In this episode Dr. Troy Spurrill, owner of Synapse Center for Health and Healing, Dr. Joshua Wallert, Lead Practitioner, and Marque Gant, Clinic Director have a conversation about High Blood Pressure and answer some social media questions sent to us.
In this episode Dr. Troy Spurrill, owner of Synapse Center for Health and Healing, Dr. Joshua Wallert, Lead Practitioner, and Marque Gant, Clinic Director have a conversation about High Blood Pressure and answer some social media questions sent to us.
Speaker 0: Welcome to the Synapse SNPs podcast, where we explore the power of health and healing On this podcast... We will be talking with health experts, professionals and leaders about hot topics in the world of health, whether it's tools to help you flourish. Successful stories to inspire or tips to optimize your health. Snaps is here to help you take the first steps towards living your best life.
Speaker 1: Welcome to synapse. This is Dr. Troy, Dr. Josh and Marquis. Today we're here to talk about high blood pressure.
And we're also gonna do a rapid fire, a Facebook rapid fire. Some questions we've been getting online and so I answer some of those today as well. Sweet. Yes. So let's start with high blood pressure.
We're actually seeing quite a bit of that right now. And so let's walk through. A little bit of what our protocol is.
Speaker 2: Yeah. It's amazing just a comment how many people don't know what their blood pressure is?
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 2: And how many people come in in it's eye. But we should mention too just the whole white coat syndrome thing. Let's stop on that. Yeah. Because high blood pressure, when you go to a doctor's office, isn't an actually a very good way to determine his, blood pressure.
Yeah. Yeah. The best way is if if it looks like you've got a family history or your doctor's is concerned about it. Buy a blood pressure cuff. Yep.
An automated one. They're actually not that expensive like twenty, forty bucks something like that that. It's a peace of mind thing. If you know that every day when you get up or when you go to bed, your blood pressure's within normal when you're not stressed at a doctor's office, You're probably pretty good. Yep.
Exactly. And we'll go
Speaker 1: through some of things that can increase your blood pressure and even... It's just nice to have... Those assessments done in the beginning of the day when you first wake up versus midday when you're active and then end of the day. So it's a good just informative tests that you can
Speaker 2: do at home. General comment on that. A lot of people are, I think afraid to know what their health is. Like they don't wanna know their genes and they don't wanna know their test results don't wanna know if they got high blood pressure. Yeah.
Because they're scared. Or They think if they ignore those things, it's just gonna magically go away. They It doesn't work that way. Just if
Speaker 1: it doesn't, no. Because if if that... If I live that way, I'd also get rid of my mirrors.
Speaker 2: Because when I look in
Speaker 1: the mirror and all sudden I I see a little extra wait in the mid section. I'd I'd have to avoid that. So if you're the type of person that doesn't want to get their blood pressure results, then get rid your mirrors too, please.
Speaker 2: Yeah. It's it's good to be proactive about knowing things about yourself.
Speaker 1: Alright. So let's just start with first of all, some of the different things that can cause. An elevated blood pressure. Already touched on one white coat syndrome is an example of a stress response. Mh And so we know stress can increase blood pressure.
What else can increase blood pressure?
Speaker 2: Yeah. Blood flow restrictions. And so this is a common thing at sclerosis, that's a little bit different but. Basically, anything that's gonna disrupt blood vessel health, whether it's buildup up of junk in the arteries or a stiff of the arteries, it's gonna cause an increase in blood pressure. Atherosclerosis.
The sclerosis is the kind of the the hardening thickening type of thing in the artery, It's like a crease you want your arteries to be like a like a balloon. You want them to expand, and they expand and contract kinda like your heart does. They can't get the pressure. Built up and if it doesn't work your heart has to beat really hard to keep the blood pressure high.
Speaker 1: Yes. So it's kinda like a garden hose that expands a little bit more than your current garden hose. So you don't want to expand too much, but we want to actually see some level of expansion there. Some adaptability. So that flow is really important.
So think about the things that can irritate that. If you're... If you have junk in the actual arteries or in that that garden hose, then it kind of blocks it up and that's hard in the heart and then pressure can increase. If you have... Then hardening or stiff of the like you said, from calcium deposits or from cholesterol deposits or from the actual nerves firing to the blood vessels, that can also cause problems.
So that those are some of the the big things that can definitely affect blood pressure. I'm gonna talk about one more unique thing before we get into some of the strategies. To help manage it. There's also a scenario where you wanna take your blood pressure on your left arm and your right arm and just compare the two. Here at the synapse, we do functional neurology.
And so we wanna look for anything that's different or not communicating properly. And people have just one heart. Correct? That's right?
Speaker 2: I think so.
