Franziska Haydanek: I think that parents need to know that these like natural things, and it's just a vitamin, just about anything, you know, the dose makes the poison. And so there is only this small range that can be in the healthy, you know, range of things. And we're outside of that. can have issues. We can have serious issues. Welcome to I Did My Own Research. I'm Dr. Fran, and today I'm joined by Dr. Sarisa Key. Dr. Key received her bachelor's of science from Northeastern State University. She attended medical school at Oklahoma State University Center for Health Sciences, and she completed her pediatric residency at St. Francis Children's Hospital in Tulsa. She currently works as a board-certified pediatrician, and online she posts at The Real Dr. Key about so many topics in pediatrics, parenting, and her experiences as a first-generation Native American doctor. Dr. Key, thank you for being here today. Thank you so much for having me. am so excited to have you because as you and I both know, the world of pediatrics is definitely exposed to misinformation. I would say, in proportionally more than a large part of medicine. You guys really have to deal with a lot when it comes to not only medical misinformation, but parenting misinformation. And you as a mother of four have a lot of experience both professionally and personally. So I'm so excited to dive in with you. Tell me a little bit about how you got into content creation. Yeah, so really in my practice and seeing so many different families, I would hear so many different stories that were just a little off or, you know, it was based in a little bit of some truth, but how that actually played out in the context of everything wasn't quite there. And educating families one-on-one... felt really important and I was making a difference for that one family, but eventually I had to get out of myself and think, you I can really make videos online and this can be spreading the correct information, fighting that misinformation to more than just one family at a time. Yeah, I always say that in our real life, in our doctor jobs, we can like reach 20 patients a day, but online you can reach a million people in a day. And it really is a way to... get out there and get that information out there in spaces that parents are really looking for it. I think about my own experiences going to the pediatrician. I'm lucky my children don't really have a lot of illnesses. So I go just for their well-child visits. then so you see your pediatrician for 20, 30 minutes, once a year for each child. And then the rest of the year, you're scrolling on social media. that's... Where really I've learned, I mean, I could ask my pediatrician about parenting. I don't really often though. I feel the majority of my parenting like advice and philosophy I've really received through social media. I've received from other parents talking about it, how they approach parenting, approach parenting in this time and like age and space, right? As well as how to deal with problems. So really meeting our parents, our patients, parents where they're at, which is for the most part, not in a pediatrician's office, I think is really smart. Because I know like in... In my clinic, we're so rushed and we have so many patients that they're trying to cram in, which that's a whole other topic that I probably shouldn't address. But I want to take that time with my patients. And I feel like I can't, or if I do, which I do, I run really far behind and it's not fair to my next patient and the next patient. So really, yeah, I think it's not fair to parents to not give them that time. know, a lot of it's like you said, we're only seeing them once a year for their well check and it's just not enough time. to get into everything. I mean, we hit on the big things like no more than two hours of screen time a day and, making sure you're eating your fruits and vegetables and, you know, that you don't have constipation issues or your potty trained or whatever, but we're not getting into all the little things that come up throughout the year with parenting and how everything honestly has kind of changed. Like, yeah, we don't want kids spending more than two hours a day of screen time, but we're not able to take all the time to talk about internet safety or right now. like kids using AI and chat bots and, you know, any dangers surrounding that, Roblox, you know what I mean? And these things are things that I didn't learn in med school or in residency because they hadn't even evolved yet to this place. And so I think, you know, as a pediatrician and as a mom, you know, we have to pivot, we have to evolve, we have to keep learning to be like up to date with all of these things. Being on social media, I can answer a lot of those questions if parents are looking for that and they don't feel comfortable, you know, taking up their pediatrician's time or sending a chart message that isn't gonna get answered for a week. Maybe they need that answer right now. It's a space that I can kind of come and hopefully help parents get the information and good information that's evidence-based and not just based on something, you know, they heard in a mom group or, you know, that they can come and get that good information whenever they want. It's at their fingertips. I think it's important for people to hear too that like us as physicians do wish we could spend more time with our patients, right? And that I do think it's really important that we acknowledge when it comes to the misinformation online is that the reason that there's such a space for those people to make their content is because... parents are frustrated that they don't get more time. And the reason for that is like extremely multifactorial as you and I both know, but I do think we have to take a little personal responsibility for the fact that like our patients are really wanting more time and more personalized care. And unfortunately the healthcare system for like many reasons, the majority of those completely out of our, you day-to-day control, we just don't have that time. And that makes people seek information online and people take advantage of that. And, you know, really the people who are the most vulnerable, which is new parents, parents of medically complex children, people who are scared of medicine, who may have had a bad experience with any sort of medicine are now distrustful of all medicine. And that's really where you get to the people who take advantage of those patients. And really in the end, the most vulnerable are their children. Absolutely. And I've seen a lot of my patients that are medically complex, you know, and I have my autistic kids and developmentally