Episode 69: A Physician's Journey as a Cancer Caregiver
Cancer care is difficult enough to navigate as someone with little to no healthcare/biology background, but what does it mean when a physician faces similar challenges within the healthcare system? Dr. Jean-Luc “JL” Neptune shares his compelling caregiver story of caring for his mother and father's cancer diagnoses simultaneously with the help of his sister. We delve into how his experience impacted his career, his outlook into the flaws of the healthcare system, and his perspective on what patients (and caregivers) can do to get the most out of their care.
Key Highlights:
- Access to contextualized information is not easy; information online without context can be overwhelming and not specific to the patient. The best source of information about your diagnosis and prognosis is likely a doctor in the field, but finding one with the time to fully inform you is not an easy feat either.
- Fee-for-service care is the current healthcare model, which arguably promotes quantity over quality. However, the tide is slowly but surely shifting towards value-based care.
- To achieve the highest quality care today, the best thing you can do is advocate for yourself and seek multiple expert opinions. Keeping track of your symptoms is a good idea for effectively and efficiently contextualizing your treatment plan with your provider(s).
About our guest:
Jean-Luc (“JL”) Neptune, MD MBA is a physician executive, digital health leader, investor and advisor with 20+ years of experience in the health innovation space. Dr. Neptune most recently served as the CEO, Chief Medical Officer, and co-founder of Suntra Modern Recovery, which provided early addiction intervention and treatment services at scale. Prior to Suntra Modern Recovery Dr. Neptune was the founder of Athletik Health Inc., which operated modern sports medicine clinics offering the “athlete in everyone” outstanding clinical care and customer service. Dr. Neptune served as entrepreneur-in-residence at the Hospital For Special Surgery (“HSS”), the #1 rated orthopedic hospital in the United States, working closely with the leadership team of the HSS Innovation Institute. Dr. Neptune was also General Manager at Blueprint Health where he oversaw investments into dozens of digital health companies (including RubiconMD, NexHealth, Moving Analytics, and CleanSlate UV), and continues as a partner in the Blueprint investment funds. Dr. Neptune earned a BA from Columbia College at Columbia University, an MD from the Columbia College of Physicians and Surgeons, and an MBA at the Wharton School. Dr. Neptune completed a residency in internal medicine at New York Presbyterian Hospital and is licensed to practice medicine in the state of New York.
Key Moments:
At 01:50 “If you are an off-pattern patient, in other words, if you come in with a pattern that we're (doctors) not familiar with, it can be really difficult. If you think about HIV in the early days, doctors didn't know what that was. If you think about people who have things like fibromyalgia and diseases like that, those are very difficult diseases to manage. And patients often have to really advocate for themselves to try to find a solution if they don't fit a pattern.”
At 10:55 “I've often debated with people online about access to information and really as a patient, should you be like going on the internet and looking at all these sites? And my argument is you shouldn't because unless you can contextualize this information, make it specific to you and cut out all of the noise from the signal, you're probably only making yourself more stressed out, more confused by seeking information from all these places.”
At 33:22 “Try to use a breadth of resources, realize that experts are going to be the people that you want to talk to. I am a believer that expertise exists in a variety of different ways. So you can be talking to licensed experts like doctors and nurses and other people. But I do think that there is a community of patient experts. Certainly anybody who's been through your particular diagnosis can be an expert and can be very helpful to you. Be active, advocate for yourself, ask questions.”
At 39:34 “I just think that most patients don't understand what to expect, but the providers understand what to expect, but don't necessarily understand that the patients don't understand.”
At 41:18 “We consistently say that navigating cancer is like a treacherous hike where you don't get access to a map, relevant gear, or a guide. The map is your crucial part. Gear and guide only mean so much, but if you don't know where the heck you are and where you're going next, like, don't give me the full backpack, what will I do with it? I need to know where I am. The very first thing is like, where am I now? What are the next things I need to do? And what does it look like two months from now, three months from now, six months from now? Because we often forget that People have lives. We need to plan things. You have jobs, you have kids, you have parents, you have work that needs to be told if you can come to work on a certain day or not. And we forget the practical aspects of life when we enter the healthcare system.”
Disclaimer: This podcast is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute the practice of medicine, nursing or other professional health care services, including the giving of medical advice, and no doctor/patient relationship is formed. The use of information on this podcast or materials linked from this podcast is at the user's own risk. The content of this podcast is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Users should not disregard, or delay in obtaining, medical advice for any medical condition they may have, and should seek the assistance of their health care professionals for any such conditions.
YouTube Chapters:
0:00-9:39 Dr. Neptune’s caregiver story
9:40-16:52 The dilemma of accessible, relevant information
16:53-24:33 The obsolete business of healthcare today
24:34-26:14 Life after caregiving and its impacts on one’s trajectory
26:15-36:27 Rapid fire: fee for service, prognosis, and more
36:28-42:54 The goal of Manta Cares (and communities like us)
42:55-43:48 Outro and disclaimer
YouTube Tags: Manta Cares, caregiver, cancer, hospice, primary care, caregiving, glioblastoma, fee-for-service, value-based care, advice for clinicians, advice for cancer patients, advice for caregivers, cancer sucks, american healthcare