How the Circadian Rhythm Impacts Your Diet and Supplement Use

How the Circadian Rhythm Impacts Your Diet and Supplement Use

You’ve probably heard a lot about circadian rhythms in terms of sleep/wake patterns and eating patterns. But, did you know that your circadian rhythms do much more than that? Our entire body is controlled by diurnal oscillations, which is why some activities seem easier at certain times of the day. This influence has the potential to impact the best times to take medication, eat your meals, and take your nutritional supplements.  

Many complementary medicine traditions, such as Ayurveda and Traditional Chinese Medicine, incorporate circadian rhythms in their treatments. Western medicine is starting to recognize the power of these rhythms to both facilitate treatments and contribute to dysfunction when they are in disarray. Let’s learn more about the influence of these powerful rhythms. 

The Power and Importance of the Circadian Rhythm 

Every process in your body, including reacting to oxidative stress, the composition of your microbiome, and the levels of your intracellular proteins, all have some type of oscillating pattern that fits within a daily 24-hour rhythm. Your body upregulates certain components of metabolism and mechanisms required for self-defense during the hours it expects to need them and down-regulates them during periods of rest.  

There are several circadian transcription factors that control positive and negative feedback loops in the cells to determine functions of key organs and systems, including your heart, lungs, immune system, and metabolism, as well as the intracellular processes, such as cellular respiration and DNA repair. In fact, this internal clock system regulates roughly one-third of your body’s entire gene activity! Your genetic code regulating these systems affects your body’s timing for peak performance, such as whether you are a morning person or a night owl. 

The central regulator of your circadian rhythms is the suprachiasmatic nucleus, SCN, which is found in the hypothalamus in your brain. It does this largely through controlling the secretion of melatonin, which is the main circadian hormone. 

Health problems associated with circadian rhythm disruption include:  

– Allergies
– Asthma
– Cardiovascular disease
– Hypertension
– Insomnia
– Jet lag
– Metabolic disorders
– Neurological disorders
– Psychiatric disorders
– Social jet lag
– Stroke 

Disruptions in the circadian rhythm also reduce your life expectancy. Furthermore, as you age, you become more sensitive to disruptions in the circadian rhythms—and less sensitive to synchronization techniques.  

Metabolism, Dietary Enzymes, and Feeding Times  

Circadian rhythms regulate your digestion and metabolism. In the proper rhythm, gastric emptying, thermogenesis, and motility rates reach their peak in the morning. During the active phase of the day, bile acids and nutrient transporters are regulated and more active, as is energy metabolism. Conversely, detoxification becomes more active during the rest phase.  

Several factors involved in regulating metabolism have a close relationship with the core clock:  

 – AMPK: a signal of low cellular energy and one of the most important sensors of nutrient status
– PGC-1a: regulates energy metabolism
– PPARa: regulates genes involved in glucose and lipid metabolism
– REV-ERBa: involved in the differentiation of adipocytes
– RORa: regulates lipid storage in skeletal muscle and lipogenesis
– SIRT1: a histone deacetylase that helps to signal transcription and stability of genes if dependent upon NAD+ 

For example, CLOCK-BMAL1 and omega-3 fatty acids activate some nuclear receptors involved in energy homeostasis, including PPARs. Glycogen synthase functions during the active period and glycogen phosphorylase during the resting period. Polymorphisms and other variants in certain genes related to circadian rhythms are associated with obesity and metabolic disease, some of which are affected by certain diets, such as higher carbohydrate intake or higher fat intake. 

Blood glucose and lipid regulation are dependent upon diurnal rhythms as well. Consuming a high-fat meal raises triglycerides in the blood more at night than the same meal consumed during the day. Important adipokines, including leptin and adiponectin, also have diurnal rhythms. 

To break it down, during the day when you are awake, you have:  

– Adiponectin production
– Decreased synthesis of cholesterol
– Glycolytic metabolism
– Increased synthesis of bile acids and glycogen
– Increased uptake of fatty acids
– Lipogenesis
– Secretion of insulin  

During night when you are fasting and sleeping, you have:  

– Biogenesis of mitochondria
– Catabolism of lipid
– Gluconeogenesis and glycogenolysis
– Leptin and glucagon secretion
– Oxidative metabolism 

It is not just the human cells in your body that have a daily rhythm; your microbiota impacts—and is impacted by—circadian rhythms as well. Melatonin exists in the gut in levels that are about 400 times the level in the pineal gland in the brain where it acts as a modulator of bowel function. One study found that melatonin might impact the microbiota in the gut as well as regulate other components of the circadian rhythm, like sleep.  

