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Dr Rangan ChatterjeeDr Rangan Chatterjee

#1 Longevity Expert: Fastest Way To Get Alzheimer's & A Decreased Lifespan (You're Probably Doing!)

This episode is brought to you by: BON CHARGE: Save 20% off with code LIVEMORE https://boncharge.com/livemore VIVOBAREFOOT: Get 20% off your first order https://bit.ly/46tnMgX WHOOP: Try the New WHOOP today at https://join.whoop.com/livemore TIMELINE: Get 25% off your order of Mitopure https://timeline.com/livemore Did you know that your daily habits directly affect the speed at which your brain is ageing and your risk of getting Alzheimer’s disease in the future? This week, I'm delighted to welcome Dr Darshan Shah to the podcast. Darshan is a medical doctor, a board-certified surgeon, an expert in preventive health and the founder of Next Health, the first health optimisation and longevity centre to offer life-extending and enhancing technology and treatments. Whilst working as a surgeon, Darshan became seriously ill with type diabetes, hypertension, an autoimmune condition, and he was told he had a 50% chance of dying in the next 25 years. This wake-up call came just as his first son was born. Rather than accepting a life dependent on medications, he immersed himself in functional medicine and completely reversed his conditions in just eight months. During our conversation, you'll discover: • The 5 things you could start doing today that would actually increase your chances of getting Alzheimer’s • The 80/20 principle for health and how focusing on just 20% of interventions can deliver 80% of the results • Why sitting for more than four hours increases your risk of death by 15% • Why becoming the "boss of your own biology" through tracking key biomarkers could be life-saving • How inflammation from your gut and mouth can directly impact your brain health decades later • Darshan’s top supplement recommendations for longevity This conversation challenges the notion that we can simply live intuitively in today's environment and expect to stay healthy. Darshan argues that in our current toxic world, taking an active role in monitoring and optimising our health isn't just beneficial, it's essential. Whether you're interested in detailed health tracking or just want to learn the basics of staying well, this conversation is packed with practical advice that could transform how you think about your health. I hope you enjoy listening. #feelbetterlivemore ---- Connect with Darshan: Instagram https://www.instagram.com/darshanshahmd/ YouTube https://www.youtube.com/darshanshahmd Extend Podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/extend-podcast-with-darshan-shah-md/id1773578243 Dr Shah's Biomarkers Guide: https://www.drshah.com/biomarkers #feelbetterlivemore #feelbetterlivemorepodcast ------- Order MAKE CHANGE THAT LASTS. US & Canada version https://amzn.to/3RyO3SL, UK version https://amzn.to/3Kt5rUK ----- Follow Dr Chatterjee at: Website: https://drchatterjee.com/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/drchatterjee Twitter: https://twitter.com/drchatterjeeuk Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drchatterjee/ Newsletter: https://drchatterjee.com/subscription DISCLAIMER: The content in the podcast and on this webpage is not intended to constitute or be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have heard on the podcast or on my website.

Dr. Rangan Chatterjeehost
Jul 16, 20251h 51mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 0:26

    A 5-step “fastest route to Alzheimer’s” (and why genetics isn’t destiny)

    1. RC

      What would I need to do if I want to get Alzheimer's or shorten my life as quickly as possible?

    2. DS

      [laughs] To get Alzheimer's. Okay, you're right. No one's ever asked me that question, but [laughs] I can give you a five-step program to getting Alzheimer's. Why don't we, why don't we do that? [laughs]

    3. RC

      Let's do it, yeah.

    4. DS

      And you'll be surprised to hear that your genetics actually not in my five steps-

    5. RC

      Wow

  2. 0:26 – 1:45

    Step 1: Repeated head trauma and long-term neurodegeneration risk

    1. DS

      ... believe it or not. Okay? Because I really believe that even if you are genetically susceptible to Alzheimer's, the chance of you being able to prevent it completely is very, very high. So I think we need to move on from, "My mother had it, my family members had it, so I'm destined to have it." That is absolutely not the case. Okay? So the five steps to getting Alzheimer's, um, starts in childhood, believe it or not. Play football, uh, American football or, you know, rugby, a sport that you're hitting your head over and over again at high velocities, right? That constant trauma, and not necessarily getting concussions, the trauma of hitting your head over and over again as a child and then into high school and beyond definitely sets you up for a situation where your chance of having dementia later on in life is greatly increased. Okay?

    2. RC

      Okay.

    3. DS

      Many people take that even into adulthood, playing professional sports, um, even riding a motorcycle and falling off, riding, um, mountain biking and falling off and hitting your head. The amount of trauma that builds up over multiple episodes of hitting your head sets your brain up to have not just Alzheimer's, but also Parkinson's later on in life.

    4. RC

      Okay.

  3. 1:45 – 3:21

    Step 2: Metabolic damage from ultra-processed food and sugar

    1. DS

      The longer you extend that and the more you play these sports that your head is unprotected, the more damage builds up over time in your brain. Okay? Um, then step two, moving on to, like, adolescence and early, early adulthood. Eat a ton of ultra-processed food, lots of sugar. Don't start your meals with vegetables. Instead, have a very carby diet and throw your metabolism off. And so step two is having poor metabolic health, right?

    2. RC

      Right.

    3. DS

      We know in the Western world, 80% of adults have poor metabolic health, and that sets you up in a situation where you have a much higher risk of getting dementia in the future. And what's beautiful about this conversation, Rangan, is, like, we don't need to just talk about dementias.

    4. RC

      Yeah.

    5. DS

      It's the same for heart disease, cancer, all sorts of-

    6. RC

      Longevity

    7. DS

      ... longevity in general.

    8. RC

      Exactly. I mean, and of course, I know we're only two parts into the five-step plan.

    9. DS

      Yeah.

    10. RC

      And, uh, of course, it's a slightly ridiculous question in many ways, but the reason I was asking it was to really just showcase how many of these things so many of us are doing.

    11. DS

      Yeah.

    12. RC

      So we don't directly ask ourselves the question, how can we speed up getting a brain disease? But it turns out that many of us are living lives which are actually doing that, right?

    13. DS

      Exactly, exactly. And the damage builds up over time, and what's incredible about our human body is it's so incredibly resilient, especially up to the age of about 30 or so, right? And this resiliency tricks us into believing that we're incredibly healthy-

    14. RC

      Mm-hmm

  4. 3:21 – 6:31

    Steps 3–5: Inflammation, toxins, and chronic stress as accelerators

    1. DS

      ... that we can live through anything, that nothing bad is gonna happen to us. But the damage builds up in childhood and adolescence as well, just as much as it can build up later. Now, what happens as we age, so step three of the program then, is to create a massive amount of inflammation, [laughs] and that is through having poor gut health, even poor oral health, being sedentary. So this all happens when we get a job, right? We become more sedentary. We continue to have a poor diet. Um, we're eating more ultra-processed food, and our gut health suffers. And 90% of our immune system lives in our gut, right?

