51. How AI is Transforming Stroke Recovery and Daily Life

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Hey. Hey. What up? What up? What up? Before we hop into episode 51 of the Lovable Survivor podcast, I did, at the beginning of this episode, discuss I've been a little under the weather, not able to record for a couple of weeks. I think it was a sinus infection. I don't really know. Could be the MS. Could be a bunch of things.

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Anyways, back at it. This week, AI in stroke recovery. I think it's a really important topic. I think there's a lot of benefits to utilizing AI in stroke recovery, whether that's at the individual level, at the collective level, at the group level. Therapy teams, therapists, I think everybody can benefit taking AI into their daily life as a stroke survivor, whether they're a caregiver. Anybody who's playing a part in stroke recovery can help with speed. It can help with recovery. It can help with, again, daily living, simplicity, breaking things down, breaking tasks down into easier morale man help with support. You can get a lot of I think there's a lot of room for growth. I'm surprised more people aren't talking about it in the stroke community. I know there's some hesitation because of privacy and HIPAA regulations and all those kind of things.

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So, yeah, that's definitely a concern. There are a lot of upsides and a lot of advantages to utilizing it and incorporating it at least in the daily life of a stroke survivor. Yeah. So I discussed some of the different tools, some of the different things out there, some of the different resources that are available. People doing cool things that interesting idea.

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Yeah. Just there's a ton of stuff. I think we've really only scratched the surface in this episode. So I continue I I I encourage you to continue to dig in after the episode and look at how you might be able to incorporate it in your life.

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Again, be safe. Don't put things in that you wouldn't wanna tell, you know, your friends or a therapy team, but the possibility is really endless. I think it could definitely help, especially in the early days if you're struggling, if you need extra help, but, you know, family members, friends, they have to get back to their on your own. That's a whole other discussion for another day, but I I just don't see a downside. Obviously, you have to use your judgment at the end. I I emphasize that a lot throughout the episode. Use good judgment. Check the things it's putting out. You know, trust but verify. That's always again, hope you find this useful. I hope you are using it. I hope you, have found good use cases for it in your life, and it's hopefully making your life as a stroke server a little bit easier. So I encourage you to check it out.

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Anyways, now My name is Vishmir. Welcome to episode 51 of the lovable star podcast. This week, we are going to be talking about AI and how it helps in stroke. We're going over some of the things that I like, some of the challenges with AI, really all things AI. I don't know how many people in the audience really are utilizing AI, but I think it's a really important topic. I think it's something that is discussed amongst therapy teams, research hospitals, psychologists, their that works in the stroke community. I don't see a ton being talked about it. There are definitely companies developing cool technologies and different devices that utilize some AI technology. I think, like anything in life, there are good sides and bad sides. I think there are things to be aware of about, things to consider. But, overall, my my take is that it's a pretty positive experience. I think there are a lot of tools out there that can aid in the recovery process, help speed some things up. They can it could certainly help with a lot of the cognitive issues, especially in the it can be I think of it as a collaborative tool. I think a lot of people tend to think about it as a collaborative tool. You know, before we get too deep into the episode, I do wanna apologize. I've been a little under the weather you could probably hear to my voice today. Still a little under the weather for the last couple weeks. I just I couldn't even last week or the previous week, I just was starting to feel a little weird, and I thought things would pass. And it would seem as though I have a self diagnosed sinus infection, which is the first time in about 5 years, really, since my stroke that I can remember being sick for a couple of weeks. I don't believe it was none of those symptoms, just a lot of grossness that comes with a sinus infection. Who knows why? Probably the MS, probably a lot of things. Could be my kids. They've been back in school now for a month, so that's always fun at the beginning of the year.

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Thought I might have escaped it because they start right in August, but right after Labor Day, things started to shift and I started not to feel so great. But I do think I'm on the other side. So, again, this is episode 51. It's been a couple of weeks since I recorded and produced and sent out a new episode of the podcast. I apologize for that, but things I am feeling much better. That is the plus side of everything.

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So, yeah, let's hop into this episode. I think there are a number of areas, but we'll start kind of at the beginning and some of the different tools for AI, some of the different reasons you might AI, when it comes to stroke recovery, I think, obviously, like everything with stroke recovery, it is very dependent on your situation, on the things that you're facing, the challenges you're having.

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One of the first tools I'm gonna talk about today and kinda the the, you know, and there are number numerous topics we could talk about, but I'm gonna start with daily life because I'm a few years removed from my stroke. So I think I'm through the worst of it. I think I have come out the other side. I've done a lot of work myself mentally, physically.

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Always room for improvement. I don't know if I would think differently whether I was strokes or not. I always think there's room to improve, a room to grow, things to learn, challenges we all face in our life whether they are strokes forever or not. I don't think a lot of the things I'm gonna talk about are not really unique to stroke survivors, but I think if you're not a just a caregiver, maybe you're a friend or family member listening to this show thinking, oh, I wonder how this can help my my my friend or family member who is a stroke survivor.

