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Join Tami Burdick, a patient advocate and the author of Diagnosis Detective: Curing Granulomatous Mastitis. We delve into the world of travel, uncovering hidden health and safety risks often overlooked by travelers. From airport concerns to international journeys, Tami shares her insights and offers valuable tips to help you stay healthy and safe on your travels.

Tami Burdick is a patient advocate and author of Diagnosis Detective: Curing Granulomatous Mastitis.

She discusses the KevinMD article, “Behind closed doors of traveling: the concerns often overlooked.”

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Transcript

Kevin Pho: Hi, and welcome to the show. Subscribe at KevinMD.com/podcast, and get CME for this episode by clicking on the CME link in the show notes. Today we welcome back Tami Burdick. She’s a patient advocate, and she’s the author of the book “Diagnosis Detective: Curing Granulomatous Mastitis.” Today’s KevinMD article is “Behind closed doors of traveling: the concerns often overlooked.” Tami, welcome back to the show.

Tami Burdick: Thanks for having me here today.

Kevin Pho: So Tami’s been on multiple times. Go to KevinMD.com/podcast to hear her story and prior episodes. But today let’s get right into your most recent one. Tell us what this article is about.

Tami Burdick: Yeah. I think that many people, there’s so many of us, millions and millions of us traveling, and whether it’s for personal or whether it’s for business, I don’t really think that a lot of people are aware of the potential risks that are involved in all of this travel. And so it really compelled me to want to write this article, not necessarily to instill fear in other people, but just to let other people know what the risks are, what they could potentially do about them.

Kevin Pho: All right, so tell us, what are some of these under reported risks of traveling that people may not know about?

Tami Burdick: I think you’re going to have security, they’re going to encounter potential issues with health, whether it be germs, whether it be incidental things that happen. And so I really just kind of wanted to talk about a lot of what we might come in contact with or might encounter that none of us are really sitting around thinking about.

It’s like, once we leave our house, and maybe you’re having a ride share person come and pick you up, already there is a potential risk involved. I would say probably especially with women. So once you leave that house there’s so many things that we can come in contact with, whether it’s security, whether it’s health related, whether it’s unexpected things that happen with the environment, or that are in the environment, that we’re not really considering or looking at.

Kevin Pho: All right, so give us some examples. You alluded to potential ride share hazards. Talk more about that, and just give some specific examples so listeners can really understand what some of these risks are.

Tami Burdick: Yeah. So if you’re looking at a plane, for example, you’re going to come in contact with a lot of things that really can impact our health. And I don’t know about you, but every time I travel I just don’t feel the best, I feel like I need to detox afterwards.

You’ve got fumes from the engine oil, you’ve got levels of EMFs that you’re being exposed to, you have the concern with cosmic radiation, you’ve got the potential for blood clots especially if you’re sitting for long periods of time, you’ve got concerns with ear pressure, you have the cabin cleaning chemicals. I mean, they’re cleaning these planes, or they’re supposed to, after every use, and they’re using all of these different chemicals to be able to clean the planes.

Of course the most common that people probably are thinking about is germs. I know a lot of people personally right now that are traveling, and they said that it’s just like coughing and sneezing frenzy on the airplanes.

And then even when you land, there’s certain things beyond the airplanes that we need to be aware of, and it’s in your hotels. Whether you’re doing a hotel or an Airbnb, you’ve got the potential for mold. I have seen, over and over and over again in the significant amount of travel that I’ve done for business especially, mold in hotels. Whether it’s in the bathroom, whether it’s on the walls, the ceilings, but more commonly is the window AC units. If you actually open the fronts of those, you’ll be very surprised at what you might just find. And you’re laying there all night basically breathing mycotoxins.

So that leads me to also look for booking hotel rooms where you’re able to open a window, or you’re able to secure a room with a veranda, and that way you can at least open those if you choose to do so and have more ventilation in the room.

And then you’ve got things like carbon monoxide. I know in the headlines, like just last year, there have been a lot of people dying at these different resorts and whatnot from carbon monoxide poisoning. We’ve got properties with cooling towers, and sometimes you can end up seeing Legionella bacteria. There’s a lot of things, honestly, whether it’s airplanes or whether it’s to your destinations, that we just need to be aware of.

