Adam Torres and Elliot Justin discuss men’s sexual health.
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Show Notes:
FirmTech creates products that provide better sex and health for everyone.In this episode, Adam Torres and Dr. Elliot Justin, CEO and Founder of FirmTech, Inc., explore FirmTech, Inc. and how its technology is helping men’s sexual health.
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About Elliot Justin
Elliot Justin MD, FACEP, is the CEO and founder of FirmTech, the world’s first sex tech company focused on keeping men firm and fit for a better lifetime of lovemaking and pleasure. Before there is ED, there is erectile fitness. How can men avoid ED, and if they have it, arrest it and potentially reverse the condition?
Dr. Justin and his FirmTech team have developed the Tech Ring and the Performance Ring, transformative tools to help men optimize personal “erectile fitness,” and to inspire better erectile and cardiovascular health. The Tech Ring embeds smart sensors into an advanced effective and safe “cock ring” form. Healthy men have 3 to 5 erections while they sleep. This number is a leading indicator of a man’s vascular health. Before heart attacks, strokes, and significant diabetes occur, this number will go down. When worn during sex, the Tech Ring measures the duration and firmness of erections. Now men, while wearing a cock ring for better sex, can also assess the impact of medications, vascular diseases, supplements, and exercises on their erectile health.
Soon, we will provide similar sex tech for women.
By background, he is an Emergency Medicine specialist and health care technology consultant. As a serial health care entrepreneur, he founded and exited Pegasus Emergency Group and Swift MD and advised several service, telemedicine and tech startups.
In the previous century, Dr. Justin concentrated in Slavic Studies at Harvard University (1971-’75) and medicine at Boston University (1975-’79). His studies instilled skepticism toward the conceits and prognoses of experts, antipathy to authoritarians and true believers, and kindled a passion for liberty and objectivity. Above all he believes the inability to admit error and uncertainty are the roots of friction and failure.
In 2014 he established Pegasus Liberty Foundation to fund research on the prevalence of slavery and efforts to rescue and rehabilitate slaves in India, Nepal and Burma. He also has served on the advisory board of the Freedom Fund.
Passionate about history, economics and pre-20th century literature and art, Dr. Justin wrote the novel “The Chastity of Honor,” about the country’s first war against jihadis during the Jefferson presidency. Kindle it!
Happily married for 35 years to his artist wife, and the father of three remarkably successful adult children, Elliot and Ann live in Montana with three energetic mares and a flock of chickens. He is a passionate trail rider who sometimes imagines, to his wife’s chagrin, that he’s a centaur.
Full Unedited Transcript
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, just head on over to missionmatters. com and click on be our guest to apply. All right. So today’s guest is Dr. Elliott Justin, and he is CEO and founder over at Firm Tech.
Elliott, welcome to the show. Thank you so much. Good to be here. All right, Elliot. So big topic today. I want to get into the work that you’re doing over at Firm Tech. And of course, men’s sexual health overall. , and your focus on this and I guess just to get us kicked off here tell us a little bit more about your background.
like, how’d you get started both like, in the medical field and ultimately as an entrepreneur as well? Sure. Well, a background, I’m actually an emergency medicine physician. And was involved with, , founded several emergency medicine service companies. And that led in the really in the late 1990s to my interest in telehealth, which was really in its infancy then.
It’s everywhere, , today. , my real goal was to provide people with the knowledge. Did you say in the 90s, by the way? That’s a long time ago. I mean, for telehealth. No, I don’t mean like age, come on. I don’t mean like that. I just mean, I’m trying to think about internet when I think about 90s or otherwise.
Well, we’ve just started with the internet, exactly. Yeah. And I really was, , being in emergency medicine, most of the problems that we see are really actually not emergencies. , it really occurred to me that use of algorithms, computer algorithms, we really could provide people with the ability to solve problems on their own.
And that would allow us to redirect healthcare resources to people that really, really need healthcare. So, and I’m talking about wrist, brain, ankle, sprain, sore throat, upper respiratory tract infection, urinary tract infection, yeast infection in women. I calculated that and I had an emergency medicine company that was almost national.
No, that was, well, we were in 11 states, so we were nationwide. I calculated that about Probably about there was like 15, 16 prompts represented 85 percent of what we saw in the emergency department. And almost all these things could could be resolved with an and so people would be able to manage the type of problems I just mentioned without seeing a doctor just by that time, the computers weren’t advanced.
They are today. It would have required the FUE police algorithms and having to work them out on paper and then on a phone call. Now, of course, could be fully automated. We’re still not there yet. We still don’t empower people to care of their health. that I then found a company called SwiftMD that was the second oldest telemedicine company after Teladoc.