delayed kids and, you know, when they go to GNC, you know, the lady who works behind the counter, the, you know, super nice personable lady will take that time to tell them all of the different supplements that are going to help their kid that... really, it's unlikely to help, like very unlikely to help, and can cause harm. And I have seen harm from the wellness side of things where, you know, a mom was told, you know, B12 is super important. Yes, it is. But most people, unless they have pernicious anemia or they're vegetarian or whatever, they don't need a supplemental B12. And this mom was giving so much B12, and I didn't know, you know, she'd ever told us that. And I understand, like, I want to feel like a trusted partner. with my parents and I want them to tell me, even if they're doing things that they think, oh, is Dr. Key gonna judge this? I'm a safe space, but I need you to tell me so I can be the best doctor to your child. But she brought the kid in because he was having numbness and tingling. So I checked a B12 thinking he may be deficient because he was a little bit of a picky eater through the roof. I mean, the B12 was so, so high and that was causing his numbness and tingling. You know, we have that balance of, you know, the... the correct number for B12 and if we're too low or we're too high, like the lab called me because they were like, this can't be right. We repeated it, you know, because I'm going treat the kid, not the number. And it came back again, just astronomically high. And I've seen that in other spaces. I had a kid that was having nosebleeds a ton, like ton of nosebleeds. And, you know, I thought for this kid to ENT after we tried, you know, saline and vaseline in the nose and humidifier and all those kinds of things. And he didn't have a superficial Kesselbach plexus. And we couldn't figure out, is this kid having nosebleeds? The mom was giving, she didn't tell us, and then she eventually did. I was like, what are you giving? Every single thing you're giving. She was giving huge doses of vitamin E. And so it was thinning his blood enough that he was having these nosebleeds. We stopped the vitamin E and his nosebleeds stopped. So I think that parents need to know that these like natural things, that it's just a vitamin, just about anything, you know, the dose makes the poison. And so there is only this... small range that can be in the healthy, you know, range of things. And we're outside of that, we can have issues, we can have serious issues. mean, I think that's like ⁓ such an important point. My husband is a family med doc and he has experienced very similar things where it's kind of like they're doing all this work up and like it can figure out what's going on. And finally the patient like says like, ⁓ well, I'm... What do you think about this medicate or this supplement I've been on? They're like, well, that's the reason that you have heart palpitations is because you're taking this like thyroid... supplement and stuff like that. I think it's, I, there are supplements that work, they are important that people will benefit from, but it's always like, what specifically are we trying to work towards? You can't just take like a general supplement for like general things and really having an open conversation, both as a patient to be like, talking to your doctor. They say that, talk to your doctor, right? You actually have to tell them. And I hope that the practitioners listening receive that non-judgmentally, will have those conversations with their patients and say like, okay, yes, I agree. Like you as a PCOS patients are gonna do really well with inositol and berberine, but you probably don't need this thyroid armor, right? And it's actually gonna cause problems. And to really approach it in a neutral way so that you become a trusted space when our patients are seeking out those like alternative treatments. But I think it's a really important to everyone listening that these are not regulated, they are not monitored, and they're not for everyone. And just because it's natural doesn't mean it's good for you. So thank you for sharing those. mean, that's like really scary. know, those parents are really trying to do what they think is best, but unfortunately it's misguided. And in the end, it's not like net zero. Like they do get, someone can get harm from that. Yeah. And you know, I really, I try to meet my parents where they're at. And I understand wanting to do more natural things, you know, with four kids. You know, I definitely am like kind of a hippie doctor. So like for cough, I'm giving my kids honey. Like, you know, I practice what I preach. I'm not giving cough suppressant medications and I'm, you know, doing saline and suction humidifier. Like all the things that I recommend for my parents and for their families, I'm doing with my own children. And I'm never gonna recommend something to your child that I wouldn't do with my own, you know? And especially like when it comes to vaccines. They're like, you know, did you give your daughter the Gardasil? Yeah, and my sons, you know? And I got it, you know? Even though I'm old, right? Like, the FDA bumped the age. We won't go into what age I am. But, you know, I had been telling all of my patients, like, get the Gardasil, get the Gardasil. And they were like, did you get it? And I was like, well, no. It kind of, you know, came out when I was kind of passed. I was already married, you know, had a kid, whatever. But I did feel a little bit hypocritical that I was recommending it, even though I'd given it to my kids, I hadn't myself gotten it. And they would ask, like, does it hurt? I'm like, well, it's a shot, but I hadn't gotten it, right? So I finally, told my nurse, I was like, hey, go grab a Gardasil, I'm doing it, like we're doing it. And yeah, you know what? It does sting, I'm not gonna lie. But I tell my patients, you know hurts worse? Cancer, you know? yeah, and as a person who treats that cancer, cervical cancer is... It's so mean. It's so painful. Like, it's so, so mean that that's... And I think it's nice that you now can say, I've had it, it was a sting, just so you understand what's coming, but... That really is a great... And, you know, I myself consider myself, like, fairly scrunchy, you know, science-crunchy too, right? So I've done plenty of the crunchy things with my own family, like you said. The honey, I baby wore, like extended baby wore, I extended breastfed, we did baby-led weaning. But all my kids are completely vaccinated. We've never been shared. I cut my kids grapes. Yeah, ⁓ my gosh, I know. There's nice ways that you can bring in very like natural things, right? Where you don't immediately