Cancer is, of course, something we all fear, a collection of diseases that strike us down unexpectedly and often put us at the mercy of a deeply flawed and exploitative medical system. So it can help to identify the factors that leads us down this path and take action to minimize such risks. We don’t smoke cigarettes, we try to consume organic foods whenever possible to minimize the carcinogenic effects of herbicides and pesticides, we avoid getting sunburned—advice you are all likely familiar w...
Apr 21, 2024•22 min
There are a great many emerging ideas to discuss, but sometimes these topics are just not big enough to fill out an entire podcast episode. So I decided to start something I call “Potpourri,” a collection of unconnected but interesting topics that may be helpful in guiding you in your health journey. I’d like to say “Ask your doctor about these issues,” but you and I know that they will, more than likely, know absolutely nothing about these questions because 1) it’s not a pharmaceutical or proce...
Mar 21, 2024•28 min
I recently had an experience in which I had to take an antibiotic. Those of you who have been following my Defiant Health podcast discussions, or have been reading my thousands of blog posts on DrDavisInfiniteHealth.com , or my books, especially my latest Super Gut book, know that I advocate for absolutely minimizing our reliance on antibiotics, as they are extremely destructive to the microbiome. Antibiotics disrupt microbial composition of the gastrointestinal tract, the airway, the sinuses, r...
Mar 06, 2024•26 min
It’s a concept that many people struggle to embrace or understand. But once you ‘get” it, a lot of issues in health will become clearer and you can save yourself a considerable amount of time, effort, and money. The idea is to get away from the idea of “treating” health conditions. This is the approach used in pharmaceuticals and employed by most doctors. If, for instance, blood glucose is high, drugs like insulin, metformin, or a GLP-1 agonist like Wegovy or Ozempic is introduced to force blood...
Feb 21, 2024•31 min
A former actress and long-time personal fitness coach, JJ Flizanes has focused these last few years on helping people identify the reasons that they often fall short of their goals, goals such as weight loss, enjoying successful relationships, success at work, or just finding happiness. Through her several popular podcasts that include Fit 2 Love and Spirit Purpose and Energy and her books, JJ helps people identify the obstacles to success and how to manage or correct them to finally achieve the...
Feb 03, 2024•58 min
In this episode of Defiant Health, Dr. Tom O’Bryan discusses his unique approach to managing environmental toxins that now flood our lives, toxins that increase our risk for numerous health struggles including cognitive impairment, autoimmune diseases, and cancers. Dr. O’Bryan brings his considerable experience in educating and investigating the effects of such factors as particulate matter in air, glyphosate, abnormal gut permeability, and diet. He has a special interest in reproductive and cog...
Jan 16, 2024•42 min
You likely know people who engage in strenuous exercise—a marathon, triathlon, long-distance biking, even just day-to-day exercise—or perhaps you do so yourself. In anticipation of the need for a great deal of energy to engage in such an effort and to increase endurance and performance, many people follow a practice called carb loading. While there are number of protocols for doing so, for most people carb loading typically consists of a large serving of pasta consumed the day before, followed b...
Jan 08, 2024•20 min
Personally, I take no prescription medications. I do not take a statin drug to reduce cholesterol, nor baby aspirin. I take nothing for high blood pressure, acid reflux, or irritable bowel syndrome. I take nothing for headaches, pain, or sleep—not a single prescription medication. Yet my blood pressure is typically around 108/72. My triglycerides are 40 mg/dl, HDL cholesterol is 94 mg/dl, and I have zero small LDL particles. My fasting glucoses are in the 80s mg/dl, last HbA1c was 4.8%, my liver...
Dec 29, 2023•22 min
If you have been following my discussions in this Defiant Health podcast or in my blog, DrDavisInfiniteHealth.com, or my Super Gut book, you know that I have been arguing that there is an epidemic of SIBO going on in the U.S., an epidemic involving every 1 in 2 people. It is an epidemic responsible for an astounding amount of health struggles. The more we all come to understand small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, or SIBO, the more you have to appreciate all the varied ways this situation can ...
Dec 16, 2023•29 min
There are a handful of strategies that you can engage that slow the phenomena of aging, i.e., slow or stop the development of skin thinning and development of wrinkles, deterioration of joint health, so-called hardening of the arteries or atherosclerosis, reduction in hormonal status, loss of muscle, loss of bone density, etc. One issue that is rarely discussed is the process of glycation, i.e., glucose modification of proteins. Glycation is something you have enormous control over and thereby s...
