“Foot & Ankle Mobility And Flexibility Treatment” with Dr. Marien Zanyk of Zaneez

Jeffrey (0s):
Hello, everybody. Welcome back to radio entrepreneurs. Again, as you can see, I’m full of energy today, my name is Jeffrey Davis. And why am I full of energy? Because I love talking to entrepreneurs. I love talking about business. I love the stories of business, the stories of leadership. And I love hearing about how people are adapting to this chaotic world of constant change and to support me. I have my producer down on the corner, Nathan Gobes welcome back, Nathan.

Nathan (27s):
Thank you very much.

Jeffrey (28s):
And we are going to welcome Dr. Marian Zanyk, founder and CEO of Zaneez, correct?

Dr. Zanyk (36s):
Yes, yes. A pleasure to be here. Thank you.

Jeffrey (40s):
So Zaneez is not about my sleeping habits. I hope, but we’ll find out

Dr. Zanyk (44s):
No as any is health and fitness and we produce mobility equipment innovative kind of change in the world.

Jeffrey (52s):
Wow. I’ll tell us a little bit more about what kind of equipment you do and how you got into this business. I love anything that deals with health. I’m always I’m game to listen to and talk about.

Dr. Zanyk (1m 2s):
Well, I have invented three products patented and we are heading to commercialization. The first product is known as ankle stone, very simple ankle stone.com. And it truly is the first all in one solution for foot and ankle pain, mobility for recovery post-injury for prevention of injury. We have discovered that the foot and ankle industry is very underserved. And this is proving to fill that void in providing an independent solution for an everyday solution. A problem, really a global problem, as so many people suffer from foot and ankle conditions.

Jeffrey (1m 46s):
Wow. So being a guy who works out every day exercises every day, I’ve had different problems from the, you know, from my waist down for the last 25 years,

Dr. Zanyk (2m 2s):
Like so many

Jeffrey (2m 3s):
And you know, ice is my best friend, my greatest campaign.

Dr. Zanyk (2m 8s):
Good.

Jeffrey (2m 9s):
Can you just tell me a little bit more, cause I’m I’m, you know, let’s pretend I’m a consumer. I understand foot and ankle, but I’m still not sure what it is.

Dr. Zanyk (2m 18s):
Yes. Well, as a consumer or even professional athlete or recreational athlete, you have like You, you like eight out of 10 adults in the world suffer some sort of condition of the foot and it might be promoted from your workouts or it may be their daily when you step in the, on your feet in the morning and shoot to the ceiling because of plantar fasciitis, perhaps from working, standing too much, for whatever reason that malalignment can occur. Very often, our, our feet and ankles are very complex structures with 33 joints, 26 bones, hundreds of muscles, ligaments, and tendons.

Dr. Zanyk (3m 1s):
And we will have issues there. And certainly we’ll bring you down when you try to live your life. Yeah. Yeah. And it’s like your thumb, your feet, your like your thumb, you recognize how much you love them. Once they’re in pain and ankle stone is a small device. I’ve got it right here. Show you. Yes. So weight 1.8 pounds and yet durable as anything could put it out 800 pounds under this, but placing the foot onto it and allows all of the movement that you need for an anatomical stretch or strengthening from Achilles tendon stretch.

Dr. Zanyk (3m 41s):
As you put the foot into the main groove and then it promotes or cradles the feet as you progress towards a plantar fascia stretch. And you can put a little bit of analgesic pressure onto the sore components toe extension, right foot, and then left foot with these nice groups that again, cradle the components of the foot for comfort. And also it allows this move, which without you being able to see it, I’m describing when you take your foot and cradle it sideways to improve the range of motion at the ankle post spring post-surgery post-injury.

Dr. Zanyk (4m 26s):
And then it’s also ankle stone has a very rough pumice stone like texture that is invigorating to the touch. So it helps in circulation when you do a deep tissue massage, anywhere on the foot that needs it. So this product allows targeted structural adjustments as if a physical therapist or an athletic trainer is holding your foot and moving and manipulating the structures. But now you can do it at home and you can do it every day. Got some people who keep it under their feet and they’re under their desk for their feet to use every day throughout the day at the computer or in the gym or in the clinic, or can take it with you anywhere.

Dr. Zanyk (5m 14s):
So it serves its purpose. Well,

Jeffrey (5m 16s):
Well, that sounds very exciting. Well, it immediately makes me think about what’s your background and how you got into all of this. It’s not something I could have done.