go towards medicines or stronger interventions, but there are, there's a time and place for those stronger things. And for me, preventative care is that place. It's huge, yeah. And in pediatrics, it's like the whole realm, you know, is basically preventative health. And that's kind of, you know, where I live every day and trying to prevent those things. And I think that's kind of the hard thing with pediatrics is it's like trying to prove like a negative, you know, like what would happen if we didn't do that? Well, I'm not going to take the chance of not doing that, you know? And so just trying to stick to the evidence. But again, being, I like scrunchie. I haven't heard that before. I'm going start calling myself that. Okay. Yeah, you should. I think the thing too with preventative care is that no one, know, we are such a product of our own success at this point that no one remembers what it's like to have high mortality rates in childhood, that we used to have all these infectious diseases that were terrible. And now we all just think that like... We as humans have always been perfect and we have never been affected by infectious diseases when the reality is very different. Mortality in early childhood especially was very high. And in the early ages too, you my children are two, four and six. And I think often when I see these like little gravestones or people's stories like, little Timmy was four and died of the measles or whatever. I'm like, I can't imagine, like some people wouldn't even name their children because they've... didn't think that they were gonna live. that just like hurts my heart, but we have forgotten that. We have forgotten how like vulnerable our little people are and how thankful like I am every single day that we've had smart scientists figure out how to protect our little humans from this. And people forget that. And I almost feel like we need to remind them more often. Actually like we are very vulnerable as humans and we should be so thankful that scientists are so smart. And I think with the recent measles outbreaks, though obviously I do not want measles outbreaks. I think that it has really brought to light how declining vaccination rates is causing these outbreaks. Like we know that for measles to be effective, the vaccine, have to have 95 % herd immunity. And if those levels drop, we have outbreaks and we've seen that. you we've been saying it for years, but unless there's lots of people getting sick or people dying, I think that... the public isn't listening. And I hate that measles is out there right now, but in some ways I think that it can be like kind of used as a tool a bit to educate the public about how other things can come back too. You know, it's not measles, pertussis. We've had a ton of pertussis so far this year. It's crazy. And these are things that children died of previously that we have in fact. for, like, it's preventable. It's completely unnecessary to have your child die of this vaccine preventable illness. You know what, we have to have polio come back, like, paralyze kids in lungs before we realize, like, get vaccinated, please, for the love of God. Yeah. I would be interested to know how other OB-GYNs and pediatricians have felt, but I personally, in my practice, have seen a huge acceptance of the RSV vaccine. Because I think people, because RSV is the number one cause of hospitalizations for children and babies. Current parents know about RSV, right? So they know the dangers of RSV. They probably know a child who's been hospitalized for RSV or their own children have been hospitalized for RSV. So when a vaccine came out a couple of years ago, at least in my practice, it has felt very accepting. They're like, yes, of course I want that. What do mean I'm out of the window, but I want it? And again, I would love for other OB-GYNs to comment and let us know that they have similar experiences, but I have a much higher acceptance rate of RSV vaccination. Tdap is still pretty good, but flu is pretty low for my acceptance rate. But I think because people know like RSV, RSV is bad and I don't want bad things. And it's almost like, well, maybe now everyone needs a reminder that measles are bad and right. And like be happy that we had smart scientists come up with smart things to prevent bad things from happening. Like it's amazing. Like when these vaccines come out, like when the RSV vaccine came out, like I was... so excited, like fangirling over a vaccine that can take care of RSV because in residency, ⁓ my God, like every February, I swear I got stuck like on the floor, on the ward in February. you know, it would be like, ⁓ but it's a short month. It was a hellish month though. Yeah, it was terrible. It was a terrible month. Like it was less, but I swear I aged more on those months. But I mean, it's like our whole patient list. would be RSV and all these kids on oxygen and all these kids on, you know, Q15 section. I mean, not really, you know, like constantly all these kids are hospitalized. And then those kids, you know, go on a lot of them to be these reactive airway kiddos that have this like baby asthma and some of them don't outgrow it they are lifelong weasers. And, you know, just seeing that in the hospital, it's like, we want to take videos and show everyone how horrible RSV can be. But I think like you said, like, I think almost everybody knows a kid who's had RSV or, you know, knows someone who had a kid with RSV and seen the ramifications. So yeah, it's a vaccine that I don't have to push too hard to get parents to take it, you know? Flu, it's still a fight, you know? And I'm scared of the flu. I have two asthmatics at home and, you know, I have IgA deficiency. Yay, as a pediatrician, it's fine. That's terrible. But I, you know, I get my flu shot every single year. But I think the thing that is important and I think it's a good thing, even though it was a bad thing as a kid, is my grandmother had diabetes and she got her flu vaccine every single year forever, ever, ever. And then when I was around like 10 or 11, she got a flu vaccine and she got Guillain-Barre, okay? And terrifying, right? Like terrifying. And she had to like... take a month or more to like relearn how to walk. I remember seeing her in a wheelchair like from this flu shot and it terrified me. so when I, my mom never got us the flu shot as a kid, but when I started med school, they were like, it's mandatory. You have to get it. And I was actually scared to get it because of seeing my grandmother go through that. I got my flu shot. I know you're shocked at nothing happened. You I didn't get the flu. That's what happened. I didn't get the flu. And I remember having the flu as a kid