Detox Yourself!

Doctor of Chiropractic, Dr. Alexander Jimenez discusses mitochondria and one’s health.

Mitochondria: you might not know what they are, but they are vital to your health.  Rhonda Patrick, PhD is a biomedical scientist who has studied the interaction between mitochondrial metabolism, aberrant metabolism, and cancer.

She’s also done research on aging at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences in La Jolla, California.

“I’ve had a variety of experiences doing research on aging, cancer, and metabolism,” she explains. “Now, currently, I’m in Oakland, California, where I’m doing my post-doctoral research, working with Dr. Bruce Ames…

The primary focus of the research is the role of nutrition in preventing age-related diseases like cancer, neurodegenerative diseases, and different inflammatory-related diseases like obesity and type 2 diabetes.

I’ve been doing a lot of research currently on nutrition, specifically what roles micronutrients play in biological processes; how inadequacies and certain micronutrients can lead to insidious types of damage that can accumulate over decades, [and how they] lead to things like cancer and Alzheimer’s disease.”

Part of her work involves the identification of early biomarkers of disease. For example, DNA damage is an early biomarker for cancer. She then tries to determine which micronutrients might help repair that DNA damage.
She’s also investigated mitochondrial function and metabolism, which is one of my own most recent passions. Dr. Lee Know’s book, “Life – The Epic Story of Our Mitochondria”, is a really good primer if you want to learn more about this topic after listening to this interview.

Your mitochondria have enormous potential to influence your health, specifically cancer, and I’m starting to believe that optimizing mitochondrial metabolism may in fact be at the core of effective cancer treatment.

The Importance Of Optimizing Mitochondrial Metabolism

Mitochondria are tiny organelles, originally thought to be derived from bacteria. Red blood cells and skin cells have very little to none, while germ cells have 100,000, but most cells have one to 2,000 of them. They’re the primary source of energy for your body.

In order for your organs to function properly, they require energy, and that energy is produced by the mitochondria.

Since mitochondrial function is at the very heart of everything that occurs in your body, optimizing mitochondrial function – and preventing mitochondrial dysfunction by making sure you get all the right nutrients and precursors your mitochondria need – is extremely important for health and disease prevention.

For example, one of the universal characteristics of cancer cells is they have serious mitochondrial dysfunction with radically decreased numbers of functional mitochondria.

“The mitochondria can still function in cancer cells. But one of the things that occur [in cancer cells] is that they immediately become dependent on glucose and they’re not using their mitochondria even though they have mitochondria there. They make this metabolic switch,” Patrick says.

Dr. Otto Warburg was a physician with a Ph.D. in chemistry and was close friends with Albert Einstein. Most experts recognize Warburg as the greatest biochemist of the 20th century.

He received a Nobel Prize in 1931 for his discovery that cancer cells use glucose as a source of energy production. This is called the “Warburg Effect” and, sadly, to this day it is essentially ignored by nearly every expert.

I am beyond convinced that using a ketogenic diet, which radically improves mitochondrial health, could help most cancers, especially if used in conjunction with glucose fermentation poisons like 3-bromopyruvate.

How Mitochondria Produce Energy

To produce energy, your mitochondria require oxygen from the air you breathe and fat and glucose from the food you eat.

These two processes — breathing and eating — are coupled together in a process called oxidative phosphorylation. That’s what the mitochondria use to generate energy in the form of ATP.

Your mitochondria have a series of electron transport chains in which they pass electrons from the reduced form of the food you eat to combine it with oxygen from the air you breathe and ultimately to form water.

This process drives protons across the mitochondrial membrane, which recharges ATP (adenosine triphosphate) from ADP (adenosine diphosphate). ATP is the carrier of energy throughout your body.

However, that process also produces byproducts such as reactive oxygen species (ROS), which are damaging to your cells, and your mitochondrial DNA, which are then transferred to your nuclear DNA.

So there’s a trade-off. In producing energy, your body also ages from the damaging aspects from the ROS that are generated. How quickly your body ages largely depends on how well your mitochondria work, and how much damage can be minimized by diet optimization.

Mitochondria’s Role In Cancer

When cancer cells are present, the reactive oxygen species produced as a byproduct of ATP production normally send a signal that sets in motion a process of cellular suicide, also known as apoptosis.

Since you generate cancer cells every day, this is a good thing. By killing off damaged cells, your body can eliminate and replace them with healthy cells.