Speaker 1: That's accurate. Right. So you would think the blood pressure should be the same on one side of the body as the other side, but it's not Yeah. So do
Speaker 2: you wanna touch touch base on why that might be? Yeah. When we look at functional neurology, you one of the basic things we look at is the balance between the function of the right versus left side of the brain. People have heard of right versus left brain, and that's a simplification, but we won't go into too much detail there. Really though, if you do have an imbalance where one side is functioning higher or lower compared to the other, the output of that part of the brain is going to change the the muscle tone, not only in specific like skeletal muscles, you know, the muscles you think of, but also you have muscles around blood vessels, And so if you have tighter muscles in the blood vessels on one side of the body versus the other, the pressure is gonna be higher.
Yeah. And that that can be a consequence of a variety of types of neurological inflammation, trauma, like, concussion, things like that. There there's so many reasons for why that can happen. It's actually pretty typical for somebody to have and imbalance.
Speaker 1: Yeah way. And generally speaking, if you're within four to six, even ten points, that's not bad. Ten points and above those starts to get and to to a little bit of an imbalance. So I've had patients come in with a twenty point difference where it's like one fifty over a hundred on the right and it's one twenty over eighty on the left. Yeah.
And so depending on which arm was actually tested, with potentially indicate whether or not they got a prescription or not from their medical doctor. When it really wasn't a cholesterol problem, it was a nerve problem.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Exactly. So fixed treatments way different.
Speaker 1: The treatments is very different. Yeah. So that... That's just important. So if you're doing any at home testing, Also take a look at what it is when you are comparing left arm to right arm, just a little little trick.
And then just know that it will be different. Standing versus sitting versus lying down. I always recommend if you're taking your blood pressure if you just ran into the store at Cvs pharmacy or target or something that has a blood pressure cuff. Give yourself a couple of minutes if you're you're sitting and just relax a little bit. Your blood pressure will go up with increased activity.
Supposed to... It's supposed to. Yeah. You want that. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So very, very important to just relax a little bit before you get that blood pressure, sit down for two minutes and then take it. And often too, especially for people with higher blood pressure, it's important to take several readings if you've got the monitor at home. I have some patients where they'll they'll sit down. Rest. Like I like he said five minutes of sitting, but they'll take three readings over the course of maybe a few minutes because they...
They're not always the same. The first the one might be ten points higher than the second. Taking an average of those is, I think important.
Speaker 1: Alright. So let's go through our flow as far as what we look at, we actually have a flow sheet as far as someone comes in with high blood pressure and we look at a bunch of different things. So we're gonna start with some of the lab testing because there is a difference in lab tests as
Speaker 2: far as what we would order to get a
Speaker 1: little bit more clarity. Also, this... We're not gonna talk about it today, but we do a test here at Sam called the endo path that measures. Your arterial stiffness, your endothelial dysfunction as well as your stress response. That's a great test.
That's a great task for us to figure if getting into the root cause of what's causing blood pressure, but even cardiovascular problems.
Speaker 2: Yeah. We'll do another podcast later on that Yeah.
Speaker 1: We'll do... We... And we've talked about in the in the past a little bit as podcast, but it's a great test that we do in house here. So what some of the other lab tests though that can be run. And then let's touch base on a little bit of the difference between just our lab tests and some of the standard lab tests that are out there.
Speaker 2: Yeah. If you go to a medical doctor, they're gonna only test your blood pressure and your cholesterol, maybe they would correlate those blood. Sugar trigger, they won't look at anything to advance beyond that because they're the only concern is if it's high, they're gonna give you a type of medication to bring it down. Yes. Trigger and we won't go into the types right now, but that's not really fixing the problem.
The lab tests that we look at are gonna be anywhere from and looking at inflammation, that's a big thing. Looking at inflammatory factors, looking at stress, looking even at some genetic issues. And so I think the the scope of which what we're looking at is looking for the root cause of that blood pressure problem because you want you don't wanna just cover up this issue.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And when we're talking about cholesterol, they do total cholesterol, which can be good. It can give you some indications. They do Ldl, the bad cholesterol, do Hdl, the good cholesterol. But in the lab testing,
Speaker 2: a lot of people
Speaker 1: don't realize that cholesterol comes in different sizes. And the small dense cholesterol particles can be way more catastrophic to a person than some of the larger particles because they literally get into spaces, and nooks and cra that can cause more problems. So the type of cholesterol you have really matters. Yeah. So I have so many people that come in and they say, my doctor wants to be put on medication because my cholesterol is high.
What is it? That's two it's two twenty. I'm like, well, that is above, range, but what's your ratio to good cholesterol to bad cholesterol. Well it's two point eight. That's a great ratio.
Mh. So if they have high cholesterol because they've been consuming a lot of olive oil and following a mediterranean diet, we're not concerned about that. The Greeks and the Italians have the highest cholesterol on average in the world and the lowest incidence of heart disease. And it's because the ratios are there.