Dr. Deanna Minich -- Green Foods and Your Heart

Green Foods and Your Heart

In my 7 Systems of Health, the color green is associated with love and, therefore, primarily the heart and lungs, which are part of your circulatory or cardiovascular system. When healthy, your cardiovascular system functions to circulate blood, nutrients, oxygen, carbon dioxide, and hormones between cells in your body where they are needed to carry out a wide variety of biochemical functions.

Cardiovascular disease includes a number of problems and can be related to hardening of the arteries, known as atherosclerosis; heart attack, when blood flow to part of the heart is blocked by a blood clot; heart failure, when your heart is not pumping as well as it should; arrhythmia, abnormal heart rhythm; and heart valve problems, when heart valves do not open as much as they should to allow adequate blood flow, known as stenosis, and when the heart valves do not close properly and blood leaks through, known as regurgitation.

Green plant foods contain vitamin K, folate, a variety of antioxidant nutrients, and fiber, all of which have the ability to nourish and benefit your cardiovascular system.

Did you know?

• Vitamin K plays an important role in blood clotting and can prevent excess bleeding if you have an injury or accident, and it also may inhibit hardening of your arteries, which can lead to cardiovascular disease.
• Folate plays an important role in protecting your heart because it can help lower levels of homocysteine, an amino acid that when elevated can damage blood vessels. Folate deficiency, and elevated levels of homocysteine, also can indicate an increased risk for cardiovascular disease.
• Antioxidant nutrients can help combat oxidative stress, which can lead to inflammation and chronic conditions such as cardiovascular disease.
• Dietary fiber can help lower total and LDL cholesterol and, therefore, may have beneficial effects for cardiovascular health.
• Eating leafy green and cruciferous vegetables may reduce the incidence of several types of cardiovascular disease.
• Evidence from scientific studies is convincing that increasing your intake of vegetables and fruit can reduce your risk for hypertension, coronary heart disease, and stroke.

Leafy greens that help to nourish your cardiovascular and LOVE system of health include:

Chard (rainbow, red) 

• Green leafy vegetables, like Swiss chard, contain antioxidant phenolic compounds, which may positively effect cardiometabolic risk factors.
• Flavonoid antioxidants can be found in chard, in particular one called vitexin, which may exert cardioprotective effects.

Vitamin and Mineral Interactions: The Complex Relationship of Essential Nutrients

Vitamin and Mineral Interactions: The Complex Relationship of Essential Nutrients

The essential vitamins and minerals share a delicate dance in the body. For many body processes to function optimally, you must have the right balance of the nutrients. Many nutrients work synergistically, so a deficiency in one might appear as or exacerbate a deficiency in another and vice versa.

Other nutrients are antagonists, so care must be taken when supplementing with one so it does not negatively impact the absorption, uptake, or metabolism of the other. For some nutrient pairs, the balance is delicate, with the pairs in certain situations enhancing the work of the other, and in other situations, they antagonize one another.

The following is a brief overview of the relationships and interactions between the essential nutrients. As you will see, some vitamins and minerals have a relationship with several other essential nutrients, while some have few if any known synergistic or antagonistic interactions.

VITAMINS

Vitamin A

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Synergistic Nutrients:

Vitamin E

• Vitamin E enhances vitamin A intestinal absorption at medium to high concentrations, up to 40 percent.
• Vitamin A and E together lead to increased antioxidant capabilities, protect against some forms of cancer, and support a healthier gut.
• They work synergistically to prevent or support obesity, metabolic syndrome, inflammation, immune response, brain health, hearing loss.

Iodine

• Retinoic acid is involved in iodine uptake.
• Severe vitamin A deficiency decreases the uptake of iodine and impacts thyroid metabolism.
• Iodine deficiency and vitamin A deficiency leads to a more severe case of primary hypothyroidism compared to iodine deficiency alone.