    2. RC

      Mm-hmm.

    3. DS

      And so when our gut is not healthy, it's being attacked by thousands of toxins that are basically in our food-

    4. RC

      Mm-hmm

    5. DS

      ... and our immune system is on overdrive, which creates a situation that we all know is another root cause of disease called inflammation.

    6. RC

      Yeah.

    7. DS

      Right? Then the next thing that you can do is just don't care about your level of exposure to toxins, right? And so, you know, we know that we live in a society now where we have 150,000 man-made toxins in our environment, and these have only been here for the last 60, 70 years. These were never here before. And we are constantly and consistently exposed to toxins in our air, our water, our food, and the skin products that we use, and you just don't even think about it, right? And so we live in this state of just ignorance of toxins, but they do build up. They're almost the fourth leg-

    8. RC

      Mm-hmm

    9. DS

      ... of the stool of health. You know, you, you have nutrition, you have exercise, you have sleep. I really believe that toxin buildup and detoxifying your lifestyle-

    10. RC

      Mm-hmm

    11. DS

      ... is incredibly important, right? And then lastly, you hit your 30s and your 40s, and many people are living a very stressed life. You have children, you have a job, you're trying to make it financially, and the amount of stress builds up, um, cortisol builds up, your hormones levels start going down, right, as we age. And, um, all of th- that situation where you have hormonal dysfunction or dysregulation combined with high levels of stress also then start predisposing you to Alzheimer's disease and all the other diseases, right? And so I think that's-- those are the five steps you can take to try to get Alzheimer's early. [laughs]

    12. RC

      Yeah. Okay. So that's, that's super, super clear. Okay.

    13. DS

      Yeah.

    14. RC

      So head trauma-

    15. DS

      Mm-hmm

    16. RC

      ... poor diet, inflammation, toxin exposure, and chronic stress. Okay?

    17. DS

      Exactly.

    18. RC

      If we, um, supercharge those five things, we're gonna start increasing our risk of getting sick in the future. We're gonna start increasing the rate at which we age. And I guess it's interesting that as I think about those five things-All of them are amenable to change.

    19. DS

      Absolutely.

    20. RC

      Okay? And I think that's the key thing that we're both very passionate about.

    21. DS

      Right.

    22. RC

      Now, I wanna go through some of those things in detail.

    23. DS

      Yeah.

    24. RC

      Okay, 'cause I want this to be a really practical episode for people so they, they truly understand what kind of things they can start doing immediately. Of course, we're living in a world now where there's more and more information out there.

    25. DS

      Right.

  5. 6:31 – 8:57

    The 80/20 rule: stop chasing hacks, master the fundamentals

    1. RC

      People are getting very, very confused. And I know, Darshan, that you're very passionate about the 80/20 rule-

    2. DS

      Mm-hmm

    3. RC

      ... aren't you? So can you explain what the 80/20 rule is? And then I think it would be fun to start going through various things like sedentary behavior, um, food, et cetera, et cetera-

    4. DS

      Yes

    5. RC

      ... and figure out how can we apply that rule to all of these different pillars of health.

    6. DS

      I love that. And you know, you and I see patients all the time. I see patients almost every single day, and I find a lot of people have paralysis by overanalysis of their Instagram feed, right? One-- You scroll your Instagram feed and one person is shouting from the rooftops, "You must focus on your VO2 max." Another person says, "No, it's all about strength training." Another person says, "Eat the carnivore diet. Eat the vegan diet." And it gets so confusing. And in reality, there's really twenty percent of the information out there that we know moves the needle eighty percent. And if you don't get those right, it doesn't matter how much you go down the rabbit hole of supplements and biohacking, you're not gonna get the effect that you need. And so we need to, we need to absolutely focus on the Pareto principle-

    7. RC

      Yeah

    8. DS

      ... which is the 20/80 principle.

    9. RC

      I heard an Insta you did a few weeks ago, and in that conversation, I think you shared someone who came to see you in your clinic in LA-

    10. DS

      Mm-hmm

    11. RC

      ... um, asking about the best sauna and cold plunge protocol.

    12. DS

      Right. [laughs]

    13. RC

      Yet when you looked under the hoods, he was eating a lot of junk food, not moving his body, and not doing the basics basically, but trying to see if sauna and cold plunge could hack his way to health.

    14. DS

      Right. Exactly. I, I told him, "You could live in the sauna twenty-four hours a day if you want. It's [laughs] not gonna negate the negative effects of the junk that you're putting inside of your body."

    15. RC

      Yeah. Okay. So this-

    16. DS

      Right

    17. RC

      ... this 20/80 rule-

    18. DS

      Yeah

    19. RC

      ... maybe that can be a kind of underlying theme throughout this conversation today, so that in this world of increasing information, people can go, "Okay, well, there's a bit of debate on this, a bit of debate on that, but these things-

    20. DS

      Right

    21. RC

      ... are gonna move the needle." Okay. So, you know, when you went through your five-step getting Alzheimer's plan-

    22. DS

      [laughs]

    23. RC

      Um, one of the things you mentioned was the inflammation caused by sedentary behavior.

    24. DS

      Right.

    25. RC

      Okay. So talk to me about physical inactivity. Where do the real problems come, and what can we start to do to start changing things?

  6. 8:57 – 12:47

    Movement that matters most: sitting breaks, “exercise snacks,” and walking

    1. DS

      Yeah, it's a great question. First of all, it's very important to define what is sedentary behavior, right? I think we have this intuition like, you know, we wake up, we sit down for breakfast, and we sit in our car, drive to work, and then we sit at work for four hours, and then we sit at lunch, and we're just sitting all day long. But in science, you can actually define where that stretch of sedentary behavior actually goes wrong. And what we see is that for every hour you spend being sedentary, after four hours, there's a fifteen percent increased risk of all-cause mortality, okay? So really, the magic number is anything more than four hours is gonna be detrimental to your life. And what I tell people is this is more important than exercising. A lot of people think that they can work eight hours in front of a computer, go to the gym for an hour-

    2. RC

      Mm

    3. DS

      ... afterwards, and then that, that's fine. They've done everything they need to do to combat this negative aspect of being sedentary, and that's not true. The gym workout does not negate the sedentary behavior during the day.

