Note: this transcript is not 100% accurate.
00:01
That microbiome, what we’re finding out is connected to virtually everything in the body from mental health to immunity to hormone balance to lung health to heart health and you name it, there’s a big connection there. About 90 % of your serotonin, which is that nice like relaxing brain chemical, and then 50 % of your dopamine, they’re actually made in the gut by your good bacteria. So if you’re gonna be low on those good bacteria, you’re have a harder time producing those brain chemicals, those neurotransmitters. So then you’re talking, you know, anxiety.
00:29
maybe you can show up there. So your stool should be kind of like a Lincoln log type form. So it should be, you know, easy to pass. It should be solid. You don’t want anything that’s too loose. If it’s a little like soft serve ice cream, that’s okay, but you don’t want that on consistent basis. It’s so weird that we’re talking about this. But yeah, but you did compare it to soft serve ice cream. So that’s weird.
00:59
This is Dr. Meenal and welcome to Uncover Your Eyes, where we break down the most pressing health topics shaping lives today. Before we start, if you can please hit that subscribe follow button so that we know you’re listening and can bring you better episodes weekly. Your gut is home to trillions of microbes that influence anything from your digestion to immunity, chronic disease, mental health,
01:29
and even hormones. The gut is often called the second brain because of its deep connection to the nervous system, mood regulation, and cognitive function. Today, we dive deep into the gut with Dr. Marcus Cirelli, a functional medicine practitioner and gut expert. Thanks, Marcus, for being on today. Really appreciate your time. Thanks for having me. Appreciate being here.
01:55
I want to say the gut, like people don’t usually or haven’t talked about the gut for many, many years. And now all of a sudden, the last few years, the gut is like the next big thing. What is the gut? Like, let’s talk about it in layman’s terms and what does it do? Yeah. So for like the longest time, people thought that the gut was just like one giant tube, food in, food out type thing. Um, but we’ve found out over the last 20 to 30 years that there’s so much more complexity to it. So what we’re really finding out is this part of the gut called the microbiome.
02:23
And that’s really the collection of like good and bad bacteria. There’s also things in there like parasites and viruses and funguses and yeast as well. But that microbiome, what we’re finding out is connected to virtually everything in the body from mental health to immunity to hormone balance to lung health, to heart health, and you name it, there’s a big connection there. gut health to me is more than like I said, just food in food out. We want to make sure that the organs are functioning properly. So we look at like the stomach, the liver, the pancreas, make sure those are all working optimally.
02:52
We look at the balance of that microbiome, so the good and bad bacteria make sure those things are functioning the right way. And then we want to make sure you’re absorbing things, right? So the food that you are eating, are you actually pulling the nutrients in from that? And then are you eliminating those waste products? And how do you mess up your gut? Like, is it solely through food you’re intaking, like bad foods? Or are there other ways? Yeah, there’s a variety of ways. Poor foods is a huge one. So processed inflammatory foods, high sugar foods.
03:20
Those are probably one of the number one things that something that we’re doing, you know, three to four to five times a day we’re eating. Antibiotics is probably number two. That’s a huge one. So those antibiotics wipe out that microbiome. So in reality, the majority of that good bacteria that’s in there. Alcohol can do it. High levels of stress can do it. Other medications can do it. I mean, there’s a large variety of things that can contribute to it. And how does one know like that your gut is off? Like I, you know, I’ve gone for physicals and I don’t want to, I want to say they don’t
03:49
test your gut, how do you know that you want to prompt your doctor to test for, do gut tests? Yeah. So the obvious symptoms would be your digestive issues like gas, bloating, irregular bowel habits, maybe some stomach pain, acid reflux. Those are your usual typical symptoms you would have, but the guts connected to everything. So then there’s other things like brain fog, fatigue, low energy, memory problems, skin issues. So the gut is really your foundation. And again, you can kind of connect everything back to the gut.
