Life At Optimal with Dr. John Bartemus: Recent Episodes
Dr. John Bartemus; sharing the latest research and clinical findings in Functional Medicine and Chiropractic to help you achieve and maintain optimal health and wellness via fitness, nutrition, weight loss, and more.
Dr. John Bartemus will share the latest research and clinical findings in Functional Medicine and Chiropractic to help you achieve and maintain optimal health and wellness. Do you suffer from thyroid problems, adrenal fatigue, leaky gut, dysbiosis, hormone imbalance, trouble with weight loss, or any of the host of common chronic diseases plaguing the developed world? Then this is your hub for information on how to take back your health naturally.
The Serotonin Hypothesis of Depression has never been proven correct. In fact, it has been disproven by multiple researchers. In today's video, I show you the research that shows why SSRI medications and the doctors who prescribe them (and the researchers who study them) fail so many patients.
See the video on YouTube HERE
Get a FREE AUDIO copy of Dr. Bartemus' Amazon International Best-Selling book, The Autoimmune Answer here: t.ly/UU_H
John Bartemus, DC Functional Medicine Charlotte 704-895-2240 http://www.FunctionalMedicineCharlotte.com
Disclaimer: *Please note that the information shared on this podcast is informational and educational and is not to be interpreted as medical advice. Before implementing any information from this channel, please consult first with your primary care provider.
NSAID medications come with many potential side effects, including damaging your gut and/or your kidneys.
Research reveals that there are many natural alternatives that provide equivalent pain relief without the side effects.
New research unveils an autoimmune mechanism for Osteopenia and Osteoporosis driven by gut dysbiosis.
Calcium is the the answer for bone loss.
You can be deficient in magnesium even if your serum magnesium level is normal.
This will fool you and your medical doctor.
Will it end your life early?
No diagnostic test is 100% accurate.
All tests have potential for reporting false negatives.
This can lead to unnecessary suffering.
Especially in people with chronic conditions that have seen many doctors who cannot find anything wrong.
Perhaps you are a victim of a false negative...
This podcast is best understood by viewing the graphic below or watching the YouTube version here: https://youtu.be/c_OMIq3Kyks
Statin drugs are the highest selling class of pharmaceutical drugs of all time.
Yet their success is built on a statistical shell game that amounts to a worldwide lie.
Should you allow your GP to coerce you into taking a statin?
What does the research reveal?
Many people slave their whole lives with the goal of retiring and then beginning to live the life of their dreams.
Unfortunately in America, by the time the average person makes it to 55+, they are too unhealthy to live their dream life.
And conventional medicine does not have the tools to help them return to health.
Functional Medicine does.
This episode teaches you how to maximize the quality of your life in your golden years.
Dr. Nayan Patel is the inventor of a novel nanoparticle technology that allows him to raise your glutathione levels within 45 minutes of use.
This has ground-breaking implications for autoimmune disease, athletic performance, and anti-aging.
Learn more about the technology, the product, and how to get it in this podcast.
You can find the product here: t.ly/qqxQ
Helping People Live Their Optimal Life Through a Podcast and a Book
– Publish. Promote. Profit. with Rob Kosberg Episode 047 Dr. John Bartemus
Dr. John Bartemus is a Chiropractor, Certified Functional Medicine Practitioner, and Board Certified in Integrative Medicine. He is the #1 International Best-Selling author of “The Autoimmune Answer,” and he hosts the Life at Optimal podcast. Dr. Bartemus has nearly 800 videos on his YouTube channel where he shares his expertise with doctors and patients alike. Dr. Bartemus has been in full time practice for 12 years and excels at getting results with chronic disease cases where conventional medicine has failed.
Listen to this informative Publish. Promote. Profit. episode with Dr. John Bartemus about living your optimal life by looking at the big picture instead of simply treating symptoms.
Here are some of the beneficial topics covered on this week’s show:
- How autoimmune diseases force us to look at everything we’re exposed to so we can treat them.
- How our environment and the choices we make contribute to our overall health.
- How conventional medicine gets it wrong compared to functional medicine.
- How a book can educate people in a way that a TV spot, or YouTube video can’t.
- How writing a book gives authors authority and enables them to help others in a way that they couldn’t before.
Connect with Dr. John:
Links Mentioned:
functionalmedicinecharlotte.com
Guest Contact Info:
Email
drjohn@functionalmedicinecharlotte.com
YouTube
youtube.com/c/drjohnbartemus
Facebookfacebook.com/pages/functionalmedicinecharlotte
LinkedInlinkedin.com/in/johnbartemus
Connect with Rob:
Website
bestsellerpublishing.org
Twitter
@bspbooks
Instagram
@bspbooks
Facebook
facebook.com/bestsellerpub
YouTube
youtube.com/c/BestSellerPublishingOfficial
Have you ever wondered how "21 days to flatten the curve" turned into the death of a republic? Here it is, eloquently expressed:
Parkinson's disease is a neurodegenerative autoimmune disease often contributed to by gut-brain axis mechanisms.
Recent research shows 2 different ways that the gut microbiome could contribute to Parkinson's disease.
New research connects imbalanced gut probiotics and induction of Grave's disease.
How does this happen and what can you do to prevent it or treat it?
Exciting new research from multiple different labs reveals that humans do produce long-term immunity when they recover from natural COVID infection.
Many doctors and scientists worldwide are raising concerns regarding the safety and long-term consequences of the experimental biologic agents being called COVID vaccines.
The subconscious mind is the key to thoughts becoming things.
How does this happen?
Can the subconscious mind be recruited to achieve goals in economics, wealth, success, and health?
Research reveals that for years science has known that vitamin D deficiency promotes acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). Even before COVID hit the scene.
A recent publication states that 90% of COVID deaths could be prevented if vitamin D deficiency was addressed.
Over 1 billion people worldwide are vitamin D deficient.
COVID-19 is caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus. The elderly are the main age group at risk for severe course of infection, cytokine storm, and death.
Early in the pandemic, the CDC and many mainstream media outlets claimed that vitamins and nutrition were useless in prevention and recovery from COVID. As I said then, they were wrong. They were the purveyors of "false information".
Science continues to come out and support what years of science has already shown, vitamins, nutrition, and many other lifestyle factors play key roles in the anti-viral immune response and overall immune health.
If you fear COVID, the most important thing to do is to clean up your diet and nutrition. By doing so, you optimize your immune system, specifically the anti-viral capacity.
Despite the mainstream media's chronic refusal to admit that nutrition and many vitamins are key to immune health, the research cannot be denied. If you strip away all financial interests, the best defense is a healthy lifestyle, which includes healthy nutrition.
Watch the video to see the research graphics referenced here: https://youtu.be/uYe2HxUXvHM
There is a sparkly creative muse inside each of us. As children, everything is perfect and whole in our curious, open eyes. Creativity is our effortless language. We play games and explore our world with delight. We build hospitals for teddy bears and perform rock concerts in our bedrooms. We design blueprints for castles and draw maps for hidden treasures. Lara held mini-funerals for her Barbies in her grandfather’s funeral home. In the journey to adulthood, our innate brilliance is insidiously tarnished by responsibilities to be dutiful partners, coworkers, friends, and citizens. In the path of a heart-centered physician, our originality is oppressed further, underneath rigorous schooling, sleepless nights, and a decaying healthcare system that values efficiency over humanity.
We are promised it will get better, only to emerge from another week in our career of factory medicine, feeling broken and battered. We wonder what happened to the Hippocratic Oath: “I will remember that there is art to medicine as well as science, and that warmth, sympathy, and understanding may outweigh the surgeon’s knife or the chemist’s drug.” We tell ourselves to be grateful. Don’t complain. This is how it is. We hide our disappointment in sips of wine, yoga classes, and mandated “resiliency” seminars. We further the disconnect from our wise intuition and silence our creative voice as we recall the blood, sweat, and tears we’ve poured into this choice to become a physician. We don’t see any other choice.
What if there comes a day when blood is exactly what awakens you of the possibility of an alternate life? What if you’re given the gift of a near-death experience that forces your eyes wide open to the beauty of a creative life again?
This is the story of Lara Salyer, a burned-out, family doctor mom in the rural Midwest who rediscovered her dormant creativity and saved her career. Growing up as a granddaughter of a mortician may have prepared her with a macabre sense of humor and extravagant Halloween decorations, but it didn’t brace her for her own near-death experience. Just when she wanted to quit medicine entirely, this experience inspired her grassroots mission to incorporate art and creativity back into medical care.
Candid and sassy, expressive and fearless, Right Brain Rescue is both a touching memoir and a call to action for all of us to color outside the lines and reinvent life on our own terms. This is a story of how one woman did everything “right” to enjoy a triumphant career as a family physician, but crumbled under the same pressure as many others in conventional “factory medicine”—the pressure to flip patients every fifteen minutes like burgers on a grill. The same pressure that has led to harrowing rates of burnout and suicide.
This is the story of a physician who lived life with blinders on, navigating the increasing demands of being “doctor mom.” It reveals that grit and diligent hard work do not protect you against the heartache of burnout, and the best decisions are not made with logic or reason, but right-brain instinct. It’s a story about bravely walking away from a stable, profitable career into a blank canvas of the unknown in order to live a fully authentic and awake life. This is not a self-help book or a how-to book, but you might recognize some self and help in these pages. Right Brain Rescue is a literary “creativity prescription” that will inspire us to think differently about how we use our energy, explore our values, and care for our bodies and minds so we can become the most sparkly version of ourselves.
Why do people seek out proactive or preventative health strategies?
Is it to deal with acute issues or chronic issues?
Is it to improve quality of life today or for the future?
Is it to delay death?
Yes.
Proactive/Preventive strategies like the Functional Medicine paradigm achieve all of these.
How?
By compressing morbidity. A concept that was first put forth in 1980.
If you experience chronic gas and bloating after meals and experience stool changes such as constipation or diarrhea, you may have Small Intestine Bacterial Overgrowth (SIBO).
Why do you have it?
Is it an entity in and of itself or is it a symptoms of a deeper underlying issue?
How do you eliminate it?
Sleep impacts health in more ways that we can count. We are evolved to sleep in a circadian rhythm that is entrained with the light and dark cycles of the sun.
When we break from our evolutionary programming, we may develop circadian rhythm dysfunction. This can contribute to immune system issues, liver and metabolic issues, and/or gut microbiome disturbance (aka dysbiosis) to name a few.
New research out of Stanford helps reveal why some people infected with SARS-CoV-2 experience mild COVID symptoms while others experience a severe clinical course.
What is really exciting is that this research reveals immune targets that we can take action toward optimizing in order to prevent infection and/or optimize recovery if infected.
Parkinson's Disease is often termed idiopathic by conventional medical doctors. Idiopathic means unknown cause. If a disease is idiopathic, the patient is hopeless. No disease is idiopathic.
There is always a cause.
Treatment for Parkinson's disease should go far beyond just prescribing Levodopa. Levodopa only suppresses symptoms. What about healing? Healing can only occur by finding and addressing the cause(s) of the Parkinson's.
Let's dive into how to do that.
If you have silicone breast implants and suffer from a wide range of seemingly unconnected symptoms, you may have implant driven ASIA Syndrome.
What can you do about it?
How can you restore your health and quality of life?
Many people suffer with anxiety and are not helped by psychiatric medications. If this is you, today's video lays out 2 physiologic mechanisms that may be involved in your case. If one or both of these are involved, there is a possibility that magnesium supplementation, in the correct form, could be a simple yet life-changing fix for you.
Biofilms are suggested by the research to be involved in up to 80% of infections. The common presentation of a biofilm-based infection is one that responds to the same antibiotic everytime, but always comes back.
What is a biofilm? Why aren't antibiotics effective? Where do biofilms occur? Are they involved in "die off" reactions (aka Herxheimer Reactions)?
Could biofilms be involved in SARS-CoV-2 virulence and COVID-19 infections?
See my video on biofilms at: Biofilms cause chronic sinus, UTI, respiratory, and gut infections (t.ly/oMFq)
If you suffer from heartburn or acid reflux you have probably been told by your doctor that you have GERD. You likely also received a prescription for a proton pump inhibitor (PPI) such as Nexium, Prilosec (omeprazole), or Protonix.
How long have you been taking it? Did you know you are not supposed to take it for longer than 2 weeks at a time? Did you know that the list of potential serious side effects is quite long?
It even includes increased risk of a positive COVID-19 test.
Glutathione status is thought to be the key determinant of whether someone with COVID is asymptomatic/mild or severe and possibly fatal. Every breathing human requires glutathione. Why?
Are you a 30+ year old woman with low sex drive and you don't know why?
Are you the spouse of one of these women and wish their sex drive would improve? There is a big role for you to play.
Today's episode is an expert interview with Dr. Abbie Ballard discussing all the possible influences to women's low sex drive; from physiological (sex hormones) to psychological to relational.
#LifeAtOptimal
www.FunctionalMedicineCharlotte.com
The US is at the bottom of the barrel in terms of life expectancy among first world countries. Why?
In a word, Lifestyle.
Research has revealed drug-free, lifestyle-based strategies that if implemented as a nation would quickly elevate our average life expectancy.
Endometriosis is a multifactorial condition that causes intense menstrual pain and infertility.
Many people think it is all about hormones. As discussed on today's episode, research proves that is not the case. Infection is a large contributor to Endometriosis.
Everyone knows we need oxygen to live, but did you know oxygen is a key anti-inflammatory?
Did you know oxygen is key for proper immune system function?
Asthma is considered to be a disease of Th2 Immune Dominance the majority of the time. Inhalers utilize corticosteroids and/or epinephrine to treat asthma symptoms. Corticosteroids and epinephrine are Th2 promoters. Do you see the potential problem?...
Gut complaints are SUPER common in clinical practice. Leaky Gut is also known as Intestinal Permeability and is a common driver of Constipation, Diarrhea, Gas, Bloating, Stomach Pain, and/or IBS.