Dec 08, 2023•19 min
Promising radiant skin and a healthier life, I'm thrilled to welcome aesthetician Rachel Varga, founder of the School of Radiance, to share her holistic approach to skin health and wellness. Rachel is ready to debunk some skincare myths, pointing out that effective skincare isn't just about what you put on your skin. It's about understanding the role of diet, sleep, and exposure to environmental toxins. She believes that radiant, glowing skin is a byproduct of overall health and well-being. Are ...
Nov 27, 2023•35 min
There are a variety of ways to lose weight: reduce calories, pharmaceuticals, bariatric procedures. But these are successful only in the beginning: You lose, say, 40 pounds over a year only to gain it all back. Of that 40 pounds, 10 pounds is muscle. And, when you gain it back, it is nearly all fat, very little muscle. You are now less healthy than you were at the start of your weight loss journey. And, if repeated, as with yo-yo dieting in which you lose, regain, then lose and regain again, you...
Nov 17, 2023•32 min
Ready to unlock the secret to your health buried deep within your gut? In today's illuminating episode, we reveal the unsuspected ways in which small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO) and lipopolysaccharide endotoxins (LPS endotoxins) can drastically alter your health. We delve into the underworld of fecal microbes and their dangerous ability to cause inflammation and endotoxemia. Connect the dots between these hidden threats and a host of health conditions, from obesity to anxiety and even...
Nov 06, 2023•25 min
Cholesterol testing is among the most common blood tests run in conventional healthcare, yet it is a perennial source of confusion and, to be honest, abuse by doctors who don’t appreciate the full implications of the values. It may surprise you to know that doctors focus on the least helpful values such as total or LDL cholesterol while often ignoring the two genuinely helpful values, HDL cholesterol and triglycerides. HDL for instance is packed with useful insights into your health, as it is a ...
Oct 28, 2023•30 min
What if a simple diet change could drastically improve your skin health? Get ready for an enlightening discussion on the gut-skin axis as we explore the amazing benefits of boosting gastrointestinal and thereby skin butyrate or butyric acid. The secret to healthier skin might be a pH shift away. We delve into the importance of maintaining an acidic pH for skin health, and how an alkaline pH can lead to skin rashes and dryness. Learn practical strategies to increase intestinal and skin butyrate, ...
Oct 13, 2023•20 min
Prepare yourself for a fascinating exploration into the depths of body fat and its varying health implications. We promise you'll walk away with a new comprehension of fat distribution and how it can impact your life. Not all fat is equal; differences abound between abdominal visceral, ectopic, and subcutaneous fat. We navigate these variations and their unique health implications, shedding light on why abdominal visceral fat can be particularly harmful. What if you could reduce abdominal viscer...
Oct 06, 2023•28 min
Ready to uncover the intriguing connection between Parkinson's disease and the gastrointestinal microbiome? Join us as we explore this fascinating subject with data analytics specialist turned microbiome researcher, Martha Carlin. Martha brings us up to speed on her research endeavors, one of which includes the Bio Collective, a project that collected fecal samples from 1,000 participants, and her venture, BiotiQuest, that developed unique probiotics with collaborative microbial species. Some of...
Sep 21, 2023•36 min
Has your dinner ever declared war on your stomach? Imagine if you could decipher the secrets of your gut and take back control. Today, we're embarking on a fascinating journey through the complex world of food intolerances, exploring how changes in our diets and lifestyles may be contributing to this modern malady. From synthetic sweeteners to shifts in our gut microbiome, we'll investigate why this issue, once dismissed as psychological, is now taking center stage in medical conversations. Into...
Sep 06, 2023•27 min
Monitoring blood glucose, or blood sugar, can be a useful tool in achieving a number of important health effects. You can apply it to accelerate weight loss, for instance, or accelerate the reversal of type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, triglyceride blood levels, fatty liver, slow many of the phenomena of aging, and other effects. And you can achieve this by following what I call the blood glucose “No change rule,” meaning allowing no change in blood sugar from just prior to a meal to 30-60 m...
Aug 28, 2023•19 min
Our great grandmothers were usually knowledgeable and adept at fermenting foods, i.e., allowing microbes to grow on food, thereby keeping foods, such as vegetables, fruits, and meats, from spoiling while increasing the nutritional value of the food and providing you with beneficial probiotic microbes. They may not have appreciated these benefits, but surely at least knew that it was a useful method of preserving food without refrigeration. Modern processed foods, widespread availability of home ...