04:19
So I hate to say any and every condition can be tied back to the gut, but virtually it pretty much can. But your obvious ones again, would be like your acid reflux, the bloating, the gas, your regular bowel habits. Those are the main ones that people notice right off the bat. You can tell you love the gut. Like that’s why you’re the expert in it. So it’s like, I love the eyes. So I say the eyes are the best. But tell me like how many, like how common are gut issues? Like, are they very common?
04:44
Yeah. So one out of every four Americans, I’m not sure what the numbers are in Canada, but one out of every four Americans has some type of gut dysfunction. And how do you test for it? Are these lab tests or are we just doing stool tests? Yeah. Stool test is the best, most accurate way to assess that. So I know it sounds weird, but literally you’re pooping into a test tube. We ship it out to a lab, the lab analyzes it, and then we get results back.
05:07
That measures, again, organ function. So liver, gallbladder, pancreas, making sure things are being broken down appropriately. It’s in look at that balance of the microbiome, inflammation. It’ll look at parasites, funguses, yeast, anything weird that should be growing in your system. There is another marker on there too that looks at gluten sensitivity. So if you have any problem with meat products. So yeah, that’s the test we run. called the GI map test. That’s the best one in my opinion out there. It does show the complete picture of your gut how it’s functioning.
05:35
And do people have to order that through a doctor or you can just like order it online? There’s some places where we can order online. You have to go through a company so you can’t just go directly to the diagnostic solutions, the company and order it. But there’s companies out there where can actually order it, have the test kits sent to you and then you ship it down to the lab. You know, one thing I found very interesting was there’s a lot of talk about gut health and you know, we’re coming across allergy season now.
06:02
But I never would have thought they were tied. And I was just thinking, I’m like, allergies are on the rise, gut issues are on the rise. Are they tied? Yeah, 100%. So there’s two main contributors to allergies when it comes to gut health. There’s something in the gut called leaky gut, which you may have not heard of that before. But essentially in the small intestine, the small intestine is very thin because that’s where we want to actually absorb our nutrients as they pass through your digestive tract. But what can happen is that small intestine can become damaged.
06:31
and then things can start to leak through that shouldn’t leak through. Once they get through the gut lining, they get into the bloodstream and then your immune system sits there too. So your immune system can kind of go haywire, starts to attack itself, it creates inflammation. So we can see allergies that come up from that standpoint. The second way is that we have an imbalance of the good and bad bacteria. So something called dysbiosis, which is a big fancy word for too much bad bacteria and not enough good bacteria. If that happens too, we can see allergies pop up. Wow.
06:58
Do people have parasites? You know, we always hear this fear mongering thing on social media and whatnot. Like, is it very common to have parasites or at all, you know, in your gut? And what are these most common parasites? Yeah, every single person on the planet has parasites. If you’ve got a cat or dog, if you swim in a lake, if you’ve eaten sushi, pork, if you walk barefoot on earth, you have parasites. So everybody has them. Now that doesn’t mean that they’re causing issues per se either. Some parasites are beneficial. They can actually help us out.
07:28
But the majority of times it can cause health issues. There is a lot of research now tying parasites to cancer, autoimmune diseases, neurological issues like Alzheimer’s dementia. So yes, everybody has them, but again, are they causing issues? And there’s a lot of countries around the world that are cultures around the world that actually do parasite cleanses on a regular routine basis. But here in North America, it’s like a taboo thing. Everyone thinks that, you you have to go to Ethiopia or something like that to get parasites, but you’re just as likely to get them here as you would there.
07:57
I’m glad you mentioned the cleanses because that was one of my questions. Do detoxes, the common detoxes that we have, do they help with that? That’s a loaded question. Detox is such a broad term nowadays because there are special detox that they do and things like that. There are certain parasite cleanses, so there are certain herbs that are better for parasites in order to kill those off. But the biggest thing with detox too, you have to make sure your bowel is moving on regular basis.
