(upbeat music) - Welcome to Business Forward, I'm your host Matt George.

I'm excited about tonight's show, we've got Dr. Michael Tarantino.

Dr. Tarantino is a hematologist and a renowned doctor in regards to bleeding disorders.

Welcome doc.

- Matt, Thank you, thanks for having me, very excited to be here today.

- Well, this is an interesting topic and I know we could talk a long time about this but, you know, you're the founder, owner, doc of the Bleeding and Clotting Disorders Institute.

And you've been in this field a long time, 30 plus years.

Is that right?

- That's correct, time has flown, but started in 1987 with my degree and have been interested in blood disorders that whole time.

So going on 31 years.

- If you Google your name right now, things pop up left or right off from all over the country, you are the expert in that area and I've known you for a long time too but you just alluded to, you've been a blood disorder specialist, what keeps you in that realm so to speak?

- Well, Matt a big part about that is the need, there are so many individuals out there with blood and bleeding problems, some of them realize that they have a problem but don't have a correct or comprehensive diagnosis treatment plan for what's going wrong with them.

And I and my colleagues and our whole institution really make it our mission to help those people.

And that's what keeps us going.

There's so many people out there that need our services and we're here to help them.

- I think what's interesting about it is, it's one of these disorders that really falls under the radar, doesn't it?

- Oh, it really does, it really does especially for the individuals with the so-called mild bleeding disorders.

You know, a problem enough to influence their life, to affect their quality of life, but there's really not good recognition or awareness of it, and it goes undiagnosed and people just sort of put up with it, and you'd be surprised how much it affects the quality of life of certain people.

So we're here to help raise awareness to not only help patients and people become more aware but other healthcare professionals.

So we focus too on education, on raising that awareness among all folks.

- Well, how do you know, like give me an example, how would you know, if for example, take me if I wasn't feeling well, I would go to my regular doctor, so what would be an example of a small or disorder that would actually affect the way I feel?

- Well, you know, for males or females, men or women, boys or girls, let's just take the example of a nosebleed for example, very common thing that happens, but it usually doesn't happen every day and it usually doesn't, you know, persist for minutes or even hours, so there's a line between what's, you know, just kind of common because of dry air or pollen in the air, depending on the season and something that is really related to an underlying bleeding disorder.

So we really help people like, you know, make that distinction and seek the right diagnosis and care for it.

For women for example, heavy periods for example is a very common issue.

And, you know, we have a wonderful OB GYN community here in the Greater Peoria area that really addresses these issues.

But, you know, a fair number of young women and women with heavy periods really have an underlying bleeding disorders.

So we work together with the OB GYN community to help raise awareness among the medical community, among the general population, to make sure that if there is an underlying bleeding disorder it gets diagnosed and properly addressed.

- So when I think of your business, I think of hemophilia.

What is that exactly?

- Hemophilia was sort of the foundation or the cornerstone of the treatment center that we built here a number of years ago.

Hemophilia mostly is an inherited blood disorder that is caused by the lack of a certain blood clotting factor, either factor VIII or factor IX, and it causes a pretty severe bleeding disorder in about 20,000 people in the US.

So it's in that category of a rare bleeding disorder, a rare blood disorder but it has a profound influence on a person's life.

Before good treatment came around in the seventies and eighties people with hemophilia didn't live very long unfortunately.

Today with the really wonderful treatment we have, people with hemophilia live a normal lifespan and mostly a normal life.

- Wow.

Do parents as an example know that their kids have something wrong and then that's the diagnosis and then they come and are referred to you.

Is that the process because I know from just doing a lot of reading, kids 20 years ago struggled and I find it very, very interesting not only with technology but research and in your field that it is, I don't know if curable is the right word but it is manageable now, and it wasn't that way in the past, is that correct?

- Matt that's absolutely correct.

Even when I started out my career, the sort of the dawn of the era of really sort of modern therapy for hemophilia was happening, and it wasn't uncommon to hear about life-threatening or fatal bleeding that was occurring in people with hemophilia, now it's a rare occurrence.

So even though we're not able to cure it, we sort of are on the cusp of a curative therapy, and that seems to be happening with this whole category called gene therapy.

We were actually expecting the first gene therapy for hemophilia to be approved last year.

I think the FDA wanted a little more safety assurance for the therapy, but there's really good therapy on the horizon that would involve a single shot and years of protection from bleeding, maybe a lifetime of protection from bleeding from a single shot.

- That's phenomenal.

That's phenomenal.

You're also a tenured professor of pediatrics and medicine at the University of Illinois, College of Medicine here in Peoria, and you're active in teaching medical students, in what you do, your business has grown, what is your goal of getting people, especially young people to get into your field?

- Oh wow, that's a great question, and I say that because it's a really big challenge because the world of what we call benign hematology, non-cancerous hematology is not so glamorous and it's, you know, sort of a niche and a person really has to be passionate and dedicated to it to make a career out of it.

Peoria has been, well, let me just say first, Peoria has got one of the best medical communities in the country.