Iron

• Iron is required for converting beta-carotene into retinol.
• Vitamin A increases iron absorption, especially non-heme iron.
• Iron increases the bioavailability of pro-vitamin A carotenoids, including alpha-carotene, beta-carotene, and beta-cryptoxanthin.
• Supplementing with vitamin A might help reverse iron deficiency anemia in children, and vitamin A deficiency might contribute to anemia.

Zinc

• Zinc is required for vitamin A transport.
• Supplementing with vitamin A and zinc in children led to a reduced risk of infection and increased linear growth.
• Zinc along with vitamin A helps maintain eye health.

 Antagonistic Nutrients:

Vitamin E

• High levels of beta carotene might decrease serum levels of vitamin E.

Vitamin K

• Vitamin A toxicity inhibits the synthesis of vitamin K2 by intestinal bacteria and interferes with hepatic actions of vitamin K.
• Vitamin A interferes with absorption of vitamin K.

My interview with Dr. Deanna Minich

My interview with Dr. Deanna Minich

Dr. Deanna Minich

Functional Nutritionist, Author, Artist, Yoga Practitioner

Dr. Deanna Minich is an internationally-recognized lifestyle medicine expert, creative visionary and teacher, and author of five books. Her extensive background in nutrition, yoga, and personal growth led her to create a whole-self, colorful approach to health called Food & Spirit. She developed the Certified Food & Spirit Practitioner Program to provide health professionals with a practical way to apply the Food & Spirit framework with their patients and clients. She is author of Whole Detox, a book based on a whole-life, whole-systems, whole-foods approach to detoxification, as well as on her Detox Summit, the world’s largest online event with 30 leaders in the detox field.

Dr. Minich has a Ph.D. in Medical Sciences (Human Nutrition and Metabolism) and a M.S. in Human Nutrition and Metabolism. During her scientific study, she also studied ancient healing arts such as Ayurveda and Traditional Chinese Medicine.  Currently, she is a Fellow of the American College of Nutrition, a Certified Nutrition Specialist, a Certified Functional Medicine Practitioner, and a Registered Yoga Teacher. She spends her time teaching for her Whole Detox and Food & Spirit programs, the Institute for Functional Medicine and the University of Western States. Her passion is teaching a whole-self approach to nourishment and bridging the gaps between science, spirituality, and art in medicine.  

Broken Brain: Episode 7

After I experienced my own broken brain,[ First Name], I threw myself into scouring the literature. I consulted with other doctors and scientists, and experimented with my own body and mind.
I finally came to understand that it wasn’t just one thing that had caused my brain to break, but the accumulation of many things.

Since it was that accumulation of many things, treating my broken brain required addressing many things.

My life’s mission has become to support humanity with what the comprehensive 7-step plan based off of the treatment that I used for myself and that I use for my patients. In this episode we will cover each of those seven steps so that you can start to heal your broken brain today. 

Click here to watch Episode Seven.

This episode also includes a long list of experts and doctors to share their most important to-do list to live your best life and support your best, healthiest brain and mind.

Dr. Rupy Aujla
Dr. Elizabeth Boham
Dr. John Ratey
Biomedical Nutrition Expert, Vicki Koblinger
Dr. David Perlmutter
Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Dr. Daniel Amen
Dr. Maggie Ney
Dr. Datis Kharrazian
Dr. Izabella Wentz
Dr. Hyla Cass
Dr. Todd LePine
Jim Kwik
Dr. Robin Berzin
Dr. Frank Lipman

Trust me, you won’t want to miss this.

Broken Brain: Episode 5 (Updated)

Broken Brain: Episode 5 (Updated)

Broken Brain: Episode 4 (Updated) -- Mark Hyman, MD

About This Episode

Are autism and ADHD just names we give to people with a list of similar symptoms? You might be surprised to hear that treating patients with ADHD or on the autism spectrum does not look so different from treating patients who have dementia or other illnesses. In episode four we take a deep dive into ADHD and autism.

