What No One Is Telling You About Autoimmune Gut Conditions
Episode 157
This week we bring you yet another informative episode on Integrative Wellness Radio about Autoimmune Gut Conditions. There are a lot of false beliefs when it comes down to autoimmune conditions. Dr. Nicole sheds light and navigates us through some of the leading factors causing gut conditions, from parasites to Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) in this day and age. Listen as she gives us more insight into the right testing to properly diagnose and overcome some of the common autoimmune gut conditions. Interested in learning more about Dr. Nick & Dr. Nicole’s courses, memberships, or private work? Learn more at Integrative You . Have a quick question, Would you like to schedule a call, or just want to say hi? Text us at 732.913.0009. Our mission to innovate humans & Healthcare does NOT start and stop with us! This is why we are also dedicated to helping other practitioners in evolving healthcare too! If you are a healthcare leader and are looking to up-level your clinical + business excellence Learn more about our course membership: Limitless Healthprenuer and start boldly disrupting this industry! Noteworthy Time Stamps: 01:29 IWG’s goal in Integrative Space 03:10 Dr. Nicole’s personal story with autoimmune gut issues 13:20 Using the same approach when it comes to gut 19:12 A patient’s case study 21:11 Immune system’s job 29:01 Myths about Autoimmune Gut Conditions 36:45 Limitations with conventional testing for gut conditions 39:57 Celiac is often confused with autoimmune pernicious anemia 47:00 A patient’s story with Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) 52:08 The right testing for AIGC
Topics: autoimmune, conditions, testing, learn, integrative, irritable, immune, unknown
Key takeaways from this episode
- ## What No One Is Telling You About Autoimmune Gut Conditions
- Understand the multifaceted causes of gut conditions beyond the surface level.
- Learn about the limitations of conventional testing for accurate autoimmune gut diagnoses.
- Discover the crucial role of the immune system's function in gut health.
- Gain insight into how patient experiences and case studies illuminate effective approaches.
Pull quotes
Imagine if medicine actually looked at you as a whole opposed to looking at you as a bunch of separate systems.
Nick and Dr. **Unknown:** Nicole to learn more about the top trends in integrative medicine, to learn about what the limitations are with testing, and what you can do to start your health journey.
Sometimes I tend to lose myself when I'm out here on the- Hello, hello, everyone.
Transcript
**Unknown:** I been up all night, no sleep. Imagine if medicine actually looked at you as a whole opposed to looking at you as a bunch of separate systems. Dive into Integrative Wellness Radio with Dr. Nick and Dr.
**Unknown:** Nicole to learn more about the top trends in integrative medicine, to learn about what the limitations are with testing, and what you can do to start your health journey. Sometimes I tend to lose myself when I'm out here on the- Hello, hello, everyone. Welcome to our podcast. So today our big focus is really honing in on autoimmune gut conditions, but we're definitely going to be just kind of talking about the limitations in testing and some of the things that get really, really confusing when we're trying to research what's best for us.
**Unknown:** Which really brings me to this quote that I constantly say with patients is, "You don't know what you don't know." If you haven't had the right testing, it's not possible for you to really know what's going on in your body. And there's also a lot of false beliefs that we have. Uh, one of the big ones is that we're ... our health is 100% gonna decline with aging, and I'm gonna shed light a little bit on that and how that relates back to the gut.
**Unknown:** And then obviously being able to give you some tools of how you can start this process of actually getting answers and then obviously starting to feel better, which is most important. So a little bit about our practice, Integrative Wellness Group, is we have always done things a little bit differently, but I think that primarily in my experience and going through school and going through clinical practice, I just found that this concept of always seeking out the specialists or seeking out the experts, um, even when I was going through just learning and trying to learn about Lyme and learn about mold and learn about gut issues, I found myself really taking pearls of knowledge from all different places and all different people. And I never found that sticking with one protocol or, or one concept or following, you know, one set of research was what was getting me results in my clinical practice. So I really wanted to think beyond just focusing on this one approach and truly move into an integrative space, which has really been such an evolution, number one, but also, number two, it's really allowed us to get amazing clinical results, um, in a very, very short amount of time, which I personally find to be really, really exciting.
**Unknown:** Because at the end of the day, when we really think about this concept of a diagnosis, our diagnosis is strictly a description of our symptoms. You know, you may be dealing with irritable bowel syndrome, also known as IBS. If you really think about irritable bowel syndrome, it's just describing your symptoms. It's describing that your gut is irritable.
**Unknown:** It's actually not necessarily giving you a definitive answer as to why your gut is irritated. So when you truly dig deeper and you understand the root, the approach and the protocols become a lot easier. Kind of a little bit further on how I got into this is I don't have that story that I was really, really sick, and I went through all different types of treatments, and then I ended up with a functional medicine or integrative medicine doctor that got me back to health. I actually had a pretty, uh, different scenario, and I was ...
**Unknown:** When I did my testing, I primarily thought that everything was gonna check out perfect. I thought I was in really good health. I thought that I felt great. I worked out.
**Unknown:** I was conscious of my diet. And at the end of the day, what I found is I was just comparing myself to the people around me because I knew more than them, and I did more than them. But when it came to really truly understanding what health was, I really had no idea at that time in my life. So I did my testing, and it actually came back that I had massive gastrointestinal distress.