Cancer cells, however, are resistant to this suicide protocol, and have a built-in defense against it as articulately explained by Dr. Warburg and subsequently by Thomas Seyfried, who has done extensive research on cancer as a metabolic disease

As explained by Patrick:

“One of the mechanisms by which chemotherapeutic drugs work is they create reactive oxygen species. They create damage, and that’s enough to push that cancer cell to die.

I think the reason for that is because, a cancer cell — which is not using its mitochondria, meaning it’s not producing those reactive oxygen species any longer — all of a sudden you force it to use its mitochondria and you get a burst of reactive oxygen species because that’s what mitochondria do, and boom, death, because that cancer cell is already primed for that death. It’s ready to die.”

The Benefits Of Avoiding Late-Night Eating

I’ve been a fan of intermittent fasting for quite some time for a variety of reasons, certainly longevity and health issues, but also because it appears to provide powerful cancer prevention and treatment benefit. And the mechanism for that is related to the effect fasting has on your mitochondria.

As mentioned, a major side effect of the transfer of electrons that the mitochondria are involved in is that some leak from the electron transport chain to react with oxygen to form the free radical superoxide.

Superoxide anion, the product of a one electron reduction of oxygen, is the precursor of most reactive oxygen species and a mediator in oxidative chain reactions. These oxygen free radicals attack the lipids in your cell membranes, protein receptors, enzymes, and DNA that can prematurely kill your mitochondria.

Some free radicals are actually good and your body requires them to regulate cellular function, but problems develop when you have excessive free radical production. Sadly that is the case for the majority of the population and why most diseases, especially cancers, are acquired.

There are two possible solutions to this problem:

1. Increase your antioxidants
2. Reduce mitochondrial free radical production

I believe one of the best strategies for reducing mitochondrial free radical production is to limit the amount of fuel you feed your body. This is a noncontroversial position as calorie restriction has consistently shown many therapeutic benefits. This is one of the reasons why intermittent fasting works, as it limits the window that you are eating and automatically reduces your calories.

It is particularly effective if you avoid eating several hours before going to sleep as that is your most metabolically lowered state. A review paper1 that provides much of the experimental work for the above explanation was published in 2011, titled “Mitochondrial DNA Damage and Animal Longevity: Insights from Comparative Studies.”

It may be too complex for many laypeople, but the take-home message is that since your body uses the least amount of calories when sleeping, you’ll want to avoid eating close to bedtime because adding excess fuel at this time will generate excessive free radicals that will damage your tissues, accelerate aging, and contribute to chronic disease.

Other Ways Fasting Promotes Healthy Mitochondrial Function

Patrick also notes that part of the mechanism by which fasting works is that your body has to rely on lipids and stored fats for energy, which means your cells are forced to use their mitochondria. Your mitochondria are the only mechanisms by which your body can make energy from fat. So, fasting helps activate your mitochondria.

She also believes this plays a huge part in the mechanism by which intermittent fasting and a ketogenic diet may kill cancer cells, and why certain drugs that activate mitochondria can kill cancer cells. Again, it’s because it creates a burst of reactive oxygen species, the damage from which tips the scale and causes the cancer cells to die.

“Of course, there are a lot of very other interesting mechanisms that occur when you’re fasting,” she says. “Your body also clears away damaged cells through a process called autophagy, which basically means when a cell that’s damaged, it can die. But if it doesn’t die, sometimes it becomes what’s called senescent and this happens a lot with aging. What that means is that the cell is not dead but it’s not really alive either. It’s not doing its function.

It’s just kind of sitting around in your body secreting pro-inflammatory molecules, things that are damaging other nearby cells thereby accelerating the aging process because inflammation drives aging in so many different ways. Autophagy clears away those cells that are just sitting there creating damage and not doing much else, which is nice because that’s also a very important biological mechanism for staying healthy.”

Feeding Your Mitochondria

In terms of nutrition, Patrick emphasizes the importance of the following nutrients; important co-factors needed for your mitochondrial enzymes to function properly:

• CoQ10 or ubiquinol (the reduced form)
• L-Carnitine, which shuttles fatty acids to the mitochondria
• D-ribose, which is raw material for ATP molecule
• Magnesium
• Omega-3 fatty acids
• All B vitamins, including riboflavin, thiamine, and B6
• Alpha-lipoic acid (ALA)

As noted by Patrick:

“I prefer to get as many micronutrients as I can from whole foods for a variety of reasons. One, they are complexed with fiber help with absorption. The nutrients are also in the right ratios. You’re not getting too much. The balance is right. And there are other components that are probably yet to be identified in there.