Kevin Pho: So when you mention things like the cleaning agents at hotels or in airplanes, or the exposure to mold, it’s likely when one goes on vacation it’s only for at most a few days. But even that exposure over a few days, that can have ill effects in your body?

Tami Burdick: I’d say for a lot of people that might be immunocompromised, or have genetics that might have more genetic expression to these things in our environment. I think there are HLA genes in particular that might have someone be affected more from mold exposure than others.

And like me, with MTHFR, and there’s actually a huge percentage of people that have at least one variant of that genetic mutation, it can impair your body’s ability to completely detox, and it also interferes with methylation.

So if you take individuals like me who are going to be more sensitive to these things, yes, your vacation might not be so enjoyable if you’re kind of stuck in those circumstances.

Kevin Pho: So sometimes we can’t help but to travel, whether it’s for leisure or whether it’s for business, you have to go on a plane sometimes. So what are some things that travelers can do to prevent some of these ill effects?

Tami Burdick: Yeah. So let’s look at the security component first. There’s AirTags that you can get, not only for your personal safety but the protection of your personal property. Security locks, especially if you’re female and you’re traveling alone. It’s pretty easy to get into a hotel room, I’ve seen an episode of Inside Edition where they did a story on that. So there’s things that you can do from a security standpoint. You can always travel with somebody as well. And in the third-party apps that people use for ride share, there’s settings that you can select to kind of inform other people that, hey, I’m being picked up right now.

The things that you can do to better support your body is looking at, what can you do for immune support, what can I do for detoxification? You can inspect the rooms where you’re going to be staying at, like I said earlier, choosing rooms with verandas or where you can open windows. Taking with you like a portable kind of tumbler or whatever that contains a filter inside, so you can always drink filtered water on the go and be able to stay hydrated as well.

Things like with detoxing, you could look at dry brushing, juicing, sauna use, Epsom salts, massages. Limit your alcohol intake, make sure you get electrolytes.

Kevin Pho: So tell me your routine in terms of traveling. If you’re going on a plane, do you do all these things whenever you travel?

Tami Burdick: I do a lot of them, absolutely. I do have a checklist too, I’m like one of those high I personality people, so before I’m ever traveling anywhere I have a checklist of everything that I’m going to need to pack. So I do definitely a lot of these extra things when I’m traveling. I think it’s important for me in particular, and I just feel better overall doing them.

Kevin Pho: And what are things you can do in the booking stage? You mentioned booking hotel rooms with open windows, verandas. Anything else that we can do from a booking stage that can minimize the risk of health ill effects?

Tami Burdick: Yeah, I actually belong, I don’t remember the name of it, but it’s on Facebook, I think it’s toxic mold avoidance, or mold-free traveling maybe is what it is. I think it’s mold free traveling. So it’s one where people will go on and share their positive stories, or like absolute negative, like do not stay at this place, where they may have come in contact or encountered mold and just didn’t feel good during their stay.

You can look at different reviews, obviously. You can look for histories of places. So say you’re going to go to Houston, or you’re going to go to Louisiana, where you’ve got these areas that are more prone to significant hurricanes. Anytime a property has had an incident like that where they’ve had significant water intrusion, you have to be concerned about, did the property get remediated appropriately? You just can’t bring in fans and think, oh, everything is going to be good to go. No. Because I have a home inspection background, luckily. So those are probably some things you can do in the planning perspective of your travels.

Kevin Pho: How about the role of masks? You mentioned things like air quality in airplanes. What do you think the role of masks are?

Tami Burdick: So I think it’s really a personal choice. For me, I am not against wearing a mask on an airplane. I think we are in such tight quarters, there’s so many people that’s coughing and sneezing, there’s a lot of illness going around right now in particular. If you want to wear a mask to better protect yourself, then go for it.