How your thyroid can make you sick, tired and overweight

How your thyroid can make you sick, tired and overweight

Low-salt diets may not be beneficial for all, study suggests

Low-salt diets may not be beneficial for all, study suggests

Salt reduction only important in some people with high blood pressure

Date:

May 21, 2016

Source:

McMaster University

Summary:

A large worldwide study has found that, contrary to popular thought, low-salt diets may not be beneficial and may actually increase the risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and death compared to average salt consumption. The study suggests that the only people who need to worry about reducing sodium in their diet are those with hypertension (high blood pressure) and have high salt consumption.

Risks associated with low-sodium intake -- less than three grams per day -- are consistent regardless of a patient's hypertension status.

Credit: © Sebastian Studio / Fotolia

A large worldwide study has found that, contrary to popular thought, low-salt diets may not be beneficial and may actually increase the risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and death compared to average salt consumption.

In fact, the study suggests that the only people who need to worry about reducing sodium in their diet are those with hypertension (high blood pressure) and have high salt consumption.

The study, involving more than 130,000 people from 49 countries, was led by investigators of the Population Health Research Institute (PHRI) of McMaster University and Hamilton Health Sciences.

They looked specifically at whether the relationship between sodium (salt) intake and death, heart disease and stroke differs in people with high blood pressure compared to those with normal blood pressure.

The researchers showed that regardless of whether people have high blood pressure, low-sodium intake is associated with more heart attacks, strokes, and deaths compared to average intake.

"These are extremely important findings for those who are suffering from high blood pressure," said Andrew Mente, lead author of the study, a principal investigator of PHRI and an associate professor of clinical epidemiology and biostatistics at McMaster's Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine.

"While our data highlights the importance of reducing high salt intake in people with hypertension, it does not support reducing salt intake to low levels.

"Our findings are important because they show that lowering sodium is best targeted at those with hypertension who also consume high sodium diets."

Current intake of sodium in Canada is typically between 3.5 and 4 grams per day and some guidelines have recommended that the entire population lower sodium intake to below 2.3 grams per day, a level that fewer than five per cent of Canadians and people around the world consume.

Previous studies have shown that low-sodium, compared to average sodium intake, is related to increased cardiovascular risk and mortality, even though low sodium intake is associated with lower blood pressure.

This new study shows that the risks associated with low-sodium intake -- less than three grams per day -- are consistent regardless of a patient's hypertension status.

Further, the findings show that while there is a limit below which sodium intake may be unsafe, the harm associated with high sodium consumption appears to be confined to only those with hypertension.

Only about 10 per cent of the population in the global study had both hypertension and high sodium consumption (greater than 6 grams per day).

Mente said that this suggests that the majority of individuals in Canada and most countries are consuming the right amount of salt.

He added that targeted salt reduction in those who are most susceptible because of hypertension and high salt consumption may be preferable to a population-wide approach to reducing sodium intake in most countries except those where the average sodium intake is very high, such as parts of central Asia or China.

He added that what is now generally recommended as a healthy daily ceiling for sodium consumption appears to be set too low, regardless of a person's blood pressure level.

"Low sodium intake reduces blood pressure modestly, compared to average intake, but low sodium intake also has other effects, including adverse elevations of certain hormones which may outweigh any benefits. The key question is not whether blood pressure is lower with very low salt intake, instead it is whether it improves health," Mente said

Dr. Martin O'Donnell, a co-author on the study and an associate clinical professor at McMaster University and National University of Ireland Galway, said: "This study adds to our understanding of the relationship between salt intake and health, and questions the appropriateness of current guidelines that recommend low sodium intake in the entire population."

"An approach that recommends salt in moderation, particularly focused on those with hypertension, appears more in-line with current evidence." The study was funded from more than 50 sources, including the PHRI, the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

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Story Source:

Materials provided by McMaster University. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

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Journal Reference:

1.     Andrew Mente et al. Associations of urinary sodium excretion with cardiovascular events in individuals with and without hypertension: a pooled analysis of data from four studies. The Lancet, 2016 DOI: 10.1016/S0140-6736(16)30467-6

The Downside of a Low Salt Diet

The Downside of a Low Salt Diet

I recently got the chance to interview my friend James J. DiNicolantonio, PharmD, author of The Salt Fix, and I’m really excited to share this interview with you. I also asked James to write a few words about why low salt diets might be harmful for some, and here’s what he had to say…

We are constantly being warned about the harmful effects of salt. All health agencies, government bodies, and dietary guidelines tell us to cut our salt intake to no more than 2,300 mg of sodium per day (about 1 teaspoon of salt). We are told that cutting back on salt saves lives and that the amount of salt consumed by the average American (one and a half teaspoons of salt) puts you at risk. This is based on the assumption that lowering salt intake will lead to a reduction in blood pressure, and that reducing blood pressure will reduce the risk of strokes and heart attacks. 