08:27
know, your liver’s working appropriately. Because if not, then if you go do a cleanse or detox, and this is what I often see with people, if they go do a cleanse or detox, those things can’t get out of their system appropriately. And then they recirculate, people get sick. They’re actually worse than when they actually began. So a lot of patients come in like, did a detox and I feel worse. I’m like, that’s probably because you’re not pooping on regular basis or you’re not drinking enough water or your liver is a little sluggish. So, but yes, to answer your question, there is certain protocols and things that you can use for parasites themselves.
08:56
And what about probiotics, right? A lot of healthcare practitioners even are, you know, taking up, whenever I used to ask doctors on a podcast, what are the most common medications you take or vitamins, everybody would say, you know, a pre, post or, you know, probiotic. I was never taking one, but I want to know what your thoughts are on people generally taking probiotics. Yeah, probiotics as a whole are good. Now it also depends on the quantity and the quality that you’re getting too.
09:25
So you can cause more harm with probiotics. If you’re taking the wrong strands, you’re taking too high of a dose. So that’s where I personally like to test the gut to figure out, what are you deficient in? it lactobacillus? Is it bifidobacter? What are you missing that we actually need to put back in? Because if you take the wrong strands or you take too much of it, or let’s say you have already too much to begin with and you kind of push yourself over the edge there, you’re going to get, you know, worsening of digestive issues like the gas and the bloating. So probiotics definitely serve a time and a place, but it’s important to figure out which one do you actually need.
09:55
Like what are the best foods, right? In terms of gut health, I’m sure there’s a wide variety of them and it’s just like non-processed good, healthy foods. But are there certain foods that you tell your patients with certain gut issues to gear towards like nuts and seeds or what kind of foods would that be? Yeah, fermented foods by far are the one of most superior foods for the gut. So it’d be things like sauerkraut and kimchi and tempeh.
10:23
Because of that fermentation process, there’s a lot of good bacteria in there. Probiotics are already built in there. Now, when you add in good bacteria, you want to have some kind of fuel source too. So that’d your prebiotics. So that’d be things like apples, onion, garlic, dandelion greens, your leafy greens in general. So the prebiotics are like the fuel source for the probiotics. So they can actually have something to eat on and grow and kind of replicate. And then as a whole, like you want to stay away from things that are going to damage your gut. So again, that’s a processed foods.
10:51
Inflammatory foods, seed oils, tons of sugar. So real whole food diet would be the one I tell people, let’s aim for that as best we can. You know, I know your gut, you know, they say it affects your mood, your mental health, I guess, essentially. How does that work? Is that through, I mean, obviously there’s the enteric nervous system, so your gut brain connection. But like if I have, you know, poor gut health, how is it really affecting my mood?
11:17
Yeah. So what we know is about 90 % of your serotonin, which is that nice, relaxing brain chemical, and then 50 % of your dopamine, they’re actually made in the gut by your good bacteria. So if you’re going to be low on those good bacteria, you’re have a harder time producing those brain chemicals, those neurotransmitters. So then you’re talking, you know, anxiety, depression, maybe you can show up there quicker to outburst things like that. So there’s a huge component there. So we want to make sure again, we’re supporting that good bacteria. So we can actually build those neurotransmitters the right way.
11:47
I’m ask you a loaded question. ADHD. It’s a loaded question, but talk to me in detail about the process. I’m assuming it’s along the same lines, but is this the future of our children? Is the gut the culprit with ADHD? I hope it’s not the future. Let’s start there first. But if we continue to eat the foods we eat, if we continue to not sleep, if we continue to have these high levels of stress, then
12:16
Yeah, you can see these things continue to pop up, but the gut definitely plays a huge role. And when it comes ADHD, it’s not solely, you know, the main contributing factor. There are things like food additives. So, you know, things like food dyes is a huge one that doesn’t impact the brain. Nutrient deficiencies, which kind of connects back to gut health because you’re not absorbing things correctly. But a lot of nutrient deficiencies, you can see things like magnesium, like low dose lithium can be a big one too with kids.