There are many systemic symptoms that can be caused by leaky gut that most people wouldn't associate with it:
Food Allergies
Autoimmune Disease
Fatigue
Mood Disorders
Etc
Anxiety and/or Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder can be crippling health challenges that are not dealt with very well by the mainstream medical model. Today's episode dives in to many of the different possible causes of anxiety and/or OCD.
Insufficient or deficient copper levels can result in a myriad of symptoms that could easily be brushed off as unrelated. This makes copper insufficiency/deficiency a commonly overlooked issue that may be contributing to your iron issues, immune issues, fatigue issues, etc.
All the manufactured hysteria over Flupocalypse 2018 has led to many questions in the practice regarding natural anti-viral strategies, particularly Elderberry.
This podcast dives into the research regarding safety and efficacy of Elderberry vs. Flu.
It also addresses the following questions:
How does Elderberry effectiveness compare to Tamiflu and Amantidine?
Is Elderberry safe if you have autoimmunity?
Is Elderberry safe for children?
If you'd rather watch the video, check it out on Youtube at https://youtu.be/jt-1pr-AaOg
Recent research implicates Ibuprofen use in male infertility and low testosterone due to induction of Compensated Hypogonadism.
Dr. Ryan Cedermark (DrCedermark@gmail.com)
DC
Diplomate in Neurology
Trained by the top minds in Functional Neurology - Dr. B/Dr. K
BSN - Duke
FNP - Georgia State
Speaker at the 2017 world conference of IAFNR
Speaker on Brain Health Summits on Gut/Brain Axis and TBI
YouTube video: https://youtu.be/jdRK_3UIAI8
Dr. Abbie Ballard of Ballard Family Chiropractic in Effingham, IL.
Dr. Ballard's expertise and specialty is in Maternal and Pediatric Chiropractic.
She is an expert in optimizing health and function from pre-conception, through pregnancy, birth, and post-partum for both mother and child.
Autism One conference in May 2018
http://www.BallardFamilyChiro.com
217-347-5010
Find the video version of this podcast on my YouTube Channel at:
https://youtu.be/21Zwd1uEYPc
One of the most common questions I am asked when partnering with a person on an Action Plan to address their health challenge(s) is:
"When will I feel better?"
The truth is...I have no idea.
A key differentiator of Functional Medicine is that we honor the fact that every person is a unique individual with their own unique list of contributing factors to their health challenge(s). Each individual, therefore, will heal at their own rate.
Although I cannot predict when you will feel better, I can tell you the 4 possible responses to care that you may experience...
Genetics are a common scapegoat in US "Healthcare". When you look into it, the statistics reveal that only about 5% of disease is truly genetic. The rest is #Choice #Lifestyle #Environmental #Epigenetic based.
Genes load the gun, but Choice/Lifestyle/Environment pull the trigger.
This means that genes may create a susceptibility to a disease, but the expression/manifestion occurs when that gene is exposed to consistently poor choice/lifestyle/environmental cues.
Our "Healthcare" system was/is built on the premise that genetics are a major cause of disease. If genes cause disease, and genes are not changable (you cannot change your genetic code), then the person has no hope and no responsibility/accountability other than to palliate the pain until they succumb to the disease.
And who swoops in to the palliative rescue? #BigPharma with their endless list of failed magic bullets.
You see, if disease is genetic, then you're hopeless (and NOT responsible/accountable for your choices/lifestyle/environment), and you're dependent on a drug to palliate you.
Making people believe they are hopeless and hold no power to impact their health is a great business model, it just doesn't lead to the clinical results that the person who is a patient desires.
Science shows that, in reality, the overwhelming majority of disease is epigenetic; or, controlled/influenced/turned on by our minute to minute choices/lifestyle/environment.
THIS IS POWERFUL because it gives you HOPE. If you get a diagnosis you don't like, 95% of the time, you can impact it in a positive way.
THIS IS POWERFUL because it makes you RESPONSABLE/ACCOUNTABLE. Some people may not like that responsibility. But, again, that responsibility provides the hope that you can change your knowledge and choices and therefore your health.
Do not be lazy. Do not blame genes. Ask yourself how have my choices/lifestyle/environment led to my current health challenge and what can I learn and do to change and impact my circumstances in a positive way.
Once you know what to do, DO IT. And do it persistently.
Health by Choice, Not by Chance.
#LifeAtOptimal
#AddressTheCause
#Epigenetics
#HealthByChoiceNotByChance
When something stressful happens, our body goes into “fight or flight” mode, pumping out stress hormones, raising blood pressure and pulse, and shunting blood away from the organs and towards the limbs. When the stress is over, a healthy body bounces back and returns to normal.
Unfortunately, many people are stuck in fight-or-flight mode. This is especially true in people dealing with a chronic health or brain disorder, as their health itself is a chronic stressor in a self-perpetuating vicious cycle.
The autonomic nervous system, which runs such bodily functions as digestion, heart beat, breathing, etc., consists of two arms:
The sympathetic system, also known as the fight-or-flight system.
The parasympathetic system, also known as the rest-and-digest system.
When you're in a life-or-death situation, you don't need to digest, detoxify, reproduce, or regenerate cells — duties for the parasympathetic rest-and-digest system. The priority is simply to keep you alive. Once you’re safe, the parasympathetic system kicks back in.
The problem is modern life has many of us on hyper drive, in what feels like an ongoing attack. This keeps us in sympathetic mode longer than we should be.
Causes of chronic fight-or-flight mode
It’s not just daily stress that can keep a person stuck in sympathetic mode. It could be stress from the past that has been hardwired into your brain, a concept referred to as negative plasticity. The neuron pathways in your brain have become highly efficient at stress so it takes less and less to trigger a stress response.
The most common example of this is post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. It can also come from long periods of overwork and sleep deprivation that have essentially trained your brain to be agitated all the time, even though your health is being sacrificed.
Signs of chronic sympathetic stress
Signs you are stuck in sympathetic mode include problems with sleep, anxiety, blood sugar issues (even with a blood-sugar-balancing diet), sexual dysfunction, brain fog, memory issues, fatigue, difficulty recovering from exercise or stressful events, getting sick easily, and chronic pain.
Chronic sympathetic stress not only creates negative plasticity, it also damages the gut lining, leading to intestinal permeability, or leaky gut. This allows undigested foods, bacteria, yeast, and other pathogens into the bloodstream, where they trigger inflammation. This chronic inflammation is the foundation to many health maladies.
Getting out of chronic sympathetic stress mode
The most obvious first step to managing sympathetic stress is to address the cause of stress. The cause can be metabolic, such as chronic infection, blood sugar issues, hormone deficiencies, inflammation, or undiagnosed autoimmunity.
Or it can be lifestyle, such as a toxic job or relationship, not sleeping enough, or taking on too much to do and never taking time off.
Another commonly overlooked cause is a brain-based disorder. The less healthy or more degenerated the brain is, the less able it is to dampen sympathetic stress.
If you suffer from brain fog, memory loss, poor cognitive skills, and lack of brain endurance, you may also find you’re often in fight-or-flight mode.
Problems with your vestibular (inner ear) system or cerebellum, both of which play a role in balance, can cause chronic sympathetic stress because the brain is constantly feeling unbalanced.
People may also have issues with the basal ganglia — which acts as the gas and brake pedal of the brain — that keeps them chronically stressed out. These are just a few ways in which a brain-based disorder can contribute to sympathetic stress.
In functional neurology we look at all facets of health to help you unwind sympathetic stress. Sometimes the issue can be as simple as removing certain foods from your diet that are inflaming your body and brain, gluten being the most common.
Other times it takes a neurological exam and some sleuthing to determine whether the issue is brain-based. Often it is a combination of metabolic and brain-based causes.
Ask my office how we can help get you out of chronic sympathetic stress and into a more balanced neurological state that includes plenty of restful and restorative parasympathetic activation.
Your #Health can be looked at as a train on a train track. There are two ways to go, forward or backward. The right way, or the wrong way. Full speed ahead or trainwreck.
Are you traveling the right way down the tracks toward health? Or are you going the wrong way around a curve about to crash into an oncoming train ( #HeartDisease #Stroke #Cancer #Autoimmunity )?
If you are living under the typical American paradigm of "I'll eat drink, drink, and be merry and modern medicine will save me with a magic bullet prescription medication" then you're on the wrong track.
Health is a never-ending journey, not a destination.
Health is being created or destroyed every moment with every decision you make.
Are you choosing #FullSpeedAhead or #Trainwreck ?
Do you want full speed ahead but don't know the choices to make? Have you been in a Trainwreck and want to get the most out of what's left of your engine?
Then partner with a train engineer that knows how to diagnose what is wrong with your engine, navigate the tracks, and get you traveling in the right direction.
#LifeAtOptimal
#FullSpeedAhead
#LowTestosterine aka #LowT is a hot diagnosis these days.
I have consulted with many men who have "Low T" symptoms such as #Fatigue #LowEnergy #LowLibido #BrainFog #WeightGain etc.
They went to a hormone replacement doctor or clinic, had their #Testosterone checked by blood work (an incomplete test 100% of the time), and were told they had Low T and needed Testosterone replacement via injection, topical, pellet, and/or oral.
I caution the men out there not to jump on this bandwagon.
You MUST ASK WHY you have Low T...or better yet, whether you have it at all.
You can't know the answers to those two questions unless you have a COMPLETE workup.
You may have low T due to #BloodSugar issues, or #Aromatization that has gone awry, or #ChronicStress or #LiverIssues or #GutIssues
Taking testosterone without assessing these interconnected areas is like taking a pain killer without pulling the knife out of your hand.
#AddressTheCause
#LifeAtOptimal
Person presents with 7+ years of #Dizziness #Imbalance #Anxiety and #EmotionalInstability
Multiple #Neurologists and #ENT have examined and imaged and said results were normal and recommended #Ativan #Xanax and #SSRI medications. This person does not want medications.
I reviewed the medical records from above doctors and found multiple #FunctionalNeurology abnormal findings in their diagnostics. These findings are DEFINITELY relevant to the case and NOT normal.
My examination confirmed the findings (still there 7 years later...it WILL NOT "just go away").
I have confirmed neurologic abnormalities. Now we must determine WHY they exist.
A history of #TBI #TraumaticBrainInjury from a golf club is one factor.
#Cerebellum #Autoimmunity is another likely contribution, so is #GlutenSensitivity based on family history of #CeliacDisease (Mom). Lastly, a long history of #IBS implicates #GutBrainAxis contribution to metabolic dysfunction.
Lab results will clarify these hypotheses.
I love what I do!
#LifeAtOptimal
#AddressTheCause
#Depression is no longer (and hasn't been for a while) considered to have a primary cause of #NeurotransmitterDeficiency
The most up to date #ScientificResearch shows that the primary driver is #NeuroInflammation
If we are seeking to truly #AddressTheCause then we must ask, "What is causing the neuroinflammation?"
The answer to that question is the key to cracking the case of the individual in question.
The cause(s) could be many: #TraumaticBrainInjury #TBI #Infection#GutDysbiosis #Excitotoxicity #ChronicStress #PoorDiet #NutrientDeficiency#Autoimmunity #PoorLiver #GeneticDefects #HeavyMetals #CorporateToxins#Medications and more.
So if you go to a doctor and complain of depression and they immediately want to put you on #Prozac or some other #SSRI drug, you know one of two things.
- They are not current with the research.
And/or
- They are not thinking critically enough and asking "why?".
If you think you can get more than 8 minutes out of your visit, try asking them what they think could be causing it and what treatment options are available beside medications.
#LifeAtOptimal
Gas and bloating are two of the most common symptoms that present in clinical practice. According the the Journal of the American Medical Association, gas and bloating can be diagnostic of Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth (SIBO). Do you suffer from gas and bloating after meals? Do you suffer from gas and bloating all day long? If you do, you may suffer from SIBO. You are about to find out that SIBO can have many causes beyond the GI tract.
I had a 12 year old female yesterday morning with OCD, Anxiety, Panic Attacks, and a Tic that has seen many neuros, pediatric neuros, had EEGs, etc that cannot diagnose her. This person came in from 3 hours away.
Beyond the obvious Basal Ganglionic issues, she also has Absence Seizures and Vestibular Migraines that the previous doctors denied and supposedly ruled out with EEG.
I was able to induce an Absence Seizure immediately followed by a Vestibular Migraine during my examination, confirming that she has them..
Mom saw it before I even asked her if she saw it. It was great.
As a mentor of mine says, "how can you treat it if you don't diagnosis it first?"
This poor girl has been through the ringer with no help because no one has examined or diagnosed her thoroughly enough, combined with the tunnel vision of only focusing on their "specialty".
Chronic neurologic issues will not be helped if not examined and diagnosed properly. They also will not be helped if there is underlying metabolic dysfunction that has never been considered.
We are excited to see lab results now investigating metabolic, autoimmune, etc contributions. With the results, I can then create an individualized and specific action plan to address her unique constellation of contributing factors.
#AddressTheCause
#LifeAtOptimal
Using a semen analysis to determine the cause of male infertility is like using the exhaust to diagnose a problem with your car. It can be helpful, but to figure out the real cause to the problem, you have to get your hands dirty and dig deeper.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRcpmsIUrCE
I recently sprained my ankle during a workout and thought I'd use the experience as a teaching platform. Today I dig in to the idea that the commonly voiced R.I.C.E. strategy for soft tissue injury is hurting you and slowing your return to action. I cover the science proving that ice is a poor recovery strategy, and I present a strategy that truly is effective and allows you to get back into action as fast as possible.
Teaching Moment:
I sprained my ankle today running in a workout. Most people go right to the R.I.C.E. (Rest, Ice, Compress, Elevate) strategy when they sprain an ankle or sustain an injury.
If your goal is to HEAL FASTER and return to the gym and/or quality of life ASAP, then the R.I. of R.I.C.E. is NOT a good strategy.