**Unknown:** Uh, I had a lot of infections in my gut, which I'm gonna elaborate further on in reference to these different pathologies of the gut. Um, one of the biggest things that I was dealing with was actually parasite issues. And for those of you new to that concept, um, when you're dealing with parasite issues, first of all, they're very, very high, hard to diagnose, number one, and number two is they create a lot of, uh, different effects also from a mood standpoint. They can create a lot of anger, irritability, um, almost like fluctuations.
**Unknown:** You could even call it bipolar. So for me, when I actually reflected back on my gut, my testing's obviously telling me that I had a lot of issues in my gut, but the stress on my gut actually for me manifested more mentally and emotionally because I had these organisms in my system that were completely throwing off my neurological pathways, and I'm gonna actually dive into that a little bit more, talking about some of the research that, uh, references how parasites can actually hijack your behaviors, which is completely fascinating. Um, but in addition to that, I also had a lot of mercury toxicity, and when it comes to my, my, uh, parasite exposure and my mercury exposure, that was ... actually had a lot to do with my diet.
**Unknown:** So I thought I was being super healthy by being a pescatarian. Uh, primarily what that means is I was only eating fish and, and vegetables. So I was not eating any poultry, and I was not eating any types of red meat. And I thought that this was really smart.
**Unknown:** I was getting a lot of Omega-3s. I was, you know, low calorie. I was eating, you know, really clean and really fresh, and I didn't really understand that not all fish is created equal and not all sushi is created equal. So it was kind of the more the merrier.
**Unknown:** And I found myself ending up with mercury toxicity in addition to a lot of microorganisms in my gut that should have never been there, and that had a lot to do withThings that I thought I was doing right, but I wasn't. So that's really the biggest thing is you don't know what you don't know, number one, and it's not your fault. It's not your fault that you don't know these things because we're working against media that is giving us a lot of really bad information, and it makes us really, really confused. So I kind of said this already, but I just want you to understand that if you have tried to get better, you've tried to seek out help, you've tried supplements, you've tried to change your diet, and you haven't gotten better, it's not your fault.
**Unknown:** There is so much information out there. It is extremely hard to navigate. It is so hard to know what diet is good for you because you may have a friend who did keto and is like, "Oh my God, this was life-changing," and you do keto, and you feel like crap. And then the same thing goes for paleo.
**Unknown:** The same thing goes for being a vegan. You have to understand that every single person is extremely different, and their needs are really different. So unfortunately, we don't, in this, you know, day and age of healthcare, we don't really test for those specifics. We don't look at every person as a whole.
**Unknown:** We don't look at everyone as being an individual. We kind of assume that, okay, if you have an infection, you take an antibiotic, or if you have, um, you know, gut issues, you go low-FODMAP diet, and it's always like this black and white. And unfortunately, when-- Because I've been in clinical practice for nine years now, nothing is black and white. Nothing is.
**Unknown:** There is so much gray, and there is so much difference person to person, despite if their diagnosis is the same. So it's really trying to understand that you need approach that's gonna help you understand your body and your needs, and it's all about strategy. When it comes to getting better, it's not about what you do, it's about how you do it. And some of you listening may have done amazing expensive supplements, and you may have gone on this most hardcore elimination diet and are mad because you didn't get the results that you hoped for.
**Unknown:** And sometimes it's not about what you did, it's about not having the strategy in place and not having the guidance and maybe not doing things at the right time. So when it comes to treatment, I'm gonna kind of expand about-- upon this concept so you understand it a little bit more in depth. When we're talking about always wanting to work with the expert or always wanting to go to a specialist that specializes in our condition, we can sometimes find ourselves falling flat, and it's because we are not necessarily looking at the body as a whole, and we are assuming that all systems are functioning separately. And that kind of brings me to this second point of understanding basic physiology.
**Unknown:** So those of you listening are probably here because you're dealing with a gut issue. So I don't know if many of you know, but ninety, and some research says ninety-five percent of your serotonin, which is your feel-good hormone, is made in your gut. So if you're a person who's been struggling with gut issues, even if it's as mild as this moderate indigestion that you get sometimes, or if it's as extreme as ulcerative colitis, you still have a gut issue. So if you have a gut issue, but you're also struggling with your mood, or you feel depressed, or you've been diagnosed with bipolar, or even as extreme of being schizophrenic, you could easily have a major problem with what your treatment protocol is because we're trying to fix a neurological system without considering the gut being connected.
**Unknown:** And at that point, you're usually working with a psychiatrist or a psychologist, and you're also working with a gastroenterologist, and nobody is talking to each other. So when we take this linear approach, or we start to break up the systems of the body, that's when we end up on a ton of medications and a ton of unnecessary, you know, protocols, procedures, surgeries, et cetera. So when we start looking at the body as a whole, we have a completely different perspective on how to heal. And part of this comes down to the way that we do testing, especially in the US.
**Unknown:** So most of our testing is chemistry-based. So when you're talking about what that means is most of our testing is blood work, it's urine analysis. Some integrated functional doctors are doing stool samples and doing saliva tests. So at the end of the day, all of these tests are still chemistry-based.
**Unknown:** So think about it. If you get your blood work back, and something is wrong with your chemistry or your biochemistry, then we are going to use chemistry-altering substances to fix the problem. So those chemistry-altering substances are drugs, medications. So when people come to our office, and they go, "Why do you guys do this and nobody else does?
**Unknown:** Why doesn't everybody have this technology? Why doesn't everybody do things integratively?" It's because our system is for profit, and that's the case for many places in the world. But medicine is for profit, and there is a big influence with drug companies, and I'm not, you know, saying this to, to create waves. It's just the reality of it.
