John O’Connor is the founder of Gene Food and an Integrative Health Coach trained at Duke Integrative Medicine.
After his career in the NYC startup world left him stressed, burned out, physically sick, and unsatisfied with what he saw as the cookie cutter approach of traditional medicine, John became a “citizen scientist” and turned to deep medical research as well as alternative forms of medicine to restore his health. A passionate “bio-individualist,”who believes there is no one size fits all approach to nutrition, his current journey is one of self discovery aimed at gaining as much insight as possible as to how his unique physiology works. In conjunction with Dr. Aaron Gardner, Gene Food’s head of research and resident geneticist, John’s role at Gene Food is to help condense and distill the latest studies and commentary on nutrition science and nutrigenomics and communicate the core message to the Gene Food audience.
While living in Southern California, John’s approach to health and wellness was shaped by three key mentors.
First, by Mia Barbrick, a healer and acupuncturist based out of Laguna Beach. It was under Mia’s care that John first saw how powerful ancient healing modalities can be when applied to the right patient by the right practitioner at the right time.
Next, Dr. Stephen Brody, a Stanford trained endocrinologist and anti-aging doctor in San Diego. Dr. Brody introduced John to the world of advanced lab testing that is sadly off-limits for most Americans. Through years of detailed lab tests, John learned just how powerful personalized medicine can be. For the first time, John was exposed to lipid markers like Lp(a), a particularly atherogenic form of LDL-P that can become dangerous in those with a genetic predisposition, but that sadly is rarely, if ever, tested for in the United States.
Last, John completed a 200 hour Yoga Teacher Training under Gerhard Gessner, a member of the faculty of the University of San Diego as well as the proprietor of Prana Yoga in La Jolla, CA. Through Gerhard, John learned that Yoga is far more than just the asana practice. The science of Yoga can be applied to all facets of life.
Interviews and podcast appearances
Parade Magazine on Pegan Diets