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Abdominal Fat Increases Psoriasis Risk in Women

Thu, 26 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Psoriasis is an autoimmune disease that’s marked by red, itchy, scaly patches that usually show up on your elbows, knees, scalp, and lower back. It affects over 7.5 million adults in the United States today.¹ However, psoriasis isn’t just a skin problem — it’s a systemic inflammatory condition that could lead to joint damage, chronic fatigue, and metabolic disease.

Researchers recently discovered a powerful independent risk factor for developing psoriasis among women — abdominal fat. In fact, they found that belly fat specifically is more predictive of psoriasis than overall body fat. This proves that the fat around your waist is a warning sign that your immune system is on high alert, and the inflammatory cascade it triggers could be the hidden driver behind this skin condition.

Abdominal Fat — A More Powerful Predictor of Psoriasis Than Weight Alone

A recent investigation published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology set out to determine whether the specific location of body fat, rather than overall fat mass, influences the risk of developing psoriasis.² Conducted by researchers from King’s College London, the study used data from the UK Biobank, one of the world’s most robust population-based datasets, to assess how body fat is associated with this skin condition.³

• Determining the study participants — Data from over 330,000 individuals, including more than 9,000 diagnosed cases of psoriasis were analyzed. Importantly, the researchers assessed 25 different fat distribution measures, using both traditional methods and advanced imaging, to identify which were most strongly linked to the disease.

• All participants were of White British ancestry to control for genetic variation — Within this population, the researchers found that abdominal fat — often referred to as visceral, central, or belly fat — was significantly more predictive of psoriasis risk than total body fat.

• Women were particularly vulnerable — Based on their findings, visceral fat volume had a much higher odds ratio in females than in males — 1.35 vs. 1.13 respectively — indicating that fat stored around the organs in the abdomen may be more inflammatory or more biologically active in women.

• The risk remained consistent even after adjusting other factors — These include body mass index (BMI), family history, and other conventional risk factors, establishing abdominal fat as a strong independent contributor to psoriasis.

• Even if you’re not genetically predisposed to psoriasis, belly fat still increases your risk — The researchers found that individuals who did not carry the HLA-C06:02 gene variant — a known risk factor for psoriasis — were more strongly affected by fat-related risk. The waist-to-hip ratio had a significantly greater impact in HLA-C06:02-negative individuals.

This means that for people without a strong inherited risk, lifestyle factors like fat distribution play an even bigger role in determining their psoriasis risk.

This study challenges long-held assumptions about how psoriasis develops. Waist circumference, once dismissed as a cosmetic measurement, now emerges as a critical biomarker for systemic inflammation and immune risk.

If you’re managing psoriasis or concerned about its onset, focusing on reducing central fat could offer a more targeted and effective strategy than simply aiming for a lower number on the scale. According to Prof. Catherine H. Smith, senior author of the study:⁴

“As rates of obesity continue to rise globally, understanding how different patterns of body fat influence chronic inflammatory conditions such as psoriasis is important.

Our findings suggest that central body fat contributes to psoriasis risk irrespective of genetic predisposition and reinforces the importance of measuring waist circumference and pro-active healthy weight strategies in psoriasis care.”

The More Weight You Gain, the Greater Your Risk of Joint Disease

When psoriasis is left unchecked, it can progress into psoriatic arthritis, which causes swelling, pain, and stiffness that mimic rheumatoid arthritis and permanently damages your joints. So what does fat have to do with this? It turns out, carrying excess weight, particularly around the abdomen, also increases psoriatic arthritis risk in women.

A long-term prospective study published in the Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases examined the link between body composition and the risk of developing psoriatic arthritis among women. Using data from the Nurses’ Health Study II, researchers tracked 89,049 U.S. female participants over a 14-year period to determine whether excess weight and fat distribution contributed to the onset of psoriatic arthritis.⁵

• Participants were free of psoriatic arthritis at the start of the study — They were then followed for 14 years, with their data collected twice a year using mailed questionnaires. The researchers gathered information such as their BMI, waist and hip circumference, weight changes since they were 18 years old, lifestyle factors (such as cigarette use or alcohol intake), and medical diagnoses, including psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis.

• Over time, 146 incident cases of psoriatic arthritis were confirmed — When stratified by BMI, the findings were conclusive — women with a BMI of 35 or higher had over six times the risk of developing psoriatic arthritis compared to women with a BMI under 25.

• The study further evaluated the role of fat distribution, specifically abdominal fat — Looking at the participants’ waist and hip measurements, the researchers found that central adiposity — excess fat stored around the abdomen — was independently associated with increased psoriatic arthritis risk. These associations persisted even after adjusting for different factors.

• The temporal aspect of weight gain was another critical factor — Women who were already overweight at age 18 exhibited an elevated risk, but those who experienced significant weight gain in subsequent decades faced substantially greater odds of developing psoriatic arthritis. This suggests that disease risk intensifies not solely from early-life weight status but through prolonged exposure to excess weight and chronic metabolic strain.

This study offers a rigorous, longitudinal perspective on how body composition affects psoriatic arthritis risk. It affirms that excess abdominal fat is more than a cosmetic concern, but a measurable, inflammatory burden that significantly increases your risk of chronic autoimmune disease. Importantly, it identifies abdominal fat and cumulative weight gain as modifiable risk factors, meaning there’s a clear opportunity to prevent and manage this disease.

Vitamin D Deficiency — Another Contributing Factor to Psoriasis

While you may be familiar with vitamin D for its role in bone health and calcium regulation, there’s now research showing that its benefits extend to your skin health. Vitamin D helps to regulate the proliferation and differentiation of keratinocytes — the cells responsible for forming your skin's outer layer. In fact, this nutrient plays a role in immune modulation and skin health, by reducing inflammation and supporting your skin barrier.

• Despite its availability, vitamin D deficiency is a common problem today — Aside from a handful of foods like fatty fish and supplements, getting vitamin D means exposing your skin to sunlight. This is important for those living in northern latitudes or have darker skin that reduces vitamin D synthesis. For people with psoriasis, vitamin D deficiency may not just be a consequence of avoiding sun exposure but could also be linked to the disease's underlying mechanisms.

• Low levels of vitamin D were associated with psoriasis — A systematic review and meta-analysis of 23 studies revealed that individuals with psoriasis have significantly lower serum levels of vitamin D compared to healthy controls. On average, the vitamin D levels of psoriasis patients were 6.26 ng/mL lower than those of individuals without the condition.⁶

• People with psoriasis also have elevated levels of parathyroid hormone (PTH) — This hormone is a marker often associated with low vitamin D. High PTH levels could reflect the body's effort to maintain calcium balance despite vitamin D deficiency. Some researchers suggest that PTH might even play a role in psoriasis pathogenesis by influencing immune activity, particularly the proliferation of proinflammatory T-helper 17 (Th17) cells.

• The lower your vitamin D levels, the worse your psoriasis is — A separate study, presented at the American Society for Nutrition 2023 meeting, looked at 500 psoriasis cases and found that patients with the smallest areas of skin affected by the disease had the highest average levels of vitamin D, while those with the most extensive lesions showed the lowest levels.⁷

• Mindful sun exposure is the best way to support your vitamin D levels — It also allows you to gain other health benefits tied to sunlight and spending time outdoors, such as reduced cancer risk and improved longevity. Learn more about the benefits of sun exposure in “Beyond Vitamin D Production — How Sensible Sun Exposure Supports Overall Health.”

• A reminder about sun exposure — It’s important that you avoid direct sunlight during peak hours (10 a.m. to 4 p.m.) until you’ve reduced your seed oil consumption for at least two to six months. This is because the linoleic acid (LA) in these oils accumulates in your skin, and when it interacts with the sun's UV rays, it triggers inflammation and DNA damage.

My Mercola Health Coach app will officially be released this year, and one of its main features is the Seed Oil Sleuth — It calculates your vegetable oil intake to the tenth of a gram, and is a helpful way to keep track of your seed oil consumption, to ensure that you’re slowly but surely reducing your intake.

• A faster way to purge LA from your skin — I recently discovered that consuming pentadecanoic acid or C15:0, a special fat found in raw grass fed milk, helps purge LA embedded in your skin faster. Increasing your intake of C15:0 to 2 grams per day causes your keratinocytes to incorporate it instead of LA within a single skin-cycle (around four weeks).

This means that if you continue drinking raw milk, the LA on your skin should go down by 25% to 30% within three to four months. When you keep it up for 12 to 18 months, the LA in your adipose tissue will decrease by 80%, instead of two to three years by following a low-LA diet alone. After doing this, whatever remaining ultraviolet risks on your skin come from direct DNA damage and can’t be fixed by your diet.

Reduce the Root Causes Driving Psoriasis and Joint Disease

If you are dealing with psoriasis — or concerned about your risk of developing it or its related joint complications — you must concentrate on reducing your abdominal fat. It’s not just a cosmetic issue; it’s a biological one, as it plays an active role in driving inflammation. Addressing this specific type of fat gives you the most direct path to improving immune balance and reducing disease progression. Here are practical strategies to help address this root cause and support long-term health:

1. Prioritize fat loss if you already have psoriasis — If you are currently managing psoriasis, central fat reduction should be one of your primary health goals. Begin by removing sugar-sweetened beverages, minimizing processed foods, and centering your meals around nutrient-dense whole foods. Combine this with daily movement to gradually reduce abdominal fat and ease the systemic inflammatory burden on your body.

2. Monitor your waist-to-hip ratio — Rather than relying solely on weight or BMI, begin regularly measuring your waist-to-hip ratio. For women, a ratio above 0.85 is associated with increased inflammatory risk. This measurement more accurately reflects fat distribution, so track this number monthly, so you’ll be able to see your progress more accurately.

3. Incorporate moderate-intensity exercises to improve fat metabolism — A consistent walking routine — particularly for 10 to 15 minutes after meals — will significantly improve your body’s ability to manage blood glucose and metabolize fat. If you’ve experienced gradual weight gain over the years, this is a simple yet effective intervention to begin reversing that trend.

4. Replace seed oils with healthy fats — The LA in soybean, corn, canola, and safflower oils contribute to systemic inflammation,^8,⁹ promote fat accumulation, and, as mentioned above, worsen psoriasis by accumulating in your skin and causing damage. Replace these seed oils with anti-inflammatory alternatives such as grass fed butter, ghee, beef tallow, or coconut oil.

5. Adopt a consistent eating window to support hormonal balance — Irregular or late-night snacking leads to chronic elevation of insulin and promotes abdominal fat storage. A simple but effective approach is time-restricted eating (TRE), where you consume all meals within an eight-hour window, preferably during daylight hours. This pattern supports better insulin sensitivity, reduces fat accumulation, and enhances overall metabolic function.

Consistently applying these strategies will help you take control of one of the most important drivers behind psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis. However, if you’re already diagnosed with this condition, don’t worry — although it’s not curable, there are ways to manage it and prevent flareups. I recommend reading “Eczema and Psoriasis — Different Causes, Similar Symptoms” for a list of natural remedies to control this condition.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Abdominal Fat and Psoriasis

Q: How is abdominal fat connected to psoriasis?

A: Abdominal fat, especially visceral fat stored around your organs, triggers inflammation that can activate your immune system in harmful ways. Studies show it's a stronger predictor of psoriasis risk than overall weight or BMI.

Q: Why are women more affected by this connection than men?

A: Research has found that abdominal fat appears to be more biologically active in women, leading to a stronger inflammatory response. This increases their susceptibility to psoriasis and related joint diseases like psoriatic arthritis.

Q: Can you still develop psoriasis from belly fat even without a genetic predisposition?

A: Yes. Even women without genetic markers linked to psoriasis are at higher risk if they carry excess belly fat. This proves that lifestyle-related fat distribution plays a central role in disease development.

Q: What’s the link between psoriasis and joint damage?

A: If psoriasis isn't addressed, it can lead to psoriatic arthritis — a painful condition that damages your joints over time. Abdominal fat further increases this risk, especially in women who gain weight over several decades.

Q: What are the most effective ways to lower your risk?

A: Focus on reducing central fat through daily walking and cutting out seed oils, replacing them with healthier fats. An intermittent fasting regimen like TRE can also be helpful. Just make sure you’re getting enough carbs (ideally around 250 grams per day). Tracking your waist-to-hip ratio regularly to monitor your progress.

Intermittent Fasting Can Trigger Hair Loss by Flooding Hair Follicles with Harmful Fats

Thu, 26 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Hair loss is often dismissed as a cosmetic issue, but it’s actually one of the clearest signs your body is under stress. When your energy reserves are low and your stress hormones stay elevated, your hair follicles go dormant — and in some cases, shut down entirely. In a nutshell, your body prioritizes survival when resources run low.

One overlooked factor is the impact of intermittent fasting or time-restricted eating, also known as TRE. While often praised for boosting metabolic health and accelerating fat loss, TRE, just like longer fasting regimens, can in some cases cause problems. Fasting triggers a hormonal response designed to help you cope with food scarcity, but that response comes at a cost.

Your body switches fuel sources, ramps up stress hormones, and alters how fat and energy are used at the cellular level. That shift directly affects the tissues that require the most energy to grow and regenerate, including your hair.

Emerging research is now confirming what many people have experienced firsthand: fasting doesn’t always work in your favor, especially when it comes to regenerative health. It activates a cascade of stress responses that reach your skin, your fat stores and your stem cells. And instead of building resilience, it often erodes it. In the next section, I’ll walk you through what the researchers found and how this process plays out at the cellular level.

Fasting Fuels Hair Loss by Flooding Your Cells with Toxic Fat

Bioenergetic researcher Georgi Dinkov highlighted what happens to your cells when your body burns fat for fuel during intermittent fasting.¹ He explains that when your body runs out of sugar (glucose), it turns to fat stores, breaking them down in a process called lipolysis. But instead of this being a “clean burn,” it dumps free fatty acids into your bloodstream, which act like a slow poison for your cells, especially in your skin and organs.

• Trying to lose fat through fasting costs you muscle and long-term health — Dinkov warns that fasting isn’t selective; it doesn’t just target fat. You also lose muscle. In fact, studies show that for every pound of fat lost, people may lose up to two pounds of muscle.

This drains your structural strength, slows your metabolism and leaves your body with fewer resources to heal and recover. Worse, the fat you do break down releases toxic byproducts that directly harm your tissues, including your skin and scalp.

• Your body floods with harmful fatty acids when sugar runs out — Once your glycogen (stored sugar) is used up, fasting kicks off a flood of free fatty acids. These aren’t clean energy — they’re unstable and highly reactive.

Dinkov points out that they create oxidative stress, damage your energy-producing mitochondria, and often lead to fibrosis, or scar-like tissue, in key organs like your liver. In plain terms: what’s supposed to be a fat-burning “cleanse” ends up polluting your system from the inside out.

• Hair follicles get hit hard when your energy source shifts to fat — Hair growth depends on high-energy stem cells that prefer to run on glucose, not fat. When fasting forces your body to burn fat instead, those cells start to struggle.

Dinkov writes that this disrupts the entire regeneration cycle and “greatly inhibits the growth of hair.” If you’ve experienced hair thinning, shedding or loss during or after a fasting period, this switch in energy source could be a major reason why.

• Even healthy people show signs of organ stress from fasting — You don’t need to have diabetes or a metabolic condition to see damage from fasting. Dinkov highlights that elevated free fatty acid levels have been tied to liver and kidney damage even in people who are otherwise healthy. So, if you’re fasting to stay “fit,” you’re trading short-term weight loss for long-term stress on your organs.

• Fasting puts your body into a chronic stress response — When glucose runs low, your body activates the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis — your emergency stress system. This floods you with adrenaline and cortisol, which break down muscle and fat to try and keep you going.

But this system is designed for short bursts of danger, not long-term daily use. The longer you push this stress response, the more damage it causes, especially to skin and hair. Dinkov sums it up bluntly: stop pushing your body to the edge. “Maybe, just maybe, don’t fast (or otherwise stress yourself) to start with.”

Your Hair Follicles Shut Down When You Fast Too Long

A peer-reviewed study published in Cell explored how intermittent fasting disrupts hair follicle regeneration through a specific stress response between your adrenal glands and the fat cells in your skin.² The researchers wanted to understand how fasting influences tissue repair, and they focused on hair follicle stem cells (HFSCs), which are essential for new hair growth. Their key question: does fasting affect the metabolism and survival of these cells?

• Researchers tested popular fasting methods and found the same harmful outcome — The study included mice exposed to two common fasting regimens — alternate-day fasting and 16:8 time-restricted eating, where food intake was limited to an eight-hour window followed by a 16-hour fasting period.

Both forms triggered a near-identical biological reaction: HFSCs stopped regenerating and began dying off. Importantly, this effect occurred even though total calorie intake remained the same, suggesting it wasn’t caused by nutrient deprivation but by the fast-feed cycle itself.

• Human trials confirmed that fasting stalls hair growth — In addition to animal models, researchers ran a randomized clinical trial on humans. Participants followed an intermittent fasting routine and had a small patch of scalp shaved to monitor hair regrowth.

The results were clear: those on fasting protocols showed noticeably slower regrowth compared to those who ate normally. This directly connected fasting habits to visible changes in the rate of hair returning.

• This effect has nothing to do with calories or circadian rhythm — Researchers ruled out some usual suspects. Mice in both groups ate the same number of calories over time. Time-of-day variations didn’t matter either — fasting at night or during the day triggered the same level of HFSC death. This shows the culprit isn’t under-eating or bad timing. It’s the stop-start energy availability from fasting that wreaks havoc on stem cells.

• The stress signal starts with your adrenal glands and ends in your skin — Under fasting conditions, your adrenal glands ramp up production of corticosterone and epinephrine — two hormones that act like emergency messengers. These hormones prompt dermal fat cells to dump fatty acids into the tissue, leading to cell damage and death.

The More You Fast, the Faster Your Hair Stem Cells Die

A paper published in Life Metabolism also explained that intermittent fasting directly alters the way hair stem cells function, shifting them into a metabolic state that ends in programmed cell death, also known as apoptosis.³

• Hair follicles stalled in the resting phase and refused to regrow — Research has shown that intermittent fasting keeps hair follicles stuck in the telogen, or resting phase, of the hair cycle. Normally, after a brief pause, follicles are supposed to re-enter the anagen, or growth phase. But in fasted mice, this transition never happened. Hair stayed dormant.

• The hair stem cell pool was actively depleted over time — Early in the fasting cycles, hair stem cells briefly activated as expected. But with repeated fasting, these same stem cells began dying off instead of renewing.

Over time, the pool of viable HFSCs shrank dramatically. This led to not just slower regrowth but actual degeneration of the follicles themselves. Unlike other tissues where fasting sometimes increases stem cell resilience, this effect was destructive in hair follicles.

• Blocking fat metabolism protected hair stem cells — To confirm what was killing the cells, researchers genetically blocked fatty acid oxidation in HFSCs. When those metabolic pathways were shut down, the cells stopped dying, even during fasting.

Similarly, when fasting-triggered free fatty acids were artificially introduced into the tissue, stem cells began dying again. The link was clear: fasting increases free fatty acid exposure in the hair niche, and those fatty acids are toxic to stem cells when used as fuel.

• Mitochondrial damage was the last straw for the stem cells — Under the microscope, fasted HFSCs showed signs of mitochondrial breakdown, including distorted shapes, leaky membranes and dysfunctional production of adenosine triphosphate (ATP), the fuel that powers everything from brain function to hormone balance.

Lab markers also showed increased reactive oxygen species, DNA damage and oxidative stress — all signs of a cell under extreme pressure and unable to cope. Once these stress markers surpassed a certain threshold, the cell’s natural suicide program kicked in.

Does This Mean All Fasting Is Bad?

It’s important to clarify that not all fasting is harmful. In fact, TRE can offer real benefits when used wisely. TRE — such as eating all your meals within an eight-hour window and fasting for 16 hours — has been shown to support autophagy, improve insulin sensitivity, and promote metabolic flexibility. The key is knowing when and how to use it.

If you're experiencing hair loss, fatigue, or other stress-related symptoms while following TRE, it's likely because you're not eating enough carbohydrates during your feeding window. Make sure you’re getting around 250 grams per day to restore balance. If that doesn’t resolve the issue, consider widening your eating window to 10 or 12 hours, or adopting a more regular meal schedule.

For some people, not fasting at all and eating every four hours works best — especially if you're dealing with low energy, chronic fatigue, or signs of metabolic burnout. But there's a catch: you can't just graze on junk food. If your goal is to restore healthy energy production at the cellular level, your body needs a steady supply of quality carbohydrates throughout the day. That means reaching for clean sources like white rice, well-tolerated grains, ripe fruits, and cooked vegetables.

And here’s another layer of nuance: if your gut is compromised — think bloating, constipation, or post-meal discomfort — high-fiber carbs might make things worse, not better. In that case, start with low-fiber carbs and slowly work your way back to fiber-rich options as your digestion improves.

As for longer fasts — lasting 24 hours or more — they too have a place in cases of extreme obesity or serious metabolic dysfunction. But these extended fasts should be treated like medical interventions, not long-term habits. When used too frequently, they can trigger muscle wasting, elevate stress hormones, and leave your body in a chronically depleted state.

So, it’s not that fasting has no value. It’s that the benefits come with trade-offs. And if you’re seeing hair loss, declining energy, or slower recovery, that’s your body signaling it’s time to adjust the approach — not double down. Ultimately, fasting is a tool, not a default setting. Whether you fast for eight hours, 24 hours, or not at all, what matters most is how you nourish yourself when you do eat. If you’re under-eating, skimping on carbs, or over-relying on fat as fuel, the drawbacks will eventually catch up to you.

Stop Starving Your Hair and Feed It What It Actually Needs

If you’ve been doing intermittent fasting and started noticing your hair thinning, falling out faster than usual or just refusing to grow, this is your wake-up call. Here’s where I recommend starting:

1. Balance your fat to carb intake — Your hair stem cells aren’t designed to run on fat. When you fast, your body dumps free fatty acids into your system, which poisons the follicle environment. Keep your fat intake between 30% and 40% of total calories, and carbs around 45% to 55%.

2. Aim for 250 grams of healthy carbs per day, and more if active — If you’ve been eating low-carb, this may feel like a lot, but this is what your cells need to make ATP efficiently. Carbs spare your protein reserves, stabilize your blood sugar, lower stress hormones and keep your hair follicles from going dormant.

Start with white rice and whole fruit. Add well-cooked root vegetables next. Hold off on raw greens, whole grains and beans until or unless your gut is healthy, meaning your bowel habits, bloating and overall comfort are under control.

3. Reduce your fasting window — Widen your eating window to 10 or 12 hours. If problems persist, consider adopting a more regular meal schedule.

4. Use near-infrared light therapy to boost cellular energy — Low-level laser therapy, especially using near-infrared wavelengths, stimulates your mitochondria to release nitric oxide and produce more ATP. These three — mitochondria, NO and ATP — work together to trigger healing effects like DNA repair and cellular regeneration, including in hair follicles. You can get many of these hair growth-stimulating benefits by using a zero-EMF near-infrared sauna.

5. Rebuild hair strength by fixing nutrient deficiencies — Your hair relies on certain nutrients to grow and stay anchored in your scalp. If you’re missing key nutrients like vitamin D, B12 or vitamin A, shedding is often one of the first signs. The best way to fix this is through a nutrient-dense, whole food diet. If your hair loss continues, I recommend seeing a holistic doctor for a full blood panel.

With those results, target specific deficiencies using food or supplements and get your body back on track. The key is consistency. Your body — and your hair — need to know that nourishment is always coming.

FAQs About Intermittent Fasting and Hair Loss

Q: Why does intermittent fasting cause hair loss?

A: Intermittent fasting triggers a stress response in your body that leads to lipolysis — the breakdown of stored fat — which floods your system with free fatty acids. This forces your hair follicle stem cells to burn fat for energy, a process that produces toxic byproducts like reactive oxygen species. These stress signals ultimately kill off the stem cells needed to regenerate new hair.

Q: What did recent research show about the effects of fasting on hair follicles?

A: A clinical trial published in Cell found that intermittent fasting actively suppressed hair growth in humans by triggering stress signals between the adrenal glands and skin fat cells.⁴ This disrupted the metabolism of hair stem cells, causing them to die off instead of renewing and growing new hair.

Q: If fasting harms hair growth, what should I do instead?

A: The solution is to make sure you’re eating enough healthy carbs when you do eat, and/or widen your eating window. If necessary, stop intermittent fasting and shift to regular, nourishing meals every three to four hours. Prioritize carbohydrates, especially white rice and whole fruits, to provide your cells with glucose, which is their preferred fuel source. Avoid low-carb diets and instead focus on fueling your body with digestible, balanced meals.

Q: Is hair loss from fasting permanent?

A: If caught early, hair loss due to fasting is often reversible. Once you stop the fasting cycle and reintroduce consistent energy through food, especially glucose, your body begins regenerating hair. However, prolonged stem cell damage from repeated fasting could result in lasting follicle loss, so early intervention is important.

Q: How many carbs should I eat to support hair and metabolic health?

A: Most adults need 250 grams of carbohydrates daily to support optimal mitochondrial function and hair growth. If you’re physically active or recovering from stress or restrictive eating patterns, your needs will be even higher. The goal is to eat enough to keep your body out of energy deficit and allow your cells to thrive.

Vitamin D Helps Lower Your Risk of Colorectal Cancer

Thu, 26 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Colorectal cancer is one of the most prevalent types of cancer today, particularly in Western countries where modern, processed-food diets have become the norm. Every year, 1.2 million cases of colorectal cancer are diagnosed worldwide, and around 930,000 people succumb to this disease.¹ It's the second most common cancer affecting men, and ranks as the third most common cancer in women.²

Some of the early symptoms of colorectal cancer include abdominal discomfort, blood in the stool, fatigue, and unexplained weight loss. However, these symptoms are usually dismissed until the disease has progressed, and it's too late.

