The gut and its bacteria a growing focus of research

Here is an interesting LA Times article about how the GI tract affects your health.  The Future of Medicine: The gut and its bacteria a growing focus of research.

Of course this is nothing new for Functional Medicine doctors like myself,  but I find it interesting, and also gratifying to see it becoming more mainstream medicine.  I routinely run comprehensive digestive stool analysis that measure levels such as the beta-glucuronidase mentioned in the article, but also in addition check other markers including the balance between friendly and pathogenic bacteria in your gut.  We look at pH, digestion, absorption, check for parasites, etc.  Its very routine for my patients because of the value it provides me in getting to the root of your symptoms, even when they are not GI related.

I have a 13 year old book on my shelf called the The Second Brain, by Michael Gershon MD that I often recommend to my medical students and sometimes patients (it can be dense at times).  In it, he explains the connection between the gut and the brain and nervous system.  How most of the serotonin in your body is produced in your gut, etc.  The point being that we need to fix your gut if we are trying to make you happy and healthy.  This is especially true of my patients on the Autistic spectrum including ADD and ADHD.

Another fact often overlooked is that most of your immune system resides in your gut.  You can expect poor health when the balance of flora is disrupted, or you have other GI issues.  So when you drink soda that contain tons of sugar and feeds yeast  in your body called candida thereby disrupting the intestinal flora in your gut, or when you chronically ingest food that you may be sensitive too inflaming the lining of your intestines (leaky gut), then you can expect to pay the price in terms of poor health, and disease.

So the solution in my opinion is simple:  Lets clean up our diets.  Lets test our stool.  Lets test to find out what foods we are sensitive to.

See Also:

Probiotics as Treatment for Irritable Bowel Syndrome
Gut Bacteria are Different in People with Diabetes
Lab Testing : Digestive and Intestinal Health Markers

 

On October 2, 2012   /   Diabetes, Diet, Digestion   /   1 Comment