Unfortunately, we are only being told one side of the story. The other side of the story is starting to make itself heard—the New York Times, for instance, just covered a study of Russian cosmonauts that hints that there’s more to the story than we’ve been told—but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Here’s part of that other side of the story. When we cut our salt intake, blood pressure may go down but it also may go up. In fact, people with normal blood pressure who cut their salt intake are equally as likely to see an increase in blood pressure (~15%) as a reduction in blood pressure (~18%). The other 70% or so experience no change in their blood pressure. And this finding has been confirmed in a study of patients primarily having borderline or mild hypertension.

What to Eat to Improve Your Thyroid Health

DIET & NUTRITION

What to Eat to Improve Your Thyroid Health

BY KAREN REED SUNDAY, JANUARY 1, 2017

Your thyroid affects much of the way your body works. It controls your metabolism, your ability to break down fat, and the way your body looks and feels.

There are two conditions that can affect the way your thyroid works: hyperthyroidism and hypothyroidism. Most people will have the latter, but there are many who do suffer from the former.

In most cases, medication can help to control the thyroid, but the medication doesn’t solve the problem. The medication is simply there to get your thyroid levels in check. Scientists don’t exactly know why our thyroids can start playing up and causing us health issues, but the diet has been known to help control the situation naturally. It can work with and without medication to improve the thyroid health.

So, it’s time to look at the dietary changes you will need to make so you can improve your overall thyroid health.

But What Does the Thyroid Do to Our Bodies?

As mentioned, there are two conditions that affect the thyroid.

Most people will suffer from hypothyroidism, which is when the thyroid stops working properly. It slows down, so it doesn’t quite give the body the right level of hormones to do all the daily functions. The metabolism slows down to counter this issue, so not as many calories are needed to fuel the whole system.

We end up feeling tired when we have an underactive thyroid. At first, it can feel like low iron levels—and doctors will usually check for low iron levels due to the overlapping symptoms. Weight gain is also likely, as we don’t realize that our thyroid levels are dropping. We’re not aware that our metabolism isn’t working efficiently.

Some people also suffer from constipation and may feel like their skin is dry. You may feel bloated and as if your whole body is giving up on you.

If you’re one of those people with an overactive thyroid (hyperthyroidism), it’s normal to see the weight dropping off quickly. Your metabolism is working too fast, and you need to consume more calories throughout the day. Feeling tired is still normal because you are losing far too much weight and aren’t getting enough calories for your body to burn.

You can also find nutrient deficiencies common. Your body is getting rid of the food faster than you’re putting it in, so the body can’t absorb all the nutrients as quickly.

This is just a small overview of the thyroid issues that you can have. Now it’s time to look at how changes in the diet can help you.

Hypothyroidism - A 7-step Plan to Boost Your Low Thyroid

Hypothyroidism - A 7-step Plan to Boost Your Low Thyroid

WHY HYPOTHYROIDISM IS WORSE WITH IRON DEFICIENCY

​Did you know that Iron deficiency may be one of the reasons you DON'T feel better on your medication?

Iron deficiency is one of the most common nutrient deficiencies seen in hypothyroid patients (even if they are currently taking thyroid medication). 

Not only is it common, but it is frequently misdiagnosed and/or missed. 

You see:

​Most Doctors are trained to look for Iron deficiency anemia, and NOT just iron deficiency by itself. 

Patients with Hypothyroidism deserve special treatment because of how important Iron is for adequate thyroid hormone production.

Let's talk about how to diagnose iron deficiency, what tests to order and the supplements I give to my patients to reverse iron deficiency...​

Thyroid Function and Iron Status

​Iron is required for proper thyroid function.

Studies are clear on the matter.