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It can do a lot of things. AI, I let's start off with AI is a really powerful thing that is it's been around for a while, but now come public facing in the last couple years. I think we're seeing companies utilize it in a variety of ways. We're seeing individuals utilize it in a variety of ways.

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Again, with everything good, there are some downsides. I think there are things that you definitely have to consider when you're work they're working with a chat gpt or a tool that utilizes chat gpt, maybe something like Grammarly. You know, you have to consider your privacy. Consider, you know I talk about it as a collaborative tool because I really believe in the power as a collaborative tool. I know a number of developers who have talked about it on podcasts and and, really, a lot of people have talked about it. It's more like thinking about if you're a writer, it's like having a writing partner where you can bounce ideas off of. You can brainstorm. If you're a developer, you might this is what I'm working on.

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This is the problem I'm trying to solve. This is the type of code that I'm writing in, whether it's PHP or Python or something old school, like, I don't know, c plus plus or Java. Whatever the code base is, you know, you look at a problem the way we use tool. Usually, we end up on Stack Overflow. We see if anybody else had this issue, what they've been able to get to, have they been able to solve the problem, have they been what have they tried to work through to the problem?

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Again, very big encoding in in the web agency space, developer space for sure. I think, you know, just we're all bouncing ideas off of one another. Chat GPT is just like having a a friend there all the time that you can do this with. It's not perfect. It's got a long ways to go, but it's come a long way pretty quickly. For me, again, I use it as a tool to assist and collaborate, not cut and paste. I think if you're thinking about cutting and pasting or having this conversation with Chatt GPT about your stroke recovery, you know, you wanna ask it questions and you wanna keep asking questions and you wanna get a base to start, and kinda build off of that. GPT because you're supposed to engage it as a chat. You wanna continually ask and evolve and see if you can get to an answer that maybe is sufficient that you like. Maybe you wanna develop a workout plan and you wanna be like, okay. I wanna work out 4 days a week. I wanna do chest, legs, back, for example, you know, and then work through that. See, okay.

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Maybe it gives you a plan. You revise that. You say, okay.

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I like these exercises. These, I feel like I can do at this point.

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These, I might struggle with. Could you provide me some alternatives for these if I can't do them complete That's just one example. I mean, the the the possibilities are truly endless. They it's a really helpful tool.

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Again, let's bring her back to the stroke, you know, planning out your recovery. Maybe you've gone to physical therapy. You've worked with therapy teams.

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You've made some progress, but you want to hopefully, you wanna see, hey. I've done this. I wanna try this. How how might I get to this from where I'm at now?

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And maybe 2 or 3 months, what could I do to build up further? Again, you could ask your therapy teams. There certainly is no no wrong answer when it comes to that. I think helpful for planning things like that. But, also, like I said, it's very helpful whether you're a stroke survivor or not. This is not exclusive to stroke survivors or people that have MS or or traumatic brain injuries.

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It can assist in some of the in the in the actual challenges we have day to day. Maybe you're like me.

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You have side weakness with your hand, with your or I'll say particular in particular, my hand, I'm right handed. I am right side affected. Left brain stroke, right side affected. My hand is a lot better than it was 5 years ago. I can do almost everything and anything. I just cannot do it maybe as quickly as I used to be. Just thinking about this the other day. I have my own preconceptions about how fast I should be moving, but in reality, when I see other people moving a mouse or doing computer work, I think there's a level that I was accustomed to being at, and I think the level I was accustomed at was so high in to be in terms of moving a mouse in terms of clicking around, doing everything myself. I think I could do everything as almost as equal or or even better so now than average users, but it's not where I wanna be. So sometimes I sometimes I get tired. These are all the physical sort of I wouldn't say limitations, but challenges that stroke survivors face. And AI can be really great for those mundane tasks where, you know, like, tracking, like, planning. It just just some of it eat things up if you use it correctly. Now, again, there are great ways.

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This is kind of a different approach, but there are other many other tools besides Shettibt. There's claw. There's there's there's actually a ton, if I'm being honest. I don't even think I should've looked them all up. Huddl, some are better than others.

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Some are you know, they're all changing. The space is still growing. It's still very new to the public facing worlds, for sure. Less than 2 years, I would say, at this point.

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May well, maybe a little over 2 years, but I think 2022 is really when it started to roll out.

