About Makkarios
Meet Dr. Duke Johnson, MD
I’m Dr. Duke Johnson MD. A graduate of UCLA’s School of Medicine, the former Medical Director of the World’s largest supplement manufacturer, Published Researcher, Author, Medical Consultant to Professional Teams and Co-Founder of Makkarios. Dr. Duke is the author of The Optimal Health Revolution” which has sold over 100,000 copies and been translated into 9 languages. Throughout his medical career, he's traveled to over 30 countries to teach in front of audiences of thousands. Additionally, through media exposure, he has taught many more how to have an optimal health lifestyle.
After 14 years of working there, Dr. Duke Johnson and Cofounder, Jim Roufs MS, RD decided to start their own company - Makkarios.
Meet Jim Roufs MS, RD
Mr. Roufs has headed up Product Development for some of the leading companies in the natural dietary supplement and direct selling industries including one of the top 15 fastest growth companies in the U.S. as well as heading up New Product Development for the world's largest dietary supplement brand for over seven years. In that role, he has developed personal relationship with scientists at some of the world’s most respected universities.
Published in both lay and scientific journals as well as being a patent holder, his focus is on bringing the most clinically-effective products to the marketplace for the sole purpose of making a difference in people’s lives.
What makes Makkarios different?
With all the misinformation on health creating stress, confusion and the feeling of being overwhelmed, Makkarios and its founders who collectively have been in preventive medicine and nutrition for over 60 years desire to be your trusted source of how to optimally live with longest lifespan and health-span. With a singular focus of providing you with the most reliable and substantiated published scientific research from their distinctive experience of caring for patients globally, Makkarios brings fresh insights which you’ve never heard before.
Dr. Duke’s Makkarios Story
After my global preventive medicine work, Jim Roufs and I obtained access to novel, clinically verified, natural products with advanced technologies able to positively impact health with methodologies not yet available in the marketplace. With our global experience and contacts with outstanding researchers, we knew we could positively impact lives so thus started Makkarios. During the journey of launching our company, I slowly gained weight and suddenly woke up one day to the fact that despite eating healthy according to all standard dietary guidelines, my weight gain was excessive and needed attention and finally weighed myself. To my amazement, I had gained over 40 lbs.! My 15-year-old daughter, who had been kindly encouraging me to exercise with her for months, started crying and said, “Daddy I’m scared you’re going to die if you don’t do something about your health.” Immediately, I started exercising but my weight didn’t change even after two months of exercise! Something was very wrong.
How could I be getting fat?
Mr. Optimal Health gaining weight?
How did this happen?
I needed to find the answer to this - immediately.
Frustrated that my lifestyle hadn’t changed in either diet or exercise but my health was worsening, I felt betrayed by someone/somewhere who had made decisions about farming or processing, etc. which was negatively impacting me and I had no control over it. I thought, “If I’ve been in preventive medicine for 30 years and didn’t immediately know what was happening to me, how would the average American know what to do?” I even tried some popular diets for a while thinking that perhaps I missed something but they made me either feel light-headed or increased my joint pain so much, it seemed as if they were killing me so I stopped it all and started over from scratch.
I discovered that these popular diets are deceiving because they have both partial truth and misinformation. All popular diets have some truth to them but also are based commonly on assumptions that haven’t been scientifically proven with longevity studies. For example, the keto diet commonly taught reduces glucose levels in the short term so their proponents claim/assume it reduces the risk of diabetes and leads to longevity when published research actually reveals just the opposite is true. Some advocates of these diets just simply are misinformed even though they may be PhDs or MDs or chiropractors.
With all the misleading information out there, I changed course from focusing on only supplements to coming up with a lifestyle plan that would allow for longevity, weight control, chronic disease minimization so that we can all live healthy as long as possible, with an active life and a clear mind. The foundation of the lifestyle must be solid before adding anything else in order to achieve optimal health.
To find the answers I was looking for, I went back to what I’ve always done before - I immersed myself in science to find out what was really going on and what I found truly SHOCKED me! There have been unannounced changes in our food chain for multiple reasons which are negatively impacting our health and increasing inflammation. Many of us have gained weight and it wasn’t our fault. I really became intimately aware of this fact.
During my in-depth research, it became readily apparent that the latest nutrition research is significantly more complex than the way the vast majority of even experts teach it. Typically, health advisors focus on ratios of macronutrients or what types of macronutrients we should eat based upon a few studies or upon the short-term benefits rather than longevity. I can tell from their teaching that the greatest percentage of popular health advisors haven’t explored the complexity of how food nutrients affect gene expression (nutrigenetics), how proteins on our DNA control gene expression (epigenetics) or how microbiota (gut organisms) are affected by diet.
I immersed myself into this vastly complex world and now it has all come together in The i60 Day Challenge which includes the M2 Diet that has a foundation which is supported by the an overwhelming majority of published clinical research. The i60 Challenge is purposely designed to be easy to follow as I walk you through it with daily videos intended to fit into your busy life transforming your lifestyle in 60 days to the optimal health lifestyle. The foundational diet involves research performed on over 1 million people in 195 countries around the world and is solidly proven to be associated with longevity and reduced risk of chronic diseases. However, since our modern lifestyle has changed drastically in the last few decades in the US, this nutritional plan had to be updated with the most recent science. Combining over 20 fields of complex sciences including nutrigenetics, epigenetics, immunology, microbiota metabolism, genetics, endocrinology, genomics, proteomics, bioinformatics, metabolomics, toxicology, medicine, biology, physiology, nutrition, biologic hormesis, gastroenterology, epidemiology, microbiology, phytochemistry, and more, I can now share a nutritional system based upon published studies from all of these disciplines. If another health advisor differs from the science presented in our program or states that what we should eat is just simply based on macronutrient percentages or “calories in vs. calories out”, they are at least one decade behind the current research.
I am a living example of the i60 Day Challenge and Makkarios M2 Diet. As a result, I have lost 50-lbs in 6 months and have achieved my ideal body weight. I now have increased energy levels, less pain, less anxiety and have a greater outlook on my overall health and future. My youngest daughter, who was deeply concerned about my health, is now out for track and I’m helping to pace her running which is something I couldn’t have done just 6 months ago. This has been a true transformation for me and I desire to bring this to you.
If you will take the i60 Day Challenge and graduate to more advanced levels, I will do everything I can to help you experience optimal health. Let’s begin now. I’m honored by your trust.