12:43
But the gut definitely a role. again, kind of going back to that, like balance of good and bad bacteria. There is a lot of research showing that if there is any kind of imbalance there, you can see neurological things pop up like concentration, focused memory, which is your ADHD type symptoms. So it definitely plays a role. That’s always something when parents bring their kids in that we look at and make sure that there’s no issues there. And then we’re looking at nutrient deficiencies. What does their diet like? What does their sleep like? Are they under high levels of stress? Is there a lot of toxins in the environment too? We do see a lot of toxins that can lead to those things. So.
13:13
It’s really, I mean, that’s a really comprehensive one and the gut is at the center of that, but it’s not solely the main reason. You know, I know with a lot of kids with ADHD, I mean, we see them because of their eyes and they want to have their eyes tested, but a lot of parents come to us and say that, you know, my child has ADHD, they are on an iPad all day or under digital devices. And so, you know, the school or whoever feels that that is the reason they have this ADHD. I don’t feel like it’s talked enough about.
13:43
Like their nutrition is not talked about. Do you feel like, I know you can’t, I guess, put a stat on it, but do you feel nutrition plays a bigger role than, you know, screen time and things like that? Or do you feel the other way? There’s a ton of research with screen time in general too, affecting the brain in a negative manner, right? The longer you’re on it, they’re finding out the more worsening these symptoms kids are going to have.
14:09
That is a loaded question. can’t wish I could put a stat on it, but we’re definitely, you I don’t want to rate one over the other, but they’re equally beneficial. But we are seeing a direct correlation again with more screen time and more of these ADHD type symptoms in kids. So that’s a big one that I failed to mention previously, but yeah, that’s something that we also look at too. And I think as healthcare providers, we need to be talking about nutrition more. That’s a good take home from you. I’m going to shift to women, you know, and hormones because
14:39
I don’t think during parabenopause, menopause, people talk about gut health helping, I want to say to regulate your hormones such that you’re not having so many of those symptoms. How is it all correlated? Yeah, there’s a collection of bacteria in the gut called the astroblome, which helps regulate and produce your estrogen, a small percentage of it. It also helps you detoxify and get rid of it. So what we’re seeing now, especially in females, is something called estrogen dominance.
15:07
which essentially means there’s too much estrogen in the system. It comes from a variety of places. It could be poor detox in general to where females just aren’t detoxifying out of their system. But it also comes from beauty care products. It comes from plastics. It comes from cookware. These synthetic chemicals are very similar that we’re getting on daily basis to estrogen and then it builds up to toxic levels in the body. So as women, you know, go through the change and they go through menopause, if they have poor detox ability, then that makes things even harder for them.
15:36
And there’s also the big stress component to it as well because your ovaries aren’t going to be producing your estrogen and progesterone in higher levels anymore. You still produce it, but now your adrenal glands take over, which are your stress glands. So what I often see is the females who are higher stress have a harder time going through menopause because of that. Interesting. Do you feel that gluten, I mean, I want to say yes, does. you know, gluten obviously is an inflammatory marker.
16:04
Do you put a lot of your patients or even people during menopause on gluten-free diets just to help with those symptoms and being an inflammatory marker? Yeah. So gluten is a big inflammatory food. Unfortunately, it’s just gluten today is different than it was 100 years ago. The way it’s raised and what it’s sprayed with is inflammatory for a lot of people. So we do usually do some kind of like temporary elimination or reduction of gluten.
16:31
And then when we do reintroduce it, we should start with sourdough. Because of the fermentation process, it does knock down the gluten content significantly. So a lot of people, even some people with celiac disease can actually handle small amounts of sourdough in their diet. So that is a big one. Gluten, dairy, sugar, those are your big three inflammatory foods. If you had to tell your patients to cut out one food, would you say that would be gluten?
16:55
Oh man. If it’s a huge staple in their diet, yeah, absolutely. And especially if we see it on testing too, if we get like a stool test back and we see a high marker, then absolutely we’re taking it out. But gluten definitely is one of those things that, again, it’s in the top three. would probably say sugar would probably be number one in terms of what we’re dealing with. But yeah, I mean, all those foods are inflammatory for the body. And where does alcohol play a role in this? You knew that was coming.