​Not only is iron required for the creation of thyroid hormone, low iron levels are also associated with low levels of free T3 (which is THE active form of thyroid hormone). 

​This means that in hypothyroid patients low iron levels = low T3 = tissue level hypothyroidism. 

This may explain why some patients still experience the symptoms of hypothyroidismdespite taking "adequate" thyroid hormone replacement.

​The association of iron and TSH level is clearly defined in the graph below: 

Dr. Mark Hyman -- My Broken Brain interview with Dr. Rangan Chatterjee

My Broken Brain interview with Dr. Rangan Chatterjee

Is it possible to make diseases disappear?by Dr Rangan Chatterjee

Is it possible to make diseases disappear?

by Dr Rangan Chatterjee   /  November 17, 2016

Despite the title, there is no trickery or magic involved with this. Getting to the root cause of disease is what I’m passionate about. My TedX talk from earlier this year in Liverpool talks about my journey and why I practice the way I do.

Here’s a transcript of the talk:

“I can make diseases disappear. To be more precise, I can make chronic diseases disappear. Chronic diseases are the long-term conditions like type-2 diabetes, high blood pressure, depression or even dementia. And there’s 15 million people in England that have already been diagnosed with a chronic conditions. That means that looking out amongst you now, there is probably 250 people in here who have one of these long term conditions. Just one of these alone, type-2 diabetes, is costing the UK £20 billion every single year. And I’m standing here before you, saying I can make diseases disappear. I’m not a magician, I’m what the Americans call an MD – that’s not a magical doctor, that’s a Medical Doctor, or what I call a ‘mere’ doctor. The reason I can make diseases disappear is that diseases are an illusion, diseases are not real, diseases don’t really exist, at least not in the way that we think they do.

15 years ago I qualified from medical school and I was ready, full of enthusiasm, full of passion, ready to go out and help people. But I always felt there was something missing, I started off as a specialist. I moved from being a specialist to becoming a generalist (or a GP) but I always had this nagging sense that I was just managing disease or simply supressing people’s symptoms. And then, just 5 and a half years ago came the turning point for me. 5 and a half years ago my son nearly died. My wife and I were on holiday in France with our little baby boy and she called out to me, she said he’s not moving. So I rushed there and he was lifeless, I thought he was choking. So I picked him up, I tried to clear his airway, nothing happened and I froze. She called out to me, my wife said, “Come on, we’ve got to get to hospital.” So we rushed there and we were worried because when we got there he still wasn’t moving. The doctors were worried because they didn’t know what was happening. That night he had 2 lumbar punctures because they thought he might have meningitis – he stayed in a foreign hospital for 3 days. What actually transpired was, my son had a low level of calcium in his blood that was caused by a low level of vitamin D. My son nearly died from a preventable vitamin deficiency and his father, a doctor, knew nothing about it. You see, as a parent that is a harrowing experience, that never leaves you. But I was a doctor, I was his dad and the guilt that stayed with me and is still here today – that changes you.

So I started reading about this vitamin deficiency, and as I started reading, I started to learn a lot of science, a lot of science that I did not learn in medical school… a lot of science that made a lot of sense to me. So I started applying the science, first of all with my son and I saw the amazing benefits. So I started applying it with my patients and do you know what happened? People started getting better, really better – you see I learnt how to resolve the root cause of their problems, rather than simply suppressing their symptoms.

Just over a year ago I got the opportunity to make a series of documentaries for BBC1, where I got to showcase this style of medicine. Let me tell you about one of the patients. A 35-year-old, Dotti, a lovely lady but she was struggling with her health – weight problems, joint problems, sleep problems. Despite Dotti’s best efforts, she was unable to make sustainable changes. So I went into Dotti’s house and on the first week I did some blood tests and I diagnosed her with type-2 diabetes. 6 weeks later when I left Dotti’s house, she no longer had type-2 diabetes – you see her disease had disappeared.

So health exists on a continuum, ok. At the top right we’ve got disease and at the bottom left we’ve got optimum health and we are always moving up and down that continuum. Take Christmas & New Year for example – we drink too much, we eat too much, we stay up late and we probably start to move up that curve. But if we re-calibrate in January and February we start to move back down it again. We get involved in medicine and give you a diagnosis of the chronic disease, here, but things have been starting to go wrong back here. When I met Dotti – she was up here, she had a disease. You can think about it a little bit like a fire that has been burning in Dotty’s body for years, it’s getting bigger, it’s getting bigger until its finally raging out of control and at that point I can say to Dotti, hey you have a disease. And I told her that “You do have a disease.” But what caused it in the first place?