**Unknown:** So when we look at broken chemistry through our testing, we are going to fix it with pharmacology. So the system is built on that. So when we're talking about, you know, "Why is nobody a- telling me about what I should eat and what I shouldn't eat, and why is nobody talking to me about supplements that will compli- complement my medication?" It's because the system is not set up that way. And in addition, your doctors don't have the ability to spend time with you.
**Unknown:** There is limitations depending on the environment that they work in, especially if you're working in a hospital setting. So with all of that being said, this is what does not allow us to understand the root cause. We're always kind of looking at the, the effects, and we're also looking at the symptoms.So we're constantly treating the symptoms and we're not necessarily focusing on the root cause because if we focus on the root cause, then the problem goes away and then there is no need for further surgeries and further medications. So at the end of the day, we need to start thinking bigger and we need to start really being our own advocates to say, I want better information and I want more answers about what is the root to my condition.
**Unknown:** So in addition to all of this, when we talk about looking at chemistry, is it broken? Is it not? Then that kind of leads us also down a rabbit hole of using the same protocols for the same diagnosis. You come in with your irritable bowels.
**Unknown:** Nobody's necessarily figuring out the root cause, but if it gets bad enough and all of a sudden you spike a fever, we're going to put you on an antibiotic. We're not going to check to necessarily see, is it viral? Is it bacterial? Is it fungal?
**Unknown:** Is it parasitic? We just kind of assume, oh, it's bacterial because that's the only thing the research has proven is that there's bacteria in the gut, which is so beyond not true. So we have to also think about this concept of always using the same approach. We're always using the same approach when it comes to the gut.
**Unknown:** We're using anti-inflammatories, we're using antiasthma, and then we're also using antibiotics when our white blood cells count spikes or we spike a fever. So we're not necessarily even doing the proper testing to figure out what type of infection it is or what is the root cause of the massive amounts of inflammation that is correlated to our symptoms. But one thing I'll say is in my consultation, I constantly ask about the moon cycles, meaning how do you feel around a full moon? Sometimes people have a hard time thinking about that because we don't always know when there's a full moon.
**Unknown:** But interesting enough is most of us have heard that phrase, oh, everyone's acting crazy, must be a full moon, or everyone's driving crazy, it must be a full moon. And we kind of think that that's a funny saying. But the reality of that saying is because parasites, which are organisms that can get into our systems from contaminated fish, contaminated animal protein, if we get exposed to parasites, they can hijack our behaviors and they are the most active under a full moon. So when people are acting bizarre under a full moon, there is a reason for it.
**Unknown:** So parasites are a lot more prevalent than people realize. And the reason why they're not being acknowledged is because they're very, very hard to diagnose through testing, which again, I'm going to elaborate further on. So another thing too is we have many patients that I've dealt with a lifetime of constipation. And they often have done protocols, supplements, dietary changes, medications, and colonics, and they haven't been able to resolve their issue.
**Unknown:** So Dr. Nick and I actually just did a podcast about this. So if you check it out on our website, it's called The Brain and Gut Connection. And we dive a lot deeper than I am right now.
**Unknown:** But what's fascinating about it is when you're dealing with this chronic constipation that nothing is helping, no laxatives are helping, nothing, that is a brain problem. So that is a neurological problem because your brain controls everything, but you also have a vagus nerve that runs from the brain all the way down and innervates most of your gastrointestinal system. So when you're not having that proper communication, you are going to have either constipation or what we call gastroparesis, which means that it's almost like the gut is paralyzed. So you have to consider if you've had this long-term constipation and have had no results, you probably haven't gone to a neurologist, not necessarily saying that they would know how to help you, but it's a neurological condition that comes back to the vagus nerve.
**Unknown:** So for those of you that are kind of wondering like, oh my gosh, is that me? A couple of ways to know is if you have either an overactive or a completely underactive gag reflex. So either one is an extreme and that is an indicator that your vagus nerve is not working properly. So that's kind of a key little thing to know when you're trying to decipher are your gut issues a brain problem.
**Unknown:** So another thing too, diabetes with the gut. So diabetes is running rampant and don't get me wrong. We obviously have a lot of hidden sugar in the American diet. And again, for those of you that are really new to this like functional integrative medicine world, I remember for me when I was younger, I used to, I would definitely classify myself as the person who didn't eat sugar.
**Unknown:** Like I was not a pastry person. I wasn't constantly like needing something sweet after I ate. But I remember like one day reflecting back and thinking about what I drank. I was never soda person, juice person, but I got into coffee at a really young age and then I got into lattes.
**Unknown:** And what's crazy about it is like when you go and you get those lattes, even if you get just like coconut milk latte from Starbucks or almond milk latte, like those milks have a ton of sugar in them. So I just remember I asked them at Starbucks once when they came out the coconut milk because I made myself a coconut latte at home and then I had one at Starbucks and I was like, did you add sugar to this? And they were like, no. And I asked them to look at the coconut milk and I couldn't believe how much sugar was in the coconut milk.
**Unknown:** So just don't be deceived by that. That was a little bit of a tangent because that's not the point of this number three. But the reason why I'm bringing this up is because your pancreas is technically part of your gastrointestinal system. So like right at the bottom of the sternum, I'm like pointing right here.
**Unknown:** So right at the bottom of the sternum, a lot of people have pain there and they call it indigestion. And that's actually where your pancreas is. But your pancreas is embedded in your stomach, which is where a lot of reflux heartburn comes from. So if you do have a long history of reflux, indigestion, heartburnChances are whatever has been an irritant in that system has now moved along the track and is starting to affect your pancreas, which is then affecting your insulin, which is then affecting how your body regulates sugar.