17:23
Longest time everyone thought like, a little bit of red wine is actually good for the heart. Like there’s some benefits. know, right? And in the last five years, we see these research papers come out like actually, no, there’s no benefit at all to alcohol. So it is inflammatory. It does damage the gut lining. can put more stress on the liver, obviously being a toxin. So when we talk about female hormone health, it can put more stress on the liver, too. You can’t get rid of these hormones the right way. It does create large amounts of inflammation in the body in general.
17:51
If you are going to consume alcohol, what I always advise is like, yes, your wine is going to be your healthier option. And then your gin, vodka, things that are more distilled. Just kind of stay away from the darker liquors because those are ones that are a little more harder to break down, but more stress on the liver. Interesting. I don’t know if I knew that. Okay. In terms of like your foods to actually eat, are there actual foods that you would tell people like, okay, I want you to…
18:20
know, start on these foods. I know it’s not generalized across the board, but like avocados or bananas, like are there certain things that you’re going to like a class of foods that you’re going to recommend? Yeah, cruciferous vegetables are always one that I recommend to pretty much everybody because the amount of toxins we’re exposed to. So that’s things like broccoli, cauliflower, asparagus, brussels sprouts. Those are really good for supporting liver detoxification and helping reduce inflammation in the body. Things like good quality fats, like you mentioned avocados.
18:50
Sardines, olive oil, anything that has a good omega-3 rich content in it. We want to incorporate more of that to help reduce inflammation overall. One of the biggest things I tell people though is like, if you’re going to buy anything that comes out of a can or a box, pick it up, look at the back. Can you pronounce the ingredients? If you don’t know what they are, your body doesn’t know what they are, it’s going to have a hard time breaking it down and recognizing it. And that’s going to create inflammation. So we try to put our patients on a real whole foods diet, things that grow from the earth or walked on the earth. That’s what we’re trying to aim for.
19:18
That’s a really good one. I’m going to use that one. That’s really good. I can’t probably pronounce half the things. But you know what? It’s something for me to learn from as well. You know, I want to go back to the stool test. Is that really the only and primary test that should be done for the gut? I mean, is that the initial test? And then if there are further issues, we go on to other tests or, you know, that’s sufficient? No, and that’s a good place to start. That’s a good kind of a benchmark.
19:47
There’s other tests out there. There’s a condition called SIBO, which stands for small intestinal bacterial overgrowth. You can see markers for that on a stool test. And then if we see that, then okay, we’re probably gonna do one additional test to see, okay, how bad is this infection? But in terms of like general digestive issues, that’s the test I’m starting with. Do you not think everybody should be getting a stool test as part of their physical then? Because I don’t think like, to be honest, I don’t think I’ve ever had a stool test. I don’t think my kids obviously have not had one.
20:14
but should it not be part of like we have the regular urine blood work tests on our physicals, should it be part of that? 100%, absolutely, absolutely. But it comes down to the fact that it does prevent things from happening and when you prevent things from happening in the body, it takes money out of people’s pockets and big pharma doesn’t like that. So it’s part of the reason why we don’t see this as your standard of care. Wow, this is something that people need to self advocate for obviously. I wanna talk a little bit about, we mentioned the liver.
20:43
But the gallbladder, right? We don’t talk about the gallbladder a lot and it’s part of the gut, I want to say. How common are gallbladder issues and how do people recognize that they have any of these issues? Yeah, super common and definitely one of more underappreciated organs in the body, for sure. Essentially what the gallbladder does, helps to break down and absorb any kind of fat that you’re eating. So your liver makes bile. Bile is not going to be stored in the gallbladder. Let’s say you ate like an avocado.
21:12
Once it gets into the small intestine, the gallbladder is going to contract. It’s going to release that bile to help you break it down and absorb it. Um, I don’t know the exact number, but I want to say it’s between like 12 % of Americans have some kind of gallbladder issue. So if you’re lacking certain nutrients, you’re not going to release bile. If bile doesn’t get released, it gets stuck in that gallbladder and turns into a sludge. Sludge can eventually turn to stones. So that’s like one of most common things people see now, usually when you find stones, like through an ultrasound, that’s kind of like.