    4. RC

      Yeah.

    5. DS

      Right? So what I tell people is we've also had a lot of research into how do we counteract sedentary behavior, and the Pareto principle here is it's just one easy thing. It's so easy it's mind-blowing to people. Every forty-five minutes, getting up and moving around, and that's it. It's called an exercise snack. We have lots of research out there on exercise snacks completely negating the effect of being sedentary, and it could be as simple as just, like, getting up and having a conversation with somebody or walking around the office for three to five minutes. What I tell people to do is once you start getting to that routine and habit, why not do some air squats? Why not have a pair of weights and just lift some weights for a few minutes, right?

    6. RC

      Mm.

    7. DS

      There's other things that you can do that actually can then build up into even not just negating sedentary behavior, but reversing the negative effects of it as well. And so forty-five minutes is the key. Take an exercise snack. I actually buy some of my patients a little manual egg timer. You know those little timers you can twist and it's for cooking eggs, but-

    8. RC

      Yeah

    9. DS

      ... you put it on your desk, and you set it to forty-five, and it gives off a really annoying buzz that just kinda stops everything. You're like, "Oh, okay." It g- gets you out of your state of just being in s- massive focus, and you get up and move around, and that combats the sedentary behavior. I will say one more thing on this too. I think it's so important to walk. You know, humans were meant to walk. That's why, you know, we started off in a small area in Africa and we went all over the world-

    10. RC

      Mm

    11. DS

      ... is because we were walking. Our biology is meant to be constantly in motion. And so the more steps you can add to your day, the research is around eight thousand right now is the number of steps, the better. And just find little moments in the day where you can get up and move around. Maybe do your meetings while you're, uh, while you're walking instead of, you know, sitting there on the phone. Maybe you walk after every meal. Walking after every meal has massive effects at reducing blood glucose level as well. So getting those steps in is also important.

    12. RC

      Yeah, it's really interesting as you talk about movement through the lens of this 80/20 principle-

    13. DS

      Mm-hmm

    14. RC

      ... the two things that you brought up there are actually quite easy... cheap, if not free to do. Right? Now, yes, we can acknowledge that some people may feel that they don't have time to walk because of their job or the pressures in their life. Let's just park that to the side-

    15. DS

      Mm-hmm

    16. RC

      ... just for the moment.

    17. DS

      True.

    18. RC

      But there is a feeling, isn't there, when people think about moving their body, that it has to be intense and-

    19. DS

      Right

    20. RC

      ... severe, and I've got to push myself to the max.

    21. DS

      Right.

    22. RC

      The two things you just mentioned there don't require any of that. You're talking about walking. Yes, walking is a uniquely human movement.

    23. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    24. RC

      But this idea of getting up regularly, of course the modern world makes it hard for people to do that.

    25. DS

      Right.

  7. 12:47 – 19:59

    Practical movement systems: timers, apps, and making walks non-negotiable

    1. RC

      So you give them an egg timer, or some of your patients. I think you also once said that you've got an app on your computer that-

    2. DS

      I do

    3. RC

      ... automatically shuts it down. Tell us about that.

    4. DS

      Yeah. There's, there's quite a few apps now out there. The one I use is called Flow app, and it just makes your screen green, and an, every 45 minutes and just puts a five-minute timer on there so you can't do anything. The other hack there, too, is, do you Zoom a lot?

    5. RC

      Uh, quite a lot, yeah.

    6. DS

      Yeah. So if you don't pay for your Zoom account, guess what? They kick you off in 45 minutes. [laughs]

    7. RC

      [laughs]

    8. DS

      So that's a great excuse to just tell the people on the other side of the meeting, like, "I'm so sorry," like, "Zoom is kicking me off." And that gets you off the Zoom, and then you go, you go do your exercise stack.

    9. RC

      Yeah. That's super interesting.

    10. DS

      [laughs]

    11. RC

      And th- this Flow app, is that F-L-O, F-L-O-W?

    12. DS

      F-L-O-W.

    13. RC

      F-L-O-W.

    14. DS

      Flow app. Yep. Mm-hmm.

    15. RC

      What I really like about that is that it's, you know, ultimately we can talk about the negatives of technology or the negatives of having to sit down and work in an office and on emails, whatever it might be, but that is the reality-

    16. DS

      Right

    17. RC

      ... for huge amounts of people.

    18. DS

      Yeah.

    19. RC

      So having some form of technology that just gives you that prompt every 45 minutes-

    20. DS

      Right

    21. RC

      ... just to go, "Hey, the screen's gone green again. This is my prompt to walk around the block," or go to the toilet or do 10 squats, whatever it might be, is super helpful. And, you know, the research on exercise stats just keeps on coming.

    22. DS

      Yeah.

    23. RC

      Even 10 years ago, there was a really good trial showing that people who moved regularly throughout the day actually had better blood sugar control-

    24. DS

      Right

    25. RC

      ... than people who went to the gym after work.

    26. DS

      Exactly.

    27. RC

      Right?

    28. DS

      Exactly.

    29. RC

      I.e. what you're saying, you can't undo the negatives of eight hours continuous sitting by working out in the evening. Yes, you're gonna get benefits from that working out for sure, but there are still negatives from that sedentary behavior, aren't there?

    30. DS

      Right. Exactly. And it brings up a really good point, because a lot of times I'll sit down with patients, and the first thing they want me to do is program out a gym routine, and they go into the nitty-gritty of how many sets do I do, how many reps should I do. Then I ask them, "Before we talk about your gym routine, let's talk about what happens during your day." And I find they're spending eight, 10, 12 hours sedentary during the day. So I say, "Let's put the gym routine to the side. Obviously, it's important, right? But Pareto principle, let's focus on this one behavior that's gonna improve your health 80%, and then we add the gym in after that." Right?

  8. 19:59 – 25:13

    Food 80/20: eliminate ultra-processed foods before debating diets

    1. RC

      Let's talk about food now.

    2. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    3. RC

      Food, of course, is a very important pillar of health.

    4. DS

      Yep.

    5. RC

      In your five-step plan, point two was directly about food, but I guess point three, inflammation, is also related to foods

    6. DS

      Yeah.

    7. RC

      Um, point four you could even argue-

    8. DS

      [laughs]

    9. RC

      ... and the sort of toxin exposure, depending on what you're eating-

    10. DS

      Yes, yes

    11. RC

      ... could also apply. So food is one of those key pillars.

    12. DS

      Right.

