LDL cholesterol, apoprotein B, saturated fat, TMAO, statin cholesterol drugs: Over the last 40 years, we have been inundated with misguided advice on how to reduce your risk for coronary heart disease, i.e., risk for such things as heart attack, need for heart procedures such as stent implantation or bypass surgery, or sudden cardiac death, serious and often life-threatening events. Has it worked? 80 million Americans now take statin drugs to reduce cholesterol yet there has been no meaningful reduction in such events and, in fact, I’ll bet some of your local hospitals have added multi-million dollar wings for cardiac care, the number one moneymaker for hospitals and healthcare.

The tragedy of all this is that the focus on issues like cholesterol have taken everyone’s focus off the REAL causes of heart disease that are, in reality, easy to identify and manage. And it involves no pharmaceuticals, no restriction of dietary fat, but draws from a handful of common sense and natural strategies that, time and again, have allowed people to stop or even reverse coronary atherosclerosis.

_________________________________________________________________________________

For BiotiQuest probiotics including Sugar Shift, go here.

A 15% discount is available for Defiant Health podcast listeners by entering discount code UNDOC15 (case-sensitive) at checkout.*
_________________________________________________________________________________
Get your 15% Paleovalley discount on fermented grass-fed beef sticks, Bone Broth Collagen, low-carb snack bars and other high-quality organic foods here.*

For 12% off every order of grass-fed and pasture-raised meats from Wild Pastures, go here.

_____________________________________________________________________________

MyReuteri and Gut to Glow can be found here: oxiceutics.com

Support the show

Books:

Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight

Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight and Find Your Path Back to Health; revised & expanded ed

Go to any supermarket and you will see the impressive variety of products in the dairy aisle labeled "yogurt." You have a mindboggling collection of choices: non-fat, low-fat, full-fat, flavored, unflavored. Single-serve cartons, quart containers, squeezable tubes, jars. Will consuming any of these products change your life in any significant way? Will you be heathier, have better bowel health, skin health, metabolic health, mental health?

Let’s discuss why, no, you will not experience any dramatic life-altering effects from consuming these products. They may be tasty, but they will not change your life in any meaningful way. But, by modifying what we call yogurt, you CAN create something that looks and smells like yogurt but DOES provide substantial life- and health-changing effects.

__________________________________________________________________________

For BiotiQuest probiotics including Sugar Shift, go here.

A 15% discount is available for Defiant Health podcast listeners by entering discount code UNDOC15 (case-sensitive) at checkout.*
_________________________________________________________________________________
Get your 15% Paleovalley discount on fermented grass-fed beef sticks, Bone Broth Collagen, low-carb snack bars and other high-quality organic foods here.*

For 12% off every order of grass-fed and pasture-raised meats from Wild Pastures, go here.

_____________________________________________________________________________

MyReuteri and Gut to Glow can be found here: oxiceutics.com

Support the show

Books:

Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight

Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight and Find Your Path Back to Health; revised & expanded ed

The practice of immersing your body in ice water is growing in popularity based on claims of improved mood and well-being, muscle recovery after exercise, even longevity. But this ignores the well-established fact that sudden cardiac death is a real risk due to coronary spasm, causing heart attack, and unstable heart rhythms due to a situation called autonomic conflict. There are a growing number of lawsuits that have been filed for the many sudden cardiac deaths that have occurred. So let’s discuss what we know about this concept of cold water immersion and why it is such a dangerous practice.

• Immersion in water around 15°C/60°F triggers dangerous physiological responses
• Cold exposure causes coronary arteries to spasm, potentially leading to heart attack
• Most adults have some degree of endothelial dysfunction, making them vulnerable
• "Autonomic conflict" occurs when both nervous system branches activate simultaneously
• Multiple lawsuits have been filed over deaths from ice baths and polar plunges
• Safer alternatives exist for achieving the claimed benefits of cold exposure
• Cold showering (starting warm and gradually cooling) may offer similar benefits with less risk

________________________________________________________________________________

For BiotiQuest probiotics including Sugar Shift, go here.

A 15% discount is available for Defiant Health podcast listeners by entering discount code UNDOC15 (case-sensitive) at checkout.*
_________________________________________________________________________________
Get your 15% Paleovalley discount on fermented grass-fed beef sticks, Bone Broth Collagen, low-carb snack bars and other high-quality organic foods here.*

For 12% off every order of grass-fed and pasture-raised meats from Wild Pastures, go here.

