Empowered Patient Podcast

About Empowered Patient Podcast

Empowered Patient Podcast with Karen Jagoda is a window into the latest innovations in digital health, the changing dynamic between doctors and patients, and the emergence of precision medicine. The show covers such topics as aging in place, innovative uses for wearables and sensors, advances in clinical research, applied genetics, drug development, and challenges for connected health entrepreneurs.

Publisher

Karen Jagoda

Category

health & fitness · science

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

14 May 2015

Latest episode

8 Jul 2026

Latest episodes

4 of 2,734 episodes have a transcript.

1. 

   8 Jul 2026

   Targeting Root Causes of Obesity and Metabolic Disease with Harith Rajagopalan Fractyl Health TRANSCRIPT

   Harith Rajagopalan, Co-Founder and CEO of Fractyl Health, is developing innovative therapies that target the root causes of obesity and metabolic diseases to achieve durable, long-lasting patient outcomes. Their drug is designed to address post-GLP-1 rebound weight gain by treating the underlying gut damage.  Unlike GLP-1 medications that manage symptoms through appetite suppression, the aim is to modify the disease driving the obesity and change the paradigm from a symptomatic treatment to one of disease modification. Harith explains, "Our focus at Fractyl is all about how to achieve durable results for patients, long-lasting benefits. And the way in which we try to do so is by targeting root causes of obesity and metabolic disease and developing innovative therapies, targeting those root causes that offer the potential for long-lasting benefit for patients." "I think that GLP-1s have been transformative, as you say, but they have in many ways created an altogether new problem called post-GLP-1 rebound. What we are seeing in the United States right now is that there are a million people a month who are stopping a GLP-1. The more effective GLP-1 was for them in weight and metabolic control, the more rapidly they rebounded to whatever their weight and metabolic control were prior to treatment." "Whereas what we are doing is with our lead asset, Revita, we are targeting a root cause of obesity in the gut, a region of the gut that becomes damaged by chronic lifetime exposure to high-fat, high-sugar diets that we think is actually driving the obesity in the first place. And so if you can fix the underlying obesity, then we think that you can prevent the rebound that inevitably occurs upon the discontinuation of the medicine." #FractylHealth #Revita #Rejuva #PopulationHealth #ObesityMedicine #Endocrinology #MetabolicHealth #GLP1 #Gastroenterology #DiabetesCare #GeneTherapy fractyl.com Listen to the podcast here (http://fractyl.com)

2. 

   8 Jul 2026

   Targeting Root Causes of Obesity and Metabolic Disease with Harith Rajagopalan Fractyl Health

   Harith Rajagopalan, Co-Founder and CEO of Fractyl Health, is developing innovative therapies that target the root causes of obesity and metabolic diseases to achieve durable, long-lasting patient outcomes. Their drug is designed to address post-GLP-1 rebound weight gain by treating the underlying gut damage.  Unlike GLP-1 medications that manage symptoms through appetite suppression, the aim is to modify the disease driving the obesity and change the paradigm from a symptomatic treatment to one of disease modification. Harith explains, "Our focus at Fractyl is all about how to achieve durable results for patients, long-lasting benefits. And the way in which we try to do so is by targeting root causes of obesity and metabolic disease and developing innovative therapies, targeting those root causes that offer the potential for long-lasting benefit for patients." "I think that GLP-1s have been transformative, as you say, but they have in many ways created an altogether new problem called post-GLP-1 rebound. What we are seeing in the United States right now is that there are a million people a month who are stopping a GLP-1. The more effective GLP-1 was for them in weight and metabolic control, the more rapidly they rebounded to whatever their weight and metabolic control were prior to treatment." "Whereas what we are doing is with our lead asset, Revita, we are targeting a root cause of obesity in the gut, a region of the gut that becomes damaged by chronic lifetime exposure to high-fat, high-sugar diets that we think is actually driving the obesity in the first place. And so if you can fix the underlying obesity, then we think that you can prevent the rebound that inevitably occurs upon the discontinuation of the medicine." #FractylHealth #Revita #Rejuva #PopulationHealth #ObesityMedicine #Endocrinology #MetabolicHealth #GLP1 #Gastroenterology #DiabetesCare #GeneTherapy fractyl.com Download the transcript here (http://fractyl.com)

3. 

   8 Jul 2026

   Using Exosomes-Based Therapy to Restore Function After Traumatic Spinal Cord Injury with Lior Shaltiel NurExone TRANSCRIPT

   Lior Shaltiel, CEO of NurExone, is addressing the unmet needs of those with spinal cord injuries, as current therapies only treat symptoms and do not regenerate damaged nerves from accidents or disease. The NurExone technology aims to stimulate nerve growth by targeting a protein that inhibits cell proliferation. Using exosomes, which are secreted by cells, to deliver the drug in a localized manner is possible because of the ability of the exosomes to home in on damaged tissues and cross the blood-brain barrier. Lior explains, "At the moment, the medicine can only treat it by treating the symptoms. There are a few attempts to try to regenerate the nerves that are broken and to have the reconnection of the spinal cord injury or any damage in the central nervous system. And this is a huge challenge for medicine, so far not solved. And when we solve it, we prepare to answer and give hope to so many patients, not only in spinal cord injury, but also in other injuries, such as traumatic brain injury, optic nerve, and ophthalmology. So many nerves that we have so far not been able to restore the function after the damage." "So traumatic, meaning we are talking about injury, the acute phase of a disease or illness. In most cases, let's say, spinal cord injury is due to injury, car accidents, or sports accidents. But, for example, ophthalmology, glaucoma, which is a chronic disease, can also cause damage to the optic nerve that cannot be restored. So it can be due to another illness, as a side effect of the illness, or due to injury." "So we discussed the RNA. This is one part of the technology here. Second, the technology of using our natural transmitter in our body, which is how cells communicate with each other, is called exosomes. Exosomes are tiny vesicles secreted from cells with tiny envelopes that a healthy tissue sends to a damaged tissue, a cell that is affected, or a cell that doesn't feel good. And when we understand this mechanism, we can use those exosomes as a drug delivery system." #NurExone #Exosomes #SpinalCordInjury #NeuroRegeneration #PTEN #siRNA #DrugDelivery #Neurology #RegenerativeMedicine #Nanomedicine nurexone.com Listen to the podcast here (http://nurexone.com)

Inside a recent episode

Navigating the Rapidly Evolving Healthcare Communications Landscape with Saul Marquez Outcomes Rocket

Published 15 Apr 2025 · Transcript excerpt

[…] As I shared with you, there's four pillars in marketing execution. If anybody tries to make it more complicated, they're trying to sell you something. And so it's strategy, right? And there's a reason strategy is at the beginning. There's a quote that we love at Outcomes Rocket. Our team, we're a global team serving healthcare exclusive clients. And the quote that we live by is, strategy is the noise that you hear before the war is lost. And that's a reminder to us every single day that if you start with the tactics, now I shared with you there's strategy, then there's own, earned, and paid. Everything under the own, earned, and paid umbrella, those are all tactics. […]

Who has been a guest on Empowered Patient Podcast

Names identified in recent episode analyses. Showing up to five guests.

• Alexander Tsiaras
• Seth Cohen
• Seth Cohen Cedar
• Jim Foote
• Deb Nevins

Reach and audience

Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.

YouTube views

2,426

Score snapshot 15 Sept 2025

Apple Podcasts (US)

4.9 / 5

18 ratings

Spotify

5.0 / 5

1 ratings

Podcast Authority Score: 78 / 100

A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.

Quality

93

Social presence

0

YouTube

68

Engagement

90

Questions about Empowered Patient Podcast