Tag Archives: antibiotics

Gut Health Wellness Trend 2016

gut-health-stomach-vegetablesIn 2016 gut health became an increasingly popular topic of discussion throughout the health and wellness world. There is increasing awareness of the value of gut health as it is integral to overall health.

Huffington Post Health Australia published an article last week entitled 6 Things We Learned About Gut Health and the Microbiome in 2016 that sums up this central theme of the year. Because our bodies are populated with a collection of bacteria (aka our “microbiome”), it’s important that we focus on a proper internal balance in order to harness its beneficial abilities.

Researchers are increasingly focused on the influence of bacteria on our bodies. Others suggest that research on bacteria may present the next frontier in modern medicine.

This article summarized six key points about gut health this year:

  1. It is related to weight loss. – “Obese people have less diverse microbiomes than healthy people”. King’s College London professor of Genetic Epidemiology Tim Spector told The Huffington Post Australia we were only beginning to understand why.
  2. It is related to mental health. – “Research from scientists with New York City’s Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai found that altering the gut bacteria in a sick person might help alleviate psychiatric conditions.”
  3. It could be related to migraines. – “A study by the University of California San Diego Health Sciences found people who got migraines had significantly more microbes with the ability to break down nitrates in their mouth than the rest of the population.”
  4. It may affect sleep and jet lag. – “Research associate Dr Amy Reynolds told HuffPost Australia sleep was mysteriously linked to diabetes, obesity and other chronic health conditions and answers could be found in the microbiome.”
  5. Early use of antibiotics could permanently affect the microbiome. – “A University of Helsinki study found early use of antibiotics in children could alter the natural population of microbes in a way that left them at higher risk of weight gain and asthma later in childhood.”
  6. It could be used to make medicine. – “Biologists and medical engineers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are reprogramming gut bacteria to act as “living therapeutics” that can correct the metabolic dysfunctions underlying certain ailments.”

For the full article from HuffPost Australia, please visit this link.

For thousands of years people around the world have found that fermenting certain foods in a controlled way increases digestibility of the raw food and adds health-giving effects, thus improving gut health. Taking Regulat® daily may help to improve gut health and overall balance in the microbiome.

Lyme Disease and Intestinal Immunity

Lyme disease was first identified in 1975 in Lyme, Conn., which gave it its name. In September 2015, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) revised their estimates for people having Lyme disease, indicating that there are more than 329,000 new cases a year in the US – an increase of up to 10 times what was previously believed.

Unfortunately, many cases are not diagnosed properly and current diagnostics miss up to 60% of acute cases (ref. Bay Area Lyme Foundation – http://www.bayarealyme.org). 40% of Lyme patients end up with long-term health problems – the average patient sees 5 doctors over nearly 2 years before being diagnosed. (International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society – http://www.ilads.org). According to Dr. Mercola, “Sometimes the cell wall can collapse around the bacterium, forming a cloaking device that allows it to evade detection by many tests and by your body’s immune system.” For this reason, many fear that Lyme is actually a silent epidemic.

When one suffers from Lyme disease, the body’s immune system may be compromised to varying degrees. Although there is no consensus in the medical community on the use of anitibiotics to treat Lyme disease, many Lyme sufferers have a compromised immune system – and antibiotics are known to kill off the good bacteria required to support the intestinal immune system. Richard Horowitz, one of the most prominent “Lyme literate” physicians in the US, has seen more than twelve thousand patients, all of whom have a tick-borne ailment. Whenever possible, he avoids antibiotics. (http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/07/01/the-lyme-wars)

Immunity Resides in the Gut
Approximately 70-80% of your immune tissue is located within your digestive system, and so-called killer T-cells (the white blood cells that defend against infection), are created in the intestinal system. So building the immune system is highly important for Lyme patients. One of the most beneficial ways to improve your gut bacteria is by incorporating fermented foods into your daily diet. Friendly gut flora found in fermented foods have been shown to survive the digestive process. So they are therefore able to introduce positive changes to the gut, allow it to function more efficiently and help the immune system do its job more effectively. screen-shot-2016-09-19-at-2-29-28-pm

Dr. Byron Braid, who has worked with Dr. Thomas Rau of the Paracelsus Clinic in Switzerland, has a ‘secret ingredient’ that helps build such intestinal efficiency and immunity – Regulat®!

Regulat® is a whole food preparation with broad-spectrum phytonutrients, produced by live Cascade Fermentation™. It began in Germany…70 years’ worth of scientific research on plant enzymes propelled the Munich company Dr. Niedermaier Pharma to world fame as the expert in the field of fermented health products.