and I had 106 fever. was hallucinating. So, I mean, it was bad. I missed two weeks of school. It was horrible. But I've gotten the flu every year since starting med school, once I had kids. You I got my flu shot in pregnancy. My kids are fully vaccinated. Everybody, like I signed my husband up. I'm like, show up and get your flu shot. Like he's good at just kind of doing it if I schedule it. But we got the flu this year, even though we got the flu shot, right? But it wasn't that bad. My kids didn't even run a fever. Like they were sick for a couple days. I never got a fever either, you know? And I'm immunosuppressed. So with all that misinformation, ⁓ the flu shot gave you the flu. A, impossible, right? Like that didn't happen. B, you get your flu shot during flu season. So it makes sense. It takes two weeks to work. Now we were past that window. But the main thing, and this is I tell my parents, we don't do the flu shot to prevent you getting the flu. Like that's a nice side effect. Like... It's a app, and we really don't want you to get the flu, but it's not for that. It's for preventing the complications of the flu, hospitalization, pneumonia, and death. And death, you know? And so with two asthmatics at home, when they get sick, they usually, they're wheezing, I'm having to do nebs, I'm doing albuterol, you know, they have to have steroids. We didn't have to do any of that. So even though they got the flu, it wasn't the flu. It's very valid for, you know... First of all, there are complications from any medical intervention and obviously there are risks with any vaccination as well. And I think what happens a lot online is that people are like, you deny this. And it's like, I don't think any person ever denies that there are side effects from any medical intervention, including vaccines. They are rare. That's the only person I know who has had that reaction, but that doesn't mean it didn't happen. we, every single thing that including supplements and including not doing things has a side effect. you know, in the end, it's up for patients to decide with true informed consent what they want to do for themselves. And I think it says a lot when pediatricians are all vaccinated and their kids are all vaccinated and obstetricians all get vaccines and pregnancy. And, know, like I am incredibly informed. I think that actually gets really annoying online when I talk about my own personal choices I've made in my medical care. Like I talk a lot elective inductions and they're like, why would you ever do this? Like only uninformed people do this. I'm like... Do you know that I'm a board certified obstetrician? This is all I do day in and day out. Like I am more informed than 99 % of the population on what I have signed up for. And I made this choice completely informed and pediatricians are making this decision completely informed. Yeah, and if we as pediatricians saw these side effects from vaccines, you know, that are so common in quotation marks, we wouldn't vaccinate. You know what I'm saying? So when you have the majority of pediatricians, I mean... just about all of us, know, are fully vaccinating our kids, even for COVID, and flu and everything. I mean, it does, it speaks volumes that we realize that they're safe, we realize that they're effective and that they're necessary. And, you know, there's so many people out there saying like, well, we even think they work, okay? So yes, we realize vaccines work, but I don't want my kid to get it, and everyone else's kid can get it. And that will kind of be the herd immunity for my kid. Well, unless your kid has some contraindication or your family has some contraindication, a true like anaphylactic allergy, your kid is, I mean, horribly like going through cancer treatment or, you know, can't get the vaccine for whatever reason, that's kind of selfish in my opinion to not get the vaccine and just depend on everyone else around you getting the vaccine. Like, you know, we have more community and globally minded. that sense of community has ⁓ kind of... gone away, I think for us for many reasons, you know, with the building of industry and all that, you know, we just don't have the communities we used to, but I think that makes us also forget that the importance of our health and our communities impacts each other. I want to pivot a little bit and you and I have similarly named series on our TikToks. Mine is called Sperm Can Find A Way about crazy ways that people have gotten pregnant. If you have not listened to the series, I highly recommend, but you... have a series called Pin Worms Can Find A Way? Yes, yes. People are kind of a little bit obsessed with pin worms. And so it's kind of funny because I will do, I'll spend so much time, you know, recording and doing the research for these videos and, you know, scripting it all out and recording all these videos. And, you know, they'll get like 200 or 300 views. But if I do a pin worm video, like... That's bull. It'll just blow up, you know? And so, yeah, mean, pinworms, think people don't understand. Tell us about pinworms. For the people who don't know pinworms, what are pinworms? Why do we care? So, pinworms are actually really, really common. So, like, 20 % of kids, disturbingly, at some point, like, in elementary school, are going 20. Yeah, it's high. It's really high. Are going to get pinworms at some point. And I was reading about pinworms, because one of my first videos that actually went viral was about pinworms, because this dad, he's hilarious, was talking about how he had to go pick up pinworm medicine from the pharmacy, and he was like, you know, totally grossed out by it. And so my video was kind of a stitch talking about like, sir, you know, if your child has pinworms, you likely have pinworms. I saw that video. You were drinking like an espresso martini. Always. It's my favorite. I love espresso martinis. Yes. So, know, pinworms are these tiny little worms that really you get from... So someone, we're gonna go Adam, the original man, ⁓ gets pinworms. You know, it's usually a kid. Kids get pinworms because they're constantly putting things in their mouth, like just constantly fingers sucking their thumbs, biting their nails, whatever. And they ingest the eggs of someone else's pinworms. And so then these little pinworm eggs, microscopic, tiny, can't see them at all, go down into their intestines and they hatch and then they have... And then those worms get, you know, a little bigger and the mama worm will go down, like when the kid's sleeping, typically it will go down to the anus and when the temperature of the child drops during sleep and will lay eggs at the booty hole. bungholio, as you call