Now, research has highlighted a powerful yet often overlooked factor that will help protect against this lethal disease — vitamin D.

New Data Shows Vitamin D Plays a Bigger Role in Colon Cancer Prevention

A comprehensive analysis published in the journal Nutrients in April 2025 has discovered a fascinating but substantial link between vitamin D and colorectal cancer (CRC). The researchers reviewed and analyzed data from 50 separate studies involving over 1.3 million participants to determine how much vitamin D impacts your risk of developing colorectal cancer.³

• This large-scale review looked at diverse populations — The data covered various groups and nationalities, including women in the U.S. Midwest, Danish adults with a family history of cancer and Canadians living in high-altitude areas. The participants had different health statuses as well — some had colorectal cancer, or a documented vitamin D deficiency. Others were also given a vitamin D supplement.

• While the participants varied in health status and genetic risk, a consistent pattern emerged — The researchers found that the lower your vitamin D levels, the higher your risk of developing colon cancer. On the flip side, people with adequate or optimal levels of vitamin D had dramatically lower rates of cancer.

"Maintaining optimal vitamin D levels and adequate dietary intake is crucial in preventing CRC and improving patient prognosis," the researchers said.

• Unfortunately, majority of people today have very low levels of this vital nutrient — A recent study that looked at the vitamin D status of more than 5,600 adults found that 37.6% had vitamin D insufficiency (blood levels between 20 and 30 ng/mL), while 42% were severely deficient (blood levels lower than 20 ng/mL) in this nutrient.⁴

Mónika Fekete, Ph.D., a professor in the Institute of Preventive Medicine and Public Health at Semmelweis University and the study's lead author, commented:

"While vitamin D is not a substitute for screening or a healthy lifestyle, it is an important and relatively modifiable factor worth paying attention to — especially in individuals at higher risk of deficiency, such as older adults, people with limited sun exposure, those with darker skin, or individuals with chronic illnesses."⁵

More Notable Highlights from the Featured Study

This new research makes it clear that if you're not paying attention to your vitamin D status, you're missing out on one of the simplest and most powerful tools available to reduce your risk of colon cancer. Below are some of the compelling findings from the featured analysis that point to vitamin D as a key factor in reducing your risk of colorectal cancer.

• A landmark 1996 study found that women with the highest vitamin D intake had a 58% lower risk than those with the lowest intake.⁶

• A 2021 meta-analysis found a 39% lower risk of colorectal cancer in people with higher blood levels of vitamin D. The researchers also noted that when vitamin D levels were monitored over time, those who maintained higher levels had a 20% lower chance of developing colorectal cancer down the line.⁷

• A Canadian study found that supplementing with vitamin D reduced the incidence of precancerous polyps — by 33% for all polyps and 43% for high-risk ones. These polyps often go on to become cancer if not addressed early, so this kind of intervention has massive implications.⁸

• The Iowa Women's Health study found that women who took vitamin D with calcium saw a 15% drop in colorectal cancer risk compared to those who didn't take any supplements.⁹

• The Danish "Diet, Cancer and Health" study (one of the major ones included) found that vitamin D offered even stronger protection in people with a high genetic risk of colon cancer. That means if you've got a family history of this disease, optimizing your vitamin D status isn't just helpful — it could be life-saving.¹⁰

How Does Vitamin D Affect Your Colorectal Cancer Risk?

Vitamin D is a fat-soluble nutrient your body naturally synthesizes when your skin is exposed to sunlight. As I've noted in previous articles, it plays an essential role in your bone health, immunity, and brain function, including mood regulation.

• Vitamin D's role in cancer protection — Vitamin D acts by attaching to vitamin D receptors (VDR) found in your cells, including your colon cells. When this occurs, a series of signals are released that affect how your cells grow, develop, and survive.¹¹ However, having poor vitamin D levels weakens these protective effects, allowing abnormal colon cells to survive and multiply instead.¹²

• Another vital purpose of vitamin D — Animal studies have also found that vitamin D helps delay some age-related changes by activating another important pathway via the vitamin D receptor. This pathway involves a molecule called Nrf2, which plays a crucial role in protecting your body from oxidative stress and DNA damage — two factors that are commonly linked to the development of cancer.¹³

• Vitamin D also supports the health of your intestinal lining — The colon is constantly regenerating itself, and this requires precise communication between your cells. Vitamin D ensures that this process runs smoothly. According to one research:

"Vitamin D and its nuclear receptor (VDR) regulate intestinal barrier integrity, and control innate and adaptive immunity in the gut. Metabolites from the gut microbiota may also regulate expression of VDR, while vitamin D may influence the gut microbiota and exert anti-inflammatory and immune-modulating effects."¹⁴

Vitamin D Has Protective Effects Against Other Cancers, Too

In general, cancer now ranks as the second-leading cause of death worldwide, after cardiovascular disease.¹⁵ As the featured analysis and the supporting studies it investigated discovered, it's clear that optimizing your vitamin D levels is a key strategy to reduce cancer deaths. However, health officials rarely acknowledge its importance. In fact, there are multiple ways by which vitamin D helps protect against cancer, such as:¹⁶

• Inhibiting cancer cell growth — It targets different stages of cancer development and progression. This includes the initiation, growth and spread of cancer cells.

• Preventing cancer spread — It has antimetastatic effects, meaning it stops cancer cells from spreading from the original tumor site to other areas of the body. This is useful for improving survival rates, as metastasis is often responsible for many cancer fatalities.

• Stopping tumor formation — Vitamin D is anti-tumorigenic; it helps prevent tumors from forming or growing by inducing cancer cell death, blocking cell cycle progression, or blocking pathways that trigger tumor growth.

A 2023 review published in the Journal of Steroid Biochemistry and Molecular Biology highlighted some of the types of cancer that vitamin D could help prevent, such as:¹⁷

Breast
Prostate
Bladder
Glioblastoma
Melanoma

Squamous cell carcinoma
Ovarian
Multiple myeloma
Osteosarcoma
Head and neck

The study also highlighted the role of genetic differences in the VDR that could influence breast cancer risk. Read more about the findings here — "More Evidence Showing Vitamin D Combats Cancer."

Sunlight — Mother Nature's Vitamin D Factory

While some amounts of vitamin D are found in foods like fatty fish, liver, and egg yolks, the ultimate way to boost your levels of this nutrient is through mindful and appropriate sun exposure.

• When sunlight hits your skin, it produces a type of vitamin D called cholecalciferol — It's far different from vitamin D2, which is what you get from plant sources like mushrooms and yeast. D3 is actually more effective at increasing blood levels. On a typical sunny day, your body may produce up to 25,000 international units (IU) of vitamin D.¹⁸

• How much sun is enough? Ideally, you must expose your bare skin to direct sunlight daily. Gauge how long to stay under the sun safely by doing this simple test — Pay close attention to your skin for any sign of pinkness. The goal is to stay just below the point where your skin starts to turn slightly pink. If your skin turns red, it's a sign of damage, not benefit — get out of the direct sun immediately.

• Your body cannot get too much vitamin D from sun exposure — Your body stops making vitamin D when you've got enough, so you can't overdo it from sunlight alone. However, if you have darker skin, you'll need to spend more time in the sun to produce the same amount of vitamin D as someone with lighter skin.

• An important caveat about sun exposure — If you're still consuming a processed food diet loaded with vegetable oils or seed oils, then sun exposure will work against you. This is because seed oils are packed with linoleic acid (LA), which then accumulates in your skin.

When the LA in your skin interacts with the UV rays from the sun, it triggers inflammation and DNA damage. To avoid this, I recommend avoiding direct sunlight during peak hours until you've eliminated seed oils for at least six months.

• Additional reminders on sun exposure — In some cases, it's impossible to completely avoid peak sunlight during the period when you're purging LA from your diet. If this is the case, it's best to follow protective measures:

◦ Take 12 milligrams of astaxanthin daily — This will enhance your skin's UV resistance.

◦ Apply niacinamide (vitamin B3) cream before and after sun exposure.

◦ Take a baby aspirin — This will help prevent LA from converting to harmful oxidized linoleic acid metabolites (OXLAMs). Ideally, take the aspirin 30 minutes to one hour before sun exposure.

• A strategy to speed up LA removal from your skin — One interesting discovery I recently made was that there's a way to quicken up the pace by which your body purges LA embedded in your skin. This is by ingesting a special fat called pentadecanoic acid or C15:0, found in raw, grass fed milk.

I recommend getting at least 2 grams of C15:0 per day, which will significantly speed up LA clearance from your body from two to three years to 12 to 18 months. My article, "The Fast-Track Path to Clearing Vegetable Oils from Your Skin" will give you more insightful details about C15:0.

However, not everyone has access to sunlight at all times. For example, people who live in far northern regions have very few months of peak sunlight. In this case, a vitamin D3 supplement is the best alternative.

Get Tested to Ensure You're Meeting the Ideal Levels for Cancer Prevention

Measuring your vitamin D level, ideally twice a year, is the only way to determine if you're getting enough sun exposure and/or taking the right amount of vitamin D3 supplement.

• What's the optimal level for cancer prevention? Ideally, you must aim for between 60 ng/mL and 80 ng/mL. The cutoff for sufficiency is around 40 ng/mL. In Europe, the measurements you're looking for are 150 to 200 nmol/L and 100 nmol/L, respectively.

• Adjust your levels depending on your test results — Once you've confirmed your vitamin D levels via testing, adjust your sun exposure and/or vitamin D3 supplementation accordingly. Then, remember to retest in three to four months to make sure you've reached your target level.

• Optimize other nutrients to help meet your levels — Remember to balance your vitamin D3 with calcium, magnesium, and vitamin K2 through your healthy diet.

• If you're supplementing with vitamin D3, here's a tip — Take it with a meal that has some healthy fat, like grass fed butter or tallow. Since vitamin D is fat-soluble, this will help your body absorb it.

Your Gut Health — Another Vital Factor to Reduce Your Colon Cancer Risk

Vitamin D, or the lack of it, is indeed a key factor that increases your risk of colon cancer, but there's another major aspect that many people are ignoring until it's too late — their gut health.

There's actually a significant connection between the state of your gut microbiome and colorectal cancer risk, particularly the composition of the food you eat. Your gut is a fascinating, complex ecosystem teeming with trillions of bacteria, both helpful and harmful. These tiny residents play a crucial role in digestion, nutrient absorption and even your immune system.

But when you consume a poor, nutritionally deficient diet loaded with ultraprocessed junk foods high in vegetable oils and LA, not only are you hampering the growth of good bacteria, but you're also nourishing the pathogenic bugs. This disruption in the gut microbiome leads to an inflammatory environment, increasing the risk of colon cancer.¹⁹

Hence, you must take the necessary steps to protect your gut health. Read my article "Unveiling the Link Between Ultraprocessed Foods and Colon Cancer" for more information.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Vitamin D for Colorectal Cancer Prevention

Q: How does vitamin D help protect against colorectal cancer?

A: Vitamin D plays a direct role in cell regulation. It slows the growth of abnormal cells, encourages unhealthy cells to die, reduces inflammation in the gut, and helps maintain the health of the intestinal lining — all of which are key in preventing cancer from developing or progressing.

Q: What vitamin D level is considered protective against colon cancer?

A: For cancer prevention, aim for blood levels of 60 to 80 ng/mL. Levels below 30 ng/mL are considered low, and anything under 20 ng/mL is classified as deficient. Most adults fall below these thresholds, putting them at unnecessary risk.

Q: Does vitamin D reduce the risk of colon polyps, too?

A: Yes. One Canadian study found that supplementing with vitamin D reduced all colon polyps by 33%, and high-risk polyps by 43%. These types of growths are often precursors to cancer, so reducing them is a major step in prevention.

Q: Is sun exposure enough to meet my vitamin D needs?

A: Sunlight is the most effective way to make vitamin D naturally, but only if you're not loaded with seed oils, which cause skin damage. If sun exposure isn't possible — due to location, skin tone, or season — a vitamin D3 supplement is recommended.

Q: Who is most at risk for vitamin D deficiency and colorectal cancer?

A: Older adults, people with darker skin, those with chronic illness, or anyone with limited sun exposure are more likely to be deficient. If you have a family history of colorectal cancer, optimizing your vitamin D levels becomes even more important.

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Your only client is the truth: Navigating the space between medicine and law [PODCAST]

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 23:00:29 +0000

Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes! Nephrologist Saad S. Alshohaib discusses his article, “Why truth still matters in the courtroom: lessons from a physician witness.” The conversation provides a profound reflection on his decade of experience serving as a medical expert witness, a role he describes as

Why truth still matters in the courtroom: lessons from a physician witness

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Why the future of medicine depends on leading from the heart

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There’s a sacred irony in medicine: Those who care for hearts often forget their own. This truth came into sharp focus for me this past weekend, where I found myself in a room of women cardiologists at The American College of Cardiology in D.C. The women in attendance were brilliant and compassionate. They spend their

Pain is more than physical: the story your body is trying to tell

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Pain is a signal. It gets our attention. It arrests, alarms, and demands we listen. C.S. Lewis wrote in the problem of pain: “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pain: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” And what a deaf world we have

Why holding a patient’s hand matters more than technology

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I was on another overnight shift in the OB/GYN emergency department. The air was thick with tension, as it always is when the night is full of contractions, cries, and codes. One woman arrived in active labor — her first baby, frightened eyes, and no family by her side. Everyone rushed to prepare for the

Magnolia Essential Oil Fights Bacteria and Oxidative Stress

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

For centuries, magnolia flower buds have been used in traditional Chinese medicine to ease headaches, relieve sinus congestion and resolve early symptoms of colds and respiratory infections. But today, that same plant is getting attention for something very different — its potent ability to help you fight modern health threats hiding in your kitchen, your gut and even your cells.

You’re probably already familiar with the problem of harmful bacteria becoming harder to kill. What used to be a minor stomach bug now lingers, spreads and resists treatment. At the same time, oxidative stress — the damage caused by unstable molecules that build up inside your body — has quietly been accelerating everything from aging and inflammation to cancer risk.

That’s where magnolia essential oil comes in. This isn’t just about soothing aromatherapy or herbal folklore. This oil delivers measurable antibacterial and antioxidant effects that rival some of the most widely used chemical agents. New research goes beyond theory and directly measures how this oil interacts with harmful microbes and oxidative stress markers.¹

If you’ve been looking for natural tools that actually work, especially ones that won’t make bacterial resistance worse, then this is where to start paying attention. The following study breaks down exactly how magnolia oil works against some of the most dangerous pathogens known to medicine.

Magnolia Oil Stops Harmful Bacteria Before They Take Hold

A study published in Frontiers in Microbiology looked at how magnolia essential oil affects four common bacteria that cause food poisoning: E. coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Listeria monocytogenes and Salmonella typhimurium.² Researchers wanted to know not just if magnolia essential oil worked, but how it worked. They used advanced tools to identify the oil’s ingredients and ran tests to measure bacterial growth, cell damage and oxidative stress.

• It was strong enough to block the bacteria that cause stomach and gut infections — The four bacteria studied are known to cause serious illness. Exposure often triggers cramps, vomiting, fever, and, in some people, life-threatening issues. Magnolia essential oil completely stopped these bacteria from multiplying.

In lab dishes, it created clear areas where no bacteria could grow — called inhibition zones. Listeria and Salmonella were especially sensitive, with inhibition zones over 12 millimeters (mm) wide, a sign of strong antibacterial power.

• Even small amounts delayed bacteria for hours — When researchers tested the lowest dose needed to stop growth — called the minimum inhibitory concentration — they found magnolia essential oil worked at just four to five microliters per milliliter. At that level, bacteria took over 12 hours to start growing. At higher doses, growth stopped entirely. For you, that kind of delay could mean avoiding a full-blown infection after exposure.

• It damaged bacteria at the microscopic level — Using powerful microscopes, scientists saw that the oil changed how bacteria looked. Normally, bacterial cells are round and smooth. After exposure to magnolia essential oil, they looked sunken and torn. The outer layer — the cell membrane — started to collapse and leak. Without that protective barrier, bacteria can’t survive.

• Bacteria spilled their contents and lost their ability to survive — The oil caused the bacteria to leak genetic material and proteins, things that are supposed to stay inside the cell. This kind of loss stops the bacteria from making new cells, repairing damage or doing basic tasks like digesting nutrients or breathing.

• It also shut down their energy supply — Magnolia essential oil lowered the bacteria’s levels of an enzyme called ATPase, which is how they make energy. Without enough, the bacteria couldn’t power their systems, reproduce or protect themselves. This kind of deep-level damage makes magnolia essential oil more effective than substances that only attack the outer layer.

Magnolia Essential Oil Also Blocks Oxidative Damage Linked to Inflammation and Aging

Magnolia essential oil caused a spike in malondialdehyde (MDA), a sign of damage to cell membranes caused by unstable oxygen molecules, also called oxidative stress. This meant the oil wasn’t just breaking down bacterial walls — it was damaging the materials those walls were made from, causing the whole structure to fall apart.

• Even the bacteria’s natural defenses weren’t enough — Bacteria have their own way of fighting oxidative stress: they use an enzyme called superoxide dismutase (SOD). When they were exposed to magnolia essential oil, their SOD levels went up, but it wasn’t enough. The oil’s damaging effects still overwhelmed their defenses, leaving them broken and inactive.

• Researchers identified the active compounds in the oil — Researchers found that magnolia essential oil contains mostly terpenoids — natural substances with strong antibacterial and anti-inflammatory effects. Together, they were even stronger than individually, working in synergy to kill bacteria more effectively.

• The oil also fought harmful oxidation — Beyond bacteria, magnolia essential oil helped neutralize free radicals, which are molecules that damage your cells and speed up aging. Another test showed it also had moderate power to reduce oxidation. That means this oil gives you two benefits: it kills bacteria and helps protect your body from cellular damage linked to aging and disease.

Simple Ways to Use Magnolia Oil for Natural Defense

If you're dealing with frequent food poisoning, sluggish digestion or recurring gut infections, chances are your body's internal defenses are struggling to keep up. The real issue isn’t just exposure to bacteria — it’s how vulnerable your system is to invasion. When harmful microbes slip past your gut lining, they trigger inflammation, digestive problems and even immune dysfunction.

Magnolia essential oil offers a natural, targeted way to stop this process before it starts — by damaging bacterial membranes and disrupting their energy supply at the source. Here’s how to use magnolia essential oil to strengthen your internal terrain and create a natural line of defense:

1. Diffuse magnolia oil in your kitchen and food prep areas — When bacteria land on countertops or cutting boards, they multiply fast. Running a diffuser with magnolia oil while you cook or clean fills the air with active compounds that help reduce airborne pathogens.³

2. Use diluted magnolia oil as a DIY surface cleaner — Mix a few drops of magnolia essential oil with vinegar and filtered water in a spray bottle. Use it to clean fridge shelves, trash bins and even reusable grocery bags. You’re not just covering up smells — you’re breaking down bacterial cell membranes and stopping growth right at the surface.

3. Add a drop to your hand soap or dishwashing liquid — If you spend a lot of time in the kitchen, or if you're a parent trying to reduce your children’s exposure to foodborne bacteria, this simple step goes a long way. It keeps bacteria from building up on your hands and utensils, while giving you the added benefit of antioxidant protection for your skin.

4. Try topical or diffused use of magnolia oil for targeted protection — If you're looking for practical ways to incorporate magnolia essential oil into your routine, consider applying it topically (always diluted with a carrier oil such as coconut oil) or using it in a diffuser. Topical use helps defend against bacterial contamination on your skin, especially if you’re prone to cuts, scrapes or skin irritation.

Diffusing it into the air supports ambient antimicrobial defense in your environment, which is particularly useful during cold and flu season or when someone in your household is sick. The same compounds that damaged bacterial membranes in the study help purify your immediate space without contributing to antibiotic resistance.

5. Rotate natural antimicrobials to avoid bacterial resistance — Don’t rely on magnolia oil alone every day. Cycle it with clove, oregano and thyme essential oils — each with its own antibacterial profile. This keeps bacteria from adapting and gives your body a broader defense system. Just like you wouldn't eat the same meal every day, you shouldn’t use the same antimicrobial nonstop either.

FAQs About Magnolia Essential Oil

Q: What is magnolia essential oil and why is it important for health?

A: Magnolia essential oil is extracted from the flower buds of Magnolia species traditionally used in Chinese medicine. It contains natural compounds that actively fight bacteria and reduce oxidative stress. Research confirms that it disrupts bacterial membranes, blocks their ability to reproduce and helps prevent infections from common foodborne pathogens like E. coli and Salmonella.⁴

Q: How does magnolia oil kill bacteria?

A: Magnolia oil works by puncturing bacterial cell membranes and causing internal leaks. This damage leads to loss of essential proteins and DNA, disrupted metabolism and oxidative stress, all of which stop the bacteria from multiplying. In lab studies, it also triggered a spike in a marker of membrane damage and increased stress enzymes in the bacteria — clear signs that the bacteria were under attack.

Q: Does magnolia essential oil protect against antibiotic-resistant bacteria?

A: Yes. Magnolia essential oil has been shown to damage bacterial cell membranes and disrupt their energy production, even in strains known to resist conventional antibiotics. By attacking the physical structure and internal machinery of bacteria, it bypasses the typical pathways that allow microbes to adapt and survive drug treatments. This makes it a promising natural tool in the fight against antibiotic-resistant infections.

Q: How do I use magnolia oil to protect my home and health?

A: To use magnolia essential oil safely and effectively, start by adding a few drops to a diffuser to purify the air and reduce airborne microbes. For surface cleaning, mix it with a natural carrier like vinegar and spray it on kitchen counters, cutting boards and other high-touch areas.

If you're using it on your body, always dilute it first with a carrier oil, like coconut, and apply it to areas prone to irritation or breakouts. Magnolia oil’s ability to break down bacterial membranes makes it a smart addition to your natural cleaning and wellness routine.

Q: Why is magnolia oil a better choice than synthetic antimicrobials?

A: Unlike synthetic disinfectants and antibiotics, magnolia oil has a lower risk of contributing to antibiotic resistance. It targets bacteria through multiple pathways — membrane disruption, metabolic collapse and oxidative overload — making it harder for bacteria to adapt. That makes it a safer, more sustainable option for both home use and long-term wellness.

Boosting Magnesium Levels Could Slow Brain Aging and Lower Dementia Risk, Research Shows

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Your brain relies on magnesium to regulate energy, nerve function and blood flow, but most people don't realize how easily they fall short. Even when your diet looks clean on paper, soil depletion, stress and common gut issues quietly interfere with magnesium absorption, creating a mismatch between what you eat and what your body can use.

What's troubling is that magnesium deficiency rarely announces itself. You might notice brain fog or memory lapses, but write it off as normal aging. Meanwhile, beneath the surface, your brain could be edging toward structural changes that raise your risk for cognitive decline. One major clue comes from research published in Advances in Nutrition, where scientists found a precise threshold for magnesium in the blood linked to dementia risk.¹

While many people don't get enough magnesium, overdoing it also creates problems, forming a U-shaped risk curve that challenges the "more is better" approach. Your brain doesn't just need magnesium; it needs it in the right range, consistently. And once that balance slips, your nervous system pays the price. Let's dig into what researchers found and how it ties magnesium levels to long-term brain health.

Too Much or Too Little Magnesium Raises Dementia Risk

The Advances in Nutrition analysis explored how magnesium — measured through supplements, diet and blood levels — is linked to cognitive decline, dementia and overall brain aging.²

The study included data from three randomized controlled trials and 12 cohort studies, pooling insights from diverse adult populations around the world. Researchers used multiple statistical models to investigate whether there's a clear pattern between magnesium status and mental decline. What they found was striking.

• Both low and high blood magnesium levels were tied to increased dementia risk — Instead of a simple "more is better" outcome, the findings showed a U-shaped curve. This means both ends of the spectrum, too little magnesium or too much, are linked to higher dementia risk.

The safest range, according to the researchers, centers around a serum magnesium level of 0.85 mmol/L. Compared to this midpoint, those with lower magnesium levels had a 43% higher risk of cognitive impairment, while those above the high end had a 30% greater risk.

• The body's magnesium "sweet spot" protects your brain — People whose magnesium levels stayed within the range of 0.75 to 0.95 mmol/L had the lowest risk of dementia. The researchers believe this is because optimal magnesium levels support key protective processes in the brain, such as reducing inflammation and guarding against damage to brain cells.

• Magnesium helps prevent neurological breakdown through multiple pathways — Researchers identified several ways magnesium keeps your brain stable and functional. It helps maintain your blood-brain barrier, which acts as your brain's security system by keeping harmful substances out.

It also preserves the structure of myelin, the fatty sheath around nerves that enables fast, accurate communication, and prevents nerve overstimulation, which, if left unchecked, leads to neuron burnout.

• Magnesium affects your blood vessels, too — not just neurons — The review also highlighted magnesium's role in regulating blood pressure and vascular tone, two factors closely tied to dementia risk. Low magnesium triggers hormonal shifts and increases clotting agents, which raise the risk of stroke and brain damage, especially in older adults.

• Brain scans confirm structural benefits of optimal magnesium levels — In one cohort of 1,466 adults, those with higher serum magnesium had larger brain volumes and fewer small vessel infarcts — tiny strokes that silently destroy brain tissue. These individuals were 56% less likely to have signs of damage in the deeper parts of the brain compared to those with the lowest magnesium levels.

Higher Magnesium Intake Means a Younger, Healthier Brain

A large-scale study published in the European Journal of Nutrition looked at how daily dietary magnesium intake influences brain volume and white matter health.³ Researchers used brain scans from 6,001 participants between the ages of 40 and 73. The goal was to see if magnesium levels, and how they change over time, correspond to differences in brain aging — decades before cognitive decline or dementia would be diagnosed.

• People with higher magnesium intake had larger brain volumes and fewer brain lesions — On average, participants who consumed more magnesium had greater gray matter volume and healthier hippocampal regions — the parts of your brain responsible for learning and memory. These individuals also had fewer white matter lesions, which are signs of microdamage in the brain often linked to memory problems, reduced processing speed and higher dementia risk.

