The Underdog Physician Podcast

On the Underdog Physician podcast, Dr. Carl Smart, a pulmonary and critical care specialist in Charlotte, North Carolina, discusses his journey from being born in Jamaica to studying chemistry at Fordham, attending Temple for medical school, and choosing pulmonary/critical care after reading CHEST and being drawn to ICU innovation and procedures. He explains how private-practice exposure to business plans and the rise of HMOs and corporate medicine led him to start a hospitalist program in the mid-1990s and pursue an MBA at Wake Forest to better understand finance and operations. Smart shares operational lessons on efficiency (including “just-in-time” concepts), his view that generative AI will transform the healthcare value chain while raising job-displacement and regulatory/ethical concerns, and the origins and thesis of Black Pearl Global Investment focused on affordability, access, and outcomes. He emphasizes founder tenacity, strong teams, realistic goals, and learning from failure, describes his intensive daily schedule across clinical and VC work, and outlines a legacy centered on scalable patient impact.

00:00 Guest Introduction
00:35 Redoing the Intro
02:20 Carl’s Origin Story
03:27 Why Pulmonary Critical Care
04:50 Path to Business Leadership
08:14 Why Get an MBA
10:13 Operational Efficiency Lessons
12:04 Generative AI in Healthcare
15:45 Black Pearl Global Investment Thesis
18:29 What VCs Look For
21:15 Founder Advice and AI Reality
23:13 Embracing Failure
24:47 Work Life Integration
26:13 Staying Calm Under Pressure
28:00 Legacy and Closing

On the Underdog Physician podcast, we interview Dr. Timothy Martens, a congenital cardiothoracic surgeon and venture partner, and Alex Tang, a clinical strategy and innovation leader, about their work at Vaark Ventures supporting clinician-led early-stage healthcare startups. Tim recounts shifting from neuroscience and an interest in neurosurgery to cardiac surgery, then gaining commercialization and FDA exposure through stem cell and tissue engineering research at Columbia, later forming Vaark Ventures as a venture studio that evolved into an active angel syndicate with a diverse membership of clinicians, operators, and technical experts. Alex describes moving from clinical practice into administrative and value-based care roles, building practice models, and bringing payer and revenue-cycle perspective to investing. They outline a thesis focused on solving real “pain points” in healthcare, warn against superficial AI buzzwords, emphasize measurable ROI and workflow solutions, and advise founders on timing, committed teams, validated paid pilots, distribution channels, LOIs, and respectful relationship-building. They also discuss value-based care scaling, mentorship, and using disciplined calendar management.

00:00 Welcome and Guests
01:55 Tim Martins Origin
02:58 From Lab to Venture
05:20 Building Vaark Ventures Network
06:42 Alex Tang Journey
09:59 Investment Thesis
13:14 AI and VC Trends
16:42 Founder Advice
19:50 Value Based Care Playbook
26:06 Go To Market Strategy
30:44 Work Life Integration
32:03 Mentorship and Integrity
34:59 Legacy and Closing

Ewelina discusses FinalSpark’s focus on transparency and science communication, including a live lab view on finalspark.com, to reduce fear and resistance to new technology. She explains the advantages of bootstrapping—control and founder freedom—while noting its limits, as FinalSpark currently has a six-person team and is talking to investors, seeking 50 million Swiss francs mainly to hire highly skilled people. She clarifies she is not the founder; the founders are Swiss entrepreneurs Fred Jordan and Martin Kutter, who started the company in 2014 and initially pursued digital AI research but pivoted due to the high energy and server costs, choosing living neurons for energy efficiency. She advises being selective about events, describes an open, idea-friendly leadership style shaped partly by cultural lessons from the Netherlands and UK, outlines her remote, meeting-batched work routine, and recommends scientists entering entrepreneurship learn psychology.

00:00 Lab Transparency Tour
19:13 Why Clarity Matters
19:40 Bootstrapping vs Investors
21:08 Founders and Early Vision
21:46 Energy Problem to Neurons
22:38 Networking and Events
23:40 Leadership Across Cultures
25:26 Remote Work Routine
27:10 Advice for STEM Founders
27:55 Closure

On the Underdog Physician podcast, Dr. Jalees Razavi, an occupational and environmental medicine specialist and author of The Anatomy of Burnout, shares how the Bhopal gas disaster inspired his career and training in Canada at the University of Alberta and the University of Toronto. He recounts leading occupational health efforts at Saudi Aramco, including a firefighter wellness program focused on nutrition, exercise, and heat tolerance, and later serving as executive director for Imperial Oil/ExxonMobil in Canada before consulting for companies and workers’ compensation boards. As current Vice Chair of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada’s Specialty Committee in Occupational Medicine, he explains the team-based strategy, communication, and external review process that achieved approval for occupational medicine to become a full Royal College specialty by 2027. He argues burnout is an organizational dose-response phenomenon often misidentified as depression, critiques superficial wellness programs, and describes his own routines, views on supplements and longevity, and the legacy of fairness and integrity he hopes to leave.

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro
01:42 Bhopal Disaster Spark
02:58 Training in Canada
04:08 Saudi Aramco Leadership
06:18 Back to Canada Career
07:02 Royal College Specialty Push
14:35 Burnout Misunderstood
19:24 Daily Routine and Focus
21:56 Supplements and Longevity
25:06 Legacy and Next Book
26:03 How to Connect and Closing

https://www.razavioccmed.com/about

In this Underdog Physician podcast episode, Anish interviews physician executive Dr. Aamir Rehman, CEO of Act Health and Vyzr Health, about his career across consulting, health systems, employers, payers, and digital health. Dr. Rehman shares his origin story—born in Pakistan, trained in medicine, then recruited into consulting in the late 1990s—describing how physician problem-solving skills translate to business and why he took early career risks to influence healthcare decisions. He discusses when an MBA can help, emphasizing individualized goals and the value of formal training and networking. The conversation covers AI’s potential and current limitations (including hallucinations), lessons from telehealth adoption, payer incentives as costs shift, and skepticism about longevity medicine due to murky science. He describes early-stage startup life, managing mental bandwidth, and his legacy goal: reducing patient stress through better navigation and “connecting the dots” after diagnoses.

00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro
01:13 Origin Story and Early Career
02:48 Consulting Leap and Lessons
05:18 Healthcare Verticals and Entrepreneurship
09:10 Risk Taking for Physicians
11:49 Do You Need an MBA
15:53 AI in Healthcare Reality Check
23:07 Payers and AI Reimbursement
26:13 Wellness and Longevity Clinics
29:06 Startup CEO Life and Workload
32:10 Stress Management and Mental Bandwidth
34:52 Legacy Patient Empowerment Mission
37:27 Closing Thanks and Wrap Up