Urology and Investing w/ Dr. Felecia Froe, MD

Episode Information

April 11, 2022

Urologist Dr. Felecia Froe talks about her travels around the United States, her journey to becoming a urologist, her investments in real estate, bladder cancer prevention, the doctor-patient relationship, and more.

Topics Include:

• The different places she’s lived in the US
• Her move to Tulsa, Oklahoma
• Her journey from veterinary medicine to pharmacy to urology
• The time she spent at Kaiser Permanente
• Her investing side business
• Her involvement with Doctorpedia and the advantages of the platform
• The causes, prevention and treatment of bladder cancer
• The doctor-patient relationship
• What she does for fun
• How she tries to stays healthy

Highlights

• “My father was a veterinarian and he worked for Pfizer in the animal health division. I went in to tell him one day that I [also] wanted to be a veterinarian and he just looked at me [with] the stare of a father that said, ‘If you’re going to school that long, you’re going to be a medical doctor.’ … From that day forward, I don’t remember ever, ever again thinking about going to vet school.”
• “I decided to match in urology, and I can’t tell you how many people told me it would never happen. They didn’t think I was smart enough, good enough, whatever. [But] after many, many years of thinking about it, I realized that if somebody tells me I can’t do it, the next thing I’m gonna do is do it.”
• “One of my patients at the time was relatively young. She never seemed to be bound by anything else in her life. And so one day I was asking her what she does, and she said, ‘I do real estate investing.’ And then she and I struck up a friendship. And she went with me to look at my first property that I was thinking about buying. And she basically said, ‘Listen, if you don’t buy this, I’m gonna buy it.’ And basically took all the risk out of it. She said, ‘If you buy it and it doesn’t work, I’ll buy it from you.’ …  That’s where we started.”
• “One of the things that I am very passionate about is empowering people to be their own advocate. I don’t necessarily like the word ‘advocate,’ but to speak for themselves and to take personal responsibility for themselves in every way, including their health.”
• “So many people go online with whatever their symptoms are. And the scariest thing in the world pops up as one of the first things. And they are frightened and just so worried.  But to get information that is more practical and realistic, so you have testicle pain, go to Doctorpedia, hear somebody talk about testicle pain, and that the most common thing is just, it just hurts. To know that that’s the most common thing would help you sleep at night.”
• “[Doctorpedia’s] little two minute, three minute videos [contain] a lot of information, but you don’t have to take it all in at once. The way it’s curated is little short things that you can take in as you need to get what you want.”
• “A lot of people equate money to life and death. Money is not life and death. You have your basics covered. Everything else is gravy on top of that. And we can always make more money. There’s so much money in the world. There’s so much money to be made. It’s all there. Your life and your health are one thing, and once they’re gone, they’re gone.”
• “Communication and building trust are the biggest things and the most important things in [the doctor-patient] relationship.”
• “If you want to try something, try it. Don’t be afraid of making a mistake. Don’t be afraid of looking stupid. Don’t be afraid of anything. Do it. Mistakes are learning chances. Looking stupid is how we grow.”

Episode Transcript

Daniel Lobell: (00:00)
This podcast or any written material derived from its transcripts represents the opinions of the medical professional being interviewed. The content here is for informational purposes only and should not be taken as medical advice. Since every person is unique, please consult your healthcare professional for any personal or specific needs.

Daniel Lobell: (00:25)
Hello and welcome back, or welcome for the first time, to the Doctorpedia podcast. I’m your host, Daniel Lobell, and today I am honored to be joined on the line by Dr. Felecia Froe. How are you Dr. Froe?

Felecia Froe, MD: (00:39)
I am doing fairly well today. Thank you, Daniel.

Daniel Lobell: (00:43)
And I understand you’re coming to us all the way from “Oklahoma, where the wind goes…” [Both laugh]

Felecia Froe, MD: (00:50)
I am calling you from Oklahoma today, which is… I’m gonna tell you, not a place I thought I’d ever live, but I’ve lived in quite a few places where I thought I’d never live, so, we can get into that later.

Daniel Lobell: (01:00)
Maybe you just were like, “You know what? I can’t go through my whole life without being afraid of a tornado. Come on.”

Felecia Froe, MD: (01:06)
[Felecia laughs] Well, I wasn’t afraid of a tornado. I’ve lived in Kansas City, so I’ve been in the Midwest before, but Oklahoma? Really?

Daniel Lobell: (01:13)
So what brought you to Oklahoma?

Felecia Froe, MD: (01:16)
Well, after living a lot of different places where we’ll get into, I started… Well, this is an interesting question because it takes a lot. I moved to Oklahoma, I moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma because of a product I was doing in my real estate investing company. Building grocery stores in food deserts. So we opened a grocery store here and I came here to make sure that project was going well.

Daniel Lobell: (01:43)
Wow. So you’ve got obviously multiple talents and you’re not strictly working in the medical world, I guess.

Felecia Froe, MD: (01:52)
That is correct. That is correct.

Daniel Lobell: (01:53)
That’s pretty cool. I think you may be the first doctor I’ve spoken to who’s also building grocery stores. [Daniel laughs] I think that’s a pretty cool distinction. [Felecia chuckles]

Felecia Froe, MD: (02:04)
Well, it was about getting nutritious food to people. And so a grocery store was the most logical thing to do. Full service grocery store, so that’s what we did.