**Unknown:** So you might be diabetic, pre-diabetic, or you might just be hypo or hyper- hyperglycemic. But when you're talking about a pancreatic issue, pancreatitis, if you have elevated pancreatic enzymes, if you have diabetes or you're told that you're pre-diabetic, you need to consider what is happening in your gut because they are a hundred percent connected because your, your pancreas is technically part of your gastro system. So kind of talking about this same vicinity is a patient that we have worked with who had a lot of respiratory issues that he was constantly treating the respiratory issues, but what it came down to i- it was actually his gastrointestinal system that was completely inflamed, pushing up on his diaphragm that was creating massive strain on his respiratory system, shortness of breath, inability to work out because he was wheezing. So sometimes when you're even dealing with a respiratory issue, and that's more symptomatic than your gut, sometimes it can actually tie back to the gut because of the pressure it's putting on the diaphragm.
**Unknown:** So when you're talking anatomy, all of these systems are just so close in proximity, and that's why you can have this trickle-down effect and have other systems that are affected. So last but not least is the root cause of autoimmune conditions. So that's the whole premise of this specifically is really diving into these autoimmune gut conditions. And when we talk about autoimmunity, we are usually being told that we don't know why autoimmune conditions happen.
**Unknown:** It's just the immune system turning on the body. And there's a lot of theories about molecular mimicry, which I'm not even gonna go into. Um, and we pretty much say, "Once you have it, you just have to deal with it." And especially if you have celiac, the solution is never eat gluten again. And we're actually not being told or educated on what is the root cause of the autoimmune condition, number one, and is there anything else I can do other than avoid gluten or take medication?
**Unknown:** And, you know, in my mind, I feel like it's a pretty simple concept. And most of the time when I explain it to patients, they're usually like, "Oh my gosh, I never thought about it that way." But if you think about it, when it comes to the immune system's job, its job is to fight bad things. It is-- its job is to fight foreign substances, if it is toxins, if, if it is infections. And those infections can vary from fungus to mold to bacteria to parasites.
**Unknown:** You know, the list goes on. So if you think about the foundation of what the immune system does is fight bad things, then wouldn't it make sense that the system that is being attacked by the immune system is dealing with an infection? So if you even just think of the premise of celiac, so celiac is an autoimmune condition that deteriorates the villi. So yes, gluten, eating gluten is a huge problem because it's creating a massive inflammatory response, which is going to create a lot of irritation.
**Unknown:** But when it comes to the destruction of the villi, because the immune system is now apparently attacking the villi, what if the villi is just in the line of fire to where the infection is? So what if the infection is in the gut, embedded in the lining of the gut, and as the immune system is trying to get to that infection to eradicate it, now it's creating massive inflammation and damage to the villi. This is not my theory. This is proven.
**Unknown:** But the problem is, is that this research is not the research that is always being talked about, talked about and publicized. And I don't know why, but when we think about this concept of autoimmune, we have so many autoimmune conditions now. There is so many im- autoimmune conditions even beyond the gut, and we are still acting like this is a complete mystery, and we have tons of inflammatory conditions in addition to that. So an immune system responds, so AKA the immune system attacking something bad creates an inflammatory response.
**Unknown:** So if we have all these inflammatory conditions like rheumatoid arthritis and migraines and, you know, fibromyalgia. We have all of these inflammatory conditions, we have all these autoimmune conditions, and we're sitting back and we're saying, "Oh, we have no idea why." But what's interesting about it is if you were to get diagnosed with an infection, technically that's the infectious disease specialist. So unless you've been having chronic diarrhea for weeks and nobody can figure it out, you're not going to an infectious disease doctor. It's only when there's that severe of a, of an extreme that you've had a fever that hasn't gone away for weeks, or you have diarrhea that hasn't gone away for, for weeks.
**Unknown:** That's when you will be referred to an infectious disease doctor. So when you're talking about the gastroenterologist that you would think is going to diagnose you with an infection in your gut, that is not necessarily the way that they've been trained. And if you think about the modalities, the modalities are endoscope or endoscopy and colonoscopy. You cannot see infections on those types of imaging.
**Unknown:** You cannot. It is impossible. You can see inflammation, you can see polyps, you can see cancer, but you will not see infections. So I am here to tell you that you don't know what you don't know.
**Unknown:** If you haven't had the right testing, if you haven't had the right approach, if you haven't had someone digging deeper, there is no possible way you are gonna know what is the cause of your autoimmune conditions or what type of infections do you have.It is not possible. So I'm going to use just a really basic example. So many of us are dealing with indigestion and heartburn. And usually we're either taking upon ourselves to take Tums or take some type of antacid.
**Unknown:** If it gets bad enough and we're in a ton of pain, we're going to then seek out something stronger, which is going to be a Prevacid, a Prilosec, a Nexium, et cetera. And what I find so fascinating about it, and this is something that I learned through my functional medicine training and then saw it over and over and over and over again in my clinical practice, is that most of the time when we're dealing with indigestion or heartburn, it's because of a lack of stomach acid. It is not because of an overabundance. So for those of you that are like, well, that's confusing because I feel better when I take the antacids.
**Unknown:** Yes, you will. And I will tell you why. So if you have bad stuff in your gut, maybe you have bacteria, maybe you have a bunch of pesticides because they're all over our food nowadays. I don't really know.
