About Dr. Bob Young

   Biographical Information: My name is Dr. Bob Young. The purpose of this web page is to assist whoever comes to this site in obtaining information about the nature and details of our medical practice, and also to facilitate obtaining authoritative and hopefully valuable information related to optimization of individual health.

   Repeatedly, throughout this website, you will find reference to the word 'individual'. The reason for this is that we are all individuals. This may sound redundant and simplistic, but in fact, it is an important issue when it comes to health. Go into a large sporting event or other crowd and look around. Everyone looks different. When someone calls you on the phone, without seeing them you can recognize their voice, because it is different.

'Biochemical individuality' is a term that was coined by Roger Williams MD in 1956 to describe the physiologic uniqueness of every person. Health is based on an unbelievably complex and enormous sequence of biochemical reactions, and everyone is unique in these. Certainly we are all similar in the vast majority of these reactions, but nevertheless, individual uniqueness exists.

   The focus of this practice is to identify and work with these uniqueness to the optimization of the health of each person that comes to this office.

   For some of you, it will be of interest to know about me, and my background. Most people will not care about this, so I write the following material in the expectation that it isn't going to be read by very many people. For those that do want to know how I got to where I am (for it will say something about the nature of the medical practice), here goes: For me, personally, my involvement in medicine has been a journey. The thoughts and approaches that I have today have evolved over the course of the last thirty years and are certainly different than they were when I started practice in 1970. I would like to go over some highlights of this journey and generally how I came to where I am today.

   I come from a family with medical background. My father and grandfather were both physicians. My mother was a nurse. (Everyone in my family have either been in the medical field or teachers). Although I was not born in Santa Barbara, when I was four years old, following the death of my father, I was raised and educated in Santa Barbara, including attending UCSB in the early '60s. Although a career in medicine was always a possibility, my interest was primarily in the arts and humanities. I began college as an Art major and later on became quite absorbed with an interest in French literature, particularly the modern existential writers.

   This fascination with French led me to drop out of UCSB and travel and study in Europe. While there, I had one of those 'life defining' experiences. While studying in Geneva, Switzerland I happened to read a play by Albert Camus entitled 'La Peste' (The Plague). Without going into any detail (other than as recommended reading), one of the central characters was a physician (Rieux) who only cared about fighting evil (disease) where he found it. His philosophy was contrasted with religious and society figures. It impressed me a lot, and solidified the decision to return to the US to study and practice medicine.