Speaker 2: Cholesterol is really not a good indicator of cardiovascular. It's not. There there are some things with advanced testing that you can... Be more specific on risk, but a lot of it is more inflammatory. If your inflammatory markers are off, that's the killer right there.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I'm wing of a shout out to a medical doctor that I I followed years ago. This is maybe twenty years ago, I'm gonna get the the date wrong. But Doctor. Lad Mc tamara, a wrote a book called the cholesterol conspiracy theory.
And that was talking about the the mis of cholesterol and how its impact on on hart disease. He was way have his time and he felt like Vitamin e and some of these other antioxidants were much, much better indicators to cardiovascular dysfunction. And now we have a lot more lot of other tests. So the lab tests work some talking about here as far as a cholesterol, we'll look for those different particle sizes. We'll look at proteins.
There's also a genetic test that can be helpful. And there's a huge link with this particular gene sequence that also is a got some impact when it comes to memory an all alzheimer's. So that's the Ap e gene and gen type. So a lot of people can you you generally know if you've got genetics in your history when it comes to cardiovascular disease because it's the number one or number two, cause of of death in United States for a reason.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so it's usually... It's it's number one I believe right now, but cancer sometimes gets Yeah. Ahead of it, but People tend to know if they have had a stroke or or heart attacks or high blood pressure in their family history.
Speaker 2: Knowing this gene that Ap isn't just informative. There there is something that you can modify, if you know that you've got bat Ap es status. And it has to do a diet. It's dietary. And we see this with our Alzheimer's patients and people who have...
The the Ap four, that's one that you don't want. Those individuals tend to do better with intermittent and fasting. Ketogenic diets, things that are higher fat, which is interest from talking about cholesterol people had little higher fat might and it might raise your clothes straw. But it's protected when it comes to to the brain if you're doing it correctly.
Speaker 1: Yes. Exactly. It's... The diet is very very important. So we'll get to that because that's literally the thing you I start with with high blood pressure is lifestyle diet.
Some many the other tests though that are actually very useful. You get the blood tests and it's a mourn death. Lipid test test in the cholesterol, but they're looking at the particle sizes they're looking at the lipoprotein. So some examples are Lp, lipoprotein b, what else is the
Speaker 2: look at Hdl particle number, Ldl particle number, small dense, Ldl Yep. Because again, some of these are still relevant because if that you do have smaller denser Ldl. And again, Ldl is the one that's considered bad, it's not always bad. But those get stuck in the inflammatory cr essentially in the blood vessels. So there's just easier to lodge in and they're...
There's really... They're innocent bystanders. You think about it. But diet does change how these Ldl are formed in the liver. Because really, if your liver is inflamed and then you're gonna export a whole bunch of junk.
If Yes. In your Ldl.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And so speaking of inflammation, one of our other core tests for high blood. Pressure is omega three index. So do you wanna speak to that a
Speaker 2: little bit? Yeah. Omega three is the best ones are fish oil. Now there are some plant sources of of omega threes. Those aren't converted quite as well in the body to the types of omega...
Threes that you want. So fish oil really is the best option. And it's... And I do know that if you are vegetarian or vegan, I think there are Lg based omega three is that threes that typically make the cut. But there's two main types of...
And there's more than the two main types of omega three Epa, which is the anti inflammatory type in Dha, which is more of a brain structure type. On the test that we look at, we compare the Epa, which is anti inflammatory to a type of fat called... Ara acid, often labeled as Aa. We... That's pro inflammatory.
When we look at the ratio between those two, and it's shocking, especially for somebody who's never controlled dia to this comes in, looking for help, how bad that ratio. Oh yes. Terrible because the normal the normal ratio should be somewhere between two to one to ten to one. Yes. See...
And that's even with the the the pro inflammatory ones still have been a bit higher, which is normal. But we've seen people where it's a hundred and fifty to one. Yes. Off the charts high. And to fix that, you need both more omega three more official.
Yeah. But then you also have to reduce the inflammatory food. Contributing.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Because that... It'll burn up the the good anti inflammatory in, and some of the things that people can add into their diet things like olive oil good, good clean pure olive oil. We just at a seminar couple weeks back that one of the instructors there was so so on top of olive oil that he orders his from Europe. He orders it from Spain and he yours it from, like, trees that are two thousand years old.
And and he'll have that and just take a teaspoon of olive oil right out of his bottle because of how good that is for his body, not just the cardiovascular, but Yeah. It's that good for you to.
Speaker 2: Mh. Alright.