it. bungholio. Yes, the bungholio. I don't even know where that came from. My kids like made this up and I was like, I love that. That's great. And so when the kid like goes to the bathroom in the morning, if they don't wash their hands well, they're gonna get those eggs on their hands. And then, you know, they're gonna touch a doorknob, they're gonna touch your countertop, they're gonna touch your coffee. I don't know what they're touching, they're touching everything. Good morning, mom, you know, and touch your face. Then you ingest the penworms, right? And then the cycle continues. And so really, if you're changing your kid's sheets, the penworm eggs, a lot of times they're in the sheets just from sleeping, kids moving around and everything. And so like when you take those off, you can actually like... breathe them into your airways and, you know, swallow them that way. I know I learned all this in school, but re-hearing it is really disturbing as now a mother. It like now I'm like, oh, God. And when I did that video, I was like looking at studies and looking at statistics and everything with pinworms. And they said that they like went to the schools and they were, you know, like swabbing things for pinworms. And they said it was even like on the soap. Like if they had like a bar of soap that there were pinworm eggs on the soap. And it's like, Jesus, you know, we're all probably gonna get, you know, pinworms at some point. But they don't really cause issues, honestly. I mean, like, the main symptoms, yeah, like the kids, like, say that their booty itches. So anytime I have a parent that's like, hey, my kid's booty itches, then, you we take a look. Usually the booty doesn't look like anything. The bunghole-io looks normal. ⁓ Unless the kid's been scratching a lot, you know, because that can happen with, perianal strep and some other things. But really, like, the diagnostic test is the scotch tape test. Yes, that's what I remember from school. Yeah, so you can get up, in the middle of the night, you know, usually a few hours after your kid goes to sleep. The mom has already come down, because the kid's temperature drops, she comes down, that's her signal to go lay eggs. And you can take scotch tape and just stick it on their booty. You can do it in the morning too. You just want to catch the kid before they have, like, wiped, like, onto the bathroom for the morning or whatever. And then you can bring that to the pediatrician's office. is very glamorous and, you know, we can just look under a microscope and see if there are eggs. And, I mean, a lot of times there are. It's an easy fix. I mean, over the counter. Oh, it's over the counter? It's over the counter. Reese's pinworm medication. And, you know, the generics are fine. Like, I'm a baller on a budget, primary care right here. So I just get the pyrintal and it tastes horrible. Have I taken it before? Yes, I have. Yeah, we won't get into that, but it's very like... and and chalky and banana flavored. And so, yeah, if I have any suspicion at all, my whole family is gonna, they're all gonna drink the banana medicine, okay? It's happening. And everyone probably already knows the banana medicine word now. Because experts. So, I mean, do I need a parasite cleanse? Like, do you have a link in your bio where I can buy your parasite cleanse for my worms? No, no, probably not. I mean, honestly, if you've got small kids, it's not a bad idea. Now, this is not super evidence-based. Now, see, I'm thinking, now I'm getting weird. It's not gonna hurt you to take pinworm medicine. But pinworms, if they're not having symptoms, you don't really need to treat them. If kids have them for a really long time, they can become anemic. but I'm talking a really long time and, you know, like, our index of suspicion needs to be really high. But no, you do not need to be doing parasite cleanses. no parasite cleanses. That's a big thing that people ask, like, how do I treat roundworms and hookworms and whipworms and all these things that really are not common, know, in the United States at all? Like, you don't need to be doing that. Unless you poop a big worm, like, you're okay. How often does that happen in your practice that someone, like, actually does that? Not often, but I will tell you, when I worked in the urgent care many, months ago, I thought that this kid was gonna have pinworms, because, you know, the kid's on the schedule for a worm. So I thought, pinworm, of course. That's the only worms that we typically see in pediatrics. But when I'm getting the history, the mom is telling me, like... I'm sorry. That she was going to the bathroom and she felt something. Okay, you don't typically feel pinworms, because they're so tiny. They're like... Millimeters. Yeah, teeny tiny. And she felt something and then, like, she pulled it out and it was... And she was disturbed, you know, and rightfully so. And so the mom actually had it in a ziplock that she pulled out of her purse and it was a roundworm, you know, like a Lumbrochortes, a scaris. And I have not seen that ever. And I had to, like, keep a straight face, because obviously, like, this patient's mortified, the mom's mortified, and, like, it's... Is that the one in undercooked pork? How do you get that? So I'm not sure exactly how she had it, but a lot of times kids can get it if they're like walking around barefoot, which I'm gonna honest, I'm really bad about doing this, but you have to like step in poop or something that the animal had it, like the dog had it, or you know, and then the larvae get in there and whatever. And it doesn't have to be like sprayed up poop, like the poop can... dry up and disintegrate and kind of become soil. But if you're walking around, you have to have like a cut in your foot. Like it's not just gonna like get in there. But it happened, and she didn't have any animals, so I'm not really sure, but we treated it, you know? I was like, we're gonna treat And then she was like, you know, do I need to tell people? And I was like, no, honey, no, take it to the grave. don't tell anyone that. No, never. Like we love news between... your mom and me and Jesus, okay? So it's fine. Yeah. worms can find a way. That is a series... Can find a way. ...that everyone needs to figure out. Okay, you are further on in parenting than I am. Like I said, my children are still younger. Your children are like tweenagers, teenagers. So for me, my algorithm has learned that I have children who are two, four, and six. So I am not seeing the misinformation out there that, you know, children of... your age's children have. And you mentioned the AI thing, and I'm not at that part in parenting. So tell us, like, what's going on in the