Why I take no prescription medications

My triglycerides are 40 mg per deciliter , hdl cholesterol is 94 mg per deciliter and I have zero small LDL particles . My fasting glucose is in the 80s . My last hemoglobin A1c was 4.8% . My liver markers are all at the low normal range , with no fatty liver suggested . In other words , I have perfect metabolic health without reliance on any medication .

The majority of the followers of my programs likewise enjoy perfect metabolic health without reliance on any prescription medications .

Of course , there are people who adopt the strategies of my program after incurring some form of irreversible damage , such as permanent loss of pancreatic beta cells that results in type 1 diabetes , hashimoto's thyroiditis that results in impaired ability to produce thyroid hormones , or loss of stomach parietal cells that results in the absence of stomach acid , or

hypocluridria or achlorhydria . So key is to adopt these strategies before such permanent damage is done .

People who have incurred such damage will therefore need to take insulin , thyroid hormones or engage in efforts to acidify the stomach , but , barring the development of such irreversible changes , the majority of us on my programs have no need for pharmaceutical medications .

So in this episode of Defiant Health , let's discuss how and why , by adopting just a handful of health strategies , you can enjoy perfect metabolic health without reliance on prescription medications . Choosing high quality products to support your health journey is also important . This is why Paleo Valley is a supporter of my Defiant Health podcast .

Their grass-fed , pasture-raised beef sticks , for instance , are fermented , unlike nearly all other beef sticks . If you haven't tried their pasture-raised pork sticks , you're in for a real treat , as they are irresistibly delicious .

I'll also tell you about Biodquest , providers of unique probiotic products that , in my experience and the experience of the followers of my program , are unlike all other probiotics as they are crafted using the scientific insights of academic microbiologist Dr Raul Cano , an innovator in the concept of collaborative effects among microbes .

As I mentioned in the introductory comments , I have perfect metabolic health and I rely on no pharmaceutical medications to maintain that . Now , it wasn't always this way . In fact , many years ago this is over 30 years ago I was a metabolic disaster .

It all started because I heard a lecture by a colleague who reported that when he took his patients onto a program that involved an extreme reduction in dietary fat , saturated fat , essentially avoiding all animal products , so a vegetarian diet very low in fat , he reported that all sorts of positive effects developed .

So I decided to give this a try myself and many of my patients . It was an absolute disaster . I gained a lot of weight around my waist . My HDL good cholesterol dropped to a dangerous 27 mg per deciliter . My triglycerides increased to a very high 390 mg per deciliter .

I developed an abundance of small LDL particles the real cause of heart disease , not LDL cholesterol and my small LDL particles numbered 1800 Nmol per liter , that's a particle count per volume , which is very high . I became a type 2 diabetic , with fasting glucose values in 160 mg per deciliter range . I developed hypertension and it felt awful .

Now this all happened on that vegetarian , low fat diet , despite the fact that I was jogging 3 to 5 miles several times per week , riding my bike , playing tennis . In other words , I was very active .

Yet I became an absolute metabolic disaster , a type 2 diabetic with all sorts of other distortions , and thereby on my way to a future of heart disease , diabetes , kidney disease and other problems from this metabolic disaster . So I stopped following that program and all those measures improved over time .

I became a non-diabetic , my triglycerides and all those other measures improved dramatically . But there was another series of lessons I learned after my mom , after my mother died of sudden cardiac death after her successful two-vessel carner angioplasm .

This is many years ago , and so I recognized that what I did in a cath lab , that is , as an interventional cardiologist putting in stents and dilating of ballooning arteries and all those sorts of procedures to abort heart attacks and open arteries that this was a very unsatisfactory way to deal with a dangerous disease , because many people died on route to the

hospital or died at home . And so I asked is there a way to identify risks , like my mom had Months or even years ahead of time ? Well , people use cholesterol values , but those are useless . If I told you your total cholesterol is 240 mg per deciliter , will you have a heart attack next week , next month , in three years ? You can tell .

Cholesterol values are an extremely poor predictor of future cardiovascular events . So I was not happy with that answer . Well , at the time . This is now over 30 years ago , but it remains true even today . The best predictor , by a long stretch is a coronary calcium score obtained through a CT heart scan .

All that means is we scan the heart using devices that are very rapid , because the heart is in motion , it has multiple phases of motion . There's breathing motion from the lungs , there's human motion , just because people are fidgety but a very rapid acquisition of images so that we can quantify sub-millimeter quantities of calcium .

And that's helpful because my friend Dr John Rumberger , while he was at Mayo Clinic , demonstrated that of atherosclerotic plaque that's the material that accumulates in your arteries , in your coronary artery , your heart's arteries , that leads to heart attacks and similar episodes that of that plaque , 20% of the volume is occupied by calcium .

So if we had two cubic millimeters of calcium , we have 10 cubic millimeters of atherosclerotic plaque and that is a very powerful predictor of future cardiovascular events . A normal coronary calcium score is zero and any value above zero signifies increasing risk .