The thing we have to understand is that acute disease and chronic disease are two different things. Acute disease is something we’re pretty good at as doctors, it’s quite simple – you have something like a pneumonia, that’s a severe lung infection, so in your lung you have the over-growth of some bugs, typically a type of bacteria. We identify the bacteria, we give you a treatment, typically an anti-biotic and it kills the bacteria. The bacteria die and ‘hey presto’ you no longer have your pneumonia. The problem is we apply that same thinking to chronic disease and it simply doesn’t work because chronic disease doesn’t just happen. You don’t just wake up with chronic disease one day. And there’s many different causes of chronic disease. By the time we give you that diagnosis things have been going wrong for a long, long time.

So when I met Dotti and she had her diagnosis – her blood sugar level was out of control. Because that’s what people say, many people say that type-2 diabetes is a blood-sugar problem but they’re missing the point. There’s a problem with blood-sugar in type-2 diabetes, but type-2 diabetes is not a blood-sugar problem. The blood-sugar is the symptom, it’s not the cause. If we only treat symptoms, we’ll never get rid of the disease. So when I met Dotti, I said “Dotti, you’ve got a problem with your blood-sugar, Dotti for the last few years your body has become more and more intolerant to certain foods. At the moment Dotty your body does not tolerate refined or processed carbs or sugar at all. So you’ve got to cut them out.” So what does that do? It stops you putting fuel on Dotty’s raging fire but then we’ve got to work out what started the fire in the first place and what was the fuel that caused it to burn for so long.

In most cases of type-2 diabetes this is something called insulin-resistance. Now insulin is a very important hormone and one of its key functions is to keep your blood-sugar tightly controlled in your body. So let’s say you’re at the bottom left in optimal health, like all of us in here, and you have a breakfast of say a sugary bowl of cereal and what happens is your blood sugar goes up but your body releases a little bit of insulin and it comes back down to normal. As you move up that curve you are becoming more and more insulin-resistant, that means you need more and more insulin to do the same job. And for all those years, before you get anywhere near a diagnosis, that raised level of insulin is causing you a lot of problems. You can think of it a little bit like alcohol – the very first time you have a drink, what happens? Let’s say a glass of wine, one or two sips maybe half a glass, you feel tipsy, you feel a little bit drunk. And as you become a more seasoned and accustomed drinker you need more and more alcohol to have the same affect, that’s what’s going on with insulin. You need more and more insulin to have the same affect but that insulin itself is problematic. And when the insulin can no longer keep your sugar under control, at that point, we say you’ve got a disease, at that point you have type-2 diabetes. So what causes this insulin resistance, that then causes type-2 diabetes? Well there’s many different things – it could be your diet, it could be your diet for the past 10 years has been full of processed junk food, that could be a cause. What if it’s something else? What if it’s the fact that you are chronically stressed? Work stress, emotional stress, perceived stress? For me just seeing my email inbox sometimes, that’s a stress. You see that raises levels of cortisol in your body and cortisol when it’s up raises your sugar which causes insulin-resistance. What if it’s something else? What if it’s the fact that you have been sleep-deprived because you are a shift-worker? In some people, one night’s sleep deprivation can give you as much insulin-resistance as 6 months on a junk food diet. What if it’s the fact that as you’re getting older you’re losing muscle mass? That causes insulin-resistance. Or what if it’s something to do with something we call your micro-biome – inside our body we have trillions of bugs living there and the balance of those bugs is critical for our overall health. If you have a disruption to that balance you can get the overgrowth of certain bacteria and on their jacket these bacteria have something called lipopolysaccharide or LPS and what that does is that when it gets in your blood it causes insulin-resistance. You see the problem is there are many difference causes of insulin-resistance and if we don’t address the causes for that particular patient we will never get rid of the disease. That’s what I did with Dotti and that’s why, 6-weeks after I met her she no longer had a disease.

