Zachariah P. Zachariah, MD, Florida Board of Medicine

Zachariah P. Zachariah, MD

Contact Information:  

University of  Miami, Ft. Lauderdale Clinic

   

Transcript

This is a transcript from The Floridaville podcast.  This transcript was created using artificial intelligence so it may not be an accurate account of what was recorded.

Rosanna Catalano  00:08

This is the Floridaville!   Get to know the people behind the Florida names you know, I'm your host Rosanna Catalano. On this episode we get to know Dr. Zachariah P.  Zachariah. A board certified internal medicine and cardiology physician who specializes in cardiac catheterization and interventional cardiology. He has performed more than 30,000 heart catheterizations, and interventional procedures, has co-authored several scientific papers and participated in various clinical trials. He also serves on the Florida Board of Medicine along with numerous other boards. We're recording remotely today, rather than in our podcast recording studio. I'm in my home in Tallahassee, and our guest today Dr. Zachariah, who I fondly call Dr. Zac is speaking to us from his office in South Florida. Well, welcome to the show. Dr. Zac,

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  01:01

Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to talk to you and Joy.

Rosanna Catalano  01:05

Well, you are currently the chair of the Florida Board of Medicine, which regulates licensed physicians in our state. You know, the Board ensures that every physician practicing in Florida meets minimum requirements for safe practice. I know this isn't your first rodeo with this board, as you were the Chair when I started my career as a prosecutor for the Department of Health about 20 years ago. So tell me why you have stayed connected. And working on this board.

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  01:36

You know, I first got on the Board in 1988. And I've served several 4 year terms under several governors, and this is my sixth term as chairman of the board. The Florida Board of Medicine is a very important part of the state of Florida, it's very important that the citizens of Florida are protected, because most of the physicians are great people, but there are some bad elements amongst like in any other profession. And it's important that we weed out the bad ones at the same time, the most important thing is to be fair. And one of the things I've noticed was that in any organization there are some people are very fair. And and some people are not so.   And having served in the board for so many years have come to understand how the system works, and also to be is how important it is. To be fair in when you make the final judgement on cases. Well, the main purpose of the board is to protect the public and not to protect the doctors.

02:39

Yes.

Rosanna Catalano  02:40

So you know, for people unfamiliar with how the Board of Medicine works, can you share with us how you got on to the Board of Medicine and explain a little bit about how the board regulates licensed physicians in the state. Expand upon that a little bit?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  02:55

Yeah, all the members of the board are appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the Florida Senate. So you just apply to the Governor's office. And they interview a few candidates and whosoever so far to say he but who's or the Governor chooses they appoint and make sure is confirmed by the Senate or for a four year term or a fraction there are what happens is if a citizen of the state of Florida believes that he or she has been harmed by a physician, or by his practice, then he or she can file a complaint with the department. The first thing the department has to make sure that is legally sufficient. Somebody will say the doctor walked into my room. He was rude, or he didn't have a you know he was not properly clothed, or he didn't smell good. Whatever are the reasons they are not legally sufficient. So the first thing the department has to make sure it is legally sufficient. Once is legally sufficient, they do the investigation. Once you do the interview, the prosecutors will go examine the case. And they will take the findings to the probable cause panel is a panel constituted by two sitting physicians and one a lay member. two out of the three members have to be current members to the board. The third one could be an MD or a non MD who would serve as a third member because it's difficult to get too many of the board members to be on the panel. There's a South panel and there's a North panel. The North Florida panel looks at the cases in the South Florida and the South Florida case panel looks at the case of the North Florida. If they find, they look at all the evidence from both sides. And sometimes lawyers representing the doctor can also make his or her case, the probable cause panel, no different than a state attorneys, will look at the case and decide if there's probable cause if there's probable cause then They would file an administrative complaint. But once that initial complaint is filed, then the record become public. Before that it is private. And then the doctor has a decision, he or she can appeal it. Or he can he or she can negotiate with the department. And if they don't like it, they can go for an administrative hearing. If if there are some disputed facts in the allegations administrative complaint, they can go to the administrative judge and fight it out and see what happens. And finally, it has to be ratified by the Board of Medicine, at the final determination has to be by the Board of Medicine. If you don't like the determination, the Board of medicine, you go to the Court of Appeals, and try to reverse it. Otherwise, the Board of Medicine is ultimate authority as a quasi judiciary body of 15 members trying to make the right decision.