**Unknown:** But you have something in your gut that shouldn't be there. That's actually going to start to compromise your production of stomach acid. Also, in addition, chewing gum and drinking carbonated beverages will also deplete your stomach acid. So if you have a lack of stomach acid, what's going to happen is you're going to eat, your food's going to go into the digestive system, but it doesn't break down fast and it doesn't break down efficiently because you don't have the proper enzymes and you don't have the proper acid anymore.
**Unknown:** So if your food is sitting there, it's actually going to start to almost like decompose. I know that sounds disgusting, but that's the reality of it. So it sits and it decomposes and it gives off what you call rancid acids. So as it gives off these rancid acids, which are bad acids, that is what creates this heartburn reflux indigestion feeling.
**Unknown:** So then you go and you take your antacid and you feel better because it combated the rancid acids. So this is not about your stomach overproducing. This is about these rancid acids coming from either the food that's not being broken down or it's even coming from the bad bacteria or chemicals that are in your gut. So this is something that is just so huge because people suffer.
**Unknown:** Like I cannot believe how many people suffer. I had a patient the other day, she told me that she bought a special really, really expensive pillow to prop herself up to practically sleep in a seated position because her indigestion was that bad. And she was just had, she had never had any tools to fix it. And in my world, that's such an easy fix, but she just was never evaluated in the right way and never had the right testing.
**Unknown:** So it's definitely something that I feel so passionate about helping people to understand like you're, you getting better doesn't have to be super difficult, but you need to take that first step to get the better testing because otherwise you're just going to go round and round and round and just keep dealing with these symptoms. So the point of it all is stop accepting this new normal and blaming it on aging. There are so many people that I work with that are in their thirties and they're saying, oh, well, you know, my stomach hurts, but it's because I'm getting older. Oh, I get bloated all the time.
**Unknown:** It's because I had a baby and oh, you know, I have heartburn a lot, but it's because, you know, I drank too much caffeine that day. And we're kind of always making an excuse for why we feel the way we do. And I know because I used to do this in, at the end of the day, we're also just accepting that this could be because of the aging process. And we're also comparing ourselves to our other friends and family that also feel like crap.
**Unknown:** And we're just saying, well, everybody's tired and everybody's stomach hurts and everybody gets bloated when they eat too much pasta. And that's not true. And we need to stop thinking that that is true. And that is going to be our new normal, or we don't want to believe that that's going to be our new normal.
**Unknown:** So as I get into these myths, these are like the top points that I wanted to go through. And number one is addressing this idea that gut conditions are genetic, especially when it comes to celiac and other autoimmune gut conditions. And the other one is, is that your testing is always accurate. We kind of assume that if our tests said that we don't have something, then we don't have it.
**Unknown:** And we just think, okay, well, that's, that's not a possibility anymore, which is also not true. And then the last but not least is autoimmune, autoimmunity as a whole, but especially autoimmune gut conditions are irreversible. So as we dive in, I'm going to shed light on all of these different things. So starting first and foremost with your, with this concept of genetics.
**Unknown:** So first of all, when it comes to research dollars, they are putting a ton of money into genetic testing. And there's a lot of theories as to why, but from my understanding is when it comes to the genetic testing, they are trying to create different medications and different even vaccines, which God knows how that will work. But, and that, and they're trying to do it to manipulate genetics. So that is one of the reasons why there is so much focus on genetic testing right now and genetic research.
**Unknown:** But at the end of the day, this is something that I feel like is very, very eyeopening. So one of the things, one of the ways that people either try to decipher if they're at risk or if they have celiac is by doing the genetic test, which is the HLA-DQ2 marker and the DQ8. So first of all, when it comes to the literature that is done by the celiac organizations, they pretty much say that just because you have the gene does not mean you're ever going to have celiac. And that really comes down to this concept of epigenetics.
**Unknown:** Epigenetics is been, you know, a big topic for many, many years, but unfortunately I feel like it's not always getting the press that it deserves because epigenetics pretty muchAllows us to know that our genes will express differently based off of our choices and our lifestyle. So when it comes to a family filled with thyroid conditions or gut conditions, there are those select few people that have zero issues that are potentially more conscious of their diet or doing things differently. So just because you have a gene does not mean that you are doomed to developing the condition. But honestly, even more fascinating is one of the markers that I used to look at a lot was the HLA, uh, marker that was for mold.
**Unknown:** And when you're talking about the HLA family, which is called a humo- human leukocyte antigen, this is the family of genes that is part of the immune system that is designed to tag foreign invaders such as viruses and bacteria. So think about that. We're looking at this HLA family to dictate if we're at risk for an autoimmune condition, and I just discussed how these autoimmune conditions are correlated to infections that are in the tissue that is being attacked. So doesn't that make sense that if the HLA marker is one of the markers that puts us at risk for different types of autoimmune conditions, then that would be correlated to a foreign invader such as a bacteria, a virus, a parasite, et cetera.
**Unknown:** So I want you to understand this because no matter what your genetics look like, you are in control. And if you take it a step further and understand, do you have infections in your body, which I will tell you we all do, then you will be able to actually take control of your fate and take control of your health fate, I should say. So bringing me to this pres-- uh, patient presentation. So, uh, I had a w-- a patient that I was working with.
**Unknown:** He had gastrointestinal issues for-- He had gastrointestinal issues his whole life, but they were really, really, really bad within the past five years. So he actually came in, and he's like, "It's so bad at this point that I can't really leave my house for until four hours after I wake up because I'm pretty much in the bathroom for a good four hours." But what was so interesting about this patient is that when I was going through his bioresonance scan specifically, and I was kind of piecing the puzzles together for his case, I kept seeing a drug allergen come up. So pretty much what that means is this drug was something that has created a lot of stress on his system. But the drug, which is called azithromycin, is actually a tuberculosis drug.