Daniel Lobell: (02:12)
And food is the best medicine. It’s the tastiest, anyway.

Felecia Froe, MD: (02:17)
It is the best. And we’re trying to get that word out.

Daniel Lobell: (02:21)
So you said you’ve lived all over the place. Is there a reason that you move so much, or a story behind that?

Felecia Froe, MD: (02:32)
So my — well, the short story is I’m running from the law, but that’s always just the funny thing to say. [Both laugh] But as my… I think it started with my parents actually. So I was born in Alabama. Tuskegee, Alabama. And when I was eight, we moved to Indiana. And when I was a senior in high school, I moved to Kansas City, Missouri. And I kind of believe that that transition right there where I just never connected with a lot of people, made long term friendships with people, made it easy for me to move. And so when I get bored somewhere, get tired of something, or I’m too cold — I lived in St. Paul, Minnesota for five years.

Daniel Lobell: (03:11)
That’s pretty cold.

Felecia Froe, MD: (03:13)
And that was just too cold. So I just move. So I went to college in Missouri, University of Missouri, Columbia, residency and medical school, medical school and residency. And then my first job, urologist’s job, was in St. Paul, Minnesota. Stayed there until zero degrees felt warm. And then I realized it’s time to go. I moved back to Kansas City. Then my first time quitting medicine, I moved to El Paso, Texas to do a little locum’s work, then moved to Hawaii. Honolulu, Hawaii, when I realized I had to keep doing urology. So I decided I was gonna do it someplace pretty.

Daniel Lobell: (03:49)
Yeah. Wow.

Felecia Froe, MD: (03:51)
And then for a lot of other reasons, I moved to California, Northern California, where I stayed for 11 years, and really started my real estate investing. And then now I’m in Tulsa, Oklahoma because of real estate investing.

Daniel Lobell: (04:06)
Amazing. So you’ve really seen a lot of this country in such extreme different places.

Felecia Froe, MD: (04:13)
A lot of different places. Yes.

Daniel Lobell: (04:14)
I mean like Hawaii versus St. Paul, that’s not only difference in weather, but culture. And I mean, I’ve performed a bunch of times in St. Paul and that’s a whole nother world out there.

Felecia Froe, MD: (04:29)
It is different. And I do tell people, I had to go all the way to Hawaii to warm up after five years in St. Paul. [Daniel chuckles] I never thought weather would be that important to me, but it is that important to me.

Daniel Lobell: (04:43)
It’s funny because when I moved to California, everybody would say, oh, you know — I got to LA, I’d say, ‘What do people like about it here?” And they’d say, ‘Oh, the weather.” And I said, “The weather? That’s all you got?” And now 10 years later, I’m like, when people ask me, I’m like, “The weather!” [Both laugh] “The weather’s great! You don’t need more than the weather!” [Felecia laughs]

Felecia Froe, MD: (05:05)
Well, because if you start talking about the traffic, you kind of go downhill. You start talking about some of the cost of living, you kind of go downhill. So, it’s the weather.

Daniel Lobell: (05:16)
Yeah. The weather is enough reason though. It’s a fantastic thing to have. So when did you decide you wanted to be a doctor? Was that when you were moving around as a kid?

Felecia Froe, MD: (05:29)
I decided that… So my father was a veterinarian and he worked for, he never practiced like working with animals, like you think of a veterinarian. He worked for Pfizer and worked animal health division. But I wanted to be a veterinarian. He used to take us around with him when he would go to farms and let me hold the pigs as he was giving them their medications. And it was just cool to me. So I went in to tell him one day I wanted to be a veterinarian and he just looked at me, he made the stare of a father that said, “If you’re going to school that long, you’re going to be a medical doctor.” [Daniel chuckles]. And from that day forward, I was gonna be a medical doctor. And I was in probably, I was in high school. I think I was a senior in high school at that point. And from that day forward, I don’t remember ever, ever again thinking about going to vet school.

Daniel Lobell: (06:26)
Yeah. I remember wanting to be a veterinarian when I was a kid too. Anyway, I volunteered at a vet for a summer. And that was the end of that dream. I loved the idea of working with animals. I didn’t love seeing them bleeding all over a table.

Felecia Froe, MD: (06:40)
Yeah. Yeah.

Daniel Lobell: (06:41)
So your dad helped you make that shift from veterinary medicine to medicine medicine, or human medicine, whatever you would call it.

Felecia Froe, MD: (06:48)
Yes.

Daniel Lobell: (06:49)
And then, what was the path from there? When did you decide to go into medical school? How you decide what medical school you wanted to go to and what was your general experience with medical school?

