autoimmune Archives - Hudson Valley Chiropractic & Wellness

Holistic Solutions for Celiac Disease in Kingston, NY

January 19, 2016 by drchrista 3 Comments

Whole-body wellness for Celiac disease in Kingston, NY

Are you living with Celiac disease in Kingston, NY (or anywhere, really)? Are you frustrated that despite strictly adhering to a gluten-free diet, you still suffer from bouts of diarrhea, constipation, stomach upset, bloating or abdominal pain? Do you frequently have other symptoms like constant fatigue, headaches, achey joints, or muscle pain that leave you feeling run down and unable to accomplish what you need to? Do you have trouble getting enough restful & restorative sleep to feel your best each day?

If you’re looking for better solutions to heal from Celiac disease, we can help!

While it’s true that there is no cure for Celiac disease, your body can heal from the damage caused by CD. Once gluten is completely removed from the diet, we know that cells of the small intestine can repair themselves to create a healthier gut, leading to a decrease in symptoms. However, it often takes more than just removing gluten to restore the integrity of the gut lining and limit antibody formation.

Other foods, particularly other grains, can cause cross-reactivity. This is when there is enough overlap between the protein structures that similar antibodies are made, even though gluten itself is not consumed. Therefore, even on a gluten-free diet, chronic inflammation of the gut can continue to be an issue. This often results in continued symptoms.

If you have been diagnosed with Celiac disease, the imbalance and inflammation in your gut has been occurring for a period of months, probably even years, before you started having the symptoms that lead to your diagnosis. In that time, other changes in gut function may have occurred that are also preventing you from healing from the symptoms of CD, such as gut flora imbalances or SIBO infections (Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth). While a gluten-free diet is the first step in recovering from such imbalances, more may need to be done, including the removal of other types of foods that may be ‘feeding’ the bad bacteria in your gut.

Another reason why you may still have symptoms is that there is still an immune system imbalance. While removing gluten from your diet helps stop the damage of your intestine, it may not be enough to calm down the chronic inflammation of your immune system. Left unchecked, this chronic inflammation may lead to develop of other autoimmune diseases in the future.

In the meantime, this chronic inflammation can drive hormone imbalances that lead to poor sleep, chronic fatigue and malaise, muscle aches, joint pain, headaches or brain fog. The chronically elevated levels of cortisol in response to chronic inflammation can also cause depletion of hormones like progesterone and testosterone. This may result in low libido, mood swings, increased PMS symptoms or even infertility.

The symptoms and problems caused by Celiac disease can show up in all parts of the body. That’s why it takes a holistic solution to find true wellness. If you’d like to learn more about a functional medicine approach to Celiac disease, please read this article. You can also learn more about why a gluten-free diet may not be enough of a solution here.

If you are suffering with Celiac disease in Kingston, NY there is a better solution. I work with patients regularly just like you, to help them find the diet and lifestyle based solutions to feel better and have more energy. I offer a free 15 minute consultation if you would like to find out more about how I can specifically help you. Call me at 845-687-6387 to find out how I can help you live better with Celiac Disease in Kingston, NY.

Hudson Valley: Help for your hypothyroid

January 11, 2016 by drchrista 1 Comment

Do these symptoms of a hypothyroid sound all too familiar? You’re tired all of the time. You’re hair is thinning or falling out and you don’t know how to make it stop. Despite dieting carefully and watching what you eat, you seem to continue to gain weight- and can’t ever get it off. You absolutely cannot go without a pair of big thick wool socks in the winter because your feet are cold all of the time. You experience brain fog that takes two or three cups of coffee to ‘fix’ and you wonder if that prescription anti-depressant is helping with that at all.

If you’re struggling with hypothyroidism, you’re not alone. And I want you to know that you’ve come to the right place. I work with patients like you everyday. I help them find relief from their hypothyroid symptoms beyond medication.

You see, there’s a couple of important things you need to know about hypothyroidism in order to get real relief from your symptoms.

You need more than just TSH measured to assess symptoms of a hypothyroid.

TSH simply measures the brain’s ability to stimulate the thyroid gland. However, to truly know what is causing an under-functioning thyroid, a full thyroid panel must be done and considered, including TSH, Total T4, Total T3, Free T4, Free T3, T3 Uptake, Reverse T3 and TPO antibodies. It is totally possible to have ‘normal’ TSH and still have hypothyroid symptoms! If T4 is normal for example, the brain will think there is plenty of thyroid hormone and not make as much TSH. But if there is inflammation in the body, which can inhibit the conversion of T4 to the active form T3, then not enough T3 can get into the cells where it has it’s effect. Thus, leading to signs and symptoms of hypothyroidism, even though TSH and T4 are within normal ranges!