You have to be very vigilant in making sure you’re eating a very broad spectrum [of foods] and getting the right micronutrients. I think that taking a B complex supplement is good for that reason.

It’s the reason I take one, and also for the reason that as we age, we also do not get B vitamins into ourselves as readily, largely due to our cell membranes getting stiffer. This changes the way B vitamins are transported into the cell. B vitamins are water soluble so they’re not stored in fat. There’s not really an upper toxicity associated with them. If anything, you’re going to pee a little bit more out. But I really think they’re beneficial.”

Exercise Helps Keep Your Mitochondria Young

Exercise also promotes mitochondrial health, as it forces your mitochondria to work harder. As mentioned earlier, one of the side effects of mitochondria working harder is that they’re making reactive oxygen species, which act as signaling molecules. One of the functions they signal is to make more mitochondria. So, when you exercise, your body will respond by creating more mitochondria to keep up with the heightened energy requirement.

Aging is inevitable. But your biological age can be quite different from your chronological age, and your mitochondria have a lot to do with your biological aging. Patrick cites a recent study showing how people can age biologically at very different rates. The researchers measured over a dozen different biomarkers, such as telomere length, DNA damage, cholesterol LDL, glucose metabolism, and insulin sensitivity, at three points in people’s lives: ages 22, 32 and 38.

“What was found was that, if you look at someone who was 38, they biologically could look 10 years younger based on their biological markers, or 10 years older. Even though they were the same age, they aged biologically at very different rates.

In fact, if you took a photograph of these individuals and showed it to another bystander and ask them to guess their chronological age, what was interesting, and this is part of the publication, is that people would guess their biological age rather than their chronological age.”  

So regardless of your actual age, how old you look corresponds with your biological biomarkers, which are largely driven by the health of your mitochondria. So the point is that while aging is inevitable, you have enormous control over the way you age, which is really empowering. And one of the key factors is keeping your mitochondria in good working order.

As noted by Patrick, “youthfulness” is not so much about your chronological age, but rather how old you feel, and how well your body works:

“I want to learn how to optimize my own cognitive performance and my athletic performance. I want to also increase the youthful part of my life. I want to be 90. I want to be out there, surfing in San Diego just like I was when I was 20. I would like to not degenerate as rapidly as some people do. I like to stave off that degeneration and extend the youthful part of my life as long as I possibly can so I can enjoy life.”

More Information

To learn more about Patrick’s work, please visit her website, FoundMyFitness.com. She also has a podcast where she interviews health professionals and scientists on a variety of topics related to health. On her website, you can find videos in which she summarizes key information in clear and easy to understand layman’s terms. You can also sign up for her newsletter, in which she publishes longer, heavily referenced articles.

Click here for the free report, “Nutrigenomics, Epigenetics, and Stress Tolerance: A New Heuristic for Lifestyle Strategy,” which covers some of the topics covered in this interview today, including: the role of DNA damage in aging cells and cancer cells, how blood cells from people show they age at different rates, how intermittent fasting increases autophagy (which clears away damaged cells) and increases genes that produce more healthy mitochondria, and more! You may also want to review her report, “How to Personalize Your Nutrition Based On Your Genes.”

Source:
Dr. Mercola

El Paso, TX. Chiropractor Dr. Alex Jimenez focuses on the rise in opioid use among older adults.

SpineUniverse reported on a study that indicated a 10% increase in opioid addiction or dependency in patients prescribed such drugs to take care of postoperative pain. Although spine surgery was not among the forms of operations included in the research, it’s intriguing to see that 3% of the patients ages 55-years plus, disclosed addiction and opioid use.

Older adults as well as the elderly are part of about 100 million adults in the USA (US) affected by severe or chronic pain. Low back pain is neck pain, and among the most frequent causes of pain, followed by headache/ migraine pain. Spinal stenosis, spinal osteoarthritis, and degenerative disc disease are frequent investigations in elderly residents and our mature adult.

In a presentation by Sullivan in 2003 about chronic pain and prescription opioid abuse and dependence in mature adults, it had been reported that “the prevalence of pain increases with each decade of life Additionally, 80% were grown by pain criticisms in adults age 65 and older. Moreover, as the number of opioid prescriptions increased, so did use by older adults—but some medical studies regularly blown off addiction as temporary or rather rare.
 
