school mainly to play football. I did a pre-med major and graduated with a 3.9 GPA. I thought I didn’t need to study for the MCAT—just went in and took it. Obviously, terrible idea. I did poorly and got waitlisted at one U.S. school.

So I went to the Caribbean—St. George’s University. Huge wake-up call. The first week of med school covered everything I learned in undergrad. It was like being blasted with a firehose. I landed flat on my butt.

That first month I thought, “How am I going to do this?” That’s when I met Peter Slinger, my advisor and mentor throughout med school. Not a religious person, but incredibly instrumental. He believed in me, taught me how to study, kept saying, “You came here for a reason. Don’t give up.” He changed everything for me.

Another was Mark Clunes—physiology professor, also amazing. There were many professors at St. George’s I could name. Then later in residency, I had even more.

NP:

I want to talk more about the challenges, because you led with one. You and I both went to school in the Caribbean—it’s a different kind of challenge. Can you speak more to the hard times and how you overcame them? Our listeners want to know how we get through that kind of adversity.

TM:

Yeah, this will be personal, but I’m an open book. My years at St. George’s were the hardest of my life—not just academically, but personally.

One of my parents has a substance abuse problem and relapsed during that time, which shattered our family. My grandmother had passed away, a cousin died by suicide, and an aunt or uncle passed—all within three months. I was in the Caribbean, away from it all, and hearing about it secondhand from my sister, who was trying to hold everything together.

There was a lot of guilt. I felt selfish for being away chasing my dreams while they were dealing with the fallout. And I was nearly failing out of med school.

What got me through? My faith, first and foremost. I leaned on Scripture daily. And I had a strong support system—friends and family who were there for me, both on the island and back home. I remember countless nights where undergrad friends would stay on the phone with me when I couldn’t sleep. That network—plus my faith—carried me through.

NP:

Yeah, we talk a lot and we hear from a lot of people about just frankly, how important that network is. Med school, of course, residency where I met Michael here and stuff like that. And like, kind of became a big part of my network, even though I don’t tell them that and won’t give them any credit for it. It really is. It’s such an important part about medical school because it’s so isolating in so many ways, especially the Caribbean side where you’re geographically separated and isolated.

Like there’s a higher barrier where you really have to push yourself to make sure that you’re maintaining those connections. I don’t know how it was at St. George. At Ross, it was like, you could almost pick the kids who just weren’t going to make it because they were isolated. No family, no friends on the island, no contacts, and no support. And, as a result, unfortunately, they just lost the thread of their dream.

TM:

Yeah, same as St. George’s, I’d say.

NP:

How have those experiences, which again, thank you for sharing and being so open and honest, how have those experiences through med school shaped your approach as you continue to become a doctor in residency and now into attending hood?

TM:

Yeah, I think they have shaped it entirely. And so, you know, one of my favorite quotes is that your current sufferings will not compare with the glory revealed within and then likewise rejoicing sufferings of all kinds, knowing that they’re going to produce in you endurance, character, perseverance, and hope. And so I know I went through hell, but keeping that in my mind—that hell that I went through—it was going to create in me great endurance, great perseverance, great character, and hope of what to be at the end.

And so when you go into residency, it is hard. You’re working 80 hours a week, you’re super stressed, you’re battling imposter syndrome, you’re trying to battle burnout, you’re trying to hold on to things that you love outside of medicine. And so for me, I just kept grounded that yeah, all of this is suffering, but I’m going to be joyous in this suffering knowing that all of these things that are causing me suffering right now, they’re going to produce in me an incredible doctor. They’re going to produce in me a doctor that’s going to love all my patients. They’re going to produce in me a doctor that’s competent. They’re going to produce in me a doctor that’s caring and loving and nurturing to my patients.

All while still doing the things I love outside of medicine when my life allows for it. And so I think keeping that as my foundation and then going throughout residency and allowing for time to do things that I love—spending time with friends and family, with my beautiful wife, with my kiddo—all those things definitely helped me get through residency as well.

NP:

I love that mindset and that frame set. And I hope that that’s what you’re teaching during your residency coaching sessions because it frankly takes hardship and applies a positive lens to it, right? That suffering has value and will make you a better and more empathic doctor. And that this hard work has intrinsic value beyond just memorizing the Krebs cycle or some other terrible thing you’re required to do, right? It makes you a better doctor, unlike a lot of the things we’re told early on, which you’re supposed to know to be a doctor.