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But, again, this is going been going on from the end of the scenes for years. So, yeah, let's talk about another tool that I really like. Audio pen dot ai is a tool where okay. So if you're a stroke survivor and you you can speak, you might really why? Because I don't know if everybody has this, but for me, I've been able to speak pretty well for the last couple of years from my stroke. Still not perfect. Still little, stumbles here and there, especially when I'm tired, like today, right after the gym before I record it. But what I is it's able to take traditional voice notes. So you can go to audio pen dot ai. They actually have an app now, a native iPhone app, I believe. They may have it for Android as well. But if you are at your computer, most computers now have at least built in microphone that is good enough for tool because you can basically record up to 15 minutes at a time. I have a lifetime membership that I bought a couple years ago, so I don't know. It might be different now because I know it's a yearly subscription, but it's a great tool, well worth the money because what you can do is, like, if you're like me, you know, some people like that's excellent. If you can write well, that's even better. I do practice handwriting. I am getting better still 5 years out. That is kind of the thing that is lagging behind for me, But this is a great replacement for me because I'm able to take do audio notes and really have them transcribed in a way it's very good. I've been using it for a couple years, so it knows me pretty well. It's able to really capture if I go on a 15 minute ramble, it's able to capture the real big highlights of those that note taking session per se, from my audio recording and really break things down for me and then from to a Google Doc or I put it into Notion, and I'm able to kind of take that sort of brain dump that I have in the mornings or or really anytime. I use it throughout the day, but particularly in the morning, I do, like, a 15 minute morning brain dump, which is very similar to morning pages. Or really any It's just a good way to get my thoughts out of my head from the day before the night from sleep and really get my thoughts out before I kinda dive into my day. I think it's a a really cool tool. And like I said, I I I utilize it so it transcribes things. The other cool thing about the tool in general is it transcribes the whole if it if you think you've said something and the notes haven't summarized that for you, you can go back and find it in the actual transcription and then add that to your your notes, And I find that very helpful.

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Again, it's a great way to just brain dump, get my thoughts out of my head to to kind of attack the day after I do that. And I think that's why a lot of people journal, or some similar activities. So I think it's really it's a really cool tool that I'm not sure enough people know about, and I hope maybe you haven't heard of it and you're able to go use it. Check it. Cool. Again, this is Strokes Forever or Not. This is just a really cool tool. I think we're seeing a shift from, you know, more handwriting in general and typing, and people are able to to to talk into a microphone or a computer or both.

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It it helps speed up. But, again, if you struggle with typing as a structure, typing or writing, both are doable for me, but they're not as great as they used to be. So talking is definitely the easier option for me. Hopefully, for you, if you do have aphasia or you have trouble speaking after your strokes, you know, when you a tool like AudioPend.ai, hopefully, you are able to type or write or both because it gives it's really important to get your thoughts and and everything going on in your life. Again, so server or not, good to get it out, get it on paper. Whether you go back and utilize that or not is day, but I think it's it's well worth the time and look and worth the investment for sure.

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And so I just did a blog post on survivorscience.com. I did a 2 part series about using AI and some of the tools. I I talk about them pretty pretty extensively, not, like, super in-depth information, nice to know, so I would definitely recommend visiting the website and checking those out. I had a lot of posts up last month of a bunch of tools, and, of course, one of them is chat gpt. You know? And I think a lot of people are aware of it now. I think, some people best out of it. Some people are still learning. It is a learning process. There are certainly lots of good courses, lots of people giving away good information, tips, suggestions, you know, like me like, like, I'm gonna give. I think it's great for brainstorming. I think it's great to get you know, I think it helps with you know, as a stroke survivor, as a brain injury survivor, sometimes I just have a lot of thoughts and I have trouble kinda connecting them, so it's it's good to connect them and then refine them. I do wanna harp on this point, though. Chat GBT, is good in the last 2 years, and I'm sure it will get exceptionally better over time, but I do want to caution everybody.

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You get out what you put in. So putting in good stuff, putting in good thoughts, you know, will help you refine that, but you have to think of this as a collaborative tool, a tool sort of refine some early thoughts. You know, again, you could utilize AudioPen to kinda do some audio notes about a thing and then maybe put that in to check GPT to start up formulate, you know, whether you're writing a blog post or a paper or even a note or or just ideas or thoughts or game plan.

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Just it's a great tool. It's a, you know, for whether you use a free version or pay $20 a month, it is well worth $20 a month because you can really refine things. I think sometimes it does get caught up in the language and and things. You have to be very careful and mindful of that. I think it's a great, great tool, especially for stroke servers who are maybe kinda putting the pieces back together themselves. So, like, things that were once easy, you'd need a little help with, and and this is a great tool for in assisting anybody with a disability, really anybody at all. Disability or not, strokes or whatever or not, it's just a really good tool to help with everyday tasks. I mean, it can do charts. It can do, you know, it can it can it can kinda if you read something and you just wanna get the high level bullet points before you dig in more, you can get high level bullet points, and you could say, oh, I wanna you know, can can you tell me where this was discussed? You know, if you're reading a really big PDF, you might wanna just read a certain section where they're really breaking down certain things.