Regulators React

Acknowledge and its particular bureaus and the government started to recognize opioid use and the potential risks in elderly Americans. In 2012, a study revealed that more than 700,000 adults (ages 45 to 84) were hospitalized particularly for opioid abuse. Mature adults as well as the elderly accounted for a five-time increase in hospitalizations for opioid abuse compared to younger Americans.

Adults of any age taking an opioid may experience drug unwanted effects that are possibly dangerous. But for mature adults or senior -aged individuals, the hazards are weightier. Why? Old people frequently take several medications simultaneously to treat different medical problems (eg, diabetes, hypertension). It may be a challenge for the patient to keep an eye on when to take a drug that is prescribed or remember if the medicine was taken, which may result in unintentional doses. An opioid drops, and introduces another tier of potential risks, including respiratory depression, lack of balance, confusion, dizziness, drowsiness, nausea.

In 2015, Congress introduced a Medicare-specific bill called “Ceasing Drug Exploitation and Shielding Seniors Act.” Now, we see changes dispensed, and monitored to prevent physician- shopping and other ways drugs could possibly be obtained and abused.
 
Managing Opioid Medications

Elderly patients or some adult live alone, in a household setting, receive home-health support, or reside in a assisted-living facility or alternative scenario. In some cases, the direction of the medication, including pain-relieving drug is managed by healthcare or nursing staff.

Many older adults and aged patients are quite capable of handling physician’s visits, their drugs, and everyday life. Then there are other people who want support. They might not realize they need help or may not ask. This is where friend, a family member or caregiver might help by being observant and step in to help. By way of example, does the patient take their medication as prescribed, but nevertheless look to be in pain? Does he /she stumble easily or fall, complain about feeling dizzy, confused, constipated, or have a few other criticisms?

Remember that people so do their needs for drugs and change with age. In unwanted effects and handling pain, the alternative can be an alternate kind of drug or a dose change. Considering many senior adults and aged men take multiple medications, it’s an excellent idea to bring OTC medication all prescription and nutritional supplements to each physician’s visit for review. This creates a superb chance for you and the individual to talk together with the doctor about new challenges and health changes.

The ability of turmeric to fight cancer has been extensively researched. In fact, over 1,500 published studies show that curcumin, turmeric’s active ingredient, is an effective treatment for over 100 different types of cancer.

The fact that mainstream medicine hasn’t embraced turmeric as a non-toxic cancer therapy is nothing short of outrageous. But a new study, in which curcumin outperformed conventional chemotherapy drugs, may finally bring turmeric the recognition it deserves.

TURMERIC GAINS POPULARITY FROM GROWING AWARENESS OF CHEMOTHERAPY & SIDE EFFECTS

Chemotherapy targets cancer cells as foreign invaders to be eliminated – an approach that ignores the root causes of the disease, and doesn’t help to create an “anticancer” environment in the body. Toxic chemotherapy drugs – which kill healthy cells and cause debilitating side effects – are not very effective against cancer stem cells, the “mother cells” that regulate the growth of tumors.

In fact, the result of these toxic drugs is to make the body even more susceptible to the cancer stem cells – spurring them to create even more treatment-resistant cells.

However, chemotherapy does succeed in killing significant amounts of cancer cells, and this is not to say it should never be used. But, the opinion of many integrative healthcare professionals is that it should be used as a last resort, not a first line of defense – especially when safer, non-toxic options are available.

CURCUMIN MAKES CHEMOTHERAPY SAFER & MORE EFFECTIVE

In a 2015 study published in Cancer Letters, curcumin was tested in conjunction with the chemotherapy drugs 5-fluoroucil and oxaliplatin against colorectal cancer. Adding curcumin to the regimen improved the efficacy of the drugs – the curcumin inhibited cancer cell growth and even increased apoptosis, or cancer cell suicide.

Even more impressive, the curcumin appeared to help the chemo drugs specifically target cancer stem cells, reinforcing the drugs’ cancer-fighting abilities while lessening the side effects – including the neuropathies that can be caused by oxaliplatin. Side effects from curcumin – on the other hand – were minimal, involving mild gastrointestinal upset and dry mouth. Researchers concluded that curcumin is a “safe and tolerable adjunct” treatment.

But this wasn’t even the most significant result of the study.