**Unknown:** So we didn't talk about tuberculosis in his consultation. We did not talk about ever having it. We didn't talk about respiratory issues. So I was like, "Okay, maybe this is gonna be far-fetched to ask him if he's ever been exposed, but at this point, I've seen the drug reaction so much that I, I need to ask." So what I-- when we came to our second visit and we were going through his results, I asked him, I said, "So by any chance, did you ever get exposed to tuberculosis?
**Unknown:** Did anybody in your family have it," et cetera. And he's like, "No, absolutely not." And I was like, "Okay." I was like, "Did you ever have the skin test where it bubbled up, and it didn't go away for a few days?" I always have to ask things in many, many ways. And he looked at me really funny, and he goes, "Hold on", and he texted his mom. He's in his fifties, by the way.
**Unknown:** So he texts his mom, and she goes, "Oh my gosh, I can't believe you're asking me that. I, I'm surprised you remember. Uh, when you were in camp around seven, eight years old, we actually had to take you out of camp because you tested positive through the skin test for tuberculosis, and we had to treat you for it." So this was like at this point, his mind's blown, my mind's blown. And what was crazy about it, it was two parts of the puzzle for this guy.
**Unknown:** He had-- he definitely had some infections going on in his gut. That was part of the puzzle, but he also had this drug that actually negatively impacted his gut from when he was a child that was actually still creating residual effects and number two, he also was tested for celiac, but he had non-celiac gluten sensitivity. So he pretty much was told after doing the celiac test, "Oh, you don't have any issues with gluten, keep eating it." But he had an issue with gluten. He just didn't have celiac.
**Unknown:** So the having gluten sensitivity and having celiac are not synonymous. They are not the same thing. They are very different. So you could easily have a gluten issue without having celiac disease.
**Unknown:** So I want you to understand that because you might be thinking that gluten doesn't bother you, but in fact it is. And gluten, by the way, does not always create gut issues. There is very specific, uh, reactions that can happen that create massive neurological issues. So if you're someone who is constantly getting fatigued after you eat carbohydrates or you're feeling foggy the next day, that is an indicator that you are having the neurological manifestation of the gluten sensitivity, not necessarily gut manifestation.
**Unknown:** So number two is your testing is always accurate, and there is limitations with almost every test that exists. Hence why when I do testing, I piece together five to six different avenues of testing 'cause I do not rely on one type of test because you will fall, uh, fall short if you try to rely on one thing. But one of the things I wanna talk about is the limitations on the celiac testing. I do wanna talk about limitations on even stool testing, blood testing, parasite testing, and also colonoscopy and endoscopy.
**Unknown:** So celiac testing. When we are talking about celiac, what you are seeing is going to be your traditional LabCorp panel, your Quest Diagnostics, which is the other major labIt looks the same. But you're looking at literally six different markers that they are testing when it comes to celiac. Then that is going to be the celiac panel by a company called Cerex Labs.
**Unknown:** Big difference, huh? So when you're talking about do I have celiac, do I not have celiac, do I have gluten that actually affects my brain? Do I have a gluten sensitivity that affects my gut? Do I have an issue with gliadin, or do I have an issue with wheat, because they are different.
**Unknown:** You could easily be missing a huge part of the puzzle. So when you are someone that are suffering with massive gus- gut issues, and you're being told, "No, you don't have celiac. No, you don't have celiac. No, you don't have celiac," we could easily be missing a huge, huge part of the puzzle.
**Unknown:** So this is just a really, really important visual because there are labs out there that are looking beyond, um, just, you know, those limited markers that is actually able to give you more answers. And in addition, this lab is fantastic because when you're talking about celiac, so this is technically the celiac panel, so if you do come back positive, they actually have a cross-reactive panel as well. And the cross-reactive panel is really interesting because when you look at certain proteins under a microscope, so if you're looking at wheat and gliadin under a microscope, and then you look at corn, and you look at oats, and you look at, um, rice, sometime they actually all look somewhat similar, so you could easily be having an issue with gluten, but you could also be having a cross-reactive ac- uh, issue with rice or oats. And I know that this is can sometimes be, you know, overwhelming information, but if you're that person who went gluten-free and you just started chowing down on all these gluten-free grains, and you still feel bad, that might be why.
**Unknown:** So it's really trying to understand more about your body and then being able to obvi- obviously have a solution for it. So when you're talking about the other gold standard for celiac testing, the other big one is using, um, an endoscope, which is, you know, a type of imaging. So what they're gonna do is they're going to shove the endoscope down into, you know, through the mouth and get it into the gastrointestinal system, and then they're going to do some biopsies. So they're gonna sample some of the tissue to see if there is damage, so they're technically looking to see if the villi is damaged.
**Unknown:** So the interesting thing about this, and it's because I do more comprehensive, uh, lab analysis, is that I've had many people that have come to me that have been told that they have celiac, but what they actually have is something called autoimmune pernicious anemia. So what this means is that there are very specific cells that are in your stomach that are called parietal cells, and these parietal cells are the cells that allow you to absorb your B12. So there are many people that are like, "Oh my gosh, my energy, my energy," and then they get their B12 checked, and it's bottomed out. And they're...