Felecia Froe, MD: (07:05)
So actually it still wasn’t a straight path. I went to undergrad at University of Missouri, Columbia. And after about two years of that, I thought, “Man, this is just a lot. It’s a lot.” And I don’t see how I’m ever gonna to be able to have the life I want, be a mom, get married, do all the things I think I wanna do in my life, and be a doctor. Because, high school was easy for me. It was like, you barely did anything and you could get A’s and get through it. It was not difficult. College was a different story. Physics and all the pre-med stuff, and it was just very challenging. I had tutors, I had all of it, it was just hard work. Not that I didn’t have a good time, but it was also very hard work. So I ultimately decided to go to pharmacy school. So I left University of Missouri, Columbia, went to pharmacy school, and stayed in pharmacy school for a couple of years and realized I’ll be bored. Just bored, being a pharmacist. And ultimately quit. Quit pharmacy school, got my undergrad degree and got accepted into medical school against my father’s wishes. He thought I should stay in pharmacy school and finish pharmacy school and work as a pharmacist for a while. So I could pay my way through medical school.

Daniel Lobell: (08:24)
Mhm.

Felecia Froe, MD: (08:25)
But his bullheaded daughter decided, “No, dad, that’s not what I’m gonna do. I’m gonna just drop this one and move to the next one.” And recently he told me, ‘You know, you were right. You did the right thing.” By doing that. So that was a good thing to hear.

Daniel Lobell: (08:40)
Yeah. That’s good. You got the validation in the end.

Felecia Froe, MD: (08:43)
Yes. And then medical school was, what medical school probably is for most people. An interesting event in your life. You go through that. And I went into medical school, once I decided to go, I went in there thinking, “Okay, I’m gonna be primary care, family practice, internal medicine, pediatrics, maybe even geriatrics.” I mean, I was pretty sure it was gonna be something like that.

Daniel Lobell: (09:05)
Mhm.

Felecia Froe, MD: (09:07)
And the third and fourth years of medical school, you start doing rotations on different services where you’re really trying to see what you really wanna do. And my first one was family practice and I absolutely hated it.

Daniel Lobell: (09:20)
Why?

Felecia Froe, MD: (09:21)
I did not… It was very slow to me. People didn’t get better. You kind of just limped them along and you treated symptoms and nothing ever got better. You were just treating the same thing month after month after month. Their high blood pressure, the diabetes, their… Whatever they had, just, they didn’t get better. They had the disease, but it was managed, that kind of thing. So you were managing a thing. Pediatrics, I didn’t really like, because I didn’t like, like how you didn’t like being a veterinarian. The idea is cool. Being a pediatrician, the kids were great. Parents of sick children are very difficult. And it was, that part made me not wanna do that. I didn’t do that.

Daniel Lobell: (10:11)
We’ve had some pediatricians on this show who’ve expressed that on the podcast.

Felecia Froe, MD: (10:15)
Yes, yes. So I’m in this place where I thought I knew what I wanted and I don’t want any of that. So now am I in this, did I make a mistake? Do I not really wanna do medicine? What am I gonna do? So I mean, I have to keep going. I’m in these rotations. I did general surgery next, which I really, really liked. Then I did OBGYN, which I really, really liked, but didn’t think I wanted that lifestyle, of being up in the middle of the night, delivering somebody else’s baby. I mean, I loved the whole thing, it was just the lifestyle that I didn’t like. And then urology was my next rotation. And I gotta tell you, these were the happiest doctors that I worked with. And being with them was fun. Their call, you’d get up, and every once in a while you had to go in, but it was usually not bad. Call, which was a life I thought I could live, wanting children, wanting to get married, all those other things. So there you go. Then I decided to match in urology, and I can’t tell you how many people told me it would never happen.

Daniel Lobell: (11:23)
That you becoming a urologist would never happen?

Felecia Froe, MD: (11:26)
They told me it would not happen. At the time, there were not very many women urologists. They didn’t think I was smart enough, good enough, whatever. They didn’t think to match into a program. So, I kind of, after many, many years of thinking about this, I realized that if somebody tells me I can’t do it, the next thing I’m gonna do is do it.

Daniel Lobell: (11:48)
Mhm. I was gathering that. [Both chuckle] Two things that I’ve picked up so far is one, you like proving people wrong, and two, you like to try a little of everything until you figure out what works.

Felecia Froe, MD: (12:00)
You got it. So I did apply, I did match my first time and I actually ended up at the University of Missouri, Columbia, where I went to medical school. So they liked me. Went through that program. And I was their first black chief resident. I actually got pregnant during my residency and had — their first one to ever have a baby, the only resident to have a baby. So the guys’ wives had babies while they were in residency. And then when I finished, I was one of the first 100 female urologists in the country.

Daniel Lobell: (12:34)
Amazing. Incredible.

Felecia Froe, MD: (12:37)
Oh yeah, kinda cool.

Daniel Lobell: (12:39)
And, I know just from what I read online, that I suppose this is while you were in Northern California, you were working for Kaiser Permanente at one point?

Felecia Froe, MD: (12:50)
Yes. That was —

Daniel Lobell: (12:51)
Sorry?

Felecia Froe, MD: (12:53)
Yes, that’s true.

Daniel Lobell: (12:55)
How’d you like that?

Felecia Froe, MD: (12:59)
I liked it. So, my medicine career, it took me about probably three, four years in medicine to realize that it wouldn’t be the last thing I would do. And it was just because, I don’t know, I just had a feeling that there was more for me in life than what I was doing. And it took me a long time to actually get to where I am now. So that’s part of my traveling to all these different practices is trying to figure out what’s my problem. Is it this practice? Is it these people? Is it…? So I did large group practice. I did small group practice. I did solo practice. I did academic and hospital practice. I did all of them.