Aug 10, 2023•51 min
Ever wonder why some people seem to age more gracefully, retaining a youthful glow and vitality while others show the rapid signs of aging and deterioration? It’s happening over and over again: Participants in my program look, act, and feel younger and younger, the longer they engage in all the strategies of my programs. Just the other day, for instance, I had a video conference with a woman who was in good health, but had added the Lactobacillus reuteri yogurt one year ago, the yogurt that we m...
Aug 03, 2023•33 min
Ready for a heart-to-heart talk about the real culprits behind heart disease? Get ready to challenge everything you thought you knew about cholesterol and heart health. Our journey begins with debunking the age-old myth that cholesterol is the primary cause of heart disease—an erroneous belief rooted in misinterpreted studies from the mid-20th century. We're also laying out seven self-manageable measures of heart disease risk that you can address right at home. If you ask your doctor about how t...
Jul 25, 2023•39 min
Prepare to be astonished as we unravel the enigma of diet advice that has left us entangled in numerous contradictions and confusions. We're taking you on a journey, tracing back the pivotal events that have led us to our current state of dietary disarray. In the spotlight are none other than the controversial figures of Dr. Dean Ornish and Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn, whose well-intentioned but misguided advice has arguably had disastrous health implications. Brace yourselves as we delve into the re...
Jul 13, 2023•29 min
Anthropologists will tell you that, of all body parts preserved in the fossil record, going back thousand or even millions of years, teeth are the best preserved, even better than bone. And teeth are, of course, the entryway into the gastrointestinal tract, the first exposure to whatever food you are ingesting or chewing. We often think of teeth as these inert things, but they are not. They are biologically responsive influenced by many factors, but especially the composition of diet. So, in thi...
Jul 06, 2023•17 min
Collagen is a protein, the most abundant protein in the human body. It is the protein that provides tensile and flexible strength to tendons and ligaments, is a major component of the dermal layer of skin, the cartilage in joints, an important structural protein in all the body’s organs. But, if you are like most of us, you have been living a collagen-deficient lifestyle. While your body can manufacture collagen, you are also meant to obtain significant amounts of collagen in your diet. The asto...
Jul 02, 2023•15 min
Long regarded as a passive phenomenon, you have likely heard that sleep is an active process complete with various phases, roles in maintaining metabolic and mental health, but often shortchanged in modern life yielding widespread sleep deprivation. But a phenomenon not widely appreciated or explored is the role of the gastrointestinal microbiome on sleep. So, in this episode of the Defiant Health podcast, let’s get thinking about the role of the gastrointestinal microbiome on sleep quality, sle...
Jun 23, 2023•28 min
Why has the 50-year-old recommendation to reduce dietary fat failed to make a dent in heart disease, death, or heart procedures? Could it be that the entire premise of this advice is based on flawed evidence and misleading conclusions about LDL cholesterol? In this eye-opening episode, we uncover the shocking truth about the ineffectiveness of cutting dietary fat and how it's time for a new approach to managing cardiovascular risk. We dive into the science behind carbohydrates and sugars, and ho...
Jun 10, 2023•35 min
Dietary guidelines advise us that a diet low in fat and rich in “healthy whole grains” helps maintain healthy weight. Is this true? It absolutely is NOT true. This belief is based on flawed evidence, questionnaires, for instance, that asked people questions about their diet. What did you eat for breakfast on Monday? You scratch your head and search your memory. You say something like “I had a bowl of stone-ground oatmeal in skim milk with some sliced strawberries.” What did you have for lunch? Y...
May 27, 2023•29 min
It’s happening with alarming frequency: Someone has routine blood work done and an increase in liver markers, AST, ALT, and sometimes GGT, are noted. The doctor sometimes then orders a liver ultrasound, CT, or MRI and infiltration of the liver with fat is identified, the situation called fatty liver. If caught in later stages, fibrous tissue can be seen replacing normal liver tissue, meaning that someone is progressing to cirrhosis, a very bad condition. Add fatty liver to the widespread epidemi...
May 21, 2023•24 min
You’ve likely heard the headlines: the new class of GLP-1 agonist drugs with silly names such as Wegovy, Ozempic, Saxenda, Rybelsus, and Mounjaro are flying off the shelves so fast that pharmacies are running out. Originally intended to reduce blood glucose in people with type 2 diabetes, it was observed that people taking these drugs lost weight, sometimes a substantial quantity. Human clinical trials have since corroborated these weight loss effects. If you have been following this and other c...
May 10, 2023•35 min