• Increased magnesium intake predicted more brain volume over time — Compared to people with normal intake levels, those in the top quartile of magnesium consumption (around 550 milligrams (mg) per day) had brains that looked nearly a full year younger, based on tissue volume. That 41% increase in magnesium intake correlated with a 0.20% increase in gray matter and a 0.46% increase in right hippocampal volume, a key marker of brain resilience.

• Magnesium benefits were tied to brain tissue, not blood pressure — Although magnesium is known to lower blood pressure, the researchers were surprised to find that its impact on brain health was not due to cardiovascular effects. Instead, the protection came from anti-inflammatory and neuro-supportive actions in the brain itself. White matter damage was reduced even when blood pressure remained unchanged.

• Long-term magnesium intake patterns mattered more than short-term spikes — The study broke participants into groups based on their magnesium "trajectory" over time: stable, increasing or decreasing. Those with consistently high intake, especially if they started high and dropped slightly, still showed strong brain protection. This suggests that lifetime patterns of adequate magnesium lock in structural brain benefits even if intake fluctuates later in life.

• Magnesium preserves both neurons and their support systems — Magnesium protects brain volume by enhancing how well brain cells communicate, reducing oxidative stress and slowing down inflammatory processes that damage brain tissue. These are some of the same mechanisms that underlie Alzheimer's and age-related memory loss, making magnesium a valuable tool for brain health in middle age and beyond.

Vitamin D Status Influences How Magnesium Affects Your Memory

Research published in Alzheimer's & Dementia analyzed data from 2,508 adults aged 60 and older who participated in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) between 2011 and 2014.⁴ The study set out to determine whether total magnesium intake, meaning from both food and supplements, was connected to cognitive performance in older adults.

• Higher magnesium intake was tied to better overall brain performance — After controlling for factors like age, income, education and calcium consumption, adults with the highest magnesium intake showed better overall cognitive performance than those with the lowest intake, with a 0.15-point advantage on standardized memory and attention tests.

That might sound like a small difference, but in large population data like this, it's enough to signal a meaningful shift in mental clarity and memory strength.

• The benefit was strongest in people with "sufficient" vitamin D levels — Among those with vitamin D levels of 20 ng/mL (50 nmol/L) or higher, high magnesium intake led to even better results.

These participants scored higher on global cognitive function and showed greater accuracy on memory tests, particularly naming animals quickly, a marker of verbal memory and processing speed. Ideally, aim for vitamin D levels between 60 and 80 ng/mL (150 to 200 nmol/L).

• Magnesium also helps your brain by enhancing vitamin D's performance — There's a two-way relationship here: Vitamin D boosts magnesium absorption in your gut, while magnesium helps convert inactive vitamin D into its active form. That means if your magnesium is low, vitamin D won't work properly, and vice versa. This interplay is likely why the strongest cognitive improvements were seen in people who had enough of both nutrients.

Magnesium and vitamin D work synergistically, along with vitamin K2. Combining all three supplements significantly reduces the amount of vitamin D needed to maintain optimal health. A study of 2,920 individuals indicated that many of those not taking magnesium and K2 required a remarkable 244% more oral vitamin D to achieve similar healthy levels compared to those who took magnesium and K2.⁵

Why I Recommend Magnesium Supplements Over Food Alone

If your brain feels foggy or your memory isn't what it used to be, you're not alone. Many people aren't getting enough magnesium, even those eating a whole-food, plant-rich diet. And that's not because you're doing something wrong. It's because our soil isn't what it used to be. Thanks to industrial farming, magnesium levels in vegetables have dropped significantly.

Further, only about 30% to 40% of the magnesium you eat is actually absorbed.⁶ While I usually recommend food first when it comes to getting your nutrients, magnesium is one exception. Whole foods still matter, but when your goal is protecting your brain and slowing age-related decline, supplements are often needed to fill the gap. Here's how I recommend you start.

1. Test your intake against your symptoms — If you struggle with low mood, mental fatigue, poor sleep or forgetfulness, there's a good chance low magnesium is part of the problem. These are all signs your nervous system is underpowered. You won't always catch this on a standard lab test, either. What matters most is how you feel and what you're eating. Track your average daily intake and watch for signs of stress or cognitive slowdown.

2. Skip the nuts and seeds, even though they're high in magnesium — Many nutritionists will tell you to eat pumpkin seeds or almonds to boost your magnesium levels. But the truth is, these are also loaded with linoleic acid (LA), a polyunsaturated fat that disrupts your mitochondria and increases inflammation. If your gut or metabolism is already struggling, these "healthy fats" will set you back. I don't recommend relying on nuts or seeds as a magnesium source.

3. Stick with magnesium glycinate, magnesium malate, or magnesium L-threonate for long-term — These forms are well tolerated and actually get into your tissues, where they matter. Glycinate is calming, making it ideal if you're facing stress or poor sleep.

Malate helps with energy production, which is useful if you feel tired all the time. L-threonate is frequently recommended for sleep, memory and mental focus. I don't recommend magnesium oxide; it mostly passes through your system unused.

4. Use magnesium as a tool, not a crutch — Supplementing is wise, but don't stop there. Magnesium works best when you're also lowering stress, walking daily, sleeping deeply and eating a wide variety of whole foods. Think of it as a foundation, not a fix. Keep an eye on your body's cues and adjust as needed. But remember, supporting optimal brain health requires a comprehensively healthy lifestyle.

FAQs About Magnesium and Your Brain

Q: What does magnesium do for your brain?

A: Magnesium helps regulate brain function by supporting your blood-brain barrier, reducing inflammation and protecting neurons from overstimulation. It also plays a key role in maintaining memory, focus and learning by helping to stabilize nerve signaling and prevent damage from excess calcium.

Q: How do I know if I'm low in magnesium?

A: Common signs include poor memory, brain fog, anxiety, trouble sleeping and fatigue. While there are blood tests to check serum magnesium levels, they're not always reliable because most magnesium is stored in your tissues, not your blood. Many people are magnesium deficient, and if you experience high stress or have gut issues, you're likely not getting enough.

Q: Can I get enough magnesium from food alone?

A: In theory, yes — but in reality, most people don't. Modern soil depletion means even magnesium-rich foods contain far less than they used to. Plus, only about 30% to 40% of the magnesium you eat is actually absorbed. Many top sources like nuts and seeds are high in LA, which causes mitochondrial stress, so I don't recommend them. For these reasons, many people benefit from magnesium supplementation.

Q: What's the best type of magnesium to take?

A: Magnesium glycinate, magnesium malate and magnesium L-threonate are highly absorbable and easy on the digestive system. Glycinate is ideal if you need help calming your nervous system or improving sleep. Malate is better if your energy levels are low. L-threonate is frequently recommended for sleep, memory and mental focus. Start by finding your ideal dose using magnesium citrate — until it causes slightly loose stools — then switch to one of these long-term.

Q: How much magnesium should I take each day?

A: Most adults need at least 400 mg daily, but the ideal dose varies by individual. The best way to find your personal dose is to gradually increase magnesium citrate until your stools begin to loosen, then reduce slightly. That level reflects your body's saturation point, and it's more reliable than guessing based on labels alone.

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What’s one simple way you can improve your sleep quality tonight?

Keep your bedroom brightly lit to create a calming atmosphere for rest
Spend extra time on your phone before bed to relax your mind
Keep your bedroom warm to feel cozy and fall asleep faster
Maintain complete darkness in your bedroom to enhance sleep quality
Maintaining complete darkness in your bedroom is a simple and effective way to improve sleep quality, as it supports your body’s natural sleep-wake cycle. Learn more.

This Ingredient in Ice Cream Keeps It from Melting but Harms Your Gut (and Overall) Health

Wed, 25 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Summer’s here, and suddenly ice cream is everywhere — picnics, barbecues and beach. It’s marketed as the ultimate feel-good treat, but what if that creamy cone is doing real harm to your gut? According to a recent report, ice cream that’s made so it won’t melt too fast in the sun contains additives that are wreaking havoc on your health.

What makes this even more alarming is how widespread these additives are. Aside from ice cream, they’re also found in thousands of food products lining your grocery shelves. Most consumers have no idea that these seemingly harmless ingredients were never actually tested for how they affect your microbiome.

Emulsifiers in Ice Cream (and Other Ultraprocessed Foods) Wreck Your Gut

An investigative report published by The Defender exposed a quiet but dangerous trend — Ice cream, one of the most widely consumed summer treats, is increasingly loaded with synthetic emulsifiers designed to keep it from melting too fast. While it seems like a clever solution, especially during hot summer days, research shows that these additives aren’t harmless. They’ve been linked to serious health consequences, especially for your gut.¹

• The report highlights the dangers of polysorbate 80 and other emulsifiers — Emulsifiers, which are made from various sources like plants and bacteria, are used to control the consistency of food products. In the video above, a manufacturer of food chemicals demonstrates how polysorbate 80 allows a scoop of ice cream to retain its shape, even under bright studio lights.²

• However, this convenience comes at a hefty price — Carboxymethyl cellulose, maltodextrin, and carrageenan are other examples of emulsifiers and stabilizers used in food products. According to the investigation, more and more research papers are now providing evidence about the dangers of these chemicals.

“Studies have found that emulsifiers can alter the mix of bacteria in the gut, known as the microbiome or microbiota; damage the lining of the gastrointestinal tract; and trigger inflammation, potentially contributing to problems elsewhere in the body,” the report notes.

• Emulsifiers actively create dysfunction by interacting with the cells lining your intestines — In simpler terms, think of your gut lining as a well-guarded castle wall. Emulsifiers are like acid poured on the wall, thinning it out so invaders, or bad bacteria, are able to break through. Once that happens, your body goes into emergency mode, launching an inflammatory response that affects digestion, immune balance, and even your brain.

• Emulsifiers also mess up mucus production in your gut — One study found that maltodextrin consumption leads to a measurable loss of goblet cells — specialized cells that produce mucus in the gut lining. Fewer goblet cells mean less mucus, and less mucus means your intestinal wall is no longer shielded from the bacteria and food particles that pass through your digestive tract every day.³

• These chemicals are contributing to digestive issues and metabolic disorders today — The rates of inflammatory bowel diseases, metabolic disorders, and cancer are skyrocketing, and the assault that emulsifiers bring to your gut microbiome could be one of the main reasons why.

Benoit Chassaing, a research director at the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research and a co-author of several related studies, said, “There is a lot of data showing that those compounds are really detrimental for the microbiota and that we should stop using them.”

• Children are especially vulnerable — Emulsifier-heavy foods like ice cream and processed snacks are marketed directly to kids, especially in the summer months when consumption skyrockets. Since children's microbiomes are still developing, this kind of disruption early in life could lead to long-term health consequences.

These Chemical Additives Are Everywhere

Avoiding emulsifiers is tricky, as they are used in almost all ultraprocessed food products today, not just to improve their consistency but also to prolong their shelf life. Even products that are marketed as “healthy” or “natural” contain these chemicals.

• Some products contain more than one type of emulsifier — According to the report, “Some emulsifiers have multiple names, making them harder to recognize. Some names apply to more than one emulsifier. And some chemical names that appear on product labels don’t appear in the FDA’s ‘Substances Added to Food’ inventory.”

• Thousands of products use emulsifiers in their formula — In fact, an online database posted by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) noted that, as of June 3, Polysorbate 80 was included in the labels of 2,310 products.⁴ Maltodextrin was found in 12,755,⁵ while xanthan gum is used in 17,146 products.⁶

As for carrageenan, it was listed on 8,100 labels.⁷ I’ve previously written about this additive’s health dangers — read about it here “Carrageenan's Gut Health and Insulin Risks.”

• Don’t be easily fooled by the words “organic” and/or “healthy” — The report notes how certain brands that market their products as organic and healthy actually contain emulsifiers:

“At a Safeway supermarket, Healthy Choice Grilled Chicken Pesto With Vegetables listed modified potato starch, modified corn starch, carrageenan, xanthan gum and guar gum.

The label on Newman’s Own Caesar salad dressing said the product contained no artificial preservatives or flavors, no colors from an artificial source and was gluten-free. The ingredient label listed ‘as a thickener,’ xanthan gum.”⁸

• Making the effort to eliminate these emulsifiers from your diet will have profound benefits — Lewis Rands, a genetic scientist who has suffered from severe inflammatory disease that causes him to suffer from bloating, cramps, stomach pain, and bleeding, made the challenging move to avoid foods with emulsifiers (at the advice of his dietitian).

The results were amazing; Rands noted a dramatic change in his health. “It’s a huge difference. To me, it’s made more of a difference than any drug,” he said.

The Harmful Effects of Emulsifiers Go Beyond Your Gut

The evidence against emulsifiers is mounting, and the report highlights a few recent studies that support the harmful effects of these chemicals on your gut health. For example, a 2024 study found that consuming a diet low in carrageenan, polysorbate 80, and carboxymethyl cellulose is an effective way to treat mild or moderate Crohn’s disease.⁹ However, these chemicals are pernicious, and their effects go beyond harming your gut microbiome.

• Emulsifiers have been linked to cardiovascular disease — A study published in The BMJ found that consuming several types of emulsifiers led to a higher risk of cardiovascular disease. According to the study authors:¹⁰

“Higher intakes of total celluloses (specifically E460 and E466) and total monoglycerides and diglycerides of fatty acids (specifically E472c) as well as trisodium phosphate (E339) were positively associated with risk of coronary heart disease, and those of total monoglycerides and diglycerides of fatty acids (specifically E472b) were positively associated with risk of cerebrovascular disease.”

• These additives have also been associated with a higher risk of cancer — In one study, published in the PLOS Medicine journal, carrageenan and mono- and diglycerides of fatty acids were associated with an increased risk of breast, prostate, and overall cancer.¹¹

“These results provide novel epidemiological insights into the role of food additive emulsifiers on cancer risk,” the researchers concluded.

“If confirmed by further epidemiological and experimental research, they could lead to a modification in the regulation of emulsifier use by the food industry, through food policies requiring a modification of the ADI of some emulsifiers, or even restricting the use of others, for better citizen protection.”

• Emulsifiers are also fueling metabolic dysfunction — An analysis published in The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology found that emulsifiers contribute to weight gain, impaired glucose regulation, and chronic low-grade inflammation in healthy individuals. They do this by altering the intestinal barrier and reshaping the microbiome in ways that skew metabolic signaling.

This is important because metabolic syndrome is a key risk factor for Type 2 diabetes and other chronic diseases. For more information on how food additives raise your diabetes risk, read “Food Additive Combinations Raise Your Risk for Type 2 Diabetes.”

This Summer Favorite Also Exposes You to Another Damaging Chemical

All these health concerns associated with ice cream might make you reconsider switching to other frozen treats, like slushies. But even though they appear harmless, slushies actually contain an additive that makes you and your children sick — glycerol.

• What is glycerol and why is it added to slushies? Also called E422 or glycerin, glycerol is an additive that helps keep slush drinks from freezing solid without loading them with sugar. This ingredient is approved as a food additive across the U.S. and Europe.

• Glycerol is harmful in certain concentrations — The problem with glycerol is that, at certain concentrations, it throws off normal metabolic balance, dragging blood sugar to critically low levels, disturbing potassium levels and triggering a metabolic emergency — this effect is particularly common in small children.

• Toddlers and preschoolers became seriously sick after consuming slushies — A study published in Archives of Disease in Childhood investigated 21 cases of young children in the U.K. and Ireland who became severely ill shortly after drinking slushies. The children, all of whom were healthy beforehand, showed adverse symptoms within 60 minutes of sipping the drink.¹²

• Nearly all the children had dangerously low blood sugar — In most cases, it dropped below a level that could lead to coma or even death. The children also had acid buildup in the blood, and most had low potassium, which interferes with nerves and muscles. One child even had a seizure.

• But why were the effects more pronounced in young children? Apparently, this is because they have less body mass. This means a 500-milliliter (or 17-ounce) serving of slushie contains way too much glycerol for them. Even a half-serving could be enough to cause harm. And when they drink it too quickly, or while hungry or after exercise, their bodies become even more vulnerable to a crash.

If you're a parent of a young child, especially under the age of 8, it’s best to eliminate slush ice drinks from your child's routine. Refreshing and colorful as they seem, these frozen treats overload their young body not just with glycerol, but also high-fructose corn syrup, artificial colors, and flavors. Learn more about this topic in “The Surprising Health Risk Posed by Slushies for Young Children.”

Cut Out Emulsifiers by Switching to Healthier Food Options

Every time you eat processed foods like ice cream and slushies, you're unknowingly damaging your gut. Emulsifiers aren’t just additives; they’re gut disruptors that damage your intestinal lining, mess with your immune system, and send your metabolism spiraling.

These steps will help reverse or prevent the damage. Whether you’re someone already struggling with digestive issues or if you just want to protect your long-term health, I recommend these strategies:

• Swap processed foods with real food options — Instead of commercial ice cream, consider making your own at home using full-fat coconut milk or cream, sweetened with honey. If you are a busy parent or on the go, look for clean-label brands with five ingredients or less — nothing you can’t pronounce or wouldn’t cook with at home.

• Rebuild your mucus barrier with gut-supporting foods — Add in real bone broth, steamed vegetables like okra and asparagus, and fermented foods like kimchi or sauerkraut. I also recommend carrots, onions and garlic, which are full of prebiotic fiber.

• Ditch ultraprocessed snacks — If you’ve struggled with weight gain, cravings, blood sugar crashes, or energy dips, emulsifiers are working against you behind the scenes. Ditch all fake “health” snacks and replace them with whole-food options like boiled eggs or fruit. Your metabolism works best when it isn’t under constant chemical attack.

• Track your progress — Eliminate emulsifiers from your meals for 30 days and track the changes in your body. Journal your digestion, mood, energy, and sleep. If you have gut issues, observe if there are notable differences in your symptoms.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Emulsifiers in Ice Cream

Q: Why do some ice creams barely melt, even on a hot day?

A: Many commercial ice creams contain synthetic emulsifiers like polysorbate 80, which are added to help the ice cream hold its shape and resist melting. These additives create a thick, stable texture — but they also disrupt your gut by damaging the intestinal lining and triggering chronic inflammation.

Q: Are emulsifiers only found in ice cream?

A: No. Emulsifiers are hidden in over 12,000 processed foods — including sauces, dressings, dairy-free products, and even “organic” or “healthy” brands. Common ones include maltodextrin, carrageenan, and xanthan gum. These chemicals are used to thicken, stabilize, and extend shelf life, even though they were never tested for long-term gut safety.

Q: How exactly do emulsifiers harm your gut?

A: Emulsifiers break down your gut’s protective mucus layer and disrupt the balance of good bacteria. This weakens your immune defense, increases inflammation, and leads to issues like irritable bowel, food sensitivities, weight gain, and metabolic disease — even without changing your calorie intake.

Q: Are children more at risk from emulsifiers and food additives?

A: Yes. Children’s microbiomes are still developing, which makes them more vulnerable to the effects of emulsifiers. Summer treats like ice cream and slushies often contain high levels of additives like glycerol, which have caused serious illness in young children, including seizures and dangerously low blood sugar.

Q: What can I do to avoid emulsifiers and protect my gut?

A: Start by reading ingredient labels and eliminating products with polysorbate 80, maltodextrin, carrageenan, and other emulsifiers. Swap in real-food options like homemade ice cream, fermented veggies, and bone broth. Stick with clean-label brands, and try going emulsifier-free for 30 days to feel the difference.

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Multidimensional Sleep Health Parameters Linked to Cardiometabolic Outcomes

Tue, 24 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Sleep is one of your body's most powerful regulators — shaping your heart health, metabolism, immune resilience and even your lifespan. Yet most people only think about sleep in terms of "how many hours" they get, missing the bigger picture. Your body doesn't just need a certain amount of sleep. It needs the right timing, quality and rhythm to operate at full strength.

A scientific statement published by the American Heart Association in the journal Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes shines new light on how multidimensional sleep patterns — not just sleep quantity — impact your health outcomes.¹ Disruptions to your sleep schedule, low-quality rest or poor daytime energy signal deeper biological imbalances that quietly drive chronic disease risk long before obvious symptoms show up.

Let's explore why sleep health involves much more than hours alone, what specific patterns predict better heart and metabolic outcomes, and simple changes to protect yourself. If you want to improve your energy, stabilize your blood sugar and protect your heart for the long haul, dialing in your sleep habits is one of the smartest places to start.

Poor Sleep Health Directly Impacts Your Heart and Metabolic Function

The scientific statement reviewed how different aspects of sleep health influence your risk of heart disease, stroke, diabetes and early death.² Unlike older studies that only focused on sleep duration, this research broke new ground by looking at sleep as a multidimensional factor.

This means sleep duration, timing, regularity, continuity, satisfaction, daytime energy and even sleep stages were all considered together. The American Heart Association emphasized that improving sleep in just one of these dimensions could significantly lower your cardiometabolic disease risk.

• Poor sleep linked to chronic disease — The statement noted that sleep problems are common in almost every demographic but hit especially hard in low-income and minority communities, where sleep disruptions often start early in life. People with poor sleep patterns showed much higher rates of obesity, insulin resistance, high blood pressure, heart disease and even early signs of stroke.

• Short and long sleep durations both raise disease risk — Sleeping less than seven hours or more than nine hours was strongly tied to a greater risk of obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease.

• Irregular sleep schedules compound the damage — People who went to bed and woke up at different times each day had higher blood pressure, more blood sugar instability and double the risk of developing heart disease compared to those with regular sleep patterns.

• Daytime tiredness signals bigger problems — Feeling sleepy during the day — even if you think you slept enough — was linked to a higher risk of stroke, heart attack and metabolic dysfunction.

• Poor sleep satisfaction and missed sleep stages matter — Those who rated their sleep as unsatisfying, even if they technically got "enough" hours, showed worse cardiovascular and metabolic markers than people who felt refreshed upon waking.

Shallow sleep that skips important phases like deep (slow-wave) sleep and REM (dream) sleep left people more vulnerable to inflammation, poor blood vessel function and blood sugar problems, even when total sleep hours seemed normal.

Fixing Sleep Regularity and Quality Rapidly Improves Your Health

The statement also detailed the speed at which poor sleep habits start damaging your health. Researchers noted that even short-term disruptions — like a few weeks of poor sleep quality or irregular bedtimes — were enough to raise blood pressure, increase resting blood sugar and trigger early inflammatory changes in blood vessels.

Over months and years, these effects snowball, setting you up for serious chronic illnesses. Interestingly, the largest benefits from restoring sleep patterns were seen in people who had the worst baseline sleep.

• Getting better sleep quickly improves health — Those who moved from highly irregular to more regular bedtimes, improved their sleep satisfaction or cut out nighttime awakenings showed fast improvements in blood pressure, insulin sensitivity and daytime energy. These results appeared in as little as a few weeks, showing that fixing your sleep has rapid effects on your heart and metabolic health.

• Early correction leads to big improvements — People who fixed their bedtime regularity and reduced nighttime awakenings saw improvements in blood pressure within weeks.

• The worse your sleep health, the bigger the payoff — Those starting with the poorest sleep habits experienced the fastest and largest improvements once they addressed regularity, satisfaction and sleep quality.

Why Sleep Timing and Quality Matter as Much as Sleep Duration

The American Heart Association also compared how different aspects of sleep health stack up against each other.³ Irregular sleep schedules appeared to be just as damaging — if not more so — than simply getting too few hours of sleep. Meanwhile, low sleep satisfaction and frequent nighttime awakenings independently predicted worse heart and metabolic outcomes, even if total sleep duration stayed within the "healthy" range.

• Sleep regularity was a key predictor — Maintaining a consistent bedtime and wake-up time mattered just as much, if not more, than hitting a target number of sleep hours.

• Sleep quality matters as much as sleep quantity — Feeling rested and staying asleep through the night had an equal or greater impact on heart and metabolic health than just sleeping longer.

The biological mechanisms uncovered were equally fascinating. Poor sleep disrupts your body's circadian rhythms, which regulate everything from hormone release to blood vessel function to blood sugar management. When your sleep is irregular, fragmented or out of sync with natural light cycles, your body struggles to maintain stable blood pressure, regulate glucose levels and repair blood vessel linings.

• Circadian disruption sets off a chain reaction — Sleeping at odd times or waking frequently sends confusing signals to your brain and hormones, throwing off blood sugar regulation and heart function.

• Poor sleep increases inflammation — Inadequate or fragmented sleep triggers your immune system to stay in a low-grade inflammatory state, which damages blood vessels and raises your risk of clots and plaque buildup.

• Loss of deep sleep impairs recovery — Missing out on slow-wave sleep — the deep, restorative phase — leaves your cardiovascular and metabolic systems in a chronic state of low repair, making damage accumulate faster over time.

By understanding these mechanisms, you can see that poor sleep is not just an inconvenience. It's a major hidden driver of modern chronic diseases. Fixing your sleep habits is one of the most powerful steps you take to protect your heart, your metabolism and your future.

Simple Changes That Restore Your Sleep Health

If you want to protect your heart, metabolism and energy levels, fixing your sleep habits is nonnegotiable. Sleep isn't just about logging hours — it's about building a stable rhythm your body trusts. Poor sleep throws your hormones, blood sugar and blood pressure into chaos. Fortunately, you don't need extreme measures to start reversing the damage. Small, consistent changes have a powerful ripple effect. Here's where to start:

1. Make your bedroom pitch black at night — If your bedroom isn't completely dark, your body keeps getting signals that it's daytime. That glow from your phone, alarm clock or even a streetlight sneaking through the window disrupts your melatonin production. Melatonin is the hormone that tells your body it's time to sleep and repair.

I recommend blackout curtains and unplugging unnecessary electronics. Your room should be so dark you cannot see your hand in front of your face. This simple step trains your brain to shift fully into deep sleep mode.