    13. RC

      And, and I, I don't know what you're gonna say here, but I think we share, I think, again, quite a similar viewpoint on foods, which I don't think enough people talk about. So, okay, so well, let's come to that. Let's start-

    14. DS

      Yeah

    15. RC

      ... by going what is your 80/20 approach when it comes to food?

    16. DS

      Yeah. It's very similar to movement. So I'll see a patient, they'll sit in front of me, "Doctor, tell me what diet is perfect for me." Right? That's the, always the first question.

    17. RC

      Yeah.

    18. DS

      "Program out my diet for me. I'm eating vegetarian. Should I be adding more protein? How many grams of protein?" And I always take it back to, "Look, I really almost don't care what diet you eat. You can have any diet that makes you feel good as long as you eliminate ultra-processed food from your diet." So we know also through research, massive studies, that for every 10% increase that you have over your daily caloric requirement in ultra-processed food, you also add 15% to your all-cause mortality rate. It's massive. Ultra-processed food is everything that comes in the center of the supermarket. Um, you know, in the United States, 90% of the supermarket real estate is p- ultra-processed food, the entire center. Packaging, food dyes, preservatives, things that were never really meant to be food in the first place, has a tremendous amount of salt, tremendous amount of chemicals, and a tremendous amount of inflammatory factors in it as well. So just eliminating ultra-processed food can completely change your health. Just n- not even talking about what type of diet you eat, right? Because what's gonna happen is you're naturally, once you eliminate ultra-processed food, you're gonna eat more produce, you're gonna have more protein in your diet. It just happens naturally. And I think that's the one thing that I think makes the 80% difference. That's it.

    19. RC

      Yeah. Uh, I, I completely agree with you. Okay, I've-- I don't know when, maybe a year ago, I said in one of these podcasts that I think contrary to, I think, popular opinion, it's more important in the modern food environment to focus on what you're not eating as opposed to what you are.

    20. DS

      Right.

    21. RC

      Okay? And people push back and go, "No, it's about, you know, just small changes. Bring the right foods in." And I get that thinking. But I've got to be honest and go, in my entire clinical career, I-- if you add a punnet of blueberries to your diet once a week, right, and you change nothing else, I haven't seen much of a change, right?

    22. DS

      [laughs] Exactly.

    23. RC

      You can look at the study about blueberries and cognitive health.

    24. DS

      Exactly.

    25. RC

      There are great, great studies on that, okay?

    26. DS

      Yeah.

    27. RC

      I don't dispute that.

    28. DS

      Right. [laughs]

    29. RC

      But what I've seen, I've seen move the needle is when people start eliminating the modern ultra-processed stuff.

    30. DS

      Right.

  9. 25:13 – 32:21

    How to quit UPFs in real life: simple meal templates and reducing decision fatigue

    1. RC

      If a patient comes up to you-

    2. DS

      Mm

    3. RC

      ... and says, "Hey, listen, Dr. Shah, I've, I've heard about the, the, the negatives of having too many-

    4. DS

      Mm-hmm

    5. RC

      ... ultra-processed foods, but they're everywhere, right? I don't know where to start," what kind of practical guidance do you have for people?

    6. DS

      Yeah, that's a great question. So I tell people, "Let's make it as simple as possible to start. Pick three meals that you could easily make that have no more than two or three or four ingredients, and let's plan out a breakfast, a lunch, and a dinner for you that has those ingredients." So for example, breakfast can be three scrambled eggs and a piece of rye toast and some steamed vegetables, for example. Pick your vegetable. Um, for lunch, it can be a salad with a piece of salmon on it or a piece of chicken. And then for dinner, it could be a vegetable, one piece of protein, and maybe some, um, some good carbs or slow carbs, right?

    7. RC

      Mm-hmm.

    8. DS

      And so just pick that and eat that consistently as many meals as possible, right? And then let's start stairstepping you into, um, a healthier diet. Then let's add another easy, simple meal and another one and another one to your menu of options. And so my patients actually have on their fridge, like, "Here are my options. Here's my list of things I need to buy from the supermarket on a weekly basis," and we add to it. It's all... You, you, you're an expert in habit formation yourself. You gotta start simple and then add and stack on top of it, and that's how we kinda shifts people's diets completely. And look, it's not fun. It's kinda boring. Your, the foods that you're eating are boring. They're very simple. But the amount of change I see in people's health in just two weeks, it's so massive. People get addicted to this new way of eating.

    9. RC

      Yeah. It's really helpful that you say boring, and I think if people are used to having their taste buds constantly stimulated and tantalized with lots of different flavors, well, relative to that, yeah, it can seem boring, at least initially. But you do this for long enough, and it's not that long, that suddenly your taste buds do start to change.

    10. DS

      Exactly.

    11. RC

      And again, look, we're all on our own journey. We've all got different levels of means. We all have-

    12. DS

      Mm

    13. RC

      ... a different capacity to make choices in our life. I'm at the point now, Darshan, where I generally don't wanna eat out anymore.

    14. DS

      Right.

    15. RC

      Like, I-

    16. DS

      Right

    17. RC

      ... I, if I can help it, I just wanna eat at home.

    18. DS

      Yeah.

    19. RC

      A, I can control what I'm eating. Don't get me wrong, it's still fun to go out sometimes with your friends-

    20. DS

      Yeah

    21. RC

      ... there's a social aspect.

    22. DS

      Right.

    23. RC

      I don't dispute that. But again, as I get older, I realize that, hey, Rangan, you know, if you are not being really proactive about your health, the modern world is gonna drag you down a certain path.

    24. DS

      Right.

    25. RC

      Right? It's not easy anymore for most people to be well and healthy. You have to actively make choices often that are in conflict with the world around you. I mean, that's a harsh reality, isn't it, for people to accept?

    26. DS

      Yeah.