Rosanna Catalano  05:52

It's an incredible and a very hard working board. So for anyone in our audience that wants to make an appointment with you tell us where you're seeing patients nowadays.

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  06:02

I work for the University of Miami, but my office is in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. And they can call the telephone number on the screen. And if they want to they can make an appointment.

Rosanna Catalano  06:15

And I'll just say that telephone number for our listeners that are listening, and that's 954-772-2200 if you wanted to make an appointment with Dr. Zachariah, now, Dr. Zac, you are no not only in the healthcare field, but also in political circles. You know, you have served on the Florida Council of 100. And the Board of Trustees for Nova Southeastern University. You also served on the Florida Board of Governors, which oversees all the public universities in Florida. In fact, you know, the State University System of Florida is the second largest public university system in the nation.  You served at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute at the National Institutes of Health as a member of the US delegation to the World Health Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, and as president of the Fort Lauderdale, Heart Institute at Holy Cross hospital. So where do you find the time to give back to your community? And why is this so important to you?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  07:18

You know, most of the physicians just stick with medicine alone. They don't go outside medicine. Some of them do. A lot of them don't. And you just stay focused just on medicine. Trust me, I love what I do. I love medicine. That is my number one priority. But outside medicine, I love education. That's reason why I serve on the Board of excellent Ed, where we talk about education from K through 12, both in Florida and around the country. And I love education because education is the keystone of our progress in our in our nation. And I also like the education at the university level. At the end of the day, the success of a nation, success of our state, success of a community, depends on the level of education. I think education is the most crucial thing, the most crucial thing in our lives. And people will agree or disagree on how funding and all other things might, may occur. But the reality is, education is very important. So I have spent a lot of last 30 years or so both focusing on education from K through 12. And also university education. So I have a passion for education. And that's one of the reasons I do that. I also teach the residents and medical students of the University of Miami and I think educating the young people is something great. I really enjoyed and I love doing.

Rosanna Catalano  08:49

Well. Let's take a quick commercial break. And when we come back I want to ask you about your private board work, learn about it some more, and talk about education and your childhood. 

Rosanna Catalano  09:00

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Rosanna Catalano  09:59

Welcome back. Our guest today is Dr. Zachariah P. Zachariah. A well known cardiologist and current chair of the Florida Board of Medicine. Now, Dr. Zac, you recently joined the advisory board of the company BIOSIG technologies incorporated and the website for BIOSIG describes itself as a medical technology company commercializing a proprietary biomedical signal processing platform designed to improve signal fidelity and uncover the full range of ECG and intracardiac signals. Can you explain to us what that means in layman's terms?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  10:39

Okay. in cardiology, the most common irregular heartbeat that produces strokes, for example, 30% of the people get stroke because of an irregular heart rhythm called atrial fibrillation. That is a most common irregular heartbeat. It has to be treated because there's a very high incidence of stroke. There are other significant areas like ventricular tachycardia and such there is a smaller number. So the most common thing that we face it atrial fibrillation, the treatment of atrial fibrillation is complex. We all agree they should be on a blood thinning medication. We all agree on one thing. The question then is, what else do you do? You can try some medication, medication, but unfortunately, a majority of the medications have serious side effects long term. And then you do a procedure called abulation. That what do you do, you go inside the patient's heart, and you burn the areas where they have the focus, the foresight to produce the irregular heartbeats. When you burn the heart, what happens you're burning, actually destroying some of the some of the atrial or the upper chamber muscle fiber as well. So BIOSIG has a cutting edge technology that finds out exactly where this focus of irritable focus is coming up. And so they can successfully treat these patient patients with atrial fibrillation and other areas as well. Again, I stress it atrial fibrillation, because it's the most common one. They have extensive studies at the Mayo Clinic, they publish data showing that the BIOSIG technologically superior, and they have done it in many others centers across the country. I'm very excited about the technology, because it'll be able to detect areas where they do an update of ablation and other arrhythmias and try to fix it makes the job of the electrophysiologist much simpler. And some people unfortunately have to have the procedure two or three times it's not a cakewalk. It's amazing procedure. So if you can go detect these things, what is happening right now there are too many artifacts, you don't know what is real, what is not real. But this cutting edge technology shows exactly where the focus is. And so you have better success, and less time being anesthetized and being under under anesthesia. So the procedure is significantly reduced. And that's a great technology that biotech has. And that's reason I'm involved with the company.