2. Get outside for natural sunlight within 15 minutes of waking up — Your brain resets your internal clock based on the first bright light it sees each day. If you roll out of bed and head straight for your phone or computer, your body misses this important reset.

I suggest stepping outside, without sunglasses or windows blocking you, as soon as possible after waking. Even five minutes helps. If you work inside all day, make it a point to take a quick walk in the morning. Morning sunlight strengthens your circadian rhythm, boosts mood and stabilizes your hormones for the entire day.

3. Cut off blue light exposure after sunset — Your body needs darkness after sunset to start winding down. Blue light from phones, tablets, TVs and laptops blocks melatonin and keeps your cortisol levels elevated. This tricks your brain into thinking it's still daytime, making it harder to fall asleep and stay asleep.

I recommend shutting down all screens at sunset. If you need to be on a device, wear amber-tinted glasses or use the warmest night mode settings possible. Small adjustments like these lower stress hormones and set you up for better sleep.

4. Drop your bedroom temperature between 60 and 68 degrees Fahrenheit — Your body needs to cool down at night to reach deep, restorative sleep stages. A room that's too warm will cause restless sleep, night sweats and early wakeups. Try setting your thermostat to the low 60s before bed.

If you tend to get cold easily, add layers to your bedding rather than heating the room. Keeping the air cool while staying cozy under breathable blankets helps your body stay asleep longer and cycle naturally through the important stages of sleep.

5. Turn off electromagnetic fields (EMFs) in your sleeping area — Your nervous system responds to EMFs like Wi-Fi signals, cellphones and plugged-in electronics — even if you don't feel it consciously. These signals interrupt your sleep cycles and elevate your stress levels at night.

I strongly encourage you to unplug any devices near your bed, shut off your Wi-Fi router overnight and move your phone out of the bedroom. For an even bigger impact, flip the circuit breaker to your bedroom before you sleep. Removing these invisible stressors gives your body a clean, quiet environment to heal and recharge.

Each of these steps works by aligning your body with its natural sleep-wake rhythm — the foundation your heart, metabolism and immune system depend on. Start with one or two changes today, and as your sleep gets stronger, your energy, focus and resilience will follow. For even more help, review my 50 Tips to Improve Your Sleep.

FAQs About Sleep and Your Cardiometabolic Health

Q: What is multidimensional sleep health and why does it matter?

A: Multidimensional sleep health means looking beyond how many hours you sleep. It includes your sleep timing, regularity, satisfaction, daytime energy and sleep stages. Poor sleep in any one of these areas raises your risk for heart disease, stroke, obesity, diabetes and early death.

Q: How does irregular sleep affect my heart and metabolism?

A: Going to bed and waking up at different times each day disrupts your circadian rhythm, which regulates blood pressure, blood sugar and hormone production. This confusion stresses your heart and metabolism, increasing your risk of chronic diseases over time.

Q: Why is short or long sleep linked to heart problems?

A: Sleeping less than seven hours or more than nine hours throws off key body functions like blood sugar control, blood pressure regulation and blood vessel repair. Over time, these disruptions lead to inflammation, artery damage and greater chances of heart attack, stroke and metabolic diseases.

Q: What simple steps can I take to improve my sleep health right away?

A: Start by making your bedroom pitch black at night, getting natural sunlight within 15 minutes of waking, cutting blue light after sunset, cooling your bedroom to 60 to 68 degrees Fahrenheit and unplugging electronics near your bed to reduce EMF exposure.

Q: How fast will I notice improvements if I fix my sleep habits?

A: Many people begin seeing changes within just a few weeks. Improvements like better blood pressure, sharper focus, more stable blood sugar and higher energy levels happen quickly once your sleep patterns become more consistent and restorative.

Test Your Knowledge with Today's Quiz!

Take today’s quiz to see how much you’ve learned from yesterday’s Mercola.com article.

Why does linoleic acid (LA) in your skin pose a challenge for enjoying time in the sun?

It reduces your skin’s natural moisture, making it prone to cracking under sunlight
It increases the production of melanin, leading to uneven tanning and potential burns
It builds up in your skin tissue, increasing the risk of sun-induced oxidative damage
Linoleic acid (LA) from vegetable oils accumulates in your skin tissue, making it more susceptible to sun-induced oxidative damage. This increases the risk of harm from UV exposure, unlike the other options, which are not directly related to LA’s effects. Learn more.
It weakens your skin’s protective barrier, allowing UV rays to penetrate more deeply

Autism Rates Keep Rising as Environmental Causes Face Renewed Scrutiny

Tue, 24 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

One in every 31 children in the United States now carries an autism diagnosis — That’s what the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed in its recent report.¹ This is a significant rise compared to 2020 data, when the rate was 1 in 36.

But what’s fueling this rise? That’s the question many health agencies are hoping to answer. U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has also launched a “massive testing and research effort” to better understand and identify the environmental causes of this growing epidemic.

Autism Rates Surge While Environmental Causes Go Ignored

As reported by the Children’s Health Defense website,² CDC’s latest findings on the prevalence of autism in the United States were taken from the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network, which tracked autism rates among 8- and 4-year-olds across multiple sites nationwide. Their findings revealed a sobering shift — the rates of this disorder have increased by 17% in just two years.³

• The steep rise wasn’t confined to one group — Boys remain the most impacted, with a national average of 1 in 20 receiving a diagnosis. In California, that number climbed to 1 in 12.5.

• The report also underscored a stark racial disparity — Rates were higher among Asian, Black, Hispanic, and multiracial children than in White children. These patterns suggest this isn’t just a case of “better awareness” or “expanded definitions.” Something deeper is driving the numbers.

• The root causes have not been given significant attention — Mary Holland, CEO of Children’s Health Defense, commented on these findings, pointing out despite the rates rising steadily for decades, there’s been no comprehensive research initiative into the root causes.

“Tens of thousands of parents have come forward in recent decades to say they believe vaccines triggered their children’s autism. Yet mainstream science, media and government regulators have rejected the idea of even examining this observation seriously,” she said. “The 1 in 31 number is a testament to the failure of the medical system as we know it.”

The ‘Better Diagnosis’ Theory Doesn’t Support Rising Autism Rates

The CHD article stresses that this report is hard to ignore due to the nature of the new cases. Contrary to popular belief that the rise might be due to milder or high-functioning cases being added to the spectrum, the 2022 data show that nearly two-thirds of diagnosed children had an intellectual disability or borderline functioning — defined as an IQ of 85 or lower.

• These aren’t just slight delays or quirks being over-medicalized — These are children who will need specialized education, therapies, and long-term care. Rebecca Estepp, an autism advocate and mother, emphasized this reality:

“These children face lifelong challenges with learning, communication, and independence. Many will need specialized care, educational supports, and social services for decades — services that are already stretched thin in many communities.”

• Autism rates are “beyond an epidemic” — The increases are not just statistical noise — they represent a true public health crisis that has been largely ignored. According to Toby Rogers, Ph.D., co-author of “Autism Tsunami: The Impact of Rising Prevalence on the Societal Cost of Autism in the United States”:

“How long is the U.S. public health establishment going to keep pretending there isn’t a problem? An ASD rate of 3.2% nationwide among children aged 8 years in 2022, 4.9% for boys, 5.3% in California, 4.7% in Pennsylvania and autism rates a full percentage point higher in Asian and Black communities than in White communities — this is beyond an epidemic.”

• Autism rates are also rising among younger children — The CDC report also looked at 4-year-olds and found autism rates were rising in this age group — 1.7 times higher for those born in 2018 compared to those born in 2014. In some states, younger kids already have higher autism rates than older ones, which suggests things are not slowing down.

• The most glaring omission in the CDC report? Any mention of environmental factors. Despite a long list of known or suspected environmental risks, such as heavy metals like aluminum and mercury, glyphosate exposure, acetaminophen use during pregnancy, and even industrial pollutants like lead and arsenic, the risks of exposure to these environmental causes are ignored.

So why has the system failed to investigate these areas? Rogers offers a blunt answer: “Autism is an industry in the U.S. that has become ‘too big to fail.’ Causing and treating autism generates hundreds of billions of dollars in profits every year for Big Pharma and various professions … the autism industry does not want the autism epidemic to end, ever.”

Kennedy Pushes for Answers While Experts Argue Over What’s Being Ignored

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD), a neurological and developmental condition that affects how individuals communicate, learn, and interact, was once a rare disorder. In fact, during the 1970s, only 1 in 10,000 children were diagnosed with this condition. Now, it’s everywhere.⁴

While most government officials continue to feign ignorance on exact cause, there’s growing hope — The new administration, along with Kennedy as the appointed HHS Secretary, is now committed to look at all the possible causes of autism. During a news conference held in Washington, RFK Jr. stressed his plan to launch an “exhaustive” investigation into autism’s environmental causes.⁵

• Kennedy’s focus isn’t just on the numbers — It’s on what those numbers actually mean for you, your kids, and your future. He frames autism as a preventable condition as opposed to being a mysterious or inherited issue, and by doing so, he shifts the attention toward causes that must be addressed.

“Autism destroys families,” he said in an AP News article. “More importantly, it destroys our greatest resource, which is our children. These are children who should not be suffering like this.”

• Kennedy is determined to pinpoint the environmental causes — Unlike many officials before him, Kennedy is making it clear that his team won’t shy away from controversial or politically inconvenient causes. He says his department will award research grants to universities and scientists willing to look into all environmental variables.

“The researchers will be encouraged to ‘follow the science, no matter what it says,’” he said. This is a major shift from the previous administration, which actually canceled billions in scientific grants, and stalled research in this area.

• Another overlooked point? The demographic breakdown — The featured study highlights that autism rates are especially high among Asian/Pacific Islander, American Indian/Alaska Native, and Black children.⁶ If you're part of these communities, you deserve to know why your children are being diagnosed more often than others — and what, if anything, can be done to prevent that.

• Kennedy is setting a firm deadline for at least some answers — He told reporters his department will release findings by September. “By then, his department will determine at least ‘some’ of the answers,” according to the AP News article.⁷ That urgency is rare in government, and it signals a shift toward real accountability. If the goal is to pinpoint preventable factors, then you’re not just left waiting — you’ll actually know what steps to take.

• Not everyone agrees with calling autism preventable — As expected, Kennedy’s position raised eyebrows. Autism Science Foundation Chief Science Officer Dr. Alycia Halladay insisted the recent spike reflects “changes in factors like access to services and de-stigmatization,”⁸ not environmental damage.

But even if that’s true for part of the population, the refusal to even consider other causes leaves many families without options — or hope.

Common Risk Factors for Autism

Like Kennedy, Peter Sullivan and Dr. Martha Herbert, who co-wrote the book “The Autism Revolution: Whole-Body Strategies for Making Life All It Can Be,” believe that there are toxic environmental factors that contribute to the development of autism.

• Autism is a response to environmental exposure, not just genetics — Herbert, whose two children struggled with symptoms of autism when they were young, hypothesizes that autism is not something you’re born with. It’s something you develop in response to environmental factors like mercury, electromagnetic fields (EMFs), and glyphosate.

• Environmental triggers lead to brain irritability, increasing autism risk — These factors contribute to irritability in the brain, and the risk of autism could be predicted by looking at the level of irritability. “There are 10,000 different ways to injure mitochondria. It all piles up. All these little seemingly innocuous exposures add to the pile, so they all matter,” Herbert says.

• Processed food is another major contributor — “Simply reducing allergens in the mother’s diet from preconception to pregnancy is a really big deal,” she says.

• Anecdotal evidence links EMF exposure to autism, and efforts are underway to collect more data — There are many anecdotal stories from families with autistic children suggesting EMF causes problems, and Herbert and Sullivan are working on setting up an online database to capture this data.

To learn more about Herbert and Sullivan’s findings regarding autism and the environmental factors associated with it, read “EMF Exposure — A Major Factor in the Development of Autism.”

EMFs — One of the Most Notorious Risk Factors of Autism

Sullivan has been particularly passionate about helping the autism community understand the impact of EMF, as two of his own children were mildly on the spectrum. To raise awareness about the health effects of EMFs, he founded the organization Clear Light Ventures.

• EMF exposure is associated with mitochondrial damage and several brain disorders — EMFs lead to significant mitochondrial dysfunction due to free radical damage. When you’re chronically exposed to these EMF sources, it triggers not just autism but other brain-related conditions as well, like Alzheimer’s disease, anxiety, and depression.

• Reducing exposure to magnetic fields in the home is one of Sullivan’s key strategies — In his experience, getting rid of magnetic fields such as transformers and power boxes and cleaning up dirty electricity were most helpful. Appliances like your refrigerator are another common source; either turn the appliance off or move further away from it. With each doubling of the distance, you reduce your exposure by about 75%, he says.

• Creating an EMF-free sleep environment is crucial for restoring quality rest — Sullivan also recommends cleaning up your bedroom and removing EMF sources. In fact, one of the most common symptoms of excessive EMF exposure is sleep disruption. "I like to make sure people create space for themselves — kind of an electronic-free zone — around their beds," he says.

• Dr. Martin Pall also identified a biological mechanism through which EMFs damage the brain — Pall discovered that microwaves emitted by cellphones and other wireless technologies harm your brain through voltage-gated calcium channels (VGCCs) located in your cell membranes.

VGCCs are highly concentrated in the brain, and animal studies have demonstrated that even low levels of microwave EMFs produce significant and diverse effects on brain function. When EMFs activate these VGCCs, it results in a variety of neuropsychiatric issues.

Pall has published an extensive study⁹ that digs deeper into the role of EMFs in our VGCCs, and how they give rise to autism. Learn more about his findings in “The Invisible Risk Factor of Autism” – I highly recommend reading this article, as it gives an in-depth look at just how pernicious EMFs are not just in increasing autism risk but also other conditions like infertility and cancer.

What You Must Do to Lower Your Child’s Autism Risk

The rise in autism diagnoses is not random, and it's not purely genetic. It’s time to take a closer look at the environmental triggers that are contributing to this condition and start reducing your family's exposure right now. Based on evidence from the recent data, this is where your attention needs to be:

1. Remove all seed oils from your home — The most overlooked toxin in our modern diets is hidden in plain sight — industrial seed oils. These oils (like soybean, canola, sunflower, and safflower) are in nearly every processed food and restaurant meal.

They’re extremely high in linoleic acid (LA), which has been linked to mitochondrial dysfunction, oxidative stress, and increased vulnerability to environmental damage. If you're feeding young children, removing these oils is one of the most important steps for you to take. Use grass fed butter, ghee, or tallow instead.

2. Filter your water and avoid glyphosate-contaminated foods — Glyphosate, the main ingredient in the Roundup herbicide, is showing up in everything from cereals to baby food. It disrupts the gut microbiome, impairs detox pathways, and has been named repeatedly by researchers as a possible environmental driver of neurological disorders. Install a high-quality water filter that removes glyphosate and other agricultural chemicals.

Choose organic produce whenever possible, especially for the foods your kids eat the most. If you’re on a budget, prioritize organic versions of the produce in the Environmental Working Group’s (EWG) “Dirty Dozen” list.

3. Stop using acetaminophen during pregnancy and infancy — The CDC may not be talking about this, but research and parental reports have long linked acetaminophen (Tylenol) use in early life with neurological changes.

It depletes glutathione, your body’s master detoxifier, at the exact time your baby’s brain is developing. If you’re pregnant or have a young child, don’t assume this drug is harmless. There are other ways to manage pain or fever that don’t compromise long-term neurological health.

4. Avoid aluminum-containing injections during early development — If you are a parent considering the current childhood jab schedule, you must understand what’s being introduced into your child’s body during their most fragile stages of brain development. Many of these shots contain aluminum-based adjuvants — additives used to stimulate immune response.

5. Create a low-toxin home environment for brain safety — Your home is your child’s first ecosystem. That means everything from scented candles and cleaning sprays to heavy metals in cookware could play a role in disrupting development. Start by removing anything synthetic or fragranced — air fresheners, dryer sheets, cleaning wipes. Switch to glass, stainless steel, and cast iron in your kitchen.

Dust regularly, since toxins like flame retardants and microplastics accumulate in household dust. Your child’s brain is building connections rapidly in the first few years — eliminating toxins from their immediate surroundings gives them the strongest foundation possible.

Taking action now helps your child build resilience in an increasingly toxic world. These steps don’t rely on policies or headlines — they rely on you. Start where you can. Pick one thing today. That’s how you take your power back.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Autism Risk Factors

Q: Why are autism rates continuing to rise so rapidly in the United States?

A: Autism rates have increased by 17% in just two years, now affecting 1 in 31 children. While improved diagnosis is often blamed, the majority of new cases involve children with intellectual disabilities, suggesting the rise is not merely due to awareness or expanded definitions.

Q: What environmental factors are being investigated as potential causes of autism?

A: Despite being overlooked by mainstream reports like the CDC’s, several environmental risks are being investigated, including heavy metals (aluminum, mercury), glyphosate, acetaminophen, and EMFs. Experts like RFK Jr., Peter Sullivan, and Dr. Martha Herbert believe these exposures may play a significant role in triggering autism.

Q: What action is the federal government taking under Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to address this issue?

A: As the new U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, RFK Jr. has announced a sweeping initiative to investigate autism’s environmental causes. His department will fund independent research and publish preliminary findings by September, emphasizing scientific integrity and transparency.

Q: Are there racial or demographic disparities in autism diagnoses?

A: Yes. The latest CDC report found that autism rates are higher among Asian, Black, Hispanic, and multiracial children compared to White children. These disparities highlight the need to examine not only genetics but also social and environmental factors contributing to the increase.

Q: What can parents do now to reduce their children’s risk of autism?

A: Experts suggest actionable steps like removing industrial seed oils, filtering water to avoid glyphosate, avoiding acetaminophen during pregnancy and infancy, limiting EMF exposure, and reducing household toxins. Creating a low-toxin environment may support healthier neurological development in children.

How to Treat Hangnails (and Stop Them from Coming Back)

Tue, 24 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Do you bite your nails or pick at your cuticle whenever you’re nervous, bored, or anxious? These habits are not only signs of compulsive behavior — they also cause you to develop hangnails. These small tears may look harmless at first, but if they become infected, they can cause redness, swelling, and irritation. In some cases, they may require medical treatment.

When a Small Tear Turns Into a Bigger Problem

To put it simply, a hangnail refers to a small piece of skin that appears along the edge of your fingernail. Despite being tiny, hangnails are quite painful and annoying, especially when they snag on something or become infected.^1,²

• Hangnails are not a part of your nail — Despite their name, a hangnail is actually a piece of your skin that has peeled away and is hanging along the side of your fingernail.³ As Dr. Neha Vyas, a family practitioner, describes: “A hangnail is really short. It’s kind of stiff and it arises from the side of your nail bed.”

• If it’s just a piece of skin, then why does a hangnail hurt so much? You’ve most likely experienced a hangnail before, and you know it’s not fun to have, as it causes intense pain. According to family nurse practitioner Samia Kadri, this is because “[y]ou have nerve endings and blood vessels in this area, especially the finger, which are more sensitive.”⁴

• Why do hangnails develop? According to Harvard Health, a hangnail occurs when the skin around your nails becomes excessively dry and damaged.⁵ The most common causes are cold weather, frequent hand washing, excessive use of alcohol or sanitizers, and exposure to harsh chemicals. Swimming in chlorinated pool can also cause hangnails to develop.

• Certain habits increase your risk — For example, nail biting, cuticle picking, and thumb-sucking can give you hangnails. Having brittle nails or soaking your hands in water a lot (such as when you are washing the dishes or doing your laundry) also puts you at risk.

• Cutting your cuticles triggers hangnails and infections — If you always have your nails done at a nail salon (or if you do it at home by yourself), make sure you’re not cutting your cuticles, but pushing them back instead. If you accidentally cut your cuticles, hangnails may form, as well as infections.

Don’t Let Your Hangnail Become Infected

While it’s tempting to simply tear off a hangnail, it’s not advisable to do so because when the protective skin barrier around your nail becomes damaged, bacteria can freely enter and cause an infection. This is called acute paronychia, and symptoms include:

• Redness of the skin around the nail

• Swelling and puffiness

• Pain and tenderness

• The affected area feels warm when touched

• Yellow or white pus forming near the nail (abscess)

When these symptoms arise, consult with your health care provider to prevent the infection from spreading to other parts of your finger. If an abscess has formed, your physician will help drain it safely.

Try This Simple Process to Treat a Hangnail

Hangnails are a fairly minor health concern and are easily treated at home. Following the right process ensures that your hangnail heals swiftly and properly, without putting you at risk of infections. Here’s a step-by-step process for you to try:

1. Soak your fingers in warm, soapy water for around 10 minutes. This will help soften the skin around your nails.

2. Sanitize a pair of small scissors or nail clippers, then use it to trim the hangnail gently, as close to the skin as possible. Do not tear the raised piece of skin.

3. Apply a gentle, fragrance-free moisturizer or tallow or lanolin to the affected skin to keep it moisturized. Coconut oil is also a great option.

4. If the hangnail is sore or bleeding, consider bandaging it to prevent bacteria from entering and causing an infection.

Prevent Hangnails with a Few Basic Strategies

The best way to prevent hangnails from forming is to keep your skin moisturized. I recommend using a natural moisturizer or mineral oil, regularly applying it to your hands, especially during dry seasons. “The dry air and frequent hand-washing can cause you to be more likely to get a hangnail. Using moisturizer daily can help,” Dr. Vyas said.⁶ Below are some more helpful strategies to prevent hangnails from developing:

• Don't bite your nails — This will lead to tears on the skin and increase your risk of infections. Instead, use a clean tool to trim your nails carefully. Avoid cutting your cuticles; use a cuticle pusher to push them back instead.

• Switch to safe skin products — Use a gentle, triclosan-free soap or cleanser to wash your hands and feet. Products that contain fragrances and other harsh chemicals will dry out your skin.

• Wear gloves — If you’re doing chores such as gardening, washing dishes, scrubbing your clothes during laundry time, or cleaning your home, using protective gloves will keep your skin from drying out. Wearing warm gloves or mittens during cold weather will also protect your skin.

• Trim your nails properly — Cut your nails straight, then use an emery board to round the tips and smoothen the edges. Make sure to sanitize your nail clippers and other tools before and after trimming your nails.

Make sure to stay hydrated as well by drinking enough pure water. Water is vital to optimal health — if you’re not getting enough, your skin is affected, and being prone to hangnails is one sign. Before you experience the signs of mild to moderate dehydration, get into a habit of staying well hydrated. Read here to learn more “Can Chronic Dehydration Age You More Quickly?”

Hangnails Are Different from Ingrown Toenails

Although rare, hangnails can also form on your toenails. However, don’t confuse them with ingrown toenails — these are two completely different conditions.

• What is an ingrown toenail? Simply put, this issue occurs when the corner or side of your toenail grows into the soft flesh. It usually affects the big toe, and causes pain, swelling, inflammation, and infection.

• An ingrown toenail messes with proprioception — This refers to your body’s ability to sense movement and spatial recognition,⁷ and your toenails play an essential role in this. However, when an ingrown toenail develops in any one of the toes, your proprioception is thrown out of balance, affecting your quality of life.

• Common causes of ingrown toenails — Ingrown toenails arise due to improper nail-cutting technique, wearing heels or tight footwear, physical trauma (such as stubbing your toe) and physical imbalances, such as when your toenail is larger than your toe.⁸

Unlike hangnails, which are very easy to treat, getting rid of an ingrown toenail is more challenging and painful, especially if the area is severely inflamed or swollen. This article “Do You Have an Ingrown Toenail? Try These Home Remedies” provides a step-by-step process to help treat an ingrown toenail at home, as well as other non-surgical treatment options.

Your Nails Give You Insights About Your Health

Although they may not be given enough attention as other areas of your body, your fingernails and toenails actually have essential body functions, like protecting your fingers, providing tactile feedback for day-to-day activities, and, as mentioned above, proprioception. However, did you know that your nails also provide clues about the state of your health? For example, the rate of your nail growth can determine how fast you’re aging.

• There’s a clear link between aging and nails — A 1979 study published in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology looked at how aging impacts nail growth.⁹ The researchers followed the linear nail growth of 192 women and 79 men, ages 10 to 100, and found a consistent and predictable decrease in nail growth speed over a lifetime, with a clear connection to overall physiological aging and metabolic slowdown.

• Your nails grow faster when you’re younger — Human nail growth reaches its peak in the late 20s, and then gradually slows down at a rate of about 0.5% per year. By the time a person reaches 100, their nail growth rate has declined by roughly 50%.

• Men’s and women’s nail growth are different — Although men’s nails initially grow faster than women’s, this changes once they reach 80 years old, with women’s nails surpassing men’s in speed.

• External factors and activities also influence nail growth — Temperature, illness, and nutrition influence nail growth, providing further insight into its role as an indicator of health and aging. Activities that exercise your fingers, such as typing, playing the piano, or using hand tools are also associated with slightly faster nail growth, while unhealthy habits like smoking slow it down.

• Having a chronic illness affects your nail growth — Diabetes and congestive heart failure both impair blood circulation, therefore causing your nails to regenerate slower. If you have minor infections, your nail grows slower as well, highlighting how the body prioritizes vital functions over non-essential processes when under stress.

I recommend reading “Your Nails Reveal How Fast You're Aging,” for more interesting facts about nail growth and how to support healthy nails even as you age. By monitoring changes in your nail growth, you’ll have an idea into your body's aging trajectory, allowing you to take action to support better health and longevity.¹⁰

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Hangnails

Q: What exactly is a hangnail, and why does it hurt so much?

A: A hangnail is a small piece of torn skin that forms along the edge of your fingernail—not part of the nail itself. It hurts because the area around your nails is full of nerve endings and blood vessels, making it especially sensitive to tearing, pressure, and infection.

Q: What causes hangnails to form in the first place?

A: Hangnails usually happen when the skin around your nails becomes dry or damaged. Triggers include cold weather, frequent handwashing, harsh soaps, alcohol-based sanitizers, chlorinated pools, and bad grooming habits like nail biting or cuticle cutting.