21:39
not end stage, but it means it’s been progressing for a long time. Females are definitely more prone to gallbladder issues. The reason why is the gallbladder also with that bile helps to bind up estrogen and bring it back to liver to help you detoxify it. So because of these high levels of estrogen in the body today, gallbladder issues are becoming more more common. Females that are under the age of 40, they’re still fertile. That’s kind of like the acronym you see typically in gallbladder issues. I don’t find them, I don’t find it very often in males.
22:08
maybe one out of every, I don’t know, 50 patients. don’t see it too often. It’s usually the female patients. But symptom wise, you can have pain underneath the right side of your rib cage. That’s pretty classic. If you have a hard time, like if you notice like, hey, I ate something fatty or fried and I started getting pain there, that’s a pretty classic symptom. You can have pain up between the shoulder blades. That’s also another referral pattern. So pain can show up there. Stool wise, if you see your stool floating a lot, means you’re not breaking down fats appropriately.
22:37
Or if you see like your stool is kind of greasy, shiny, maybe like sticking to the toilet bowl when you actually flush it, that’s also sign not breaking down fats appropriately. That could be a gallbladder issue. I’m to get to stool back in a second because you reminded me something, but gallbladder. So is it still a stool test that we’re doing to detect gallbladder issues ahead of time before we form those stones? Yeah. So that is a marker that does show up on there. Now symptom wise too, right? I you could have these symptoms and you don’t necessarily
23:05
need a stool test. You can say, every time I eat fat, I feel like crap and my stool is floating. It’s real greasy, shiny. That’s a good indicator there too. Okay. Back to the stool. So, you know, we see all these things on the internet, right? Your stool should be. Now, a lot of people are talking about the way you go to the washroom and like the type of stool that you have. tell me about that and what we’re looking for and how regular we should be.
23:35
Yep. So there’s something called the Bristol stool chart. If anybody wants to look this up so you can actually get a good like picture of what this should look like. Um, so your stool should be kind of like a Lincoln log type, type form. Um, so it should be, you know, easy to pass. Um, it should be solid. You don’t want anything that’s too loose. If it’s a little like soft serve ice cream, that’s okay, but you don’t want that on a consistent basis. Um, but you want good girth to your stool too. So, and you want to feel like you’re
24:01
Once you’re done, everything’s kind of been released. You don’t want to feel like anything is kind of still stuck in there. You should be going to the bathroom at least once a day. Um, most people, that’s not the case. Uh, some people it’s every third day. Some people it’s four to five times a day, but one to two times a day is what I tell people. But at minimum, at least once a day, you want to have the bowels to be moving because you want it. That’s the way that you do release toxins from your system too. So if you’re not releasing toxins, they can recirculate. You can get like the low energy fatigue and brain fog and things that pop up there too.
24:30
And what if you’re the person who’s going four or five times a day? What are the risks there? Or are there risks? Or maybe that’s a good thing. Yeah, no, no. If it’s formed like that, it’s not necessarily a bad thing. But if it’s going to be loose, you know, you do risk dehydration. probably the number one thing. And then especially if you start seeing like your undigested food in your stool too, that means things aren’t being broken down. So that tells you there’s something else going on upstream that you want to fix and work on. But yeah, four to five times a day is a little excessive.
24:59
I’d say like three max and get as long as it’s that good solid form. That’s kind of where you should be. And is there a perfect color? It’s so weird that we’re talking about this. But yeah, but you did compare it to soft serve ice cream. So that’s Dark brown is what you’re aiming for. So if you start seeing other colors pop up, that could be something else. Like if it’s a light clay color, it could be a pancreas problem. If you start seeing like green in your stool, that could be a gallbladder issue. So your stool does tell you a lot about what’s going on inside your gut.