TM:

Right. No, I agree completely and I think on hour 70 I’m gonna share a story with you guys just because I know that we don’t have a ton of time, but I’m gonna share this story anyway. I was working a long week on service and you guys know inpatient medicine can be brutal and we had a son at this time and I was already late and I get an admission right before I was about to leave, right? And so everyone is just frustrated when that happens and I was burnt out.

Tired, wanted to be home to tuck my son in. So I went to go to the patient’s room and just went through the motions. Like, why are you here? What is going on? Well, unfortunately, this patient probably wasn’t going to live very long. And the patient says to me, “I could tell you want to get out of here, so just ask me what you need to ask, get it done, and get out of here.” And I took a step back. I’m like, ouch. This is not the type of doctor that I wanted medicine to make me. And so that patient really woke me up.

Then I reframed my whole framework and before I left the room I said, “If you had one last thing to eat before you passed away, what would it be?” And the patient said, “Carrots with lemons.” I was like, what? Like, who in the world would ever ask for carrots with lemons? And they said, “Carrots with lemons.” And I said, okay, I walked out and left. Well, the next day when I went home, obviously tired, went to bed late, woke up early, and I made carrots with lemons. And I walked into the patient’s room.

And literally as soon as I walk in, they said, “My gosh, you made it.” And I said, what? “You made carrots with lemons. That’s what my mother made for me when I was a kid. And that’s the last thing I’d want to eat before I passed away.” And so I share that story, not to say, Tommy did great things, but to show that suffering has a purpose. That staying after for an hour, that missing the bedtime with my son, that experience—even though it was suffering in the moment—had incredible, incredible purpose. But it’s like, how are you looking at that suffering? How are you looking at that opportunity? And it’s such an honor and privilege to have that opportunity with a patient and make it into an incredible, incredible encounter.

NP:

Yeah, I thank you. I love that story because you were going to use that time. You were going to miss the bedtime. Like, let’s be honest, right? There’s a loss that you’ve already taken in one area. So how do you make sure that you maintain or recover the value? And I think it’s on re-centering what you’re in it for—keep the patient at the center like we all try to do. We all struggle to do.

TM:

Either way, right?

NP:

I’ve shared stories where I also likely failed at that and I probably didn’t recover nearly as gracefully as you did. But yeah, I think that’s absolutely brilliant, right? The job is going to take so much. And so if by giving a little back, can you recover some of what gets lost? Then I think there’s something brilliant in that. I want to turn to talk about—we can’t talk about you, even though we’re co-faculty and we could nerd out all day on med-teach stuff—we need to talk about you as a social media influencer and that impact on your life.

And so there’s a parallel story here. There’s your life in medicine, but then there’s also this other identity of a health influencer and a wellness influencer. And I really want to understand how you came to develop that almost in parallel to your developing, you know, doctor and training.

TM:

Yeah, for sure. Social media—I have honestly been doing social media since 2013, although no one would know that because I was obviously a very small creator in 2013. And how it came about was my wife had said, “Tommy, you’re spending”—I guess it was 2014—”Tommy, you’re spending so much time meeting with students, teaching them how to study, just doing mentorship. Why don’t you just start a social media account and funnel people to that so you quit having 10 meetings a day?” And I was like, what a brilliant idea.

And so I made a deal. I was like, God, if it helps one person, I’ll never stop making content. So all I had was an iPad Mini first generation. That’s what I filmed with. That’s what I edited with. That’s what I uploaded with. And I started making content. And so from 2013 to 2019, I worked hard on social media. I was posting almost three times a day on majority of platforms. And the growth was slow, but I had made a deal. And I was going to keep that end of the deal.

In 2019, I saw a video by Gary Vaynerchuk who said, if you’re not on TikTok, you’re missing the boat. And I was like, all right, well, let me see what TikTok’s about. So I studied that for two weeks, saw what videos did well, what videos didn’t do well, made my first video, and it hit around 300,000 views and I had 50,000 followers overnight. And then from there, it kind of transformed into where it is now with about 4.5-ish million followers across platforms where I have been able to lead advocacy for my son and his really rare genetic disorder.