Q: Is it dangerous to bite off a hangnail or pull it with your fingers?

A: Yes, tearing or biting a hangnail damages the protective skin barrier and increases your risk of infection. It can lead to redness, swelling, tenderness, and pus-filled abscesses if bacteria enter the torn skin.

Q: How do I safely treat a hangnail at home?

A: Soak your fingers in warm, soapy water for 10 minutes to soften the skin. Gently trim the hangnail with sanitized nail scissors, apply a moisturizer, tallow or lanolin, and use a bandage if the area is sore or bleeding to protect it from infection.

Q: What’s the best way to prevent hangnails from coming back?

A: Keep your hands moisturized, especially after washing. Avoid biting nails or cutting cuticles — gently push them back instead. Use gloves when cleaning or handling chemicals, and trim your nails properly to prevent skin from snagging.

How to speak the language of leadership to improve doctor wellness [PODCAST]

Mon, 23 Jun 2025 23:00:21 +0000

Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes! Pediatrician and certified coach Jessie Mahoney discusses her article, “Physician wellness is a strategic imperative—not a moral crusade.” The conversation focuses on why physicians must shift their advocacy for well-being from a reactive, moral argument to a strategic one that aligns

Ethical dilemmas in using unclaimed bodies for medical research

Mon, 23 Jun 2025 19:00:49 +0000

In January, I wrote regarding the biased NBC report on unidentified bodies from a coroner’s office being used by a medical school. Subsequently, the network aired two related episodes. The second report centered on a self-employed purveyor of bodies and parts. He displayed no respect for the people whose bodies or parts he sold. The

The Nova Oath: a physician’s pledge to courageous and ethical care

Mon, 23 Jun 2025 17:00:41 +0000

The Nova Oath is a modern physician’s declaration of courageous care and ethical impact: I stand not merely as a technician of the body, but as a steward of life, a witness to pain, and a catalyst for healing. I vow: To do more than avoid harm — I will do good: actively, intelligently, and

AI is not a threat to radiologists. It’s a distraction from what truly matters in medicine.

Mon, 23 Jun 2025 15:00:07 +0000

As a radiologist, I’ve heard the same question too many times, usually from anxious medical students struggling to decide if they should pursue radiology: “Is AI going to replace radiologists?” I understand the concern. I had similar fears during training. But after years of practicing medicine and watching AI promises play out in the real

How deep transcranial magnetic stimulation is transforming mental health care

Mon, 23 Jun 2025 13:00:31 +0000

As a psychiatrist deeply committed to my patients’ well-being, there are moments etched into my memory—moments of profound suffering, struggle, and ultimately, redemption. I vividly recall Sarah (name changed for confidentiality), a 45-year-old teacher whose severe depression had drained all joy from her life. “Dr. Rifai, I just want my life back,” she told me,

True stories of doctors reclaiming their humanity in a system that challenges it

Mon, 23 Jun 2025 11:00:50 +0000

There’s a quiet rebellion happening in medicine. A movement of physicians no longer willing to sacrifice their humanity for productivity quotas, administrative burdens, or the illusion of perfection. We wrote White Coats, Courageous Hearts with thirteen other physicians to shine a light on this shift—voices reclaiming agency in a system that often forgets that doctors

Insomnia and Sleep Medications Increase Disability Risk in Older Adults

Mon, 23 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Sleep problems don’t just make you tired. They strip away your independence, one night at a time. As you get older, those restless nights you shrug off quietly erode your ability to function during the day. What starts as trouble falling asleep or waking too early snowballs into physical decline that’s hard to reverse.

Many people assume poor sleep is just part of aging, but that belief keeps them stuck. Insomnia is a warning sign that your body isn’t recovering the way it should. And when you turn to sleep medications to force rest, the consequences are even worse. If you’ve noticed your balance feels off, your energy is low or daily tasks are becoming harder, don’t overlook your sleep.

What you do — or don’t do — at night affects every system in your body. And if you’re relying on pills to get through it, you’re not fixing the problem. You’re feeding it. To understand just how serious this issue is, researchers tracked thousands of older adults over several years to see how insomnia and medication use affected their ability to live independently.

Sleep Drugs and Insomnia Both Raise Your Disability Risk

A study published in Sleep used data from 6,722 adults over the age of 65 as part of the National Health and Aging Trends Study.¹ The researchers aimed to understand whether insomnia symptoms and the use of sleep medications would lead to greater disability over time.

The focus was on real-world outcomes like the ability to dress, bathe, eat and walk. The researchers accounted for health history, demographics and lifestyle risks to measure how disability scores changed year to year in relation to sleep problems.

• The research focused on a vulnerable population already at risk for declining mobility — Participants were all Medicare beneficiaries, living independently in the community, not in nursing homes or assisted care. Their health status varied, but they were mostly representative of the general aging population in the U.S.

Disability was assessed using a system where each task, like showering or getting out of bed, was scored. If someone had difficulty or needed help, that raised their disability score. A rise of just two points was considered a meaningful sign of functional decline.

• Even mild increases in sleep troubles predicted more physical disability the following year — For every step up in reported insomnia symptoms, such as from never to once a week, a person’s disability score increased by 0.2 points the following year.

That may sound small, but the progression added up quickly. Someone who shifted from never having insomnia to struggling every night faced a full-point increase each year — enough to push them toward needing assistance with basic daily activities.

• Using sleep medications made things worse, and it didn’t take much — The same scoring method was used to track sleep medication frequency. Participants who increased their use from rarely to regularly experienced a 0.19-point rise in disability scores each year. Not only did sleep medications fail to stop the decline tied to insomnia — they worsened it.

• Those who used sleep drugs and had insomnia suffered the most rapid decline — According to study co-author Orfeu Buxton of Pennsylvania State University, this combination — ongoing insomnia plus regular use of sleep drugs — created a feedback loop of worsening function.

Participants in this group experienced the steepest increase in disability scores over time. “... As older people used more sleep medication or experienced more insomnia symptoms, they moved more rapidly towards greater disability,” he said in a news release.²

• The rise in disability was consistent, predictable and clinically meaningful — A consistent year-over-year rise in disability scores, especially among those with chronic sleep issues, reflected a loss of independence. Daily activities that once seemed simple, like getting dressed or walking outside, became harder, and eventually required help.

Many Older Adults Believe Sleep Problems Are ‘Normal’

Soomi Lee, a co-author of the study, emphasized that insomnia should not be brushed off as a harmless part of aging, as many older adults believe. “Insomnia can decrease a person’s quality of life both directly and indirectly,” she said.³ The longer it goes unmanaged, or masked with medication, the more likely it is to rob you of your independence.

• Sleep medication likely increases fall risk, which accelerates disability — While the study didn’t measure falls directly, previous research showed that older adults on sleep medications are more likely to fall.⁴ This is one likely reason why their disability worsened more quickly. The sedative effects of these drugs often linger into the morning, impair balance and dull reflexes. That makes nighttime drugs a direct threat to daytime mobility.

• Doctors need to address insomnia with safer, more effective treatments than pills — According to the research team, physicians should be screening older patients for sleep issues and reviewing medication lists carefully. Sometimes insomnia is caused by drug interactions, poor light exposure or stress.

Cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, which helps people reframe thoughts and habits that interfere with sleep, is a safe and proven alternative to medication that doesn’t raise disability risk.

Sleep in Total Darkness and Fix Your Nighttime Environment

If you're struggling with sleep, especially if you're older, this isn’t just about feeling tired — it’s about protecting your independence. What you do at night affects how you function during the day. The more nights you lose sleep or rely on medication to force it, the faster your risk for disability rises. But you’re not stuck.

There are safer, more effective ways to reset your sleep without sedatives, and it starts with removing the factors that block your body’s natural rhythm. Here’s what to do if you want to fall asleep more easily, sleep more deeply and avoid the long-term consequences that come with insomnia and drug use:

1. Sleep in complete darkness every night — Your body relies on light cues to know when it’s time to rest. Even a small amount of light in your bedroom, like a streetlight through the window or the glow from a digital clock, disrupts melatonin production.

Melatonin is your brain’s natural signal that it’s time to shut down. If you regularly wake up at 2 a.m. and struggle to fall back asleep, your room is probably too bright. Use blackout curtains, remove glowing electronics and eliminate any nightlights that aren't absolutely necessary.

2. Remove all electromagnetic field (EMF) sources from your bedroom — If you sleep with your phone next to your head or have Wi-Fi signals pulsing through your bedroom, you’re interfering with your nervous system’s ability to rest. EMFs cause mitochondrial damage, DNA fragmentation and neurological issues, and disrupt sleep architecture.

Remove your cellphone from your bedroom, unplug your router at night and move anything wireless out of your sleeping space. You’ll notice the difference within days.

3. Avoid blue light after sunset — Blue light from screens tells your brain it’s still daytime, even when it’s pitch black outside. This is one of the biggest disruptors of deep, restorative sleep. If you're using your phone, computer or watching TV at night, you're sending the wrong message to your brain.

Wear blue light-blocking glasses after sunset, or better yet, shut off screens when the sun goes down. Replace that time with reading, stretching or a warm shower to help your body shift into rest mode.

4. Move your body during the day to sleep better at night — Your sleep at night is shaped by your activity during the day. If you're sedentary or spend hours sitting, your body doesn't build enough internal pressure to feel truly tired when bedtime comes.

Regular daily movement, especially walking and strength training, helps regulate your circadian rhythm, reduces stress hormones and improves blood sugar control, all of which directly support better sleep. If you struggle to fall asleep or wake up feeling tired, a 60-minute walk during daylight hours will make a major difference.

5. Use sleep as a feedback tool for deeper issues — If your sleep is off, something else in your system is likely off too — blood sugar, stress, circadian rhythm or even gut health. Instead of masking the symptom with medication, use it as a signal.

Are you getting enough sunlight during the day? Are you eating enough healthy carbohydrates to support cellular energy production? Fix those upstream issues and sleep improves as a result. The research is clear: sleep drugs don't fix the root issue; they just numb your awareness of it.

For more help, I recommend reviewing my 50 tips to improve your sleep. You don’t need drugs to get the rest your body is designed for. You just need to remove the modern signals that confuse your brain and replace them with ones it’s hardwired to understand.

FAQs About Insomnia, Sleep Drugs and Disability

Q: How does insomnia affect older adults’ long-term health?

A: Insomnia significantly raises the risk of disability in older adults. According to recent research, each increase in insomnia symptoms, like difficulty falling or staying asleep, correlates with a measurable decline in a person’s ability to perform basic tasks like dressing, bathing and walking. Over time, this sleep disruption accelerates loss of independence.

Q: Are sleep medications a safe solution for insomnia?

A: No. The study found that regular use of sleep medications increases disability risk just as much as insomnia itself. When used frequently, these drugs contribute to faster physical decline, likely due to side effects like impaired coordination and increased fall risk. Using both sleep meds and experiencing insomnia is associated with the worst outcomes.

Q: What is the most important first step for improving sleep naturally?

A: Sleep in total darkness. Your brain needs complete darkness at night to produce melatonin, the hormone that signals rest. Even small amounts of light from electronics or streetlights suppress melatonin and interfere with deep, restorative sleep.

Q: Why should I eliminate EMFs from my bedroom?

A: EMFs from devices like cellphones, Wi-Fi routers and Bluetooth signals disrupt your nervous system and interfere with natural sleep cycles. Removing these signals at night — by unplugging or turning devices off — helps calm your system and supports better-quality rest.

Q: What are safer, nondrug options for treating insomnia?

A: Instead of relying on medications, focus on behavioral and lifestyle strategies. These include avoiding blue light after sunset, following a regular sleep-wake schedule and getting regular daily movement, like walking and strength training. These changes support your body’s natural ability to rest and recover.

The Fast-Track Path to Clearing Vegetable Oils from Your Skin

Mon, 23 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Linoleic acid (LA) is the most abundant fat in the modern diet, not because your body requires it in large amounts, but because it's the primary omega-6 polyunsaturated fat (PUF) in vegetable oils used throughout the food supply. While often marketed as heart-healthy, LA accumulates in your tissues over time and integrates into cell membranes, including the keratinocytes that make up your skin.

As keratinocytes migrate toward the skin's surface, they carry LA with them. Once exposed to sunlight, LA breaks down easily into reactive byproducts that increase your risk of skin damage.¹ The good news is, a promising solution exists in an odd-chain saturated fat found in full-fat dairy and ruminant animals — pentadecanoic acid (C15:0). Unlike LA, C15:0 supports cellular integrity and protects the skin from oxidative stress.

The Adipose Trap — Why Diet Alone Takes Too Long

LA creates a persistent metabolic challenge that defies simple dietary changes. Once consumed, it's absorbed into adipose tissue and stored in triglyceride reserves, where it lingers far longer than most people realize.²

• Adipose tissue turns over slowly — Triglycerides are continually broken down through lipolysis and reassembled through re-esterification, yet radiocarbon dating studies show that the average triglyceride molecule in subcutaneous fat remains in place for approximately two years. In other words, the LA you consumed one or two summers ago may still be entering your bloodstream today.^3,⁴

• Skin cells renew on a much shorter timescale — Keratinocytes complete their journey from the basal layer (the deepest part of the epidermis where new skin cells form) to the stratum corneum (the outermost layer made of dead skin cells) in roughly 28 days.⁵ During this process, they assemble membranes using fats transported through the bloodstream by the protein albumin.⁶

This lipid supply reflects not only your current diet, but also what's being released from fat stores. This means that even if dietary LA has been completely removed, keratinocytes will continue to incorporate it into their membranes as long as it's still being released from storage.

• The body has no built-in mechanism to speed up LA removal — The body lacks a mechanism to specifically target or rapidly eliminate stored LA, nor does it flag it for disposal based on its instability. As a result, clearance proceeds at the natural pace of adipose turnover.

• This mismatch in turnover rates creates a metabolic bottleneck — Enzymes involved in phospholipid synthesis prioritize lipid abundance over quality. So as long as LA dominates the bloodstream, it will continue to be used.

This is why dietary changes often fall short. While removing seed oils is important, it does not address the backlog that continues to influence tissue composition. This is where new approaches, such as incorporating specific fats that reshape membrane competition and accelerate turnover, offer a meaningful advantage.

What Is C15:0 and How Does It Help Clear LA from Your Skin?

C15:0 plays an important role in cellular stability, mitochondrial health, and metabolic regulation. It has recently been proposed as a newly recognized essential fat, since the body cannot synthesize it in sufficient quantities to meet physiological needs. Yet, most people consume only 100 to 200 milligrams of C15:0 daily, primarily from dairy fat.⁷

• C15:0 is chemically stable and resists oxidation — C15:0 contains no double bonds, making it highly resistant to peroxidation. This contrasts sharply with LA, which has reactive bis-allylic bonds and breaks down easily into damaging lipid peroxides. C15:0 helps build membranes that are less vulnerable to oxidative stress.⁸

• C15:0 integrates directly into membrane phospholipids — It occupies the sn-1 position of key phospholipids like phosphatidylcholine (PC) and phosphatidylethanolamine (PE), the same structural slot typically taken by palmitic acid or LA. This integration reduces LA's presence in cells that turn over quickly, including keratinocytes.⁹

• It suppresses lipid recycling by altering enzymatic competition — As circulating C15:0 increases, acyl-CoA and lysophosphatidylcholine acyltransferase (LPCAT) enzymes, which play key roles in phospholipid remodeling, preferentially incorporate C15:0 over PUFs. This reduces the chance of LA being reincorporated into cell membranes. Over time, this reduces LA availability for skin cells and helps restore healthier lipid balance.¹⁰

• It influences fat-burning and anti-inflammatory signaling — C15:0 partially activates PPAR-α and PPAR-δ, two nuclear receptors that regulate lipid oxidation, inflammation, and mitochondrial function. Activation of PPAR-α upregulates CPT1, the enzyme for transporting long-chain fats into mitochondria, thereby promoting β-oxidation and accelerating the clearance of stored fats, including LA released from adipose tissue.¹¹

• It activates AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK) — AMPK acts as a cellular switch that flips on when energy reserves run low. Once activated, it boosts mitochondrial activity, initiates the removal of damaged or dysfunctional components, and promotes β-oxidation. AMPK also dampens mTOR signaling, a growth-promoting pathway that drives fat storage and cellular expansion. Together, these shifts promote faster lipolytic turnover.^12,^13,¹⁴

How Long Does It Take C15:0 to Push LA Out of Your Skin?

C15:0 acts quickly once circulating levels rise, integrating efficiently into the blood lipid pool and shifting the body's lipid supply within weeks. From there, the process of displacing LA from skin tissue unfolds across several biological layers — plasma, cell membranes, and ultimately adipose tissue.

• Circulating levels rise within weeks — In a 12-week randomized controlled trial, just 200 milligrams per day (mg/day) of C15:0 raised its concentration in plasma phospholipids by 1.9 micrograms per milliliter (mg/mL). This study suggests that even modest doses are efficiently absorbed and incorporated into circulating lipids over time.¹⁵

• What a study on EPA tells us — Since no direct human studies exist on how fast C15:0 displaces LA from skin membranes, we can look to similar fats that compete at the same biological sites to estimate timing and effect. One of the best-established examples comes from eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), an omega-3 fat.

In one trial, a dose of 1.8 g/day of EPA reduced LA content in platelet membranes by 15% within two weeks. Although EPA and C15:0 differ structurally, both act on the same enzymatic targets during membrane assembly, making this study a useful benchmark for modeling displacement kinetics in the absence of direct human data on C15:0.¹⁶

• Red blood cell (RBC) membranes turn over rapidly — In vitro studies show that saturated fats like C15:0 are quickly esterified into RBC membrane phospholipids. Since keratinocytes draw from the same circulating fatty acid pool, this rapid renewal offers an early indication of how fast C15:0 becomes available for skin membrane remodeling.

• Modeling membrane turnover at 2 grams per day — Based on the EPA displacement kinetics,¹⁷ 2 g/day of C15:0, which is 10 to 20 times the current average intake, can be used as the modeled dose to initiate meaningful LA displacement in keratinocyte membranes.

At this intake, circulating lipids reach saturation within three to four weeks. This allows membrane remodeling to begin within a single skin renewal cycle. Below is a projected timeline of LA displacement in the epidermis:

◦ Weeks 0 to 4 — Around 10% reduction in LA in newly formed keratinocyte phospholipids.

◦ Weeks 4 to 12 — About 25% to 30% cumulative reduction as successive skin layers cycle out.

◦ Months 3 to 6 — Progress plateaus until adipose LA supply wanes.

• C15:0 cuts the clearance timeline in half — This modeling shows that 2 g/day of C15:0, combined with LA restriction, can cut the effective half-life of adipose LA from 12 months to about six months. This reduces the time required to clear up over 80% of mobilizable LA to roughly 12 to 18 months, helping stabilize the skin's lipid profile far sooner.

• Individual factors influence your remodeling timeline — Individuals with over 30% body fat typically carry a larger reservoir of stored LA, which extends the time required to fully remodel skin membranes even with consistent C15:0 intake and strict LA restriction.

In addition, genetic differences in fat metabolism, such as fatty acid desaturase (FADS) gene variants or reduced LPCAT enzyme activity, may reduce C15:0's effect during membrane assembly. These variables don't negate the benefits; they just mean the timeline may stretch closer to 24 months for some.

The Skin Benefits of Accelerated LA Clearance

When LA saturates skin membranes, it increases your susceptibility to oxidative stress. Upon UV exposure, LA breaks down into lipid peroxides like 4-hydroxynonenal (4-HNE), which damage DNA, compromise mitochondrial function, and fuel inflammation. The higher your skin's LA content, the more destructive this reaction becomes.^18,¹⁹

• Displacing LA with C15:0 measurably lowers this risk — As the skin remodels over successive renewal cycles and adipose leakage slows, the burden of UV-induced 4-HNE drops substantially. The table below outlines the projected timeline for this shift, inferred from linear relation between membrane LA and 4-HNE generation:²⁰

Timeframe	What's Happening Biologically	Estimated Reduction in UV-Driven 4-HNE Burden
0 to 1 month	C15:0 enters circulation; first new keratinocyte layer forms with less LA	~10%
1 to 3 months	LA levels fall further as skin continues to renew with C15:0-rich membranes	~25%
3 to 12 months	Skin keeps improving, but LA released from fat slows additional progress	~30% to 45%
12 to 18 months	Most stored LA is cleared; skin maintains a more stable, low-LA membrane state	More than 60%

• This shift brings forward your "don't-burn" window by about a year — The C15:0 protocol compresses your skin's vulnerable period to 12 to 18 months. While this doesn't eliminate all UV risks, it significantly lowers your skin's baseline sensitivity to sun damage.²¹

• Sunlight becomes safer once your lipid profile stabilizes — LA removal doesn't mean avoiding sunlight. In fact, once your skin has remodeled away from PUF dominance, sun exposure supports circadian alignment, nitric oxide release, vitamin D production, and mitochondrial energy output.

Take a deeper dive into the benefits of C15:0 to your health in "C15:0 — Found in Dairy — May Be an Essential Fat."

How to Do the C15:0 Protocol

Clearing LA from your skin requires more than adding the right nutrient — it depends just as much on subtracting the wrong ones. The steps below outline how to properly implement the protocol, monitor your progress, and support your body's lipid turnover mechanisms along the way:

1. Keep LA intake less than 2% of your calorie intake — Eliminate industrial seed oils, including soybean, corn, sunflower, safflower, cottonseed, canola, and grapeseed oil. These fats are widely used in packaged foods, restaurant meals, condiments, and processed snacks.

LA also accumulates in the fat of grain-fed animals, particularly poultry and pork, where it reaches levels comparable to seed oils. These sources should be avoided or replaced with pasture-raised alternatives to prevent ongoing exposure through hidden dietary fats.

Learn more about how to lower your LA intake in "Linoleic Acid — The Most Destructive Ingredient in Your Diet."

2. Take 2 grams of C15:0 per day, divided with meals — Use a pure pentadecanoic acid powder or a verified high-C15 butter or ghee concentrate. Split the dose between meals to maintain even plasma levels and maximize tissue uptake.

3. Track your status every three months — Use an RBC or dried-blood-spot test to confirm that your C15:0 levels are 0.4% or more and your LA is less than 5% of your total fats. These markers confirm that remodeling is occurring. If your numbers plateau, reassess for hidden LA intake or inconsistent dosing.

4. Support fat turnover with lifestyle strategies — Promote the release and clearance of stored LA from adipose tissue by incorporating intermittent fasting, high-intensity workouts, and heat exposure through sauna use or hot baths.

For high-intensity exercise, limit sessions to no more than 75 minutes per week, as research shows longer durations undermine longevity and recovery. If using intermittent fasting, avoid long-term restrictive protocols that depress thyroid function and metabolic rate; short, occasional fasts are safer and more sustainable.

5. Ease into sun exposure until at least your second summer — Until adipose LA is largely depleted, skin remains vulnerable to UV-triggered oxidative stress. During this window, avoid midday sun, especially between 11 a.m. and 3 p.m., and instead focus on early morning or late afternoon sun exposure.

Once LA levels decline and membrane composition stabilizes, your skin becomes more resilient. At that point, you can begin to increase midday exposure gradually without burning.

Avoid using conventional sunscreens, which block vitamin D synthesis and contain ingredients that interfere with endocrine or skin health. Instead, build your tolerance with timed, progressive exposure and support internal protection through dietary antioxidants like astaxanthin, niacinamide, and vitamin E, along with saturated fats from ghee, butter, and tallow.

For a deeper understanding of how to safely approach sun exposure, read "Beyond Vitamin D Production — How Sensible Sun Exposure Supports Overall Health."

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Clearing LA from Your Skin

Q: Why is linoleic acid harmful to my skin?

A: LA is highly unstable and prone to oxidation. When integrated into skin cell membranes, it generates toxic byproducts like 4-HNE upon sun exposure, which damage DNA and accelerate skin aging.

Q: How does C15:0 help clear out LA?

A: C15:0 is a stable saturated fat that integrates into cell membranes in place of LA. It supports structural integrity and resists oxidation. By competing at key enzymatic sites, C15:0 helps displace LA from skin tissues and accelerates its clearance from fat stores, especially when combined with a low-LA diet.

Q: How long does it take to remove LA from my skin using C15:0?

A: At a dose of 2 grams per day, C15:0 begins altering skin membrane composition within one skin renewal cycle (about four weeks). Over the course of 12 to 18 months, it can remove more than 80% of mobilizable LA from tissues, cutting the typical clearance timeline in half.

Q: What are the best food sources of C15:0?

A: C15:0 is naturally found in full-fat dairy and ruminant fat, particularly in butter and ghee. However, typical intake from food is only 100 to 200 mg per day, which is well below the effective 2-gram daily dose needed for membrane remodeling. Supplementation with pure pentadecanoic acid powder or tested high-C15 butterfat concentrates is usually necessary.

Q: Is sun exposure safe during the C15:0 protocol?

A: Sunlight is beneficial once your membrane composition stabilizes. However, early in the protocol, when LA is still leaking from your fat stores, the skin remains vulnerable to UV-induced damage. During this window, practice caution when spending time outdoors.

Test Your Knowledge with Today's Quiz!

Take today’s quiz to see how much you’ve learned from yesterday’s Mercola.com article.

How can drinking hydrogen water improve your daily life as a senior?