Speaker 1: So one the other tests that we do is a bio beans analysis and this one is interesting. For when it comes from a cardiovascular perspective. The Bi actually gives you a lot of information about what's going on in the body, but it can give us a good a good idea of the extra cellular mass, which is part of our lymph network. And if our blood flow is pushing up against this this pressure that's, you know, our lymph system and our liver system, we will see a higher blood pressure from that. So the Bi becomes very important to see.
Are you carrying muscle mass or are you carrying fat mass? Or are you... What is your heart pumping against?
Speaker 2: Yeah. That
Speaker 1: So I like that test a lot.
Speaker 2: Yeah Another way to see this is var veins and the legs in particular. You have veins, you know that you've got a pressure problem. Usually from lymph. Yes, or damp... It can be damaged to the veins as well.
But if you have that, you have swine in the legs, fluid retention. That's a lymph fat backup. Problem. Yeah. That's gonna put stress on this whole system.
The other thing too, I I I did wanna mention, it's very common for especially men coming in with this problem to see a huge level of this extra cellular mass, this this excess buildup, and they don't necessarily have the the var coast veins, fluid retention in the legs. Theirs this like a global inflammatory fluid retention problem. A lot of guys when they start doing a detox or something like that. They'll lose ten pounds of fluid within a week. Yeah.
So the inflammation is really the driver especially as Men go.
Speaker 1: Yes. And good markers on the lab for inflammation other than the omega three index or Cra reactive protein, said es is a good one even fight b in and lately even though it's got a short half life d dime, Is also good. You wanna make sure that your blood is not too thick, Fe tint or the iron stores is another good example of something that can cut be a sign of inflammation within the blood. Yeah. And then one other thing that is kind of that sneaks in there is I always have to look at my patients medications, and look for the side effect because any medication that affects the kidney or liver and excess has the potential of increasing blood pressure So always if you're you're on medication, look to see if high blood pressure is one of the side effects of the medication and then address that with your doctor.
Right away, if you feel like that might be the main contributor. Yeah. It's it's a
Speaker 2: two way street especially with the kidneys. Yes. Because if the kidneys aren't working, you're body will get signal to increase blood pressure.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 2: And then if it's high blood pressure, it's gonna damage the kidneys. So you get into this tails spin a bit.
Speaker 1: Yes. Exactly. Alright. So what do you do When you have blood pressure that high.
Speaker 2: So they'll come to the.
Speaker 1: Correct yeah be beyond that.
Speaker 2: How do you start a lifestyle. Yeah. Diet. We've had people were changing diet alone is is the the big thing. I have a patient right now.
I saw him yesterday. He came in with type two type two diabetes, blood pressure issues, And he's been on essentially a mediterranean diets for the last month. His blood sugar and know we're not talking about blood sugar, but it's a good proxy inflammation. He was running almost two hundred fasting in the morning, and now it's been hardly even a month and he's below a hundred. He's normal.
It's ninety. Just from diet change alone.
Speaker 1: Yep.
Speaker 2: So if you can figure out what the things are in your diet that you're either eating too much of or not eating enough of. Yeah. It seems simple it diet change is hard, but that sometimes is the only thing you need.
Speaker 1: So just some real life examples, sugar is very inflammatory for a lot of people and can cause that problem. The top two by far though or alcohol. And tobacco. So... Yeah.
I'm smoking.
Speaker 2: Don't smoke. Don't drink the accent. Yes. Sure. Yeah yeah.
Yeah. Seems easy, but... People.
Speaker 1: So... And if you think about it, so stress what what do people crave when they... When they have stress
Speaker 2: salt sugar. Yeah, That stuff. And smoke.
Speaker 1: And smoke. Yeah. So yeah So reducing the stress. That's why I die and lifestyle so so crucial. So we wanna we wanna get the good mediterranean diet, the the good.
Mh. Fruits and vegetables, the oils, especially, you know, the olive oils, the good lean cleans, I should say foods and and a lot times the carbs are something that is blocking up the liver ability to. To pull up that limb. So we have a lot of people with non alcoholic fatty liver disease. The the rates are actually staggering.
What's what's happening with that right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: A So that's the the first place to start, decrease any inflammatory foods, fruits and vegetables, especially veggies or anti inflammatory and help quite a bit. And reducing the alcohol and the the tobacco is also a big big component for that.
Speaker 2: I want to make one more comment on the diet stuff. I've seen some people attempting, you know, to have a healthy healthy diet, they'll go gluten free, but they'll still eat a lot of processed, gluten free grains, Yes. That's still not great. I mean, the process anything that's processed that's carbohydrate even if it's labeled as kind of a health food. Still has the potential of causing these issues.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely. So that's that's by far the first place that we start. And then you kinda look at what testing has been done. Mh.