STUNNING FINDING: CURCUMIN OUTPERFORMED CHEMOTHERAPY DRUGS

In a small subset of patients, curcumin alone was found to be more effective in reducing overall cancer cells and cancer stem cells than the pair of chemo drugs alone. In other words, curcumin went head-to-head with chemo drugs and outperformed them – a truly astonishing result.

Researchers credited curcumin’s multiple methods of action with its success. Curcumin not only directly killed cancer cells, but also induced apoptosis, inhibited the growth of new cancer cells on a genetic level, and prevented blood supply from reaching new tumors.

All this, while promoting health with beneficial anti-inflammatory, antioxidant and hormone-balancing properties.

EXTENSIVE STUDIES ATTEST TO CURCUMIN’S ABILITY TO FIGHT MANY TYPES OF CANCER

As the researchers noted, clinical trials of curcumin in an oncology setting have targeted many types of cancer, including colorectal, pancreatic, breast and blood cancers.

In one study, colorectal cancer patients who were given 1,080 mgs of curcumin daily showed an increase in the amount of dying cancer cells, a reduction of inflammation, improved body weight, and higher gene expression indicating suppression of cancer.

In another study published in Nutrition Research, curcumin-supplemented lab animals showed a 40 percent decrease in the development of colon tumors. These results are supported by an animal model of colon cancer in which curcumin improved survival rate and colon health by completely eliminating cancerous tumors.

In yet another study, patients with pancreatic cancer who were given 8,000 mgs of curcumin a day showed increased survival time along with significant reductions in tumor size – in one case, up to 73 percent.

And, finally, in a study involving prostate cancer, curcumin was shown to cut in half the growth rate of prostate-specific androgen, a marker of tumor progression.

TURMERIC IS STILL UNAPPROVED & UNACKNOWLEDGED BY CONVENTIONAL MEDICINE

In spite of its proven results, turmeric is not approved by the FDA for cancer treatment – and does not enjoy mainstream acceptance in the conventional medical community. The reason, many say, is financial – with hundreds of millions of dollars invested in clinical trials, and massive profits to be made, big pharma doesn’t have much incentive to develop a treatment from a common kitchen spice.

In fact, the industry lobbies to make treatment of cancer by alternative means a criminal offense.

Having said that, we naturally suggest you talk to a trusted medical professional before using turmeric – for any reason – and, don’t stop taking prescribed medication unless advised by your physician.

It should be noted that in the past, turmeric’s therapeutic potential has been limited by its poor bioavailability – the fact that the body doesn’t absorb or use it effectively. But, the development of liposomalized turmeric extract has changed all that, increasing the bioavailability 10 to 20-fold and allowing the curcumin to begin its health-promoting and cancer-fighting work.

Hopefully, the research – presented in this article – will shine a light on the amazing healing potential of turmeric. We encourage every caring physician to do their own research – for the sake of their patients.

Editor’s note: I, personally, use a wonderful liposomal form of turmeric – which you can purchase here and, yes, your purchase does support our operations – at no extra cost to you.


References:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4510144
http://www.naturalhealth365.com/curcumin-prevent-cancer-1803.html

http://www.naturalhealth365.com/curcumin-cancer-cells-2009.html

Doctor of Chiropractic, Dr. Alexander Jimenez takes a look at the latest diet drink with fiber.

COCA-COLA

Coca-Cola recently unveiled a new pop with the ingredient that’s sure to drop easily with its customers: dietary fiber.

The beverage firm introduced the product, which will be called Coca-Cola Plus. The soda is exclusively sold in Japan and features five grams of indigestible dextrin (which is a form of dietary fiber).

According to an announcement from Coke in February, the product is an integral part of Coca-Cola Japan’s Food of Specified Health Use (FOSHU) beverages. FOSHU beverages are intended to appeal to Japan’s health conscious consumers who are 40 and older. Coke, which has had a popular FOSHU tea beverage in the marketplace since 2014, said it took over a decade to research and develop Coke Plus, which was recently accepted by the Japanese government. If its “ ” claims that are healthy will actually do that much to help consumers, yet, individuals aren’t too certain.

“Drinking one Coca-Cola Plus per day with food may help suppress fat absorption after eating,” the firm asserted in a press release, and help moderate the levels of triglycerides in the blood.

Companies adding dietary fiber to its drinks is nothing new. Pepsi added beverages in its Japanese market a few years ago and dietary fiber and made similar claims about fat absorption and triglycerides that Coke did in the statement above.

