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The Role of Infectious Agents in Autoimmune Conditions

Please enjoy our exciting new format!

It has been estimated that some 50 million Americans have been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease. As such, we have become all too familiar with things like rheumatoid arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus, and multiple sclerosis, to name a few. 

On our program today we are going to speak with the authors of a new book entitled Chronic: The Hidden Cause of the Autoimmune Pandemic and How to Get Healthy Again by Dr. Steven Phillips and Dana Parish. Dr. Phillips and his patient, Dana Parish, reveal the role that chronic underlying infections, like Lyme disease, may play as it relates to autoimmune conditions. We will explore not just Lyme disease, but other chronic infections that also may have long-term manifestations. We explore how these diseases present, how they are diagnosed, and of course, treatment, as well as the politics that may well be keeping this information from gaining widespread acceptance or at least recognition. Continue reading

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COVID-19 Isn’t Random

One of the common statements often repeated in the media about COVID-19 is that it is seemingly random in terms of both getting the virus and having a poor outcome. But, upon further inspection, that’s not what the actual science is revealing. As we move deeper into our involvement with this virus some important patterns are emerging that make it quite clear that COVID-19 does indeed discriminate.

In a recent article, Dr. Austin Perlmutter explored how COVID-19 is actually an “opportunistic infection,” meaning that it takes advantage of patients whose immune systems are not functioning optimally. In the past we would have considered less than optimal immune function to be a characteristic of people who have had, for example, chemotherapy or radiation treatment, exposure to immune-suppressing medications after organ transplantation, or a diagnosed autoimmune disease. But as Dr. Austin Perlmutter has made clear, we now need to broaden our scope and embrace the notion that so many of our most common degenerative conditions, from diabetes to obesity, actually compromise immune function and allow the SARS-CoV-2 virus the opportunity to do its dirty work. Continue reading

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Should We be Treating Hair Loss with Fecal Material?

Alopecia areata is a form of baldness that affects approximately 2% of people in the United States. In this condition, hair is lost from various parts of the body, typically the scalp. The actual cause of this condition is unknown, but new research clearly supports the idea that this disease is an autoimmune condition, meaning it is a manifestation of a disruption of the regulation of the immune system. There is certainly thought to be a genetic component as well.

Treatment for this condition is often unsuccessful, but includes medications designed to treat immune imbalance. This may include the use of steroids. Continue reading

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Rebalance the Gut, Rebalance the Immune System

It is very exciting to see the incredible increase in scientific research being released that relates gut issues to various health problems elsewhere in the body. The research that explores this relationship in terms of autoimmune conditions is particularly interesting, not just because it links gut-related problems to changes in immune balance, but in terms of how this new understanding might open the door for new treatments for these challenging conditions.

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The Empowering Neurologist – David Perlmutter, MD and Dr. Amy Myers

It’s clear that the prevalence of autoimmune conditions is on the rise. Far and away, the most common autoimmune condition in America is directed against the thyroid gland, autoimmune thyroiditis. Like all autoimmune conditions, autoimmune thyroiditis is far more common in women, but for a reason that remains unclear. Nonetheless, it is clear that environmental issues, or lifestyle choices, seem to be playing a very important role in causing an imbalance within the immune system, paving the way for thyroid problems.

In today’s program, I have the great honor of interviewing Dr. Amy Myers. Dr. Myers is very much a pioneer in getting out the information related to how lifestyle choices affect the immune system, and is very candid about her own personal experience with thyroid disease.

Her new book is certainly worth reading, as it is filled with not only great information, but information upon which you can act to achieve more balance in immune function. I think you’re going to enjoy this interview.

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Psoriasis – A Gut Related Disorder

Modern medicine is clearly vested in what I like to call the Las Vegas mentality. We’ve all heard that “what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas,” and it seems that, as it relates to medicine today, we still tend to look at illness as being uniquely related to the body system that is affected. For example, autism is thought to represent a brain disorder having to do with the development and functionality of that organ. This is despite the ever-increasing research that demonstrates significant gut abnormalities associated with this disorder. Further, a recent study has shown that giving children with asthma increased amounts of dietary fiber leads to significant improvement. This study clearly challenges the notion that asthma is specifically a lung related disorder.

Psoriasis is a skin disorder and has been described as the most common autoimmune condition in the United States. It is thought that as many as 7.5 million Americans suffer from this condition with more than 120 million people worldwide having this disease.

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Could Gut Bacterial Imbalance Cause Brain Illness?

We Americans seem to be obsessed with hygiene and cleanliness. Whether it’s the hand sanitizer dispenser at the end of virtually every aisle in the grocery store, the plethora of antimicrobial cleaning products, or our insistence on taking powerful antibiotics for every cough or cold, somehow or another we have bought into the mentality that bugs are bad and are waging a war against us at every turn.

As it turns out, in many ways the multitude of bacteria that exist in our world and within our bodies may actually be doing more good than harm. Within our intestines, for example, there exists a vast and expensive colony of living organisms upon which we are completely dependent for our wellbeing. Most of these organisms reside within the intestine and are called our microbiota. In fact, the number of organisms living within each of us outnumber the cells of our body by a factor of 10 to 1.

And it is these bacteria and other organisms including fungi and viruses that control any number of aspects of our physiology that determine health versus illness. Our immune function, levels of inflammation, ability to fight cancer cells, detoxification, and even absorption of various nutrients, are all intimately dependent upon the various species of organisms that live within the gut. Continue reading