Rest (assuming no fracture) and Ice slow healing. Yes, Ice does decrease pain (for a short period) by numbing nerves, but it also slows healing by causing blood vessels to constrict. This means that the swelling and inflammation (which are causing the pain along with tissue damage) remain in the injured area (especially when paired with Rest).
To speed healing you want to C.H.E.M. (copyright Dr. Bartemus): Compress, Heat, Elevate, Move.
Compress with an ACE bandage or my favorite tool from MobilityWOD.com, Voodoo Floss.
While Compressed, you want to Move for a couple reasons:
-
Moving will Move swelling and inflammation out of the injured area via lymphatics and venous circulation.
-
Moving will cause the body to heal/lay down new tissue along lines of stress/normal range of motion. Rest causes the new tissue to be laid down in a disorganized fashion, which results in poor function.
-
Moving also stimulates the nerves that communicate Movement to the brain. These nerves send signals to the brain at speeds that would make any race car driver jealous; thereby out competing the slower pain nerves signals to the brain, as well as inhibiting pain signals at the spinal cord level.
Heat augments the benefits of Movement by causing blood vessels to open up (vasodilation). This increases the Movement of swelling and inflammation away from the damaged area and increases the Movement of white blood cells and healing factors to the area.
Elevation of the injured area (my ankle in this case) above the level of the heart uses gravity to increase Movement of swelling and inflammation away from the injured area, especially when the area is being Compressed. To really create synergy while Compressing, Heating, and Elevating (and therefore likely sitting/laying still), add Movement by putting a TENS or e-stim unit on the area and turning it up enough to create passive Movement (make the muscles jump).
In conclusion, to heal faster get rid of R.I.C.E. and use C.H.E.M.!
It’s commonly thought that sleep apnea is simply a problem of obesity or structural issues that interfere with breathing. However, a commonly overlooked cause of sleep apnea in men and women is the brain. When the brain is not functioning properly, this can interfere with the body’s ability to maintain proper breathing function while asleep.
Sleep apnea and the brain in women
The brain’s influence on sleep apnea can be seen in women during perimenopause and menopause if their estrogen drops too low.
Insufficient estrogen causes the brain to fail in signaling the palate and tongue to maintain tone during sleep. The resulting lack of tone blocks the airway.
The brain-related cause of sleep apnea is different in men. In a rat study, young male rats responded to normal episodes of oxygen deprivation during sleep by automatically increasing brain activity to take deeper and more frequent breaths. However, the older male rats did not respond in the same way due, it’s theorized, to more aged brains.
Researchers observed a much different response to these normal episodes of sleep-induced oxygen deprivation in female rats. For one thing, older female rats responded much more positively to these hypoxic events than the older males.
Younger female rats had an even better response, especially during specific times in the menstrual cycle. This led scientists to believe female hormones play a role in how they respond to normal episodes of oxygen deprivation during sleep.
This theory is what leads researchers to believe estrogen deficiency contributes to sleep apnea in women during perimenopause and menopause. Estrogen influences serotonin, a brain neurotransmitter chemical that plays a role in giving the tongue and palate tone, including during sleep.
Estrogen tells the brain to breathe in women
To test the theory that the interplay between estrogen and serotonin plays a role in sleep apnea, researchers induced menopause in female rats by removing their ovaries. Sure enough, post-mortem brain biopsies showed less serotonin in the area of the brain that controls the tongue. This had made it harder for the female rats to respond to episodes of oxygen deprivation during sleep. This helps explain why sleep apnea affects more women in midlife.
Sleep apnea and the brain in men
Middle-aged men also experience higher rates of sleep apnea due to the effect of declining testosterone on the brain.
In midlife, men snore more and have more episodes where they stop breathing.
Middle-aged women, however, more commonly complain of insomnia, as well as headaches, fatigue, and irritability caused by sleep deprivation and poor sleep quality. That estrogen deficiency promotes weight gain, and restless leg syndrome only worsens the problem of sleep apnea.
Hormone status that plummets too low in midlife can be the result of chronic stress, poor diets, lack of exercise, and other standard bad habits of modern living. These are areas we can address through functional medicine.
Functional neurology and sleep apnea
Sleep apnea can also arise in relation to traumatic brain injuries, childhood brain development disorders such as autism, or other brain-related issues. In functional neurology we can identify areas of dysfunction related to sleep apnea, such as with nerves traveling from the tongue to the brain through the brainstem. Based on findings, customized rehabilitation exercises may help address problems with sleep apnea.
Functional medicine and neurology strategies can profoundly improve both brain and hormone function so you not only sleep better, but also feel and function better. Ask my office for more advice.
Recent studies have shown rice can be dangerously high in inorganic arsenic, particularly rice grown in the southern United States. This is bad news for gluten-free people who eat rice-based products — one study showed people on a gluten-free diet have twice as much arsenic in their urine compared to controls (and 70 percent more mercury).
Although guidelines exist to minimize arsenic exposure (buy rice from California, eat white rice, wash rice thoroughly before cooking, and cook rice like pasta in a ratio of about 6 to 1 water to rice), what about rice-based gluten-free foods? It's nearly impossible to know where their rice comes from, how it’s processed, and what the arsenic levels are.
Arsenic levels in popular gluten-free foods
Until now. The Gluten-Free Watchdog has begun testing arsenic levels in popular brands of gluten-free foods, which you can view with a subscription.
Keep in mind that what is considered an acceptable amount of arsenic varies. Codex, an international collection of safety standards, proposes a maximum of 200 parts per billion in white rice. The European Union proposes 100 parts per billion.
However, arsenic expert Dr. Andrew Meharg proposes a maximum of 50 parts per billion for children, who carry a heavier toxic body burden, and a maximum of 100 parts per billion for adults.
Arsenic levels in rice-based gluten-free foods
For results of inorganic arsenic testing on various brands of gluten-free foods that you can browse by category, visit Gluten-Free Watchdog. A paid subscription is required to access the reports. However, below are examples of arsenic level ranges in some categories of popular gluten-free foods.*
Inorganic arsenic in gluten-free breads
Inorganic arsenic in popular gluten-free breads ranged from 10 parts per billion to 40 parts per billion.
Pastas
Inorganic arsenic in popular gluten-free pastas ranged from 20 parts per billion to 150 parts.
Cereals
Inorganic arsenic in popular gluten-free cereals ranged from 70 parts per billion to 280 parts.
Miscellaneous rice products (rice bran, rice milk, rice syrup, rice cakes)
Inorganic arsenic in miscellaneous rice products ranged from 20 parts per billion to 540 parts.
Rice
Inorganic arsenic in several rice brands ranged from 80 parts per billion to 140 parts per billion. (Brown rice has more than white rice. Gluten-Free Watchdog reports a brand called Mighty Rice grown on the island of Mauritius shows very low levels of inorganic arsenic in their tests.)
Factor in frequency and amount of consumption
It's important to understand these numbers tell us the concentration of inorganic arsenic in each product. The frequency and amount of any item eaten and whether the eater is an adult or a developing child are also very important factors in the equation. For example, at 540 parts per billion of inorganic arsenic, one rice bran product looks pretty bad. But consumed in very small quantities as brans typically are, it may not pose as much a problem, relative to the other foods listed, as it first may seem.
It would be better if rice were not high in inorganic arsenic. Thankfully groups such as Gluten Free Watchdog are around to help us reduce exposures. Also, there is a group based at Cornell University working to shift the world to a rice farming method that uses up to 50 percent less water while increasing yields, thus saving precious water while reducing the amount of arsenic in the rice produced.
*Ranges included with permission from Gluten-Free Watchdog LLC.
Humans have been fasting for millennia, either for religious or spiritual reasons or simply due to lack of food. Today, a new form of fasting called intermittent fasting is increasingly popular among those seeking it’s anti-aging and health benefits.
Intermittent fasting, or IF, makes fasting an everyday part of life versus something you do once or twice a year. Many people use it successfully for weight loss and inflammation control, as well as to improve brain function and insulin sensitivity. The promise of increased longevity is another reason people choose to fast regularly.
Different forms of intermittent fasting
Intermittent fasting can be done in a number of ways:
- 5:2 diet — In this plan you eat normally five days per week, and either fast completely, or severely restrict calories (500-600 calories) the other two days.
- Alternate day fasting — This plan includes normal eating for 24 hours and zero, or very low calories (500-600) for the next 24-hour period, alternating every other day. These 24-hour periods typically begin at dinnertime so that in any one day you may miss one or two meals, but not all three.
- 16:8 or 14:10 — Also known as the “eating window plan,” this plan has you eat during an 8- or 10-hour window and fast the remaining 16 or 14 hours of each 24-hour period. For example, you stop eating at 7 p.m and do not eat again until 14 hours later at 9 a.m. the next morning.
Intermittent fasting for weight loss
Restricting caloric intake can lead to weight loss, but intermittent fasting seems to help with weight loss in more ways than that. For one thing, studies show intermittent fasters have better insulin sensitivity and glucose regulation. Among other things, this makes a person crave less sugar and use glucose more efficiently for energy production instead of being stored as fat. Intermittent fasting also causes your body to burn more fat. Because it depletes glycogen, the storage form of glucose, your body switches over to burning stored fat for energy.
Intermittent fasting for brain function
Studies show intermittent fasting can benefit brain function and potentially even stave off Alzheimer's disease and depression. This is likely due to better glucose and insulin control (Alzheimer's disease is often called type 3 diabetes), as well as production of ketone bodies for fuel. Ketones provide a ready source of clean-burning fuel for the brain that leave behind fewer free radicals than glucose does. High-fat ketogenic diets have long been used to help prevent seizures.
Other benefits
Intermittent fasting has been shown in trials to reduce blood pressure, triglycerides, LDL cholesterol, and insulin-like growth factor, a hormone that is linked to cancer and diabetes. There is still much to learn about the benefits and pitfalls of intermittent fasting. Fortunately, it is an area of great scientific interest and research is happening at a rapid pace.
Intermittent fasting is not for everyone
Children and teens, pregnant women, people with eating disorders, as well as those with hypoglycemia should not fast. Also, diabetics taking insulin should only attempt this diet under supervision of a doctor.
Women often find less stringent forms of intermittent fasting are more suitable for them. For example, a woman might start by trying a 12:12 eating window plan and potentially lengthen her fasting time gradually, or not, as it suits her.
As always, it is important to understand that there is no one-size-fits-all remedy to any health concern. Contact my office to discuss if intermittent fasting might be right for you.
Skyrocketing suicide rates: Brain-based prevention tips
While death rates from cancer, heart disease and even homicide have gone down in the last 20 years, the suicide rate in the United States has risen sharply. Suicide is one of the 10 leading causes of death in the country, having jumped 80 percent between 1999 and 2014.
Economic distress, social isolation, and social media are factors that take part of the blame for skyrocketing suicide rates. While it is important to address these factors, we must also look at addressing depression, anxiety, and brain injury by improving brain health.
What does a brain need for health?
To function optimally, your brain needs fuel, stimulation, and oxygen; appropriately timed and in proper amounts. Unfortunately, our standard American diets (SAD) and sedentary lifestyles deprive the brain of these critical elements, setting the stage for dysfunction.
Brain fuel
The brain consumes about one third of the body's energy and depends on a steady, reliable source of glucose to keep it fueled and functioning properly. Spikes and drops in blood sugar (glucose) levels sabotage brain function, often causing depression and anxiety.
Symptoms of high blood sugar levels include fatigue after meals, constant hunger and thirst, and cravings for sugary foods and drinks.
Some common low blood sugar symptoms are moodiness or lightheadedness if meals are delayed or missed, waking up at 3 or 4 a.m., and a dependence on caffeine or sugar to keep you going.
Both low and high blood sugar are commonly caused by eating too many processed carbohydrates and sugary foods. Therefore, one of the best ways to keep your brain healthy and protect against depression is to eat a healthy, whole foods diet devoid of processed carbohydrates and sweets.
Brain stimulation
A healthy brain also needs exercise. Physical activity, such as jogging or gardening, and mental activities, such as playing chess and reading, stimulate the brain to keep it active and healthy. Watching TV is not stimulating, and spending hours on social media can worsen brain function. A well stimulated brain is less likely to get depressed.
Oxygen
The fact that you are breathing is no guarantee that your brain is receiving sufficient oxygen. Oxygen enters through our lungs and is carried, attached to iron, through the bloodstream into the brain where it can be used by the brain's cells. If you have poor circulation (symptoms can include cold hands and feet, or fungal nail infections), compromised lungs, or you are anemic, your brain may not be getting the oxygen it needs for optimal health, and depression could result.
History of brain trauma also important
Just one concussion triples the risk of suicide according to a Canadian study. This is likely due to unchecked brain inflammation, which damages brain cells, or neurons, leading to depression later on. If you have had a brain injury in your past and suffer from depression or anxiety, it’s vital to seek functional neurology help to help improve your brain health.
Functional medicine and neurology strategies can help to minimize damage from concussions, thereby reducing the risk of future depression and suicide.
To learn more about how to support brain health, contact my office.
Gluten-free folks accustomed to eating rice-based gluten-free breads, pastas, cereals, and other substitutes may be consuming dangerously high levels of arsenic.
In fact, a 2017 study showed people consuming rice-based products on a regular basis showed almost twice as much arsenic in their urine compared to those who did not (and 70 percent more mercury, another troublesome finding.)
Why arsenic is harmful
Arsenic is a naturally occurring heavy metal. It is the inorganic arsenic (not bound to carbon) that is toxic to humans if levels ingested are too high.
Although inorganic arsenic occurs naturally, it also accumulates in soil and water due to pesticides and fertilizers. Because rice grows in water, it is the grain highest in arsenic.
Consistent exposure to small amounts of arsenic increases the risk of bladder, lung, and skin cancer, as well as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and neurological disorders. Consuming arsenic during pregnancy may affect the baby’s immune system.