We have the best mix of excellent clinicians, subspecialty care, tertiary and quaternary referral centers, a university with now a four year medical school.

This is a wonderful medical environment.

So it was really conducive to building this program here.

- [Matt] Interesting.

- I hope I didn't lose you there, look like I lost my video.

- I still have you on, so we're good.

- It's really about getting people sort of excited and inspired to possibly take that career path in Benign Hematology.

- Well, let me ask you this so to kind of take it a step further.

If a young person, I take my kids as an example, and one of them says, I wanna become a doctor, they don't sit there and they don't think of hematology, they're sitting here thinking I'm gonna be a surgeon or whatever it may be.

What are you doing with your team, and you e-com in going and saying this is the change that's happened in the past years, this is what you can do to change lives, this is what I do.

And kind of in a way sell, sell the business that you're in because you have to have a lot of good people around you to stay and maintain the world-class agency that you have.

- Matt you're so absolutely on point about that.

It takes a lot and it's not just intuitive things, it's really, really looking out for the next generation.

We do have an active medical rotation for residents of many disciplines that spend a month with us or even two weeks with us, we even have it for the students, we even have visiting residents from outside, and we've even had sabbaticals from physicians from other countries come and spend time with us here.

And so part of it is just seeing what we do and seeing like the quality of our care and this comprehensive care model that we've really perfected here.

And I think it really has paid off because if you look at the graduates of our residency programs here in Peoria, it's fair to say a disproportionately higher number are entering the field of hematology when they go beyond their residency.

Kind of warms my heart, but it also makes me really optimistic for the future because we need good people to, you know, sort of carry the torch in the next generation.

- And you've got a strong team with you now, and so you're just constantly nurturing teaching and so on.

I'm guessing every day.

- Yeah, absolutely, it is an everyday thing.

And I think that this sort of inquisitiveness that we have, myself, Dr. Roberts who's our associate medical director, all four of our nurse practitioners.

They have sort of adopted this philosophy.

We're not gonna stand on the sidelines and watch medical innovation happen around us, we're gonna do it.

We're not just gonna read literature, we're gonna write it and show people that, you know, our experience here, our involvement in research is really helping to shape the future of medicine.

- I think another interesting thing too is to show the need, but not only the need, the specialty of what you do, you have people coming from not only all over the State of Illinois, just not just Central Illinois, you've got people coming from all over the country for your business and you know, about 10 years ago when I was talking to you about something, I mean there were people driving a long way for your services, is that because there's not a equivalent Dr. Tarantino over in other counties or is it just, is it a combo of maybe you're the best or one of the best in the country and I'm gonna go there because my kid has hemophilia or what's the answer there?

- Well Matt, I think that if we sort of put ourselves in the shoes of the concerned patient or the concerned parent, we want what's best for ourselves, we certainly want what's best for our kids, and we'll, you know, extend ourselves to find it.

So there are some areas of hematology where there may be some experts around the country but just not that many.

In the world of hemophilia, there are around 150 treatment centers like ours around the country.

So we've created a network so that people don't have to travel all that far.

And in our model here in Downstate, Illinois, we actually travel to them, we go to nine other cities to provide comprehensive care for the people in Downstate, Illinois.

But for some other also rare bleeding disorders, there's just not that same network and we make ourselves available to people from literally from all over the world.

I mean, this method of communication now, like we're doing right now, it has become a sort of a new aspect of the way medicine is practiced.

We've done telemedicine care for people in other countries even.

- I think it's good to hear that you go, you said nine different locations and you're going out and about, because that really, you know, there are certain rural areas where it's hard to get to people or it's hard for people to get to you maybe, and by doing that, you're actually capturing more patients, correct?

- Oh, absolutely, and honestly Matt, that has grown based on the need.

We feel like it's our responsibility to do needs assessment around the state, and if there are pockets of people in certain parts of the state that really don't have good access, we sort of make that decision, I mean, it's are part of our mission, we're gonna go to them and provide the care if they can't come to us.

- Very interesting, so when did you see the shift from a manufacturing Middle Illinois to really and you just, you alluded to it a few minutes ago, really to a booming medical sector that's one of the best in the country, when did you see that?

- Well, you know, I think I've seen, I don't know that I caught the very beginning of the evolution but it's definitely been an evolution.

I've been here in Peoria over 21 years, and if I think back to 21 years ago, I thought the medical community was a really good growing medical community, but it's a great medical community today.

So that's happened in my lifetime here in the last 21 years for sure.

And part of it is the expansion of the medical school for one, and then the growing healthcare system that, you know, the Unity Point System and the St. Francis System has become, and they've done the same thing we've done, they've responded to need, because we know that, you know, a great hospital can't be in every small town, but we have to extend our services and make it convenient for patients to use our services through outreach for one, and now with this growing sort of field of telemedicine, I think is really making it a world-class medical community.

I'm really, really proud to be a part of this medical community for sure.

- That's awesome.

So you're also an oncologist, correct?

- Well, that was part of my career early on.

So about 21 years ago I gave that up, but I did train in Pediatric Oncology as well.