I’ve had the opportunity to be a keynote speaker for the WHO on stopping the spread of misinformation online. I’ve been an ambassador for the National Infectious Disease Society of America on also stopping the spread of misinformation. And so it has transformed into this role of being a reliable source of medical information online. And as I said before, I think it’s such a responsibility of physicians—that if we have the opportunity to reach 7 billion people, it’s not a luxury that we have a cell phone. It’s not a luxury that we have social media. But it should be something that every physician has to do because we have access to all these people knowing that’s where they look for their information.

NP:

So within that, there’s a bunch of questions that I know we’re going to ask about the social media influencing part. First, how do you—there’s a lot of information about doctors online. And unfortunately, during the pandemic, what we saw was that some of the biggest spreaders of misinformation were physicians or physician-associated networks. How do you speak with authenticity and realism, and frankly, how do you make sure that you stay true to it? It is frankly an ongoing challenge. Healthcare lives in a world of gray, of what’s good and what’s bad. So how do you maintain and make sure you’re connecting and communicating authentically?

TM:

Yeah, of course. So there are some things that are just hard truths that we know from literature. It is sound. Every governing body agrees on it.

NP:

Measles, vaccines, let’s just—yeah, yeah.

TM:

I love that you said that. I was gonna say that—I hope this isn’t too controversial.

NP:

No, I mean, look, as three pediatricians, I think we can all probably say measles vaccines might be right down the middle of the pipe for us.

TM:

One example would be measles vaccines and saying that they’re efficacious and that the benefits far outweigh the risk. Any governing medical body and institution would agree with that. And so you can make content on that confidently knowing that you are doing the correct thing. Whereas there may be some gray areas, such as some maybe new weight loss supplements that are coming out—not the medications. Weight loss medications are evidence-based, have decades of research on them. But there are some supplements that maybe the research isn’t there yet.

So to make content and give hard and fast answers and guaranteed results on things that we do not have research yet—it just doesn’t make sense. And so kind of where I stay grounded is covering topics that are well-established, backed by all the governing medical bodies. And I try not to cover too controversial things unless it is needed—such as the measles vaccine.

NP:

You can’t always tell what’s going to be controversial. I think we’ve created controversy around items where I would tell you five years ago, I wouldn’t have thought were controversial. So skip.

TM:

Skippy peanut butter. Literally just made a video about Skippy peanut butter. People are going ballistic about Skippy peanut butter.

MJ:

Explain that? I’m very interested now.

NP:

Yeah, which direction? I don’t know what I’m supposed to feel.

TM:

It’s just the type of oils that they use in peanut butter that people are complaining about and saying I’m gonna die and stuff. I’m like, yeah, if you want to compare metabolic numbers with me, I’m more than happy to compare lab results.

NP:

No, but I mean, look, there is a whole world of peanut controversy and even at the medical level, right? Early feeding of peanuts and allergies or allergic families. Like that was a study that came out, I think when we were late into residency and completely changed practice. So I like waiting in on, you know, controversies.

MJ:

I think we just stumbled upon the title of this podcast episode, The Peanut Controversy.

NP:

The Femur Controversy. Tommy Martin wades in on the Femur Controversy.

TM:

I it, that’s too funny.

Man. OK, one other thing that I’ll add to that is, and we’ve said this a lot, but it’s so important to have a good network. And so I have a really good network of medical professionals who are active online that we kind of double check each other. And so we’re looking at each other’s content. And if I make anything that’s a little bit off or maybe isn’t the most evidence-based, they immediately tell me and they give me their sources to why they disagree with me or why it’s off. And I think that’s so beneficial, right? None of us are perfect. And it’s so important to be so humble in this space because we’re all trying to do what’s most important. And that is to provide the best education, the best value for our patients, and with it being evidence-based. And so I think having a network like that can be very, very beneficial.

NP:

Yeah, I mean, you’re doing peer reviewed social media health and wellness effectively at that point. You know, you’ve got a network supporting you. All right, couple of quick questions here. Do your patients recognize you? Probably not at Boston Children’s Hospital, maybe the adults, but maybe not.

TM:

I will say usually when I’m on service at least a couple of patients recognize me.