80% of hypothyroid cases in the U.S. are attributable to Hashimoto’s hypothyroid

Many cases of hypothyroidism in the U.S. are actually the result of an autoimmune disease that attacks and destroys the cells of thyroid gland. This results in a decreased ability to produce adequate thyroid hormone over time. These folks often have to keep increasing their dose of thyroid medication in order to feel normal. In others, the right dose for them seems to be all over the map, fluctuating frequently. The only way to confirm Hashimoto’s is to do a blood test for antibodies to the thyroid gland. Thyroid peroxidase antibodies are the most common, but Thyroglobulin antibodies may be present too.

Cases of Hashimoto’s hypothyroid are autoimmune diseases- the immune system needs to be addressed too!

The sad fact is that many hypothyroid patients are giving prescriptions for replacement hormone and told that’s it; that’s all they can do and they will be on the medications for life. However, there is so much more that can be done! Implementing an anti-inflammatory diet and beginning to balance the immune system can retard it’s attacks on the thyroid gland. Focusing on a nutritious diet that decreases the inflammation can also help with stubborn weight loss and even help to regrow thinning hair. More importantly, correcting the immune system imbalance early can help prevent other autoimmune disease from developing in the future.

If you’d like to read some indepth articles I’ve written about hypothyroid and Hashimoto’s, go here, here and here. You can also check out this short video.

If you live in the Hudson Valley, have hypothyroidism and want to learn about holistic solutions for your symptoms, I invite you to call my office and learn more about how I can help you. I offer a risk-free, complimentary 15 minute consultation so you learn about how I can help you. Call me today at 845-687-6387.

Should you try The Paleo Diet?

December 21, 2015 by drchrista Leave a Comment

Paleo. Some call it a “fad diet.” Many associate it with uber-lean, muscle-bound Crossfit-types. It’s been confused with Atkins and the low-carb craze. It’s philosophical underpinnings have been the subject of TED talks and scathing critiques throughout the media. Maligned by vegetarians and vegans, this juggernaut diet trend isn’t going anywhere.

The Paleo Diet is here to stay.

You may be curious about it yourself. You have a coworker or neighbor or fifth cousin-twice removed who lost a ton of weight and swears by it. Or maybe you are thinking that any diet where bacon is heartily embraced is your kind of diet. Perhaps you are enticed by the idea of not having to count calories and still losing weight.

Is The Paleo Diet the right choice for you?

Despite what the detractors say, the Paleo diet is not about trying to recreate the life of a caveman. We can, however, gain some important insights into how our bodies function best by looking to our past. The fact is there is a lot of very modern scientific research that backs up this intuitive & ancestral approach to eating. That’s why having my patients adopt a Paleo-type diet is one of the first steps in their nutritional treatment protocol. It’s about more than just rock hard abs. Here’s why I recommend it and why I think you should do it too:

Nutrient-density. The Paleo Diet is the most nutrient dense diet on the planet. A paper published by Mat LaLonde, a chemistry professor at Harvard, showed that for the same number of calories, a Paleo Diet contained more vitamins, minerals and essential fats than the SAD (Standard American Diet.) Not especially surprising, but what was enlightening is that even when he tried to add dairy or whole grains, he could not come up with more vitamins & minerals without adding more calories. This raw data for this came straight from the USDA’s own database of the nutritional content of foods. When you give the body the nutrients it needs, it doesn’t crave more empty calories in a misguided attempt to get them. While eating a nutrient-dense, whole-foods diet, most people spontaneously lower their calorie consumption, without trying or having to resort to willpower.
Anti-inflammatory. Wheat, dairy, soy and peanuts (a legume) are common allergens, yet are absent from a typical Paleo diet. Gluten in particular has been shown to increase the amount of an inflammatory protein in the gut called zonulin. This protein opens up spaces between cells of the gut lining called tight junctions. When these tight junctions are opened up, it leads to a leaky gut. (In the scientific literature this is referred to as ‘increased intestinal permeability.) Pieces of undigested proteins than cross the gut lining where they meet the GALT- Gut Associated Lymphoid Tissue. Made up of the same white blood cells as the rest of your immune system, its estimated that up 70% of your immune system is hanging out in your gut. When the GALT starts having to react to pieces of undigested protein, it creates inflammation, both in the gut itself as well as the rest of your body. If you have aches or pains, brain fog or memory loss, depression or hormone imbalances (all of which can be caused by inflammation), you really should give the Paleo diet a try.
Whole-foods based. We can argue all day long about what cavemen did or didn’t eat and whether those foods still really exist, but at the end of the day I think we can all agree that whole-foods are way better and more nutritious for you than anything processed. Fresh meats and eggs from pastured and grassfed animals, wild seafood, plenty of vegetables in an array of colors and some fruits. Nuts and seeds. These are not controversial health foods, they’re just common sense.
Sustainability. Diets that leave you hungry and starved are not sustainable. For sustained fat loss and long-term recovery from inflammatory conditions, a diet has to be one that you can follow over the long haul. There are so many resources now; the number of Paleo cookbooks has exploded in recent years and the number of Paleo recipe blogs has grown exponentially. There really is no legitimate reason for getting bored on the Paleo Diet.
Lifestyle Factors. There’s more to health & fitness than just food, yet so many ‘diets’ fail to account for this. Many people will say that Paleo isn’t just a diet, it’s lifestyle. What that means is that food is just the start. Beyond diet, a healthy lifestyle should also include plenty of quality, restorative sleep, stress management, frequent movement & exercise, good posture & alignment, relaxation and time in nature. To heal from a chronic disease, all of these factors must be addressed.