Daniel Lobell: (13:39)
[Felecia laughs] You’d be be fun to go to a restaurant with, I feel like. [Felecia laughs]

Felecia Froe, MD: (13:44)
I went to Kaiser. I was like, “Well, okay, let’s try this. Let’s see what this is like. And if this is any different than anything else.” And as far as medicine is concerned, it’s very much the same. I know a lot of physicians who have not been in that system think it would be very different, but it’s very, very much the same as far as I’m concerned. You are salaried. And as far as I was concerned, I was making good money. I mean, I could practice medicine the way I wanted to practice medicine. So I didn’t feel like I had constraints like I was concerned I would have when I went there.

Daniel Lobell: (14:23)
Uh-huh.

Felecia Froe, MD: (14:25)
So I liked it. It was fine.

Daniel Lobell: (14:27)
Well, yeah, I —

Felecia Froe, MD: (14:27)
It was actually the place — I’m sorry. It was the place where I worked with, we had at one point four female urologists in our practice, in our group.

Daniel Lobell: (14:35)
Wow. So that’s, I mean, that’s gotta be extremely rare.

Felecia Froe, MD: (14:39)
Exactly. Yes. And fun.

Daniel Lobell: (14:42)
So I’m a Kaiser patient. I like it. I think. I mean, the only thing I don’t like is how long it takes to get an appointment anywhere, but. I don’t know if that’s unique to Kaiser, but…

Felecia Froe, MD: (14:53)
I think it’s unique to where you are, because it seems like to me, we’re not in Kaiser anymore where we are, and all I could think is, I want my mom, who lives with me now, to be in Kaiser. If we were in Kaiser, she would never wait six months, eight weeks, two months, three months, to get a neurology appointment. Or all the things that we have to wait for to get, in Kaiser, it’s more of a… You can have your appointment next week. Now there’s some, our department, our urology department now is very short since I left. So those appointments are longer. It takes longer to get those appointments. But the majority of appointments are fairly quick.

Daniel Lobell: (15:30)
So you are practicing medicine in addition to doing real estate in Oklahoma, or am I off base with that?

Felecia Froe, MD: (15:38)
No, right now I’m working what’s called locums. Locum tenens, where you’re doing temporary travel work. And my temporary travel work is back at the practice that I just left, at Kaiser, because they’re very short, and I didn’t burn that bridge. It’s like, you guys, I just wanna do something different. So I go back to help them, do a little telemedicine, and I’m here doing the real estate investing, working on the social impact, real estate investing.

Daniel Lobell: (16:07)
Very interesting. How’d you get into that?

Felecia Froe, MD: (16:11)
Back like three to four years into medicine when I realized this wasn’t the last thing I was gonna do, I started looking for what am I really going to do. And we moved to Kansas City and I started working with some women, a women’s gynecology practice, OBGYN practice, and we bought a building to put our practice in. And we were all just practicing in a building. So just our own building, we all had our separate practices, but owned that building. And we decided — one of the women and I, and another woman who’s not a physician, but owned an insurance company that she built, started another company called the Women’s Life Care Center, where we were going to, like a spa in health for women that wasn’t necessarily medically based, more holistic.

Felecia Froe, MD: (17:04)
And that woman introduced me to Rich Dad Poor Dad, which is a book by Robert Kiyosaki that talks about money in a way that I never thought about money. And it showed how yes, you may be making a lot of money, but the thing that really makes you wealthy is having assets, which put money in your pocket. So passive income. So it was a just completely different way to think about money. And then I read a ton of his other books, and that’s when I started thinking about real estate. And actually, one of my patients at the time was relatively young. Was a woman could come in whenever she wanted. She never seemed to be bound by anything else in her life. And so one day I was asking her what does she do, and she said, “I do real estate investing.” And then she and I struck up a friendship. And she went with me to look at my first property that I was thinking about buying. And she basically said, “Listen, if you don’t buy this, I’m gonna buy it.” And basically took all the risk out of it. She said, “If you buy it and it doesn’t work, I’ll buy it from you.”

Daniel Lobell: (18:06)
Wow. That’s great.

Felecia Froe, MD: (18:07)
There you go. That’s where we started.

Daniel Lobell: (18:09)
So are you making passive income now?

Felecia Froe, MD: (18:13)
I am. I am. I own a assisted living home in Shawnee, Kansas that I actually have rented that to a business that we are making income there. The grocery store is about to be profitable and I own four single family homes that are profitable and, let’s see what else… Earn a result, and also looking at a bunch of other social impact things to really put investments into, to help other people make passive income.

Daniel Lobell: (18:46)
Wow. Wow. Then maybe you could help me. I’ve only ever made passive aggressive income, which is not as good.

Felecia Froe, MD: (18:52)
[Both chuckle] We’re good.

Daniel Lobell: (18:56)
Yeah, definitely not as good as passive income.

Felecia Froe, MD: (18:59)
Passive income. That sleep money, money just shows up. It’s great.

Daniel Lobell: (19:05)
I love it. I love the idea. So you are still making trips out to Kaiser then, and so you’re maintaining your medical career in that way. And you’re also doing some work, I understand, with Doctorpedia now. As this is a Doctorpedia podcast. How did you get involved with Doctorpedia? And in what capacity are you getting involved?