So If you are physically inactive, we have to increase your physical activity, to get your muscles contracting to push the lymph flow. You gotta do and steady with this because you don't necessarily have the mechanics as far as the cardiovascular system working for you. So all it's kinda like opening up a highway that's been taken out by a tornado. There's there's cement everywhere and you've got a... Kinda just ease into it and slowly rebuild that highway internally.
So it's it's not a... I'm gonna go back and do the x exercise I was doing when I was twenty. Yeah. You've gotta just be consistent with it.
Speaker 2: This that's why the the post... Like, the new Year's resolution. Yes. Work out people who they're going for a month and they'll just hit it really hard, but because they haven't eased into and their body not used to it. They just...
They crash and bring.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Historically, between Halloween and Christmas is when the majority of Americans gain eighty percent of their weight for the year. And then they try and lose it in January by going hard, And they end up hurting themselves. Usually. And they...
And so that's why the new resolutions just don't work. What you wanna do is just get into a routine that you can do year round and stick with it through the seasons and make good choices for in October, November and December. When it comes to the food. Yep. So actually, it's a big part of stress management.
One of the other tests that we get cat orders and adrenal stress. Tests where we actually look at the Hp access. We've talked about this and past the podcast with the hypo adrenal access. We wanna see how you're sleeping and the melatonin that's produced, We want make sure that you're in rest and digest and that you're not spiking with your adrenal, hormones because think about it, if your adrenaline is high or core cortisol is high, that's a stress hormone If your adrenaline high, your body is expecting you to what, go and run or fight. Mh.
So it's gonna increase your blood pressure. That's what adrenaline is meant to do. It increases your heart rate. If which will then increase your blood pressure. And if you don't go fight, then it's...
You're sitting there and your blood pressure just goes up. Yeah So that's the fire flight mechanism. And I... I wanna put another caveat here for lifestyle, caffeine. Should not be consumed with people with high blood pressure.
And because it can also trigger the adrenal response, it can actually affect the liver And so Caffeine has to be regulated properly with the actual blood sugar or blood pressure elevations.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: One of the best things for blood, pressure is sleep. Yep. Just getting good, deep, rest rec sleep.
Speaker 2: It's so much so that in some of our patients, especially with unresponsive high blood pressure will do sleep test. Yeah. We've got a an ap diagnostic test here called a watch path test. And that test is a at home test you where just a watch with a finger probe and something on your chest one little sticker thing. And that's enough to diagnose apnea.
If you have ap, that is a significant fact. In high blood pressure. Yes. And you won't fix the high blood pressure if you're not fixing the apnea. Correct.
And fixing the apnea, sometimes there's a weight thing. Yep. Sometimes it's a muscle tone issue. Sometimes there's other structural reasons. Sometimes it's more brain based.
But figuring out if you have sleep apnea and how to fix that. Has to be addressed.
Speaker 1: And I I like the watch pat, which is that home test better than some of the sleep studies because you catch things and it's your own home environment.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Versus a lot of people will actually go in and the sleep studies are great as far as you know, observing and different things that they're looking at, but it's not your own bet. It's not... And you're hooked hooked up with so more wires. This is something where you get a a good, look in your home environment. So that's why I do actually like the the at home test.
Other than improving your sleep There are some relaxation things, deep breathing, meditation are very, very helpful with this as well, just things that that help relax. Prayer can go both ways if you're praying and you actually feel more relaxed after praying. It helps if you're praying and actually works you up because you're praying for someone you're worrying about, It can actually make it worse. Yeah. So know yourself.
I had to literally change one of my patients prayer schedule because they were praying... Praying for traffic victims because that's the world she worked in for the kids, right for going to bed. And then she'd have nightmares all night. And so by praying for those kids in the morning, it actually helped her sleep, which then helped us be able to improve her cardiovascular and her anxiety.
Speaker 2: That's interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Cool.
Speaker 1: So let's go through briefly, we'll wrap it up here with some of the... We'll name some of the particle sizes and some of the things we look at, but just you know, there's so many variables. So we could have d where the the the cholesterol is just out out of balance and that just need some specific attention. We could have high Ldl. High Ldl are the bad.
Cholesterol. And a lot of times you need antioxidants to help with Ldl and in particular with a lot of these, we see Niacin seen is very important component of cardiovascular function and be has a dual effect, especially with high Ldl. Because it helps balance insulin. It's an insulin regulator. It also helps to kill fungal infections, which can actually make blood pressure issues works.
So I love burberry as a as a product. And we use that a lot with the high ldl dale. High triglycerides, I'm just gonna say the first thing I always think of with people come in high triglycerides is they're just eating to make carbs. That'll just drive your your triglycerides high. We also see high small dan ldl p particles and There's a cocktail different things you can do it with antioxidants and anti inflammatory, high Lp, which a lot of times they say is genetic is becoming a marker.