NP:

Okay, okay. Did they look for you or do they already?

TM:

Yeah, I’d say that I don’t think people necessarily look for me just because a lot of my social media does not talk about my place of work. And so I don’t think it’s like widely known, you know, where I work necessarily. And so I’d say that they see me, they’re like, I recognize that. Often what actually happens is my voice. So people will hear me talking and then turn and be like, wait, I know that person. I know that voice. And then they’re trying to place where did that voice come from. So I think that happens more often than anything.

NP:

Okay, all right. That’s good to know. Is that both in, look, is med-peds, is that both on the adult and the pediatric side? Like you’re getting recognized on both sides?

TM:

Yeah, probably the adult population more. So even on the pediatric side, the parents more so than the children. And then on the adult side, the actual patients.

NP:

It’s the actual patients. All right. And what are the biggest misconceptions that social media commenters, like participants, have about doctors that you’ve seen?

TM:

Yeah, I think this is something I disagree with and I’m actually starting a podcast to talk about it, but it is that doctors should not be human. And what I mean by that is that a lot of people think that doctors should not have a life outside of medicine. So for example, if I show a video of me working out, like commenters will be like, that’s inappropriate. You don’t need to be working out on social media. Well, I am a physician, but that’s a very small part of who I am.

It’s not who I am. I have so much more to offer. There’s so much more about myself. And I have so many other passions that I want to share with the world that being a doctor is a very small part of the entirety of who I am. And so it’s OK for me to share my life as a doctor, medical education. It’s OK for me to share my passions outside of medicine. It’s OK for me to advocate for rare diseases and syndromes because my son has it. And so I would say that there’s a huge misconception that doctors should not be human, that they should be a robot, and that they should only do doctor things. And that’s just not reality. And I think that’s truly what leads to burnout.

MJ:

What’s interesting to me about that is that I think it is generational even within doctors too, right? The social media commenters are saying that to you, but I think generationally there’s also a little bit of that in a generation maybe before us of, this really is your life and this is all what your life is. And if you’re doing anything outside of that, that cuts into kind of your calling, which you, I think, are the first guests that literally had a calling to medicine that they could talk about.

But we’ve talked about this with several other guests — and I am strongly opinionated on this — but I totally agree with everything you said because once you start to dehumanize yourself and you become kind of, maybe it’s a, feel guilty or your mentors in med school and in residency had this kind of superhero, this is a calling, but sometimes it is just, can feel like a job and that’s okay.

It’s a really awesome job. The stories you even talked about how you’ve helped just a couple of patients anecdotally here is amazing. Like no other job really can do something like that. But at the end of the day, if you’re not taking care of yourself, you can’t take care of patients, right? And the extra committee meeting at six in the morning on Wednesdays that’s not paid or the extra thing for your residency program that’s obviously really cool, but at the end of the day isn’t paid and cuts into your time of somewhat trying to be human outside of medicine may not be worth it.

I think our generation is more prone now to be like, I’m actually okay. I don’t need my painting on the wall amongst people that no one will know who I am in five years or some title that once I leave, someone else will take it and it doesn’t really matter. I always go back to the saying I heard from an amazing mentor I had in residency that said institutional memory is short, but patient memory is long. So that stuck with me all the way on all of the little administrative things that people ask you to do and maybe guilt you into doing and being like, you know what, I’m good. I’m going to focus on taking care of patients. But I think that’s a misconception, I guess, all that hot air to say misconception among social media commenters, but also doctors. I don’t know if you’ve experienced that as well.

TM:

Yeah, for sure. I mean, I think… like you said, I believe it’s generational and I think Gen Z is really going to throw that out the window. I shouldn’t say any other comments before I get us in trouble. So yeah, I definitely think it’s generational, but I would argue that even though the generation, you know, maybe two, the generation above us believes that to be a good doctor, that’s it. Like that’s a hundred percent your life. I would argue against that. I would argue that if you want a doctor that is joyous, that is excited to be there, that is going to give you 100%, then you also need a doctor that gets to do the things that they love outside of medicine. Because for me, when I get to work out in the morning, when I get to spend time with my family at night, I go to work the next day literally jacked out of my face to be a doctor. I filled up my cup to where it’s literally overflowing, that it probably is overflowing a little too much. When I’m at the hospital, they’re like, Tommy, tone it down a bit. Too much happiness. Too much happiness right now. And so I think that by doing those things outside of medicine, it makes you into the doctor that you’re supposed to be.