“Unless Pepsi can provide data from controlled studies in humans to the contrary, their claim should be thought of as bogus and deceptive,” Walter Willett, Fredrick John Stare Professor of Epidemiology and Nutrition and chair of the Department of Nutrition at Harvard School of Public Health, told Time in 2012.

HuffPost reached out to Miriam E. Nelson, Ph.D, one of the state’s leading nutritionists and director of the Sustainability Institute at the University of New Hampshire, to talk about the inclusion of dietary fiber to pop.

“There isn’t any evidence that supplying fiber, scattering it in here or there, that that fiber has an entire health benefit, so that’s an important difference,” Nelson told HuffPost. “The evidence for dietary fiber having a health-promoting impact is with eating a routine of foods (such as fruits and vegetables and whole grains) that supply that fiber.”

Nelson said that adding the fiber won’t do anything harmful to the customer, but just adding the fiber by itself won’t have the well-being aspects a fiber-rich diet would offer. But she did find one part “disturbing” about the fiber claims.

“The companies are trying to add a positive halo or health attribute within a product which doesn’t have some health benefits,” Nelson said. If it’s a sugar-sweetened beverage afterward it truly has a lot of health benefits that are negative, so it’s trying to counterbalance that. That’s the disturbing part, since I believe they’re trying to link with the consumer and develop a health aspect where there isn’t one.”

IF YOU NEED TO INCORPORATE MORE FIBER INTO YOUR DAILY DIET, DO IT WITH WHOLE GRAINS, FRUITS & VEGGIES

El Paso, TX. Chiropractor Dr. Alex Jimenez investigates sugar, acidity and inflammation.

A study late last year, which appeared in JAMA Internal Medicine, presented a damning declaration hardly surprisingly to anyone remotely tuned in to the sugar debate recently.
Researchers here noted way back in the 1960s, the sugar industry paid three Harvard scientists to publish a study in the New England Journal of Medicine arguing fat (particularly saturated fat) and cholesterol triggered heart disease while largely exculpating sugar.(1)

Repercussions of that sugar-lobbied study resonated over the next few decades – into 2017, in fact – as low fat, cholesterol-free, and calorie counting became mantras for healthy eating.
Sugar? Well, it got a free pass as a “healthy” part of any sensible diet, whatever that meant. Meanwhile, over the ensuing decades we became fatter and sicker. And today, more experts acknowledge sugar became the chief culprit that sabotaged our health and waistlines.

Recent Studies on Sugar

Recent studies show sugar converts to belly fat, paving a nasty path for obesity — and other problems. (2) One study found just 24 teaspoons of a few sugars, including sugar from “healthy” honey and orange juice, decrease your neutrophils’ ability to destroy bacteria, thereby hijacking your immune system.(3) (A 12-ounce glass of OJ has nine teaspoons of sugar! So much for drinking OJ when you get a cold.)

Pick your poison — excess sugar probably messes with it. Consider brain health. One study found sugar triggers buildup of toxic amyloid proteins, directly responsible for dementia.(4) Another showed older adults who consumed excess sugar and other carbohydrates increased their risk for dementia compared with older adults who ate a higher-fat and protein diet.(3)

We’re eating more sugar than ever before. Between 1977-78 and 1994-96, the average American daily consumption of added sugars increased from 235 to 318 calories, an increase of 35 percent. Mostly that was due to soft drinks, the single biggest source of calories. Today, over 10 percent of Americans’ daily calories (over 55 grams, in fact) come from sugar-sweetened beverages but also grain-containing foods and fruit or fruit juice, which are essentially sugar. (5)

Today Americans eat an average of 133 pounds of sugar yearly. That doesn’t account for bagels, breads, pasta, and other starchy foods that break down to sugar. According to some experts like Dr. Mark Hyman, altogether the average American eats about a pound of sugar daily!  (6, 7)

Those results, unsurprisingly, have been disastrous. In his new book The Case Against Sugar, Gary Taubes argues over-consuming the sweet stuff has created adverse metabolic and hormonal effects, predisposing us to obesity and preventable chronic diseases including cancer and Alzheimer’s disease (now referred to as Type 3 diabetes).

Anyone following the sugar debate won’t find this breaking news, although Taube’s book presents it in a more mainstream, palatable, arguably jarring light.

But how does sugar lead to obesity, Type 2 diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and pretty much any other disease on the planet? While the path isn’t necessarily linear, we can certainly trace it.

