 We're coming to you from our studios of think te kawaii in downtown Honolulu and from my home office in Makiki. You all know that I'm a promoter of prevention and awareness. Today, Dr. Oliveira will be talking to us about just that, disease prevention and quality of life. Welcome Dr. Arnoldo Oliveira. Thank you, Wendy. Thank you so much for inviting me and thank you for think te kawaii for allowing this space for us to talk about important issues. Yes, you know, I've been wanting you to come on my show for a long, long time. Your schedule has always booked up, so that's why I reserved you and you are here. So I'm very excited to share you with the rest of the world. So Dr. Oliveira, please share a little bit about yourself before we begin. I've been working in natural medicine for the past 20 years here in Honolulu, Hawaii. My focus is on prevention, disease prevention, but also I want quality of life and I'm very interested in increasing your health span. Or in other words, I want you to be as healthy as possible for the long time as possible. And all these things together will lead to longevity as well. So I work with natural medicines and natural therapies to achieve that goal. Well, I know that when I first met you, it came from, I had to be referred to you and making sure that I understood what type of doctor you are and that I received whatever information they gave me about you. And I was positive that walking into your office would make some difference in one way or another for my benefit. So I was very grateful to do that, walk into your office. But when I got to you, I know that you were sharing with me a little bit about where your medical history comes from. I know that you're from Brazil and what was your specialty in Brazil? I was born and raised in Rio, Brazil and in Brazil I was a trauma surgeon. I practiced that for a long time. I specialized in facial trauma and after a while, I believe that God brought me to Hawaii and so I changed my focus to emergency medicine like trauma surgery to natural medicine. And it's been a wonderful 20 years. Wow, 20 years already, huh, doctor? So I know from a trauma surgeon in Brazil to a doctor in acupuncture and oriental medicine here in Hawaii, cultures are different, people are different. Medicine is different but you've nailed it by focusing on just prevention and wellness and through what you've been doing as an obedient servant of God. So I'm very grateful that you heard the call and you were very obedient by coming and not knowing what was on the other side of the water. You came and you were very, as I said, obedient and look at where you are now. You've helped so many people in your practice. So I would like to ask you, how would you describe your practice, Dr. Oliveira? Well, to describe my practice, we need also to talk about what is going on in the world and especially in this wonderful country. We, our citizens are suffering from chronic disease and the healthcare system is not really healthcare but more like disease care. So the therapies and the drugs and everything never look to the causes of disease. In my practice, I will look and try to find what is causing the disease itself and try to deal with the causes. For example, I think that we are spending over $4 trillion in chronic disease and chronic disease is cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular stroke, but without having very good results the average American is taking anywhere from five to 15 different drugs daily. And in my practice, we, by identifying the causes, we hope that we improve not only the quality of life but also the health care. Well, wow, what a concept. Right, what a concept. So, what is the difference between disease and chronic disease? Chronic disease is disease that it's not like acute. It's a disease that has a longstanding. For example, diabetes or cancer, those things don't, don't appear overnight. It's like an overtime process of not eating well and of having too much inflammation. Inflammation will lead to chronic disease, especially cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular, stroke and things like that, autoimmune. Yes. So what diseases do you treat in your practice? Well, I would say that about 85% of my focus is on prevention. So I do treat diseases, but I try to prevent that the diseases happen anyway. And I'll treat anything, but I'll treat things that with natural medicines and it can be anything, basically. Right. Somebody comes in the door, you run your test and your process on them, and then you diagnose them. And then the good thing is you being, I want to call it Eastern medicine. I don't know what the proper term is, but those systems that you use. You're not invasive, you're not drawing blood or you're not going in for any dissections of any sort, but you are doing, and again, correct me if I'm wrong, I tell people it's the pressure points and you by looking at the different organs through pressure points, you can diagnose and see some of the issues that's going on in your body. Is that correct? That's correct. So I use a technique