Rosanna Catalano  13:15

Oh, that's fantastic. I love to hear about cutting edge technologies, especially in the healthcare field that can help people. So that's wonderful. Now, tell us about your involvement. I know you're involved with GEO TOLL, you told us a little bit about ExcelinEd in education. But tell us about your involvement with GEO TOLL, I think that's another board you're involved with,

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  13:35

okay, GEO TOLL has nothing to do with medicine, Geo Toll at all has to do with when you go to a toll booth. And, for example, let's say somebody's visiting Florida, when they rent a car, they buy a little gadget so they can toll gets paid has you you know, you don't have to stop and pay money. First of all, when you rent it from Orlando to rent it from, they charge you X number of dollars, and then they will charge you sometimes either $5, you know, $5 or $6 a day. The accuracy of that is much to be desired. So what happens is, someone will say I did not go to the turbine. And there's no way to figure it out. This is an enhanced GPS system, whereby they can actually pinpoint the time. And within three feet of wherever you were. Right now the technology can only go to about 33 feet within 33 feet, the GPS can tell you where what place you're in. It is sometimes difficult to tell whether when through the toll booth or not. But with this technology you can see within three feet is a great technology is being introduced in various parts of the country. And that again, if it becomes reality, which I believe is going to be a major breakthrough in tolling when you go through toll booths.

Rosanna Catalano  14:54

It seems to me that that's a technology that could be used and applied in other places as well. I would think

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  14:59

Absolutely. That is they're going to start there. And this will pinpoint exactly. And again, you don't need a device is from your iPhone. So you don't have to go get a gadget. So when you go through that little thing, your iPhone will tell you that you went through the toll. And so and they can deduct it from your, you know, from your account. So you don't have to go page some places automatically if you've been through the toll you pay, because it shows exactly that he went through the toll because they can see it with an accuracy within three feet. So that's a great new technology. And that's a company that I'm involved in

Rosanna Catalano  15:34

three feet. That's incredible. Well, now I want to take you back to your childhood, tell us where you were born, and what your home life was like growing up?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  15:44

Well, I was born in the southern part of India, in Kerala, that's the southernmost part of India. I born in a Christian family, my dad was a missionary. And my mother was a college professor. And I had two brothers and a sister. And one brother actually was a former chairman of the Board of Medicine as well, my brother MP Zachariah and his wife, Molly Zachariah. And having a younger sister, an older brother, so we were four siblings, my older brother actually went to Georgia Tech, became a scientist. And without me My brother is number two. Number three, I have a younger sister, whose husband is a physician as well. You know, growing up in India, all they talked about was education. They did not want to know about your sports. And certainly not in interested in your whether you can be a movie actor or a football player. All they talk about morning and evening, especially morning prayer, evening prayer, all they talk about is education, education. And my daddy says, Son, the only difference between a guy who does labor job and a successful person. The only difference is education. You know, this opportunity for most of the people is that there are some people may not have opportunity, but I would say majority the people as opportunity. So, going through high school, and going through college, I did not take part in sports, because we were all we talk about is education. So I finished high school and we have a different system. So I finished high school when I was 15. I finished college, even at 17. I have a med school, 17 years old, in med school, I was away from home so I can get away with it. So I do a bunch of sports when as Americans who live in an Armed Forces Academy. So they are exercise was a must. So I highly compensated for all the years I couldn't do. And looking back at time my parents were guiding us because if you don't have a parent or guidance, you can always land up in the wrong side of the street. And I always wondered if my parents were so strict. And you know, they there's a lot of compassion. They gave us an education as to why education is not important. Why is this so important? So I think you drilled that thing day in and day out. And you realize that that education is more important. So the only thing we could do, believe it or not, on Monday through Friday evening, when he came home, you got to do homework on Saturday, all day is all Saturday you could do was get prepared for the Sunday school. You can study on Sunday night, but on Saturday, you cannot read a book period, there's no there's no compromise except maybe in the final examination. So I grew up in, you know, such an environment. I didn't like it when I was in there growing up in Alabama, I hated it. But looking back, it was the right thing to do. And I always wondered where I grew up. I could have been a taxi driver. But the reality is that I realized that education was the most important thing.