Sugar Wrecks pH Balance

Research shows an alkaline state is healthier for your body, and most tissues and cells maintain an alkaline pH balance.(8) Sugar does the opposite: It imbalances pH and makes you more acidic, increasing your risk for numerous problems including kidney stones, chronic inflammation, and oxidative stress.

The pH of your blood is tightly regulated and usually stays around 7.35 to 7.45. When experts talk about acidic or alkaline foods, they refer to your urine Ph, since blood Ph stays relatively stable. Urine pH provides clues about numerous things include cellular health and nutrient status.

However, excess sugar can lower pH between cells. Excess sugar also creates sodium and potassium imbalances, contributing to that more acidic environment. Combine that with lost calcium in the urine and decreased sodium bicarbonate (the body’s major buffer) and you’ve got a perfect recipe for metabolic acidosis.(8)

Coupled with fewer higher-alkaline foods like fruits and vegetables, your body becomes more acidic while lowering its main buffer (serum bicarbonate). Metabolic stress ensues in your liver, pancreas, kidneys, and other organs.

Studies show overall people who eat more refined sugar consume fewer fruits and vegetables, creating sodium to potassium imbalances that mess with your body’s buffering system, creating – you guessed it – an even more acidic environment between your cells.(8)

An acidic environment also stresses your body out. Sugar-triggered metabolic acidosis raises your stress hormone cortisol, keeping your body on high alert and cranking out more free radicals that damage mitochondria (your cells’ energy plants) while accelerating aging and ramping up fat storage.(9)

Acidity also flips the switch for cytokine production, spiking inflammation and free radical production. An acidic environment also stresses out your liver, kidneys, pancreas, and other organs, ramping up those inflammatory and oxidative stress pathways, damaging cells and sometimes leading to cancer. (10)

Sugar, Chronic Inflammation & Oxidative Stress

The acidic environment excess sugar creates contributes to two major killers that often occur together: Chronic inflammation and oxidative stress.

Chronic inflammation plays a role in every disease on the planet. Numerous culprits contribute to chronic inflammation, including insufficient sleep, lack of exercise, and stress.(11, 12)

So does sugar. Excessive amounts can also increase oxidative stress,(13, 14) creating an antioxidant imbalance that leads to metabolic damage.(15) Oxidative stress weakens your antioxidant defense, dampening your body’s ability to clean up this oxidative damage.(16)

Studies also link oxidative stress to obesity(17) and chronic diseases like cancer.(10) That particularly becomes true when you eat a diet low in omega-3 fatty acids, dietary fiber, and antioxidant-rich foods like vegetables.(18)

Sugar & Disease

So, sugar makes your body acidic, which increases chronic inflammation and oxidative stress, spiking obesity and nearly every disease on the planet. Consequently, obesity and disease increase chronic inflammation and oxidative stress, creating a vicious cycle.

What ensues is often catastrophic and sometimes deadly. Insulin resistance, which paves the path for Type 2 diabetes and other problems, might be sugar’s biggest culprit. Many overweight or obese people also have some form of insulin resistance, which becomes a major player for inflammation.(19)

None of this occurs in a vacuum. Metabolic syndrome – an umbrella term that affects 34 million Americans(20) and includes insulin resistance but also high blood sugar levels, hyperlipidemia, high blood pressure, weight gain, and high uric acid levels – also increases inflammation and oxidative stress.(21)

Taubes, like some other experts and recent studies, pins sugar as the chief driver for insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome.

Many studies particularly blame fructose. Yes, fruit contains fructose, but getting 15 grams of this simple sugar from an apple becomes far different than a soda. For one, that apple comes packaged with nutrients, fiber, and antioxidants that buffer its fructose load. (22, 23)

What’s Wrong With Fructose?

Ironically, fructose doesn’t raise insulin levels but contributes to insulin resistance.(24) It also depletes your main energy “currency” adenosine triphosphate (ATP), damages cells, and creates uric acid buildup (leading to gout and other problems).(25, 26)

There’s more. Fructose increases apolipoprotein B levels, creating “sticky” blood platelets that increase blood clotting, paving the way for stroke and heart attacks.(27) And it raises triglyceride levels while becoming the chief driver of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD).(28)

This simple sugar shuts down satiety hormones like leptin, delivering a double whammy of insulin resistance and leptin resistance.(29)

It can even make you less intelligent. A 2012 study at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA showed compared with a control group, rats fed a high-fructose diet performed poorly in tests using mazes designed to observe memory and learning.(22)

Keep in mind sucrose (table sugar) breaks down to fructose and glucose, and even high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) contains glucose. Glucose is no angel, but it behaves metabolically different and (at least compared with fructose) overall creates less damage. At the same time, eating large amounts of sugar means you’re simultaneously getting huge amounts of fructose, creating these and other problems.