    27. RC

      'Cause I think if you look at these mythical so-called blue zones, and I know there's-

    28. DS

      [laughs]

    29. RC

      ... you know, some sort of debate, you know, as to-

    30. DS

      Yeah

  10. 32:21 – 34:55

    Sponsor messages (BON CHARGE red light, Vivobarefoot shoes)

    1. RC

      BON CHARGE are a wellness brand that have a fantastic range of products designed to help you feel better, live better, and sleep better. From blue light glasses to red light therapy devices and beyond, BON CHARGE make it really easy for you to prioritize your wellness at home. And I myself have been using many of their products for well over five years now. One of my current favorites is their Demi Red Light Therapy device. I've been following the research on red light therapy for many years, and the potential benefits include enhanced recovery, better skin, improved eye health, and also improved sleep. Now, since I got this panel, I've been sitting in front of it for about 10 minutes every morning whilst reading and 10 minutes every evening, and I'm definitely finding that I feel more relaxed. I'm falling asleep much faster, and overall, I would say I've had a big increase in energy. To get 20% off all of their products, go to boncharge.com/livemore. Now, I'm a huge fan of Vivobarefoot shoes. I've been wearing them for about 12 years now, and one of the main reasons I love them is because when I'm wearing Vivos, I feel fully connected to the ground beneath my feet. What do we want? We want feet that move naturally, and because Vivos are wide, thin, and flexible, your foot can move in the way that it's meant to. A lot of modern shoes are stiff. They're narrow. They start to manipulate the way your foot functions, whereas in Vivos, your feet can do what they're meant to do, and that means they help your feet become stronger. There was this trial that showed within four months of wearing Vivos, your feet are around 60% stronger. Your feet are your foundation, and when you've got problems in your feet, it goes all the way up the chain. It can go to your ankle, to your knee, to your hip, to your back, and even to your shoulder and neck. And as a doctor, I have seen back pain, hip pain, and knee pain actually start to get better when people start to wear barefoot shoes. To get 20% off your first order, go to vivobarefoot.com/livemore. In your five-step Alzheimer's plan, um, in number three where you mentioned inflammation-

    2. DS

      Yes

    3. RC

      ... I think you also mentioned inflammation from the gut-

    4. DS

      Right

    5. RC

      ... and inflammation from the mouth.

    6. DS

      Yes. Uh-huh.

  11. 34:55 – 39:22

    Inflammation 101: immune overdrive, gut-first approach, and oral health links

    1. RC

      Okay, so could you just briefly explain to people what inflammation is?

    2. DS

      Absolutely. Mm-hmm.

    3. RC

      Uh, and then sort of talk to us about gut inflammation and oral inflammation and what we can actually do to improve those things.

    4. DS

      Yeah, so inflammation is a state where your immune system, which is there to help us fight off bacteria, viruses, toxins, is there to, to eliminate cancer cells from inside of our body. Our immune system is incredibly important, uh, and unfortunately, as we age, it does become weaker. It's a process called immunosenescence that happens as we age. But the healthier you are, the longer your immune system will stay healthy, and why is that important? Because obviously we need it to fight off infections and cancer-

    5. RC

      Mm

    6. DS

      ... et cetera. Now, what happens when you get inflammation is that your immune system is active all the time, and it's not active fighting off cancer. It's not active fighting off infections. It's fighting off all the toxins that are being accumulated in our body. Most of those toxins come in through our gut, and our gut starts in our mouth, and it goes all the way down to the other side, right? [laughs]

    7. RC

      Mm.

    8. DS

      And so once again, ultra-processed food has a lot of toxins in it, a lot of inflammatory factors in it, and if you constantly assault your gut with ultra-processed food, it's gonna all be absorbed and keep your immune system overactive. And when you're have a lot of inflammation-What's happening is your body is just in a state where it's fighting off these toxins, but it's also destroying normal cells, and it's also creating havoc throughout areas of your body that aren't necessarily injured.

    9. RC

      Mm-hmm.

    10. DS

      And so this is why we always check for inflammation in our patients. And then when we see high inflammatory markers, the first place we look is in the gut.

    11. RC

      Wow.

    12. DS

      Yeah.

    13. RC

      How do you check for inflammation in your patients?

    14. DS

      So we use a marker called HSCRP, highly sensitive C-reactive protein. That's one of the first markers we look for. This is a super simple blood test that anyone should be able to ask their doctor for. And I'm a huge believer in checking this marker once a quarter or once every six months-

    15. RC

      Wow

    16. DS

      ... just to make sure what's happening in your lifestyle over the last few months is not causing inflammation, right? One area where people get a lot of inflammation from is from their oral cavity. What's happens is they haven't seen a dentist in a while, they forget to floss, and they get inflammation in their gums. And people live with inflammation in their gums, in their oral cavity sometimes for years-

    17. RC

      Yes

    18. DS

      ... and years and years. And you and I both know-

    19. RC

      Yeah

    20. DS

      ... there's a association between poor oral health and Alzheimer's disease and cancer and also heart disease. And so we know keeping your oral cavity healthy is critical, so go to see your dentist every six months at least.

    21. RC

      Yeah, it's interesting hearing you talk, Darshan.

    22. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    23. RC

      It's, it's interesting, we started talking off about the brain, right? And the various things that many of us are doing without realizing that are assaulting our brain and increasing the risk that our brain is gonna age prematurely, and then potentially get things like age-related cognitive decline.

    24. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    25. RC

      Okay? But as we sort of unpick those five areas, it, it's very clear, as we both know very well, that everything's connected, right?

    26. DS

      Right.

    27. RC

      It's not as if you need one lifestyle approach for your brain and one lifestyle approach for your heart and one lifestyle approach for your inflammation, right? It's, it's the basic foundations of what it means to create health in the body. You just mentioned the oral cavity.

    28. DS

      Right.

    29. RC

      Right? Again, people may think, "Oh, well, I'm, I've, you know, I focus on my physical health. You know, what, what the hell's my tooth or my teeth got to do with my physical health?"

    30. DS

      Yeah.

  12. 39:22 – 47:29

    Dr. Shah’s origin story: from elite surgeon to chronically ill patient to root-cause medicine

    1. DS

      Well, you know, I did graduate from medical school very young. I was 21 years old when I graduated from medical school, and I-

    2. RC

      Can I just pause you there, right?

    3. DS

      Yeah.

    4. RC

      That would be massive in the UK.

    5. DS

      Uh-huh.

    6. RC

      But in the US, I think it's, it's even more impressive because we don't have to do a degree before we go to medical school here.

    7. DS

      Right.

    8. RC

      So I went to medical school when I was 18, right?

    9. DS

      Uh-huh.

    10. RC

      So we finish, like, at 23 you can walk out of medical school in this country as a doctor.

    11. DS

      Wow.

    12. RC

      In the US, I think it's normally 26, 27-

    13. DS

      Yeah, mm-hmm

    14. RC

      ... right? Because you do a degree first.

    15. DS

      Right.

    16. RC

      You qualified as a medical doctor at the age of 21. When did you start training?