world of AI and teenagers? Chatbots, we're chatting with AI? Absolutely. So, I mean, they can, these AI chatbots can give, like, inappropriate responses to kids. So kids will be asking, you know, pretty innocuous questions, or even, like, on the curiosity spectrum of things, and get something that's not, like, developmentally or age-appropriate knowledge. about like sexual things, know, innuendos and those kinds of things, which are, you know, concerning. And so like I've recommended for, like with my kids, I only let them use AI like when I'm there with them. So they have smartphones that aren't smart. So they're smartphones, but they're completely locked down. So my kids probably are gonna hate me for, you know, telling this on a podcast that, because they have iPhones, so they look really cool, right? They, I mean, we have like screen time limits, everything shuts off automatically. They can't text their friends after a certain amount of time. They don't have internet browsers on their phones. They cannot download an app without approval. So it sends a request. I look into it to see if it's an appropriate thing for them. You know, they can't get AI on their phone. I don't want that because I do want to monitor those things because weird things do happen with AI and too much education at like a younger age, you know? And so like my 16 year old, He can have the knowledge and we've talked about everything, we're open about everything, but me and my 10-year-old, maybe I don't want him knowing everything that's out there about things. Yeah. And it's like you want me to be able to have that conversation with him rather than chat-shabby-tee. Exactly. Yeah. And so a lot of kids are using chat-shabby-tee, you know, as a friend. And I can see that because I will sometimes use chat-shabby-tee. I'm not gonna lie, I'm not immune to it either. Like chat-shabby-tee can be kind of flattering. Like, ⁓ that's a great question. And I'm like, ⁓ thank you, chat. So kids are definitely not above that. And they kind of feel like they can build a relationship with these AI, you know, platforms and chatbots and things. And it can get to a place where it's confiding, you know, the kids are confiding in AI and not in a trusted parent. Like if, or an adult, if they're having suicidal ideation, if they're having depression, if they're getting bullied and they can kind of like take the place. of a human and that's not safe because the issue with AI, AI is not going to tell a trusted adult. You know, we don't have those safety measures where it's gonna let a parent know or, you know, help this kid the way the kid needs to be helped other than give them a number that they're not gonna call. And, you know, and so that can become an issue with kids in AI for sure. I'm more concerned about that than like cheating. I know that sounds horrible. But if they're using it for homework, like I'll be honest, I will sometimes take my kids, because I don't remember how to do algebra that my daughter's in algebra right now. And I'm like, I don't remember. I don't remember this stuff. And they changed it. Didn't they change math? It's all messed up, man. I don't know. Like I used to be good at it. Now I'm having to relearn everything. But I'll put it in ChatUBT and have it explain it. And so it'll explain it step by step. And I'm like, ⁓ yeah, I do remember this. Like rise over run with the slope and how we plot. I don't know. Like it's all coming back to me now. And so I think it can be a helpful, you know, resource in those ways, but it can be dangerous in other ways. So there are AIs. So like ⁓ Conmigo, it's like by Con Academy. They have one that's just academic. And so it's an AI that kids can use for homework help and it stays to homework help. they're not able to ask questions that'll say like, ⁓ ask a parent or, you know, ask someone else. I'm not the one, you know? And so I think that that's helpful. Gemini has an AI that you can sign. It's like a family paired AI so that you can see what your kids are searching. You can kind of like, you can put words that you don't want them to be able to search, which can be very helpful for like those safeguards. So I'm trying to think of the other one. I haven't used it, but I think it's a Microsoft AI that does like family pairing. I'm not familiar with it, but I've heard of it. Yeah. I mean, I think it's important for parents to hear that, right? Like as we move into always the next stage of technology, our children want to explore that, but we ourselves need to understand it and know how we can protect our children using it. You know, I grew up in a time where the internet didn't have any guardrails. You know, I am 38, so I came up in the late 90s, early 2000s. there weren't like, I mean, if there were parent controls, they weren't on my computers. My parents couldn't look at my phone through an app or like give me like time limits because they were flip phones and like a Nokia phone, like that didn't exist. Granted, all I was doing on that phone was playing snake. So like, it's okay. But I think, you know, it's smart for parents to know what is happening in the world and what their parent and what their children can get out of that so that they can put guardrails in. Cause that's really our job, you know. I'm thankful that there's so much conversation about things like screen time, because I have really made that one of my core parenting things, is like, my children do not touch cell phones or iPads. My oldest does in school, but they have never had an iPad. I've never just handed them my phone just to mindlessly play on it, because people talk about it online, how detrimental that is. And I do think AI is kind of that next screen time. and parenting that parents are gonna have to be really cognizant about and really know like the detrimental effects of like AI like you talked about. I mean, we have stories of adults who fall in love with chat GBT. So of course children who are probably working through relationships, learning how to be a friend might feel lonely. Of course they're vulnerable to chat telling them like... that you're a good person and that you're misunderstood or whatever. But really, knowing as parents how to keep our children safe from that, I think is gonna be the next big parenting hurdle with the internet. SHANNONSTER And there's a story of a teenager, like a late teenager, 19, who was using chat, and this is really sad, but he was gonna take drugs, and he was trying to figure out how much he could take to get a good high but not die. And he died. He overdosed. And so that is so tough. And, you the guardrails there were like, whose fault is it? You know, like, so should Chad