I would probably myself be wearing a mask right now in particular if I was traveling. The last thing I want to do is get to my destination, and whether it’s for business or whether it’s for pleasure, and not be able to enjoy my vacation, or to be able to work my best for whatever client I might be working with.

Kevin Pho: We’re talking to Tami Burdick. She’s a patient advocate. Today’s KevinMD article is “Behind closed doors of traveling: the concerns often overlooked.” So Tami, tell us a story where perhaps one of these travelers may not be aware of some of these issues and just had negative effects to their health, just to illustrate some of the points.

Tami Burdick: Yeah. I’ve done some traveling before personally where I just haven’t felt the best. I’ve seen firsthand in the Charlotte Airport, I’ve seen firsthand in the Memphis Airport, where there’s been visible mold. I’m kind of like a dog sniffer or something, it’s just like I could be somewhere and just kind of be like, I think this place has mold.

I guess it’s probably more from a lot of the different health groups, travel groups that I belong to, where people have shared all of their personal stories. So it’s really kind of hard to give you a specific about a certain person, but there’s been a lot of people that I’ve seen that have not felt great from their travels or whatnot.

Kevin Pho: Let’s talk about mold specifically. In general, what’s the status of a typical chain hotel? Do we have to worry, if we’re not part of these groups, that mold is everywhere? What’s the prevalence of mold exposure in a typical chain hotel?

Tami Burdick: I mean, mold is everywhere in our environment. All you have to do is walk out of your house and there’s going to be mold. But we have to look at the opportunistic component of how it could potentially affect our health. And there’s actually information out there that says our own homes or our own properties could actually have more unhealthy air than the air outside that we’re breathing.

And I think that, because I’ve seen it firsthand so much in my travels, whether it be mold in the AC units or whether it be mold on the walls, I’ve seen it a lot in the groups, that we can do a lot better. And I think a lot of these big hotels and resorts need to do just that, especially when all of us are putting out top dollar prices sometimes for our pleasurable travels, and we should not have to have this fear or concern that we could potentially get sick from something in their own building.

Kevin Pho: So let’s say you come back from a trip. What are some typical symptoms that one should worry about that may direct them to a physician because of any travel related issues?

Tami Burdick: Gosh, I mean, that’s probably hard to answer, because are we looking at your typical illnesses that we’re seeing, like right now with COVID and the flu and different upper respiratory infections, or certain stomach infections that people are having? Or are we looking at something more kind of environmental symptoms?

And sometimes you may feel just kind of bad from it, but we really don’t know if there’s going to be any long-term effects from someone’s exposure. But I would probably be more concerned if I was going to be staying at a property for a significant amount of time, or maybe I was going to be on a cruise ship touring the world. That’s when I would probably be more concerned, because I certainly wouldn’t want to be on a cruise for an entire year and there’s nothing I can do, out of my control, unless I end up at one of the ports of call and I just fly back home.

Kevin Pho: Any questions that I as a physician can ask patients to elucidate some of these travel related health issues?

Tami Burdick: I think if someone goes to a doctor, no matter what it is. Like with me, with granulomatous mastitis, when I was diagnosed, how difficult would it be for the doctor to say, OK, let’s look at everything that may have changed, new things that you could have done, places that you could have visited, have you moved?

And I put this specifically in my book, what we as patients really need the medical community to do. We need this uniformity and this structured way of how we approach GM when it comes to our medical community.

So I think anytime that a patient comes to a doctor with symptoms, OK, when did they start, have you been anywhere lately, and all of these questions, kind of that diagnosis detective role that they’re asking their patients, can really help give them clues as to what maybe tests they want to run, or what they should be looking for, or other questions that they should ask.

Kevin Pho: And my final question, Tami. As always, we’ll end with your take-home messages to the KevinMD audience.

Tami Burdick: Yeah. My take-home message is, I’m not saying to stay at home and live in fear and not go see the world, or not take a job because you don’t want to travel. So I’m not sharing this information to instill fear, for sure. It’s just, be a little more self-aware, and there are things that you can do to better protect yourself in travels.

Kevin Pho: Tami, once again, thank you so much for sharing your time and insight, and thanks again for coming on the show.