    17. DS

      [laughs] Yeah, I actually went-- I left s- my parents' home at the age of 15 to go to school. Yeah. And so I was very lucky. I was trained in a system that was emulated from the UK system in Kansas City, Missouri, University of Missouri, Kansas City. And they took the UK system and it was one of five schools in the United States-

    18. RC

      Mm

    19. DS

      ... that, um, had a six-year medical degree program. However, you still had to go through college, so they compressed all of college into two years, plus they put you right into the hospital at, at f- I remember the first day of college, I was in the hospital following a doctor around-

    20. RC

      How old were you?

    21. DS

      ... doing rounds. I was s- 15 years old.

    22. RC

      Wow.

    23. DS

      Yeah. With a lab coat on [laughs] following a doctor in the hospital. And, um, yeah, so you know, I was, I'm so lucky that I got to do this because it's afforded me multiple times in my life that I've had multiple careers in medicine now. [laughs]

    24. RC

      Yeah, I've heard you say you're in your third career at the moment-

    25. DS

      Yeah

    26. RC

      ... within medicine.

    27. DS

      My third career in medicine, right. [laughs]

    28. RC

      So what were they? What, what was the first one?

    29. DS

      Yeah. So the first one, as soon as I graduated from medical school, I decided I want to do surgery. It was just enthralling to me how you could go to the operating room and literally open someone up and fix something or save their life or change their life. And so I was a surgeon for 10 years. I did trauma surgery, general surgery. Um, after doing that for 10 years, I got another challenge, so I went to the Mayo Clinic and I trained in reconstructive surgery. So this is doing incredibly complicated procedures, sometimes under a microscope, where you're reconstructing people after cancer. And so I did that for another 10, 15 years. But then I got sick because I was a stressed out surgeon. I was operating 14 to 16 hours a day. I was not sleeping. Um, I was eating a lot of junk, just whatever was in the hospital, 'cause I basically lived in the hospital.

    30. RC

      You, you were on the Alzheimer's plan.

  13. 47:29 – 56:33

    What he changed to recover: steps, UPF removal, sleep, gut repair, hormones

    1. DS

      And I think, I think that's a helpful construct. So some of the things that I did was the 80/20 principle. I went from not moving at all to moving my body constantly and getting ten thousand steps in. Back then, there weren't a lot-- any wearables-

    2. RC

      Mm-hmm

    3. DS

      ... so I bought a pedometer [laughs] actually, and I got my ten thousand steps in. I stopped eating the ultra-processed food. I started really focusing on my sleep. I was brought up in this generation where, you know, sleep was considered a waste of time, and instead I started just making sure I slept eight hours a night. And then I did some of the principles of functional medicine. I looked at my gut health, which was a disaster-

    4. RC

      Mm

    5. DS

      ... right? I was eating ultra-processed food. I had a lot of pain from my autoimmune as well, so I was taking, uh, Advil and Motrin, which is like a nuclear bomb to your gut bacteria, right? And then I, um, stopped the immune suppressant, and I checked my hormone levels. It turned out my testosterone level was in the toilet. It was so bad. It was, um-- Even, you know, we look at the testosterone levels now, and the numbers have been brought down because over the last fifty years, normal levels have become lower and lower.

    6. RC

      Wow.

    7. DS

      Mine was even lower than what is considered normal, um, now. And so, you know, I just started then seeing a functional medicine practitioner that could really help me improve my hormone levels, get my gut fixed, and that made all the difference.

    8. RC

      For people who don't know, explain why testosterone levels are so important.For a middle-aged man

    9. DS

      Yeah. Maybe I'll answer another question in taking it back to Alzheimer's disease, right?

    10. RC

      Sure.

    11. DS

      One of the main causes of s- a subtype of Alzheimer's is lack of trophic factors.

    12. RC

      Yeah.

    13. DS

      Trophic factors are the hormones that our body secretes to keep us in a state of growth and health, right?

    14. RC

      Mm-hmm.

    15. DS

      And testosterone is, for men, is a h- is the most important trophic factor. For women, they have estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone as well. Very, very important. And unfortunately, we're genetically programmed to have these levels start going down after the age of about 40 or so. You know, women go through menopause, men go through menopause or andropause. That happens genetically. But what happens now in modern society is that comes sooner and sooner and sooner. Sometimes even I see patients now in their 20s with hormone levels that are in the toilet, right? And so-- And that's because of our lifestyle. Our sedentary lifestyle, our, uh, lack of good nutritious food and micronutrients in our food has caused this to happen. And so-

    16. RC

      Ch-chronic stress?

    17. DS

      Chronic stress, yes, exactly [laughs] .

    18. RC

      It's a big one for hormones, isn't it?

    19. DS

      It's a big one, right. Yeah.

    20. RC

      I mean, it was, it was the fifth one of your five-

    21. DS

      Yes

    22. RC

      ... step plan. I think, yes, we were talking about chronic stress through the lens of brain health, but you can also look at our hormonal levels and the kind of hormonal havoc that many people are living through these days, men and women. I would say chronic stress is one of the key drivers.

    23. DS

      Absolutely. Absolutely. And so, you know, a lot of times patients will come to me, and I'll show them their hormone levels are a problem, and the immediate question is, w-what hormones are you gonna put me on? Before we put you on hormones, what we do is we manage their stress levels-

    24. RC

      Mm

    25. DS

      ... primarily, and then also look at all the other things that we talked about. And I would say five times out of ten, we can make significant improvements just by doing those things.

    26. RC

      Yeah.

    27. DS

      Yeah.

    28. RC

      It's interesting, you know, if you talk about a man and testosterone, a lot of people's mind will jump to libido or sex drive. Okay?

    29. DS

      Yeah.

    30. RC

      But what you just said there is, again, not that libido and sex drive is not important, but you're talking about this on a completely different level. You're talking about these hormones and testosterone as being a trophic factor to signal growth to the brain.

  14. 56:33 – 1:21:10

    Be the CEO of your health: why biomarkers matter (and which ones to track)

    1. DS

      Yes, I mean, exactly. It's like now we have the sci- I mean, we've had the science for decades, but now it's actually allowed to be distributed to where people can actually see their own biomarker results, and now everyone has the ability to look under the hood. Everyone can see what's going on in their biology by just learning a few simple numbers and taking control of those. I talk about becoming the CEO of your own health-

    2. RC

      Yeah

    3. DS

      ... or the boss of your own biology because what does a CEO do? He or she runs a company, and they look at numbers every single day, sometimes every hour. They look at quarterly reports. They look at yearly filings, and they're managing their business based on what do those numbers show. Everyone now has ability to do that. And so once you gain the understanding of how to do that, how to get these numbers and what they mean, and there's not a lot of them. There's probably, like, ten numbers that I have my patients follow. It's massively empowering because remember I talked about the resilience of the human body?