Felecia Froe, MD: (19:31)
So, I’m trying to remember. Rivki found me on LinkedIn. I’m pretty sure that’s how that connection happened, and emailed me. And we started talking and I found out about Doctorpedia, and actually one of the things that I am very passionate about is empowering people to be their own advocate. And I don’t necessarily like the word “advocate,” but to speak for themselves and to take personal responsibility for themselves in every way, including their health. One thing I had noticed is my father, a very smart guy, will go to the doctor and never really speak up. Like “Dad, what did the doctor say?” “Well, I don’t know. He said everything was fine.” Like, what does that mean? Well, I don’t know. He said everything was fine. So that’s not acceptable. And I notice that in my patients, many would come in and basically advocate their free will to the doctor. Whatever you tell me to do, I’m gonna say I’m gonna do while I’m in the office, then you do what you do when you’re not in the office.

Felecia Froe, MD: (20:37)
But those things really bother me. And the thing I noticed about many people when they come in and as medicine started to drive me more and more crazy, was the less time we had to spend with patients, the less we got to know them. And one of the things I loved about medicine was getting to know somebody. And so, as reimbursements went down, as all the things in medicine happened that happened and are still happening, you had to see more and more people just to make the practice viable, which gave you less and less time to hear what they had to say. And there was a book that… Unfortunately can’t remember the name of it, but one of the stories was, your doctor gives you on average 18 seconds to tell your story before you’re interrupted.

Felecia Froe, MD: (21:28)
So my goal has been to give everybody the best 18 seconds so that they get more time to tell their story instead of coming in and wishy-washing around and your doctor’s going fine. I don’t understand what’s going on with you, which is what we say in our head, I don’t get this so you start ordering a bunch of tests. Whereas if a person can actually tell a story, the doctor listens and you tell the story the way the doctor needs to hear it. You listen, you get it, you may have less tests ordered, get closer to a diagnosis at that first visit than you ever would if you came in with the “Well, I don’t know, how long has it lasted?” “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe about…” Those kind of things just drive doctors crazy, especially when we’re in a rush. So Doctorpedia came along and feels to me the way the videos are, the way that the system is being built, to be the way that patients can, people can be better at having that conversation with their doctor. And they have information from doctors. It’s not them trying to weed out what’s the best thing from the sites that we have now.

Daniel Lobell: (22:36)
A lot of life always comes down to good storytelling.

Felecia Froe, MD: (22:40)
A hundred percent.

Daniel Lobell: (22:41)
[Daniel chuckles] Whether it’s…

Felecia Froe, MD: (22:42)
One hundred percent.

Daniel Lobell: (22:43)
…A book, a movie, a doctor’s visit or a piece of artwork, it’s all about storytelling

Felecia Froe, MD: (22:50)
Or a comedian telling a joke. It’s a story, right?

Daniel Lobell: (22:53)
Absolutely. Yeah. So have you had many patients come in over the years that have gone online and done their own research before they came in? And what is your general take on that? And by extension, and you touched on this already, how do you feel that Doctorpedia can best serve the online health space?

Felecia Froe, MD: (23:19)
Yeah. So many people go online with whatever their symptom is. And the scariest thing in the world pops up as one of the first things. And they go “Look at that,” and they are frightened and just so worried. And they come in and they don’t ever say it. They never say what they’re most afraid of. And even when I, I even got to the point, I was like, “What are you most afraid of?” “I don’t know.” “So, what makes you, when you’re talking about this knee pain, cause that’s easy. What scares you?” And so many people won’t say it, but they read online “I could have some kind of cancer in my bone.” Which is the farthest thing from my mind or from the orthopedist’s mind or from whoever’s talking to them’s mind. We’ll go to a urology thing, testicle pain. Guys come in there with testicle pain and they’re like, “What are you worried about?” Some say, “I’m worried I have cancer.” Some say, “I don’t know, I just want this to go away.” And the ones who say it’s cancer, you can address that right away and ease that or tell them why that’s not something you’re worried about, or a test so that I can take that out of their mind.

Daniel Lobell: (24:27)
Yeah.

Felecia Froe, MD: (24:28)
But it is that that going online and finding the scariest thing that it could be, and then not admitting it or coming in and being frust — not admitting it, number one, and / or not admitting it and then not even when the doctor doesn’t address it, being frustrated that the doctor didn’t address it when it was the furthest thing from our mind that it could be.

Daniel Lobell: (24:50)
Yeah.

Felecia Froe, MD: (24:52)
So those are the things that frustrate me most about what people can find online. I’m all for looking it up. All for looking it up. But to get information that is more practical and realistic, so you have testicle pain, go to Doctorpedia, hear somebody talk about testicle pain, and that the most common thing is just, it just hurts. And then we usually find nothing. I mean, how much relief is that for you to know “Okay, well I’ll just go make sure it’s really nothing, first of all,” cause that’s what we also say, go make sure it’s really nothing. But to know that that’s the most common thing would, to me, help you sleep at night. Once you know that most of the time it goes away, helps you sleep at night, and lets you go on with your life.