That was in the early 2000s. The company doesn’t exist anymore. It’s been sold. And then that got me interested in Did you have, real quick, before we go further along. Sure. Did you have any tech back then? Background here, or were you just like drawn to the technology person or internet or like how, how, like, that’s insane.
Like you’re ahead of your time on this. Yeah, and if you’re ahead of your time, it’s often the risk associated as well, too. And when we get the sperm check, we’re way ahead of our time. We have world’s first technology. So that got me interested in, well, if we want to take care of people at home and empower them with the knowledge that physicians would apply if they weren’t.
This is pre cancer. They weren’t motivated by secondary gain, by money. Because you get, in this country, and in most countries, you get the care that the insurance companies or the government will pay for. And you can get lots of it, because that’s how the doctors make money. And you don’t get the care , that’s not covered.
So when it comes to healthcare, what do people want most from a doctor? Advice with insurance companies or the government pay forgive me advice. Nothing. So you said you really have kind of like a, a don’t care system , from, from managed care Medicare. Yeah, I get it. People care about the most.
so then I got involved remote patient management technology, because if we want to people take care of themselves at home, they need to have data and we live in this incredible age of healthcare, wearable, smartwatches, smart rings. And there’s a gap, which is sex, and an area of health that is of enormous concern to people.
I mean, men care more about? How many steps they took yesterday or their erections? The answer’s obvious. So and if you think about the benefits of sex I mean, if people have sex every day, the cortisol level, which is the stress hormone, is 50 percent of people who have sex twice a month.
So, Why do we recommend to people to have more sex? We know from a huge large study in the United Kingdom that men over the age of 70 have sex twice a week As opposed to twice a month. They reduce their cardiovascular risk by 50%. They’re gonna die anyway. That’s a significant change and there’s been several studies various countries showing that couples that have sex frequently cut their divorce rate by up to 50%.
Well, single parent families, , divorce rates, , these things are, problems that have enormous social ramifications, go way beyond health because it has an impact on kids too, and kids and crime and everything, and so many things. So when I got, when I left emergency medicine, I was involved in these developing, consulting largely in developing these technologies, remote patient device technologies.
And a about three years ago, a urologist, urology professor contacted me and said he wanted to come up with a way of counting the number of nocturnal erections that men have once they have them when they’re asleep, because they’re a leading indicator of man’s cardiovascular health. And that, like, took me aback because I, I had no idea.
And we all know about, , a joke about, , mourning wood. Yeah, that’s not enough. You see, , a healthy man should be having three to five not erections while they’re sleeping. And if they’re not, in medicine, we say a leading indicator. We’re saying it’s predictive. So, high blood pressure, think about that.
Yeah, think high blood pressure. It’s associated with heart attack and stroke now, high blood pressure when systolic was above one 80 becomes a leading indicator, but in this country and throughout the world, we treat an association because, , your blood pressure is high. It’s one 40 or whatever, one 50 that’s associated with heart attack, stroke, kidney failure.
It’s not predictive, but if you’re nocturnal erections, Man go down by 50% from, , three to five to, , one, one to two or to zero. It is highly likely the next two or three years, more than 50% chance that you’ll have a heart attack or a stroke man for some major cardiovascular complications.
So when this, when the serologist told me that it was. I thought, wow, , that’s a vital sign. That’s a vital, a vital interest to all men and a more motivating vital sign than , how many calories did I eat yesterday or how many steps did I take? So, yeah, the quality of the sleep. So that’s what got me involved in this.
And what we’ve essentially done is create the world’s first smart cock ring. So, because when this doctor wanted to count nocturnal erections my thought was, why limit it to that? Let’s, let’s come up with a way of, of, of assessing all erections. And let’s also at the same time reinvent the erection ring for men just to go through those three points.
One overnight, our device, the tech ring measures the firmness and duration of nocturnal erections. So with that data, men can then get an objective sense of where the sexual health is as well as the cardiovascular health. That’s profoundly valuable. And then one during sex, , we measure again duration firmness.
And we also, with that information, men and the health care providers can then not only assess their cardiovascular and sexual health, they can measure the impact of. Medications, , and we doctors don’t take good care of people’s sexual health. , has anyone ever asked you, you ever had a doctor ask you about the status of your primary relationship or your marriage or your sexual health?
And they’ve never warned you about the sexual side effect of the medication. And there are two very commonly prescribed classes of medications that I call them, I’m being a little bit vulgar, but I call them the cock killers. So, those are the antihypertensives. And also the anti, and the antidepressants, that’s right, antidepressants, and all the men are taking both of those.