25:28
And most people don’t want to look in the toilet bowl, it can tell you a lot about what’s going on. is there, you know, there are people that I know that will wait in the morning to go to the washroom and like caffeine is the trigger or certain things are the trigger for them to go to the bathroom. Is that a bad sign? Not necessarily. Caffeine is a stimulant, so it can move things throughout, you know, your digestive tract, which is okay.
25:56
What I often find though too is a lot of people who have to use caffeine to go to the bathroom, there’s some kind of stress component to it. So that could be more like a vagus nerve dysfunction to where things aren’t working appropriately. So you shouldn’t have to rely on caffeine in order to go to the bathroom. Interesting. You know, I know we talked a lot about the functional medicine side of it. Is there a place for medication and you know, what generally type of medications would you be giving? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, there’s
26:24
There’s a time and place for, you know, Eastern Western medicine, there, can’t sometimes medications needed. So, um, we always in our, at least in our office, we always try to do the natural route first. Um, you know, diet changes, stress, sleep, make sure those things are all improved. But yeah, medication wise, there is definitely time and place for it. Now, a lot of times to medications can be abused. So probably the most common one we see people come into in our office is like a PPI for acid reflux. You’re only supposed to stay on that for 14 days. We have people come in that been on those for 10, 20 years. That’s just.
26:54
poor medicine and whatever doctor they’re going to, it’s poor. They should not be on it for that long. That’s probably the most common one we see is PPIs. We’ll see a lot of people using Mirallax, which doesn’t fix anything. It just kind of moves the bowels and helps regulate things. But again, what’s actually causing those things to begin with? So those are probably the biggest two that we see. Yeah, I’d say probably those two. A lot of people take probiotics back to that.
27:21
know, as one of the Medicaid. And I’m sure a lot of your patients come in and the first, you know, part of their vitamin list, they say probiotics. What are the natural foods? You touched on this a little bit, but that are in everybody’s everyday foods that they can just easily eat to get that natural probiotic. Like, is yogurt a big one? Yeah, yogurt’s good source. Yogurt, kefir, sauerkraut, kimchi, tempeh, those are like your more common ones.
27:48
Um, kombucha is considered a, know, a fermentant food. Now you get, you have to watch the sugar content in that sourdough bread, even though it’s fermentant, it doesn’t have like the good bacteria in there, but the fermentation process does happen. But those are your most common ones that people could add in. And personally to me, I would rather someone eat their probiotics. I’d rather people, Hey, let’s try to get through diet first, as opposed to just loading you up with a bunch of probiotics. Um, so we always try to get people to do that first. And then if we get a stool test back, we see.
28:14
someone super low in something, then we can add in a probiotic that’s more targeted for that condition. A lot of patients talk about bloating, you know, a lot. And it’s a very loose term. I don’t even know how to describe it, but just, you know, we’re bloated, you know, and a lot of people will say, Hey, we just got back from vacation, so we’re bloated because we ate a lot of bad foods. Can we touch on that? Like what essentially is bloating and is it an issue that needs to be addressed ASAP? Yeah. So bloating is going to be just
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general like distension of the stomach. And usually that’s from a large amount of gas that’s either trapped or not moving appropriately, or that’s being produced by something. So it could be from certain foods you’re eating that can produce that. process inflammatory foods is a huge culprit. You’ll see it a lot. Seed oils is another big one. Alcohol can be a big contributing factor as well. You can also see bloating if there’s some kind of, again, bad bacterial overgrowth. That’s one of most common.
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side effects you’re going to see. the condition I mentioned earlier, SIBO, that’s like the number one side effect is going to be bloating there. You can also see that in organ malfunction. So if the liver is not working appropriately or the pancreas isn’t breaking things down appropriately, or if there’s a little bit of that leaky gut going on, you can see bloating as a side effect there. So is it a major concern if you get back from vacation, you ate crappy, that’s kind of, you you should go back. Yeah, normal. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. But if it’s something that’s happening on a daily basis or if you’re waking up with it, like
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Hey, I woke up and had a flat stomach and by lunch, it looks like I’m six months pregnant. That’s a sign from your body that something’s going on that needs to be looked at. Wow. You know, another one we hear or we see a lot of patients saying they’re diagnosed with is just inflammatory bowel syndrome. Um, that is so common. Can we touch on, you know, how that’s happening and how do we help with natural foods? Yeah, I love that one. Cause people come in and I got diagnosed with IBD. I’m like, okay, so your bowels are inflamed. Why? Like what’s going on? Like what?