So that people who have a score of 1,000 or greater have approximately a 12% to 15% chance of dying or having a heart attack or developing symptoms that require some sort of action like implanting stents or bypass surgery every year . So 12% to 15% per year risk of those events at a score as high as 1,000 or more .

It also became clear and we helped publish these evidence that if you do nothing a score will increase approximately 25% per year . So a score , say , of 400 , 500 a year later , 625 another year later and as with each leap in scoring you're closer and closer to heart attack , death and other sudden and dangerous cardiovascular events .

So what can we do to stop it ? So if it goes up 25% per year , what if we put you on a high-dose statin cholesterol drug like Lipitor , 40 milligrams a baby aspirin , a low-fat diet and an exercise program , how much will that slow the progression increase in growth of carnetary atherosclerotic plaque ? It has no effect whatsoever on that measure .

So 400 will become 500 and so on . And so that date that has been corroborated numerous times . That's what my colleagues continue to call , even to this day , optimal medical therapy , even though it is an outright failure . So I set out to find out better ways to control this rise , this otherwise relentless rise in growth of carnetary atherosclerotic plaque .

By the way , the so-called experts were asked what should we do ? If we can't put a stop to the growth of atherosclerotic plaque by tracking carnet calcium measures , what should we do ? And they actually said this . Don't repeat the scan for another score . Just let people have their heart attack or develop an angin and manage it .

Then , as you know , this is ridiculous . It means that people are being resigned to dying at home , dying on route in the ambulance or other bad outcomes . So I was unsatisfied with that awful , awful answer .

So I set about trying to find ways that really did put a stop to the rise in carnetary calcium scores and the progression of carnet atherosclerotic plaque , and it led to a number of unique observations .

One of the lessons you learn is that if you reject cholesterol testing , this crude , outdated thing we should have rejected 40 or 50 years ago and instead did a more thorough , more precise method called lipoprotein analysis , and the method I use most of the law was nuclear magnetic resonance , nmr . So an NMR lipoprotein analysis . These are easily available .

Every major lab does it . It's covered by health insurers and Medicare , even though many of my colleagues will claim that it's not .

That's what they're really saying is I can't be bothered understand this more advanced form of testing and so I'm going to tell you it's unavailable , it's non scientific , there's no evidence that it works or that insurance doesn't cover it . None of that is true .

So when we took people's blood and subjected to NMR lipoprotein analysis became clear that it's not LDL cholesterol that drives growth of plaque , it's an abundance of small LDL particles . There's a number of reasons for that . Small LDL particles are smaller , they're better able to penetrate into the arterial wall to create atherosclerotic plaque .

Small LDL is much more prone to oxidation and glycation , that is , glucose modification of the proteins in that particle . And when they are glycated and oxidized or glycoxidized , that particle , that small LDL particle , is much more dangerous , much more likely to gain entry into the arterial wall and incite an inflammatory response .

Small LDL particles are also unusually persistent in the bloodstream . That's because when the particle is small , when the LDL particle is small , the recognition protein on its surface , called apoprotein B , its configuration is changed and it's partially concealed . So the liver has a hard time recognizing that small LDL particle and the concealed apoprotein B .

As a result , while large LDL particles that the liver does recognize are cleared promptly within 24 hours of their creation , small LDL particles require five to seven days to be cleared by the liver .

That means once you form small LDL particles they're persistent for about a week , going round and around your circulation and giving plenty of opportunity to cause or grow carnal atherosclerotic plaque . So the question I asked is what foods in the diet cause the formation of small LDL particles ? Simple Wheat , grains and sugar ?

There is more than ample evidence to tell us that's the amylopectin A of wheat and grains and sugars such as sucrose and fructose that trigger the formation of small LDL particles by the liver .

And , by the way , there are now 55 human clinical trials to tell us that quantifying small LDL particles by advanced lipoprotein testing is a superior , dramatically superior predictor of the future cardiovascular events . Likewise , carnal calcium scores a superior predictor .

You can pretty much time somebody's heart attack or need for procedures or related events by knowing their carnal calcium score and see whether it's progressive or not . So another question comes up is there a way to reduce that score ? Slow down the 25% per year rate of increase , slow it down or even decrease the score ?

Well , the diet alone was extremely powerful and eradicating the expression of small LDL particles .

But I went further and we added back nutrients that are lacking in modern life , lacking or at low levels , such as vitamin D , magnesium , omega-3 fatty acids and iodine , and that also amplified the benefits of the diet by reducing insulin resistance and inflammation , the two driving factors that grows coronary disease .

Then I took it even further by addressing bowel flora , by trying to restore lost microbes such as lactobacillus rhodorii and lactobacillus gastri , by using prolonged fermentation to make our yogurts . They're not yogurt , of course , but something that looks and smells like yogurt . We also incorporate lots of fermented foods and prebiotic fibers . Put this all together .