have been like, no? And it looks like, like when they did the investigation that Chad was like, hey, we shouldn't be taking this. And, but if you ask enough questions, a lot of times Chad will be like, okay, well, if you're gonna do it, here's the safest way to do it. Well, that didn't work out. And so it's... horrible the things that AI can be used for. And I think that a lot of people think it's just like, ⁓ help me write this essay or give me this idea for this. And it can really, everything can be twisted and used in really unhealthy ways. And we don't want kids getting all of that information that, you know, is out there. It's just too much. It's too much. It's important that you guys keep talking about that as pediatricians online, because I think... Like you said, probably most of us are not as well versed in that yet. Like when you first mentioned it, I was like surprised a little bit, because that's not like the parenting side. I'm not in that era of parenting yet, but I will be soon enough. And so I think hearing it from the experts, continuously about the dangers of AI and how to use AI safely with our children, there's gonna be lots of parents looking for that information online and hopefully we get the right people there to give us that information. My kids have taught me so much more, feel like, than even like med school and residency. Like I learned the science, I learned the medication, the pharmacology, the pathology, and all those things, which are obviously very important towards pediatrics, but like the evolving nature of parenting and not just like potty training. You know, I think in pediatrics, a lot of time in residency, we were focusing on the younger kids. And I feel like the teens kind of get left out a little bit. You know, we learn about doing PHQs, like depression screens, craft... and those kind of things. But I think all this evolving, you know, social media things, but just other things that they're encountering. Vaping. Like, vaping wasn't a thing when I was back in med school and residency, and now it's huge. And it's like, kids don't understand, I don't even think adults understand the dangers of vaping, which, I mean, it's kind of scary. And they don't understand that, like, there's more nicotine in these vapes than cigarettes. And these kids think that, vaping isn't as bad as smoking a cigarette when, and many times it's worse. And so just constantly as a parent, as a pediatrician, trying to keep up with things. And, you my 16 year old is very helpful helping me like, hey, what's new now? What's the new stuff? What are you all doing? What are your friends talking about? What are y'all like, what should I be telling you not to do? You know, like even like Snapchat. I'm like, no, you know, my kids want Snapchat. No, we just message. No, you're not getting Snapchat. That's absolutely not happening. But I didn't even know on Pinterest that they could chat. so like that's another thing. that either. I had no idea. so like found that out. And so it's like constantly, you know, I don't know, being a parent of a teenager is kind of like being a prison like warden. Like you've got to like search the rooms and look and see, you know, and make sure you're on top of everything. But I think it may get more difficult as a pediatrician once my kids are older, you know, but my youngest is eight. So I've got, you know, a good decade left of being in touch with everything. And they teach me the words, the lingo, you know, six, seven, still no one knows what that means, I don't know. But anytime we see it, we're gonna do it. We're gonna do it. We have told our children that phrase is banned in our house, because my oldest, mean, it's six. I've heard it on the bus. I'm like, we don't say that here. She goes, what does it mean? was like, no one knows. No one knows. No one knows. Yeah. But I get to hear all the cool lingo, and I use it with my son's friends, and he's like... He acts like I'm cringe, but I think he secretly loves it. You know, not gonna he's a cool mom. He's a cool mom, so cool. Amazing. All I'm gonna get into a little rapid fire with you, okay? Do it. Would you rather work at Build-A-Bear again or Subway? Oh, Build-A-Bear, Build-A-Bear. I like Subway because they got free cookies at the end of the shift and that was always delicious. I love those cookies because you had to throw them They're so good. They're so good. so good. That Build-A-Bear was fun, like, because I love kids, I mean... obviously, and pediatrician, but getting to see their little faces and helping them pick out their special bear that was gonna be their bear, name their bear. And then, like, I don't know if you've been to Build-A-Bear and, like, done the my daughter loves Build-A-Bear. Okay, okay. She's like, can we go, like, you have four Build-A-Bears. We don't need any more. Yeah, we're gonna have like, sell any to afford Build-A-Bear. But when they take the little heart, you know, and I have them kiss it and, manifest a little thought in their little bear and put it in there. And it's just so sweet and helping them pick out the outfits and naming their bear. I just loved it. Like the whole experience was super fun. I will say, I hope Build-A-Bear doesn't sue me or anything. The one thing I did not like about Build-A-Bear is I worked there over Christmas ⁓ one year and it was a lot of like... or grandparents coming in and making the bear for them. And I was kind of like, no, what are you doing? No. You should bring them in to do it together. Yeah, like get them a gift card so you guys can come back and do it together. And I was like, what is going on? But like, so I was making these bears, right? And so I'm like stuffing the bear on the machine. But like, don't, these parents and grandparents were like super rushed, you know? So I'm like, do you want to pick out a heart? They're like, no, I don't care about the heart. Like just stuff it and sew it up and whatever. And I swear like... stitching the bears up over and over and over. Like, I had bleeding marks on my fingers, and they played this, special Christmas Build-A-Bear music, but it was really only, like, five songs on repeat. And that made me insane. So then, like, o'clock when we shut down, was like the first thing I did is run to the back and like hit that sing-songy stuff out. Other than that, I absolutely adored Build-A-Bear. It was so fun. I loved it. amazing. How many babies have you taken care of that were born with a tooth? Um, really, none. None? None. Just on the internet? Yeah, just on the internet. Like, seeing that, like, oh yeah, I heard that in med school and those kinds of things. Like, we had a kid that was like a scare of a