_____________________________________________________________________________

MyReuteri and Gut to Glow can be found here: oxiceutics.com

Support the show

Books:

Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight

Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight and Find Your Path Back to Health; revised & expanded ed

Over 50% of Americans are, at any one time, trying to lose weight. So it’s understandable that the GLP-1 agonist drugs like Ozempic and Mounjaro have become so popular, given their spectacular upfront results. Others have used reduced calorie diets in their various forms: counting points, assigning foods red, yellow, or green lights, meal replacement products, etc. Or bariatric procedures like lap-band, jejunoileal bypass, or gastric bypass. But there is a lot that people are not told about these methods. The near-term prospect of losing weight is so enticing to people and so profitable to doctors, the healthcare system, and the pharmaceutical industry that is simply no incentive to tell you the full story.

So let me fill you in on the real story, the full details about why cutting calories, regardless of the form it takes, can be so dangerous.

_________________________________________________________________________________

For BiotiQuest probiotics including Sugar Shift, go here.

A 15% discount is available for Defiant Health podcast listeners by entering discount code UNDOC15 (case-sensitive) at checkout.*
_________________________________________________________________________________
Get your 15% Paleovalley discount on fermented grass-fed beef sticks, Bone Broth Collagen, low-carb snack bars and other high-quality organic foods here.*

For 12% off every order of grass-fed and pasture-raised meats from Wild Pastures, go here.

_____________________________________________________________________________

MyReuteri and Gut to Glow can be found here: oxiceutics.com

Support the show

Books:

Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight

Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight and Find Your Path Back to Health; revised & expanded ed

I first met Dr. Eric Westman at a low-carbohydrate meeting a number of years ago where he discussed an extremely important and insightful human clinical trial he had conducted in which he counseled participants with type 2 diabetes to follow a very low-carbohydrate, essentially ketogenic, diet. He was almost prohibited from conducted the study because some colleagues felt it was too dangerous. Nonetheless, the study was completed and demonstrated that type 2 diabetic participants no longer needed insulin and most diabetes drugs while achieving improved blood glucose measures by engaging in a lifestyle that was the direct opposite of conventional dietary advice. As groundbreaking as this study was for its time, it is simply not talked about enough, as it is one of the most important pieces of evidence that validates the idea that limiting carbohydrates and sugars, not fats or saturated fats, is key to, in this case, improving diabetes control, even helping make many people non-diabetic. I therefore thought it would be a good idea to ask Dr. Westman to describe his rationale for the study, discuss the results, and share the lessons he has learned since then.

For BiotiQuest probiotics including Sugar Shift, go here.

A 15% discount is available for Defiant Health podcast listeners by entering discount code UNDOC15 (case-sensitive) at checkout.*
_________________________________________________________________________________
Get your 15% Paleovalley discount on fermented grass-fed beef sticks, Bone Broth Collagen, low-carb snack bars and other high-quality organic foods here.*

For 12% off every order of grass-fed and pasture-raised meats from Wild Pastures, go here.

_____________________________________________________________________________

MyReuteri and Gut to Glow can be found here: oxiceutics.com

Support the show

Books:

Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight

Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight and Find Your Path Back to Health; revised & expanded ed

We all recognize that American healthcare is a badly broken system. Wildly overpriced, exploitative, with a focus on pharmaceuticals and medical procedures to the exclusion of basic issues such as nutrition, the role of nutrients, and the microbiome. Can we expect doctors, healthcare executives, pharma or medical device executives to find better solutions?

I highly doubt it. One of the problems plaguing conventional delivery of healthcare is that doctors lack the time, knowledge, and frankly the interest in spending more time with their patients, hearing about their issues, then creating solutions that address their unique concerns.

Enter the age of health coaches. A number of years ago, when I first heard about this phenomenon, of heath coaches playing a role in the delivery of health, I was skeptical. But over the past decade, as I’ve worked with health coaches, witnessed what they could accomplish, and heard plenty of positive feedback from the public engaging their services, my opinions about health coaching has completely changed. I now see them as part of the engine that will drive improvements in healthcare.

I therefore tracked down Sandra Scheinbaum, a Phd clinical psychologist who counseled patients for many years but then diverted her career into functional medicine and health coaching, bringing the unique insights into human behavior and emotions that came from decades of practicing clinical psychology, now applied to health coaching. Dr. Scheinbaum founded the Functional Medicine Coaching Academy that educates and trains people in acquiring the skills and knowledge to practice as a health coach. She is also author of several books including Functional Medicine Coaching: Stories from the Movement That's Transforming Healthcare, and her newest book, Your Health Coach Will See You Now available in April 2025 on Amazon and selected bookstores. In this episode of Defiant Health, Dr. Scheinbaum recounts how she made this change in direction and what she foresees for the future of this important phenomenon of health coaching.