1 What’s a safe and simple way you can try to reduce mosquito bites, even if scientific evidence is limited?
- Drinking herbal tea daily
- Applying lavender lotion
- Eating citrus fruits regularly
- Taking vitamin B1 supplements
  Many people report fewer mosquito bites when taking vitamin B1, and as a water-soluble vitamin, it’s safe to try with minimal risk. Learn more.
2 What can you learn from Western Europe’s approach to water fluoridation?
- Most countries add fluoride to improve dental health
- 98% of people drink non-fluoridated water
  98% of Western Europeans drink non-fluoridated water because many countries rejected fluoridation decades ago due to health concerns. This suggests you might consider exploring fluoride-free water options to align with practices prioritizing long-term well-being. Learn more.
- Fluoridation is not mandatory in all major cities
- Fluoride is only used in bottled water
3 Why might you avoid magnesium-rich foods like nuts and seeds?
- They contain too much sugar, which affects blood glucose
- They are low in other essential nutrients compared to supplements
- They have linoleic acid, which may cause inflammation
  Nuts and seeds contain linoleic acid, which can promote inflammation and worsen metabolic health, making them less ideal as your main magnesium source. Learn more.
- They are hard to digest and cause stomach discomfort
4 What’s a key reason plant-based fake meat might harm your long-term health?
- It lacks sufficient protein, weakening your immune system
- Its ultraprocessed additives disrupt your immune signaling and metabolic balance
  The ultraprocessed ingredients and additives in fake meat disrupt immune signaling and metabolic function, leading to inflammation and increased risk of chronic conditions like heart disease and diabetes. Learn more.
- It contains too many natural fibers that overload your digestive system
- It mimics whole plant foods too closely, causing nutrient imbalances
5 What might you notice about how vaccine injuries were handled in the past?
- They were openly shared to encourage public debate
- They were fully resolved and no longer occur today
- They were often hidden to maintain public trust in vaccines
  Historical records suggest the medical profession sometimes concealed vaccine injuries, believing the public health benefits outweighed the risk of hesitancy. Learn more.
- They were only reported by non-medical professionals
6 Which lifestyle adjustment best supports your body’s natural rhythm to prevent CircS?
- Practicing daily stress management techniques like meditation or deep breathing
  Daily stress management, like meditation, helps regulate your internal clock and lowers CircS risk by reducing cortisol disruptions. Learn more.
- Using blue-light glasses only during late-night screen time
- Not consuming food three hours before sleeping to protect cellular health
- Keeping your bedroom warm and dimly lit to promote relaxation
7 What makes hydrogen a unique antioxidant for your body?
- It provides a broad energy boost, helping you power through workouts and daily tasks with less fatigue
- It neutralizes all free radicals in your body, ensuring complete protection from oxidative stress
- It selectively targets harmful free radicals without disrupting essential cellular functions you rely on
  Hydrogen’s unique ability lies in targeting only harmful free radicals while leaving essential cellular functions intact, unlike typical antioxidants that may interfere with vital processes. Learn more.
- It acts as a general nutrient supplement, filling gaps in your diet to improve overall health and vitality

Test Your Knowledge With

The Master Level Quiz

1 Which natural oil can you apply to keep mosquitoes away as effectively as DEET for up to 135 minutes?

Wild mint oil
Tangerine peel oil
Russian sage oil
Studies show Russian sage oil matches DEET’s effectiveness, repelling mosquitoes for up to 135 minutes. Learn more.
Citronella oil

2 Why might you get a headache during exercise, even if you're drinking enough water?

Your brain is cooling itself by increasing blood flow, which raises pressure in your skull
Your brain cools itself during exercise by increasing blood flow, which can raise pressure in your skull and cause headaches. This is a natural response, especially if you're new to exercise or push yourself too hard. Learn more.
Your muscles are tightening too much from intense exercise
Your body is losing too much energy too quickly
Your heart is pumping blood too slowly to your brain

3 What’s the most effective step you can take around your home to control mosquito populations?

Planting marigolds near your garden
Eliminating standing water
Mosquitoes need standing water to breed, so removing it from your property is a key way to reduce their population. Learn more.
Installing outdoor fans
Burning citronella candles

4 What are other U.S. states like Ohio and Texas doing about water fluoridation?

They are decreasing fluoride levels in water
They are considering bans similar to Florida’s
States like Ohio and Texas are considering bans on water fluoridation, following Florida’s lead. This trend encourages you to stay informed about local water policies to make choices that support your health. Learn more.
They are removing fluoride in all public water systems
They are replacing fluoride with other minerals

5 How does participating in multiple sports benefit your child’s motor skill development compared to focusing on one sport?

It enhances their ability to master one sport faster than their peers
It sharpens their focus on sport-specific techniques over general skills
It primarily improves their endurance for longer practice sessions
It boosts coordination, balance, and movement skills by up to 14.5%
Research shows that children in multisport programs outperform single-sport peers by up to 14.5% in coordination, balance, and movement tests. Learn more.

6 Why might you add tulsi to your daily routine to support your well-being?

It helps your body recover from stress and sharpens your focus
Tulsi supports stress recovery, lowers cortisol, and boosts memory and focus, making it a great addition to your routine for mental clarity and balance. Learn more.
It boosts your energy with high caffeine content
It improves your digestion by increasing stomach acid
It enhances your muscle growth during exercise

7 How can you find the right magnesium supplement dose for your body?

Take as much as possible until you feel energized
Start with magnesium glycinate and increase until you feel calm
Use magnesium citrate until you get loose stools, then reduce slightly
Starting with magnesium citrate and adjusting the dose just below the point of loose stools helps you find your ideal dose safely, which you can then maintain with forms like glycinate or malate based on your needs. Learn more.
Take a fixed dose of magnesium threonate daily for brain health

8 What might you experience if you have precordial catch syndrome?

A dull, aching pain that lasts for hours
Short, sharp chest pain that goes away in minutes
Precordial catch syndrome causes short, stabbing chest pain that typically resolves within minutes. It’s often triggered by poor posture or growth spurts and is harmless. Learn more.
A burning sensation after eating spicy food
Chest pain with fainting and shortness of breath

9 What’s a key difference between a healthy scalp and a dandruff-prone scalp?

A healthy scalp has more protective bacteria, while a dandruff-prone scalp has fungal overgrowth
Healthy scalps have a rich presence of protective bacteria, which keeps harmful microbes in check. Dandruff-prone scalps, however, show reduced microbial diversity and an overgrowth of fungi like Malassezia, leading to flaking and irritation. Learn more.
A dandruff-prone scalp has more diverse bacteria than a healthy scalp
A healthy scalp has no bacteria, while a dandruff-prone scalp has too many
A dandruff-prone scalp produces less oil than a healthy scalp

10 What changes in your blood lipids occur when you regularly consume fake meat?

It lowers triglycerides and raises HDL cholesterol, supporting heart health
It slightly raises LDL cholesterol but has no effect on triglycerides
It maintains balanced lipid levels, similar to a whole-food diet
It elevates triglycerides and lowers HDL cholesterol
Regular consumption of fake meat is associated with higher triglycerides and lower HDL cholesterol, both of which elevate your long-term risk for cardiovascular disease, making it a less heart-healthy choice. Learn more.

11 What’s the best way to boost the gut health benefits of sauerkraut in your diet?

Eat it with high-protein foods like chicken to aid digestion
Combine it with other fermented vegetables and prebiotic foods like green bananas
Combining sauerkraut with other fermented vegetables and prebiotic foods like green bananas nourishes beneficial gut bacteria, maximizing health benefits. Learn more.
Pair it with starchy foods like potatoes to increase nutrient absorption
Mix it with fruits to enhance its flavor and gut benefits

12 If you’re looking to keep your bones strong, what makes sardines a smart pick?

They’re loaded with vitamin A, which boosts bone growth
They provide magnesium, which improves bone flexibility
They’re high in iron, which supports bone density
They contain calcium, which strengthens your bones
Sardines are an excellent source of calcium, a key mineral for maintaining strong bones. Learn more.

13 Why might you question the “safe and effective” label for vaccines?

Because historical injuries were downplayed
Historical documentation of injuries, sometimes erased or hidden, suggests the “safe and effective” label may not tell the full story. Learn more.
Because vaccines are no longer tested for safety
Because all vaccines cause severe injuries in most people
Because the label guarantees no risks exist

14 What sensations might you feel in your legs if you have Restless Legs Syndrome?

Numbness, tingling, and sharp pain
Burning, swelling, and stiffness
Crawling, pulling, aching, and throbbing
RLS is characterized by uncomfortable sensations like crawling, pulling, aching, and throbbing in the legs, often urging you to move them, especially at night. Learn more.
Cramping, heaviness, and coldness

15 Why might women be more likely to hit the snooze button than men?

They enjoy staying in bed longer for relaxation
They sleep more deeply, making waking up harder
They prefer gentler alarms that encourage snoozing
They have higher rates of insomnia and caregiving responsibilities
Women are more likely to experience insomnia and often have greater caregiving demands, which can disrupt sleep patterns and lead to more snooze button use as they struggle to feel rested. Learn more.

16 What role does “social jetlag” play in your risk of developing CircS?

It has no impact, as it’s unrelated to your body’s internal clock
It refers to weight gain from social eating, indirectly

How Gen Z is transforming mental health care [PODCAST]

Sun, 22 Jun 2025 23:00:14 +0000

Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes! Entrepreneur, AI enthusiast, and wellness advocate Vaishali Jha discusses her article, “Gen Z is already transforming mental health care—are we listening?” The conversation explores the vital need for new perspectives in health care, arguing that the system often overlooks the voices

Nurses aren’t eating their young — we’re starving the profession

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I know what I’m about to say is unpopular, and maybe even controversial within our field — but I need to say it. I’ve been a nurse for 18 years. I care deeply about my patients, and I care about the future of this profession. But I’m increasingly disheartened by what I see inside our

Why wanting more from your medical career is a sign of strength

Sun, 22 Jun 2025 17:00:45 +0000

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U.S. health care leadership must prepare for policy-driven change

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How Molecular Hydrogen Helps Reduce Inflammation and Support Cellular Repair

Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

What if the solution to chronic inflammation, fatigue and accelerated aging wasn't found in pharmaceuticals but in the most abundant element in the universe? In a wide-ranging interview on the Joe Rogan Experience, human biologist and longevity expert Gary Brecka makes the case that molecular hydrogen isn't just a theoretical breakthrough — it's a missing link in how we approach health, longevity and recovery.¹

Unlike conventional treatments that suppress symptoms, hydrogen supports your body's ability to self-repair at the cellular level. It interacts with antioxidant pathways, enhances circulation and helps neutralize the hidden stressors — like oxidative damage and toxic overload — that drive many modern diseases. As you'll see, this isn't about quick fixes or biohacking hype. It's about restoring the systems your body was designed to rely on, and unlocking performance and vitality in the process.

Hydrogen Taps Into Your Body's Healing System, Not Just Symptom Control

In this episode of the Joe Rogan Experience, Brecka detailed the therapeutic benefits of molecular hydrogen.² The conversation revolved around how hydrogen gas interacts with your biology to reduce inflammation, support circulation and enhance cognitive and physical function. Unlike common anti-inflammatories that suppress your immune system broadly, hydrogen acts as a "selective antioxidant" that works with your body's own regulatory pathways to restore balance.

• Hydrogen showed positive results in elderly adults, even in restrictive conditions — Brecka referenced a six-month study during the COVID-19 lockdowns involving adults over 70 who had limited movement and high emotional stress.³

Despite these conditions, those who drank hydrogen-infused water experienced a 4% increase in telomere length, a genetic marker tied to aging and disease, while the control group lost 11% over the same time period. Telomeres shorten as you age or endure chronic stress, so increasing their length under such constraints is considered remarkable.

• Hydrogen improved sleep and mobility in older adults — Study participants who drank hydrogen water also reported deeper sleep and improved "sit-to-stand" performance, a key measure of functional independence in older populations. These kinds of improvements suggest that hydrogen is doing more than offering a mild benefit; it's helping the body rebuild.

• Benefits were seen within just six months, even in immobile seniors — What makes this even more compelling is that these individuals weren't exercising or moving much due to lockdown restrictions. This eliminates physical activity as a confounding variable and spotlights hydrogen as the core intervention. Improvements happened without diet changes or exercise routines — only the introduction of hydrogen water.

• Participants showed improvements in inflammation markers and cardiovascular indicators — C-reactive protein (CRP), a marker of chronic inflammation, decreased significantly in those using hydrogen. Brecka explained that there was also an improvement in cardiac function — both are major predictors of disease risk and mortality. Lowering CRP not only means reduced inflammation but also a lower chance of developing autoimmune conditions, heart disease or metabolic issues.

Hydrogen Delivers Fast Relief for Inflammation-Linked Pain

Anecdotes from Brecka's clinical experience echoed the findings of the study: those with joint pain, stiffness, poor circulation and fatigue experienced noticeable changes after introducing hydrogen baths or water. "I have literally put people into these tubs, crippled with arthritis, and they will skip out of my unit like they won the lottery," Brecka said.⁴ For many, it was the first time in years they slept through the night without pain.

• Hydrogen helps your body turn on its own healing defenses — Brecka explained that hydrogen doesn't just fight inflammation directly — it tells your cells to make their own natural antioxidants. It works by activating a protein called NRF2, which signals your body to produce powerful internal defenders like glutathione and superoxide dismutase. These compounds are already built into your biology, but stress and illness shut them down. Hydrogen helps switch them back on.

• Unlike other antioxidants, hydrogen is selective; it targets only harmful free radicals — Most antioxidants blunt your entire oxidative system, which includes helpful processes your body needs.

Hydrogen is different. It targets the hydroxyl radical, the most damaging and biologically useless of the free radicals, while sparing others like nitric oxide and hydrogen peroxide that your body uses for signaling and repair. This selectivity is what makes hydrogen safe for daily use — it supports balance instead of forcing suppression.

• Its molecular size allows it to reach every part of your body, even your mitochondria — Hydrogen is the lightest, smallest molecule in the universe. That allows it to cross cell membranes, your blood-brain barrier and even enter your mitochondria — your body's energy factories. Most supplements don't even come close to that level of penetration. Once inside, it reduces inflammation at the cellular level, where most chronic diseases actually begin.

• You can drink it, bathe in it or use it in cold plunges — Brecka explains that hydrogen gas is highly absorbable whether you ingest it or apply it through your skin. In one example, a Navy SEAL veteran with widespread joint pain bathed in a hydrogen-infused tub and experienced his first full night of pain-free sleep in over a decade. Brecka has also installed hydrogen systems into cold plunges, where the chilled temperature allows water to hold more hydrogen gas.

From elite athletes like mixed martial artist Jon Jones to elderly clients recovering from surgeries, Brecka's account paints a clear picture: hydrogen isn't just about "antiaging" hype — it's giving people back their capacity to move, think, sleep and heal.

Chronic Inflammation, Mold and the Real Root of Disease

In the second half of the episode, Brecka emphasized that most chronic diseases, including autoimmune conditions, are rooted in hidden exposures to toxins such as mold, heavy metals, parasites and persistent viruses. What if your immune system is working properly, chasing a threat lodged deep inside your cells? Rather than blaming your immune system for attacking healthy tissue, Brecka suggests identifying and eliminating the real intruder.

• Toxins like mold, BPAs and jet fuel hide inside cells, triggering immune reactions — Brecka shared personal and clinical examples of patients, especially those with arthritis, fatigue or brain fog, who dramatically improved after testing for and treating mold and mycotoxins. In one example, his daughter suffered from recurring sore throats until mold was identified and removed from her environment and body using sauna therapy, binders, glutathione and other natural treatments.

• Mitochondrial dysfunction, not cholesterol, drives modern disease — Returning to metabolic health, Brecka stressed that LDL cholesterol is often scapegoated in isolation. We don't study human physiology in a vacuum, and LDL only becomes dangerous in the presence of high insulin, abdominal obesity, poor glucose control and chronic inflammation.

Lowering LDL with statins hasn't produced a meaningful extension in lifespan, he noted, and is associated with multiple health risks, because the true issue is systemic dysfunction, not one biomarker.

• 'Aging is the aggressive pursuit of comfort' — One of Brecka's most quoted takeaways: "Aging is the aggressive pursuit of comfort." He and Rogan discussed how cold plunges, sauna, exercise and voluntary discomfort are key to longevity and vitality. "We've really got to stop telling grandma not to go outside — it's too hot to go outside; it's too cold."

How to Use Hydrogen to Lower Inflammation and Boost Repair

If you're dealing with joint pain, brain fog, poor circulation or stubborn inflammation that doesn't respond to diet or supplements, molecular hydrogen gives you a completely different way to approach it. This isn't about suppressing symptoms.

You're restoring the natural repair systems inside your cells — the ones your body was designed to use but often can't access due to stress, toxins or chronic illness. This approach works for all kinds of people — young athletes, elderly patients, even those recovering from surgery or injury. If you're looking to take action, here are the steps I'd recommend.

1. Start with hydrogen water daily — Drinking hydrogen-rich water is the simplest way to get started. It's fast, portable and doesn't interfere with your daily routine. Use high-quality hydrogen tablets that dissolve in water and drink it immediately after it finishes reacting — this is when the hydrogen concentration is highest.

If you've had fatigue, joint pain or brain fog, this is often where the biggest changes begin. For best results, place two tablets in 1 liter of water and drink it all in the morning. This will give you a very strong pulse, which will produce better results than a lower pulse twice a day. Once the tablets are fully dissolved, you'll want to drink it as fast as possible.

2. Add hydrogen baths if you have joint or muscle pain — If you struggle with arthritis, muscle soreness or post-workout stiffness, you'll want to take it a step further. Hydrogen-infused baths are absorbed through your skin and go directly to the areas that hurt. You can use hydrogen bath tablets in hot filtered water at home. Many people notice improvement after just one session, especially when pain is localized to a specific area.

3. Use hydrogen in cold plunges to enhance recovery and circulation — If you already do cold plunges or want to start, add hydrogen tablets to the water. Cold water holds more dissolved hydrogen, giving you even better absorption. This combo improves circulation, reduces inflammation and speeds up tissue repair. If you're an athlete or recovering from injury, this step helps shorten your downtime and improve performance.

4. Be consistent for at least four to six weeks — Your body needs time to begin producing its own antioxidant enzymes. Some people feel benefits right away, but real systemic changes — like improved mitochondrial function, better sleep and reduced inflammation — show up after weeks, not days. Stick with it, even if the improvements start small.

5. Pair hydrogen with other healthy habits; it's not a replacement — Hydrogen works with your body's natural systems, but it's not magic. You still need to eat real food, move your body, sleep deeply and avoid environmental pollutants that damage your cells in the first place. Think of hydrogen as the activator. It helps your biology do what it was built to do.

But it works best when you give your body the raw materials it needs to heal. Hydrogen doesn't force your body to do anything unnatural. It restores what's been blocked by stress, toxins and inflammation. If you've been stuck in survival mode, this is one reset you've been missing.

FAQs About Molecular Hydrogen and Health Recovery

Q: What is molecular hydrogen and how does it support health?

A: Molecular hydrogen is a naturally occurring gas that acts as a selective antioxidant. It helps your body produce its own internal defense systems by activating the NRF2 pathway, which boosts production of protective compounds. This supports healing without suppressing your immune system.

Q: What health benefits were observed in the hydrogen water study during lockdown?

A: In a six-month study involving elderly adults during COVID-19 lockdowns, participants who drank hydrogen-infused water showed a 4% increase in telomere length, better sleep, improved mobility and lower inflammation markers like C-reactive protein, despite no changes in diet or exercise routines.

Q: How does hydrogen help with pain and inflammation?

A: Hydrogen selectively neutralizes harmful free radicals without blocking your body's beneficial oxidative functions. Clinical examples show rapid relief from joint pain, stiffness and fatigue — even in individuals with arthritis — using hydrogen water or hydrogen-infused baths.

Q: What makes hydrogen different from other antioxidants?

A: Unlike conventional antioxidants that indiscriminately block oxidation, hydrogen targets only the most harmful free radical — the hydroxyl radical — while leaving beneficial ones like nitric oxide intact. Its small size allows it to penetrate deep into cells, including the mitochondria, where chronic diseases often start.

Q: How do I start using molecular hydrogen for health support?

A: Begin by drinking hydrogen-rich water daily using high-quality tablets. For joint or muscle pain, hydrogen baths or cold plunges offer additional relief. Results typically build over four to six weeks and work best when combined with other healthy lifestyle habits such as healthy eating, exercise and toxin avoidance.

Test Your Knowledge with Today's Quiz!

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Maintaining a healthy weight despite irregular sleep

How Your Microbiome Influences Your Dietary Recommendations

Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Editor's Note: This article is a reprint. It was originally published April 21, 2024.

In the ever-evolving field of bioenergetic medicine, the relationship between our diet, microbiome and overall health continues to unveil complex and intriguing connections. At the heart of this exploration is the legacy of Ray Peat, Ph.D., whose theories on sugar intake and metabolic function have sparked widespread debate and interest among researchers and health enthusiasts alike.

In this interview, repeat guest Georgi Dinkov, a bioenergetic medicine researcher and I delve into the nuanced understanding of how our microbiome influences dietary choices, particularly the contentious decision between starch and fruit as preferable sources of carbohydrates. Dinkov also reviews groundbreaking research and innovative treatments that aim to manipulate cellular energy pathways to combat cancer.

My Take on the Fruit Versus Starch Controversy

Many of Peat’s followers believe that he advocated large amounts of sugar, but that’s not the case. Sugar, or glucose more specifically, is necessary for cellular health. Refined sugar can be a problem, especially in large amounts.

The issue really boils down to your microbiome, which Peat didn’t really understand as many technical advances have been made since he was actively learning. He certainly warned about the hazards of endotoxin, but I suspect he may not have fully appreciated the power of the microbiome.

The contention within the bioenergetic medicine community is that it’s wise to avoid starch and replace it with ripe fruit. They mostly believe fruit is the ultimate carbohydrate, but I now suspect starch may be the ideal type of carb, but only if your gut microbiome is optimal.

Since most people have poor gut health they don’t do well when eating a significant amount of starch. Most also have dysfunctional mitochondria, and if you don't have enough mitochondria, you can't create cellular energy efficiently enough to ensure a healthy gastrointestinal tract.

Your gut contains primarily two types of gram-negative bacteria: beneficial and pathogenic. The beneficial ones include obligate anaerobes, which cannot survive in the presence of oxygen and are essential for health. They do not produce harmful endotoxins and contribute positively by producing short-chain fatty acids, like butyrate, propionate, and glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1).

Proper gut function requires energy to maintain an oxygen-free environment in the large intestine, where 99% of gut microbes reside. Insufficient energy leads to oxygen leakage, which harms obligate anaerobes while not impacting the facultative anaerobes, thereby disrupting the balance of the microbiome.

Pathogenic bacteria, or facultative anaerobes, can survive in oxygen and are harmful, as they possess endotoxins in their cell walls. Feeding these bacteria with starch can exacerbate their growth, leading to health issues.

The only carbohydrate that does not promote these bacteria is fruit juice, which some people may tolerate better than whole fruit. Polyphenols, found in high amounts in fruits but not starches, also has beneficial effects on the gut microbiome.

In short, enhancing mitochondrial energy production is crucial for maintaining a healthy gut environment. When you do that, it helps suppress the growth of pathogenic bacteria and support beneficial microbial populations.

The bacterium Akkermansia is particularly beneficial and should ideally constitute about 10% of your gut microbiome. However, DNA analyses suggest about one-third of people have few to no Akkermansia at all, and I suspect this is due to insufficient energy production (low metabolism) and resulting oxygen leakage in the gut.

Antibiotics Can Worsen an Already Bad Situation

As noted by Dinkov, the high prevalence of antibiotics in our food supply also has a detrimental effect on the microbiome by indiscriminately killing off both good and bad bacteria. Pathogenic bacteria tend to rebound faster, resulting in a predominance of endotoxin-producing bacteria that destroy the intestinal barrier.

A robust intestinal barrier can prevent bacterial fragments from entering the bloodstream, whereas a compromised barrier allows these harmful fragments through while blocking beneficial compounds like short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs).

The overall health impact of the microbiome, therefore, significantly depends on the integrity of the intestinal barrier, and the strength and function of the intestinal barrier, in turn, is determined by the presence or absence of endotoxins.

Considering the adverse effects of antibiotics on gut health, I do not support Peat’s recommendation to use antibiotics to kill off pathogenic bacteria. It’s not an ideal solution. What you need to do is restructure your microbiome, and the most effective way to do that, I believe, is through eating foods that support Akkermansia and other beneficial bacteria, and avoid foods like linoleic acid that destroy these bacteria.

One of the reasons Akkermansia is so important is because it produces mucin, a thick, protective gel-like substance that lines various parts of the body, including the gastrointestinal tract. Mucin forms a protective barrier on the gut lining, shielding the epithelial cells of the intestinal wall from mechanical damage, chemical irritation from stomach acids and digestive enzymes, and pathogenic organisms like bacteria and viruses.

Mucin also supports the immune system by trapping potential pathogens and other foreign particles, which are then expelled from the body through the digestive process. It also contains antibodies and antimicrobial peptides that help fight off infections.

Lastly, mucin serves as a food source for other beneficial gut bacteria. This relationship is essential for digestive health, as the bacteria fed by Akkermansia aid in digestion, produce essential nutrients, and help maintain an overall balance of gut flora.

Intestinal Motility Is Dependent on Your Metabolic Rate

As noted by Dinkov, there’s also a tight relationship between intestinal motility — the frequency and quality of bowel movements — and metabolic rate, particularly in relation to thyroid function. Historically, frequent bowel movements (nearly after every meal) were considered normal and were used as a diagnostic indicator of thyroid health.

Currently, however, the accepted norm for bowel movements has shifted to once a day or even once every two days without concern, unless constipation extends beyond a week. Ideally, you should have at least one or two bowel movements per day.

The composition of your stool can also provide insights into your hydration status and gut fermentation processes, which are indicative of the overall health of the colon and reflect your metabolic rate. Patterns in urination and bowel movements can also serve as indicators of metabolic health, with infrequent bowel movements and excessive urination suggesting a low metabolic rate.

The Importance of Collagen

Another one of Peat’s recommendations that I don't think he stressed enough is the value of collagen (or gelatin). Collagen and gelatin are related substances, but they differ in structure and uses due to how they are processed and prepared. Gelatin, I think, is an inferior form of collagen.