Is Paleo the right choice for you? I think it happens to be the right choice for anyone who wants to build or maintain their health. Want some help getting started on your journey to more energy, less fatigue, clearer skin and less pain? Call my office today at 845-687-6387. I help people like you implement and tailor a Paleo approach to meet their health goals.

January is just around the corner. If you have been thinking of starting a Paleo diet as part of your commitment to get healthier in the coming year, but are a bit overwhelmed or unsure how to get started, check out my New Year, New You! whole-foods based cleanse program. To learn more, click here.

Celiac disease: What your doctor hasn’t told you

November 24, 2015 by drchrista 3 Comments

It can be difficult to adjust to a gluten-free life after being diagnosed with Celiac disease, especially if the only thing your doctor has told you about your new diagnosis and lifestyle is “don’t eat gluten.” Thankfully, now there are many groups and organizations to help the newly diagnosed find the information they need. There are also many more food choices available in the marketplace and they are more accessible now than ever. Even most large chain grocery stores have a gluten-free section now.

It wasn’t always this way. I remember when my mom was first diagnosed with Celiac disease. There were only one or two organizations providing reliable information. The ‘can have’ and ‘can’t have’ lists changed rapidly, especially regarding certain food additives like ‘modified food starch’ and its ilk. But the worst was the few gluten-free foods available. Pastas and breads made with brown rice flour that tasted like eating sand. I still remember attending a meeting of a local Celiac support group and a woman holding a gluten-free product in her hands, exorting the group “this is not a health food.” That stuck with me.

As I started to study more functional medicine, and learn more about leaky gut- what causes it and how to heal it, and why its such a key part of addressing all autoimmune disease, including Celiac disease- I finally started to understand what this woman meant.

If you have Celiac disease, going gluten-free may be enough to make your GI symptoms go away. You might not feel the bloating or have the constant diarrhea that you experienced before, but that doesn’t mean its enough to heal the damage caused by the Celiac disease in the first place. That’s the part your doctor probably left out. So if you really want to heal- to get to the root cause of the issue- these are a couple things you need to keep in mind.

Other grains can cause cross-reactions of the immune system that still lead to antibody formation.

In fact, its not uncommon to see patients on gluten-free diets develop sensitivities and intolerances to other grains. I’ve seen patients become sensitive to corn, amaranth, tapioca, even rice. In general, when I have a patient with Celiac disease report to me that they are stilling having symptoms of inflammation, even on a gluten-free diet, I have them do a trial elimination of ALL grains right away.

Gluten-free processed foods are no healthier for you than their wheat-laden counterparts.

I’m sure you’ve looked at the ingredients on the package of a gluten-free bread or pasta. (You do still read the ingredients even though its labeled gluten-free, right?) Potato starch and tapioca starch are often used because they have a finer texture than rice flour- which often gives the product that aforementioned ‘sand’ texture. The problem with these starches though, is that they are highly processed- most of the nutrients are processed out and what is left is the pure carbohydrate. This changes the speed at which the carbohydrate is digested and usually leads to a high blood sugar spike afterward. The higher the blood sugar goes, the higher insulin needs to go. Over time, this mechanism leads to insulin-resistance or what many refer to as “pre-diabetes.” Along the way, this increase in insulin may make it harder to maintain your weight, lead to increased cortisol production and belly fat, and cause imbalances in several hormonal pathways. It doesn’t matter that these products are gluten-free. Gluten is a protein; the refined and processed starches in these products are the often the real problem.

Your Celiac diagnosis is the end stage of a long process that has been going on in your body for years.

It is now accepted that gluten-intolerance and its symptoms are better represented by a spectrum. There are folks in the middle who have various negative symptoms when they eat gluten and feel much better when not eating it, but have not yet reached the threshold for a diagnosis of Celiac disease. Current research from Dr. Alessio Fassano’s lab (he’s the guy publishing a bulk of the research on Celiac disease today) suggests that if these people continue to eat gluten despite their reactions to it AND have the gene the express Celiac disease, they will eventually express full-blown Celiac disease. (Note here that even if they don’t have a gene for CD, but for perhaps another autoimmune disease, this gene may be triggered the same way). If you look back at your own health history, its pretty likely that you’ve known something wasn’t right for years before your diagnosis. Chronic depression, severe PMS, chronic diarrhea or stomach upsets, anxiety about eating out or whether there would be a bathroom nearby when you needed it, acne or chronic skin issues, headache or brain fog, unexplained neurological symptoms- you’ve known these things weren’t ‘normal’ but nobody could tell you what they were. Once you were diagnosed with Celiac disease, a lot of those chronic symptoms began to make sense. They were subtle ways your body was telling you something was wrong.