They're actually arguing about this being a better marker for cardiovascular disease and dysfunction than any other markers. But there's a lot that can go into this one an acetyl cy or Nec. Is an important part of that one as well as looking at, again, potential fungal infections and things that can that can drive that also na kinase and things that thin the blood in a good way are very, very helpful for that. Low Hdl this is one of my hot topics because this can be so difficult for people to to improve upon and there's some general recommendations. If you're good cholesterol.
The Hdl is low and you're trying to increase it. They always tell you first and foremost, Lose some weight. Reduce your body fat. Increase your omega fatty acids, decrease alcohol, increase your resistance, training for muscle work. And a lot of times you have to also...
A lot of these people are deficient in bile acids. So they're not absorbing the fat soluble vitamins. And so by improving your bile acids, which can which you can do with improving your your gut bio, It's amazing how much the digestive bacteria can influence your blood pressure. And so a lot of that again is by diet and but by just increasing the bile acids, you can actually increase your H hdl as well. Yep.
And then let's see as far as anything else as far as the... Blood pressure and lab markers Mp and some other lab markers are good indicators of cardio function. There's a product that we use called cardio flow that's got the meth fo eight in there as well as magnesium and l ar, which is one of the the big markers. And then tau is in there as well which helps with the bile part of of this whole scenario. So to get your blood flowing they're working on your liver bio system.
Speaker 2: It's such an ar quick because we we should we should talk about nitric oxide. Yes. Nitric oxide, and I think we've talked about this on another podcast, but it's very small molecule that's made in the blood vessels. Its job is to dilate the blood vessels. Which means to make them bigger.
Right? So if you have high blood pressure. And if you don't have nitric oxide working, that could also be the main problem, This also especially in men connects with e dysfunction. But low nitric oxide can be due to low ar, which is a protein. There's other nutrients as well that are needed in order to make nitric oxide.
And there's even infections that can inhibit your nitric oxide. Yeah. Taking cardio flow with ar and is a good option. Some people can't tolerate the ar if they have cold sores it'll make their cold sores worse. In those situations, the the replacement there would be ci.
And that can work just as well for some people. But assessing... This is another reason why we assess with the endo pad. The endo pad. If you've got poor function of the the lining of your blood vessels, supporting nitric oxide can help.
And you you
Speaker 1: touched on something there people or men with a Ed or e dysfunction, ninety percent of it improve when you address the same protocol for cardiovascular. Yeah. And so because we're addressing stress as well, everyone thinks it's a hormone thing, and they go right to low testosterone or or a problem with with hormones and it really is a cardiovascular problem. And so to treat and get to the root cause of with e dysfunction, you treat high blood pressure or cardiovascular dysfunction. Mh And that improves the Ed.
If you take a pill, for Ed and it helps with nitric oxide, which helps with the Ed. You're not fixing the cardiovascular at all. No. And so you're you're basically just set yourself up for a heart attack or some type of cardiovascular event down
Speaker 2: the road. Those medications are nothing but glorify blood pressure medications. Yes.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. So let's get to the root cause and see if we can do anything about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah. For a lot of the things we talked about switching gears here quickly. With the cholesterol. And if you're gonna go to a standard medical doctor, they're likely gonna try to put you on a stat. Yeah.
And if you are on a stat, I would at least encourage you to take C q ten. C ten is... Necessary for your cells to make energy. You. For your heart to make energy for your muscles, your brain to make energy.
It's part of part of your mitochondria, the part that makes the majority of your energy. A stat is going to shut down your ability. It's to make that. Yes. We've had people on statins were so bad they'll come in wheelchair.
Wondering how did I how did my muscle look get so bad And I've got a patient like this. I'm working with out of state. And all it is, if you if you can get off a stat and control everything naturally, the muscles improve, the energy production improves. So statins can be kind of a sneaky thing because medical doctors will hand it out like candy. It's it's even been mentioned should we put it in the drinking water?
Speaker 1: Yes. Should
Speaker 2: I hope they never do that?
Speaker 1: Yeah. No. It shouldn't. And as it's because they really don't think it's a causing this big problem with C ten because it's ten percent of the... Statistically, it's between ten percent twenty percent, usually when they do when they measure it.
But there are other consequences the c ten depletion. Just one of them. And again, you're not getting to the root cause. Of what's set up the problem in the first place. And many times, people will come and say, well, I've got the genetics, I have to have a stat And my answer is there are other ways.
And so if you're willing to put the work in, you don't have to be on the stat, and you don't have to live with a negative consequences of the stat either.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And again, it's it's really ignoring the inflammatory part. Yep. Because if you can control the inflammation even if your cholesterol is higher, It's it's that's protective.