So so if, with, with the ring, men can then assess the things that are, could be hurting their sexual performance and health medications, diseases, but they also can, also can assess things that might be beneficial. Like the medications, which are or testosterone therapy, shockwave therapy. So where we are until this device came along and we sold about 30, 000 products.
But until the device came along, if you are, I don’t know how old you are, I’m 71, but if you are, I went to, let’s suppose we exercise our pulse races. And it’s alarming to us. We feel like we’re going to faint. Our pulse goes to like 160, 180. And we went off to our internist, our family doctor, and said, gee, , exercise my pulse races.
And the doctor just put his hand on our pulse. Pulse and a wrist. Is that? Yep. You’re right. Elliot, your pulse is racing. Take this the jocks and pill and come back in three months. We would think WTF forces 1900 1850. I won’t have an electrocardiogram. How about a Holter monitor? How about blood test?
And you got, but when it comes to sexual health of man goes to urologist. And says, I like my sexual health where it is right now. I’m, everything’s good, I want, but I want to keep it. Or, again, if they’re not getting a problem, that’s all, if that, that’s the equivalent, like, put the, they just put a finger on it.
They don’t do anything. They just, they get prescribed a Viagra or Cialis to you. Until they come back in a few months. Well, so with data, with a wearable, people can now get data driven, objective, actionable, personal health care. And I say personal because we’re all different. Because if you don’t mind me going on about, because I’m so frustrated with my own, with medical profession, I’ve been in forever.
We treat everyone as if they’re one size fits all. I don’t know how old you are, I don’t know your weight, let’s suppose, I’m assuming you’re not a different age, might be a different weight, might be different in the cases that we’re taking. And if we all, if we went to a doctor with high blood pressure, they would put us on the same, probably on the same pill to start.
Well, that’s wrong, because with a blood pressure cuff, which is, , I don’t know, like 60, 70 million people have blood pressure cuffs in the United States. You can actually titrate your dose. Yourself. pick on myself for a moment, get back to sexual health in just a second. But when I started thinking about developing a device to track sexual health, I thought, Gee, I have high blood pressure.
I take medication called Losartan for it. Do I really need it? So I thought, , I got a blood pressure cuff, and I should have gotten one years ago, and I started taking my blood pressure once or twice a day, and realized I only need the pill two or three times a week. Otherwise, my blood pressure is normal.
why would I take the pill? Interesting. Yeah. And people, so, , you can go off the subject of sex, but if your listeners got high blood pressure, get a cuff. See what’s really going on. because everyone’s unique. All right.
So getting back to ED, this is rectal dysfunction. This is an enormous problem and 50 percent of men by age 50 report four more episodes of rectal dysfunction. At age 30, it’s probably 25 percent and it goes up 10 percent per decade every year. 60, 70, 70%. So, and most people want to enjoy The pleasure, the emotional, the physical, emotional benefits of a happy sex life.
So, with data, you can start to address problems and relieve anxiety. Talk a little bit more , about how the data like over time. Like if you can give kind of like a use case of whether it’s. Fictitious or otherwise. But in general, like how you would use that data over time? ’cause I’m trying to make the connection for myself and also the listeners.
So I think about, and I think the Fitbit or like the Apple Watch or whatever, like that’s a good kind of like comparison. Yeah, it’s good analogy. This, that data maybe weight, maybe, , sleep or things like that. But this takes it to the next level and this is a different and different way of doing that.
So maybe talk about how that data and how this data there, how can you use it? Yeah, sure. , a lot of people call, we’re doing a dick bit just to play off of the bit. Yeah, I did it. So, , we’ve had two men that I’m aware of, and we’ve documented close to 50, 000 erections.
We’ve had two men get cardiac catheterizations. One guy his, strong family , the history of cardiovascular disease. And he went from five nocturnal erections. The two nocturnal erections. Now he was having other associated medical symptoms. That’s a little short breath.
Excellent. Tolerance was, , it was less and the device is telling him objectively that , something is wrong. I’m not going to tell you. We saved his life, but he’s got a catheterization for the heart attack. And that’s great. we had two men I know that get cardiac catheterizations.
We’ve had I’m aware of two, we’ve had a couple of divorces too. We had a guy who , claims he couldn’t get up with his wife. and was blaming her and his wife bought him a tech ring. He didn’t wanna wear it. She, uh, seduce him into, into wearing with sex . Mm-Hmm. Good, good way to do it.