Consumer Reports found one serving of rice pasta, rice cereal, and rice milk exceeded a safe amount of arsenic for one week while one serving of rice cakes came close.
The FDA recently proposed a limit of 100 parts per billion of arsenic in infant rice cereal. However, it’s impossible to know how much arsenic is safe to consume as risk is dose dependent; the more you consume the higher the risk.
How to minimize arsenic exposure from rice
These troubling truths about arsenic exposure through rice don’t have to spell doom for gluten-free folks who depend on rice-based substitutes.
For starters, look for products made from other grains besides rice. Thankfully, there are many more on the market these days.
Look at where your rice comes from. In 2014 Consumer Reports found that rice from Arkansas, Louisiana, or Texas had the highest concentrations of inorganic arsenic while California rice has almost 40 percent less arsenic. Brown basmati rice from California, India, or Pakistan has a third less inorganic arsenic than other brown rice.
Unfortunately, because the arsenic comes from the water, organic rice may not be lower in arsenic.
Consider white rice. Since arsenic tends to accumulate in the outer layers that are removed to turn brown rice into white, white rice contains less of the toxin than the whole grain.
Rinse your rice thoroughly and cook in excess water. Wash your rice thoroughly before cooking and then cook your rice in a ratio of about six cups of water to one cup of rice and drain the excess water after. This cuts down arsenic levels by about one third compared to letting rice absorb all the water during cooking.
Consider a grain-free diet. Many people feel and function significantly better on a grain-free diet. If you don’t eat rice-based products, excessive arsenic exposure is one less thing to worry about in a world where we are constantly at battle with toxic chemicals and heavy metals.
Ask my office for more ways to protect yourself from toxic chemicals and heavy metals.
Although genetics play a role in memory loss, that doesn’t mean you have to be a helpless victim to the ravages of brain degeneration. By taking action right away if you notice memory loss, you can reverse your risk of dementia and Alzheimer’s before it’s too late.
One study showed that nine out of 10 patients were able to reverse their memory loss. The study subjects also showed significant long-term improvement in memory function.
What was the magic bullet? No magic, just implementation of functional neurology basics.
The subjects underwent a dietary and lifestyle overhaul that included changes in what they ate, regular exercise, supplementation, better sleep, and exercising their brain.
The improvements were so profound that some of the subjects were able to work again, having previously quit their jobs due to advancing memory loss.
Of the 10 study subjects, the only one not to improve suffered from late-stage Alzheimer’s — showing how important it is to take action to reverse memory loss before it’s too late.
Although plenty of functional neurology clinical cases show memory loss can be reversed, this was the first study of its kind.
Functional neurology to reverse memory loss
In the study, subjects reversed their memory loss through the following approaches also commonly used in functional neurology:
- Removing all simple carbohydrates (white rice, pasta, bread, sugar, etc.) from the diet
- Eliminating processed foods
- Gluten-free diet
- Eating more produce and wild fish
- Doing yoga and activities that reduce stress
- Increasing sleep from 4-5 hours a night to 7-8
- Supplementing with methyl B12, vitamin D3, fish oil, CoQ10, curcumin, resveratrol, ashwagandha, and coconut oil
- Exercising a minimum of 30 minutes four to six times a week
- No snacking
- Use of hormone therapy in cases where it was necessary
Researchers found the biggest challenge in the study was complaining from the subjects about all the changes. Nevertheless, all but one enjoyed significant benefits.
How functional neurology can reverse memory loss
One of the more important factors in reversing memory loss is reducing consumption of simple and processed carbohydrates. These foods spike the blood sugar, inflame the brain, and trigger a cascade of chronic health problems.
In fact, some researchers call Alzheimer’s type 3 diabetes because excess sugar and carbohydrates are so destructive to the brain.
Exercise is another vital strategy to reverse memory loss because it has so many beneficial effects on the brain.
It’s also important to get enough sleep every night to reverse memory loss. This is because one purpose of the brain waves produced during sleep is to transfer memories from short-term storage to long-term storage areas of the brain (hippocampus to neocortex). Too little sleep disrupts this process.
A gluten-free diet can be a profound tool to reverse memory loss — in some people gluten triggers inflammation or autoimmune destruction of brain tissue, sabotaging memory function. Other foods such as dairy, eggs, soy, and grains can do the same.
Although most people think a gluten sensitivity causes gut problems, the truth is that it more commonly causes neurological damage. For some people, simply going gluten free profoundly improves their brain health and reverses memory loss.
Rehabilitating brain deficits to reverse memory loss
In addition to dietary and lifestyle approaches, functional neurology rehabilitation techniques can help reverse memory loss. If an area of your brain is under active or over active, functional neurology exercises to restore balance and function to the brain will help improve overall brain function, including reversing memory loss.
Ask my office about ways functional medicine and functional neurology can help you reverse memory loss and prevent dementia or Alzheimer’s.
We commonly think of autism spectrum disorders (ASD) affecting mostly boys. While it’s true ASD affects more boys than girls, it turns out that many girls go undiagnosed because their symptoms are much different than that of boys. Girls with autism may behave socially more like neurotypical (aka, normal) males than boys with autism. Female autism may also be misdiagnosed as anorexia, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), or attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
The diagnostic criteria for autism — difficulties with socialization and communication and repetitive, inflexible behavior patterns — come from studies on boys. A 2012 study of 15,000 twins found that girls needed to exhibit more extreme behavioral problems and intellectual disability to receive a diagnosis. This means that many girls on the milder side of the ASD spectrum go undiagnosed.
Girls with autism closer to typical boys
Brain scans, genetic testing, and other measures show that girls with autism disorders not only present differently than boys, but also that the understanding of autism has been overly narrow by primarily studying boys.
For one thing, brain scans show a girl with autism processes social information much differently than neurotypical girls, but also differently than boys with autism. Instead, their brain operates very much like that of a neurotypical boy. Furthermore, research assessing friendship quality and empathy showed autistic girls score about the same as neurotypical boys.
Girls are better able to hide autism
Girls often go undiagnosed also because they can excel at suppressing their symptoms and studying and mimicking neurotypical girls. However, it’s an exhausting and stressful process for autistic girls, who show a much greater desire to connect than boys.
Girls also exhibit less repetitive behavior and more typical types of play as children, although researchers can pick out subtle differences — obsessively lining up their Barbies, for instance, or being more engaged in staging a scene than the story line.
Female autism can present as anorexia or OCD
Autistic girls also differ from their neurotypical peers by being extreme in their traits, such as “too sensitive” or “too intense.” Their single-minded intensity is believed to underlie anorexia in some who channel those traits into dieting and body obsession. The extreme aversion to certain tastes and textures common with autism also lends itself to anorexia. It’s estimated about 20 percent of women with anorexia also have autism.
The same can be said for autism and OCD, as obsessive-compulsive behavior, fear of change, and being overly rigid are hallmark traits of both OCD and autism.
Autism can make girls vulnerable to predators
Sadly, the autistic girl’s traits of taking things literally combined with social isolation makes her more vulnerable to sexual predators and abusive relationships.
Autistic girls are more apt to suffer from anxiety, low self-esteem, social isolation, and depression. Although people with mild autism are ten times more likely to be suicidal than the general population, the rate is highest in women — 71 percent of women with Asperger’s report suicidal thoughts.
The role of maternal testosterone in autism risk
Autism risk is linked with higher levels of fetal testosterone. A mother with polycystic ovary syndrome, a hormonal disorder that causes high testosterone, has an almost 60 percent higher risk of giving birth to a child with autism. This is why having a female brain offers protective barriers to this tendency.
However, researchers have found girls with autism have a higher number of genetic mutations than autistic boys. In other words, a girl’s brain may need more genetic and environmental “hits” in order to develop autism.
Although the autoimmune diet is a well known foundation for managing chronic health issues, some people are dismayed to find embarking on it makes them feel worse. What gives? The sudden change in diet can temporarily upset your chemistry and reveal hidden health problems.
If you have been accustomed to eating gluten, dairy, grains, sugars, and processed foods, going cold turkey off those foods is a radical shift. Likewise, adding in lots of vegetables can also shock a digestive system unaccustomed to ample plant fiber.
Most people feel significantly better on the autoimmune diet. If you’re not one of them, however, don’t give up on the diet. Instead, look for the underlying reason why.
Feeling temporarily worse on the AIP diet
Following are common adverse reactions to the autoimmune diet. Knowing why you react negatively can further help you on your wellness journey.
Low blood sugar. Symptoms of low blood sugar and adrenal fatigue can worsen on this diet. This is usually caused by not eating enough or frequently enough. The general recommendation is to eat every two to three hours, however, some people may initially need a bite or two every hour until blood sugar stabilizes and they can go longer without eating. Avoid sugary fruits and investigate what else may be taxing your adrenal function, such as brain-based issues, autoimmunity, or chronic infection.
New food sensitivities. When gut damage is bad and inflammation high, it’s possible to develop food sensitivities to new foods on the autoimmune diet. This is very frustrating for people as the diet is already so limited. This can be a complex situation that requires concerted effort to tame inflammation and repair the gut.
Opioid withdrawal reactions. Opioids are morphine-like chemicals made by the body that reduce pain and create a feeling of euphoria and well-being. Some people become dependent on foods that release opioids in the brain, namely gluten and dairy. They can initially experience depression, anger, lethargy, and agitation on the autoimmune diet. For those with serious opioid addictions to gluten and dairy, withdrawal can be intense.
Brain chemical imbalance. A diet high in processed carbohydrates affects brain chemicals that influence our mood, particularly serotonin and dopamine. Suddenly switching to a lower carbohydrate diet can disrupt the balance of brain chemicals and cause temporary changes in mood, behavior, and personality. If this sounds familiar, you may need to gradually lower carbohydrate consumption.
Insomnia and anxiety. Some people report irresolvable insomnia and anxiety if carbohydrate consumption is too low. If these symptoms persist long after an adjustment period, you may simply need to use trial and error to find the carbohydrate “sweet spot” that lets you sleep but also keeps blood sugar in check.
Difficulty digesting fiber. The autoimmune diet is heavy on vegetables. For those with compromised digestive function, this can overwhelm the gut. Concerted gut repair nutritional therapy can ease you into a higher fiber diet.
Histamine intolerance. This is a reaction to aged or fermented foods that causes myriad symptoms, including rashes, runny nose, or headaches. Avoiding these foods for a while can help the gut heal so you can eat them later.
Yeast and bacteria die-off reactions. Going cold turkey off processed carbs, gluten, and dairy can cause a sudden and uncomfortable die off of harmful yeast and bacteria in your gut. This is especially true in the case of poor liver detoxification and constipation. Supporting the body’s pathways of elimination can help.
These are a few of the issues that can arise when you switch to the autoimmune diet. Don't forget to consider the grief and anger you may feel about missing your favorite foods. However, if you weather the transition and ferret out sources of discomfort, your newfound health will more than make up for the rough legs of the journey.
Hypothyroidism has received a lot of attention online since the publication of Why Do I Still Have Thyroid Symptoms? by Datis Kharrazian in 2009. While many facets should be addressed in managing hypothyroidism, one of the most important continues to be a gluten-free diet.
Research shows ninety percent of hypothyroidism cases are due to an autoimmune disease that attacks and destroys the thyroid gland. This disease is called Hashimoto’s.
Most doctors do not test for Hashimoto’s because it does not change treatment, which is thyroid medication. Also, many cases of hypothyroidism go undiagnosed because Hashimoto’s can cause the lab marker TSH to fluctuate.
Where does gluten fit in with this? Numerous studies have linked an immune reaction to gluten with Hashimoto’s hypothyroidism. Whether it’s a gluten sensitivity or celiac disease, gluten triggers an autoimmune attack on the thyroid gland in many people. Most of these people do not even know they are sensitive to gluten.
Going off gluten is the first step with Hashimoto’s
Studies, clinical observation, and patient stories make a very strong case for the benefits of going gluten-free to better manage your Hashimoto’s hypothyroidism symptoms.
A number of studies from several countries show a link between Hashimoto’s and gluten. This is because the protein structure of gluten closely resembles that of thyroid tissue. When your immune system reacts to gluten, it may start erroneously reacting to thyroid tissue as well. This will cause the immune system to attack and destroy thyroid tissue in a case of mistaken identity.
Studies also show patients improve on a strict gluten-free diet. One study showed as many as 71 percent of subjects resolved their hypothyroid symptoms after following a strict gluten-free diet for one year.
Why you may need to stop eating other foods too
Sorry to say, going gluten-free alone doesn’t always work. Many people with Hashimoto’s hypothyroidism also need to go dairy-free. Dairy, whether it’s cow, goat, or sheep, is the second biggest problem food for people with Hashimoto’s hypothyroidism.
Many people simply have an immune intolerance to dairy and aren’t aware of it until they stop consuming it. However, in an immune sensitive individual, the body may also mistake dairy for gluten and trigger an immune reaction that ultimately ends up targeting the thyroid.
For those serious about managing their Hashimoto’s hypothyroidism, a gluten-free and dairy-free diet frequently results in profound alleviation of symptoms, if not total remission.
Many find they may need to eliminate additional foods, such as certain grains, eggs, or soy. An elimination/provocation diet can help you figure out what your immune system reacts to, or a comprehensive food sensitivity test is another option.
What is there left to eat?
If you’re used to eating without restrictions, eliminating gluten, dairy, and possibly other foods to manage your Hashimoto’s hypothyroid symptoms may seem overwhelming and too restrictive. Many people are left wondering, what is left to eat?
Rest assured there is more than enough to eat. Most people fare well on a paleo diet that is primarily vegetables (a diverse array of plenty of vegetables helps create the healthy gut bacteria that improve immunity.)
More importantly, symptoms and general health improves so dramatically that people come to love their new diet and despise the way they feel after they cheat.
Ask my office for more information about implementing a gluten- and dairy-free diet.