that was developed by a German doctor called Dr. Paul, and it's called electro acupuncture, according to Paul. And so I measure points on the fingers and toes and these points are associated with organs and systems of the body. By doing that, I'm able to see what the problem is. And then I use homeopathy and other herbal products to treat the problems. That's amazing. I went to your clinic. I didn't tell you what was wrong with me and you looked at me and you did that pressure point and I call it like a probe, like a joystick, but I just sat there and I was ready to receive what you could find out that was going on in my body and you absolutely nailed it. And so I am a true believer of it, of course. And what I did know and I share with others is that go into the office and be ready to receive good news, bad news, whatever the news the doctor wants to share with you, you need to be ready to receive it. Because he's not going to tell you, oh, you're great. You didn't come in to hear that. So you're going to tell them the truth and what's going on in their body. And I thought that was very important. So as I said, I went in, sat, listened. That was very difficult for me to do, but I just listened. And you absolutely nailed what was going on in my body and then you were able to diagnose and prepare this treatment for me that through course of time you fixed me. And it was my pancreas and you elevated it to function at a higher level so that I would not have to take common medicine, medication for the rest of my life. So for that, I'm truly grateful. And I wanted that for more and more people who are ready to receive what you have in your clinic. So that's why I really wanted you to come on this program so that you could share with others because it's hard for me to just keep talking and talking to everybody, but that we have this they can better have a level, better level of confidence to walk into your doors knowing that you can try your best to locate what's going on in their body and direct them to wellness. Is that correct? That's correct. Yeah, so we, like you described, we only use natural medicines and herbs and homeopathy and we've been doing this for a long time. The main focus is on prevention, but we do treat. And by doing that, we seem to really increase health spend. We also focus a lot on the blue zones and the traits of the blue zones. For those who don't know, the blue zones are five places on this planet where there are an unusual number of centenarians. In other words, the people who live, who passed 100 years of life. And these places are the Costa Rica, Paloma Linda, California, Sardinia, a Greek island named Icarus, and Okinawa. And we just had an Okinawa festival this weekend to celebrate the great community of Okinawans here. So they have common traits of things and it seems that they do the similar things to live longer. One is to move the lots. They are always walking. The other one is that they seem to manage your stress really well. They kind of slow down, they downshift. They stop eating when they are 80% full. And I think the Okinawans have a saying for that which is, para i tibume, which means when you 80% full you stop. Their diet is basically a plant-based diet. They eat very little fish or pork and rarely red meat. They seem to have a plan of life. And again, you know, the Okinawans call that ikigai, like a purpose in life. They also, they put a lot of emphasis on family. If you go to, if you visit those places, there's no nursing homes. They take care of their elderly. They have friends that they share life with. And also the Okinawans have a name for that, which is moai. And they drink a little glass of wine at five. They have joy, they have a spirituality. They seem to have like a connection with a higher power, not religion, more spirituality. So all these things seem to make people live longer. And we try to apply the same concepts in the clinic here. Wow, well, you passed the test of what is the blue zone. And so that's amazing. I mean, sometimes I forget one of the five, but you've absolutely nailed it. I'm so proud of the people of the blue zones. And we really try and try hard and will continue to try that Hawaii should be one of those blue zones because of our size, our location. And the fact that we can eat a lot of the food that Hawaii produces, the outdoor activities, everything about it. Plus we have community, plus we have intergenerational within a home. So that really helps all of these things should make Hawaii a blue zone. So folks out there, we need to work harder for that to happen because we want to be number six on that list because it's just amazing when you watch the generations how they mix. And I think that's a large part of it. I love to see the centenarians reading the preschoolers coming out of school and giving them a hug. That's what we need. We need more of that intergenerational and then the diet, the quality of life, the level of stress. Everything makes for a blue zone which Hawaii should be. So what you're doing and together we can all make a difference towards