Physician Peter Attia introduced "Medicine 3.0" to describe the latest phase in medical evolution. In this episode, Matt explores Medicine 1.0 to 3.0 and proposes a future Medicine 4.0, aiming to extend not just lifespan but healthspan. He suggests steps for launching Medicine 4.0, with an even further vision of Medicine 5.0.

Key Points:

This episode explores the medical evolution from Medicine 1.0 to Matt’s proposed Medicine 4.0, which combines geroscience and AI to focus on healthspan extension. Matt also envisions Medicine 5.0, a future phase that aims to unlock new scientific frontiers to expand both lifespan and quality of life.

• Evolution of Medicine: Medicine has progressed through three phases—Medicine 1.0 relied on non-scientific methods like humors and leeches, Medicine 2.0 introduced a scientific, reactive approach focusing on treating diseases, and Medicine 3.0 shifted toward proactive, evidence-based, personalized healthcare that seeks to prevent disease.
• Limits of Reactive Care: While Medicine 2.0 dramatically increased life expectancy through sanitation, antibiotics, and other public health improvements, it left many people living longer but with chronic diseases that impact their quality of life. This “reactive disease care” approach has not been effective at extending healthspan, the period of life spent in good health.
• Medicine 4.0 Vision: Matt proposes Medicine 4.0 as a further evolution that integrates proactive approaches with a strong emphasis on geroscience, the study of ageing. By directly targeting the biology of ageing, Medicine 4.0 seeks to compress the period of ill health at the end of life, enabling people to live longer, healthier lives.
• Role of AI in Healthspan: Artificial intelligence could play a transformative role in Medicine 4.0. AI tools could be used to develop sophisticated biomarker signatures for ageing, design personalized health interventions, and create “healthspan agents” that monitor a person’s health data in real time to provide continuous insights and behavior coaching.
• Future Outlook - Medicine 5.0: Looking beyond Medicine 4.0, Matt imagines Medicine 5.0, which would focus on pushing the boundaries of lifespan and healthspan further through novel scientific approaches. This would include unbiased exploration of ageing processes using unique animal models and advanced high-throughput drug discovery to identify new pathways for healthy ageing.