Physician because you’re not resenting medicine.

MJ:

Yes, I think what’s interesting too about you specifically is you’re probably the healthiest person I know just in general, but definitely the healthiest doctor I know. Although there’s a lot of doctors that are kind of into fitness for sure, but I as a doctor have treated many other doctors as patients. And we’ve already talked about how grueling our schedule can be and how sometimes dehumanizing you put the job first and put yourself second, which means your health sometimes goes away.

What is some advice, I guess, you give to trainees or those that are actually in medicine or healthcare to try to stay healthy despite their stressful, high energy, kind of high demand job?

TM:

Yeah, for sure. There’s a few different things that I’d say. So one would be make sure that you do not give up the things that you love outside of medicine. And this could be five minutes a day or 10 minutes a day. So even if you’re working an 80-hour work week, five minutes a day, 10 minutes a day, do the thing that really fills you up and that you enjoy doing.

Number two would be to sleep as much as possible. And in residency, that can be very, very challenging. And I’m a hypocrite because I don’t sleep enough.

Science will tell you that the more you sleep, the better your stress will be controlled, the better your hunger hormones are controlled, the better adaptability you have, and the better resilience that you have when stressful things come up. So sleeping as much as you possibly can will definitely make you healthier.

A third would be to exercise in a way that you enjoy daily. And even small doses of exercise has shown to have profound benefit. So even if it’s just five to 10 minutes a day of walking or jogging or tiny bit of strength training, that’ll add up over time. And you’re not doing 80 hour weeks every single week. And then so in the weeks that you have less, then you could do more. And it’s just literally whatever way that you enjoy.

And then the last thing, I guess the last two things, one would be to try to eat whole foods. It’s obviously basic, but at the hospital, you’re going to be surrounded by a bunch of non-whole foods. But try to eat as much whole foods as you possibly can. But do not overly restrict yourself.

And then the last thing would be spend time with like-minded people that are positive and bring you up instead of bring you down because in residency you will do two drastic groups very negative very positive go to this side go to positive side and then from afar try to bring other people to that side.

MJ:

What’s interesting, I mean, I can go through all five of those and see where I may be messed up in all five of those in residency. But I think just like financial habits in residency and training, the healthy habits in residency and training, you can have, if you start to establish it then, you’re more likely to be able to do it as an attending.

Because I think there’s a little bit of a false sentiment, at least I had in residency, of once I become an attending, then I will have more time to be able to do X, Y, and Z, and that’s actually not the case a lot of times for many of us, right? And sometimes it’s even worse in many ways.

So I think that that makes a ton of sense. I’m curious, since you engage in the health space and engage with doctors a lot, are there any misconceptions that doctors hold about fitness and nutrition that you encounter? Is there any common thing? Tell me what grinds your gears, as they’d say on Family Guy.

TM:

My goodness, tons.

It would be so controversial.

MJ:

I can’t wait.

TM:

Okay, so one would be—so creatine is not bad for you and it does not hurt your kidneys. That’d be one. Two, artificial sweeteners are not bad for you and the research is pretty sound that it can have net positive, at least net neutral, maybe net positive benefit, especially in the obesity population. So it has been shown to help with weight—and it is not inflammatory. It does not cause cancer. A lot of the studies that show those things are done on rodents and mice with absurd doses that would kill probably a human anyway. And so I’d say that artificial sweeteners are probably net neutral but may have net benefit. Unless another study comes out that debunks everything, there’d have to be a lot of them because there’s a lot of sound research on it.

Another one that we hear often would be that seed oils are bad for you and that they’re inflammatory. There’s no study that shows that seed oils are inflammatory. And it also shows that seed oils actually have cardiovascular and a multitude of other comorbid benefits when compared to other fats and oils.

Let me think of what else… fasted cardio. A lot of these are fitness related, but I hear a lot of doctors talking about it, probably because we don’t get enough nutrition and exercise training. That fasted training burns more fat than fed training. So that meaning if you work out without eating, then it’s only going to burn fat. And that’s just not true at all. We actually see that it’s probably neutral. But in some studies, it shows that fed training actually helps you to work harder, perform better, and maybe burn more calories throughout that workout anyway.

