John La Puma

Dr. John La Puma is a board-certified internist and two-time New York Times bestselling author who has spent his career asking a simple question:

Why are modern humans so sick in environments we were never designed to live in?

Early in his career, Dr. La Puma co-taught the first Culinary Medicine course at a U.S. medical school and helped bring food, metabolism, and lifestyle back into mainstream medical education. Culinary medicine is now taught in medical schools across the country and around the world.

His focus later expanded beyond food to the environment shaping human biology. His work examines how light, movement, time outdoors, and daily exposure to nature influence sleep, focus, metabolic health, immune function, and resilience. Research shows these environmental factors can, in many cases, be as influential as medications or devices.

• Dr. La Puma’s work has been tested in academic medicine, national media, and real-world clinical practice

• Invited speaker at Harvard, Stanford, TEDMED, and at national medical, business, and public health conferences

• Designed and co-taught the first skills-based “Nature as Medicine” CME curriculum for physicians in partnership with UCLA Medical School

• Co-taught the first Culinary Medicine course at a U.S. medical school, now taught worldwide, helping to establish food as a legitimate clinical tool

• Contributed to The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and the Associated Press, with regular appearances on leading podcasts and national television

• Published in top medical journals, including NEJM, JAMA Internal Medicine, Annals of Internal Medicine, The BMJ, and The Lancet

• Lives the science he prescribes, testing it outdoors on a regenerative organic farm, not just in journals and clinics

Dr. La Puma lives and works in Santa Barbara, California, where he continues to study and live the relationship between environment, lifestyle, and long-term health.