Rosanna Catalano  18:43

I grew up in a household where education was really put to the forefront. So I always joke that it was true, though. You know, my parents always asked me if I was going to be an attorney, or a doctor. Those were my two choices. I didn't have any other choice. Like there's nothing else. So were you a good student? I mean, obviously, you went all the way in school, but were you a good student growing up? You know,

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  19:09

it's very interesting. How you didn't think so I had significant attention deficit. And I didn't know what it was. For example, I will read something for about three minutes and I was done. I just couldn't figure it out. But in the classes I was very attended. If I heard something I remember when somebody one teacher said, but I couldn't sit still. So I had that issue. I really didn't know what it was like way later on in life coming to the United States. I realized what my problem was, but I had had a tough time reading any books more than 15 minutes that's a match. Even now I have the same problem. Nothing

Rosanna Catalano  19:45

so I was gonna ask you if you had any hobbies as a kid, but I guess that really wasn't promoted as a kid the hobbies it was the only hobby

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  19:55

yeah when i wasn't in school only have your stamp collection, stamp collection and We used to have a bunch of pigeons at home we used to, you know, grow and mature pigeons. and then let them all out when you finish college, as the only hobby I had,  because right or wrong, that's what the Indian culture demand. And that's what we have, we had no choice. It is not something you'd negotiate with your parents, the world has changed. But those days, I had no negotiating power with my parents nor did my siblings.

Rosanna Catalano  20:27

Now you completed your residency at St. Joseph's Hospital, and Medical Center in Paterson, New Jersey, what brought you to the United States.

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  20:36

See, when I finished my education in India, I actually got on an airplane. The next day, the day after I finished my internship, I was on an airplane going to New Jersey. I knew when I finished education, I either want to go to England, or the United States, the level of education in the US was far superior in the medical field, we're just not nothing to compare with. So I always want to come to America, even you want to come to the UK and just say you want to come to America sounds pretty good. But it's not that easy. So you have to take a test. So that they did not give the test in India, with a lot of guys who are passing the truth is absolute truth to many guys who are passing. So the US decided not to do any more tests in India. So I had to go fly to a place called Malaysia, which is near Singapore. I had to go take a test. And luckily, by the grace of God, somehow I got a good score. I don't know why I did it. Maybe a copy from the guy next to me, why don't I did I got a good score. And so I was able to apply for a residency at St. Joseph's Hospital in Paterson, New Jersey. And I did two years of residency in medicine that I went on to Cleveland.

Rosanna Catalano  21:51

Right. So you did a fellowship in interventional cardiology at the Cleveland Clinic Educational Foundation in Cleveland, Ohio. Where did you go after that?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  22:00

I came to Fort Lauderdale. Actually, when I was in New Jersey, I have you heard about a man by the name Mason Sones.  anyways, I thought for the longest time he was dead because he was in every medical book in the United States was a name mentioned by the a Mason Sones.  He invented heart catheterization. So I thought he was dead, you know that he died a long time ago like Ian Fleming. Lo and behold, I found out that he was still alive. And he was ahead of the curve, but he started a heart program at the Cleveland Clinic. He invented heart catheterization. Wow. So So I went to meet with him and asked him if I could do a fellowship with him. I knew my chances were one in a million. I said, if you don't ask, you never know. So I asked. And I got it. And then so I went and worked with him for two years. Where was that? At the Cleveland Clinic?