If a child suddenly develops behavioral and neurological symptoms after a strep infection, PANDAS should be suspected. PANDAS is a neuro-immune disorder in which a strep infection triggers brain inflammation and the immune system starts to attack and destroy brain tissue, causing a sudden onset of neurological symptoms.
PANDAS stands for Pediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorders Associated with Streptococcal Infections.
PANS, or Pediatric Acute-Onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome, is similar, except environmental factors or other infections trigger symptoms.
PANDAS diagnosis criteria
- Significant obsessions, compulsions, tics
- Abrupt onset of symptoms or relapsing and remitting symptom severity
- Onset prior to puberty
- Association with strep infection
- Association with neuropsychiatric symptoms, including PANS symptoms
PANS diagnosis criteria:
Abrupt, dramatic onset of OCD or severely limited food intake and the addition of at least two of the following:
- Anxiety
- Emotional swings and/or depression
- Irritability, anger, oppositional behavior
- Regression
- School performance deteriorates
- Sensory or motor abnormalities
- Sleep disturbances, urinary frequency, bed wetting
Functional neurology help for PANDAS/PANS
Because PANDAS and PANS involve the immune system, management involves testing markers for inflammation, infections, immune function, and brain autoimmunity (when the immune system attacks and destroys brain tissue).
It’s also helpful to conduct a functional neurology exam to identify compromised areas of the brain, as well as to establish a baseline of brain function.
Repeat testing can show you how well PANDAS/PANS protocols are working. Functional neurology rehabilitation may also help with recovery. For instance, therapies targeting different areas of the brain can calm an over active immune system and over activation of pathways.
Functional medicine help for PANDAS/PANS
Additionally, functional medicine strategies may include removing inflammatory triggers from the diet and the environment; nutritional therapies to lower inflammation and support brain health; addressing blood sugar, gut health, and toxicity; supporting neurotransmitters; and repairing mitochondrial function and the blood-brain barrier.
Conventional medical help for PANDAS/PANS
Therapies from the conventional model that have been shown to help include steroids and NSAIDs for inflammation; plasmapharesis (plasma exchange) to reduce antibodies; intravenous immunoglobulins (IVIG) to support immune modulation; and immune modulating medications when necessary.
Understanding the PANDAS/PANS brain
When PANDAS/PANS strikes a child — an estimated 1 in 200 children are affected — parents become both frightened and devastated. Understanding what is happening in the brain can help alleviate anxiety.
The functional neurology exam can help identify which pathways in the brain are affected. PANDAS/PANS typically affects communication loops between the basal ganglia, cerebellum, and frontal lobe.
Act quickly to address PANDAS/PANS
PANDAS/PANS is a significant and scary disorder, but taking action quickly improves the chances of an optimal outcome. For more information, contact my office.
More than one in seven children suffer from developmental disorders today. But this doesn’t mean change isn’t possible. The brain is enormously malleable, or plastic, and with the right input on a consistent basis using functional neurology, we often can improve brain function.
Common childhood brain development disorders today include:
- Attention deficit disorder (ADD)
- Attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
- Asperger’s syndrome
- Autism
- Developmental coordination disorder (DCD)
- Nonverbal learning disability (NLD)
- Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
- Oppositional defiant disorder (ODD)
- Pervasive developmental disorder (PDD)
- Tourette’s syndrome
- Chronic allergies, asthma, eczema, digestive disorders
How brain development disorders arise
These disorders can arise for a variety of reasons, such as:
- Environmental toxins interfere with normal brain development.
- A viral or bacterial infection interferes with brain development.
- The child has an autoimmune reaction against neurological tissue that prevents normal brain development and function. This can be passed on in utero from the mother or develop in early life due to an environmental, viral, bacterial, or dietary trigger.
Poor brain development unfolds in a variety of ways. For instance, important milestones in brain development, such as crawling, may be skipped. The brain is a highly complex network of multiple pathways. Proper formation of this network of pathways depends in part on the child going through each milestone of development.
When the brain fails to develop correctly, one hemisphere grows more slowly than the other, giving rise to various disorders that are either left-brain dominant or right-brain dominant. This is why we see kids who are intellectually advanced (left brain) yet socially and emotionally delayed (right brain). As this imbalance progresses, the brain finds it increasingly difficult to network between the hemispheres, causing poor function.
Also, infections and autoimmune attacks against areas of the brain sabotage proper development and hinder function in those pathways. For instance, the basal ganglia, which helps regulate involuntary motor movements, is a common site of viral and autoimmune attack. This can cause disorders such as PANDAS, OCD, Tourette syndrome, and tics.
Start with metabolic health of the brain
Functional neurology also includes addressing the metabolic health of the brain. If the brain is struggling with inflammation, iron deficiency, blood sugar imbalances, or chronic poor health from a bad diet, it will not respond as well to rehabilitation. Additionally, children’s brains require ample healthy fatty acids — EPA and DHA.
Metabolic issues to look out for with brain development disorders include:
- Inflammatory foods (sugars and junk foods) and food intolerances
- Chemical sensitivities
- Chronic infections — bacterial, fungal, or viral
- Digestive issues and leaky gut
- Autoimmune disease (when the immune system attacks and destroys tissue in the body, which can include the brain)
Functional neurology brain exercises for brain development disorders
Fortunately, functional neurology can address brain development disorders.
The types of brain rehabilitation a child needs depends on patient history and a functional neurology examination, which assesses brain function, areas of under and over development, and areas that are over stimulated or under stimulated. The functional neurologist can then tailor exercises to the brain environment and adjust them over time as function improves.
Many families report swift and significant shifts in behavior, mood, sociability, learning, and other brain-based signs.
Ask my office how functional neurology can help if your child has a brain based developmental disorder.
Brain Fog and associated signs and symptoms such as decreased mental clarity, decreased mental performance, increased occurence of loss of keys, and increased occurence of forgeting names with faces should not be shrugged off as old age. This may be an early sign of neurodegeneration that could progress to Parkinson's or Alzheimer's.
How can we know our risk? Are there lab markers that we can use to give us an indication of where we are on the spectrum of neurodegeneration?
Yes, there are. In today's show we will dive into a couple and discuss what to do about it if your levels of these biomarkers are unhealthy.
Brain fog is a common symptom suffered by many people each day. In this episode, we will dive into 5 common causes of brain fog. These causes may show up individually or in combination. How many are contributing to your brain fog?
The cerebellum (the area at the back of the brain) is best known for its role in balance and coordination. However, the cerebellum does more than that — when it starts to malfunction, the results can be not only worsened balance, but also anxiety, insomnia, and hyper sensitivity.
The cerebellum is a primary integrator of information for the brain. Our body has hundreds of thousands of receptors that detect motion, vision, and where and how our body and joints are positioned at all times. These receptors constantly relay information to the brain so that we can move and function properly in our environment.
This information requires organizing before heading to the rest of the brain. The cerebellum condenses the information and “gates” it, meaning it releases it in manageable amounts to the brain’s cortex, the outer covering with its characteristic folds.
The cortex, which is responsible for higher-order functions of thought and action, decides if you need to carry out a specific action or thought in response to the information, such as turn left, answer a question, run from danger, make a decision, etc. The cortex then sends its information back to the cerebellum to help carry out actions.
When things go wrong with the cerebellum
The cerebellum is a common site of dysfunction. It can degenerate, meaning neurons die. The cerebellum is very susceptible to sensitivity to gluten and other foods, environmental toxins, autoimmunity, and oxidative stress. It also can degenerate with age — why older people notoriously have bad balance. Children born with brain developmental disorders often have poor cerebellar function.
Poor cerebellar function is observed in various ways, such as poor balance, lack of coordination, or a tremor as you go to pick something up or bring a glass to your mouth (known as termination tremors).
Stand with your feet together, your arms at your side, and then close your eyes. If you sway more frequently to one side, that may indicate the side with more cerebellar dysfunction — it takes it longer to respond to falling on that side of your body.
Other tests your doctor may use to observe cerebellum function are coordination tests such as: finger to nose, walking heel to toe in a straight line, performing complex alternating movements, and ocular tracking (the eyes give insight into function).
Poor cerebellar function can also cause dizziness, disorientation, and nausea in cars, on boats, or when seeing things move swiftly, such as in a movie. Basically, the cerebellum is not able to respond appropriately to input from the environment.
Cerebellum function and anxiety and insomnia
As the cerebellum loses function it begins to falter at its job of gating information delivered to the cortex. As a result, excess information slips through.
This means the cortex and areas in the brainstem receive more information than they can adequately manage. Much of the role of the frontal cortex is to act as a brake pedal on the brainstem, preventing the brainstem from spinning out of control. Our brainstem governs myriad functions, such as emotions, heart function, blood pressure, and digestion.
This poorly gated sensory overload can cause many symptoms:
- Anxiety
- Sensitivity to light and sound
- Startle easily
- Insomnia due to racing mind
- Irritable
- Trouble staying asleep
- Highly emotionally sensitive
- Fearful
- Heart racing/palpitations
- Blood Pressure changes
- Digestive Issues
Many factors work against us when it comes to healthy brain function that prevents an overactive brain and anxiety. They include a culture that cherishes overworking, inflammatory diets, unstable blood sugar, too much screen time, stressful lives, and not enough sleep.
Ask my office for information on how to dampen brain activity and help relieve anxiety and insomnia.
Do you suffer from acid reflux, indigestion, slow gut transit time, or feeling like there’s a brick in your stomach after eating? Or perhaps you’re on a restricted diet for a chronic health condition but still react to an ever shrinking list of foods. If so, you need to work on restoring digestion.
Many factors affect digestion, including aging, poor brain function that affects gut function, poor diet, and more. Often the problem isn’t the food itself, but a hyper sensitive immune system reacting to food proteins that are not broken down properly. Thankfully, you can improve your symptoms greatly with proper supplementation.
Breakdown of food proteins is key for good digestion
For good digestion, you need sufficient hydrochloric acid (HCl) and digestive enzyme activity in the gut. These both serve the important function of breaking down food proteins, which prevents the immune system from targeting them and causing symptoms.
HCl is naturally present in the stomach and is vital for digestion of proteins. Low HCl symptoms include:
- Not feeling well after eating meat
- Feeling like meat sits in your stomach too long
- Feeling like you ate a brick
- Acid reflux
- Constipation
It may sound contrary that low stomach acid can cause acid reflux. In fact, many people with acid reflux-like symptoms are mistakenly prescribed acid-blockers intended to cut stomach acid, when in fact it’s low stomach acid causing the problem — the low stomach acid results in undigested food becoming rancid and moving back up the esophagus to cause the pain and burning sensation. What these people need is additional HCl to improve digestion.
Many people with poor digestion also have poor pancreatic enzyme output. Similar to stomach acid, these enzymes are critical to break apart food proteins so the immune system doesn’t react to them, causing inflammation.
Supplement with HCl and digestive enzymes for healthy digestion
Supplementing with HCl (use code: lifeatoptimal) and digestive enzymes can go a long way toward improving your digestion by supporting breakdown of food proteins as well as relieving symptoms.
Follow this advice when supplementing with HCl and digestive enzymes:
- HCl: Supplement with HCl when you eat meats to help break down the proteins better. This will not only improve your digestion but also bring you relief from uncomfortable symptoms. Take HCl with the last bite of the meal.
- Digestive Enzymes: Take these with all meals; include pepsin, bromelain, and proteases. Look for a high-quality, broad-spectrum digestive enzyme supplement with a minimum of fillers. This is the best one I can find (use code: lifeatoptimal). Take one capsule with the first bite of each meal.
Oral tolerance and digestive function
It’s particularly important for people with food sensitivities to support food protein breakdown with proper levels of HCl and digestive enzymes. At the root of this is the concept of oral tolerance. Oral tolerance is how well a person’s immune system can tolerate acceptable foods while responding appropriately to bacteria or other harmful compounds.
While there are other factors that affect oral tolerance, it’s important for food proteins to be broken down small enough that the body accepts them and doesn’t mount an immune reaction against them, causing symptoms.
You’ve heard the phrase, “You are what you eat.” When we can’t digest food properly, it means our bodies aren’t getting the fuel to function at their best. If you suffer from symptoms of poor digestion or food sensitivities, contact my office.
How does functional neurology differ from conventional neurology? Conventional neurology diagnoses neurological disorders that can be treated with pharmaceutical or surgery. Functional neurology, on the other hand, identifies a broader range of brain disorders and restores function through rehabilitation that either dampens or activates specific regions of the brain.
A good example is migraines. Many people see neurologists for debilitating migraines. However, virtually every person who suffers with chronic migraines has a normal brain scan. As a result, conventional neurology has little too offer beyond pharmaceuticals. In other words, the neurons are there, they just aren’t firing correctly.
The same can be said for other brain disorders. Autism, depression, anxiety, insomnia, chronic fatigue, chronic pain, hyper sensitivity to light and pain, emotional instability, loss of memory, gut problems, childhood developmental disorders, autism, brain injury, memory loss, vertigo, tremors, dystonia, are examples of brain-based disorders functional neurology can help.
An analogy for brain function is a symphony orchestra. Before the performance, the musicians tuning their instruments sounds jarring. However, when the instruments are tuned and the musicians play at the appropriate time, the result is lovely.
Our brain works the same way. Firing and timing that are off in the brain causes symptoms while restoring function through rehabilitation improves neurological harmony.
Functional neurology and underlying causes
Neither drugs nor surgery are appropriate or effective for many brain-based disorders.
For one thing, medications are not selective for one area of the brain, but instead they bathe the entire brain. Depression may be related to dysfunction in just the frontal lobe, but an anti-depressant affects the entire brain and may cause negative side effects.
Another example is a patient with Meniere’s disease, which causes dizziness, ringing ears, and nausea. They may be told they need anti-nausea or anti-vertiginous medication and surgery to sever the nerve in the inner ear. However, Meniere’s is an autoimmune disease caused by the immune system attacking and destroying the inner ear.