**Unknown:** they can't get it up. They can't get their B12 levels up, you know, without taking massive amounts of B vitamins or doing B12 shots. But if you have an issue with the actual parietal cells in your gut, then that's not going to allow you to absorb the B12. But working with autoimmune pernicious anemia is different than working with celiac because these are two different regions of the gut, and they also are creating two different cascade effects essentially.
**Unknown:** So it's very, very important to understand that you may have had this biopsy and been told, "Oh, you a hundred percent have celiac," but it might be being confused for autoimmune pernicious anemia, and that is probably the reason you cannot get your B12 levels to be at an adequate amount. So when it comes to this limitation on stool testing and parasite testing, so when it comes to testing for parasites, you cannot test them in the blood. That's just you're never gonna get a positive reading. That's number one.
**Unknown:** Number two is the other way that you could potentially test them is through stool sampling. But the way that a lot of the labs do it here in the US, it i- it has its flaws. So number one, if you've had a stool sample through a lab like Quest or LabCorp, when you... they take a sample from you, they are only testing for one microbe.
**Unknown:** So they might take a sta- sample from you, and they're testing, "Oh, does he or she have E. coli?" So they're only testing for that. They're not, like, putting the sample on a petri dish to see if there is any organisms. They're only testing for one, and I don't know why.
**Unknown:** That's just the way the labs are set up. So if you're trying to work with a lab that's gonna look at any possibility for infection, that's usually going to be some of these other private labs like Doctor's Data, Genova. I personally like Doctor's Data. But when it comes to utilizing a stool sample, I will use it to understand someone's probiotic levels.
**Unknown:** I will use it to look at bacteria. But I do not rely on it for parasites, and I will tell you why. Twenty minutes after a bowel movement leaves your body, your... any parasites that would have been in your sample will self-destruct.
**Unknown:** It is called autolysing. So if you take that sample, and you put it in a kit, and you ship it off to a lab, and it takes a couple days to get there, and it takes a couple days for them to process it, they are not going to find parasites. It's just not possible. So in most other countries, not the most glamorous, but you're required to have a bowel movement within the office, and the, uh, practitioner will actually put it directly under a microscope.I don't do that.
**Unknown:** I don't want to do that. I do, uh, I do have other ways of testing. But the most important thing for you to understand is if you have been down this road of functional integrative medicine, and you've had stool samples, and you've done supplements, and you've been told you don't have parasites, and you still feel badly, it's probably because the parasites are being missed because of the limitations in the testing. So for those of you that have been tuned in all along from the beginning, I mentioned that my personal health journey, I had a lot of parasite issues, primarily because I was a pescatarian, and I ate tons and tons of fish and tons of sushi.
**Unknown:** And I didn't know there was a difference between wild fish and farmed fish, and I kinda thought it was all free game. But for me, I didn't have a ton of gut complaints. I actually found that I had a lot more mood instability. I found myself being very irritable at times, found myself kind of-- when I got irritable, I couldn't get out of it.
**Unknown:** Um, it was just a very interesting behavior because I was conscious of like why do-- why am I acting this way? But I couldn't help myself. I couldn't stop doing it. So there was this book that I was introduced to, um, called This Is Your Brain on Parasites, and I literally couldn't put it down because this woman, Kathleen, her entire, um, career of research was focused on parasites, and her colleagues were, like, pretty much just bashing her saying, "You're stupid.
**Unknown:** You're gonna waste your whole life. You know, your, you're career is gonna go down the tubes because parasites have no validity in health, and they, you know, they have no validity in anything." And what she proved over and over and over and over again is that parasites will hijack your behaviors. So the first study that she did was on ants, the insect, and what she found is that the ants-- She infected, um, a group of ants that were in an anthill with a par- with a parasite. And what happened is during the day, the ants that were infected as well as not, they pretty much went out to the field, gathered, and brought things back to the anthill.
**Unknown:** But normally at night, ants will stay in their anthill together. So the ants that were infected actually left at night, went out into the field, got-- went onto the tippy, tippy, tippy top of a blade of grass, and the reason they did that is because the parasite hijacked the behavior to put the ant in an opportune environment to get eaten by a sheep because the best place for that parasite to reproduce was in a sheep's stomach. I almost read it and was like, "No way. This can't be real." And literally, the entire book is study after study after study after study, and she proved it over and over and over again.
**Unknown:** It was-- It, it's completely fascinating. So when you are dealing with massive mood instability, you know, again, bipolar, it can even be as extreme as schizophrenia, you have to get evaluated for parasite infections because you could easily being, be, being treated as a psychiatric patient. Um, it's not a brain problem. It's a parasite problem.
**Unknown:** So it's a very interesting concept when you are able to look at mental health differently, and I'm not saying that's the case for everyone. Some people have very specific neurological issues, but I have had people that have transformed as a person, um, in front of me. Everything from the way they talk to others, the way they communicate, their relationships, their passions, and that was by helping them to get rid of some of these organisms that were in their system. So another really interesting case study here is, um, a patient who was struggling with migraines.
**Unknown:** Um, she came in for her migraines, but she-- as we went through her history, she did reveal that she had IBS. She had IBS for so long that she kinda was like, "It is what it is. You know, I don't even... Uh, that's not even why I'm here.
**Unknown:** I'm here because my migraines are so bad that I can barely go to work some days." So we, we were talking, doing the full history, and one of the things that she revealed is that she had a lot of pain in her right ribcage area, which is actually the location of your liver and gallbladder. Um, and then the other thing that she told me was that she was lactose intolerant. So the first place that my mind went was, "What's going on with her gallbladder?" So for those of you not familiar, your gallbladder, again, located on your right ribcage, but your gallbladder is in charge of breaking down fats. So when somebody is lactose intolerant, sometimes they're truly lactose intolerant.