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Interesting recently, now I don't necessarily advise against this. You have to be careful of the privacy policies. Things tend to get switched on and off. You know, I wouldn't put anything in that I would be worried about the rest of the world finding out, but I'm kind of an open book and I genuinely don't care. I think I would have that I put in are things other people would be questioning or want answers to or want a different perspective on. So, like, my I recently did this with my, annual MRI scans where my doctor had left some notes, and I was just curious. I followed her notes, but I I wanted to dig in more of the reasoning behind something in her notes and kind of at a broad level here. It had to do with some issues, around my spinal cord, particular, my the kinda the connection between some of the vertebraes in my neck, in particular, c 6 and c 7, which are I have, I guess, I have little issues there. They're not terrible. They're not who know from the MS per se, I think they're more a product of being 6 foot 8 and being somebody who just constantly bends his neck in a certain way. You know, for years, I would hunch over. I still have trouble with posture, that wasn't helped with the stroke or MS, but I have been trying to sit up more upright. You know, when I'm sitting around, I actually have a brace to fatigue. Even at 41 now, I've been 6 foot 8 for quite some time, and I still need daily reminders of my shoulders to push them back, and I have a brace that helps me do that sometimes just to improve. Standing or sitting or which I'm rarely doing, but it it is helpful and is a good reminder to kinda tighten things up or what it's really good for is paying attention when I'm not paying attention to that because I'm paying attention to so many other things.

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But, anyways, long story short, with chat gpt, I was like, let's let's get some more, you know, these vertebraes and some of the issues. And it it's interesting because, I guess, I was trying to find out why or how they might improve.

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If there was a way to improve this because, you know, my doctor had said that things things are fine, but there was, like, a little pushing or or, you know, the something in these c 6 and c 7 areas.

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And it does seem tied to the remaining deficits that I have for my stroke, which is my right hand coordination much better than it was.

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Definitely a lot better than year 1. Way better than year 2, 3, and 4. It's always getting better, but it's still I want it to be, and I I'm determined never to give up. I I don't think I believe in a 100% recovery anymore because I think the goal posts on recovery always change or they're shifting because we're getting older and we're seeing life differently and we're continuously improving.

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So a 100% recovery is really weird. This is probably a topic for another episode, but, anyways, I was looking at what could I do to improve these these potential bulging discs or or kind of aid in myself. And I did talk to my my neurologist, actually, when I saw her and, you know, we discussed some of the things, and I told her I had done this. And she's like, oh, that that makes sense. That's a good use case. It's, you know, the reality is I can only do what I can do, and I can try some things, but they may or may not work. But just knowing I was able to talk to Chachi, dig into this before I went to my my neurologist and then reaffirm with her that there were some things I could work on that might help improve, but there's obviously no guarantees. I thought it was a really good I was surprised that I didn't think of it sooner, but I'm glad I thought of it. And I'm glad I had the conversation.

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And, again, you could have this conversation. You could have run the chart. You could have talked to your doctor. I just thought Chatt GPT was, like, an assess assistant or, like, a, collaborative, you know, my own stroke buddy in the computer that I could talk to whenever I wanted to that could give me some ideas and just it was really but, again, I caution you to when you're using these tools to be sort of general and not super specific, check your privacy settings, make sure you're comfortable putting something in there that you know, like, anything in life, I I've been a grew up with the Internet. I helped build the Internet. I worked in big web agency spaces. I I've been a a proponent and an advocate and also on the other side where I've been fighting against certain things. And so you said I caution you to be careful, and use generalities and, you know, don't put anything in you wouldn't be comfortable sharing with somebody else. I think that's the good the big takeaway there, especially when it comes to your personal medical issues and and stuff like that, but it is it it helps simplify some of the I'm gonna call it non but to be fair, when doctors write notes and charts, they're generally writing them for other doctors or other medical professionals and not necessarily writing it always for your benefits in the chart.

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So it's a good it's it's a good way to break, you know, complex things down, medical things aside.

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Or if you're a stroke survivor who used to be a high performer, right, you may struggle at times getting overwhelmed with information, so it might be easier. We've talked about this numerous times in the episode, breaking tasks down as a smaller incremental task. Again, this is not unique to stroke survivors, but I think stroke survivors could certainly agree.

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Too much information can be much more overwhelming than it might have been before you became a stroke survivor, so it helps break down actionable, you know, big big information to more actionable plans and and break down those complex tasks.

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You know, and I think they're probably the most people, but I think it can help from, like, even organizational to do lists. You know, maybe you need just help getting started creating that to do list, and then you can handle it from there, or weekly planning or monthly planning or planning out your your schedule for the week. You know?

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I don't think of it as an embarrassment or it's not something you can't do. It might just be able to help you speed up things.