    4. RC

      Mm-hmm.

    5. DS

      Your numbers change twenty to thirty years before you start feeling-

    6. RC

      Yeah

    7. DS

      ... symptoms of disease, right? By the time you feel symptoms, usually there's a lot of damage done, right? And what's also magical about these numbers is they're not just on-off numbers, not just zero and one. We have levels.

    8. RC

      Mm-hmm.

    9. DS

      So you can aim for optimal levels. You can follow and track your progress, just like a CEO would look at their profitability number over time, and they'd continue to try to optimize and optimize to get it to a good number. We can do that now.

    10. RC

      What would you say to someone who's listening and says to you, "Hey, Darshan, listen, I, I get what you're saying. At the same time, I don't think that's what being a human is about. Being a human is about experiencing life, not obsessing over what's under the hood, not giving myself health anxiety when I see numbers going up or numbers going down. I don't want to live like that." What would you say to that individual?

    11. DS

      Yeah, I would say that might have been a good model sixty years ago, but unfortunately, it's not a model that you can realistically live under right now. And so look, I, I totally realize health anxiety is a real thing, and I have patients with health anxiety, and so we don't throw a lot at them. But this is the era of medicine that needs you to participate in it, because if you're not participating in your own health and you're outsourcing your health to your primary care doctor, who has fifteen minutes with you once a year and maybe checks two or three things if you're lucky-

    12. RC

      Mm-hmm

    13. DS

      ... you will head down a path of early disease, Alzheimer's potentially, cancer, heart disease. The incidence of all of these is increasing rapidly. You know, in the Western world, thirty-three percent of people over the age eighty-five have dementia, one out of every three. Who wants to live to eighty-five if you have a one in three chance-

    14. RC

      Mm

    15. DS

      ... of having dementia and not recognizing your friends and family? And that's a long, drawn-out course that eventually leads to death, right? No one wants to do that. You don't have to be in that category-

    16. RC

      Yeah

    17. DS

      ... at all if you can take some personal responsibility of your health, and it's not that hard. You know, everyone-- almost everyone has a car, right? And you're constantly looking at your dashboard of your car, you know, making sure that the check engine light is not on. Your-- You know, a lot of people do their own oil changes. They're, they're doing maintenance all the time. We spend more time and energy on our motor vehicles than we do on our own biology, [chuckles] right? So I think it's, I think it's necessary now because unfortunately, the medical system is not built to handle the volume of chronic disease right now, and your only chance is to be able to detect it early and reverse the trend before it becomes a problem.

    18. RC

      Yeah, it's a, it's a, it's a really interesting point you just made, this idea that, hey, that more intuitive way of living-

    19. DS

      Mm-hmm

    20. RC

      ... not looking under the hood, just experiencing life and enjoying life, that approach may well have worked for the bulk of human evolution.

    21. DS

      Right. [laughs]

    22. RC

      But as you started off this conversation with that five-step Alzheimer's plan-

    23. DS

      Mm-hmm

    24. RC

      ... that was a question that I asked slightly tongue in cheek.

    25. DS

      Yeah.

    26. RC

      But what was interesting as you went through that five-step plan, I was thinking, "Wow, this is a plan that many people are unintentionally following."

    27. DS

      Exactly.

    28. RC

      Right? And so it's interesting to say or, or to think and reflect and goIn this modern world where it's hard to make the healthy choice, if you're not tracking or taking ownership or, I like what you said, being the boss of your own biology, who's gonna do it for you?

    29. DS

      Exactly.

    30. RC

      Like, no one is, and that's, you know, people don't really get that these, the US healthcare system, the UK healthcare system, these things are built and structured around disease management. Once you've got sick or something's wrong, these things come in to help, right? Their whole DNA is not about health creation, prevention.

  15. 1:21:10 – 1:28:48

    Toxins & microplastics: BPA testing, plastic exposure, and the precautionary principle

    1. RC

      Right? And, and this, this whole point about testing and empowerment I think is, is really interesting, okay? So when I went to your clinic-

    2. DS

      Mm-hmm

    3. RC

      ... in November in LA, one of the things, uh, we checked for was my BPA levels.

    4. DS

      Yes.

    5. RC

      Okay? So I appreciate this is probably for most people not a test that they commonly get.

    6. DS

      Right.

    7. RC

      But on a personal level, Darshan, and I, I think I shared this with you a few months ago, I know about the research on microplastics.

    8. DS

      Yeah.

    9. RC

      Okay? I'm familiar with it cognitively.

    10. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    11. RC

      Okay?

    12. DS

      Right.

    13. RC

      And I do my bit.

    14. DS

      Right.

    15. RC

      You know? But you guys drew my BPA level.

    16. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    17. RC

      And when you sent me the results, it was in the red.

    18. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    19. RC

      Right? So by... I know the science, I know the research in my rational mind, but it wasn't enough to force me to take drastic action. I'm telling you-

    20. DS

      [laughs]

    21. RC

      ... since I saw my BPA levels in the red, I have not had a single hot drink from a takeaway cup, I've rarely drunk out a plastic bottle. I think I did it once on a flight, and it was a small bottle.

    22. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    23. RC

      Right? Even on the train this morning down to London-

    24. DS

      Yeah

    25. RC

      ... I was thirsty, and I thought, "No, no, I'm waiting."

    26. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    27. RC

      "Um, I'm not having it." Right? So the point I'm trying to make is that, um, testing and understanding, not what's happening in general science, but what's happening in your own body-

    28. DS

      Exactly

    29. RC

      ... is one of the most powerful motivators for change.

    30. DS

      Yeah, because now it ties back to you. It's not just like a concept in the stratosphere.

  16. 1:28:48 – 1:42:20

    Wearables, blood pressure, and CGMs: data as a behavior-change engine

    1. RC

      What's your take on wearables? I see you-

    2. DS

      Yeah

    3. RC

      ... I think you have an Oura Ring on.

    4. DS

      Yes, I do. Mm-hmm.

    5. RC

      I've been wearing a WHOOP band now since-

    6. DS

      Right

    7. RC

      ... I think July last year, so-

    8. DS

      Yeah

    9. RC

      ... maybe nine months now. Uh, I'll share my experience with it in just a moment, but what is your take on wearables? Are you a fan, or are you against them?