Daniel Lobell: (25:38)
Absolutely. So by extension, let’s talk about Doctorpedia and how they can best serve the online health space there.

Felecia Froe, MD: (25:47)
Yeah. So like I said, it’s about having those, the online videos, is having the ability to go into someplace where it’s doctor-led, doctor… I wanna say the word evidence-based, but it’s just, it’s our experience, doctors’ experience that you can watch these little two minute, three minute videos about what you’re looking for. It’s not a ton of informa — I mean, it’s a lot of information, but you don’t have to take it all in at once. The way it’s curated is little short things that you can take in as you need to get what you want.

Daniel Lobell: (26:25)
Absolutely. Yeah. So are — yeah, sorry, please go on.

Felecia Froe, MD: (26:29)
I was gonna say, and we’re always — the main thing is, we’re always saying, bring it down. Don’t worry about it so much, but go to the doctor to make sure. That’s what you do. And then like for you, where you’re having to wait a long time for your appointment, maybe you’re not having so much anxiety where you then have a heart attack waiting to find out that your testicle pain is not cancer.

Daniel Lobell: (26:55)
God forbid. But yeah, I understand what you mean. So what can we hope to see from you on Doctorpedia’s website? Cause I’m excited. I’m already a fan. I want more. [Daniel chuckles] I want more Dr. Froe. So…

Felecia Froe, MD: (27:12)
So my favorite thing to do in urology was working with women, and it’s very untraditional cause everybody thinks of urology as a male, that’s where guys go. That’s the male OBGYN. But we actually had a very strong, I had a very much, a very strong female practice, working with women with pelvic pain, incontinence. In addition to the traditional urology things like bladder cancer and kidney stones. But the pelvic pain patient, the pelvic pain woman and the incontinent women, are the ones that got the most, I like talking to the most. They took a lot of time, but it’s those conversations that I get to know you. And then for most incontinence, it’s a very simple treatment, works most of the time really, really well. And people walk away happy, which is what I love about surgical interventions and what I love about a surgical subspecialty is you actually make people better, quickly. It’s not a lingering chronic problem, most of the time. Now the thing about urology that I like in addition is that there are some of those patient relationships that you have for years and years and years. So the guy with BPH, that’s usually gonna last for quite some time and he doesn’t always have to have a surgery. If it’s not bothering him enough, he doesn’t have to have a surgery. So you’re talking to that guy on a regular basis. But females, pelvic pain, working through that problem with them and helping them see all the different aspects of that problem and how it’s related to so much more of their life than just their body, I love that. So that’s one of the things I will be talking about in Doctorpedia in addition to incontinence, mainly female urology. And then for the doctor facing side, we’ll be talking about investing. Real estate investing, passive income, building your legacy.

Daniel Lobell: (29:05)
I wanna learn about that too. Maybe you can do that for the patient facing side to some extent. [Daniel chuckles]

Felecia Froe, MD: (29:13)
If they let me, I will. That’s something else I love talking about.

Daniel Lobell: (29:16)
Yeah. So you mentioned one of the things that you commonly would treat is bladder cancer. Is there some way… First of all, it sounds terrifying and I’m sure it’s not a good thing, but is there some way or something that we can do to try and work preventively from getting bladder cancer? Is there something people are doing that’s bringing it on or anything we could do to stop it?

Felecia Froe, MD: (29:45)
The number one cause of bladder cancer is cigarette smoking.

Daniel Lobell: (29:49)
Really? I wouldn’t have thought that. I would’ve thought lung of course, but bladder cancer.

Felecia Froe, MD: (29:55)
And when I have people come in who smoke and I say, “I know you know all the things, are you ready to quit?” “No, not really.” Okay. I’m okay with that. Because people know all those things, like I can get lung cancer, I can… whatever, and I was like, “Well, let me add, to what you already know as to why you should quit, bladder cancer.” And then if it’s a guy, smoking affects your blood vessels. And when your blood vessels are affected, it affects your erections. And that sometimes is enough to get a guy to quit smoking.

Daniel Lobell: (30:28)
Yeah. Well, I can understand why. [Both chuckle]

Felecia Froe, MD: (30:35)
People just don’t put it all together. And giving them those little more, that just a touch more. I mean, you have enough to know why you should quit smoking. I mean, there’s enough out there, but you hear people all the time. My dad smoked until he was, and he lived to be 90 and he died from whatever. So they think it’s not a big deal. Like yeah, but you don’t know all those little things your dad had to deal with, and bladder cancer, while majority of them are not horrible, I think of ’em and try to explain ’em like skin cancer. Some skin cancer. you just gotta get it removed and watched on a regular basis. It’s not gonna kill you. And then there’s the kind that’s gonna kill you. It comes in both varieties.

Daniel Lobell: (31:20)
Is it a chemo treatment for bladder cancer or is it a surgical?

Felecia Froe, MD: (31:25)
Bladder cancer is a surgical treatment. It’s both. So surgical treatment to remove the tumor from the bladder. You do that cystoscopically, so you don’t have to cut somebody open to remove the tumor initially to get the full diagnosis. So you remove the tumor cystoscopically and then you find out how deep into the bladder wall it goes.

Daniel Lobell: (31:47)
Wow.