Because this has been a drawn-process, happening over years, true healing is going to take time to work through. And very likely it will take more than just going gluten-free. The damage in your gut has lead to poor nutrient absorption and there may have even been negative compensations that have developed over time in response to the lack of key nutrients. Vitamins and minerals will need to be replaced. They will need to be replaced in a smart and efficient way, not by just taking a multi-vitamin pill and calling it a day.

The best way to go about this is to work with a functional medicine practitioner who understands Celiac disease and will help you find an integrative, whole-body solution to healing. If you’re ready to start the journey to a deeper level of healing and want some experienced guidance, give me a call at 845-687-6387. I work with patients locally in the Hudson Valley region, but I am also available to consult with non-local patients via telephone or Skype.

Not sure if you’re ready to commit yet? That’s OK too- I still want to do what I can to help you.

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6 “hidden” sources of stress

July 21, 2015 by drchrista Leave a Comment

Stress. It is ubiquitous in this modern age, so much so that most of us consider it inevitable. However, our relationship with stress over the last hundred years or so is vastly different from our relationship with it for the vast majority of our evolution as a species.

For most of our time on this Earth, stress was a punctuated, limited experience. The saber-tooth tiger chased us, we ran away and once safe in our cave, we could rest, relax and repair wounds, tissue damage and even metabolic damaged incurred on our getaway.

Unfortunately, nowadays that ‘rest, relax and repair’ phase never comes and so the damage builds and builds. Even if we don’t feel ‘stressed,’ our bodies may be experiencing stress. Though most of us associate ‘stress’ with psychoemotional stressors, we can experience ill effects from physical stressors too- and the body does not distinguish between physical and mental stresses.

So what are some ‘hidden’ sources of physical stress that might be contributing to your overall stress and slowly eroding away your health?

1. Food intolerances. Intolerances are different immunologically than a true food ‘allergy’ so the symptoms can be a lot more subtle. Headaches, fatigue, joint pain, skin rashes, and other chronic conditions can be symptoms of a gut being assaulted regularly by foods it doesn’t tolerate. Since the majority of the your immune system resides in your gut, this can create imbalances that can set the stage for autoimmune disease.

2. Poor sleep. Not just a lack of sleep, which most of us have experienced as a stress, but a lack of quality, restorative sleep. Sleep apnea is an all-to-common manifestations of this. If your body is not getting enough oxygen and alarms are constantly going off in your brain to wake up and breathe, you can be in bed ‘sleeping’ for 8-10 hours and still be tired and fatigued throughout the day. Another thing that can negatively impact your sleep quality is electromagnetic radiation from any electronics. Current evidence suggests that EMR disrupts the circadian rhythms that govern our sleep-wake cycles deep in a part of the brain called the pineal gland. Set your phone to ‘airplane mode,’ turn off the wireless router and unplug whatever electronics you can at night. They draw a small current even if plugged, but ‘off.’ Put all bedroom electronics on a power strip so you only have to unplug one thing to kill the electricity to them all at night.

3. Nutrient deficiencies. Most of us have moved away from eating nutrient-dense whole foods for most of our calorie intake. Modern farming practices can often deplete the soil of important minerals like magnesium and selenium and because of this, even organic produce may not be as nutrient dense as the food our grandparents ate. Additionally, in trying to digest process foods, our bodies are often depleted of more vitamins and minerals that we receive from the food itself. In dealing with increased stress, we use up our stores of B vitamins, Vitamin C and magnesium.

4. Blood sugar imbalances. Have you ever experienced the feeling of being ‘hangry,’ when you are so hungry your mood tanks and you get mad at everyone and everything until you get something to eat? Or have you ever had that afternoon ‘food coma’ where all you want to do about an hour after lunch is take a nap? These are symptoms that your blood sugar is unbalanced. One way that your body deals with low blood sugar is to secrete cortisol, our stress hormone, which mobilizes stored glucose from the liver in order to make it available to brain cells. Though this is a key survival adaptation, particularly in times where food is scarce, when this leads to elevated cortisol levels on a daily basis, it can suppress the immune system and lead to problems regulating our inflammatory response.

5. Sex hormone imbalances. Cortisol is made primarily from progesterone, but can be made from estrogen, testosterone and DHEA as well. Poor libido, changes in menstrual cycles, changes in PMS, infertility and erectile dysfunction may all have their route cause in stress that robs of us of our sex hormone balance.

6. Exercise. Bet you didn’t see that one coming? Exercise is a stress, usually a good one. But too much, too frequently, especially ‘cardio,’ can overtax the adrenals and result in overproduction of cortisol. In a healthy person, this is not problematic, in fact, it helps the body be better prepared for future stresses, but if you have a chronic health condition, or any one of the hidden sources of stress listed above, it may useful to reevaluate what kind of exercise you are doing and for how long. Strength training workouts are less ‘stressful’ to the adrenal glands then long steady-state cardio workouts. Additionally, short, high-intensity interval workouts appear to be less taxing on the adrenals glands than a steady-state cardio workout as well. If a patient is suffering from stress from too much of the wrong kind of exercise, I will also recommend moving more and exercising less. Focus on things like walking, playing outdoors, standing instead of sitting, gardening, etc.- activities that are fun, can be fit into your daily routine (as opposed to having to carve out extra time in an already hectic schedule to go to the gym) and move your body in new and novels ways, instead of the repetitive motion of most cardio exercises.