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that’s the worst diagnosis ever because it doesn’t tell you anything except for your bowels are inflamed. So a lot of times what I find with that is it’s going to be the foods that people are eating. So that’s a huge contributing factor. I do find high levels of stress too. there parasites is a huge one with IBD as well. So the inflammation that gets created there. And then again, organ malfunction can show up there too where things aren’t being broken down, but diet’s always the first place we start with people. So we try to aim for like an anti-inflammatory more like a Mediterranean type diet.
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we’re getting more of those omega threes in there. We’re removing those processed foods out of their diet. And then usually in that case, we’re going to use more targeted supplements too. Things like postbiotics, butyrate is one of the most common ones that we’re going to use. Something else help calm down inflammation. So that could be something like a boswellia or tumeric or black cumin seed oil. There’s a lot of different naturally anti-inflammatory that you can use for that as well. But then making sure again, make sure the gut’s optimized the way it should, the diet’s optimized the way that it should. And then
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The other things, the sleep, the stress, the toxins, making sure everyone’s avoiding those things. It’s so interesting because it’s like all of these conditions are all tied in and it’s the same common things you hear, right? You hear the processed foods, the alcohol, the sugar, all of the same things. And those lifestyle modifications can probably resolve a lot of these issues or…
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resolve it to certain degree. What do you feel is going to be like, are there breakthroughs coming through? I mean, you probably do a lot more reading up on, you new research on gut health. Like are there new medications or new breakthroughs that, that you feel are important for our listeners to know? Yeah, a big one, and it’s going to sound really weird. a fecal transplant is a really common one that’s becoming really popular right now. So essentially what they’re doing is they’re
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taking fecal matter from someone with a nice healthy gut microbiome. And then they’re inserting that back rectally into the gut essentially to help repopulate the gut. So if someone has a really bad dysbiotic, poor gut health, they can actually use that healthy fecal matter. And again, I know it sounds gross to go back in and actually help rebalance things back out. So that’s probably the biggest thing that we’re seeing right now. It’s becoming more more common. There’s more more hospitals and medical offices doing these things.
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But it’s still pretty taboo because again, it’s a gross thing. I’ve seen patients have it done with pretty amazing benefits. So it’s something that I always encourage people to do if they’re willing to do something like that.
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Wow, that’s really cool. Also gross, but really cool. I’ve actually never heard of that. So that’s amazing. Thank you so much, Marcus, for your time today. Really appreciate everything and all the advice that you’ve given all of us. I know that I’ll take home a lot about my gut and have to check out my stool next time, which is gross, but I’ll have to. Tell us where our listeners can find you. I’m on social media. So I’m at DrMarcusRell. can find me on there. try to give much free information and things out there as I can.
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Our website is balanceholistichealthcenter.com. So if anybody’s looking to schedule appointment, we do see people virtually from around the world as well. And yeah, just trying to help as many people as we can and spread awareness to these gut issues, because it is such a common thing that people need to know about. we’ll put everything in the show notes. I follow you on Instagram and definitely, like, I didn’t even know about the allergies connection with gut health and I have severe allergies. So, you know, thank you for sharing all that advice. I encourage people to follow you on Instagram.
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so that they can, you know, open their eyes to all these issues. Thank you so much for your time today. Thanks for having me. Thank you listeners and viewers for tuning in. If you want to catch more episodes of Uncover Your Eyes, make sure to follow or subscribe on your favorite podcast platform and on YouTube. To learn more about me, follow me on Instagram @Dr.MeenalAgarwal Until next time, keep those eyes uncovered!
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See comfortably, near and far.
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with total multifocal contact lenses. Feels like nothing.