Felecia Froe, MD: (31:48)
When they’re not very deep into the bladder wall, and if it’s a high grade tumor and not very deep into the bladder wall, you do treat that with a topical chemotherapy, which is injected into the bladder on a regular basis. If it’s into the muscle of the bladder, the treatment is generally to remove the bladder.

Daniel Lobell: (32:07)
Just… Wow. So what happens when you remove someone’s bladder? Do they get a bladder transplant?

Felecia Froe, MD: (32:13)
No, you can make a bladder. You can make a new bladder using intestine. Doesn’t work like your regular bladder. We do not have the ability to make things like they were made in the first place. So you have a reservoir that you have to empty in a certain way. Or you have what’s called a conduit where you use a piece of intestine and you have a bag where urine comes into the bag on your skin.

Daniel Lobell: (32:38)
Wow. Wow. Fascinating stuff. Sounds pretty intense too.

Felecia Froe, MD: (32:47)
It can be. It can be. Anytime you hear somebody gets a diagnosis of, I think this looks like a cancer, I mean, that’s just, you hear the C word and you don’t hear anything after that.

Daniel Lobell: (32:59)
Yeah.

Felecia Froe, MD: (32:59)
So often, a doctor explains every treatment when they say you have cancer, whatever cancer, and then we explain all the treatments and then the patient calls back the next day and goes, “I didn’t hear anything after cancer. Can I come back and hear what’s next?”

Daniel Lobell: (33:15)
Yeah.

Felecia Froe, MD: (33:16)
So that’s pretty common.

Daniel Lobell: (33:18)
You should start — anytime you tell someone they have cancer, you should hit record on something. Like “Listen to this when you get home.”

Felecia Froe, MD: (33:25)
Or, make sure you bring somebody with you, which also scares them and makes them know that something bad’s about to happen.

Daniel Lobell: (33:31)
Yeah, boy oh boy. That’s gotta be a terrible thing to have to tell somebody.

Felecia Froe, MD: (33:35)
It’s tough. It is tough.

Daniel Lobell: (33:37)
I can understand why that can get pretty heavy and real estate can feel like a nice change of pace.

Felecia Froe, MD: (33:44)
It is. And then comes handling other people’s money. Cause people get pretty tied to their money.

Daniel Lobell: (33:51)
Mhm.

Felecia Froe, MD: (33:53)
It’s different. And then there’s some of the same stress feelings that goes with it.

Daniel Lobell: (34:01)
Interesting.

Felecia Froe, MD: (34:02)
And then you talk to people about, money’s not life and death. Actually, a lot of people equate money to life and death. They really do. And so that’s something I really work with. And I work with a lot of women physicians trying to get that energy released. Money is not life and death. You have your basics covered. Everything else is gravy on top of that. And we can always make more money. There’s so much money in the world. There’s so much money to be made. It’s all there. Your life and your health are one thing, and once they’re gone, they’re gone.

Daniel Lobell: (34:38)
Maybe we should add “inspirational speaker” to your resume because… [Both laugh] I’m sitting here going like, “All right. I’m starting to feel like there’s hope!” This is… [Both laugh]

Felecia Froe, MD: (34:51)
There is always hope.

Daniel Lobell: (34:58)
I know how to get you do it too. I’ll just tell you you can’t, and then…

Felecia Froe, MD: (35:01)
There you go. [Both chuckle]

Daniel Lobell: (35:04)
The next thing you know, you’ll be beating Tony Robbins.

Felecia Froe, MD: (35:08)
It’s done. Exactly. [Both laugh]

Daniel Lobell: (35:12)
So this hour has just flown by and it’s been really wonderful talking to you. I only have a few more questions for us to cover, but they’re short ones. One: what is the biggest compliment a patient can give you?

Felecia Froe, MD: (35:28)
“You changed my life.” That’s it.

Daniel Lobell: (35:35)
All right. I like it. I like it.

Felecia Froe, MD: (35:37)
Yeah. And I heard that a lot from the incontinent patients. I mean, it sounds like such a non, like you’re not gonna die from incontinence, but it is… It’s devastating for women sometimes. You can’t — it’s just a scary, icky thing to be wet. Can’t control your urine. Come on.

Daniel Lobell: (35:58)
What’s the number one way you’re able to help people with that problem?

Felecia Froe, MD: (36:04)
Stress incontinence is a surgical repair that’s fairly simple, fairly straightforward and works really well.

Daniel Lobell: (36:13)
What do you think are the most important facets of the doctor patient relationship?

Felecia Froe, MD: (36:18)
Communication. It’s all about communication, which is everything in life.

Daniel Lobell: (36:24)
Giving them more than the 18 seconds. Was it 18, I think you said?

Felecia Froe, MD: (36:27)
Yes. 18 seconds. It is being able to hear each other, and trust. Trust. And we have to build those things very quickly in your appointments, cause you don’t have a lot of time in your appointments. So you’re building a relationship, building trust, building the Know, Like, and Trust which we learn about in business, in your 15 minute appointment, which really isn’t 15 minutes, with somebody or something huge, their life and their health. It’s tough. But the communication and building trust are the biggest things and the most important things in our relationship.

Daniel Lobell: (37:04)
What do you wish your patients knew coming into you?