- So if someone had a bleeding disorder but you, I'm trying to get to the cancer piece because I knew somebody that had blood cancer and they recently recovered from it and even 10 years ago that was a death sentence, and now we have such good healthcare here in Central Illinois, now it's almost just like, you know, here's what you do, you go to Dr. T and then you go to the next referral and it's almost like it's taken care of now, it's just crazy what's happened this last decade.

- Yeah, certainly care for people with blood-related cancers has really come a long way.

I'll tell you that we have two great organizations here that deal primarily with the cancers of the blood, for the adult folks, it's the Illinois Cancer Group, world-class group for oncology problems of any kind for the adults.

And then we are the largest affiliate in the country of St. Jude and St. Jude affiliate, you know, associated with OSF are experts in the care of pediatric blood cancer disorders, leukemia is the most common type of cancer that happens in children, that's malignant, and, you know, they have this resource in Memphis with St. Jude's, that's just, you know, second to none, so we have a great community for the people that end up with cancers of the blood, many times where we're sort of the first stop because the recognition that it is a blood cancer has not been made, so once we see that or suspect it, you know, we make a referral to the Illinois Cancer Group or St. Jude's and they're wonderful folks on both sides.

- Well your business has expanded over the years because of need, and now you're expanding again, why don't you tell us about the fun project you've got going, I don't know if it's fun for you but it's fun for our economy.

You're growing again doc.

- Right and it's the medical version of the field of dreams Matt, maybe a little bit in reverse, I mean the need happened and this is the third time.

Well, the fourth expansion, I guess, third time we'd moved, but each time it's to address the growing need.

So we are more and more addressing those blood disorders that are underserved and under-recognized and really focusing on making life better for those those individuals and with it has come the need for more people to join our team to make that that happen so we are moving hopefully by August of 2021 into the new location which used to be the Midstate College location down on Knoxville in Northmoor and we're very excited about it.

We'll have a bigger facility, we'll have much more capability to see more patients.

And with that is coming recruitment, we're recruiting for two additional doctors, and we're recruiting for established researcher to expand our research program along with many other programs that will happen there.

We are being evaluated now, I mean, a formal application is in to be considered officially a medical home, and we'll hopefully be celebrating that as we move into the new location.

- So, so cool.

It's much needed too.

Let's shift to a topic that has really just hit us hard the whole world, the past 10 months COVID and you know, patients come first with you, I've always known that about you, how has COVID complicated your treatment to the patients?

- Well Matt, you know, you could have a whole week of podcasts on this topic, I'm sure, but, you know, it has resulted in an adjustment by our entire team, our administrative team, our business folks, our pharmacy folks, our lab, the medical people, the way we do things, the way we see patients, but you know what has really dawned on me that our model of care is really designed to keep people not in our clinic or in the hospital but to keep them healthy at home.

So the amount of adjustment we've had to make is not as great as maybe other organizations who sort of really sort of thrive on that patient interaction directly.

I'm not saying it hasn't been a challenge because it certainly has been, there is value and I'm the first to say that, not being able to see patients for a time in person, close up, you know, I think really does affect care to some degree, but, you know, because we've made diagnoses and referred patients on to cardiologists and immunologists based on our physical examination.

So when we're a little bit limited that way, it worries me a little bit that, you know, we might be missing something.

But our whole team has just like completely stepped up and risen to the occasion so we communicate with our patients really as much maybe more now than we did before the pandemic started.

- I was just gonna say that, in a way though, you probably have touched more patients in a sense.

- Well, we certainly have been able to keep up with the number of referrals that happen here, you know, which is a growing number, we really haven't turned anybody away.

We do rely a little bit on technology and that it's kind of a two-way street, patients have to have the certain capability to, you know, get online like we're doing now in their home, but when they can't, we try to make up for it another way.

- Okay, so we've got a couple of minutes left but I wanna talk community.

Central Illinois obviously is great for many reasons, we all have our homes here but, what does Central Illinois mean to you?

I mean what keeps Dr. Tarantino for not going to another location?

- Matt that's a great question.

I've asked myself that a few times and only a few times because I think it's a very simple answer.

21 years ago, you know, my wife and I and our young kids at the time took a little bit of a risk because we knew nobody in Peoria, we'd never been to Peoria, and it just seemed like the place to be and it didn't take long for us to realize that this was a wonderful place to raise a family and a great place like I mentioned before about the medical community, a great place to establish a medical program here.

Not that there haven't been challenges along the way, because there have been but they've always resulted in us rising above and growing and becoming a better institution.

I feel like this is home professionally and personally and I'm sure like many of my colleagues who practice here offers come from outside to entice us away but I'm not sure there's an offer that would take me away from Peoria.

- Well, that's great to hear for our whole community.

In talking about leadership, Dr. Tarantino, you are a true leader in your field, you are a mentor to many and a blessing to many, many families, so we appreciate you staying in Central Illinois and expanding in central Illinois, and we appreciate everything that you and your team does for our community.

Keep it up and thank you for coming on, I appreciate it.

Thank you so much.

I'm Matt George and this is Business Forward.

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