Glutathione: What it is and why you need (more of) it!

September 29, 2014 by drchrista Leave a Comment

The short answer here is that glutathione is your body’s main antioxidant. As with any antioxidant, its main function is to reduce free radicals within the body. The damage caused by free radicals accelerates the aging process, as the free radicals destroy essential compounds and tissues, like the lining of your arteries or even your DNA itself.

Inflammation can also increase the production of free radicals and therefore the need for glutathione. In fact, almost any inflammatory condition can be helped by ensuring the body is adequately synthesizing glutathione.

Outside of inflammatory conditions that might call for more glutathione synthesis, we may become deficient in glutathione because of insufficient dietary intake of the necessary building blocks of glutathione. In particular, the amino acid cysteine, which is rare in food, is often a limiting factor in glutathione synthesis.

Magnesium and selenium are two minerals also necessary for the production and function of glutathione. Due to modern farming practices, both of these minerals can be hard to come by in adequate amounts through just diet alone. Vitamin D3 has also been shown to augment glutathione synthesis.

So how can you insure that you have adequate amounts of this very important antioxidant on hand?

Whey protein has been shown to increase glutathione synthesis.
Supplementation with N-acetyl cysteine has been shown to be useful. SAMe has also shown to be beneficial
Optimize your Vitamin D levels by making sure you get 15-20 minutes of sun (or more if you have darker skin) on unprotected skin daily, year around. Consider supplementation if this is difficult.
Make sure you get adequate magnesium and selenium. Magnesium is a safe & effective supplement that almost everyone should be on. Three Brazil nuts eaten daily can help insure adequate selenium levels.

Why going ‘gluten-free’ is not enough

September 22, 2014 by drchrista Leave a Comment

Gluten-free is all the rage now with major restaurant chains offering gluten-free menus and even the smallest grocery stores having aisles dedicated to gluten-free products. With the proliferation of gluten-free offerings, one might be tempted to think we are making healthier choices.

This is not the case.

I remember when I first started working with Hashimoto’s patients. After delivering the news that their thyroid condition was in fact an autoimmune condition, I informed them that they needed to go gluten-free in order to prevent their bodies from making antibodies that attacked and destroyed their thyroid gland. Knowing that this can be quite a drastic change for some people, I tried to encourage them by reminding them that this was an opportunity to eat healthier by filling out their diets with vegetables instead of processed wheat products. What quickly became apparent though, is that people simply started swapping their processed wheat products for processed gluten-free products.

Let me be plain: Gluten-free foods are NOT health foods.

Gluten-free products are highly processed. It takes the marvels of modern machinery to make something made of rice flour to not taste gritty and chalky.
Gluten-free foods are high in sugar. What’s the best way to cover-up that chalky taste? Sugar. Lots of it!
Gluten-free foods are terrible for blood sugar regulation. Another way to improve the taste & texture of a gluten-free food, besides adding a lot of sugar, is to using highly refined starches like cornstarch, potato starch & tapioca starch. These are very fine powders that are often a solution to that ‘gritty’ texture of rice flour. The problem is that they are so refined, there is nothing to digest and their carbohydrate content hits the bloodstream very quickly, provoking an insulin spike. This is very hard on the pancreas and is the same mechanism that leads to the development of Type II diabetes.
Gluten-free foods use refined vegetable oils. Fats are another way to cover up the chalky taste & texture. This wouldn’t be so problematic if we were using heat-stable, traditional fats like coconut oil or butter. However, most refined foods have refined fats in them like canola and soybean oil. These oils are not stable at high temperatures and have gone through a complex treatment process to deodorize and clean them before they are even sold to you. Why would they have to go through this process? Because they are so delicate, they become rancid just going through the extraction process. They have to be cleansed and deodorized or they would be too disgusting to eat. While the smell may be gone, the artery-destroying free radicals and inflammation-promoting omega 6 fats are not. Avoid these.
Gluten-free foods are not a good source of nutrients. This is a problem with any processed food. Processing removes and/or destroys the nutrient content. The more highly processed, the more of the nutrients that have been destroyed. Compared to vegetables, grains aren’t that great a source of nutrients to begin with. Refining them further into flours and even starches, removes what little there was to begin with. If health is really your goal, its best to swap out gluten-free wanna-be foods for real, whole foods that are naturally gluten-free. Like vegetables 🙂

It’s for the above reasons that I started recommending a Paleo-type diet when I need my patients to go gluten-free. Paleo is about whole, real foods. It’s also about healing the gut. Because here’s the other thing I began to notice when my patients just started swapping their processed wheat products for gluten-free processed products: they started developing sensitivities to other grain products- particularly the ones that they started consuming more often in the processed gluten-free foods. In the scientific literature this is known as ‘cross-reactivity.’ This occurred because the underlying problem- often a leaky gut- was not fully healed by simply switching to a ‘gluten-free’ diet.