So those would be a handful of ones that I have that I think I hear most often. And why I think I hear them is like I’ll be in the hospital drinking a Diet Coke and another doctor will come up to me like, my gosh, you’re a doctor and you’re drinking a Diet Coke. I’m like, come on.

NP:

Yeah, it’s Michael Michael too, but he has no health benefit knowledge whatsoever. Deep Southern genetics.

MJ:

So you’re saying it’s okay for my protein creatine peanut butter shake artificially sweetened with Splenda is okay to drink after this? Okay, okay, good.

TM:

1000%. I could talk about this for hours. What a lot of people do not know is that the ADI for the artificial sweeteners that we use, that’s how much you can consume in a day for the rest of your life to not have adverse effects is about 21 cans of soda. Right? Like who in their right mind is consuming 21 cans of soda? No one. Right?

NP:

You can have way other issues with like your acid base status and phosphorus, like you’re not going to run into issues with aspartame.

MJ:

Dentist colleagues might have a problem with that too—for other reasons. Well, talking about fitness trends, so that you kind of talked about some of the debunking what doctors think, but in general now on the fitness trends, what is the most overrated fitness trend you’ve seen on social media recently?

TM:

Ooh, the… I’m gonna get hate for saying this probably, but the trend of being a hybrid athlete. And why I say I’m gonna get hate on that is because I would say that I’m a hybrid athlete. But I would say that like everybody under the sun is just trying to do like so many different things in fitness that I think that they’re truly just spinning their wheels. And like I think it’s amazing to be fit, you know, to lift heavy weights, to do cardio and stuff, but I think too many people are trying to take on too much and then they just spin their wheels and they don’t reach their goals in any category.

And so I think being a hybrid athlete right now is what everyone’s trying to do and to become. But I think they don’t understand that it takes years and years of training in each discipline to really achieve some of the goals that people have set out.

MJ:

Interesting. I have not heard that. I am interested if you were to just given your passion and how much you know about this, if you could eliminate one unhealthy habit from everyone’s routine immediately with the snap of your fingers, what would that unhealthy habit be?

TM:

Not sleeping eight hours a night. And I would be included in that. My Garmin is on me all the time and I would have so many health benefits from sleeping more. And so I think that would be the one. We see that sleep helps with longevity. We see that it helps with weight neutrality. We see that it helps with recovery from exercise, with muscle growth, with stress recovery. Sleep is the, like if someone wants a magic potion, if someone wants a magic drug, a magic pill to like be the best that they could be, it’d be sleeping as much as you possibly can.

MJ:

What is your Garmin? What’s your Garmin say? Your averages? You’re not allowed to say.

TM:

Can’t talk about it, can’t talk about it. So last year was five hours and 46 minutes. My annual average, yeah. This year I’m doing better, it’s about 6:45. My goal for this year is to truly be seven and above. So we’re trying hard.

NP:

Okay. Annual average.

MJ:

I can’t wait to talk to you in March of 2026 and see where you wound up for 2025.

TM:

Think anybody wants to see me with more sleep. Like I don’t know what would happen if I had more sleep.

MJ:

I think the first thing I would do is maybe four five more exclamation points and all your text.

NP:

Every hour of sleep you get another couple exclamation points. There’s got to be a multiple in there somewhere.

MJ:

It has to be it.

TM:

This is the best comment ever. You would not believe, you probably would believe, how many people at my place of work that was like, so until meeting you, I didn’t understand why you send emails like you do, but you send emails like you do because that’s who you are. Like, yeah, you’re right. You are correct.

MJ:

Yes, a lot of people use exclamation points and emails to like sound nice, but they’re actually not really and they don’t really want to communicate anything nice, but they think it’ll be a better receive. But for you, you’re actually that excited for every single sentence.

TM:

So it’s acceptable.

MJ:

It’s acceptable. I know we’re wrapping up. Ned, you have a couple of questions on just kind of professional stuff and then we have some rapid fire questions I to end with. But Ned.

NP:

Yeah, absolutely. So we got a couple of fun ones here at the end. So like, if you had complete control over medical education for one day, what would you immediately implement across the board for every?