that direction we need it. All right. Yes. Yes, and blue is my favorite color so we need to make Hawaii more blue. Yeah. Okay. So chronic disease is a big problem. What are the causes of chronic disease? Well, I briefly mentioned that in the main cause of chronic disease is inflammation. Inflammation is a process, a natural process in the body that it's meant to help us to protect us. If inflammation goes rampant and chronic, you will lead to cancer, to diabetes, to cardiovascular, to stroke, to Alzheimer's, autoimmune, and you name it, there's a big list of chronic diseases. But what is more important in my focus is what causes inflammation. And in that slide that you just showed, there are different factors that cause inflammation. One of them is stress. The stress is directly related to increase inflammation. Another cause of inflammation is bad food. It's processed food with a lot of chemicals that will invariably cause inflammation in the body. Obesity is a contributor factor for inflammation. Like gut issues also create inflammation in the body. We also have diseases like viral and bacterial diseases that cause inflammation in the body. For example, the COVID that caused a lot of inflammation in the lung that initially killed people. Pollution causes inflammation, like environmental toxins, like eating veggies that are sprayed on with pesticides, herbicides. That causes inflammation. Lack of sleep causes inflammation. We need to work on our sleep to avoid that. These are the areas that I focus my practice to prevent that inflammation stays in this chronic state and will lead to diseases like diabetes and cancer and cardiovascular. How do I do that? In terms of stress, I will try to manage stress. I go from there. If you have environmental toxins, I'll help your body to detox. If you need to lose weight, we'll help you to do that. If you have a viral or bacterial infection, we also treat that. If you need to sleep better, we'll work on what we call sleep hygiene so you can sleep soundly and consistently longer times. That's the focus of what we do here on a daily basis. Your approach is definitely holistic and that's what I really love. Knowing that we can come in there and I'm not going to walk out and being sent to the pharmacist and getting all four and five and six bottles of things that I can't even pronounce to take into my body. But that you could just tell me what I need to do and get to me what you have there which you highly researched and know how they will affect cause of reason I came to you. So with all these factors that you've described causing all this inflammation and chronic diseases, how does your practice address these difficult issues? How do you tell us and what do we need to do after you've diagnosed us and found out what's our cause? What does your clinic do for us? Well, you briefly show a slide that is showing exactly what we do with a holistic approach. If your stress is a big factor for your inflammation or is it creating health damage, we have to address that. And how do we do that? We can use natural medicines to do that. We can use techniques to help you manage your stress better. If stress is always going to exist, but we have to manage so it doesn't take over our immune system and inflammation doesn't grow out of control because of stress. And then we work on like if you need to lose weight, yes, if weight is a factor and causes inflammation, we're going to help you to lose weight. There are wonderful natural techniques that people sometimes like they lose 8 pounds a week and that's a highly anti-inflammatory therapy that I use is a mimicking fast diet. It's really effective. We need to fix your gut. If your gut is not working well, about 60% of your immune system is in the gut and we have to fix that. How do we do that? Again, we use natural medicines to do that. We improve your diet. We're going to give you sound nutritional recommendations and instructions. If you have a viral infection, we're going to treat that naturally as well. What we do here is really effective against those things. If you need to be detox, the same way we are going to deploy all our therapies to help you detox from natural environmental toxins. And that's basically a holistic approach addressing all the issues that might cause inflammation. I just really wanted you to talk about that and what I'm hearing you say that the holistic approaches that you are using are all natural remedies. I know that you will fix and prepare exactly what each patient needs according to their needs. I call you like an apothecarian. You find out what's wrong with us and you measure out what we need and then you go to your little table and you start mixing things. I thought that's so cool and knowing that it's not like a pharmaceutical and one more pill after another. And like I said, the ones that we can't even pronounce. So I know that I'm in good hands when I walk into your door and I want others to know that if they're serious about wellness or about prevention, that they would seek a higher means of cure and of getting or feeling