Tag Archives: nutrition

Dr. M’s SPA Newsletter Audiocast Volume 13 Issue 30

Asthma, Allergies and Nutrition – The Story
Here is a long form look at asthma and allergies as I am preparing a lecture on asthma and allergies for a conference in October. I will break it up into a few parts for your consumption.
  • Asthma is now well known to be an inflammatory disease based on the response to anti-inflammatory medications and pathophysiological evidence making it a prime candidate for anti-inflammatory nutritional interventions.
  • The Standard American Diet is filled with pro-inflammatory highly refined and processed foods that are laden with excessive amounts of sugar and unhealthy fats thus promoting inflammatory pathways that exacerbate disease.
  • The genesis of the inflammation is now believed to start in part in the intestinal and pulmonary microbiomes with the loss of immune tolerance. The intestinal microbiome is highly responsive to whole food dietary alterations.
  • Uric acid, a by product of fructose metabolism, is becoming a known driver of inflammasome activation and local tissue inflammation
  • We will discuss in depth the food choices that lower the inflammatory burden, the asthma phenotype and the food immune reactions that exacerbate disease……..

Enjoy,

Dr. M

Dr. M’s SPA Newsletter Audiocast Volume 13 Issue 27

Let us head back to the headwaters of HDL biology to find some more answers. If you did not read the original HDL piece or remember the basics of HDL biology, go back to Newsletter V13 #15 for a review. HDL as an associated biomarker of death risk has a U shaped curve with higher all cause mortality at very low and high levels of volume. Let us understand why? (Madsen et. al. 2017) Anything that causes more LDL, low density lipoproteins, to stay in circulation will raise one’s risk of ASCVD or heart attack. The historical reality (as I have discussed for years) for why we would have these genomic mutations to have more LDL particles in circulation is 1) as a protection mechanism against bacterial infections which were common for thousands of years. The HDL and LDL particles have receptors on their surface to grab bacterial cell wall debris like LTE or LPS and remove them via the liver. This is a massive beneftit to the human species until recent times. 2) as a storage mechanism for calories/recirculation of metabolically expensive cholesterol. (Maile et. al. 2020)(Feng et. al.. 2019)(Trinder et. al. 2021)…….
Enjoy,
Dr. M

Dr. M’s SPA Newsletter Audiocast Volume 13 Issue 26

Do you know if you have periodontal disease?
Do your gums bleed? Do your teeth hurt? Do you have red and beefy appearing gums? Do you floss daily? Do you brush two times a day? Do you have sleep apnea?
Why does this matter? Well it turns out that gingival and tooth related disease is highly associated with cardio metabolic diseases. The main reason is that the bacterial microbes in the oral cavity can travel via the bloodstream to places far and wide in the body leading to inflammation and heart disease when the oral cavity is damaged and then manipulated. This especially occurs during tooth decay and periodontal decay phases of oral disease. There are also associations with autoimmune diseases making your oral health very important…..
Enjoy,
Dr. M

Dr. M’s Women and Children First Podcast #50 – Richard Johnson, MD – Fructose and Perinatal Issues

This weeks guest is my favorite researcher, Dr. Richard Johnson.
He is the Tomas Berl Professor of Medicine and the Chief of the Renal Division and Hypertension at the University of Colorado since 2008. A graduate of the University of Wisconsin, Madison, with a major in Anthropology, and a graduate of the University of Minnesota Medical School, Minneapolis, he is a physician and nephrologist whose research has focused on the role of sugar, and especially fructose, in driving obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure and kidney disease. Much of this work has explored the role of fructose metabolism, especially the generation of uric acid, in driving this phenotype, and his work has included studies ranging from molecular biology, integrative physiology, and evolutionary biology. He is the author of The Sugar Fix which introduced the first low fructose diet, and also The Fat Switch which explores the role of fructose in driving the obesity epidemic. His newest book, Nature Wants Us To Be Fat, is a tour de force of the entire pathway of survival via metabolic events in the body related to fructose and the polyol pathway. This is a must read book.
This podcast will follow up on the original conversation, podcast #14, and the exceptional work of Dr. Johnson this time looking at how we are mismatched metabolically for the environment of modern America and our food systems from the maternal health and perinatal perspective.
Enjoy,
Dr. M

Dr. M’s SPA Newsletter Audiocast Volume 13 Issue 24

Breastfeeding Versus Formula
Science versus Opinion
I read with somewhat of a frustrated feeling a recent article in Scientific American entitled: It’s Okay Not to Breastfeed by Kavin Senapathy. In principle, the reality of this statement is reasonable. Then you read the article as to what makes this reasonable. She states: “Exclusive breastfeeding is not imperative, and the “breast is best” mantra can be harmful to babies and parents, especially among marginalized people.”(K. Senapathy 2023) Again, at first blush this may seem reasonable. Let’s dig into the science and the truth of breast versus cow milk based formula for optimal health for a child. Does formula in all of its forms work for infant nutrition in order to grow and survive in a reasonable way? The answer is a resounding yes, however, this does not tell the whole story, far from it…..
Enjoy,
Dr. M

Dr. M’s Women and Children First Podcast – The Growing Brain and Autism

The Growing Brain and the Upstream Etiologies of Neurodevelopmental disorders – AUTISM
This weeks guest is me! I re-recorded a lecture that I gave in Florida this month at the Annual International Conference for the Institute for Functional Medicine. My goal in this lecture is to look at the upstream reasons that we are seeing more Autism and neurological diversity in children year upon year. It is a wide ranging look at the current state of the science and my thoughts on a unifying theory. As with Dr. Stone’s interview last week with Grow Baby, this is a follow up discussion that is a critical primer for “mother’s to be” regarding disease avoidance measures that can be taken for the best health of the maternal child dyad.
Enjoy,
Dr. M

Dr. M’s SPA Newsletter Audiocast Volume 13 Issue 21

Literature review this week: Plastics in the blood, dogs can sniff Covid, mental health and exercise, CT scans and brain cancer risk, aging and the microbiome. Also, a piece on mothers and the shaming from social media critics. Recipe is coconut curry fish.

For example: Brain Cancer – a single CT can raise the risk of cancer of the brain in children if the exposure occurs before age 22 years.

Enjoy,

Dr. M

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