Functional neurology looks at not only the underlying causes of an over zealous immune system, but also at the areas of the brain that are responsible for interpreting this information. The combination of these two can provide relief and slow or halt progression of the disease.
Functional neurology exams and protocols
Functional neurology uses a variety of techniques to assess which areas of the brain are breaking down. An important aspect of the functional neurology exam includes observing your eyes in response to various stimuli; eye function involves almost every part of the brain.
How your eyes respond when tracking fast movements, slow movements, and when you are rotating or balancing delivers specific insights into brain function and what kinds of rehabilitation will work best.
Other exam techniques involve observing your response to balance, coordination, gait, and rotation challenges. The discipline requires a strong understanding of neurological anatomy, physiology, function, and the various pathways and networks in the nervous system.
The functional neurologist uses the data from your exam to create brain rehabilitation exercises that activate sluggish areas of the brain or dampen over active areas.
For instance, a person with anxiety, insomnia, hyper sensitivity to light and sound, and who startles easily may suffer from degeneration of the cerebellum (at the back of the brain) that is causing the midbrain (in the lower center of the brain) to become over active, resulting in PTSD-like symptoms.
When you’re starting on a new health journey, knowing what to eat can seem confusing. For starters, there is a ton of conflicting advice out there, with proponents of each diet insisting their diet is the healthiest.
The truth is, the best diet depends on which one works best for you. Factors that depends on include your individual food sensitivities, digestive health , blood sugar handling, autoimmunity, and stress handling.
In functional medicine we follow general guidelines that focus on whole foods, remove foods to which you are intolerant, and stabilization of blood sugar. Beyond that, your history, lab tests, and current condition guides the customization of your diet.
A custom diet plan starts with real food
With customization tips in mind, one basic rule still applies across the board: Eat whole foods.
When you eliminate foods that have been through processing (like breakfast cereal or chips), foods with artificial colorings, additives, and preservatives, and foods laden with industrialized fats and too much sugar, you are already on solid ground nutritionally.
This means stick largely to the produce, meat, and nut sections in the grocery store. Use healthy, natural fats such as coconut oil and olive oil. Avoid vegetable oils, which are unstable and become inflammatory free radicals in your body.
Avoid hydrogenated oil as it has been shown to damage brain cells and raise heart disease risk.
You have to develop new habits to shop for and prep vegetables, cook healthy meats, and wean yourself off sodas, pizza pockets, chips, and other quick-grab items. But you’ll start feeling so much better you won’t mind. In fact, you’ll feel enthusiastic about it.
When eating real food is difficult
Some people favor processed food because they have trouble digesting real foods. This is a red flag that digestion is seriously compromised.
For instance, if your stomach feels heavy after eating meat, as if it just sits there and does not digest, your stomach may be low in hydrochloric acid (HCl). HCl is necessary to digest meats and it’s a common deficiency. It can lead to insufficient B vitamins too, especially B12.
In functional medicine, a diet that consists primarily of produce is very beneficial. However, the dramatic increase in fiber from eating more fresh fruits and vegetables causes digestive problems in some people.
Factors that make eating produce difficult include an overgrowth of the wrong bacteria, low HCl, insufficient output of pancreatic enzymes, inflammation of the gut lining, and other digestive issues.
These people need to work on restoring gut health and slowly ease into eating more vegetables.
Blood sugar and stress handling
Most Americans eat too many carbohydrates and sugars, which contributes significantly to inflammation and chronic disease. At the same time, not everyone fares well on a very low-carb diet.
People with chronically low blood sugar and adrenal fatigue need to eat smaller meals more frequently to protect their brain health.
Also, some people feel great on a short-term, very low-carb, or ketogenic, diet, while others develop anxiety and insomnia. Finding the right amount of carbohydrates to eat so that you keep blood sugar stable and lower inflammation, yet can function optimally, can take some tweaking. Also, as blood sugar and stress handling improve, you may be able to readjust.
One of the biggest mistakes many people make is assuming a tremor signifies Parkinson's disease. The truth is many different kinds of tremors exist for different reasons. You can distinguish between them by knowing some basic characteristics.
Understanding the expression of the tremor
Tremors can be grouped into three categories: action tremor, resting tremor, and physiological tremor.
Action tremor happens with movement. These tremors typically stem from a disorder of the cerebellum, the area at the back of the brain involved in movement and coordination. The more calibration the movement requires (such as touching your pinkie finger to your nose with your eyes closed), the easier it is to see this tremor. Drinking alcohol may make this tremor worse.
Resting tremor happens when the hands are totally at rest. These tremors are related to the basal ganglia, and area of the brain involved in regulating movement. Moving the hands will stop the tremor. This is the type of tremor associated with Parkinson’s disease.
Physiological tremor results from a metabolic issue affecting muscle contractions, such as too much coffee, low blood sugar, too much thyroid hormones, or certain medications. The key feature of this tremor is that it happens both at rest and in action.
Types of tremors
Those are the three primary ways tremors express themselves. Beyond that, we can identify different tremors based on what causes them.
Essential tremor is the most common tremor and is caused by a hereditary disorder of the cerebellum. You know you’re a candidate for this tremor if drinking alcohol makes it better and other family members have it. It may also occur in the head and the voice.
Orthostatic tremor occurs in the legs when a person stands up but goes away upon walking. It is related to misfiring in the autonomic nervous system, which governs unconscious bodily functions.
Dystonic tremors occur with dystonia, a disorder in which muscles contract involuntarily.
Parkinsonian tremor is a pill-rolling rest tremor and re-emergence tremor (i.e., it occurs after the arms have been held out a few moments).
Cerebellar tremors occur when the cerebellum cannot correctly calibrate muscle movements during movement, such as bringing a glass to your mouth. Vertigo and nausea may be other complaints.
A Holmes tremor is also known as wing-beating, midbrain, or rubral tremor. It is associated with strokes that impact the midbrain, as well as copper toxicity.
Palatal tremor is a rare disorder that causes rhythmic tremor of the soft palate.
Neuropathic tremor stems from neuropathy, more often an acute autoimmune neuropathy.
Neurotoxic and drug-induced tremors, are, like they sound, induced by toxins and medications.
Psychogenic tremors are a psychiatric disorder in which the individual creates the tremor.
Functional neurology and tremors
In functional neurology, we can often lessen the severity of tremors by identifying the area of the brain causing them and then using brain rehabilitation techniques to address dysfunction in those areas. We also work with you to reduce inflammation, ensure proper brain nutrition, and improve overall metabolic health so that your brain has the best chance at improvement.
Lab testing is foundational to functional medicine, and for good reason. It can show you what is causing your symptoms, if you are headed toward a disease (even if you don’t have symptoms), track the progress of your protocol, and motivate you to stick with your protocol.
Lab testing includes many different tests. Some examples of testing used in functional medicine include:
Food sensitivity testing. If a you eat food regularly causes inflammation, this contributes to chronic health disorders.
Gut testing. Gut problems contribute to chronic health issues. Tests can screen for leaky gut, gut function, parasites, bacterial overgrowth, and autoimmune reactions.
Blood chemistry panel. This is an excellent starting point in functional medicine testing and includes the use of functional medicine ranges (versus lab ranges). Blood testing screens for some diseases and can catch a trend toward a disease while there’s still time to reverse it.
Chemical and metal sensitivity testing. As with foods, an immune reaction to metals and/or chemicals can trigger chronic inflammatory health disorders.
Adrenal testing. Adrenal testing reveals the relationship between your health and stress handling. The most important test is the second one because it shows if your protocol is working. If not, you need to dig deeper.
Hormone testing. Hormone imbalances profoundly affect health. Testing screens for excesses, deficiencies, feedback loops, and how well you metabolize hormones.
DNA genetic testing. Genetic testing delivers insight into disease risk and genetic metabolic variations that affect health. An example is the MTHFR variance.
These are just a few examples of the types of testing used in functional medicine. What type of testing you need depends on your symptoms and health history.
Why lab testing is important in functional medicine
Functional medicine is based on peer-reviewed science and finds the root cause of your symptoms. There are a variety of factors that can lead to depression, fatigue, chronic pain, poor function, and other chronic health disorders.
Functional lab testing shows a trend toward disease
In conventional medicine, doctors use labs to screen for disease. Once a condition has become a disease, such as diabetes or autoimmune disease, the damage is significant.
Functional medicine uses lab testing to catch a health trend that is on the way to disease but that can still be slowed, halted, or reversed. For instance, lab markers that show elevated blood sugar, inflammation, and poor liver function allow you to easily reverse the march towards diabetes.
Another example is autoimmunity. A significant amount of tissue must be destroyed before conventional medicine can diagnose autoimmune disease. However, by testing for antibodies against tissue, the autoimmune progression can be slowed or stopped in its early stages.
Functional lab testing tracks progress
Although the first test is important for identifying health problems, subsequent testing is also crucial to let you know whether your protocol is working. If there is no improvement, it means you have not hit on the right protocol or discovered all the underlying causes.
Lab testing improves compliance and social support
Seeing the results of a lab test makes it easier to stick with a protocol. It also can encourage a disbelieving spouse, family member, or friend to support you. Many people think gluten sensitivity is just a fad, or that your symptoms aren’t real and you simply complain too much. Your lab results validate your symptoms and can help others be more supportive.
Ask my office about functional lab testing to help you get to the bottom of your chronic health condition, 704-895-2240
Parkinson’s and parkinsonism — symptoms that mimic Parkinson’s — stem from the same areas of the brain. These disorders both cause tremors, stiffness, slowness of movement, however they have different causes and may be helped with different nutritional therapies.
Parkinson’s versus parkinsonism
It’s helpful to know the difference between the two. Parkinson’s is a disease that slowly destroys brain cells (for some people it happens quickly) in an area of the brain that produces the brain chemical dopamine. Symptoms worsen over the years and include resting tremors, stiffness, slowness, not blinking enough, loss of smell, digestive problems, depression, and dementia.
Parkinsonism belongs to a class of disorders called “hypokinetic disorders,” which means diminished muscle function. Symptoms are slow or stiff movements.
Parkinson’s is due to degeneration of the brain’s dopamine area; parkinsonism is caused primarily by abnormal clumping of proteins called alpha-synuclein.
This clumping interferes with communication within the brain and also degenerates tissue.
Nutritional support for Parkinson’s
Because Parkinson’s disease degenerates the area of the brain that produces dopamine, nutritionally (and pharmaceutically) supporting dopamine can significantly help Parkinson’s patients.
Dopamine is an important brain chemical that helps regulate not only feelings of reward and pleasure, but also mood, movements, learning, and motivation.
Nutritional compounds that support dopamine include L-dopa, pyridoxal-5-phoshate, DL-phenylalanine, beta-phenylalanine, and acetyl-tyrosine.
Nutritional support for parkinsonism
Parkinsonism also involves dopamine, but nutritional support should focus more on preventing or slowing the clumping of alpha-synuclein. In fact, research shows dopamine medications may worsen parkinsonism.
The key is to support the energy factories inside each brain cell, called mitochondria, and to support cell function.
Nutritional support for Parkinson’s and parkinsonism
These strategies have been shown in studies to help nutritionally support both Parkinson’s and parkinsonism:
Support healthy gut bacteria and function. Research shows an unhealthy balance of gut bacteria and gut inflammation can cause aggregation of alpha-synuclein, thus increasing the risk of Parkinson’s and parkinsonism.
Consider a ketogenic diet or intermittent fasting. Both these diets have been shown to slow down protein aggregation and promote healthy function of brain cells.
Take flavonoids to protect brain cell mitochondria. Flavonoids are anti-inflammatory plant compounds that have been shown to protect the brain. Turmeric and resveratrol are examples of powerful flavonoids.
Take nutrients to protect mitochondria. Nutritional compounds that have been shown to protect the mitochrondria include CoQ10, carnitine, riboflavin, niacin, alpha-lipoic acid, and magnesium.
Make sure you consume enough essential fatty acids. Essential fatty acids are anti-inflammatory and protective of brain health. Consume enough in the right ratio.
Support methylation. Methylation is a molecular process necessary for healthy brain function and helping prevent brain inflammation and degeneration. Nutritional compounds that support methylation include methyl B12, L-methylfolate (5-MTHF), trimethylglycine, choline, riboflavin, and pyridoxine.
Exercise! Increasing your heart rate through regular aerobic activity has been shown to help manage the progression and symptoms of Parkinson’s and parkinsonism. It’s best to get your heart rate up to higher levels for at least a few minutes every time you exercise.
What not to take. Acetycholine is a brain chemical and a supplement that can be great for the brain but it opposes dopamine. Therefore, in many cases it is recommended not to take acetylcholine supplements or precursors when you have parkinsonism or Parkinson’s disease.
This is a broad and simple overview of some nutritional strategies that can help you manage Parkinson’s or parkinsonism in addition to medical and functional neurological care. Ask my office for more advice, 704-577-9676.
The lack of control when a dizzy spell, or vertigo, hits you is frightening. The world spins and rocks, the ground feels like it’s giving way, your ears ring, and nausea may grip your gut.
Vertigo feels terribly wrong and frightening and understandably has people wondering, “Why do I get dizzy?”
Several things can cause vertigo and it’s important to understand the underlying cause of your dizzy spells to improve your success in addressing them.
Types of dizziness, or vertigo
Before looking for underlying causes, first figure out what type of vertigo you have.
Peripheral vertigo and dizzy spells
This is the most common cause of dizziness and is usually caused by an inner ear, or vestibular, problem, which plays an important role in balance. Peripheral means on the outside, indicating this is not a brain-based vertigo.
Common causes of inner ear problems include:
BPPV (benign paroxysmal positional vertigo): A small crystal is floating loose in the inner ear, causing dizziness. This can be treated with the Epley maneuver.
Vestibular neuronitis and labryinthitis: Nerves in the inner ear associated with balance become inflamed, usually due to infection. Using functional medicine and functional neurology approaches to address the infection and inflammation often help.