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You know, when I think about it too, sometimes tech gbt can just literally you know, again, I wouldn't cut and paste things ever, but I think you can get essentially, again, if you're using a tool like AudioPen, you can take the rough audio and you can kinda put it into chat gpt, and it could help refine your thoughts. And and really, it can just speed up your typing, you know, so then you can go back and focus on if you do struggle with typing, you can thing which is a little less frustrating than typing out a whole paper. I think we can type out a whole paper now, but it is not without more effort. You know, sometimes I just don't like how a sentence sounds, so I'll use tool to give some suggestions, and I'll tweak it from there. Some in the end, it winds up being up to the same amount of time if I'm being honest. So I'd I'd I don't know how much it speeds it up, but it appears to speed things up, and it helps it just helps me when I'm at my best. I think that's when it's a really good tool as well for ship servers. I think we all struggle with fatigue. There's this window in the day. Well, there's several windows. It depends on how much I work out. It depends on what else is going on in my life. But there are windows, and it's not the full, like, 6 AM to 11 PM that it used to be. Now it's you know, it might be 6 AM to 11 PM, but middle of or after a big workout or a big run out in the sun here in Florida, it might be rough for the first hour, you know, and it's it's very helpful in that regard. Again, all the tools, I think, are I talked about it. You know? I think some good yeah. I would I guess it kinda uses AI, but, you know, it's not necessarily AI per se, but I'm sure it's baked in there somewhere. But when you think about Google and Alexa with the home assistance, like, yeah, I have a lot of lights in my house now hooked up to certain apps that just kinda make life a little easier. This is not AI specific, although I'm not really sure about Alexa. It's kind of in between. But, yeah, again, they're very helpful for having those devices, whether they're AI or not, are very helpful tools to make things a little bit easier.

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And if if you are able to speak and you're able to, you know, it's it's hard to write. It might be easy or to have an Alexa around to just be like, hey, Alexa. Make a note of doing this, that, or that thing, and I think I'm about trauma.

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I should stop talking, you know, and there she goes.

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Right. Hey, Alexa. Stop. Sorry. I didn't think about that. There you go. That that's in the middle of this episode. So, yeah, there are tons of use cases. I think, like I said, there's Cloud, there's ChatGPT, there are a number of other ones. Some are better than others. Some Again, they're all going to improve. I think the big takeaway is that utilizing ad as a collaborative companion and not a full on replacement is the thing I cannot emphasize enough when it comes to AI.

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It's about helping you refine things. It's about helping you get better. Not specifically when it comes to, like, chat GBT. Audio pen's a little different because you're really literally just speaking into a microphone, speaking into your computer, built in microphone, and it's recording and transcribe notes and just kinda breaking down for you. There are different options whether you want it to do long form, you want to do bullet points. Really good way to help speed some things up again, especially if you struggle with typing. But the other side of AI got GPT not necessarily behind a computer. Well, not behind a computer with your input is there's a lot of technologies being developed. I've met with a couple of different students over the last couple of years that are trying to utilize AI in terms of stroke recovery, whether that's full on routines, whether you're using a web, virtually meeting with, you know, teams to have the AI build out routines based on what it perceives to be your your your deficits or where you're struggling. I think it can help a ton too with actual providers, whether they're, physical therapists, speech therapists. I mean, I was thinking about this. I had my stroke in 2019. I was in inpatient in 2020, January 2020. I bought a bunch of books when I first couldn't speak because I was just like, I need books to go over. But now you need to go to chat gpt, and I don't wanna take away from the people who have spent time and money on these books, and they've made them for people to utilize. They're so useful, but if you're in a pinch, you can definitely get people to help you or you can even help yourself by, like, just asking Checkatrade to produce a list of 20 or 30 or 40, 50 words that are good. You, like, tell it tell ChatJPD, hey. I have improved my speech. I can speak 3 letter words, but I need a new set of words. I just want 50 words that would be good for working on speech therapy, and you can get ask it all sorts of pass specific questions and refine them, and you can have your caregiving team, your your partners, your wife, your husband.

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Your kids can even help.

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There's just a lot of unseen is to utilize chat gpt. I mean, the the sky is really at the limit. It's what can you think of? I mean, I'm not even sure I've asked it a question where it doesn't have some kind of answer, and then sometimes they are terrible. Sometimes it just doesn't know. I mean, I think at this point, there's enough people who have used it that it really gets at least to get the ball rolling. But, yeah, it's it's it's great for I've seen tools developed where, you know again, I don't know how much AI this is necessarily, but I think it's it's it's an integration of the camera and the AI to, you know I've seen hand signaling and doing practice hand exercises. It it seems like people are really utilizing it. I know a number of people are utilizing AI to to track some of the monitoring devices that are able to, like, some I'm I'm not clear on the specifics here, but I believe a number of tools, whether it's for your hands or for your legs, are able to monitor certain things. And, you know, I think the way it works is that they they build these devices, and then the AI kinda tracks movements and things where you might be struggling and is able to help.

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And then I don't know if the devices can actually you know, they can they can take the tracking from AI. AI kinda monitors everything that's going on and that feeds that real time data to a therapy team or you know, I'm sure this has changed. I'm sure somebody who's working in this space specifically gets much more eloquent than me about this. But that's the general idea is that it can tend to track and monitor, not not unlike a Whoop or a a Fitbit or any of these other devices, but think about it on a bigger, larger, broader scale.

