Dr Kristi Funk is a breast cancer surgeon in California. She has treated celebrities like Angelina Jolie and Sheryl Crow. How did she come in touch with Whole Food Plant-Based guidelines?
(73 mins, 2019) How to Reduce Cancer Risk | Interview with Kristi Funk, MD
Early in this interview, Dr Kristi Funk shares her personal story.
Dr Kristi Funk was actually following a Mediterranean Diet (which allows for meat, fish, dairy and oils) when she developed a strong urge to write a book. She wanted to share whatever she knew about breast cancer with the masses. She explains, 'it was as if God has asked me to do this!'. So she started spending 15 hours every weekend researching and writing. Throughout, she followed two principles:
She would pray, "O Lord! Let no falsehood pass my lips!"
She kept in mind an advise that a psychologist gave her, "Write with love and compassion for your readers".
Kristi knew that cancer is classified as a 'lifestyle disease', so she had to write about diet and nutrition. Interestingly, as she dug into cancer-related literature to formulate and justify her food guidelines, she discovered that Whole Food Plant-Based (WFPB) guidelines were the best — that prompted her to completely change her own food habits! Her husband and her three children also changed.
I also need to point a manicured finger at our flawed educational system. During my four years of undergrad, four years of med school, five years of general surgery training, and my surgical breast fellowship, nutrition was a fleeting mention in the form of the Krebs cycle in the middle of one lecture — and for many of us physicians, that was twenty to forty years ago. Most doctors do not explore the science of eating or the impact of lifestyle choices to the degree that knowledge affects their own behavior, let alone yours.
On page 15, she says:
Even when doctors do recognize the nutrition-illness connection, part of the reason they don't tell you much is a reimbursement issue. Just as insurance companies don't pay for your gym membership, weight-loss program or stress management course, they don't reimburse us doctors to spend time detailing preventive strategies. Doctors already need to stay up-to-date on what you expect from them, like screening guidelines and the best treatments for all the diseases they handle, which leaves no time for researching and dispensing extra freebies like, "Hey, did you know that three cups of green tea a day cuts breast cancer risk in half?" (By the way, did you?)
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