I also noticed this pattern in my Celiac patients. Their symptoms greatly improved on a gluten-free diet, but they still didn’t feel fully well or healthy until they started eating more whole foods and less processed food. Again, years and years of irritation and inflammation in the gut could not be fixed simply by going gluten-free. All grains needed to be eliminated and more nutrient-dense foods like vegetables and bone broth needed to be added.

If a product has to be labeled ‘gluten-free,’ its probably not healthy for you. If health is truly your goal, you would be better off investing in naturally gluten-free foods like animal products, vegetables, fruits and nuts.

Could your symptoms be caused by leaky gut syndrome?

May 27, 2014 by drchrista 1 Comment

Leaky what?

Leaky gut. Also known in the scientific literature as increased intestinal permeability, this syndrome is more common then most people think and has been the subject of many recent scientific studies. As our knowledge of this syndrome grows, more and more people are hearing of this condition.

Leaky gut can manifest in a variety of ways, which can make it tricky to diagnosis. Irritable bowel syndrome, SIBO, food intolerances, Candida infections, depression, memory loss and even autoimmune disease, may all start with a leaky gut.

The GI tract, including the intestine, is the primary place where your inside environment meets the outside environment. Because the outside environment can be full of bacteria, fungi and viruses, up to 70% of our immune system actually resides in the gut as GALT (gut-associated lymphoid tissue), ready to protect us from the potential foreign invaders that have hitched a ride in our food or drink.

One primary cause of leaky gut appears to be gluten ingestion. Gluten is a protein that is found primarily in wheat and other grains like barley and rye. Gluten increases the production of a protein in the cells of the small intestine called zonulin. One thing we know zonulin does is open up the spaces between the cells of the small intestine. As these spaces open, bigger pieces of protein, fat or carbohydrate can cross through the lining of the gut. Once within the wall of the gut, the immune cells that reside there, the GALT, don’t recognize the larger pieces of food and mount an immune response. This creates an inflammatory response that can lead to a feeling of swelling or bloating around the gut. Inflammation can be non-specific, so it can also lead to feeling just plain ‘ick,’ particularly after a meal.

This kind of chronic inflammation can lead to the development of more serious health conditions. According to research by Dr. Aristo Vjadani at the University of Maryland’s Celiac Research Center, leaky gut and the resulting chronic inflammation may lead to the development of autoimmune diseases as the cells of the gut’s immune system begin to become confused and start attacking the body’s own tissues instead of the foreign invading proteins. In short, any inflammatory condition may have leaky gut either has an accompanying problem or even as the cause.

leaky gut may be linked to the development of autoimmune disease

So what to do if you think your symptoms may be caused by leaky gut?

Modify your diet. This maybe the only thing you need to do to start feeling much better! Elimination diets are a gold standard for diagnosing food allergies and intolerances and are also the best way to begin healing the gut. Start by eliminating all grains, legumes and dairy for one month. It takes about 21 days for the cells of the intestine to replace themselves, so after a month of following the elimination diet closely you’ll have a brand new gut! After the month, reintroduce one new food group every third day and observe for the return of any symptoms. Permanently eliminate any foods that cause your symptoms to return.
Get tested. There are few tests available to confirm a leaky gut. An older one is the lactose-mannitol challenge. This test is more widely available, but a positive is not necessarily specific for leaky gut. There is one commercial company with a more specific test on the market, available from Cyrex Labs. Unfortunately, this test is not as widely available as the lactose-mannitol challenge.
Find the right doctor. If you google ‘ leaky gut’ you may find official looking sites that say that it doesn’t exist. Some doctors still don’t believe it is real. However, I am sure that the hundreds of research scientists writing papers about it and getting grants to study it would beg to differ! Your best bet is to find and work with a functional medicine doctor who understand and can recognize the signs and symptoms of leaky gut syndrome, order the cooperating lab tests, and then help coach you through the appropriate dietary changes. Many of these doctors can also recommend nutritional supplements that can help your gut heal faster, especially if you have had the problem for a long time.

Do you take Synthroid? Armour? Cytomel?

September 21, 2012 by drchrista 1 Comment

Synthroid is the 4th most prescribed medication in the United States, so there are probably many of you who said yes.

How do you feel???

Did you initially feel really great and then many of the symptoms- the tiredness, weight gain and irritability, crept back in?

Have you been bouncing back and forth between different medications and dosages trying to find the one that will relieve your symptoms and give you your life back? Have you found it yet?

If you haven’t, here’s something to consider: 90% of patients with hypothyroidism have a subset of hypothyroidism called Hashimoto’s Autoimmune Thyroid.

What’s that????

