#16: Tackling Diabetes and Health Education with Ethan Bezner: Insights from the Future Healthcare Leaders

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This is Pete Moore on Halo talks. Fast break

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2026. Happy New Year to everyone in the

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Halo Network. As you know, we are here to help

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solve loneliness, obesity and diabetes.

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Bringing in straight from Athens, Georgia, University

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of Georgia student and friend of the square.

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Through relations and some camp networking, Ethan

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Besner. Welcome to your first HALO talks. Thank

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you. I appreciate it. So. So, Ethan, we're bringing you on here

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because you got a couple interesting things that you're focused on,

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you know, clinically on, on the diabetes side and eradication of

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that and then a couple funny stories. But give us, give

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us a quick background on what you're. What you're doing, what you've learned

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so far, and what you think could be some aha

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moments or takeaways for our, our Halo Network.

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Yeah. So I'm a public health major at the

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University of Georgia with an emphasis in behavioral medicine.

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So my outlook for the future is the pre med track. I'm

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beginning my MCAT prep now, and through

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this program at the University of Georgia, you learn a lot

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about, like, health policy and, you know, current health

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trends and how things have changed over the years.

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And in one of my classes, HPRB

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5410W, it's a writing workshop class,

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we had to write a literary review on a subject of our choice.

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So it was something we were passionate about, something we wanted to research about. And

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my mother is a type 1 diabetic. So

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diabetes has always been something I've known about since I was a kid

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and seeing her deal with it. And so that's kind

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of the background for my research project. So

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how long of research project is it? How intense?

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Are you doing any kind of clinical trials? Are you

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aggregating research, or what are some of the takeaways that

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you've kind of come across so far? So this project

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took every student about three months. There's 75 people

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in my cohort, my major, so that's. You had to apply to be in

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this major. And 75 students got accepted. So per graduation

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year, there's 75 students. And this was during.

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It was in the class. It was during one semester. And it was about two

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months of that class, three months of that class. And the project was

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based off of research that we've done on current literary reviews. So we

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use tools like PubMed or the UGA library

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or like the CDC page. And we use data from

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these research studies that have already been done and we

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compiled them into our own paper. So my paper

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consisted of three risk factors that I identified

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and wanted to Research and find a way to connect

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to the increase in early onset diabetes

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and type 2 diabetes from 2010 to

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2020. And so that was the basis for my

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research project and my risk factors that I

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found through my research word technological

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factors such as like medical, medical equipment and then also

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changes in like a more sedentary lifestyle because of

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technology. You know, people are sitting on their couches all day, they're on their phone,

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they're not active as much, they're not outside as much. And like these

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are kind of things that everyone notices but they don't know to link them. So

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my next one was dietary risk factors such as increased

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consumptions of ultra processed foods, which are changes in our diet to make

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food cheaper. Expensive foods are healthier,

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but if you have a cheaper option and people need to save money, they're going

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to buy the stuff that's cheaper and more visually appealing, which unfortunately

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is ultra processed foods that are placed right in front of you on these shelves.

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And then the last thing or the last risk factor that I put

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into this project was fitness and physical trends.

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When my dad was growing up, he likes to tell me stories about walking miles

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to school or whatever, taking a bike, having to make his own way to school

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and not like we don't bike anywhere anymore. Like

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I walked to class at the University of Georgia because it's a super walkable campus,

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but there's not, people aren't outside as much doing these things

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right. So when you take a look at, you know, the ultra

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processed foods, obviously there's some administrative and

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governmental changes. I saw that came out with kind of like a new food pyramid

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recently. I think serving sizes and what they put

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on the back of, of serving some of these packages and labels

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are, are purposely misleading. Or even when you get a bar

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that you know, you think would be healthy for you and they have the bar

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kind of flipped over so you actually have to open it in order to see

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the, the actual, the label and

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the ingredients table. What's

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the, what's your kind of view on, you know, there's

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processed sugar, there's, there's sugar from alcohol that now they're

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putting on the labels is kind of like that really counts as sugar.

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And then I've always looked at it and said when I had this aha

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moment that, you know, 4 grams of sugar is basically like one sugar cube.

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And if you actually put on the label and showed like, here's how many sugar

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cubes you're consuming, such as A Mountain Dew 20 ounce Mountain Dew

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has 14 cubes of sugar in it. You know, you might think twice about

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buying that. Do you think that there's an

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educational component that goes to the consumer but that there's

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a responsibility of either the government or responsibility of the

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manufacturer to be more open disclosure

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about these things? Yeah, I'll answer both your

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questions. Yes, I think that it is a problem

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and I think it is something the government needs to say.

