Sometimes, we need reminders. This post from 2022 reminds us how different fibers in our diet and supplements affect us differently. Get to know your fibers and let food be thy medicine with this reminder…. Both conventional and functional medicine can agree that most people in our nation need more fiber. The average American diet…
Most of us are tired of the “new normal”, but are unsure what to do about it. Apparently, the microbiome of infants born during the pandemic lockdowns also underwent a change in the normal which may or may not return to the old normal. In one sense their change had some positive effects in that…
We live in an age of preservatives. Fresh food has almost become a luxury. In the health food world, we advocate that our patients shop the grocery store more around the periphery rather than down the aisles of processed and preservative filled foods. We repeat the cliché that if you can’t read the ingredient on…
The proponents and opponents of countless fads constantly bicker back and forth over their entrenched positions on the internet. The question of gluten, wheat, and their effect on health is old and heated. The doubters of gluten’s negative impact on health have long dismissed this staple of the American diet as having any contribution to…
The surprising connections between the microbial residents of our gut and various human body systems continue to astound. Medical research has uncovered many mechanisms which connect a variety of bacteria and other organisms with our brain, our immune system, our hormones, and more. In this paper, researchers not only found a very strong correlation between…
If only healthy living allowed you to have your sugar-stuffed cake and eat it too. Years of nutritional research, along with billions of dollars, have gone into letting us enjoy the sweetness of sugar without the extra calories and pounds it brings. We’ve wanted to believe that with the help of artificial sweeteners we’ve been…
The concept that ‘food is medicine’ is growing like wild kudzu through the medical world, prompting more and more research like this study on how diet can affect diarrheal infections. This is more than just the “BRAT” diet of bananas, rice, applesauce, and toast after the diarrhea has passed, meant to allow your intestines to…
Series Intro (repeated from the last entry): old is everywhere, so they say. “They” refers to mainstream medicine as they try to convince you that mold toxicity cannot be causing your symptoms. They challenge you to explain how a little chemical called a mycotoxin made by little molds that are all around us could somehow…
While we know that excess sugar in the diet contributes to a multitude of health risks, we as a society still long for that sweet taste in our foods. For that reason, the industry of artificial sweeteners has bloomed to fill that longing with the taste without the calories. If sweetness were the only criteria,…
For all that a patient recently told me that their GI doctor dismissed the effects of their diet on their Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) symptoms, a recent study demonstrates a likely mechanism by which sugar worsens IBD severity. With around 3 million or more in the United States suffering from Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis,…