Yeah. There you go. Go ahead. So it turned out that, he had nocturnal erections and. The issue was really, if a man is having nocturnal erections, but can’t get up with a partner, there’s something going on in the relationship. And at the opposite extreme we had a, we had another couple where the guy was also angrily blaming his wife for his lack of sexual performance.
And he, and she was concerned about his health. He was overweight, diabetic, he had risk factors for ED as well, bad cardiovascular health. And he he got a ring and she he had one, only one weak nocturnal erection as opposed to three to five strong ones. Yes, the guy had significant cardiovascular disease.
She divorced him because she was pissed off with him for the way he was treating her. But yeah, and he ended up, he’s the other guy who ends up getting cardiac cath, whatever, cardiac catheterization. So the ring also kind of made it clear to him that The issue wasn’t her. He had a major physical problem.
I’m not mental problem. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He might have mental problems too. But in this case, in this case, he had physical problems. So we have men that are using the device to, , they’re, they’re considering therapies for, for shockwave. So therapies for E. D. like shockwave therapy. Well, if a man and expense expensive, it’s six at six to 12, 000 a year.
So if a man has nocturnal erections, he will benefit. From the shockwave therapy, but a man has no nocturnal erections. He’s not going to benefit and he’s wasting his money. We have men who are using the device and doctors who use the device after prostate surgery to monitor recovery. The therapy is difficult.
Men have to do exercises, take medications and stick with the program in order to increase their chance, , because the, the, the incidence of. Impotence after, after prostate surgery is, , up to 70 percent as low as 35 to 40%. But it’s contingent upon, to some degree, upon men complying.
But if nothing’s happening, the men often just give up after months. But if they see that they’re having nocturnal erections and there’s some recovery going on that they’re not aware of that can conspire them to stick with the therapy. So there are that that makes a lot of sense to though, because it’s just another one when we think about and I know you talked about that, , different types of rings and wearables and things like that.
But this makes a lot of sense for it to be another indicator. And especially if that is how, especially with E. D. or something like that to where if that’s how your body is telling you something’s up like, And you want to start like, , everybody’s body is going to start showing a symptom in a different way, whether it’s weight or otherwise, right?
Like, whatever it is, whatever it is, if that’s how your body is kind of like, letting , Hey, , you’re not functioning like the, the system isn’t working, whether it’s your sexual system or otherwise, like, then this is a way to start exploring that and to start thinking about like how you go down that line and to start collecting data.
Like I think that’s super interesting that you can’t really. , I mean, the biohackers like to say you gotta track it to hack it. Well, you can’t, you can’t track it unless you have data and now you can, now men can have data. So previously the only data that was a avail available in this area was, , going into Mm-Hmm.
into a urologist’s office, maybe getting a, an ultrasound, dopp, a Doppler study, but. that’s not replicating what’s going on at home in real life, , circumstances, , I’m not over time. Let not like, over time. Exactly. And not over time. Warning indicator. Like, I know you don’t, I don’t think you use the word predictive, but it has a level of it is predictive.
Oh, it is. Okay. That’s what I mean by leading indicators predicted. You’re making a really good point. It really is, , over. Over time, because actually quite a bit of variability. I mean, if you’re. other men are using it to to titrate, to figure out what’s the right dosage of a PD five medication.
So, , the male mindset, actually most people’s mindset is, Hey, if the doctor recommends five milligrams of sali, I’ll take 20. , Mm-Hmm. of the, that the maximum of 20, I’ll take 40. Well, you can actually see with this technology, well, is it really having more impact? I, I’ll speak for myself that, yeah, because I’ve, I, I take five milligrams of todalofil.
Every day. Mm-Hmm. and 71 years old. But I don’t if, if I go to 10 or 20, if I go to 20, just get a headache. If I go to 10, it doesn’t have any impact. There’s no difference. We have men who are utilizing the device to see the impact of testosterone therapy. Testosterone therapy is expensive. Mm-Hmm. , is it expensive?
Is it, is it working? Is it not working? And most importantly, what’s the right dose? For me? My doctor might say, oh, well I saw everyone on this dose. Yeah. But, but now with data, getting back the blood pressure analogy, you can actually, yeah. you’re unique and what you might respond to might be different what I respond to.
Yeah, this makes total sense. It makes total sense. And another data point, another type of wearable someone can use. I’m just, I mean, I’m just overall excited about what’s going on in medicine. When we think about wearables and other things like the, the potential to extend not just our longevity of life, but like quality of living, right?
This is also right. We’ve been talking a lot about the medical side, but then just the quality side of having a healthy sex life and having a healthy, , maybe not. And I’m not saying these particular examples you get, you’ve given, but in general, maybe this, this, Does help some relationships, revitalize them and lead to some, let me be optimistic and say some less divorce or things like this or communication or whatever that is that we do.