    10. DS

      So part of my, my talk track with patients about becoming the CEO of their own health or the boss of their own biology is not just blood tests. There's a few other simple things that you can empower yourself with on a day-to-day basis that can completely change the course of your health, and those are, number one is a wearable, right? Number two is a special kind of scale called a bioimpedance scale. You can buy these for 25 US dollars, um, and it sends a little electrical signal through your body every time you step on the scale-

    11. RC

      Mm-hmm

    12. DS

      ... and gives you your skeletal muscle mass and your fat mass. I always tell people, "I don't care what your weight is, but I wanna know what your skeletal muscle mass is week after week after week." And lastly is the blood pressure cuff, because you and I both know that blood pressure elevation is usually ignored for sometimes up to a decade before anything is done about it, right? So I know I gave you a longer answer to your question about wearables, but let me tell you why I love wearables. You can get them for less and less money now. In fact, you can start-- there are some Fitbits now that are less than $50-

    13. RC

      Mm-hmm

    14. DS

      ... that people can buy, and this gives you a few really important numbers. One of them is your amount of movement you've had throughout the day, so we had a lot of discussion about number of steps. Another one is the HRV-

    15. RC

      Mm-hmm

    16. DS

      ... which I think is a biomarker that, you know, in medicine we don't even look at that, right? But it's such an important-

    17. RC

      Yeah

    18. DS

      ... biomarker of health, right? And lastly is a sleep score, okay? And so another marker we rarely talk about in, in medicine, in Western medicine, but something that people can really improve on. And what I love about all of these markers is there's something that you can do almost every single day that can make it a tiny bit better. And, you know, just doing a 1% improvement day after day adds up to a 3800% change over the course of a year. It's massive.

    19. RC

      Yeah.

    20. DS

      So just getting a few more steps in, just, you know, trying to optimize your sleep so you get better deep sleep, doing some breathwork once a day for even just two minutes can help improve your HRV. This is all data that you can now get on yourself that, once again, no one's gonna care about this more than you do, right? [laughs]

    21. RC

      Yeah.

    22. DS

      And so I, I think it's important. So-

    23. RC

      Let's just talk about blood pressure for a moment.

    24. DS

      Yes.

    25. RC

      Um, in terms of home monitoring, of course there's been blood pressure cuffs that we've been able to buy-

    26. DS

      Mm-hmm

    27. RC

      ... from pharmacies for decades now.Are there any more modern, less intrusive, uh, ways to measure our blood pressure that you're using with your patients?

    28. DS

      I mean, I wish I could use this because it's available in the UK and it's not available yet in the US. I'm hoping it will be soon. But there's a company called Aktiia that now has a continuous blood pressure monitoring device. Just a little wristband-

    29. RC

      Yeah

    30. DS

      ... a little light, and it gives you your blood pressure every f- I think it's 15 minutes throughout the day. And that, that is an incredible device, and I have personal experience because it's what finally allowed me to get my blood pressure-

  17. 1:42:20 – 1:51:48

    Supplements: foundational basics vs. ‘advanced’ mitochondrial support + closing takeaways

    1. RC

      I think it's very helpful, free, accessible. People can empower themselves and, and be the CEO of their own health. Supplements is a topic that many people are interested in, and a lot of people will say-

    2. DS

      Yeah

    3. RC

      ... it should always be lifestyle first, and supplements are exactly that. They're a supplement. At the same time, I just wanna, a- and again, I want your perspective on this, I think that is one way to look at it, and I, I'm very much a nutrition and lifestyle first guy.

    4. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    5. RC

      But I've also had many patients over the years who really didn't feel good. Low energy, brain fog, and actually certain supplements-

    6. DS

      Mm-hmm

    7. RC

      ... allowed them in the short term to feel good so that they could then engage with the nutrition and lifestyle changes. So well, like-

    8. DS

      Yes

    9. RC

      ... all these things, I think we love the black and whites. You know, you can never use supplements until you've dialed in your nutrition and lifestyle.

    10. DS

      Yeah.

    11. RC

      I'm like, look, I get the principle behind that. I just don't think it works in every case. What's your take on supplements, and do you have a few favorites?

    12. DS

      Yes. Um, so one of the things I always am very, uh, empathetic about is that even myself, I can't maintain the same level of diet every single day, day after day after day after day, right? And so-There are some days that I take in probably very little nutrients. Maybe I'm fasting on a plane and, you know, I get off the plane and it's late at night and I just eat something quickly-

    13. RC

      Yeah

    14. DS

      ... maybe a quick salad, and obviously I didn't get my nutrition for the day, right? And so that's where supplements come in helpful. And the nice thing is too, is now we can actually measure in blood tests whether you're low on vitamin D3, B12, et cetera.

    15. RC

      Mm.

    16. DS

      What I find is most people are, are low, they are nutrient deficient. And like you said, they're not feeling good because they have nutrient deficiencies. And, um, one of the things that worked really well for me, and it's, um, uh, so powerful, was seeing my vitamin D level be 20, which is extremely low. And I just started taking a vitamin D3 K2 supplement.

    17. RC

      Yeah.

    18. DS

      You know, we know 60, 70% of people are deficient in vitamin D.

    19. RC

      Mm-hmm.

    20. DS

      Um, that really helped me turn around my health as well. And so I'm a believer in supplementation. Um, I think there's some core supplements that most people should consider, and if they're one of these people that are skeptical of supplements, you can get blood tests to see if you really need it or not. Then I think there are some more advanced supplements that I like. And then, you know, there's other people that are biohackers, right? They wanna take every supplement that they hear three biohackers are taking, and they have little baggies that they carry around all day. And I think sometimes that can also be, uh, detrimental. I think sometimes we have to take people off of supplements they don't necessarily need or probably have very little benefit. So I see all sorts of people-

    21. RC

      Yeah

    22. DS

      ... and I try to just meet people where they are and try to get them to a place where they're supplementing smart.

    23. RC

      Yeah. It's interesting, this idea that many doctors are skeptical of supplements. If you have used supplements with patients in a targeted way, you will know that they can be extremely powerful for the right person.

    24. DS

      Right. Exactly.

    25. RC

      Okay? Again, it's obvious if your D3 is low and you're getting symptoms related to that, sure, correcting it could have a benefit. If your B12 is low, which it is for many, many people... And there, here's the other point with supplements, when people like to say, "Well, it's all about good nutrition," well, hold on a minute. To absorb certain things-

    26. DS

      Right

    27. RC

      ... like B12, okay, you need adequate amounts of stomach acid.

    28. DS

      Mm-hmm.

    29. RC

      Right? We're living these chronically stressed out lives. What does chronic stress do? It, it-

    30. DS

      Yeah

Episode duration: 1:51:48

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