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Like you need to be honest with your products, like this is

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what's in it. But the problem is the education level, like the reading level of

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most of the people buying these stuff, like these items in the grocery store. They

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don't know. And so it's something that needs to be taught. And my aha

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moment as you said was so I work at a non

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profit clinic called Mercy Health center as their in house phlebotomist

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and I do a lot of in house a 1C test to like check their

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glucose for pre diabetes. And my aha moment

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was I'm sitting here and one day, let's say I

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draw blood from 12 patients. Eight of these patients have

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A1Cs over seven. Like that's not, that's not a one

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out of 10 people or have early onset diabetes or

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diabetes. These people all have prediabetes. And I'm

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like, this is a trend. And this also, you know, tied into why I wanted

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to do this research project. It's a problem that needs to be taken care of

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and it's because of people aren't educated and what's in

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their food and how to like eat healthy and they don't have

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access to these things. It's not their fault, but they don't have access to it.

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Sure Is that, was there a funny story that you had from the

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lobotomy that you wanted to share? I mean I have,

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I don't know, I have some funny stories from it. I don't know if you'll

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think they're very amusing. Hit us up with one.

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Yeah. So we had a patient come in and the way it works is

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the first person who sees them are the like

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CNAs or whatever, like the nurse practitioners and they take them back and

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you know, they get their vitals, height and weight, their story, what

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medicines they're taking and then they go into the room and then the

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doctor comes in, he does whatever and then he comes out and goes, hey Ethan,

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I need these tests. I go print the like the labs,

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whatever, and then I take them to the phlebotomy room and I do

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their tests and I package it and whatever One of the times the

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doctor goes into the room, he comes out, and he's holding a bedbug in

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his tweezers, a very big bed bug. And he goes,

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all right, nobody go in this room like this. We're going to call. There's,

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like, a pest control medical company that deals with the stuff they call the people

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to come clean the room. But the patient's in there, and he needs

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labs, and he goes, ethan, I need you to go in there and draw his

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blood. And I'm like, you just said nobody's going in there.

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I'm not going in there. Like, I'm wearing scrubs. I don't have any, like, other

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equipment anyways. I ended up putting, like, I

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wrapped my face in, like, Covid masks in

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my hair and coven mask because we didn't have a hair net at the time.

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And I wore, like, a full gown and a trash bag over

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my legs to, like, prevent, like, to take everything off the second I got out

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of there and throw them away. And I go in and I take

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his blood, and it's fine. I don't have bedbugs. But it was, like,

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terrifying. And meanwhile, the doctor. And I love the

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doctor I work for. He's taught me a lot, and he's shaped the way I

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want to practice in the future. He's really caring. He went home to shower while

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I was drawing his blood just because he didn't want. What about the patient? What

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happened to the patient? Did he know what was going on?

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Was he exposed to the bedbugs dilemma? Or maybe not necessarily

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exposed to the bugs. He probably knew

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he had them. The patients we serve are all below the poverty line

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or without insurance or with no immigration status. So he brought the

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bedbugs to the. To the. To the. To. To the lab. I got

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it. Okay. Okay. Now it makes sense. Well, at least the guy's

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gonna know where he is on the A1C level. He's just gonna have to have.

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He's got A1C and a bedbug issue he's got to deal with. So throw something

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else into the mix. So look, in closing here, you

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know, you're. You're. You're part of the next generation, and congrats on what you're

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doing. And I know Georgia is not an easy school to get into, nor it

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is to graduate fund, and it sounds like you're excelling there, so that's

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awesome. Just leave us with. From your perspective, whether

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it's, you know, TikTok and all the videos, whether it's Instagram, whether

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it's Snapchat, how do, how do. How does

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your generation get. Consume information like this that will

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educate them as well as entertain them? Where do you have to. Where do we

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have to be to reach you and people like you, but people

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that aren't educated in this yet? I mean, my, My

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honest opinion is not social media

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like you. You need to be reading books and you need to be doing.

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You need to be able to learn on your own. I, like, I find,

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and I'm like the creature of habit as well. Like, I go

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on Instagram and I'm doing whatever. You do not know

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if what you're reading is factual. And that's something you realize as you,

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like, mature and, like, know more. Like, I'm learning all this stuff, like, all

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these things in my classes, and I would not be able to apply, like, I,

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I wouldn't be able to tell if it was real or fake unless I knew

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for sure from the teachers that I'm learning from. So my

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idea would be reading, like, reading books and going back,

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getting the. People that need to know about this and how they're going to change

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their lifestyle. You still have to reach them on social media because that's probably

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where they are. So. So, like your clinical

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research and we'll post the notes. Is that something that you're allowed to

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expose or is that something that's internal? I mean, yeah, that. It's a

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research project I did on my own and I'd love for you to post it.

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Yeah, it's awesome. Yeah, but I. I guess

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Instagram maybe is my answer, but I think people need to read more.

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Is mine. Yeah. Awesome. All right, man. Well, thanks for coming on. Keep doing

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what you're doing. Wave the halo flag for us. We're getting your dad all,

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all entrenched in the industry. So the more business we could have the

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best. The more business, the better. So,

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yeah, keep doing what you do. We'll see you soon. Thanks for coming on. All

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right. I appreciate it. Thank you. Later. Awesome.