00:36:15.139 --> 00:37:00.929
The more information they have from individuals, the more they can data could they can this is where it gets weird because people are worried about their data and their privacy, and it's a delayed sword. If you can get the help you need, you know, for me, I'm happy to give away the data. Take whatever you want because I I just wanna get better and continuously improve, but not everybody feels that. It is a concern, and it's a valid one. So I understand it. It's just, you know, it'd be nice to get to a place where those two things you know, I I just generally tend to look into companies and look into things before I get too far into it.

00:37:02.510 --> 00:37:05.150
But, again, certainly a valid concern, I think.

00:37:06.510 --> 00:37:27.960
For me, I'm always, like, of the mindset of, like, okay. If my data can help somebody else get better and improve based on things that are being tracked on me, whether that's, like, you know, a leg sleeve, whether that's a hand sleeve, you know, anything at all, I'm happy to share. I wanna share. I want it to be used for other people to help them improve.

00:37:28.900 --> 00:37:39.974
I'm all about it. But, again, that's not for everybody, so it's it's something to consider. AI, again, it's kinda I I wouldn't say it's a wild west, but it is kind of very early days.

00:37:43.074 --> 00:37:46.195
And, you know, you just have to be careful when you're using things like these.

00:37:46.195 --> 00:38:49.690
You have to, like I said earlier, consider being more vague, less specific sometimes. Consider, would you talk to anybody about these certain things? Would you feel comfortable talking in a group setting versus 1 on 1? Would you con would you feel comfortable telling x, y, or z to the world? Maybe you shouldn't tell chat gbt, but that's that's an individual based decision and something you should consider. I feel like I could talk about AI. And let's see. I think there are really, honestly, cases we barely have scratched the surface here. I you know, I'm I'm really hopeful in the next couple of years that it will help improve a lot of things for soap servers. I feel like I had a ton more ideas, and now I seem to be, drunk. See, end of this podcast, I have a bunch of notes, but I I just, I think about it in terms of really in terms of daily use.

00:38:51.510 --> 00:38:57.144
I think chat gpt gets a better app because I think a lot of people are very lazy when it comes to using ChatGPT or Cloud.

00:38:57.525 --> 00:39:05.204
I I, for 1, run this enough. It's called chat because you should chat with it.

00:39:05.204 --> 00:39:31.155
You should have conversations with it. You should not try to overload things. You see, some of these people have complex prompts, and I don't know that they, I don't know if these programs have anything. If you overwhelm it, I don't think you'd get the best answer. I think if you do things in steps to build, you'll get better return on your investment in terms of your asking questions and things.

00:39:37.389 --> 00:40:07.425
You know, I I can't. It helps with speed. It helps with simplicity. It helps with supporting me and my businesses. Like, really, it's just it's just it's just such a cool tool, and I know there are two sides to this where there are one side where everybody thinks it's evil and stupid, and the other side where people are crazy and and, somewhere in between, which sucks because I hate being in between, but I'm definitely not on the side of AI as being dumb.

00:40:08.679 --> 00:40:15.579
I do worry about people, you know, like anything in life, anything that's good. Somebody comes people come along.

00:40:16.360 --> 00:40:33.135
There's always gonna be bad apples. Something's gonna go wrong at some point. But I I I I tend to look at the positive side now. I just, you know, I there's so many possibilities for individualized care with stroke, especially because it's so individualized.

00:40:34.429 --> 00:41:15.400
I'm surprised we're not seeing more people in the stroke community talking about AI because I was thinking I wanna start building some courses around the community, you know, and helping people. I've thought about writing a book because every stroke so ever seems to write a book, but I don't know that I'm ready to write a book. But what are some things maybe some guides. Right? Like, just small guides that are actual 10, 15, $20. If we can help out a couple 100 or a couple thousand people, you know, I'd love to build it. It's just because the brain is so individualized, it's wired a certain way. Not everybody has the same experience.

00:41:15.460 --> 00:42:10.855
Stroke is so unique in that, but I think there are broad topics that can really be and I'm really excited about AI when it comes really, AI in general, but sorry. My nose is getting really stuffy. But think of me out. Your own personal journey as a recovering, you know, stroke survivor going through recovery, what happens after, you know, maybe you're only able to see your therapy team for year 1. Is it so you don't get to see them again until the following year, so you might have 6 months of nobody doing rehab. And if you're, you know, you're driven, but you you're lost and you're not sure what to do, there's no support really. That's again why survivor science is so important to me and why I'm really trying to build out the community. I have some excited about because you're isolated, and I think chat GPT is another great way to keep yourself out of the isolation.

00:42:11.074 --> 00:42:21.760
$20 a month, not terribly expensive, well worth the money. You can have conversations. You can you can kinda build a great plan.