Speaker 1: Alright. So now let's finish up here with some Facebook rapid fire. So thank you for sending in. The the questions, I feel like we need to do some some type of, like, I don't know, drum rule or something there something
Speaker 2: Oh, there's Mark input. Thank you. Fighting all. Yes. Front the drummer.
They're on the drum. Yeah actually plays the drone. He didn't know what it was.
Speaker 1: Alright. So first question, should fo eight be taken with low b twelve and high homo assisting. It's a great question.
Speaker 2: That's a good question. I love the meth cycle. Try not to get too nerdy on the answer. So really does I I do. Urban is because I have the genetics that make mine break.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 2: Really easily. High homo sis, let's start there. Homo is the... By byproduct of your meth cycle. Meth is is really just a...
It's a way of your body modifying different substances. Modi Dna. It can modify certain chemicals to improve detox justification and clearance, That whole system also helps you produce glut t which is your main accident helps you make tau, which we just mentioned is helpful for the liver. It does... That whole system does a lot.
It's it's very important and it's a high demand system in the body. If your homo is high, it means that you have an inefficiency somewhere in that system. Yes. Homo assisting alone is also inflammatory. If it's above...
Even if it's above eight, certainly above ten, you are increasing your risk for cardiovascular disease. Like you just talked about stroke risk and cognitive decline. Yes. None of those are great. So I I tend to be very picky on homo assisting, if it's above ten in particular, even though medically that's okay.
According to the research, that's a that's a long term inflammatory risk. Yes.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And it's it is significant.
Speaker 2: Mh. Significant. So the question is if you've got that high according you've got low b twelve, should you also take fully. And so this gets into, again, the pathway of of how do you get your homo. Down.
Yes. The b vitamins play a huge role, no matter which direction you try to push it. There's multiple directions and I won't get into those details Some people have heard of an enzyme called mt h r. That is the way that your body activates fo to use it. Correctly in the cycle.
Yes. And so that's broken in a high number of of individuals. That's what I mentioned that I have a problem here. That's what I've got. I've got an issue that makes my enzyme there only work at about twenty to forty percent capacity.
Now the way that you get around that, we really got a couple of options. You can take meth fully, which bypass that. You. You can supplement with... B twelve.
You can also supplement with b two rib then. I won't get into exactly why I think that gets too detailed for this question. But...
Speaker 1: Yeah. And the this person did actually mention that they have low b twelve, but when they take b twelve they get jittery. And this is very common. So this this part is very important to list. To answer your question specific.
Speaker 2: Part it depends on the type of b twelve. It does. And so some people can handle and should use meth b twelve since for some people, that form is too potent. Yes. It has to be balanced with fully aid even.
Yes. And so the balance of this is not always so simple as saying, I'm just gonna take a boat load of meth b vitamins, meth fo, meth b twelve and get passes from, some people can't tolerate that. But for people who can't, either different forms of b twelve or supporting, especially if their B twelve is lab below. I mean if your B twelve is lab below, you know you need it, that you gotta find a different form that works and the dose that works. Adding in fully, though, can increase your tolerance just Yes.
Adding in glycine can increase your tolerance. So and, again, this is getting probably more complicated than it what.
Speaker 1: But we... I wanna go fetch this process a little bit important. Because the the the way I I tell people to navigate this is you have to go low and start slow and you have to observe because there's so many... Forks in the road when it comes to this process. So the answer to your question should fully be taken with Low b twelve and high home assisting.
The answer is Yes. Maybe. Probably. And probably. Yeah.
And then the answer is the right form of full eight just to make sure it works. And then you have to just course correct along the way. But order So what order. So you have to you have to do things in different orders. So you may have to pull home homo sis down a different pathway, which requires b six and iron.
So if you're low iron, then you have to work on that first, it be six, a lot of times it's thrown off because of stuff in our gut. So if you're getting Jittery from b twelve, then that is a a a sign that there's some other level of dysfunction, usually, we see that with some... Problem with the the Gi tract. So the right form B twelve, like Dr. Josh said meth bowel as well as fixing the Gi dysfunction.
And some people need Sammy and some people have to avoid it like the plate.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so it's one of things where there there's there's some mechanisms here that have to be identified. Now, I have found tremendous success with people who are jittery from the b six, they have to get their magnesium and b six right, they have to get sleeping restored. They have to be able to sleep better And so you focus on the things that help with the sleep magnesium is one of the important minerals and it's the number one deficiency in Nice. States. So magnesium is a very common one.
And things like the b six, the iron, the glycine, serine even with some people.
Speaker 2: Mh.
Speaker 1: State what else is... I know I'm missing one. O b three can sometimes be needed.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Especially with the the recycling glut file.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 2: And I mentioned b two rib flavor what helps you with the enzyme for the for the fo conversion. What what I think of here... One of the other reasons potentially for the jitter ness is a detox or action? Yes. Because if you're not able to...
