Some spine surgeons have poured time into side hustles that also support patient care outside the clinic.
Three spine surgeons discussed the businesses they’ve launched on current and upcoming episodes of “Becker’s Spine and Orthopedic Podcast.”
Gbolahan Okubadejo, MD, created the 360 CoreBoard, which has been on the market for about a half decade, he said. The 360 CoreBoard is a fitness device designed to strengthen the abdominal muscles.
“I have a vested interest in prevention,” Dr. Okubadejo said. “I’ve been vested in optimizing body’s performance to minimize the risk of injury or just to be able to cope with pathology and avoid having surgery.”
Other spine surgeons, including Ramin Rak, MD, have looked at the nutritional aspect of brain and spine health. Dr. Rak created iMind Brain Food, a line of nutritional snack bars. His product includes 15 plants, roots and nuts to support brain
“Everybody’s worried about the number of calories they take a day,” Dr. Rak said. “What is the sugar content, or what is the protein? And at the end of the day no one really thinks about if they feed their brain properly? Does what I’m consuming every day really provide the nutrition that my brain needs as an as an human organ?”
Similarly Franco Vigna, MD, has made his own ventures to create nutraceuticals to help take the guesswork out of pain management and wellness.
“We have one called Relief, that is for inflammation,” he said. “We have another one for joint health, and we have them for neuropathy. We have multiple others. We’ve been providing these to our patients, and patients can have subscription service … I’m also trying to help other physicians do well and build their business and help other physicians to help their own patients. So we’ve been white labeling these.”