00:42:23.019 --> 00:42:36.925
You should talk to your doctors and your therapy teams, but, you know, when you're out on your own family is helpful for the beginning part for sure, but, again, I'm talking about year 2, 3, 4, 5, and on.

00:42:38.744 --> 00:42:56.380
Like, you know, a couple years out, there's nobody there. You know, my friends are still my friends. I have friends, but they haven't been through it. You know? Some friends have totally gone by the wayside. A lot of people in my life have moved on. Some haven't, some have.

00:42:57.000 --> 00:43:00.219
That's okay. That's part of life in general, I think, as as an adult.

00:43:00.945 --> 00:43:25.280
Three kids, that's not the unexpected, but, you know, things change. And it it it and I'm not saying chat gbt should be your friend. I'm just saying it's a really good tool for collaboration and brainstorming when you don't have access to somebody else. What do you what do you, you know, so I drivers have trouble sleeping. That is one area I do not have trouble in. I love sleeping.

00:43:26.414 --> 00:45:25.085
I'm emphatic about my sleeping. I strive very hard for 7 minimum 7, 7 to 9 hours of sleep a night that my brain continues to heal, continues to evolve, continue I probably do more than I should. I probably don't give enough breaks, but I I'm just adamant about continuously improving, driving towards that, you know, staying sharp. I know when I don't sleep well. I can feel it. I can't run as well. I don't have a great day. There's no plus like, heavy less sleep. There's only downside to getting less sleep, which is why I'm such a neurotic you know, to be honest, I'm a neurotic fuck about my sleep. I I do not really I try not to mess with my sleep. I try not to let it be messed with. It happens sometimes, but I I really make a conscious effort to to focus on that and make sure it's not getting interrupted or or messed around with. So, anyways, again, there are tons of things for AI. I think, I think I've talked about them at nauseam here, but I I I'm excited to to this topic has more things develop and more things become a part of stroke recovery. I'd be curious to have on some of my therapy team members to see what they think about AI. What how can they help them improve their plans with survivors? Can they help them plan out exercises? Not unlike what I was talking about is individualized. They could they could, you know, talk to their patients, and they could help. Maybe they don't. You know, maybe they're not able to talk to another therapy person, but maybe with check GPT and Claude and things like that, they're able to develop or try different things that might be good particular patients. Obviously, again, I know privacy is a concern.

00:45:25.144 --> 00:46:09.318
I'm sure there's some issues around ChatGPT or AI in general with HIPAA, but, I mean, I think it can really do a world of wonders for everybody in the stroke community, and I think that's that's the big takeaway. For me, I think people of all abilities and disabilities really can be utilized to their advantage, and it's something we'll talk about many more times, I'm sure, as we continue on with the podcast. So let's hop into the last segment, which is the what I'm watching, what I'm listening to, what I've been reading in, then we'll do a little house check-in. Obviously, you can hear that I'm under the weather. I I think we're on the other side and just kinda getting rid of the end of whatever's in my nose, making it harder to breathe.

00:46:10.338 --> 00:46:17.403
One of the frustrating things is that I released my breathe better, feel better course. It's a free email course that you can go to breathe better, feel better.com.

00:46:18.105 --> 00:46:32.548
Sign up. You get a it's like a total of, like, 7 or 8 emails. 1 on day 1 when you sign up, then we go through a 5 day thing, and there's a follow-up, and then a following follow-up. I know it doesn't sound like it today.

00:46:32.548 --> 00:46:58.840
It's actually because it's sinus infection, the breathing thank God I work on my nasal breathing, but it has been a rough go the there are no nasal breathing exercises that will make a sinus infection go away. So it's been a bit of a struggle, but because of all that, I have been watching my one of my favorite shows. I enjoy it endlessly. I've been watching seal team right now.

00:47:00.900 --> 00:47:29.679
That's that's always exciting at this time of year. I love SEAL Team. I think it's a really good show. I am fascinated by military. I wanted to be in the military. I went all the way to Mets in 2009, was going to join the army, went to MEPS. I was overweight by, like,£5 a month, and that is when I went by now wife and daughter. And I never went back to MEPPS and never wound up joining the army in 2009.

00:47:32.619 --> 00:48:19.255
Not a regret, but I I certainly would have loved to have seen how that panned out. Obviously, Navy SEALs, still military is military. I love that lifestyle. I love that mindset. I love that leadership. I think with everything in life, like AI, like the military, there are goods and bads. Good size and bad sides. Bad apples, good apples. It's it's, you know, the story of the world. There's a there's a bad side, and, neither of those neither AI nor the military are immune to the other. I haven't been reading a ton lately. I just have not found books recently that have really drawn me in. I think that is just something that happens every now and then, so I've been shifting to podcasts.