22:53

Okay, at the Cleveland Clinic,

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  22:54

he was the head of the Cleveland Clinic, he invented heart catheterization. So I went and spent two years with him to learn from from learn from him to do heart catheterization, then he actually paved the way for me to come to Holy Cross in Florida, because Holy Cross was going to have that assumes leave Cleveland Clinic and come to Holy Cross in 1976. Then he changed his mind. So he asked me to come that you only reason I got the time.

Rosanna Catalano  23:21

Amazing. Now I had the pleasure of working. Not only have I worked with you with the Board of Medicine, but I also had the pleasure of working alongside your brother, Dr. Mammen Zachariah. MP, when he served on the Board of Medicine credentials committee, because, you know, I was their attorney. But for many years, I know you worked alongside your brother Mammen and your sister in law, Dr. Molly Zachariah. They're both cardiologists. So what was it like working with your family and have your children followed in your footsteps?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  23:57

We got along very well, we still do. But five years ago, one of my very good friends that you know, Dr. Nabil El Sanadi, one of my dearest friends. He became the head of Broward Health. So he convinced all of us leave our practice. i never worked with holycross my office in holycross. So he asked us to come and join him at Broward health which we did, but unfortunately you know what happened. So having Nabil was one of my best friends having him leave us. After one year that MP and Molly and my brother Dr.  George decided to stay there. And the University of Miami offered all of us moved to University of Miami they decided to stay and I went to University of Miami. I still I still work with MP and Molly because I still do some cases at the hospital. I talk to them almost on a daily basis. But they work for Broward health and I work for University of Miami.  It's interesting. What my children when, you know, I was working like 16-18 hours every day. And my boys are pretty smart. But they decided they do not want to go into medicine. My oldest son went to Wharton School of Business at the University, Pennsylvania, my second Lehigh, but they decided to go into law. They both became lawyers, they went to University of Florida, and they now work for a law firm called Greenbert Traurig. They both work in the same law firm in Fort Lauderdale doing mergers and acquisitions.

Rosanna Catalano  25:33

So it's beautiful to see, I would think that you know, you worked alongside your brother in your profession, and it's probably very comforting for you to know that both your children are working alongside each other at the law firm now.

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  25:47

Yeah, they're the same law firm the same office.

Rosanna Catalano  25:51

That's incredible. That's incredible.

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  25:53

You know, what's funny? I asked, why'd you go into law? This a dad, he's a you're working too hard. And we didn't want to do and guess what? Work harder harder now. In no different than being an intern or resident in the big law firm. They work all the time. And

Rosanna Catalano  26:11

yeah, like, um, it's a pretty labor intensive profession that I think a lot of people don't realize. So I like how they tried to get away from that and ended up sort of in the same path. Now, you hold numerous awards, including the Ellis Island American Legion award, the golden heart award from the American Heart Association, Freedom Foundation, Medal of Honor from the Freedom Foundation at Valley Forge, and the Ellis Island Medal of Honor. Do you have a particular award that really stands out for you or speaks to your heart?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  26:49

Probably the most impressive award I ever got was the American legends award by the by Ellis Island. And there are five honorees and one was one of my greatest heroes, Senator John McCain from Arizona. Other was Jhn Sweeney from the head of the AFL CIO, Helen Thomas White House reporter, other was Mrs. Pope who gave, you know, Mrs. Pope was a major donor to the University of Miami and me. And the funniest thing was I President Clinton came up and said a lot of nice things about me. It was kind of funny.

Rosanna Catalano  27:26

Well, for our audience members that don't know you are you have been a, I guess we could call you a very big Republican supporter for years. So I guess that would explain the irony there so people can get the

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  27:41

you know, 1992, and President Herbert Walker Bush ran for president I was a finance chairman. But unfortunately, that year, he was beaten by Bill Clinton. And I was also finance chairman for President George W. Bush. And also for it, I was a major fundraiser for governor, Jeb Bush, and also several other governors in Florida and senators.