Dr. Zanyk (5m 27s):
Yeah. You know, it’s interesting. The entrepreneurial mindset. I did question at a meeting a group and I said, why are we putting money towards the young 18 to 22 year olds in entrepreneurship? When the entrepreneurs are known to be age 46 to 49 years old, you have to live a little bit. You have to be experienced. And my experience is a combination of my, my academics in clinical pathology, anatomy. I’ve done autopsies along, along the way, and really understood biology and anatomy and physiology from a macroscopic and microscopic point of view.

Dr. Zanyk (6m 9s):
I also did electron microscopic studies and flow cytometric study. So I’ve gone into the idiosyncrasies of, of the small nature of, of the body and its function. And then when I worked as a medical device consultant for orthopedic surgeons and neurosurgeons and their patients for seven years in the recovery from contractures, from injury, from reduced mobility, that’s when it hit me, that really, really is no effective tool out there for people to use on their own. They have to pay quite a significant amounts in, in weekly fees to go to therapists or whoever they need to find a clinician for help.

Dr. Zanyk (6m 52s):
And yet they can restore the mobility at home if they only had the right tool and the beauty of it, this is the plasticity of soft tissues. They will stretch and form and realign if you give them that opportunity to, but again, we need the tool to hold the foot in the right position to be able to target those joints in particular. And it’s very important to think about the specifics of the feet from the great toe, perhaps a picture out on the field that digs in and all of the thrust comes from that starting point or tennis player, volleyball, soccer, right through to the, the heel, the, all of the components of the foot.

Dr. Zanyk (7m 35s):
And so that is what led me to find a solution. And I also run and do workouts in the Connecticut forest. I use the rocks, the trees, the cliffs, you’d see me, touch me, hanging off a tree limb with my legs up on a cliff, doing the most incredible body realignment stretching. You know, I got Sylvester Stallone type of workout up trees on my shoulders. I don’t need to go to the gym. I just use what is the wealth of innovation out in that forest. And that is where the inspiration came from.

Jeffrey (8m 12s):
And I heard

Dr. Zanyk (8m 13s):
That you’re all my products.

Jeffrey (8m 14s):
I heard that you recently had a call with the director of NASA. Can you tell us about that?

Dr. Zanyk (8m 19s):
Yes, it was kind of before COVID time. So not too recent, but it certainly is a significant call. And it was with Dr. Spend EMA the director of ISS lab. And he was very interested in the products, not only Ecclestone, but also the second bedrock and Willow works for the innovative nature, the next generation potential of the products, because you don’t need to go to the gym and use heavy metal equipment or bulky equipment to hold on to my products, work with a lean attitude where you just need to hook, for instance, the fingers, flexor digitorum of the fingers as if a rock climber, and that allows stabilization for you to then work the entire joints elsewhere.

Dr. Zanyk (9m 11s):
But you have to get that stability first, almost like putting part of the body into a vise so that then you can work this part. Otherwise we’re just a bunch of flailing joints. You have to stabilize, and then you can target the manipulative physical therapy type of work that you need to do on the soft tissues. And so he was very interested in that. And then also the conversation tied into the ISS study that to diva Adidas has had, it was previous study on the ISS to figure out some components of their running shoes. And that just exemplified the massive business of footwear, our feet and ankles, the billions that are spent on fancy running shoes, and yet nothing exists to truly improve the condition of the feet and ankles from a wellness point of view.

Dr. Zanyk (10m 3s):
And that’s where ankle stone fits in.

Jeffrey (10m 6s):
I think I’m going to ask you to come live with me. I could use the full-time help.

Dr. Zanyk (10m 10s):
Oh yes.

Jeffrey (10m 11s):
I work out every day and I play tennis about four or five times a week. So as I said, wrapping my legs and different parts of my anatomy with ice is part of my regular routine. No different than having breakfast.

Dr. Zanyk (10m 25s):
Yeah. And you should do that. That’s good thing because it reduces the inflammation, reduces the pain and really helps you recover, but then you also have to move

Jeffrey (10m 34s):
Your ice pack. So if somebody was looking for a Zaneez, how would they find it?

Dr. Zanyk (10m 41s):
They would find us on ankle stone.com. Yeah. And a beautiful newer website that we have released. And it’s phenomenal because it really provides from a diagnostic or a sports interest point of view as to how ankle stone will help your feet and ankles.

Jeffrey (11m 1s):
Oh, that’s great. And you know, for 103 year old woman, it’s wonderful how your product is clearly worked for you. So, No, I’m wrong. I want to remind you. I want to thank you for being on radio entrepreneurs. I look forward to coming back again and any of my silly comments and I want to thank Nathan Gobes as well. My producer and remind everybody, this is radio entrepreneurs.

Dr. Zanyk (11m 23s):
Thank you.