False, you take these things and you're making, you know, glut better, you're making a, you you're meth eating better, all these different substances. You might start to push stuff out. That makes you feel weird. Yes you feel healthy.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So if you have flu like symptoms, then that can actually be a good thing because you've just improved your levels of glut and your detox is find better. So that's why it's such a tricky thing. Everyone just wants, you know, they hear about Mt, And they say, oh, take this and we're done. It doesn't work that way.
In fact, again, at the seminar that a couple weeks ago, this Genes... Didn't say I hate Mt r. But basically said, she she does not like how people think everything's just linear. Yeah. You never treat a single snip by itself.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And and it is Ray true. So there are so many forks on a. So that's why I love this question. It's a little... It's complex.
But the answer again is yes, you should take full eight right type with Low b twelve have to discern on through how to be able to get the correct B twelve without the j. We tend to need to work on our digestive dysfunction, maybe liver dysfunction And sometimes you have to do other detox. If the bowel are cons, magnesium is usually what's needed to help with that process as well. So love that question, and now we're gonna move on to our two more. We've got one that's real quick.
So we'll wrap that one up. Any doctor recommendations for the San Francisco area functional medicine and our answer is...
Speaker 2: Unfortunately.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, no. We don't... Don't have anyone. I'm sure they exist there, but we don't have anyone that we've worked with in that area. So thanks for asking that.
Last question to wrap up here, is there a safe way to get off Ppi and replace it with something that will be safe. So the answer... The answer is yes. Absolutely. And just like with everything else with functional mass and there are probabilities here.
And the Ppi... For those I don't know what a Ppi, is a proton pump inhibitor, people are given that for challenges with the asset reflux. And my biggest problem with that is is the long term consequences when people are on Ppi, when you are inhibiting your body's acid production, the general outcome is increased body acid. So we did a whole podcast just on that topic. The fast explanation in the safe way to do it is, you have to find out...
Why you're you're not regulating the stomach acid properly. It can be an infection like h p lori is out of control. It can be a sleep disorder where your brain is not supporting the digestive function, It can be a histamine or zinc imbalance. That's causing a timing mechanism issue as far as when you're releasing the the stomach acid. We've even seen functionally...
The stomach gets caught in the diaphragm, It's a functional hi hernia. Where it's being squeezed and the parietal cells and the stomach release stomach acid. So the answer is yes, there is a safe way to get off the Ppi I'm not a hundred percent on that with my patients, but pretty darn close. There was a just a couple of people that were in their eighties. That was very challenging to get them off their Ppi without the reflux.
And one of the things is very, very undervalued is the role of melatonin because the the the actual valve where the reflux comes out of that can start to affect the esophagus and stuff. That valve is like a muscle. And if it's weak, then it doesn't hold the stomach acid in, and that valve is and another one thing that strengthens that valve, melatonin. Yeah. So melatonin gets decreased with age.
It also gets it decreased with stress infection and inflammation. So again, work on the stress infection inflammation. It it is a larger program. It's a harder work to get off the Ppi. But you're also preventing and we've done this before.
You have to go back to the podcast, but you're preventing things potentially like cancers, and infections that like acidic things in the body. So so there's a there's a lot of value to getting off the Ppi and and fixing the actual mechanisms. Making sure your sleep is good. Some people... I know the answer they wanna hear is just take apple cider vinegar and everything will be okay.
It doesn't work that way although there might be some some benefit to it. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Some people it is easier because it's... The the assumption medically is that if you've got reflux, you've got high stomach guests. Yes. And that's frankly, really not true
Speaker 1: in a lot people.
Speaker 2: It can be the people. And most people it's opposite. We as as humans especially if you look at diets of our ancestors. Right? It was, you know, there was a lot of meat being consumed.
We have higher stomach acid than some other animals that would be considered car. We're meant to have high stomach acid. Yeah. And so if you don't have that stomach acid, those other things aren't working, that can be the cause of reflux. So you mentioned that muscle at the top of the stomach that response melatonin also response to stomach acid.
Yeah. You need stomach acid to keep it tight, Yes. So if you keep pushing down stomach acid, you increase your likelihood for reflex once you go off the medication. So there's a rebound effect and you kinda have to work. Through that issue.
Speaker 1: And anything that causes tension on the stomach like a spas in the small intestine through will actually pull on a stomach and release stomach acid. So the parietal cells release stomach acid when they have a bolus of food or weight of any kind, and when they get pulled when they get stretched. Yeah. Alright. Great questions.
Keep sending them sending them in and we will address them as we go with our our podcast So that was the the Facebook rapid fire, and our topic day high blood pressure. A lot more to it, but we look forward to to bringing up more good topics Keep sending them in. Thanks, everyone.
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