TM:

Goodness, there are so many things. And I’m sure a lot of residents and stuff would want it to be wages or work hours, but honestly, I don’t think any of that creates happiness. You make more money, yeah, it helps, but that’s not happiness. You work a little bit less, that’s not necessarily happiness. So for me, just because I think that it could benefit their overall health and everything would be either, like you said…

I would probably implement that every training or every residency has its own personal workout center that includes everything from cardio to weights to Pilates to yoga to like absolutely everything they can and that every resident gets one hour a week at least to do that activity.

NP:

I like that, like protected physical time.

TM:

Yeah, protected physical health, yeah.

NP:

Or protected physical health time. Yeah, I think that’d be great, cause it’s also an hour away from work. Like somebody else carries your pagers, something else. Like I love that because you get a lot of what people are asking for, which is when grounding or I’m stressed around something else. I’m like, here’s an hour to disconnect. Like, know, 20 minutes of that or half of that could be meditation, you know, as a quiet room associate, like all of that, like that would be, I love it. I love it. Okay.

Okay. Another question here is,

Is there a moment in your career, as our relentless optimist here, but is there a moment in your career where you almost quit medicine?

TM:

So I’ll talk about two instances. One would be, I already talked about, was in medical school during my first year when my family life was falling apart, when I wasn’t doing well in school and I was just questioning.

Am I able to do this? Can I do this? So that would be probably the most serious time. And I would say all throughout my training before I became an actual doctor, there was multiple times where I thought maybe I should just leave medicine and do some sort of philanthropy stuff instead of going throughout the career of becoming a doctor and then doing stuff like that later on. So there’s multiple times where I was like, I should just be done and…

Go do these things that I want to do, you know? And so maybe those two instances. Yeah, now there’s been other extremely hard times in medicine where I didn’t question what I was doing, but that I was like broken in medicine. One was my first week as an attending.

NP:

What helped you stay? You’re obviously, you stayed, you know, through being broken through these challenging scenarios, like what helped you stay?

TM:

So just like what I was talking about earlier is that my framework and my foundation of everything in my life is that whatever that end goal is, and for me it is caring for patients and having those magical moments at the bedside with patients, that trumps all the suffering. Knowing that all the hell, all the suffering that I was gonna go…

Through was going to lead to moments like that I experienced that I talked about with carrots and lemons and know, multitude of others knowing that moments like that was on the other end of this, I would go through the hell that I went through times 10. I would go through it times 15. I’d go through it times 20. I would take on double the debt to get the opportunity to have the honor and privilege of being someone’s physician and serving them at the bedside. And even to this day, even though I went through it, I still say this like it is such an incredible rewarding job.

And I just, I think it’s the best job in the world.

NP:

I couldn’t agree more and thank you. I would not tell St. George’s you’d pay twice as much because if there anything like Ross, yeah, they’ll take it.

TM:

Hate it. Actually, think they’re calling me right now. Dang.

NP:

Peace out.

MJ:

We have some rapid fire questions. So these are actually statements and you have to tell us if you think they’re true or false. So here we go, let’s get started. Carbs are unfairly demonized, true or false? Residency is harder than medical school. I agree with that too. Most doctors neglect their own health.

TM:

Boy. True. False. True.

MJ:

Morning workouts are better than evening workouts.

TM:

Both are incredible, but I’ll say true.

MJ:

I kind of figured you couldn’t say that. Influence our culture as more positives than negatives.

TM:

This is going to be unpopular, but false. We’ll just say that the wellness industry is around a $6.5 trillion industry based upon them selling products that don’t work to steal people’s money. And so I would say that comes from influencer marketing, a lot of it. And I think that a lot of influencer marketing without sound evidence and integrity leads to a very corrupt system of selling things

MJ:

Tell me why.

TM:

That truly do not work. And in a world where you can demonize health care and make it seem like health care is out to get you, but then give a shiny new product that no one’s ever heard of for $100 a month, people will buy the shiny new product that has no evidence. And so I think from that aspect, and that’s another reason why I advocate for physicians to be on social media, because there’s so much that we have to overcome that we cannot do it unless we have a very large body of physicians willing to step out there and do it.