Meniere’s disease: A chronic inner ear disorder that also causes hearing loss and tinnitus and tends to progressively worsen. Functional medicine autoimmune protocols have been known to help; conventional approaches include medications and surgery in severe cases.
In addition to dizziness, other common symptoms of peripheral vertigo include nausea, vomiting, sweating, pain or fullness in the ear, hearing loss, or tinnitus (ringing in the ear). The vertigo comes and goes and fixing your eyes on a point can help stop the spinning.
Central vertigo and dizzy spells
Central vertigo refers to dizziness caused by brain issues. These causes can be more serious and difficult to treat than most cases of peripheral vertigo.
One distinguishing factor of central vertigo is that fixing your eyes on one spot does not help relieve dizziness. Also, central vertigo episodes are more intense and last for longer periods of time. Although hearing is not as affected as it is in peripheral vertigo, people often experience headaches, trouble swallowing, and weakness.
Factors known to cause central vertigo include head injury, illness, infection, multiple sclerosis, migraines, brain tumors, stroke, transient ischemic attacks (mini strokes), and neurological autoimmunity.
How functional medicine and functional neurology can help address dizziness and vertigo
The first step is to identify what type of vertigo you have and what is causing it. This may involve lab testing to identify chronic inflammation, a blood sugar imbalance, an autoimmune reaction, or other health disorders.
For instance, multiple sclerosis, an autoimmune disease in which the immune system destroys the lining of nerves, can cause vertigo. An autoimmune protocol and functional neurology rehabilitation exercises can help.
Another example is when a head injury causes vertigo—a nutritional and dietary protocol to support brain healing along with functional neurology may help profoundly.
Vertigo is the symptom, not the disease
Your dizzy spells are a symptom of something else. Through functional lab testing, examination, and clinical history, we can help you address your problems with vertigo.
The placebo effect is a target of ridicule but studies show it has become increasingly effective in recent years, particularly in the United States, where drugs for pain, depression, anxiety sometimes barely outmatch placebos.
Fortunately, researchers have decided to study how and why the placebo effect works.
By embracing the mystery of the placebo effect, you can harness its powers and to enhance your health protocol or better cope with your ailment.
What is the placebo effect?
Researchers give one group of subjects a new drug or procedure and a different group a sham, then compare the results. Neither group knows which treatment they received. In some studies, the placebo treatment works as well or even better than the real treatment.
1: Use belief to enhance placebo effect
A person’s beliefs and expectations play a profound role in how their body will respond to something. When subjects are told their pain will drop before receiving a placebo, it does. Likewise, when they are told they will experience more pain, they do, even though pain delivery was not increased.
Scans during these experiments show brain activity corresponds with the expected outcome, even though neither pain relief nor increased pain was delivered.
Scientists have also learned that positive expectations release endorphins and dopamine, the “reward” brain chemical. Endorphins dampen inflammation and both endorphins and dopamine help relieve pain.
Spend some time every day reaffirming why you’re on your health journey and what you expect to gain from it. Visualize feeling and functioning better.
2: Receive care and attention to enhance placebo
Increased attention, concern, and care are also believed to be why the placebo effect has become much stronger in recent years. When people take part in these studies, they receive an increased level of interaction and care that positively impacts their health.
Seek out supportive care and nurturing during your health journey. This can be from a practitioner you work with, through body work appointments, or in the company of a support group or class. Make sure these are in person and not just online.
3: Develop a positivity and gratitude practice
Negativity is stressful and inflammatory. Doctors report that patients who are angry, don’t believe their treatment will work, or who are not supported by their friends and family in their healing journey may not experience optimal results.
However, the person who expects the best from their protocol, learns about their new diet and supplements, and enjoys working with their practitioner enjoys less stress and inflammation and better results.
Give some time each day to think positive thoughts about your health journey and what it involves. Keep a daily or weekly gratitude journal and make sure to note your progress. These tips really do help your health!
Remember, it’s the placebo effect and not superstition
Although we’ve all heard miracle healing stories, it’s best not to pin your hopes on one. The placebo effect alone is estimated to work between 18 to 80 percent of the time, which is a wide spread to bank on.
Functional medicine is about creating new lifelong habits as much as it is about restoring function. By injecting the best the placebo effect has to offer into your daily diet and protocol, you are laying the groundwork for a lifetime of more positive outcomes.
While phone apps and online programs that exercise the brain are popular to improve memory and prevent dementia, most people overlook a key component to lasting brain function: your balance.
Your brain requires good balance to stay sharp and lower the risk of dementia. In addition to doing brain exercises, make sure you regularly challenge and improve your balance.
How good balance improves brain function
What does good balance have to do with preserving memory and brain function?
The cerebellum, the area at the base of the brain, governs balance, as well as precision, coordination, and timing.
It makes sure you can walk upright, put a spoon to your mouth, or hit a tennis ball. The movements of daily life keep the cerebellum in a constant state of activity.
It’s this constant activity that keeps the rest of the brain on its toes. A healthy cerebellum feeds the brain a steady stream of information to keep it actively firing and healthy. (This is also one reason regular physical activity is so vital to brain health and function.)
Bad balance leads to bad brain function
This explains why symptoms of cerebellum degeneration, such as bad balance, often tie into loss of memory, cognition, and brain endurance. The brain isn’t getting enough juice from the cerebellum to keep it charged and running well.
Brain overwhelm from bad balance
If a different area of cerebellum degenerates, this can overwhelm the brain with information.
The outer area of the cerebellum serves as a gatekeeper, regulating information that travels from the body to the brain. When this area of the cerebellum degenerates, the gates are left unguarded, and too much sensory input floods the brain.
Symptoms may include restless leg syndrome, tinnitus, hypersensitivity to stress, depression, fatigue, anxiety, and others that you wouldn’t think could be related to balance.
Can you pass this balance test?
- Do you wobble if you stand on one foot? How about with your eyes closed?
- If you walk in a straight heel-to-toe line do you stumble? How about with your eyes closed?
- If you stand with your feet together and close your eyes do you sway to one side?
- Do you walk with a wide gait, or feel like you’re going to fall if you don’t hold the handrail going down the stairs?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, your balance issues could be a sign of compromised brain health and increased risk of dementia later in life.
How to improve your balance and hence brain health
Since we know regular exercise is a must to preserve brain function, look for forms that emphasize balance. Ideas include specific balance exercises, yoga, tai chi, stand-up paddle boarding, dancing, and the use of a wobble board or Bosu ball. Just be safe and work within your limits!
Good balance is only part of a bigger brain puzzle
Good cerebellum health is important, but it’s not the end all. The inner ear, or vestibular system, also plays a vital role in balance and may need attention if your balance is off.
Also, screening for gluten sensitivity is important, as a gluten intolerance degenerates the cerebellum in many people.
Follow an anti-inflammatory diet and reduce stressors. The brain and cerebellum are very sensitive to inflammation from junk foods, sleep deprivation, chronic stress, and more.
And make sure you keep your blood sugar stable — blood sugar that is constantly too low or too high (or both) rapidly ages the brain and contributes to poor balance.
Millions of people drink diet soda in the belief they’re preventing weight gain, and the soda industry invests millions of dollars to perpetuate this belief. Research, however, paints a different picture — diet sodas are dangerous and can make you fat.
Artificial, low-calorie sweeteners used in diet sodas confuse the body and derange its ability to metabolize sugar and carbohydrates. This “confusion” increases hunger and sugar cravings.
Also, artificial sweeteners create imbalances in gut bacteria, boosting the bacteria that turn calories into body fat, which can lead to obesity, diabetes, and inflammation.
Diet sodas bring bigger risks than obesity
The health risks associated with diet soda are far more serious than weight gain.
The primary sweetener used in diet sodas, aspartame (which goes by the benign-sounding names Equal and NutraSweet), has been linked to numerous cardiovascular conditions, including stroke, heart failure, and heart attack.
In fact, a nine-year study of 60,000 women showed women who drank two or more cans of diet soda a day were 50 percent more likely to die of heart disease.
Moreover, aspartame overstimulates the brain chemical dopamine, which over time can result in depression, migraine headaches, and seizures.
The other FDA-approved artificial sweeteners — saccharin, neotame, sucralose, and acesulfame potassium — have also been linked to increased risk for heart disease and other health conditions.
Aspartame is a controversial topic. It has been linked to myriad health conditions, some as serious as brain tumors, birth defects, cancer, and memory loss, and is behind numerous complaints to the FDA. However, industry science holds fast to its safety.
Fruit juice is not a healthy substitute
Unfortunately, fruit juice is not a healthy substitute for soda. Fructose is every bit as fattening and inflammatory as sugar or chemical sweeteners. Excessive consumption of fruit juice also puts you at risk of heart disease and diabetes.
In contrast, eating whole fruit also has you consuming fiber, enzymes, minerals and other healthful compounds stripped away by juicing. Also, chewing tells your brain that you’ve eaten, which reduces your appetite.
If you are addicted to diet sodas (as many people are), you may have to wean yourself gradually. Begin by substituting sparkling water with lemon or lime juice, or even just plain water, for some of your sweet drinks. Often when you think you want something sweet, you’re really just thirsty, and plain filtered water will do you fine.
With patience, you can develop an automatic preference for whole, healthy, unsweetened foods and drinks, largely because they make you feel better. After a while, the foods you crave most can actually be those that are best for your body.
Ask my office about transitioning to a whole foods diet so you can feel and function your best.
Medical advice following a concussion is straightforward: Get plenty of rest, avoid stimulating the brain, and don’t return to regular activities until your brain can handle it.
But a concussion is a much bigger deal than people realize, and there is plenty more you can do to improve brain recovery after a concussion.
Lower inflammation after a concussion
Your diet following a concussion is more important than ever before. You want to focus your efforts on reducing inflammation in the brain.
The immune system in the brain is different than the body’s. The body’s immune system has mechanisms to shut off an immune attack when it’s no longer needed.
The brain’s immune system, however, has no off switch. A concussion can result in unchecked inflammation that slows recovery and continues to destroy healthy brain cells long after the concussion.
This is why concussions can increase the risk of gut problems, depression, suicide, brain issues, and other health disorders.
A healthy post-concussion eating plan
Studies have firmly established the link between diet, gut health, and brain health. What you eat after a concussion matters greatly. Here is an overview of brain healing strategies:
Stabilize blood sugar. Blood sugar that is too low or too high inflames the brain. Cut out sugars and starchy carbs and eat frequently enough to keep energy stable (but don’t overeat).
Remove inflammatory foods. Gluten and dairy are inflammatory to the brain in many people. Undiagnosed food intolerances, such as to corn, eggs, soy, or other foods can inflame the brain. MSG and artificial sweeteners are toxic to the brain and should be avoided, too.
Improve gut bacteria diversity. A slew of studies recently established a link between brain health and the bacteria in your gut. Now is the time to build a healthy gut microbiome.
Eat good fats. The brain is made primarily of fat, so it’s important to eat healthy fats such as olive oil, avocado, cold water fish, and nuts and seeds.
Follow an anti-inflammatory autoimmune diet. It’s best to follow the autoimmune diet as it focuses on lowering inflammation and healing the gut, two things that will help heal the brain. Just make sure you eat enough to sustain energy and blood sugar.
This is a general overview of post-concussion nutrition. For more detailed advice, contact my office.
A healthy post-concussion protocol
Fortunately, certain herbal compounds are effective in reducing brain inflammation. They include apigenin, luteolin, baicalein, resveratrol, rutin, catechin, and curcumin.
Nutrients that improve oxygen flow to the brain also aid recovery. They include feverfew, butcher’s broom, ginkgo biloba, huperzine, and vinpocetine.
Additionally, supporting the omega-3 fatty acid DHA and the body’s master oxidant, glutathione, is helpful.
Lifestyle factors that can aid brain recovery include identifying and addressing autoimmune diseases and chronic infections, and stabilizing hormones (especially in perimenopausal or postmenopausal women).
These are some foundations that can make the difference between a downward spiral after a concussion or the beginning to a more brain-healthy way of living.
If your life hasn’t been the same since your concussion, ask my office how we can help.
If you’re like most people, you over indulged during the holidays and now you’d like to reboot your health with a detox diet. The autoimmune diet calms inflammation, stimulates repair and recovery, and boosts energy while preventing hunger. It also helps tame autoimmunity and repair leaky gut.
Remove foods that cause inflammation
Many foods people eat daily can be inflammatory, causing fatigue, rashes, joint pain, digestive issues, headaches, anxiety, depression, autoimmune flare ups, and more.
The foods most people react to are gluten, dairy, various grains, eggs, nuts, and nightshades. Sugar, sweeteners, and sweet fruits also cause inflammation.
The autoimmune detox diet calms inflammation
People new to this diet often wonder if there is anything left to eat. There is plenty to eat on the autoimmune diet! In fact, the autoimmune diet more closely resembles what people have eaten for most of human history.
The diet is based on grass-fed and organic meats, wild fish, healthy fats, fermented foods, and lots of veggies. Eating plenty of vegetables will help build good gut bacteria, detoxify the liver, and boost immune health and tolerance of more foods.
Healthy fats include coconut oil, avocado oil, olive oil, and ghee (if tolerated). Avoid processed vegetable oils and strictly avoid hydrogenated oils, or trans fats.
The rewards of feeling better outweigh the downsides
The autoimmune detox diet is certainly more work than eating fast food or microwave meals. But the rewards in how much better it will make you feel are worth the effort.
This diet requires planning and preparation. You may experience cravings, low energy, and some detox symptoms for a few days in the beginning. Online support groups can be very reassuring and helpful.
However, it doesn’t take long before most people feel an increase in energy and well being and actually come to enjoy the diet. Many also lose unwanted fat.
After following the diet for 30 to 90 days, you may wish to add in some of the eliminated foods — one at a time every 72 hours — to see whether you react to any of them. This will help you customize a lifelong diet that is healthy but satisfying. Many find going off at least gluten and dairy bring substantial health benefits.
