Co-founded in 2020 by Cody Sims, a certified physician assistant, Kensho Well-being started off in a small location off West River Street in Truckee. But, like so many other businesses in 2020, COVID threw a wrench into the day-to-day operations.

After moving out of that location and sharing an office with Dr. Jared Anderson for a spell, Sims was approached about opening up a wellness center in the CAMP1 building, and in 2021, the doors to the new (and current) location opened.

While some people may call Kensho Well-being more of a functional medical practice, Sims likes to think of it as a really detail-oriented disease program.

---

---

“We do a lot of internal medicine here,” said Sims. “A lot of wellness centers are based off of alternative wellness practices. We’re more, and I hate to use the word, holistic, but we’re really looking at everything.”

When Sims says they are looking at everything, he means exactly that. When a patient arrives for an initial appointment, they will spend on average three hours going through a physical exam, lab panels, and an extensive family history to help identify items like genetic dispositions to hereditary cancers – really looking at every angle to help prevent disease.

---

---

“In many primary care offices these things get overlooked because they don’t have enough time. It takes a while to get history from people,” added Sims. “It’s not uncommon for a primary care office to see 30-plus patients in a day in an eight hour shift. Three to five minutes with a patient is pretty average. If you get to talk to your medical provider once or twice a year for five minutes, how the heck are they going to know anything about you?”

In addition to services like IV infusion therapy, ketamine infusions, and platelet-rich plasma injections, metabolic testing is also high on the list. According to Sims metabolic issues can lead to things like cardiovascular disease or diabetes and be one of the drivers of cancer.

Sims adds, “I always encourage people to look at the big picture, but if someone comes in with a broken arm, we can mange that here easily. The thing at hand that we’re treating is what they came in for, but I’ll also say, how can we prevent that stuff from happening because a lot of it is preventable.”

With a background in emergency medicine for nearly 20 years, Sims understands the meaning of preventable.

“One of the things I learned about in emergency medicine is probably 90% of what’s coming into the ER is preventable. Most of it comes from chronic diseases that culminate in emergencies.”

And while many people would also prefer to prevent ER trips, much of that could be boiled down to understanding the difference of an ER visit versus going to an urgent care – something that Kensho has always provided, but until the recent hiring of Rebecca Cordero, not really pushed.

“A lot of people don’t know that we’re a board certified emergency physician’s office,” added Sims. “I’ve always had the capacity to do it, but we hired Rebecca to handle the bandwidth.”

Cordero, who also has an extensive background as an emergency medicine physician assistant and graduated from the Stanford School of Medicine PCAP program, also noted the challenge about what patients might consider using an urgent care for as an alternative to the ER.

Urgent care services are typically services that are mandatory for injury or an illness that has a potential for an even bigger threat if treatment is delayed for more than a 24-hour period, but won’t result in death if not treated immediately.

“Our clinic is here to help alleviate the burden on local emergency departments and fellow urgent care facilities,” said Cordero in an email to the Sun. “By focusing on non-life-threatening conditions, we aim to reduce wait times and provide faster service compared to traditional emergency departments allowing the emergency room to focus on more critical cases. Together, we strive for optimal patient care for all”.

Having an additional urgent care option is a great benefit to the community – especially when it comes to wait times.

“I know during the holidays I’ve had patients tell me they’re waiting three to four hours for urgent care. We have pretty immediate availability to see patients. They’re not going to wait in line,” said Sims.

While the office is set up to accommodate walk-ins on the urgent care side, given Kensho’s general approach to health, the visit could very well end up in exploring why a patient is there in the first place – and potentially preventing another visit down the road.

Nevertheless, both Sims and Cordero are looking forward to the next step in the evolution of Kensho Well-being with Cordero adding, “We are very excited about this new opportunity to help the local Tahoe-Truckee community.”

Kensho Well Being is located in the CAMP1 building at 10700 Pioneer Trail in Truckee, CA. For more information you can reach them by phone at 530-214-8992 or visit them online at kenshowellbeing.com.