Dialing Back Your Sugar Quota

Considering certain sugars (like fructose) are more damaging, and naturally occurring sugars create different effects than added sugars, the whole sugar debate can become confusing. And what does “excessive amounts of sugar” even mean?

Opinions differ, but the American Heart Association (AHA) recommends no more than six teaspoons daily for women and nine for men, while the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends no more than 10 percent (ideally less than five percent) of your calories come from added sugar or sugars like honey, syrups, and fruit juice.(27)

My own recommendations tend to be in-line with those of the World Health Organization, though I’d recommend those sugar calories only ever get into the body in the form of organic raw honey or unrefined maple syrup — if at all!

When you reduce sugar, you help restore acid-base balance and lower inflammation as well as oxidative stress, reducing your risk for obesity and chronic disease. You can’t eliminate sugar (even super-healthy foods like broccoli contain a little sugar), but you can cut back on it. Here are five ways to do that.

1. Increase healthy foods.

Add before you take away: Edge out sugary foods with more nutrient-rich ones. Studies show focusing on antioxidant-rich fruits and vegetables can reverse sugar’s inflammatory response.(30) No, eating three servings of steamed broccoli doesn’t give you leeway to eat chocolate cake, but that broccoli can help minimize sugar’s impact.

2. Scrutinize labels

Never mind that the front package boasts “low sugar” or whatever. The only way to really know is by looking at nutrient facts. Keep in mind that roughly four grams equals one teaspoon of sugar. Do your math and multiply accordingly. Learn the many names for sugar that hide on ingredients lists (Jonathan Bailor notes 57!) and realize manufacturers keep serving sizes incredibly small to trick you into thinking you’re eating less sugar than you actually are.

3. Beware of “healthy” foods and especially drinks.

A green juice or honey-sweetened bottle of green tea can have as much (if not more) sugar than a cola. Just because it gets touted as healthy or you find it in a “healthy” grocery store doesn’t make it healthy.

4. Remember all carbs break down to sugar

That bag of potato chips might only contain two grams of sugar per serving, but look at the complete carbohydrate count. Something like 20 grams of carbohydrate from processed foods – meaning foods without fiber, antioxidants, or other nutrients whole foods provide – essentially break down into about five teaspoons of sugar. That’s one Let’s face it: You’ll probably eat several servings of these “trigger” foods. Proceed accordingly.

5. Eat real food

Cut through the chase and simplify your eating by avoiding processed foods. Even though some whole foods contain sugar, they come wrapped in fiber, nutrients, and antioxidants that buffer out that sugar load.

Have recent studies made you rethink how much sugar you consume, particularly from sneaky sources? Does sugar rightly deserve to be demonized or are we being overly dramatic making it public enemy number one? Share your thoughts in the comments below or on my Facebook page.
 
 
About Dr. B.J. Hardick

Raised in a holistic family, Dr. B.J. Hardick is the co-author of the best-selling Maximized Living Nutrition Plans, used in natural health clinics worldwide, and a contributing author for its follow-up publication, The Cancer Killers. Dr. Hardick shares his own journey dealing with heavy metal toxicity in Real Detox, his e-Book available on DrHardick.com. An organic food fanatic and green living aficionado, all Dr. Hardick’s passions are anchored in helping others achieve ecologically sound, healthy, and balanced lives.

Named after the Developer of Chiropractic, Dr. B.J. Hardick is a second-generation chiropractor, a 2001 graduate of Life University, and has spent the majority of his life working in natural health care. Dr. Hardick is in full-time clinical practice in London, Ontario.

Outside of patient hours, Dr. Hardick is known for speaking on his natural health strategies to numerous professional and public audiences every year in the Unites States and Canada. In 2009, he wrote his first book, Maximized Living Nutrition Plans, which has now been used professionally in over 500 health clinics, alongside a follow-up publication to which he was a contributor, The Cancer Killers. Dr. Hardick serves on the advisory board forGreenMedInfo.com, the world’s most widely referenced natural health database.

All Dr. Hardick’s passions are anchored in helping others achieve ecologically sound, healthy, and balanced lives.