Felecia Froe, MD: (37:11)
Hmm. I guess one of them is how much I really wanna help them and how challenging medicine really is. Even though I guess it’s kind of hard for them to care about when they have their own issue. And one of the real big things is how human, that doctors are truly humans. And we have good days and bad days just like everybody else. And if today I didn’t get ya, it just was not my day. The next time might be my day. Just realize that you never know what happened before I walked in your room. Somebody might have just died. Somebody might have just… You never know. And it takes some time to get into understanding that.

Daniel Lobell: (37:57)
Something really worth considering. Yeah. Any life advice as somebody who’s done it all, been all over the place, tried all kinds of things. What’s a takeaway for the listeners?

Felecia Froe, MD: (38:13)
Oh my gosh. Wow. So I wanna say, if you want to try something, try it. Don’t be afraid of making a mistake. Don’t be afraid of looking stupid. Don’t be afraid of anything. Do it. Mistakes are learning chances. Looking stupid is how we grow. Imagine how many people just… You look stupid all the time. Don’t worry about it.

Daniel Lobell: (38:45)
[Daniel chuckles] I know I certainly do, but…

Felecia Froe, MD: (38:47)
[Daniel chuckles] Me too, me too. And I’ve made so many mistakes, so many mistakes and you just, you keep going. In medicine, as doctors, you can’t make a mistake. You can’t make a mistake, but we do. And we fix them and we go forward and we learn and the same thing in everything else in life.

Daniel Lobell: (39:08)
I love it. I love it. What do you do for fun?

Felecia Froe, MD: (39:13)
Lately it’s been really tough cause I’m living with my… My mom is living with me. She’s got medical problems. I do, for fun, I like to travel. I actually like to even just be on a plane, believe it or not, where nobody can get me. [Felecia laughs]

Daniel Lobell: (39:28)
I love being on a plane.

Felecia Froe, MD: (39:28)
Nobody can get me. I sit there and watch a movie, read a book. Just, I love it. So…

Daniel Lobell: (39:35)
It’s the closest I’ve ever felt to royalty. You have people bringing you drinks and food. [Both chuckle] I mean, are you OK, here’s a pillow…

Felecia Froe, MD: (39:41)
They don’t do that so much anymore.

Daniel Lobell: (39:43)
No, it’s getting worse, but… [Both chuckle]

Felecia Froe, MD: (39:49)
Not so much anymore. But being on a plane, getting on a plane is actually fun for me. I like it.

Daniel Lobell: (39:55)
I love airports. I love the feeling of people going and coming and traveling and exploring. There’s a real excitement in the air at airports.

Felecia Froe, MD: (40:04)
It’s kinda exciting. Exactly. There is excitement in the airport. Yep.

Daniel Lobell: (40:09)
Dr. Froe, this has been so much fun. And I love getting to know you a little bit and learn from you and being inspired by you. Do me a favor. Give me the secrets. How do I become rich and successful? [Daniel laughs] And real estate tycoon? I’m coming to your seminar.

Felecia Froe, MD: (40:30)
[Both laugh] Come on in. You’ll be surprised how we start.

Daniel Lobell: (40:34)
I would. I would love to hear it. But for now, what I’m gonna ask you is the same question that I round off all these interviews with, which is, what do you personally do to stay healthy?

Felecia Froe, MD: (40:48)
Oh my. Well. In my head, I eat well and every day I wake up and say, I’m going to eat well. And at the end of the day, I look back and go, “Well, I could have done better,” but every day we start over again in how I’m going to eat well.

Daniel Lobell: (41:06)
I guess I should ask you as a follow up, what does eating well mean?

Felecia Froe, MD: (41:11)
For me, it’s lots of produce. Vegetables, fruits. I won’t say I’m a vegetarian cause I do like a steak, but I like more fruits and vegetables. Water has to be like the number one thing in your life. And I’ve failed on that in lots of different ways lately. But you know, every day I start over again.

Daniel Lobell: (41:35)
Tell me about it. I have such a hard time with that one. Water, water.

Felecia Froe, MD: (41:39)
Well, me too. I do too. I do too. And every day I start all over again. Today, I’m gonna do it.

Daniel Lobell: (41:46)
You know what, when I hang up and this call is finished, I’m having a glass on you. Or for you. With you in mind.

Felecia Froe, MD: (41:54)
I have a daughter. My daughter says, we fill up our glasses with water and she goes, “Now I’ve decided, every time I do that, I’m gonna drink the water.” Cause half the time I end up at the end of the day with a glass of water on my desk. So when you put water in a glass, drink it.

Daniel Lobell: (42:08)
It’s such a difficult discipline. And yet it seems so simple.

Felecia Froe, MD: (42:12)
Exactly.

Daniel Lobell: (42:15)
Yeah. Thank you so much. It’s been a pleasure and I really look forward to seeing all the great future work that you’ll be doing at Doctorpedia on Doctorpedia.com.

Felecia Froe, MD: (42:25)
Thank you. I had a really good time. I appreciate it. I had fun.

Daniel Lobell: (42:31)
This podcast or any written material derived from its transcripts represents the opinions of the medical professional being interviewed. The content here is for informational purposes only and should not be taken as medical advice. Since every person is unique, please consult your healthcare professional for any personal or specific needs.