Rosanna Catalano  28:09

Yeah, so you know, on this show, we like to discuss the entrepreneurial spirit, which is an attitude, you know, an approach to thinking that actively seeks out change, rather than waiting to adapt to change. It's a mindset that embraces critical questioning, innovation, service, and continuous improvement. So tell us in what ways if any of these qualities have shaped your career and life.

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  28:39

You know, as a kid, my dad always used to tell us that other than getting top grades in class, which you always wanted us to do, he thought one of the most important thing is to be all around looking to see how life works. And he always taught us a critical thinking about anything is one of the most important qualities that you have to have. And I always wanted to get it to see how the world works, to understand it to understand how things work in this world. And that's reason I got involved and see the politics, see how the government works. Look at what how education impacts the country. And that's one of the reasons I, you know, I went to some of the representative United States in the World Health Organization, to get a picture of how the world really works. Of course, I only know a fraction of the reality, but to learn more about the stuff you have get involved  in the system, and that's one of the reasons I have found myself getting involved in many aspects of life, so I can learn more about those things.

Rosanna Catalano  29:43

Now, I know recently, you had quite an incident at your local gym, could you tell our audience about what happened? And I guess maybe provide some guidance and advice.

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  29:56

What happened? It was about three weeks ago. I was just finishing up my workout at the gym I was doing. When I was doing the last set of triceps exercises, I suddenly I look to my left and I see one of the gentlemen who works at the gym. He's an employee of that gym and the hospital. I saw him on the floor, totally gone is dead. So I saw I rushed to him I checked this was he had no pulse, his eyes were rolling. And I knew that he that he was in their cardiac arrest by the pump on his chest, I call for help. And after pumping on the chest, about a minute to a minute and a half, probably, I think I'm sure I broke up with his ribs. And they call the code. So then doctors when the doctors and nurses from the emergency room came along. By the time he woke up. He got out he woke up with a cardiac compression. They took him to the emergency room. As soon as he gets in the emergency room, he goes into cardiac arrest again into ventricular fibrillation. an amazing thing. Well, God was looking after him. Because he there are only three people in the gym at that time. This is about seven o'clock, only three people in the gym, the gentleman who fell down, there's another gentleman works in the gym, me and one of the questions there's only three people working out and the two employees and nobody was near him. And the worst thing could have happened to him was he had nobodies if I would have left the gym, 10 seconds later, I would have been out of the gym, if you were laid there. And he would have been had significant issues with his brain, he could have had a major stroke, or maybe on a ventilator for the rest of his life. He's a great guy.

Rosanna Catalano  31:38

Could you provide some advice,

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  31:41

I always tell my patients, the most important thing in life expectancy to live longer and healthy, is exercise four to five days a week and maintain your body weight. Maintain the optimal body weight is a difficult proposition because you're telling a person to lose weight, that means don't eat too much of food, we say hey, because they love eating. I tell him to do something we say hey, physical exercise. You know, people say Can I take a vitamin, he doesn't matter what vitamin you're going to take. If you're obese, it doesn't matter. Even if you look at people who got COVID. If you look at the people who are really sick with COVID, at two sets of people, one who got a huge dose of virus too much viruses into the system, when I virus load, right virus load or people are obese. So obesity, I always say patients, alcohol kills people. Tobacco kills people. Cocaine kills people. But food kills people with a factor of 20. For every single person who dies with all the bad habits 20 times the number of people die just eating food. So going on a diet and losing weight. And exercising is the most important thing in life. In my opinion, as far as health is concerned, a lot of people will say I'm going to do it, I see patients who who, of course, stops, you know, to stop smoking is crucial. I'm telling you, other than smoking. These are the two most important things. I have seen patients who got a heart attack, they said I swear to you, I'm going to lose weight. And guess what they don't lose any weight Well, they had open hearts, they said I swear to you, I would lose weight. They were swearing last for about a day or two a week. And they forget about the fact they had a heart attack or they had open heart surgery. And I would say majority of the patients, they don't want to change the lifestyle, that they may have other issues as to why they don't do it. But they just don't do it. The smart ones do.