Hashimoto’s is a condition where the body makes antibodies to its own thyroid tissue. Your body for some reason thinks your thyroid is a foreign invader and needs to be destroyed.

Since Hashimoto’s in an immune problem and not a thyroid problem, thyroid-hormone replacement medications like Synthroid are a stop-gap measure, making up for the deficient thyroid hormone, but not addressing the immune system dysfunction that is causing the thyroid hormone to be low in the first place. This is why many people on these drugs bounce back & forth between different formulations & dosages, but don’t seem to get any lasting relief.

How do you know if you have Hashimoto’s? If you feel worse on bio-identical hormone formulations, like Armour, you may be making antibodies to your thyroid. Symptom-wise, a strong clue that you may have Hashimoto’s is if you have hyper AND hypothyroid symptoms. Do you sometimes have heart palpitations, insomnia, night sweats, nervousness or inward trembling and other times feel tired, sluggish, have cold hands & feet, gain weight easily, are constipated and feel depressed with lack of motivation?

A diagnosis of Hashimoto’s can also be confirmed with a blood test. If antibodies to the thyroid are found, this confirms a diagnosis of Hashimoto’s. However, because it is an immune disorder, the presence of antibodies depends on how well the immune system is functioning at the time of the blood test. It can sometimes take 2-3 tests over the course of a couple months to confirm the diagnosis of Hashimoto’s one way or the other.

Once Hashimoto’s is diagnosed, what can you do to feel better? Well the good news is that this condition can be managed well completely naturally. Stay tuned for my next article where I will talk about this in more detail.

The Effects of Hashimoto’s and hypothyroidism on brain health

September 19, 2012 by drchrista Leave a Comment

This is article written by a colleague, Dr. Datis Kharrazian, who has been doing brilliant research into the widespread effects of mistreated hypothyroidism.

February 17th, 2010 | Author: Dr. Datis Kharrazian

Do you need to take the Leaky Brain Challenge? Read on to find out.

The most disturbing thing I see in regards to Hashimoto’s is that although people’s TSH may be managed with thyroid hormones, their immune dysregulation goes unchecked. This leaves other areas of the body vulnerable to attack, the most profound being the brain.

There are three ways Hashimoto’s can affect the brain. First, many people with Hashimoto’s also have an autoimmune attack against their nervous system. On a blood test this can be identified by positive antibodies to neurological tissue. Second, unrelated to an autoimmune attack against the nervous system, the inflammatory response generated by Hashimoto’s can activate the brain’s immune system, hence promoting inflammation in the brain. Third, Hashimoto’s can lead to low thyroid hormones, which are necessary to dampen the brain inflammation caused by the previous two factors.

Depression, fatigue, and brain fog

It’s important to know that we all experience brain degeneration on an ongoing basis. A more common term for accelerated brain degeneration is simply known as aging. The trick is to prevent the brain from degenerating any faster than it has to.

Unfortunately, it is very common to see advanced brain degeneration in long-term, unresolved Hashimoto’s cases, with the most common symptoms being depression (from decreased firing of the frontal cortex), fatigue (from brain fatigue due to neurodegeneration), and brain fog (from brain inflammation).

True, these are also symptoms of hypothyroidism, but in some cases, particularly when the condition is long standing or still persistent despite successful management of thyroid levels, the impact of an unresolved thyroid condition on the brain should be investigated.

How Hashimoto’s affects the brain’s immune system

The brain is made up of two types of cells: neurons and microglia cells. Neurons are responsible for communication within the brain and everything we associate with brain activity, such as our intelligence, emotions, and the ability to automatically breathe, digest or maintain a heartbeat.

The microglia cells are the brain’s immune cells. It’s their job to react to foreign invaders, clean up debris and plaque, and dissolve dead neurons. The microgia are necessary for optimal neuronal communication and healthy brain function.

Although microglial cells function as the brain’s immune system, they are unlike the immune system in the rest of the body. When a virus or bacteria invades your body, the body’s immune system orchestrates a comlex and multi-faceted response, as described briefly in Chapter Three of my book. For instance, once an antigen (a foreign invader) is successfully dispatched, the immune system’s T-suppressor cells call off the attack and send the troops home.

Not so with the brain’s immune system. If an antigen makes its way into the brain, there is no complex orchestration, but rather an all-out assault by the brain’s microglial cells on the invader and, as a consequence, inflammation and degeneration of surrounding brain tissue. What’s worse is that there are no T-suppressor cells to call off the attack, and the glial cells, in their unrestrained assault, create brain inflammation and chew up brain tissue in a degenerative cascade.

Hashimoto’s is a double whammy for the brain

Unfortunately, Hashimoto’s activates microglia cells in two ways. First, thyroid hormones are integral to brain health, and Hashimoto’s can lead to low thyroid hormone status. Thyroid hormones dampen overactivity of the microglial cells, thus preventing or slowing down this cascade that causes inflammation and degeneration in the brain.(1-8)

Second, the inflammatory response caused by Hashimoto’s increases the activity of the brain’s microglia cells, hence promoting brain inflammation.(9)

So failing to address the autoimmune attacks of Hashimoto’s is a double whammy on the brain — the inflammation caused by Hashimoto’s increases microglial activity, while low thyroid hormone status fails to adequately dampen the microglial cells.