MJ:

What do you think about TikTok Shop?

TM:

Ooh, I have a love-hate relationship. I would say I’ve got some great things on TikTok Shop, but I’ve got some really cheap—bad word—but like really not good stuff off TikTok Shop. But I think the thing I have the biggest problem with it. So one example will be there’s this electrolyte supplement and you’ll have these—I shouldn’t say this—You’ll have this certain type of provider go on TikTok shop and be like, are you having brain fog and you feel tired all the time and you’re weak and you just wake up and you don’t feel good. All you need is this electrolyte supplement. Buy it for 50 bucks and they make $5 on everyone they sell. And so I think it’s a way for people to scam people. And so I don’t like that aspect of it. But then it has been life changing for some people. And I know that some people do it with great integrity, but people that may not have that integrity, they’re still making a killing by doing it by lying to people.

MJ:

It’s not like we don’t want people to feel better. We of course want that. The first part of our oath though is do no harm. So we take that very seriously. Here’s a statement. You could run, Tommy Martin could run a marathon right now in under 4:30. Like right now, no warmups. You just literally run right now. No, no, you can, you’re like, yeah, wow.

TM:

Right. Yes.

NP:

Going to like as soon as we’re done. That’s his next thing on his calendar.

MJ:

What is your PR?

TM:

My PR is 2:50.

MJ:

Okay, so that was a really great question that I read. Thank you.

TM:

With a weighted vest or like pushing Oliver or like I was waiting for what

MJ:

Sorry, sorry, sorry. I missed. My screen is shortened. I didn’t get that last part. 4:30, dragging four other people behind you. I missed that part.

NP:

Carrying Michael because that’s what he thinks is a good marathon time.

TM:

That’s awesome.

MJ:

Okay, last true or false, sleep is more important than exercise for overall health.

TM:

Oh man, after everything I’ve said on this podcast, that is so hard. I’m gonna say true.

MJ:

Okay, it’s consistent at least. I appreciate that with the earlier answers.

TM:

That was a hard one. I’m actually gonna have to research this as soon as we’re done.

MJ:

I can’t wait to get what the research based answer is.

TM:

I don’t know the true evidence behind it, but I know that there’s great benefit to both. But think sleep will win. I don’t know.

MJ:

Well, last question we always ask everybody this that I do. We are flooded with information all the time more than ever, but not all the time do we listen to information that actually changes our views. We likely reinforce our opinions. Many of us. So my question to you is what’s one thing you’ve actually recently changed your mind about?

TM:

This is terrible.

MJ:

I can’t wait.

TM:

No, it’s terrible because you prepared me and I still don’t know. So that’s why it is so terrible. I’m trying to, like, when you ask me, I’m trying to think of like a new study that came out or something that like…

MJ:

To be about medicine can

TM:

Okay, this is actually true. I hope it’s true if I’m gonna say it. So I previously thought that you needed to carb load for a marathon for about three to five days leading up to your race. But the most current literature, I think it was out of 2022, shows that you actually only need to carb load if you do it correctly for two days leading up to your race. And when you do that, you’ll consume about eight to 12 grams per kilogram of carbohydrates depending on the person. And so when I’m carbohydrate, when I’m carb loading for a race, I do 10 grams per kilogram of body weight of carbs the two days before and then the day before of carbohydrates.

MJ:

Because if you didn’t, you might run over 4:30. Is that what you’re saying?

TM:

Right, exactly.

MJ:

My gosh. Well, this was very fun. Dr. Martin, thanks for all the work you do. Where can people find you online?

TM:

Yeah, of course, any of my social media accounts, they’re all the same handle. It’s just the at sign and then dr.tommymartin, so Dr. Tommy Martin on all platforms.

MJ:

Amazing. Dr. Martin, thanks for joining us today. This is great. Thanks for your work you do and we’ll see you

TM:

Awesome thanks for having me guys.

NP:

Thanks for joining us this episode. You can catch the podcast for Doctors by Doctors on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, and all the major podcasting platforms. If you enjoyed this episode or learned anything here today, please take a moment to give us a rating and subscribe so that you don’t miss a single episode release. As always, thank you for listening. The next time you see a doctor, maybe you should prescribe this podcast. We’ll see you next time.

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