Supplements to enhance detoxification and gut repair
Certain nutritional compounds can aid in your health reboot. Some are great at supporting liver detoxification, gut repair, blood sugar balance, and stress handling, all of which can aid you in your new diet. Just call my office for advice, 704-895-2240.
Foods to avoid on the autoimmune detox diet
- Sugars and sweeteners, including honey, agave, maple syrup, coconut sugar, etc.
- High-glycemic fruits: Watermelon, mango, pineapple, grapes, canned and dried fruits, etc.
- Tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, eggplant, and other nightshades
- Mushrooms
- Grains: Wheat, oats, rice, barley, buckwheat, corn, quinoa, etc.
- Dairy: Milk, cream, cheese, butter, whey
- Eggs or foods that contain eggs (mayonnaise)
- Soy: Soy milk, soy sauce, tofu, tempeh, etc.
- Alcohol
- Lectins: Lectins are compounds that can promote leaky gut. Avoid nuts, beans, soy, nightshades, peanut oil, peanut butter, and soy and soy products while on the diet. You may be able to add some or all back in later.
- Coffee: For some coffee over taxes the adrenal glands. Many instant coffees contain gluten.
- Processed and canned foods
Foods to eat
- Most vegetables (except nightshades and mushrooms): Asparagus, spinach, lettuce, broccoli, beets, cauliflower, carrots, celery, artichokes, garlic, onions, zucchini, squash, rhubarb, cucumbers, turnips, watercress, etc. Eat with every meal!
- Fermented foods: Sauerkraut, kimchi, pickled ginger, fermented cucumbers, coconut yogurt, kombucha, etc. You must make your own or buy one of the few available truly fermented brands. (If you have histamine intolerance you may need to avoid these.)
- Meats: Grass-fed and organic chicken, turkey, beef, bison, lamb, etc., and wild fish
- Low glycemic fruits sparingly: Apricots, plums, apple, peach, pear, cherries, berries, etc.
- Coconut: Coconut butter, milk, cream, oil
- Herbal teas, non-stimulating, non-caffeinated
- Olives and olive oil
- Ghee (butter oil) unless severe dairy allergy
What is the difference between food allergy and food sensitivity? Are food sensitivities real? Or are they just a fad?
Today's episode will answer these questions and more.
If you have chronic gut problems, you could have a brain problem. This is especially true if you’ve had a head injury or if you also suffer from worsening memory, brain fog, cognitive decline, or other symptoms of poor brain function.
Chronic digestive complaints — indigestion, acid reflux, constipation, burping, gas, bloating, diarrhea, pain, or irritable bowel disorders — are common complaints of a brain that is not functioning well.
The brain gives orders to the gut through the vagus nerve, which then tells the gut to digest food, repair and regenerate the gut lining, push food through the intestines (motility), and many other functions.
When brain function declines, the brain doesn’t give the vagus nerve enough input. As a result, constipation, leaky gut, food sensitivities, irritable bowel disorders, and other problems can arise.
This is one reason why people with a head injury or dementia have chronic gut complaints.
Exercise the vagus nerve to address gut problems
In functional neurology, we conduct a neurological exam to evaluate areas of the brain that are not functioning well. We then provide activities to activate or dampen different areas of the brain, depending on your needs, to improve function. This in turn can improve communication between the vagus nerve and the gut.
However, sometimes you can activate the vagus nerve yourself at home with some very simple daily activities.
Vagus nerve exercises
A few simple tests can tell you if your vagus nerve may not be sufficiently active:
- You don’t have much of a gag reflex; when you say, “ahhh” the uvula (the little punching bag at the back of your throat) does not rise much
- When you listen to your abdomen with a stethoscope, you hear virtually no rumbling noises — a healthy gut makes intermittent rumbling noises.
Here are some simple exercises to activate the vagus nerve:
Gargle vigorously several times a day. Gargling contracts the back of the throat, which activates the vagus nerve. Gargle each drink of a glass of water several times a day. Gargle vigorously and for a good length of time, ideally until your eyes tear (it may take a while to build up to that.)
Sing loudly. If you are alone at home or in the car, spend some time singing as loudly as you can. This also activates the back of the throat and hence the vagus.
Gag. Using a tongue depressor, which you can buy from Amazon, gently press on the back of your tongue to make yourself gag. Please do not poke the back of your throat. Do this several times a day, again, ideally until your eyes tear. Gargling and singing are like sprints for the vagus nerve, whereas gagging is strength training.
Coffee enemas. Please Google instructions for doing a coffee enema (or email me for a How-To guide). Hold the enema solution as long as you can. That, together with compounds in coffee that stimulate nerve receptors, will help activate the vagus nerve.
This is a simple overview of how to improve gut function by activating the brain. For more customized advice, please contact my office, 704-895-2240
You’ve probably heard it over and over: Stress raises the risk of disease. But how do you know if your stress is the disease-causing kind? It’s helpful to know some signs and tests to let you know.
Severe stress can either cause you to be fatigued all the time, wired all the time, or a mix of both. Or maybe stress manifests as sleep issues.
It’s not uncommon for people to become so used to being stressed out they fail to realize it’s an issue.
Symptoms of fatigue-based stress
- Fatigue
- Slow to get going in the morning
- Energy crash in the afternoon
- Craving sweets, caffeine, or nicotine
- Unstable behavior; moodiness
- Shaky, light-headed, or irritable if meals are delayed
- Inability to stay asleep
- Dizziness when moving from sitting to standing
Symptoms of wired stress
- Excess belly fat
- Insulin resistance (high blood sugar)
- Insomnia
- Not feeling rested in the morning
- Women grow facial hair; men grow breasts
- PCOS in women (polycystic ovarian syndrome).
How to do a lab test for stress
You can also do a lab test to measure stress levels using your saliva; it’s called an adrenal salivary panel. Your adrenal glands are two small glands that sit atop each kidney that secrete stress hormones.
The best way to use the adrenal salivary panel is do the test a second time after following a health protocol. This shows you whether your health is improving.
This is because stress is always caused by something else, such as low or high blood sugar, an infection, or autoimmune disease.
Adrenal health should improve as you manage these conditions. If things do not improve, it means you must keep searching to find out what is taxing the body.
Measuring your sleep-wake cycle
Another way to gauge stress is to look at your sleep-wake cycle, or circadian rhythm.
Are you alert in the morning and sleepy at night? An abnormal circadian rhythm is one symptom of adrenal stress.
Your primary stress hormone, cortisol, should be high in the morning and low at night. Many people have a backwards rhythm causing fatigue in the morning and insomnia at night. Or, instead of a gradual decline of cortisol during the day, it may suddenly drop in the afternoon, causing an energy crash.
Where are you on the stress scale?
By measuring several markers, the adrenal saliva test can tell you whether you are in:
- The “alarm reaction” of high adrenal hormones
- Adrenal exhaustion and chronic tiredness
- Somewhere in between
You do not necessarily have to progress from alarm reaction to adrenal fatigue. It’s possible to jump between phases, or stay in one phase for years.
The adrenal saliva test also measures immune cells called total SIgA. This measures how stress is impacting your immune system. If SIgA is low, it can mean you are more susceptible to food intolerances, infections, and weakened immunity.
Start with blood sugar stability to manage stress
Although diet and lifestyle factors are important in managing stress, the most common cause of chronic stress is a blood sugar imbalance. Addressing high or low blood sugar are vital to addressing chronic stress.
Additionally, various herbal and nutritional compounds can profoundly influence adrenal function. For instance, herbs called adrenal adaptogens are very beneficial regardless which stage you are in.
Ask my office how you can support your adrenal health, 704-895-2240.
Gut health is a massive topic. There is no way to cover it in 1 episode, or 10. This episode lays the groundwork by covering gut anatomy and physiology. It then forays into the microbiota, food sensitivities, GERD, and your stools. This is a nice 10,000 foot view to get you started.
Functional Medicine is the future of healthcare. What is it? What are the benefits? How is it different from mainstream medicine? All of these questions and more are answered using a case example of a patient with an Estrogen Dominance diagnosis.
Many doctors in mainstream medicine believe that gluten is harmless unless you have Celiac Disease or an IgE Wheat Allergy. Holistic clinicians and patients have observed otherwise clinically for years. Brand new research now confirms what Holistic clinicians and their patients have known and experienced...Glute Sensitivity is REAL! Now we have objective lab markers to prove it.
"Low T" is an ever growing complaint/diagnosis that men are entering my practice with. What is driving this increase in decreased T? Are testosterone injections the best answer for these men? What is the best way to evaluate testosterone to get the clearest clinical picture? How do lifestyle factors like sleep, nutrition, and exercise affect testosterone levels? What about genetics?
The movie Vaxxed, directed by Dr. Andrew Wakefield, is a must see. If you are a parent and you vaccinate your children, you want to see this movie before giving them the MMR vaccine. There is a scientifically validated reason why the pharmaceutical companies do not want you to see this movie. That same reason is why they pressured Robert De Niro to remove the film from the Tribeca Film Festival. Go see it!
Therapeutic Laser for Chronic Pain, Hashimoto's Thyroiditis, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and Brain Injury [ctt title="Is Laser the missing link between your chronic disease and health?" tweet="#Laser therapy shown to yield significant benefits in #hashimotos #alzheimers #parkinsons and #chronicpain #lifeatoptimal" coverup="H14dp"] Scientific research continues to document the benefits of therapeutic laser in a wide range of chronic diseases. There seems to be unlimited potential for laser to benefit chronic disease patients of all kinds. On my YouTube Channel, I have documented the benefits of laser for Hashimoto's Hypothyroidism and Chronic pain. I have also detailed the mechanisms of complex ailments such as brain Excitotoxicity, which laser has been proven to significantly reduce. In this podcast epidsode, I share the results and conclusions of the research looking at the significant beneficial impact of laser on these common and escalating chronic diseases.
Infertility - Causes and Treatments from a Functional Medicine Perspective [ctt title="Infertility solutions via Functional Medicine" tweet="#FunctionalMedicine solutions for #infertility " coverup="5Gu2U"] Infertility has many causes that mainstream medicine never addresses. Unless you investigate the possible causes and address what you find, you have no hope of a successful pregnancy. In this episode, we will cover multiple under-investigated causes of infertility and discuss how to address them. Issues addressed are thyroid function, autoimmunity, birth control, gut health, and more. Hear what the latest research has to say on these causes of infertility.
Do you think that you are fat? Have you tried losing weight via diet and exercise to no avail? Does your self-esteem suffer due to your physical makeup? Before you judge yourself, listen to this podcast episode and learn how you may be healthier than all your skinny friends.
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Are you on an Opioid drug such as Percocet, Vicodin, Hydrocodone, etc for chronic pain? Do you have chronic knee pain, chronic low back pain, etc.? Do you know your options beside drugs and surgery? Educating yourself could save your life.
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Does your child have trouble reading and/or a learning disability? Does your child a developmental delay? Did your child skip crawling and go straight to walking? All of these things could be due to a functional neurologic deficit. This deficit can be corrected and your child can learn to read, and eliminate the developmental delay.
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Do you suffer with symptoms such as migraines, depression, constipation, ADD/ADHD, Dementia, or Brain Fog? Have you tried medications and alternative treatments without results? The cause to your problem may be Energy-Linked Excitotoxicity...
Do you suffer with an autoimmune disease? Do you know someone who does? Did you know that there are better ways to support immune system health than steroid drugs like Prednisone?
Instead of putting a band-aid on, why not address the cause of autoimmunity. How? Listen to find out.
CDC Autism-Vaccine Cover Up
A huge story has been unraveling over the last week involving the CDC's cover up of evidence showing causation between MMR vaccines and autism. Of course the mainstream media hasn't said a word because they are controlled by Big Pharma and Big Government. Check out today's Podcast to get the facts of the story, beginning with the CDC "Whistleblower" and continuing on to the collusion between government and Big Pharma. Your family's health depends on you knowing the truth.
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Inflammation and Leaky Gut
Today we build on what we established regarding Nuclear Factor-kB and Inflammation in the episode on Hormone Imbalance. This episode dives deeper into the global affects of NF-kB on health, including:
Leaky Gut
Liver Detoxification
Immune Dysfunction
Autoimmunity
Do you suffer from chronic inflammation and Leaky Gut? This episode will set you down a path toward recovery.
Vitamin D and Chronic Disease
Over the last 10 years there has been an explosion of research into Vitamin D and it's effects on health. In today's episode, Dr. John Bartemus will review a brand new study that presents a paradigm of Vitamin D that is counter to what we have come to believe. It challenges the thought that Cancer, Autoimmune Disease, Diabetes, etc cause you to have low Vitamin D. It also presents a new hypothesis on the cause of chronic inflammation and the diseases associated with it. This could be a huge paradigm shift for you. Listen in and let us know!
What Causes Hormone Problems?
In this episode, Dr. John Bartemus answers a listener's question regarding hormone issues and their causes. This is a great episode to learn about the fundamental causes of hormone imbalances and how you can address them. Before chasing after the sexy problems of thyroid dysfunction, pituitary dysfunction, etc, you would be smart to first check on the physiological fundamentals. What are those? Listen in to find out.
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What is Functional Medicine?
Dr. John Bartemus explains the What, Why, Who, and Where of Functional Medicine.
Our mainstream medical model has failed us. The promise of the magic bullet cure has been nothing more than a pipe dream for years, yet marketing continues to keep the dream alive, all the while creating a Sick Care system. If you are fed up with the one size fits all diagnostic algorithms of the mainstream medical model, it is time to educate yourself about the Functional Medicine paradigm. Functional Medicine looks at you as the unique biochemical and physiological individual that you are. Functional Medicine discovers YOUR specific cause to YOUR specific health challenge and then creates and individualized, patient-centered plan to help you optimize your health.
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