better. And that's by walking into your clinic and understanding how valuable what you do for them. And yes, it's not that cheap guys. It's not. However, it's a one time you're going to get well and better. So you don't have to pay for the rest of your life every month. Even if it's a copay from a doctor or a hospital, you're going to pay upfront, but it's not that bad. But it will take care of you and it'll take care of your body so your body doesn't have to endure unnecessary stress. But you are going to endure when taking pharmaceuticals. So I'm so grateful to you, doctor, and you can hear it in my voice. So after addressing all of your all the other inflammation causing factors, what do you do to increase the lifespan, the quality of life and longevity of me and your patients? Well, we talk a little bit about that. So I use the blue zone concepts and I tried to adapt that not only to my life personally, but also to the patients. If you can move around more, if you can walk more, if you can be more physically active, you don't really need a gym, but you need to be active. You need to leave your couch and walk. If you need to buy something, don't use your car, just walk or buy. We need to control our stress, all of us. We need to manage stress. We need to get less overwhelmed with life. And this is the blue zones. Exactly what I'm talking here. You downshift. You have to stop eating too much. When you're 80% full, you just stop it because you don't need to go on and have seconds. You have to have a cleaner diet, basically a plant-based diet. It's okay to have some animal protein, but not the level that most Americans do. We need to have a plan, a purpose in life. Not only to our lives, but how we apply our gifts to our communities to help others. We need to have joy. That's the wine at five means. You don't need to drink wine, but you have to have joy. You have to respect the elderly and to love the elderly, to take care of them. You have to have friends. You have to have some sort of spirituality, some kind of connection to a higher power. We try to apply that on a daily basis and that invariably not only help us to prevent disease, but also improves our quality of life. It increases our health spend and all of these factors will lead to longevity, invariably. Over the course of the last few years, there's a lot of negative things that we had to endure, but there were a lot of positive and we always have to try and find the positive in everything that happens. My takeaway from the last few years is that I didn't drive hardly as much, but I did walk more. I was walking, I live up on Ward Avenue. I was walking to Makali, then to Olimwata Park. I was walking to Chinatown. I walked everywhere because I had more time and just because. I still continue those habits, walking, walking, walking. I'm not a runner, but I do love to walk. Then I walk to the beach and I walk to the parks and we walk and walk. I think those, as I said, anything that happens, good or bad, you always want to look for the good. For me, the last few years really encouraged me to get out, walk more. When I walked more, I felt better. It was easier for me to claim a healthier lifestyle. I thought I was living a healthy lifestyle, but it got even healthier. When I went to see you the last time, we talked about the consumption of beef, right? Because one of my friends says, oh my gosh, Dr. Oliveira eats meat. I said, of course he does. You shared with me and I want to share with everyone that it's not that we eat meat, but it's how much of it we eat. Just exactly what you said, Dr. Oliveira. Yes, we can reward ourselves with all the yummy things, but it's how much we eat. That really, really matters. Thank you for confirming that, Dr. Oliveira, and really emphasizing the blue zones. I wish more people would look into that so they can see how to live and live better, along with all the great advice that you share with us. Dr. Oliveira, for those of us who want to improve their quality of life, their health span and live longer, where are you located and how do we get in touch with you when they want to take their health back? Right here in Honolulu, this is my information there. You can call. I think I have a phone number there. I'd love to meet you and to talk to you if you have any questions. There is a great documentary on the blue zones on Netflix right now. I encourage everybody to watch because it's a very effective way to improve your quality of life and hopefully live longer. But if you need help in other areas, also I'm here. Very good. He's there and he has office hours that you can call his secretary, Secretary Sandra will be there to answer your calls and book an appointment for you. But right now, Dr. Oliveira, our show has now come to a close. I would like to just mahalo you, Dr. Arnold Oliveira, for taking some time out of your very busy schedule to help all of us work on prevention so that we can enjoy a better quality of life. I am Wendy Lowe and we'll return in two weeks with another edition of Taking Your Health Back. Aloha and mahalo Dr. Oliveira.