For more information:

FunctionalMedicineCoaching.org

___________________________________________________________________
For BiotiQuest probiotics including Sugar Shift, go here.

A 15% discount is available for Defiant Health podcast listeners by entering discount code UNDOC15 (case-sensitive) at checkout.*
_________________________________________________________________________________
Get your 15% Paleovalley discount on fermented grass-fed beef sticks, Bone Broth Collagen, low-carb snack bars and other high-quality organic foods here.*

For 12% off every order of grass-fed and pasture-raised meats from Wild Pastures, go

Support the show

Books:

Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight

Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight and Find Your Path Back to Health; revised & expanded ed

Over the past decade, most of us have converted our home lighting to light-emitting diode (LED) bulbs, as they save a significant amount of energy, requiring 75-90% less energy than older incandescent lights. Personally, I converted the 50 or lightbulbs in my house to nearly all LEDs.

Most current LEDs emit, of course, visible light. But they also emit a significant amount of blue light and very little red and infrared (IR), in contrast to old-fashioned incandescent bulbs that emit some blue and a lot of red and IR. Remember when you had to change an incandescent bulb when it died? If you tried to unscrew it, it could burn your hand because the bulb was extremely hot. That’s the effect of red and IR that generates heat. Change a LED bulb and you can do so immediately, as the bulb is cool, even after dying just moments earlier. This is due to the absence of significant amounts of red and IR.

While well-intended to save energy, it is now becoming clear that the wholesale conversion to blue-emitting LED lighting has been exerting adverse health effects, especially visual. So let’s begin talking about the role of light, specifically blue wavelengths in this episode of the Defiant Health podcast, then about the role of red and IR in a future episode. _______________________________________________________________________________
For BiotiQuest probiotics including Sugar Shift, go here.

A 15% discount is available for Defiant Health podcast listeners by entering discount code UNDOC15 (case-sensitive) at checkout.*
_________________________________________________________________________________
Get your 15% Paleovalley discount on fermented grass-fed beef sticks, Bone Broth Collagen, low-carb snack bars and other high-quality organic foods here.*

For 12% off every order of grass-fed and pasture-raised meats from Wild Pastures, go here.
_____________________________________________________________________________

MyReuteri and Gut to Glow can be found here: oxiceutics.com

Support the show

Books:

Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight

Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight and Find Your Path Back to Health; revised & expanded ed

I’ve touched on the topic of endotoxemia in past episodes of the Defiant Health podcast. In this episode, let’s dive deeper into this topic that is absolutely crucial to understanding and managing SO many aspects of health, from subduing anxiety and panic, to depressive, to joint pain and skin rashes, to gastrointestinal conditions, even weight management.

What is endotoxemia? Fecal microbes, so-called Gram-negative species because of the way these microbes take up stain for examination under a microscope, species such as E. coli and Salmonella, have something called lipopolysaccharide endotoxin in their cells walls. Other species, so-called Gram positive species such as Enterococcus, Staphylococcus, and Streptococcus, that stain in a different manner, have something called lipoteichoic acid in their cell walls. When these microbes die, both Gram-negative and Gram-positive, these toxic factors are released into the intestines. If these fecal microbes are confined to the colon, where they belong, a section of GI tract adapted to their presence, the entry of these toxic components are limited and current evidence is unclear in how importat this process is. The real trouble occurs, however, when fecal microbes have invaded the 24-feet of small intestine, a process we label small intetinal bacterial overgrowth, or SIBO, because the small intestine—the stomach, duodenum, jejunum, and ileum are not well-adapted to the invasion of fecal species. Here, they die, release their toxic components, which then enter the bloodstream, the process labeled endotoxemia. People with SIBO therefore have high blood levels of endotoxin. This is how microbes in the GI Tract export their effects to other parts of the body. Let’s discuss this process and how you can take control over your emotions, mood, sleep, energy, weight, and numerous other aspects of health. _______________________________________________________________________________
For BiotiQuest probiotics including Sugar Shift, go here.

A 15% discount is available for Defiant Health podcast listeners by entering discount code UNDOC15 (case-sensitive) at checkout.*
_________________________________________________________________________________
Get your 15% Paleovalley discount on fermented grass-fed beef sticks, Bone Broth Collagen, low-carb snack bars and other high-quality organic foods here.*

For 12% off every order of grass-fed and pasture-raised meats from Wild Pastures, go here.
_____________________________________________________________________________

MyReuteri and Gut to Glow can be found here: oxiceutics.com

Support the show

Books:

Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight

Wheat Belly: Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight and Find Your Path Back to Health; revised & expanded ed