It became clear that when all these strategies were put together , people achieved extraordinary metabolic health . It started all uncommon for people in my programs to have HDL cholesterol of 70 milligrams or greater , triglyceride levels of 40 to 50 , even though your neighbors have levels of 180 , 300, . We enjoy levels of 40 to 50 milligrams .

Small LDL is typically zero , not just reduced , but zero . Blood pressures are typically in the 110 , over 80 or similar range . C-reactive protein and measure inflammation is near zero . So not only do we achieve extraordinary metabolic health , but we avoid the need for pharmaceutical medications to try to correct these factors , and that we thereby save money .

We're not exposed to side effects , but we enjoy side Benefits such as reduction of abdominal visceral fat , improved testosterone status , improved cognition and other benefits . But you all begin to recognize just how unnecessary the majority of pharmaceuticals are , though you'd never believe it if you watch TV commercials .

The Divinate Health podcast is sponsored by Paleo Valley makers of delicious grass-fed beef sticks , healthy snack bars and other products . We're very picky around here and insist that any product we consider has no junk ingredients like carrageenan , carboxymethylcellulose , sucralose and , of course , no added sugars . All Paleo Valley products contain no gluten nor grains .

In fact , I find Paleo Valley products among the cleanest in their category . One of the habits I urge everyone to get into is to include at least one , if not several , servings of fermented foods per day in their lifestyles .

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And I'd like to welcome Defiant Health's newest sponsor , biodicuest . I've had numerous conversations with Biodicuest founders Martha Carlin , an academic microbiologist , dr Raul Cano .

They have formulated unique synergistic probiotic products that incorporate what are called collaborative or guild effects , that is , groups of microbes that collaborate with each other via specific metabolites , potentially providing synergistic benefits . They have designed their sugar shift probiotic to support healthy blood sugars . Simple slumber to support sleep .

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Enter the discount code UNDOC15 for a 15% discount for Defiant Health listeners . One of the peculiar things that happens when those of us who enjoy perfect metabolic health experience is that when you go to a healthcare clinic or hospital , they ask you what medications , what prescription medications , do you take , and you say none . They look at you confused .

Inevitably they are very confused . The peculiar thing is that they don't recognize perfect metabolic health . It's not uncommon for them to insist that you begin several drugs even though you enjoy perfect metabolic health .

They'll tell you that you need a statin drug , for instance , or a baby asthma or some other drug to somehow improve your health , which of course they do not .

Or they advocate conventional ideas such as follow dietary guidelines or eat more healthy whole grains , or here's a prescription for this or that health problem all the mantras that cause unhealthy metabolic health and many diseases . One of the key concepts to get your arms around in understanding these ideas is that we avoid the idea of treating conditions .

In other words , if you have a high blood sugar , let's resist the impulse to treat that high blood sugar and force it down . If you have a high blood pressure , let's avoid the idea of treating that high blood pressure with some drug to force your blood pressure down .

Instead , we adopt strategies that correct these factors that allow such conditions to emerge in the first place . So we're going to address the mistakes we all made in diet . We're going to address the factors the nutritional factors absent or lacking in modern life that affect insulin resistance and inflammation .

We're going to address this disrupted microbiome and the endotoxemia that accompanies a disrupted microbiome . And , as I mentioned again in the introductory comments .

We ideally begin these strategies before there's irreversible damage done , such as irreversible damage to the brain and spinal cord in some with multiple sclerosis , or damage to the brain from a stroke , or damage to the heart muscle from a heart attack or the implantation of prosthetic hypra-knee . These , of course , are things we cannot reverse .

So the key is to adopt these programs , adopt these strategies before these sorts of irreversible changes occur . And are most of these conditions avoidable ? Absolutely . Now we can't protect you from accidents , from injury , from most infections or infestations .

You know indigenous hunter-gatherer populations , such as people who live in the jungles of South America or New Guinea or the east coast of southern Africa or the savannas of Tanzania . These are people who , unexposed to antibiotics , don't eat modern diets but just live outdoors and hunt and gather their food .

They have no type 2 diabetes , no coronary disease , no autoimmune diseases , no constipation , no ulcerative colitis , no Crohn's disease , no colon cancer , on and on and on . These people are spared all the diseases of civilization that we have Now .

They have other problems , of course , right , they have infections , infestations and injuries , but they do not have most of the common chronic disease that plague modern people .

I think there's an important lesson in that and they also , of course , enjoy normal blood pressures , normal blood sugars , no small LDL particles and other aspects of health , without relying on prescription medications to do so .

So is it possible to enjoy perfect metabolic health without statin drugs , without blood pressure medications , without all the other things that conventional healthcare tries to load on you ? It absolutely is , and in fact , most of us enjoy biomarkers of health superior to the people who rely on pharmaceuticals to correct or treat various aspects of health .

Now , if you learned something from this episode of Defiant Health Podcast , I invite you to subscribe to your favorite podcast directory . Post a review . Post a comment . Help us build this movement of self empowerment in health . Thanks for listening .