What about something else, completely unrelated. What about depression? One in five people are going to get depression at some point in their lives. So what is depression? There’s no blood test for depression, there no scan for depression – depression is simply the name that we give to a collection of symptoms. What causes the depression, well we know that many cases of depression are associated with something called inflammation. Now this isn’t the same inflammation as if you trip up, you sprain your ankle, it gets red, it gets swollen, it gets hot for a few days. This is entirely different; this is chronic inflammation. This happens when your body thinks it is under constant attack. Kings College London, 3 weeks ago, published a study on this – this is current up-to-date stuff. Patients with depression, if they had high levels of inflammation in their body they did not respond to anti-depressants. Take a step back, it sort of makes sense, doesn’t it? Because an anti-depressant is designed to raise the level of a chemical in your brain but what if the cause of your depression is actually coming from your body and the inflammation that’s in your body, surely it makes more sense to address that? What causes this inflammation? Well, your diet plays a part in that, your stress levels play a part in that, chronic sleep deprivation, physical inactivity, a lack of exposure to the sun which gives you vitamin D, disruptions in the gut microbiome – you see there are many different things – if we do not address the cause we will never get rid of diseases. Diseases are the symptom.

What about something else? What about Alzheimer’s disease? We’re all livinglonger aren’t we? But we’re scared, we’re scared that as we live longer and as we live older we may have to live with the devastating consequences of things like Alzheimer’s. I’m sure many of us in here have experienced that ourselves or our family. It’s a heart-wrenching condition and we the doctors, we’re scrambling around aren’t we, trying to find the cure. Well there’s a professor, near San Francisco, Professor Bredesen who’s actually demonstrating that you can cure dementia. He’s showing that you can reverse cognitive decline in his patients with dementia and how is he doing that? Well one thing he’s not doing, he’s not saying – well all these patients in my office have got dementia, Alzheimer’s disease – what is the cure? No he’s going the other way, he’s saying with all these patients, let’s say 10 patients in my office, he’s trying to work out what have been the triggers for the last 20 years that have ended up with this patient expressing themselves as dementia? And he identifies them and he corrects every single one of them. And when he does that, guess what’s happening – they are reversing their symptoms, they are no longer being classified as having dementia. It’s a brand new way of looking at disease. Its looking at what is causing this disease in this individual patient, it’s totally different. So what factors is he looking at? Well he’s looking at their diet, he’s looking at their stress levels, their sleep quality, their physical activity levels, their exposure to environmental toxins, etc., etc.

Is this all starting to sound a little bit familiar? What if all these seemingly separate diseases actually at their core share common root causes? We need to update our thinking, our genetics are not our destiny, our genes load the gun but it’s our environment that pulls the trigger, all these factors here – these are the factors that interact with your genes and determine how your genes are expressed; whether you are in optimal health, whether you have a disease or whether you are somewhere in between. Collectively as a society I genuinely believe we can do better and we have to do better. Type-2 diabetes alone is costing us £20 billion a year. Just a 1% saving there would be £200 million and I think we can do way better than 1%. In the United States today, the new generation of kids that are born have a lower life expectancy than the generation before them.

Is this evolution or is this devolution?

You see we need to evolve the way that we practice medicine of aetiology not symptomology – the medicine that asks why, not only tells you what. This is personalised medicine, this is precision medicine, this is progressive medicine and actually if you take a step back, this is preventative medicine in its purest form. We have got to stop applying 20^th century thinking to 21^st century problems, we need to take back control, empower ourselves and re-educate ourselves away from our fear of disease and right back down the curve to optimal health. Because if we do, together, I genuinely believe that we can change not only our health, not only the health of our communities but maybe, just maybe, we could start to change the health of the entire world. Thank you”

— Dr Chatterjee

Source:

 https://drchatterjee.com/video-is-it-possible-to-make-diseases-disappear/

Dr. Mark Hyman -- Broken Brain. Episode 3 - Dementia and Alzheimer’s

About This Episode

Alzheimer’s and dementia are devastating brain disorders that rob elderly of their past. Unfortunately, even middle-aged individuals are suffering from memory loss. What is causing the increase in dementia and Alzheimer’s and is there anything we can do about it? Find out in episode three of Broken Brain.