**Unknown:** Sometimes they're actually just struggling to break down fats as a whole, so they assume they're lactose intolerant, and that is because the gallbladder is not functioning properly, and they're not able to break down those fats anymore. So, um, an interesting thing as we went through, we found that she definitely had major gallbladder stress. Um, she had some mold exposure. She had some parasite infections that were actually the major stressors on her gallbladder.
**Unknown:** But the most fascinating thing is that we have a technology called a bio scan, and the bio scan is-- I call it digital acupuncture. That might sound really confusing, but it scans meridians, and it populates a report of what is stressing the meridian. So we decided to run her gallbladder meridian. The reason is because the gallbladder meridian runs the pathway of this photo.
**Unknown:** So if you look at the pathway of this photo, it's pretty much the whole side of the head and even parts of the temple. Her complaints were her right temple and right side of her head was where she felt her migraines. So when we evaluated her gallbladder meridian, that was the root cause to her migraines. So we did a couple of different treatments to work on that pathway, and her migraines went away.
**Unknown:** So this is a person who went neurologist to neurologist, um, you know, migraine specialist, et cetera, and wasNot able to get any results, and it's because it was never a head problem, it was never a brain problem, it was never a, a sinus problem. It was always a gallbladder problem. So this is again, comes down to if you do the right testing, you can get answers, and you can get solutions. If you don't ever do more comprehensive testing, you will not be able to figure these things out.
**Unknown:** So last but not least is autoimmunity is irreversible. So reiterating for the new people that are on here is when it comes down to this concept of autoimmunity, even this quote that I found online, I just found it to be so fascinating. So in Crohn's disease, a rogue immune system attacks the digestive tract causing inflammation and tissue damage. A rogue immune system attack.
**Unknown:** So we're literally just settling for this idea that, oh, well, the immune system just goes a little haywire sometimes, and it just happens, and that's kind of the end of the story. But if we really again go back to the foundation of what does the immune system do, it kills and fights off bad stuff. It gets rid of infections, it fights viruses, it fights parasites, it fights bacteria. And if we have tissue that is dealing with the infection, so if the infection is embedded in our parietal cells that's causing that autoimmune pernicious anemia, or if the infection is embedded in our small intestine, or the infection is embedded in our large intestine, we are going to have the immune system attacking that infection but unfortunately creating a lot of damage to the tissue around it.
**Unknown:** So if you understand the root, and we understand that there could potentially be something foreign that is the culprit behind this autoimmune condition, then we can actually heal from it. It's just a matter of knowing what it is and also understanding what is the best approach for the, for the person which I'm gonna talk a little bit more about how we decipher that. So at the end of the day, don't be fooled because rarely does anything look like a textbook. So if you don't match the textbook of what, you know, the telltale of, you know, the IBS is or the telltale of the GERD or the telltale of the celiac, if you don't fit the textbook, then why should your treatment be textbook?
**Unknown:** And again, it's about having answers, but don't take those answers and then just fall back on the, the cookie cutter approach because if the approach is specific, then you will actually be able to get better. But also you will be baffled on how much faster you can get better from something that you thought that you would have to live with forever. But I find it so fascinating when there are so many limitations in testing when it comes to looking at the brain, looking at the cardiovascular system. You know, we're really limited to, um, you know, EKGs, we're limited to MRIs, we're limited to stress tests, we're limited to, you know, CT scans.
**Unknown:** So when you're looking at a non-invasive way to get some answers, the bioresonance is just one of my favorite technologies for that purpose, and it is always uncovering the most amazing information that always ties back to the clinical, um, repr- or presentation of the patient. Thank you all for being here, but I really wanna just tell you that this is really just an educational process and, and an e- educational experience. But when it comes to actually figuring out what's going on with you and actually knowing what you need to do to get better, that's truly when the breakthroughs happen. So I just want you to know that taking that step to really understand more about yourself is, is just so huge, and it's really just so life-changing.
**Unknown:** And I could confidently say that because I know it's changed my life personally, and I see it every day with all of our clients. So check out our website. Um, for those of you that were interested in that podcast about the gut brain, for those of you that are dealing with chronic constipation, that is up on the website. If you do want to, uh, link up with our client services team, just kinda learn a little bit more about the process and what it looks like to work with us and how does it work to work with us when you're far away, um, go to integrativewellnessgroup.com and, uh, sign up to chat with one of them.
**Unknown:** There are links all over the site, so you can pretty much find it anywhere. Um, but I thank you for being here. We're gonna be back next week. Um, so I hope you had a tremendous amount of value, and I will see you guys next week.
**Unknown:** We thank you for being a listener and subscriber to Integrative Wellness Radio. If you're looking to learn more about Integrative Wellness Group as well as Dr. Nick or Dr. Nicole, you can check out integrativewellnessgroup.com.
**Unknown:** All night, no sleep 'cause I feel like I'm always dreaming. Wide awake, that's okay.
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About Integrative You Radio
Integrative You Radio is a root cause medicine and integrative medicine podcast hosted by Dr. Nicole Rivera and Dr. Nick Carruthers — two integrative doctors who build personalized wellness protocols from your DNA, minerals, hormones, gut, and nervous system rather than from a population template. Looking for an integrative doctor who reads your labs together instead of in isolation? This is the show.
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