00:48:21.010 --> 00:49:47.869
I do talk about Joe Rogan. I'm not the world's biggest fan of the well, no. That that's incorrect. I like Joe Rogan. I'm originally a Howard Stern fan. He was a guy he was my guy forever. Him and Robin, so my my team, but I do enjoy Joe Rogan. He what I love about Rogan is this he genuinely seems curious. I mean, he genuinely is curious. I know a lot of people don't like him for some reason. I know if that's because they don't listen to the whole episode or they just listen to the episode or they just listen to the clips or they hear one side of the stories. I I think sometimes these people that I'm not as interested in, but I I mind. And I I just think he's I don't know if he's the greatest interviewer, but it's it's a good show. It's certainly better than a lot of them out there, including myself, but I think I'm speaking to a very specific audience. I think he's reaching a very broad audience, but it's a really good stuff. You know, it's a entertaining. I love a lot of sports podcasts. There there's something you know, Joe is obviously a commentator now for UFC and has been for a long time, And he's a big martial artist. He's not a traditional athlete. He's not from the NBA, NFL. It'll be that kind of stuff. UFC is certainly quite big. I He's a really interesting guy just like Joe Rogan. I just love people that are curious and asking questions, talking about interesting things.

00:49:48.809 --> 00:50:24.255
You know, that's why I had Chris on, a couple weeks ago. It was somebody different. It was not necessarily a stroke survivor, but I thought his insights into being incarcerated for a number of years and were relatable. I thought they were interesting, and that's, again, that's kinda where I wanna take this show is different perspectives. I think as stroke survivors, we can all agree that there's definitely there's definitely, you know, the moment where not necessarily the moment, but, like, when you have a stroke, most of us have a change that goes on.

00:50:24.795 --> 00:50:56.405
I don't think we're unique in that sense. I think, you know, there are milestones in every life. Probably getting married or having children are milestones for your per perception changes. Certainly, medical life, perception changes. Certainly medical life you know, I'm sure people in the cancer community, people in the MS community, people in the brain injury, stroke survivors, heart attacks, you know, any major medical life event, you're going to have a shift, and there is sort of a before and after.

00:50:58.545 --> 00:51:00.324
And I can forget where I was going.

00:51:02.065 --> 00:52:24.693
Yeah. It's just I just I enjoy genuine curiosity, and I think those are all those are worth listening to as well. Even if you're a fan of this show, maybe you're not a fan of that, but I I think it's worth giving it a try. That's what I love too about life is you can always try something new, learn something from different people. I mean, I even tried to justify TV, be and it's as silly as it is. It's like, I like to watch things where I can learn or or there's a different perspective, you know, where it is a little bit of a break from you know, I think everybody deserves a break at some point in the day. You gotta earn those breaks, but when you earn them, you wanna earn them, but also get something out of it. I go to the gym a lot, but I get a lot out of going to the gym. Same thing with TV. I try to get a lot out of TV when I'm watching TV. Same with reading a book. I don't read a book because I'm not interested in the topic. I'm trying to learn something. I'm trying to take away something. I'm trying to then maybe apply it to my life. I think it's just it's my yours may not be, but, again, kind of to recap before we wrap up. Today, we covered, you know, AI and tools and how it can really speed up daily life and tasks that were once kinda mundane that we maybe used to be able to do, but now it might be more of a struggle. But even if it's not a struggle, I mean, you might find or in things that you don't like as much, but you know you have to do.

00:52:26.070 --> 00:53:08.719
All worth considering trying out. It's definitely a trial and error thing just like most of stroke recovery. Once you get out of inpatient rehab or rehab in general, once you're really on your own, you gotta you gotta try things out. Some people feel very I'm not one of them. I feel like try, test, see if it works. If it does, great. If it doesn't, what can I try next? You know? On to the next. But, yeah, it can it can simplify complex information, just things that you have questions about. It's it's not it's it's worth taking a look. It can really help support your independence, especially when people move on and you're not able to get that daily help as much as you might have been able to get in the beginning.

00:53:10.135 --> 00:54:05.045
Their tools, their resources, they're not humans. They're never gonna replace human input and emotions and feelings, but they can certainly give you something to think about. So I'd encourage you to explore them if you you're comfortable with see you know, I think all these tools, they learn you over time. They learn what you like, what you dislike, what your tone is. Whether you're writing, whether you're just trying to get things done, whether you're doing tasks, check it out. If you haven't, I'd love to hear what your experience has been like, what tools you've used in rec if you've used any. Really wanna hear from other other listeners and other survivors what their what their take is and what they've experienced with AI. So, yeah, I don't I don't know I don't have a topic off the top of my head right now for the next episode, but I'm pretty sure it'll be something fascinating. We can't wait to come back feeling a 100%, hopefully, next time we record.

00:54:05.824 --> 00:54:18.119
Feel pretty good, but, like, super, of course, I just caught getting a little stuffy, but I think I think we'll end it there for this week. This has been episode 51, vulnerable survival podcast.