tooth, but it really just an Epstein Pearl. know, it looked like it have been... Yeah, so it's called Epstein Pearl, but it's really, it's just like a... It's not a tooth, but it looks like it, and they usually resort over time, but it's just like a little white growth in the mouth. Oh, okay. Yeah. What is your favorite age to see for a well-tried visit? Ooh. This is a good question. I think four is like a sweet spot. I really like three and four because they're so funny and they say, like they have no filter, which is really funny to see like what they think. Three is really fun too, but some three-year-olds are three-nagers and they will like throw themselves on the floor. And so that's not as fun. feel like four, they're Have you met my son, Freddie? How did you know that? And it's funny, because you have a penny and I have a penny. was like, aw, that's so cute. I love that. Yeah, but four is fun, because then you can have them do the stuff, like, yeah, let's hop on one foot, let's do this, and they'll do all the stuff they want to do it, and it's just fun. get to interact more. Yeah, so four, perfect. And then what is your favorite type of parasitic worm? you know, it's like favorite and least favorite, the tapeworm. I think it's just intriguing. It's disgusting and intriguing, like, how it reproduces by like... shedding off just a segment of itself is gross and also really cool. And I've never treated a tapeworm in real life, so... You've got like decades left, you're good to go. ⁓ I'm gonna get one, I don't know. Yeah, the day you do, you get to retire, okay? I will. Hey, that sounds great. Yeah, there you go. Well, who are your three favorite people to follow online right now? They don't have to be medical. Ooh, ooh, ooh. Okay, let's see. So I love Jen Hamilton. I know she's medical, but she's just so freaking funny to me and relatable and has such good information, but she has such a good heart. I feel like I'm aligned a lot of ways with kind of like her ideology and those kinds of things. Being in Florida, it's kind of hard a little bit sometimes. I won't go into that as much, but I love Jen and she's funny. Like she has chickens. Like I'm from Oklahoma originally, so we have like lots of animals. We have like... ducks, which is weird in Florida, but anyway, I'm not gonna get in trouble with the HOA, but like we just love animals and I just think that like she's so goofy. I'm kind of goofy and I love that. Beach jam, I love her. She has such good information. I know it's also medical, so I'm being kind of boring. But I think she's just so relatable and she takes all that information. Like she's so smart. Like you can tell from her videos that she is so knowledgeable, so smart, but she can take that information and like bring it down where people understand it and parents understand it and... I feel like she's just really trustworthy and I love that. I love getting information ideas from her. Non-medical, I would say. So Rachel, the considerate mom, have you heard of Rachel's considerate mama? She is so sweet. She is a mama that teaches like how to parent intentionally and how to... So it's not like permissive parenting, but more like gentle parenting. And I think that that's really helpful because we learn about parenting as pediatricians, but not like in depth and like, this is what you do if this. It's more like... general, you know, like reward good behavior and ignore negative behavior and like whatever. But she gets into the nitty gritty and the step one, step two, step three, and has charts and all that kind of stuff. And I think that's really helped me as not only a pediatrician to help, you know, my families with their behavioral issues with their kids, because let's be honest, all of our kids at some point have behavioral problems and some kind of spectrum of that. But as a mom, my mom was, love her, but very strict and... discipline was different and I wanted to kind of discipline my kids differently. And so she's given me lots of tools to be able to do that and to show up for my kids the way that need to do, you know? And I think it was with older school parenting. I think that's just like how it was back then. And I think like, when we know better, we do better. And so I want to, I want to know better and I want to do better. So she's been really helpful. think that if there's no one there to like give you any other insight into parenting, you just default to the way that you were parented. And that can be good or bad, or it can be both, obviously. Like, no one's a perfect parent, and everyone was doing that the best they could. But I think, you one of the benefits of parenting, you know, there's lots of downsides to parenting currently, but one of the benefits to parenting, especially if you are someone who consumes social media, is that you have other insights to parenting. You hear other people talk about how they... you know, work through any sort of thing, how they discuss things with their children, how they... Even as simple things as like when my daughter was, she started first grade this year, and she would come home and be like, how was school? And she would like have nothing to say. I was like, you were just gone from me for eight hours. In a new school, what do mean you have nothing to tell me? And then I saw this video that someone's like, oh, your children aren't talking to you about what happened at school today. Here's a couple of things that you can ask them. Ask them what the stinkiest part was of their day. And don't... I asked Penny that that night, and she talked for 10 minutes about the bathrooms and how she went there with so-and-so and blah, blah. And I couldn't have gotten that out of her if she had... If I didn't have someone say, like, here's a couple of ideas about how you can get your child to talk to you about their day. Yeah. Yeah, being a parent is a lot, being like a psychologist also, you know, and trying to figure out how to bring it out of them and how to, you know... Encourage them in their interest and discourage them in things you don't want them to do, but let them think that it's their idea. You know? Like that's, I that's a big part of parenting too. The reverse psychology is huge in my house. That's amazing. Well, Dr. Key, thank you so much for being here. This was so wonderful. I can't wait to learn more about where the next worm is gonna go. For those people who aren't following you yet, where can everyone find you online? At the real Dr. Key is my handle everywhere. So TikTok. Instagram, Facebook, and I just started a YouTube channel. Amazing. Everyone go follow her. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you so much. It was great.