Rosanna Catalano  33:42

Well, that's a good reminder, as we are entering, you know, we've all made new year's resolutions. And this is a good reminder that, you know, a lot of us made resolutions to you know, be more active or lose the pounds that we've gained during this pandemic been at home. So this is a good reminder that we should stay active and also learn CPR clearly. You know, you've saved that, that man's life. Now what advice would you give to somebody that wants to be as successful as you,

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  34:14

you have to work hard. You got to stay focused, and you gotta love what you do. Take it to work Smart is very important. Some people just work but they don't work smart. He had to work smart. And he had love what you do. And if you love what you do, then he doesn't become a job is something that you love. And you have to stay focused. When I was a kid, my dad used to tell son when you're at any location, ask yourself What are you doing here? What are you doing here right now. So some people cannot focus is what they're doing right now. They just do it. But then our focus has to why why are you here right now. If you are a Gas Station, wherever you are, you have to know half of the people they just did is do something, but they're not thinking as to why they're there, and and what they're supposed to do, and stay focused and work smart.

Rosanna Catalano  35:15

Great advice. Now we like to end our show with a little bit of fun by asking all of our guests the same seven questions. What would people be surprised to know about you?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  35:26

Probably I have significant attention deficit because if somebody goes on talking a lot, they lose me because I'm just lost. I tell him Get to the point.

Rosanna Catalano  35:37

Well, I better get to the point then with these remaining six. When you have guests in town, where is your favorite place to take them?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  35:46

You know, I had a boat till about a year ago donated to a charity. And before that, I would take them on the boat. I still have a small boat it I take my friends on the intercoustal,  I live on the intercostal waterway. I took him on the boat to a restaurant. And I what I love most is when I spend time I have a farm in Punta Gorda, I go hang out there. I have the best time of my life that I take my friends up there. You only take your four friends at a time because I only have three or four bedrooms. Hey, go hang out with my friends. A lot of animals there. A lot of wild birds come there and I love nature. And I love being there more than anything else.

Rosanna Catalano  36:25

I love that. You know, I represent the city of Punta Gorda as a lobbyist so I do so what is the name of a book you recently read? That you could not put down or the name of a show you enjoy binge watching?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  36:40

I can tell you I have read books but I I am not being facetious. I don't think I can read anything more than 10-15 minutes I'm done with it. I go to the first time ashamed to tell you but I started in the friend. I go to the end and that's it. I'm I'm not good at it.

Rosanna Catalano  37:00

That's all right. Now among your close family and friends, what are you best known for?

37:07

Maybe my generosity.

Rosanna Catalano  37:11

I think that's accurate. If you have a nickname Who gave it to you

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  37:17

Well, I have nicknames believe it or not president. George W.  Bush calls me ZZ a lot of my friends call me Zac but he gave me the name ZZ. So a lot of people who know him calls me ZZ.

Rosanna Catalano  37:29

I like that. If you knew you could not fail. What would you attempt?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  37:35

Try to fly? I will try to fly.

Rosanna Catalano  37:40

Very cool. What are the top three things you love about living in Florida?

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  37:45

You know it's a it's an amazing place. Great weather. And I have cultivated a lot of great friends. And I love Florida. It's a great place to live. I have lived most of my life in Florida. I've lived in Florida for 45 years. most of my adult life I live in Florida.

Rosanna Catalano  38:08

Well, thank you Dr. Zac, for joining us today. This has been really, really it's been so fun and refreshing. And it's been great to catch up with you.

Zachariah P. Zachariah, M.D.  38:19

Rosanna thank you so much. It is so wonderful to see you again. And thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to chat with you. It is a wonderful,

Rosanna Catalano  38:27

excellent. Be sure to subscribe to our podcast The Floridaville on all of your favorite podcast listening platforms. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Visit our website www.theFloridaville.com to see some extras regarding this episode. Our audio editor for this podcast episode is Joy Tootle with Rocket Ship Consultants. If you're interested in sponsoring the Floridaville  or would like to suggest a future guest contact us through our website, the Floridaville.com Thank you for tuning in.