They contain the same amino acids, and are known to support skin health, strengthen joints and bones, and improve digestive health. However, because collagen peptides are smaller and more bioavailable, they may be more efficiently absorbed by the body than gelatin.

About 30% of your bone is collagen, making it an essential dietary component to prevent osteoporosis (age-related bone loss). Your muscle fibers also contain loads of collagen, not to mention your tendons and ligaments, so you can’t build muscle if you don’t have enough collagen. Collagen intake can also help lower your risk of insulin resistance. As noted by Dinkov:

“Several studies have demonstrated that if you ingest collagen with a very large amount of glucose, it doesn't trigger nearly the same insulin response because the collagen can fill in for a lot of the insulin. Some of the peptides are very similar in structure. So, it's like you're ingesting insulin and you don't have to trigger your pancreas to produce as much. So, you directly improve your insulin sensitivity with every meal.”

Unfortunately, many who are following a carnivore diet fail to realize that most of the protein should be in the form of collagen, NOT red meat. An all-meat diet will only accelerate your demise, as most of the amino acids in muscle meat — methionine, histidine, tryptophan and cysteine — promote inflammation and suppress thyroid function and metabolism.¹

According to Dinkov, tryptophan is also directly carcinogenic. Collagen, meanwhile, contains radically higher levels of glycine, proline, hydroxyproline and alanine, which are essential for health. Dinkov comments:

“Glycine is an actual neurotransmitter. It’s the major inhibitory neurotransmitter in the spinal cord and one of the major neurotransmitters that regulates gastrointestinal motility. So, without sufficient amounts of glycine in the body, you'll have problems with digestion even if you don't have an inflamed gastrointestinal tract.”

Bone Broth Is an Ideal Source of Collagen

The best source of collagen is homemade bone broth, which you can whip up in four hours using a pressure cooker, such as the Instant Pot. Simply place the bones in the pressure cooker, fill the pot with pure, filtered water — just enough to cover the bones — add salt and other spices to taste, then set it to cook on high for two hours if the bones are CAFO (from animals raised in a concentrated animal feeding operation), and four hours if organic and grass fed.

Organic grass fed beef bones are the best. Using bones from CAFO beef can be problematic due to potential heavy metal contamination. When cooking these bones in a pressure cooker, it's best to limit the time to two hours to avoid introducing heavy metals into your broth.

If you're using beef bones from grass fed organic sources, you can safely cook them for four hours. I recommend chilling the bone broth before you eat it. This will allow the fat to rise to the top so you can skim it off. While some beef fat is good, excess can be problematic.

On a side note, if you have a dog, you can carve off the loose cartilage around the joints after two hours and feed the cartilage to your pet. If you cook the bones for four hours or longer, most of the collagen will be dissolved in the broth, so there won’t be anything left to pick off. More importantly, you never want to give your dog cooked bones as they can splinter during chewing and cause great damage to the esophagus.

Another delicious way to get more collagen into your diet is to make homemade ice cream. My homemade healthy ice cream recipe done in a Ninja Creami includes one scoop of my collagen protein powder, three tablespoons of maple syrup, two egg yolks, and a cup of goat milk. It tastes almost identical to store-bought ice cream but is much healthier.

How Much Protein and Collagen Do You Need?

So, just how much collagen do you need? As noted by Dinkov, in studies conducted on rodents, researchers have discovered that adding 1% to 2% collagen to the diet can effectively mimic the life-extending effects observed from the depletion of certain amino acids such as cysteine, tryptophan and methionine.

This finding is particularly intriguing as it suggests a possible direct translation of these benefits to humans due to the metabolic nature of the intervention. When considering overall dietary protein, the consensus among nutritionists is that it should ideally comprise about 15% of your total daily calories.

Approximately one-third of this protein, or about 5%, should ideally be collagen. This recommendation is based on achieving the optimal balance for health benefits without adverse effects. It’s probably safe to increase the proportion of collagen up to 10% of total calorie intake.

A similar ratio — 5% to 30% — applies to dietary fat as well. That range is probably ideal. The remainder of your daily calories would then come from healthy carbs, mostly fresh fruits (if you can tolerate them) and fruit juice if you’re mitochondrially impaired, or starches like white rice and cooked potatoes if your metabolism is high (which is indicative of healthy mitochondrial energy production).

Amino Acids and Their Role in Fatigue

Interestingly, cheese is also high in tryptophan, significantly more than egg white. However, according to Dinkov, the casein in the cheese basically acts as a tryptophan blocker. Calcium also has tryptophan-buffering effects. He also goes on to explain how different types of amino acids interact in the body, particularly in relation to brain function and fatigue.

A key point to remember though is that most cheeses today are made with genetically modified rennet, so make sure you’re buying cheese made from raw, organic, grass fed milk and natural animal-based rennet only.

Amino acids are building blocks of proteins that have various functions in the body. Among them, branched-chain amino acids (BCAAs) and aromatic amino acids like L-tyrosine and phenylalanine are important. BCAAs include leucine, isoleucine, and valine. The blood-brain barrier is a filter that controls what substances can enter the brain from the bloodstream.

BCAAs and aromatic amino acids such as L-tyrosine and tryptophan compete to cross this barrier, and if you consume large amounts of BCAAs alone, they outcompete L-tyrosine and tryptophan at the blood-brain barrier. This results in lower levels of L-tyrosine and tryptophan in the brain, which in turn can decrease the levels of neurotransmitters like serotonin.

Dinkov cites animal research showing that fatigue during exhaustive exercise isn't primarily caused by a lack of energy but rather by an increase in serotonin in the brain. Administering BCAAs and L-tyrosine seemed to mitigate this type of fatigue without significantly adding calories, suggesting the importance of amino acid balance over sheer energy intake.

He also reviews some of the natural ways to influence amino acid absorption and serotonin levels, such as consuming foods rich in BCAAs, aspirin, cheese, and fruits containing salicylic acid, such as blackberries and apricots. All of these have an inhibitory effect on the absorption of inflammatory amino acids from food.

Results of a Personal Experiment

Biomolecular biologist Brad Marshall, whom I interviewed, argues that starches are a more ideal carb than fruit, but again, the caveat is that you must have a healthy microbiome. If you don't, starches can pose problems.

Since my gut health is good and my metabolism high, I make 6 cups of white rice cooked in bone broth for my dog and I each day, along with an egg yolk or two. I think these three foods — bone broth, white rice and low-linoleic acid egg yolk — make for a close to optimal meal, both for humans and dogs. I also eat about half a pound of organic, grass fed cheese each day.

After eating this amount of cheese, rice and bone broth for one month, I did a SECA test to assess my bone mass and body fat percentage. I’d grown half an inch in height, gained 4 pounds in total body weight yet my body fat decreased from 8.5% to 5.3%. Basically, I gained 4 pounds of pure muscle.

The increase in height is explained by improved structural integrity of my vertebral discs. They get crushed with time, which is why you tend to shrink with age. The bone broth supplies loads of collagen, which strengthens those vertebra. An increase in connective tissue also increases intracellular water, and at the time that I did this test, my intracellular water had increased by half a liter.

Vitamins and Cancer Metabolism

Dinkov also discusses the findings of experimental studies he’s involved in, in which they’re using vitamins and pharmaceutical agents to target the metabolism of cancer cells. Vitamins studied include B1 (thiamine), B3 (niacinamide), and B7 (biotin). These vitamins were chosen based on historical studies, some nearly a century old, that connect them to cancer metabolism.

As explained by Dinkov, thiamine (B1) acts as a cofactor for pyruvate dehydrogenase, a crucial enzyme in cellular energy production. Thiamine also inhibits pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase (PDK), which itself inhibits pyruvate dehydrogenase (PDH). Thus, B1 indirectly supports energy production by keeping PDH active.

Niacinamide (B3) converts to NAD+ in your body, thereby affecting the NAD+ to NADH ratio, which is vital for metabolic processes like the functioning of another enzyme, alpha-ketoglutarate dehydrogenase. NAD+ also inhibits lipolysis, reducing fat availability to cancer cells which can use fat as fuel.

Biotin (B7), meanwhile, is noted for significant effects in human studies involving neurological disorders like multiple sclerosis and Huntington's disease.

High doses of biotin (300 mg) have been observed to halt the progression of primary progressive multiple sclerosis, with the proposed mechanism being an improvement in mitochondrial function. It also appears to enhance the Krebs cycle, a key component of cellular respiration, as shown by increased carbon dioxide production in cell cultures.

A combination of all three were found to completely stop tumor growth but didn’t trigger regression. The research used the JEKO-1 cell line, which is a type of human mantle cell lymphoma.

This cell line is described as being highly malignant and fatal when transplanted into immunocompromised animals, showing a 100% mortality rate and 0% chance of tumor regression, whether through treatment or spontaneously. This indicates the aggressive nature of the tumor and the challenge it presents for therapeutic intervention.

Seeking additional treatment options, the researcher then added aspirin at a dose of approximately 1.5 grams per day, which is high but below toxic levels typically associated with treatments for conditions like rheumatoid arthritis. This dosage successfully led to the full regression of tumors in three experimental mice.

After the tumors regressed, the mice were monitored for recurrence. One mouse showed signs of potential tumor recurrence, but this subsided, and after 70 days — a significantly extended period compared to the usual two-week lifespan due to the lethality of the tumors — all mice remained tumor-free.

With the success of aspirin, the focus shifted to a more potent analog, 2,6-dihydroxy benzoic acid, known for its stronger acidic properties and better lipophilicity, which can potentially lower the intracellular pH of cancer cells more effectively. This shift in pH is crucial because cancer cells typically avoid apoptosis (programmed cell death) by maintaining an alkaline internal environment. Lowering the pH is thought to trigger apoptosis.

This compound, 2,6-dihydroxy benzoic acid, which was used in the past to treat rheumatoid arthritis at doses significantly lower than those required for aspirin, showed promising results in further lowering the dose required for treatment compared to aspirin. The initial results from using this compound in conjunction with vitamins showed that tumors not only regressed but the treatment was effective at much lower doses.

So, in summary, a combination of vitamins and an aspirin analog may be a potent cancer treatment, minimizing side effects related to high doses of conventional aspirin. This shows how a combination of dietary supplements and pharmaceutical agents can target the metabolic vulnerabilities of cancer cells, specifically through the manipulation of intracellular pH to induce apoptosis.

Low PUFA Linked to Cancer Prevention

Dinkov also reviews other experimental approaches aimed at understanding and manipulating cancer cell behavior through dietary and pharmacological means. In a fascinating dietary experiment, mice were fed a fat-free die

Understanding Butyrate — The Key to Optimal Health and Well-Being

Sun, 22 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Editor's Note: This article is a reprint. It was originally published February 23, 2025.

You may be familiar with gut health, but you might not realize how important a single compound called butyrate is for your overall well-being. In the video above, Dawn Boxell, a registered dietitian with Gastric Health, expands on butyrate, a type of short-chain fatty acid produced by certain beneficial bacteria in your gut whenever you eat specific types of fiber.¹

When you feed these helpful bacteria, they ferment the fiber and release butyrate, which influences many parts of your body, including your digestive system and brain. Butyrate helps nourish your colon cells, which rely on butyrate as a main energy source.

When these cells get the fuel they need, your gut lining stays strong, lowering the chances of substances such as undigested food, bacteria and metabolic wastes sneaking through into your bloodstream and causing systemic inflammation.

Butyrate's protective effects are linked to multiple health benefits, including more stable digestion and better immune response. Despite its benefits, however, butyrate doesn't usually make the headlines when people talk about digestion or healthy diets. You often hear about proteins, carbohydrates and fats, but rarely about the byproducts that form when you digest nutrient-rich fiber.

This short-chain fatty acid impacts not just your gut but also your blood sugar balance, weight, mood and your inflammatory response. In other words, your body depends on butyrate to keep many essential functions running smoothly, and you can boost its production by eating fiber-filled carbohydrates on a regular basis.

You also get butyrate from certain foods like grass fed butter and ghee, but a key way to increase your supply is by adding fiber sources such as vegetables, fruits, whole grains and beans to your meals. When you give your gut bacteria enough fiber to ferment, they create even more butyrate. It's important to understand, however, that if your gut health is poor, increasing dietary fiber must be done gradually to avoid the production of endotoxin, a mitochondrial poison.

Feeding Your Gut Bacteria

You might not think of your gut as an entire ecosystem, but that's exactly how Boxell describes it. Trillions of bacteria live there, forming what scientists call the gut microbiome. These bacteria include both helpful and not-so-helpful types, and the balance between them makes or breaks your overall health. When the balance tilts in the wrong direction, you get what's known as dysbiosis.

That means you could have too many harmful bacteria or not enough beneficial bacteria, which leads to reduced butyrate production and a weaker gut barrier. Butyrate-producing bacteria include groups like Faecalibacterium prausnitzii and Roseburia species, which thrive on fiber-rich diets. When you skip whole fruits and vegetables and rely on low-fiber options like processed foods, you starve these good bacteria, limiting their ability to ferment the fibers that create butyrate.

Over time, low butyrate production increases your risk for various health problems, from digestive disorders to struggles with body weight. You might also feel more fatigued, experience more frequent digestive discomfort and face greater challenges with controlling your blood sugar. On the flip side, a varied and fiber-filled diet shifts your gut environment in ways that promote good health.

Further, diversity matters. If you stick to the same few foods, your gut bacteria don't get the full range of nutrients they need. Think of it like feeding a garden: If you keep watering the same plant and ignore the rest, you won't have a vibrant, thriving plot. The more variety of produce and high-fiber carbohydrates you include, the more you encourage a broad array of friendly bacteria to do their job well.

Fermented foods also contribute to this ecosystem. Yogurt with live cultures made from grass fed milk, kefir, sauerkraut and kimchi all bring beneficial microbes to your gut, enhancing butyrate production. These foods repopulate your digestive tract with helpful bacteria, which, in turn, maintain or boost your butyrate output.

By blending high-fiber foods with fermented choices, you create a synergy that helps you maintain healthy digestion and benefit from the many roles that butyrate plays in your body's immune and metabolic systems. An important point, however, is to ensure your mitochondria are functioning optimally to support proper cellular energy. Without this key component, your gut environment will be inhospitable to the beneficial bacteria you're consuming.

Strengthening Gut Health with Butyrate

As mentioned, the cells in your colon rely on butyrate as a primary energy source. These cells make up your gut lining, and a resilient gut lining is key for keeping unwanted substances out of your bloodstream. When you support these cells through high butyrate levels, you help maintain tight junctions in your gut, which stop large particles or toxins from passing into your body. That's why a shortage of butyrate weakens your intestinal barrier.

This protective function also ties into inflammation. When particles slip through a weakened gut lining, your immune system goes into overdrive, triggering extra inflammation. Over time, that inflammation spreads, affecting not just your digestion but also your metabolism and mood. In fact, butyrate has been shown to calm inflammation in the colon and even help repair damage in inflammatory bowel disease.²

Boxell notes that adequate butyrate levels also help maintain the important mucous layer that sits on top of your gut lining. This mucous layer provides extra protection by ensuring that food you eat is broken down into smaller particles before entering your bloodstream. The process gives your immune system less to worry about, so you're not constantly battling what it sees as foreign invaders.

If you maintain this protective layer, you're setting yourself up for fewer digestive troubles and a more stable immune response. You should also remember that your gut is partially permeable for a reason. You need it to absorb nutrients, water and other key substances, so the goal isn't to make your gut wall completely sealed.

Rather, you want it to be selective, allowing in the vitamins and minerals you need while blocking harmful germs and toxins. By promoting butyrate production through fiber-rich eating habits — once your gut is healthy — you help your gut do exactly that, all while fueling the cells that keep your digestion on track and your health protected.

Butyrate's Role in Overall Wellness

Healthy butyrate levels do more than shore up your gut barrier. Research suggests this short-chain fatty acid plays a protective role in obesity and diabetes.³ You might think carbs are your enemy if you're trying to control your weight, but the truth is more nuanced. When you get enough of the right carbs, your beneficial gut bacteria produce more butyrate. This compound influences hormones that control your hunger, helping you feel full and satisfied.

Butyrate also plays a role in brain health. Butyrate is capable of crossing your blood-brain barrier, and butyrate-producing bacteria like Eubacterium and Eisenbergiella are associated with lower Alzheimer's risk.⁴ If that wasn't enough, butyrate is also associated with a lower risk of colorectal cancer. Because butyrate keeps colon cells well-fueled, it contributes to their proper functioning and division.

Studies have shown that this compound helps damaged cells undergo a self-destruct process called apoptosis, which could prevent them from turning cancerous.⁵ By promoting these normal patterns of cell life and death, butyrate reduces the chance that abnormal cells will grow into dangerous tumors.

Increasing Your Butyrate Levels Safely

Most adults need around 200 to 350 grams of healthy carbohydrates each day. This range helps support cellular energy by giving your body the fuel it needs. You might suspect that the best way to get more butyrate is to reach for fiber-packed foods, and you'd be correct. Boxell emphasizes that you need both enough and the right kinds of fiber to boost butyrate production. Fruits, vegetables, whole grains and beans supply fiber that your gut bacteria ferment.

Still, simply meeting basic fiber goals might not be enough if you don't vary your fiber sources. Different plants have different types of fiber, such as soluble fiber, insoluble fiber, and resistant starch. One type of resistant starch is found in cooked and cooled potatoes and rice. When these starches reach your colon, they resist digestion in your small intestine and become food for butyrate-producing microbes.

However, it's important to introduce fiber-rich foods gradually, as many people don't have a high enough concentration of beneficial bacteria in their gut to digest the fibers in healthy carbs like fruit, vegetables, and grain. Then, when you do eat those types of foods, you feel worse, as you have a buildup of pathogenic bacteria that produce toxic endotoxin, one of several factors that destroys mitochondrial function.

So, if you have gut sensitivities or ongoing digestive discomfort, avoid jumping straight into eating whole grains or non-starchy veggies. Instead, try simpler carbohydrate sources like white rice, fruit juices with pulp or whole fruits first.

If your gut health is severely compromised, start with dextrose (also known as glucose) water. By sipping small amounts throughout the day, you keep your energy stable while allowing your gut to heal. Dextrose water is a short-term solution that should only be used for one or two weeks.

After those initial steps, transition toward more fibrous carbs. After white rice, whole fruits and fruit juice with pulp, try root veggies. This preparatory period allows your body to recover mitochondrial function and create a more hospitable environment in your colon.

Once your gut health is healed — meaning your bowel habits, bloating, and overall comfort are under control — you can expand your diet further. Add non-starchy vegetables, starchy options (sweet potato or squash), beans, legumes, and eventually whole grains with minimal processing. The key is variety. This wide assortment of fibrous choices supports the beneficial bacteria in your gut and makes each meal more satisfying.

Strengthening Gut Health with Butyrate

If you maintain this protective layer, you're setting yourself up for fewer digestive troubles and a more stable immune response. You should also remember that your gut is partially permeable for a reason. You need it to absorb nutrients, water, and other key substances, so the goal isn't to make your gut wall completely sealed.

By prioritizing butyrate production through dietary changes and targeted supplementation, you support better digestion, a stronger gut barrier, and lower inflammation. These small but impactful adjustments to your daily routine can make a profound difference in your overall wellness, helping you maintain metabolic stability, brain health, and long-term vitality.

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Why women doctors are still mistaken for nurses originally appeared in KevinMD.com.

Harnessing the Healing Power of Music

Sat, 21 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

When words fail, music speaks. Across hospitals, clinics and rehabilitation centers, music is being used as a proven strategy to help patients restore lost functions, ease emotional distress and recover from serious neurological damage. Unlike passive background noise, music engages your brain in complex, coordinated ways, activating emotion, memory, movement and reward circuits all at once. That’s what gives it such a wide range of therapeutic power.

From stroke and traumatic brain injury to Parkinson’s disease and dementia, music therapy is now being recognized as a medically effective intervention — one that restores speech, improves gait, triggers memory and reduces anxiety or pain without the side effects of drugs. Researchers describe music not as entertainment, but as a neurological stimulus capable of rewiring your brain.¹

Evidence published in medical journals shows that this isn’t limited to chronic conditions. Even surgical patients exposed to music before and after operations show better recovery outcomes, reflecting deep biological shifts in how your brain and body respond to stress and healing cues.²

If you’ve ever felt chills during a powerful song or turned to music for comfort during a hard time, you’ve already experienced part of this effect. But now we know it goes far deeper. Music doesn’t just make you feel better. It changes how your brain functions in ways that promote resilience, repair and recovery. To understand how this works, let’s explore what the latest research reveals about music’s role in emotional healing, brain recovery and physical resilience.

Music Becomes a Prescription, Not Just a Pastime

A featured article published in The Journal for Nurse Practitioners emphasized the growing use of music as a therapeutic tool in modern health care settings.³ The focus wasn’t on music for entertainment or relaxation but as an active part of clinical care.

From intensive care units to psychiatric clinics, hospitals are using structured music interventions to improve patient outcomes. Music is being used not only for comfort but as a tool to treat stroke, dementia, Parkinson’s disease and even post-operative pain.⁴

• Patients with neurological conditions show especially strong responses — For those with brain injuries or degenerative diseases, music stimulates multiple brain networks at once. This includes regions involved in emotion, memory, movement and even language.

One striking example involves patients with difficulty speaking after stroke, who are able to regain speech through musical vocalization techniques. Rather than conventional therapy, they use singing to retrain the brain’s speech pathways.⁵

• Music works by activating multiple biological systems — When you hear music, your brain responds across several regions simultaneously. This includes the auditory cortex, which processes sound, the limbic system, which regulates emotion, and the motor cortex, which controls movement. This “whole-brain” stimulation is especially valuable in rehabilitation, where other therapies typically activate only one or two areas.

• Heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing respond instantly — Slow, rhythmic music promotes relaxation by synchronizing with your body’s autonomic nervous system. This triggers a parasympathetic response, commonly referred to as the “rest and digest” state, which slows your heart rate, lowers blood pressure and reduces muscle tension.⁶

Music Activates Your Brain in Ways Medicine Can’t

A systematic review and meta-analysis published in The Lancet evaluated the role of music in clinical and surgical settings, especially around procedures involving anesthesia and postoperative recovery.⁷ Researchers assessed how music affected anxiety, pain and the need for pharmaceutical intervention before and after surgery.

• Patients listening to music needed fewer painkillers — Among the most striking findings: patients who listened to music required significantly less opioid medication during their recovery. Pain scores dropped in nearly every case, suggesting that music works as a natural pain reliever. For patients, this means fewer side effects, less risk of addiction and better recovery experiences.

• Music was effective even when patients were under anesthesia — While you might assume music only helps when you’re awake, the research showed otherwise. Surgical patients still experienced reduced pain and anxiety markers even when music was played during general anesthesia. This suggests music affects more than just conscious mood — it interacts with your nervous system in ways that persist even when awareness is suppressed.

• Patients were less anxious and more satisfied with care — Music didn’t just ease pain. It also helped patients feel safer and more in control. Anxiety levels dropped, especially in patients with higher baseline stress before surgery. Additionally, patients reported higher satisfaction with their care overall. This effect has implications beyond comfort — it improves cooperation, recovery compliance and perceived quality of care.

• Music interacts with your body’s stress and pain systems — Though the study didn’t dive deeply into mechanisms, music alters activity in brain areas responsible for pain perception, memory and attention. It also suppresses the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis — the system that governs your stress hormone (cortisol) response. Lower cortisol means less systemic inflammation, faster tissue repair and better resilience after surgery.

Music Offers a Shortcut to Emotional Healing and Mental Clarity

In an episode of the American Psychological Association’s Speaking of Psychology podcast, soprano Renée Fleming and Tufts University psychology professor Aniruddh Patel explain how music taps into unique parts of your brain to influence health, cognition and recovery in ways conventional medicine cannot.⁸

• Music reach people when nothing else can — Fleming shares how melodic intonation therapy, which uses singing to activate speech in stroke and traumatic brain injury patients, has restored language in people who could no longer talk, sometimes after just one session. “Singing enables them to recapture the words they were trying to communicate,” she says.

• Music’s impact is biological and evolutionary — Humans, Patel explains, appear to be the only primates with a natural ability to synchronize to a beat. This predictive rhythmic capacity is not shared with apes or monkeys, but is seen in parrots and some birds, which suggests a specialized neural mechanism that evolved alongside complex vocal learning. In other words, music is hardwired into human biology in ways we’re only beginning to understand.

• Engaging with music, mentally or physically, produces powerful changes in your brain — For cognitive improvement and recovery, active participation like singing or playing an instrument often leads to more lasting benefits than passive listening.

But mental engagement also matters: Fleming recalls undergoing a brain scan where imagining herself singing activated more of her brain than physically singing or speaking. “It required a different level of focus,” she explains.

• The push to make music therapy mainstream — Twelve U.S. states now license music therapists and the National Institutes of Health has already invested $40 million to research in this space. Fleming called for states to expand licensure for music therapists and for hospitals and children’s facilities to embed music and arts programs into routine care.

How to Use Music Intentionally to Support Emotional and Physical Wellness

If you've been feeling emotionally flat, mentally overwhelmed or stuck in a loop of anxious thoughts, you need a way to interrupt the cycle. That’s where music becomes your shortcut. Unlike other strategies that ask you to push through or figure it all out, music meets you where you are. It gives structure to your emotions, calms your nervous system and brings your attention back to the present.

But it’s not just about your emotions. If you’re dealing with chronic pain, recovering from surgery or trying to lower your reliance on pain medication, music helps there too. Research shows that patients who listen to music before and after procedures experience less anxiety, report lower pain levels and require fewer opioids. It’s one of the few tools that works on both your brain and your body — at the same time.