The effect of Hashimoto’s on the blood-brain barrier

The microglia cells not only make up more than half of the total mass of the brain, but they also make up the blood-brain barrier, a thin barrier that lines the brain and allows necessary, nano-sized substances to pass through. The blood-brain barrier is important for keeping antigens (foreign invaders, such as viruses or bacteria) and environmental toxins out of the brain.

Unfortunately, the blood-brain barrier can develop “leaks” for a variety of reasons, including poor blood-sugar stability (particularly insulin resistance),(10) chronic stress,(11) chronic inflammation,(12) poor gut health, poor diet with unhealthy fats,(13) and unchecked autoimmune activity, such as Hashimoto’s disease (alcohol and high homocysteine are other recognized factors(14-16)). If you are familiar with leaky gut, as discussed in the book, then you’ll understand leaky brain, as both the gut and the brain are immune barriers vulnerable to the same problems.

When the blood-brain barrier develops leaks, bad guys get in, the microglial cells go nuts, and a whole lot of brain tissue gets chewed up. This creates inflammation, which in felt in some as “brain fog,” and leads to accelerated brain degeneration.

The Leaky Brain Challenge

How do you know if your blood-brain barrier is leaky? A simple and easy way to find out is to do Blood-Brain Barrier Challenge. To do this, simply take 1000 mg of straight GABA (not GABA precursors such as theanine).

GABA is a neurotransmitter synthesized in the brain and is responsible for calming or inhibiting over activity. Although some companies sell GABA supplements, the reality is the GABA molecule is too large to pass through an intact blood-brain barrier. The fact that this supplement sells so well is a testament to the integrity of the average American’s blood-brain barrier.

So, if several hours after taking 1000 mg of GABA, you feel calm, relaxed or sleepy, you know that GABA, a molecule too large to pass through the blood-brain barrier, has nevertheless made it into your brain and is performing its calming duties. This means your blood-brain barrier has become compromised and your brain is highly susceptible to the immune rampages I discussed above.

Some people, instead of feeling relaxed, will find GABA makes them feel more anxious or jittery. There are other reasons for this that will be discussed in my next book, however any reaction at all indicates a leaky brain barrier.

If you felt no change after taking GABA, that is a good sign that your blood-brain barrier is intact and functioning well. (For accurate results, be sure to take this test during the day and not at bedtime.)

What to do about a leaky brain barrier

Addressing the areas that helped cause a permeable blood-brain barrier is the best place to start if you want to restore integrity. First make sure your diet is strictly void of gluten. Then do an Elimination/Provocation diet, as explained in my book, to determine whether other foods, such as dairy or eggs, are also provoking the immune system.

Continue on with the other strategies explained in the book: Balancing blood sugar, addressing gut health and gut infections, and supporting adrenal health so your adrenal hormones are neither too high or too low. All of these will help quench inflammation, a notorious saboteur of brain health. Also, ask your practitioner about the supplements I have created specifically for blood-brain barrier integrity, brain inflammation and increased blood flow to the brain (which will be discussed in my next book). Other strategies include enhancing the liver’s methylation pathway (Chapter Eight of the thyroid book) and supplementing with alpha-lipoic acid.

Modulating your autoimmune disease is a vital step to protecting the integrity of your blood-brain barrier and the health of your brain. The longer Hashimoto’s or any autoimmune disease goes on unchecked, the more vulnerable your brain is to autoimmune disease, degeneration, and inflammation.

References

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8 Flavin RSL, et al. Regulation of microglial development: A novel role for thyroid hormones. The Journal of Neuroscience. 2001;21(6):2028-2038.

9 Flavin RSL, et al. Regulation of microglial development: A novel role for thyroid hormones. The Journal of Neuroscience. 2001;21(6):2028-2038

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11 Espositie, P, et al. Acute stress increases permeability of the blood-brain barrier through activation of brain mast cells. Brain Research. 2001;888(1):117-127.

12 Haroh J, et al. Oxidative stress activates protein tyrosine kinase and matrix metalloproteinases leading to blood-brain barrier dysfunction. J neurochem. 2007;22(1).

13 Jali C, et al. Cyclooxygenase inhibition limits blood-brain barrier diruption following intracerebral injection of tumor necrosis factor-alpha in the rat. JPET. 2007;323(2):488-498.

14 Haorah J, et al. Alcohol0induced oxidative stress in brain endothelial cells causes blood-brain barrier dysfunction. Journal of Leukocyte Biology. 2005;78:1223-1232.

15 Atul F, et al. Elevated levels of homocysteine compromise blood-brain barrier integrity in mice. Blood. 2005.

16 Homocysteine attenuates blood-brain barrier function by inducing oxidative stress and the junctional proteins. FASEB. 2008;22:734-7.