I know it does. It’s all in the mix. I feel like it’s all in the mix. I mean, I was not doing, when I started the company, I wasn’t thinking about how, just how beneficial it would be. And I was, and I get 100 heartwarming emails three or four times a week. Some people tell me that we’ve, , that we’ve changed that we saved their marriage or we saved their relationship or they didn’t.
Because there’s another, there’s another component to what we’re doing, which is the the, just the benefit of an erection ring. So, , my lifetime I’m gonna call them cock rings. That’s what people, that’s what they’re called commonly. I, I try to call them erection rings. The medical field calls them constriction rings.
That’s like, sounds like something a Nazi would think of. Who wants to put a constriction ring on their penis? So, , so let’s call them cock rings. So, Sid. Yeah, , they’re made up. They’ve been for the last 150 years. They’ve made out of hard silicone. They paint.
They’re uncomfortable. They choke off the arterial blood flow and they’ve never really caught on. So unlike vibrators for women, so in order to count the number of nocturnal erections, we need to come up with a, with a cock ring material that would be comfortable and also allow arterial blood flow in.
So it could be one for hours and not and not prevent directions. So. So we are, our rings are made out of an elastomer, which is a softer material, and whereas silicone the conventional sextile material makes you adapt, makes you adapt to it elastomers adapt to you. It’s much more, it’s much, it’s much, it’s great, it’s a great material, and the and what men don’t realize is Because, whether it’s from pride or because these conventional rings have been poorly designed, is that well designed physiologically considered, if you will, erection ring will enhance a man’s pleasure.
It’s not a crutch. Guys can kind of see these things as crutches and they’re reluctant to use them. It’s an enhancer. And if you’re, if a man, because he’s using a ring, is more confident. And it’s going to last longer and have more intense orgasm. It’s good for his partner as well too, in younger men, performance anxiety is probably the leading cause of, of ed and a ring can make a man more confident because most men’s problem is not that they can’t attain erection.
If a man can’t attain erection, he, he’s got a major problem. He’s urologist. Mm-Hmm. . If a man can’t sustain an erection, which is to get an erection, then you lose it. There’s usually an anxiety component. To that, so you’re getting blood in and the blood’s not staying there, and that could be due to psychological factors, anxiety.
Could we do a partner? Could we do distraction? Or it can be aggravated by medications. , I talked about the cochlear medication for and depressant hypertensive diseases. Well, so a well designed ring helps all men, men without ed, just performance anxiety or men.
But with not, I just want to answer performance or men who have ED that’s been, it’s due to a physical, , , issue. So if I were to want to send a message to your listeners, it would be threefold. One, put a ring on it, especially if you’re a man over the age of 45, 50, or a man who’s diabetic or hypertensive or taking medications that could affect your sexual performance, put a ring on it, get the data and figure out what’s going on objectively.
Don’t rely upon speculations, anecdotes, what you hear from friends. You now can figure out, with objective personal data. Two, if you want to last longer and have more intense pleasure, put a ring on it. And three, do it for your partner because good sexual relationship is one of the, tripod of a successful with, with someone, man or male or female.
Mm. Mm hmm. It’s awesome. Elliot, this has been a lot of fun. I mean, I, I learned a lot. I’m sure my audience did as well. it’s a great story to bring my audience. How do people get a ring? , like, tell me more about, like, , the website or how people can connect?
Yeah, you can find us at my firm tech. M. Y. F. I. R. M. T. C. H. dot com. You can reach me personally at Elliot at my firm tech dot com. And next next 30 days you can use the promo code. I know Elliot. I K N O W E L L I O T. You can get a 20 percent discount. Awesome. And for everybody listening, just so you know,, we’ll put the links in the show notes to the website.
So again, that’s myfirmtech. com. And speaking of the audience, if this is your first time on Mission Matters or listening to Mission Matters, we’re all about bringing on business owners, entrepreneurs, and executives. And having them share their mission, the reason behind their mission, their companies, how they’re out there helping people.
If that sounds interesting or fun or exciting to you, we welcome you hit that subscribe or follow button number one, but also look out on your phone. Phone after you hit that subscribe button, because tomorrow, guess what? You’re going to get a notification. That notification is going to be for our next episode.
So we’d love for you to come back and listen to some more episodes and some other amazing entrepreneurs, just like Elliot. And Elliot, again, thank you so much for taking some time out today to come on the show. Thank you. That was a lot of fun and I really appreciate the opportunity.