If you’ve been through trauma, grief, burnout or any long stretch of stress, you’ve probably noticed how hard it is to just feel OK again. Music helps bridge that gap. It taps into areas of your brain untouched by logic or language. Even when you can’t or won’t talk about what you're feeling, your body starts to regulate and repair. Here’s how to use music as part of your emotional and physical recovery toolkit:

1. Start with what you loved as a child — Go back to the songs you used to play on repeat — what you danced to, cried to or sang in the back seat. These aren’t just nostalgic. They’re neurologically wired to help you reconnect with parts of yourself buried under stress. If you grew up playing an instrument or singing, try doing that again — even for five minutes.

2. Create a personalized “state-shifting” playlist — Build at least three playlists: one that calms you, one that energizes you and one that helps you cry. Use them deliberately, like emotional prescriptions. When you’re anxious, reach for the calming one. If you feel shut down, go for something upbeat. Let the crying playlist move stuck emotions through. The goal isn’t to fix; it's to flow.

3. Listen with full attention, even just for one song — Instead of letting music fade into the background, give yourself three to five minutes to really listen. Lie down, close your eyes and let the sound take over. This kind of focused listening activates deep healing circuits in your brain. If you’ve never liked meditation, this offers similar nervous system benefits — without the silence.

4. Use rhythm to reset your body clock — If your sleep, appetite or energy patterns feel off, rhythm helps restore order. Try percussion-heavy or evenly paced music at the same time every day, like right when you wake up or before bed. Your brain uses rhythm to track time and create routine. It’s one of the fastest ways to re-regulate your internal clock.

5. Make music social whenever possible — Join a choir, attend a community drum circle, sing in the car with your children or just hum out loud around others. Shared music taps into parts of your brain linked to bonding and oxytocin release. If you’ve been isolating or feeling disconnected, this step matters more than you realize. Your brain responds to group music the same way it responds to physical affection.

Let music become a nonnegotiable part of your daily recovery, both emotional and physical. It’s low-cost, drug-free, noninvasive and always accessible. Your nervous system already knows what to do with it. You just have to press play.

FAQs About Music for Emotional and Physical Wellness

Q: How does music help with emotional recovery and brain health?

A: Music stimulates brain regions tied to memory, emotion and sensory processing. This allows it to calm your nervous system, improve mood and support recovery from trauma or chronic stress without relying on verbal processing. Music works directly on the emotional centers of your brain, helping you reset when logic and language fall short.

Q: What types of music are most beneficial for healing and mental clarity?

A: The most effective music is personal. Songs you loved during childhood, music that makes you cry, rhythms that energize you and calming melodies all have unique effects. The key is intentional use: build playlists based on your emotional needs, such as calming anxiety, lifting low mood or helping you release grief, and use them as emotional tools.

Q: Does music therapy offer measurable health benefits?

A: Yes. According to a review published in The Lancet, music interventions reduced anxiety, improved mood and even lowered the need for pain medication in hospital patients. These findings highlight how structured musical engagement helps regulate the body’s stress response and supports physical healing.⁹

Q: What are some practical ways to use music for healing at home?

A: Listen mindfully to one song a day, create specific playlists for different emotional states, use music with a consistent rhythm to support better sleep and energy regulation and reconnect with instruments or vocal practices from your past. Even singing with others or attending music-centered events helps rebuild emotional resilience.

Q: Is there scientific support for using music in clinical settings?

A: Absolutely. Music is increasingly used in hospitals to treat trauma, depression, pain and neurological disorders. Clinical staff have found it valuable for reducing patient anxiety, enhancing emotional expression and fostering social connection during care.

Psychological Treatment Linked to Physical Brain Changes That Ease Chronic Pain

Sat, 21 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Chronic pain doesn’t just hurt your body — it reshapes your life. It chips away at your ability to work, sleep, move freely and feel like yourself. It changes how you think, how you interact with others and how you see the future. And when it lingers for months or years with no clear cause, it becomes something else entirely: not a symptom of injury, but a condition driven by your nervous system’s unrelenting alarm.

You’ve likely been told the pain is in your muscles, joints or nerves. Maybe you’ve tried injections, medications or even surgery, only to find yourself stuck in the same cycle. But what if the true source isn’t structural at all? What if the pain loop is being generated, moment by moment, by the way your brain has learned to interpret signals from your body?

New research suggests that’s exactly what’s happening.¹ And more importantly, it shows you’re not powerless to change it. By targeting the mental and emotional patterns that reinforce pain, you begin to teach your brain something radically different: that it’s safe to let go.

Therapy Rewires Your Brain to Reduce Pain at Its Source

A review published in The Lancet, examined how psychological treatments like cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) reduce chronic pain by targeting your brain’s processing patterns — not your body’s physical tissues.² Rather than managing symptoms on the surface, these therapies interrupt how pain is constructed by your nervous system.

• When pain becomes chronic, your brain's default settings start to work against you — The review describes how chronic pain is reinforced by what’s called the default mode network, a group of brain regions active when you're lost in thought or emotionally overwhelmed.³ This network keeps background fears, worries and self-protective instincts running on autopilot.

When it stays overactive, pain becomes constant, even when there’s no ongoing injury. Psychological treatment helps interrupt this background loop.

• Changing how you think and feel about pain disrupts the pain loop — The researchers found that successful therapy wasn’t just about coping. It helped people recognize when they were reacting automatically — expecting pain, bracing against it or fearing what it meant — and taught them to interrupt those patterns. Over time, this cognitive shift led to noticeable reductions in pain intensity and improvements in daily functioning. The result was more freedom and less fear.

• You don’t need a psychologist to start making progress — While face-to-face therapy was where most of the evidence came from, the review stressed that others, like doctors, nurses and physical therapists, also help guide these shifts. Even self-directed methods such as CBT-based apps could offer real benefit. There are already hundreds of pain-related psychological apps available, and while many lack formal validation, those based on CBT are promising.

• Therapy helps restore your life, not just reduce your pain — Pain relief is just one part of the bigger picture. These therapies help you get back to the things that matter: playing with your children, going for walks, feeling in control again. When you no longer avoid life out of fear of pain, your nervous system starts to settle down. It stops scanning for threats that aren’t there. This shift — toward safety, not fear — is at the core of true recovery.

• Personalization and consistency matter more than perfection — Outcomes improve when therapy is tailored to the individual. There’s no one-size-fits-all protocol. What matters is helping you spot your own patterns — the thoughts that ramp up pain, the habits that reinforce fear — and learn how to interrupt them. That’s where change starts: not in your back or joints, but in how your mind responds to signals that no longer need to be loud.

Rewiring Belief Systems Helped Two-Thirds of Patients Eliminate Chronic Back Pain

A randomized clinical trial published in JAMA Psychiatry tested a therapy called pain reprocessing therapy (PRT), which helps people shift how they think about chronic back pain.⁴ Unlike conventional treatments focused on physical damage, this approach retrains your brain to view pain as a false alarm — not a sign of injury. The researchers wanted to see if changing beliefs about pain could provide long-lasting relief and whether those changes could be measured on brain scans.

• The trial focused on people with long-standing, non-injury-related back pain — Researchers studied 151 adults between ages 21 and 70 who had suffered from chronic back pain for an average of 10 years. Most had already tried conventional treatments like medications, physical therapy or spinal imaging without lasting results. Importantly, their pain didn’t come from a clear injury.

• PRT outperformed both placebo and usual care — After just four weeks of treatment, 66% of the people who received PRT were either pain-free or nearly pain-free, compared to only 20% in the placebo group and just 10% who continued with usual care.

The PRT group reported the lowest pain levels — an average score of 1.18 on a zero to 10 pain scale — while the placebo group scored 2.84 and the usual care group 3.13. These improvements held steady for an entire year after treatment ended.

• Participants reported significant life improvements beyond just pain relief — People receiving PRT also had better sleep, lower levels of depression and anger, and reduced disability scores, all of which indicate the pain wasn’t just disappearing from their bodies, but from their lives. That’s a key difference. While most treatments only reduce the intensity of pain, PRT helped participants regain function, mood and quality of life.

• Brain scans showed that the brain physically changed during therapy — Functional MRI scans revealed that PRT reduced activity in several pain-related regions of the brain that help determine how dangerous your brain thinks pain is — and how emotionally disturbing it feels. After therapy, they became less active, suggesting the brain had learned to downregulate the pain response.

• Stronger brain connections emerged between sensation and control centers — Not only did the “pain alarm” regions calm down, but they also formed new, healthier connections. The parts of the brain involved in emotions and decision-making started working more closely with the area that senses touch and pain, helping your brain better understand where and how you feel physical sensations.

This suggests the brain was switching from a distorted emotional response to a more accurate, grounded interpretation of the pain signal.

Retrain Your Brain to Break the Pain Loop

If you're living with daily pain that no scan or test fully explains, it's time to stop searching for something broken in your body and start looking at what’s happening in your brain. Chronic pain often stems from outdated fear patterns and nervous system “false alarms,” not actual physical damage. The good news is you’re not stuck. You can train your brain to interpret pain differently, and that process starts with how you think, move and respond to your symptoms.

This isn’t about ignoring pain. It’s about understanding how your beliefs, reactions and habits shape your nervous system — and learning to change them. You’ll need to take an active role. That means shifting away from trying to numb the pain and instead focusing on building new brain patterns that put you back in control. Here are five steps to help you start:

1. Reframe what your pain means — If your imaging is clear and doctors haven’t found tissue damage, it’s time to stop assuming pain equals harm. Instead, start viewing your symptoms as brain-based — signals that are no longer accurate. This shift is what helped 66% of patients in the PRT study become pain-free or nearly pain-free.

Try reading or listening to resources that explain pain as a protective brain signal rather than a sign of injury. You’re not broken. You’re stuck in a warning loop, and it’s one you can reset.

2. Interrupt the fear-pain cycle by changing your reactions — Every time you flinch, brace or avoid something out of fear that it will make the pain worse, you reinforce the alarm in your brain. Instead, try to calmly acknowledge the pain without panicking. Speak to yourself like you would a scared child: “You’re safe. This hurts, but nothing is wrong.”

Doing this retrains your brain’s emotional centers to respond with less urgency. It’s a simple strategy with powerful neurological effects, as both studies showed.

3. Use PRT throughout your day — The PRT protocol includes specific techniques to help you rewire your pain response. These include mentally reappraising symptoms (“This is just my brain sending a false alarm”), gently exposing yourself to feared movements and shifting focus to sensations that feel neutral or safe. You don’t need to wait for a specialist to start.

Apps that guide you through CBT or PRT-style exercises are often effective if used consistently. Try using one of these before bed, when you wake up or during a pain flare.

4. Get moving, even if it’s uncomfortable at first — Movement isn’t dangerous when your pain is brain-generated. In fact, avoiding movement makes the cycle worse. Your brain starts to associate more and more actions with pain and threat. If you’ve been sedentary, start with walking or light stretching. Track your progress like a game. Each movement you complete without bracing or fear helps rebuild a sense of safety.

5. Track your beliefs and progress daily — Keeping a daily record of your pain intensity, emotional triggers and automatic thoughts gives you insight into your brain’s pain loops. Use it to notice patterns. Which thoughts make it worse? Which actions give you relief? Treat it like an experiment. Many patients in the studies saw major improvements just by realizing how often their thoughts were fueling the fire. The more awareness you build, the more control you gain.

You don’t need perfect discipline. You need consistency, self-compassion and the willingness to believe that your brain is changeable. Because it is. And once it learns safety again, pain no longer has to be your baseline.

FAQs About Psychological Therapy for Chronic Pain

Q: How does psychological therapy help relieve chronic pain?

A: Psychological therapies like CBT and PRT change how your brain interprets pain signals. Instead of focusing on physical damage, these treatments retrain your brain to stop reacting to pain as a threat, which leads to real, lasting relief.

Q: What makes PRT different from other treatments?

A: PRT focuses on shifting the belief that pain equals injury. By helping you understand that chronic pain is often a brain-generated false alarm, PRT teaches your nervous system to calm down. In a clinical trial, 66% of patients became nearly or completely pain-free within four weeks.

Q: Does therapy really change your brain’s pain response?

A: Yes. Brain imaging showed that therapy reduced activity in pain-related brain areas. It also improved communication between brain regions that help you process sensations and regulate emotions, confirming that these treatments create physical changes in how pain is processed.

Q: Who benefits most from this kind of therapy?

A: People with long-term pain not linked to ongoing injury, like chronic back pain, migraines or post-cancer pain, tend to see the biggest improvements. These individuals often have heightened fear responses and avoidance behaviors that therapy directly addresses.

Q: What steps help retrain my brain if I have chronic pain?

A: Start by shifting your belief that pain always means damage. Practice responding to pain with calm acknowledgment, use CBT-based or PRT-inspired apps, reintroduce movement without fear, and track your progress daily to build awareness and reinforce your new response patterns.

Having a Disrupted Body Clock Increases Your Risk of Early Death

Sat, 21 Jun 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Like a conductor leading an orchestra, your circadian rhythm is a 24-hour cycle that governs many of your body's processes. It ensures that all your body functions are in sync, working together harmoniously to keep you healthy and well-functioning.

So when this internal timekeeper becomes disrupted, it takes a significant toll on your health, exacerbating your risk of chronic conditions. Experts have coined a term for this chronic disruption that causes your internal clock to go out of sync — Circadian Syndrome (CircS) — and a recent study found that it not only puts you at risk of diabetes, but also leads to early mortality, particularly among middle-aged and older adults.¹

Your Internal Clock Isn't Just About Sleep

A large, multi-country study published in Scientific Reports² examined the long-term health outcomes of over 16,000 adults aged 40 and up in the United States and China. The researchers investigated how Circadian Syndrome affects your risk of dying from various diseases.

• What is Circadian Syndrome? CircS refers to a cluster of metabolic, emotional, and sleep-related problems that signal your body clock is severely out of sync. According to an article in News-Medical.Net, seven components could indicate CircS. The researchers noted that having four out of these seven classifies you as having the condition:³

◦ Hypertriglyceridemia

◦ Central obesity (belly fat)

◦ Low high-density lipoprotein (HDL) "good" cholesterol

◦ Hypertension

◦ Hyperglycemia

◦ Sleep deprivation (getting less than six hours of sleep at night)

◦ Depressive symptoms

• Many people normalize these symptoms — Millions of people struggle with these health issues, but many choose to ignore them. However, this combination is lethal, especially for older adults.

• What happens when your body clock is consistently out of sync? According to the featured study, people with CircS have the highest risk of early death. Based on their findings, CircS is "significantly correlated with mortality attributed to cardiovascular, cerebrovascular, kidney disease, diabetes, malignant neoplasms, Alzheimer's disease, certain infections, and death from all causes."⁴

Circadian Syndrome Raises Your Risk of Early Death

The researchers of the featured study used the U.S. National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) database and the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS). A total of 7,637 adults from China and 9,320 from the U.S. were tracked for nearly a decade.⁵

"Of the 7,637 participants in the Chinese survey, 2,270 had CircS; 4,335 respondents out of 9,320 in the American study had the condition. In both cohorts, people with CircS were older and had higher rates of chronic diseases, including heart disease, hypertension, and diabetes," News-Medical.Net reports.⁶

• People who were flagged as having Circadian Syndrome were significantly more likely to die early — Most of the causes were from metabolic causes. In the U.S. data, the risk of dying from diabetes was 6.8 times higher in people with CircS. As for kidney-related deaths, the risk was 2.5 times higher.

• There were notable differences in mortality rates between Chinese and American participants — In the Chinese cohort, the death rate was 2.9 per 1,000 person-years for those with CircS, compared to 2.0 for those without.

In the American group, the contrast was even more dramatic — 18.56 deaths per 1,000 person-years versus 10.9 for those without this condition. That's a nearly 70% higher death rate just for having this pattern of metabolic and circadian dysfunction.

• It wasn't just metabolic disease — Alzheimer's, cancer, and even infections like pneumonia were also more likely to take the lives of those with CircS. One of the strongest associations was seen among middle-aged adults, particularly those between 40 and 60 years old. For this group, the risk was consistently elevated across nearly every major cause of death.

• The risk remained even after adjusting for other factors — To make their findings more reliable, the researchers used sophisticated modeling techniques — including Bayesian generalized linear models — to back up their findings.

In simple terms, they ran multiple types of statistical tests to ensure the associations weren't flukes. The highest risk levels — like the 6.8-fold increase in diabetes deaths — held firm even when adjusting for age, gender, and other baseline health differences.

• Each component of the syndrome adds weight to your risk — The researchers noted a "graded association," meaning your risk of dying goes up steadily with each additional CircS trait you check off. This is especially alarming when you consider that these issues are common and often brushed off.

The next time you think sleeping just five hours a night or having excessive body fat isn't a big deal, remember this — if combined with blood sugar problems or high blood pressure, it becomes a deadly cocktail. The more components of CircS you have, the greater your risk of going to an early grave.

Your Health Depends on Keeping Your Circadian Rhythms in Sync

Your circadian rhythm influences everything in your body, from when you feel tired and awake to when your body releases certain hormones like melatonin and cortisol. Your body temperature, digestion and metabolism are also controlled by this internal clock. But it's not only found in humans; most living things, including plants, animals, fungi, and even some bacteria, have their own circadian rhythms as well.⁷

• The importance of the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) — A tiny region found in your brain, the SCN is found at the center of your circadian rhythm. It's often called the "master clock" because it's the main control center for your circadian rhythm.

• Your circadian rhythm relies on light and darkness signals — The SCN receives light cues directly from your eyes. When light enters your eyes, it sends signals to the SCN, which then interprets these signals to determine the time of day. This helps synchronize your internal clock with the external world.

• Your body's central circadian clock is not alone — There are "peripheral clocks," also known as peripheral oscillators, located in your tissues and nearly every organ, including the liver, lungs, heart and skeletal muscles. Their role is to help regulate local physiological processes in coordination with the master clock in the SCN.

It's important to remember that everyone's internal clock is slightly different, which is why the concept of chronotypes was developed.

This categorizes people as either "morning larks" (those who wake up early naturally; they feel most energetic in the morning) or "night owls" (those who prefer to stay up late and are more productive in the evening). These individual differences in circadian rhythm significantly influence daily routines, preferences and even how well someone performs at certain times of day.

Common Factors That Throw Off Your Circadian Rhythm

Many factors today throw your circadian rhythms off kilter. One example is jet lag. When you travel across time zones, your internal clock goes out of sync with the local time. This leads to fatigue, difficulty sleeping and other symptoms.

• One of the biggest culprits is artificial light — Considered modern-day conveniences, the advent of electronic devices like smartphones, tablets, and computers that emit blue light is one of the primary factors that affect your circadian rhythm.

Blue light interferes with melatonin production, the hormone that makes you sleepy, making it harder to fall asleep and stay asleep. When you use these devices before bedtime, it delays your sleep onset and disrupts your sleep quality significantly.

• Exposure to any amount of light during nighttime is detrimental to older adults — One study found that it increases their risk of obesity, high blood pressure, and diabetes.⁸ In another study, researchers found that higher exposure to outdoor light at night increases the risk of postmenopausal breast cancer.⁹ There's evidence linking it to a higher risk of thyroid cancer as well, especially since thyroid function is regulated by the circadian rhythm.¹⁰

• Many people also work irregular schedules — Shift work and irregular work schedules also disrupt your circadian rhythm. Every time you work nights or rotate shifts, you're forcing your body to operate on a schedule that's out of sync with the natural day-night cycle.

• "Social jetlag" is another factor — Basically, this refers to having a different sleep schedule during weekdays and weekends. It usually happens when people choose to sleep in on weekends so they will "catch up" on the sleep they missed during the week.

However, this shift in sleep timing throws off your internal clock; it makes it more difficult for you to get back on track when the workweek starts again. Think of it this way — It's like you're constantly changing time zones every weekend, making it difficult for your body to establish a consistent rhythm.¹¹

Other factors include chronic stress, lack of exposure to sunlight, and consuming an unhealthy diet. The good news is that there are ways to reset your circadian clock and reduce your risk of Circadian Syndrome.

How to Fix Your Internal Body Clock to Protect Your Health

If you're waking up groggy and grabbing sugar just to stay alert, your body clock is sending you warning signals. This is particularly dangerous, especially if you also have stubborn belly fat, high blood pressure, or symptoms of depression, as it could mean you're already dealing with the early stages of Circadian Syndrome.

Fixing the issue starts with resetting the rhythm your body depends on to heal, burn energy, and stay alive. Here are strategies to help you get started:

1. Get outside within 30 minutes of waking up — Your body needs direct early morning sunlight to reset its internal clock each day. Make it a habit to step outside within the first hour of waking up. Getting morning sunlight helps regulate your melatonin production, keeping your sleep-wake cycle balanced. Aim for 10 to 15 minutes of direct morning sunlight (don't wear sunglasses) every day.

2. Follow a consistent bedtime routine — Going to bed and waking up at the same time every day, even on weekends, reinforces your circadian rhythms. To ensure you get high-quality sleep, one of the first things you must do is to eliminate all blue light sources from your bedroom.

Scrolling your phone, watching TV in bed, or working late on your laptop sends your brain signals that it's still daytime. Cut your screentime at night, ideally avoiding artificial light 90 minutes before bed. If your bedroom gets light pollution from outside, use blackout shades or wear a sleep mask. For more helpful sleep tips, check out "Top 33 Tips to Optimize Your Sleep Routine."

3. Incorporate movement into your routine — Your circadian rhythm isn't just about sleep — it's also about metabolism. Getting your muscles moving in the morning tells your body it's time to wake up and use energy. I recommend 10 to 15 minutes of light movement (ideally under early morning sunlight). Try walking, stretching, or even bodyweight squats.

4. Practice mindfulness techniques — Your circadian clock function is also closely connected to your body's stress response system.¹² Practicing relaxation techniques like mindfulness, meditation, and yoga to manage stress will help sync your circadian rhythms.

5. Track your sleep and body temperature — If you really want to take control, start collecting real data on your rhythm. Use a thermometer to take your oral temperature each morning and afternoon. Your waking temp must ideally be around 97.8 degrees F (36.5 degrees C) and reach 98.6 degrees F (37 degrees C) by late afternoon. If it doesn't, your metabolism is dragging.

At the same time, track how many hours you sleep, when you fall asleep, and how rested you feel. You don't need a fancy device — just write it down. After two weeks, you'll identify your patterns clearly, and see what's working and what's not.

If you start with these steps, you'll be addressing the core issue that drives Circadian Syndrome. Most people are too focused on treating symptoms with pills or supplements. But you don't need to medicate your way back to health; you simply need to reintroduce your body to the rhythm it was designed to follow. Fix that first, and everything else will fall into place.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Circadian Syndrome

Q: What is Circadian Syndrome and why is it dangerous?

A: Circadian Syndrome (CircS) is a cluster of health issues — like sleep deprivation, belly fat, depression, and metabolic dysfunction — that signal a disrupted internal body clock. It's linked to a higher risk of early death from diseases like diabetes, heart and kidney conditions, cancer, and Alzheimer's.

Q: How does Circadian Syndrome increase the risk of early death?

A: People with CircS have significantly higher mortality rates. In the U.S., for example, individuals with CircS were 6.8 times more likely to die from diabetes and 2.5 times more likely to die from kidney disease, even after adjusting for other health factors.

Q: What are the warning signs or symptoms of a disrupted body clock?

A: Key signs include chronic sleep deprivation, abdominal obesity, high blood pressure, low HDL cholesterol, high blood sugar, and depressive symptoms. Having four or more of these suggests you have CircS.

Q: What factors in modern life disrupt the circadian rhythm?

A: Blue light from screens, irregular work schedules, lack of natural sunlight, night-time light exposure, and inconsistent sleep routines all throw your circadian rhythm off track, leading to serious long-term health effects.

Q: How can I restore my circadian rhythm and lower my health risks?

A: Simple lifestyle changes will help. Get morning sunlight, avoid screens before bed, maintain a consistent sleep schedule, exercise regularly, manage stress, and track your sleep and temperature patterns to monitor progress.

Test Your Knowledge with Today's Quiz!

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Why might you want to learn about historical vaccine injuries?

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Learning about historical vaccine injuries, like those documented since the smallpox vaccine, helps you understand potential risks and make informed health choices. Learn more.

How home-based AI can reduce health inequities in underserved communities [PODCAST]

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 23:00:07 +0000

Subscribe to The Podcast by KevinMD. Watch on YouTube. Catch up on old episodes! Physician executive Sreeram Mullankandy discusses his article, “Bridging the digital divide: Addressing health inequities through home-based AI solutions.” The conversation highlights that while the future of health care delivery is moving into patients’ homes, this shift risks leaving the most vulnerable

Adriana Smith’s story: a medical tragedy under heartbeat laws

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 19:00:32 +0000

I’ve felt an overwhelming need to write for about a month now. I struggled to find the right words as recent events in medicine and society have created a constant state of confusion and distress. Most notably, I have found it increasingly difficult to understand or process how some medical professionals can remain silent or

What if medicine had an exit interview?

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 17:00:24 +0000

They left quietly. Logged their last note. Disconnected their badge. Maybe cleared out a drawer, maybe not. And just like that, another clinician walked away from medicine. No exit interview. No debrief. No conversation about what led up to that final decision. Just silence. In most professions, when someone resigns, leadership wants to know why.

What if medicine had an exit interview? originally appeared in KevinMD.com.

Why U.S. health care pricing is so confusing—and how to fix it

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 15:00:41 +0000

Imagine assembling an IKEA bookshelf with instructions in 12 languages, missing pages, and screws that cost vastly different amounts depending on which store you went to, unbeknownst to you. Then, after assembling it, you discover you’ll be charged even more because you used an Allen wrench. That’s a standard experience for Americans navigating the health

From survival to sovereignty: What 35 years in the ER taught me about identity, mortality, and redemption

Fri, 20 Jun 2025 13:00:59 +0000

I’ve lived a full life. A hard one. A beautiful one. A complicated one. And now, at 61, I’m finally beginning to live an honest one. I was built in survival mode. Growing up as a Korean American boy in Central Texas—often the only Asian face in the room—my earliest years taught me that difference