This website is now averaging around 9,000 page views per month, which is frankly amazing to me given how sporadic my blogging has been of late. Of that number, a good 75% are first time visitors so let me say welcome to you all. I realize most of you come here for a post … Read More →
Cheshire Cat: Where are you going? Alice: Which way should I go? Cheshire Cat: That depends on where you are going. Alice: I don’t know. Cheshire Cat: Then it doesn’t matter which way you go. ― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland Dear Dr. Aaron E. Carroll, You don’t know me from Adam, but I feel … Read More →
Abbreviations: CNS: central nervous system DNA: deoxyribonucleic acid DNMTs: DNA methyltranferases EAAT: excitatory amino acid transporter EAAT3: excitatory amino acid transporter 3 ENS: enteric nervous system FODMAP: Fermentable Oligo-, Di- and Mono-saccharides and Polyols GERD: gastroesophageal reflux disease GSH: glutathione IBS: irritable bowel syndrome LPSs: lipopolysaccharides SAM: S-adenosylmethionine SIFBO: small intestinal fungal and bacterial … Read More →
Today’s post will cover a question that repeatedly comes up. It’s a question I’m sure many of you also have: “What diet should I be following when dealing with a gut issue?” Let me first dispense with dietary recommendations that have not been subjected to controlled trials to assess efficacy for controlling annoying or … Read More →
On February 13th of 2013, I published a post entitled Fibromyalgia, Irritable Bowel Syndrome and Endotoxemia. I made the case that the high prevalence of bowel dysfunction and fibromyalgia was no mere coincidence. In today’s post, I’ll present evidence from a preliminary study out of Spain implicating non-celiac gluten sensitivity (NCGS) as a possible trigger … Read More →
This is a short post about an intriguing study done in rodents to assess what effect different polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) have on progression of ulcerative colitis (UC). (1) Ulcerative colitis is defined by Taber’s medical dictionary as: “An inflammatory bowel disease marked pathologically by continuous inflammation of the intestinal mucosa, which typically involves … Read More →
“Proton-pump inhibitor therapy is now being prescribed for a wide variety of upper gastrointestinal symptoms on the basis that they might be acid induced and therefore may benefit from such treatment. This increasingly liberal usage of these powerful drugs is due to a number of factors, including reduced concerns about potential side effects, reduced … Read More →
“Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong.” Thomas Jefferson Abbreviations: BCM7: beta-casomorphin-7 C. albicans: Candida albicans FOS: fructooligosaccharide GERD: gastroesophageal reflux disease GI: gastrointestinal H. pylori: Helicobacter pylori, aka Campylobacter pylori IBS: irritable bowel syndrome LES: … Read More →
“We look for medicine to be an orderly field of knowledge and procedure. But it is not. It is an imperfect science, an enterprise of constantly changing knowledge, uncertain information, fallible individuals, and at the same time lives on the line. There is science in what we do, yes, but also habit, intuition, and … Read More →
“Saturated fats are benign with regard to inflammatory effects, as are the MUFAs [monounsaturated fats]. The meager effect that saturated fats have on serum cholesterol levels when modest but adequate amounts of polyunsaturated oils are included in the diet, and the lack of any clear evidence that saturated fats are promoting any of the … Read More →
The role of stress in negatively impacting the gastrointestinal system has long been recognized. It doesn’t take an Einstein to note a strong correlation between acute psychological stress and the onset of gut feelings that are anything but pleasant. I’ve written about how gut dysbiosis is capable of initiating psychological states like depression and … Read More →
I can almost hear the moans coming from some of you as you read the title of this post. You’re no doubt thinking, “For real? You haven’t posted in a while, but you’re going to trash what I do to relax and unwind on my night off? Seriously?” No dear reader, not entirely. Me … Read More →
This is a post I’ve been meaning to get to for a while now. Thyroid hormone impacts many areas of the body, including the GI tract, and in many cases the first symptoms of thyroid dysfunction are manifested here. To save myself a bit a typing, here is how I described the … Read More →
I’ve been meaning to write this post for a while, but I’ve been putting it off until we approached the summer here in the Northern Hemisphere. What prompted this article was a series of email exchanges this past winter (his summer) with a young man living in Sydney, Australia. Like many people who write … Read More →
The study I’m going to cover today came out several weeks ago, but in draft form with watermarks splashed across its pages. (1) As I wanted to display some of the charts, I thought it best to wait until the finalized version was made available before blogging about it. This study was a randomized, … Read More →