A New Understanding of the Microbiome: How to Heal Leaky Gut

Hi, and welcome to How Humans Heal. In this episode, I'm going to be talking with Dr. Mark Stengler. He is a naturopathic doctor who's been in practice for almost 30 years. And today we're going to be diving in deep to talk about gut health. Some of my favorite topics, leaky gut and the microbiome. Thank you so much for joining me today, Mark.

Hey, great to be with you.

Oh, my gosh. It's, like always so great to talk with you and to get your insights. I mean, you've been helping thousands and thousands of patients, plus writing, like, some more than 20 books, including your most recent book, the Holistic Guide to Gut Health, which I'm so excited for people to check out. So let's talk about this. Like, I mean, of course, as naturopathic doctors, we kind of say we're going to start with the gut. So you're here. You are like, saying, let's do this. Let's look at the gut and see what we can do.

Well, for people like you and I, it's old news, you know, the connection between the gut and the whole body health. What I want to do in this book was really look in the mainstream literature. In other words, is this just something that holistic doctors, you know, believe in? You see results with which we do. Right. But what does the actual mainstream literature show? And I was astounded to see by the hundreds in mainstream medical journals describing what's going on with leaky gut syndrome being a real thing. These are mainstream medical journals like the Journal of Endocrinology, articles by Harvard Things, which, you know, when you talk to your typical doctor, they still think leaky gut is not a real thing. It only occurs when people are extremely sick. You know, and so it's out there. We understand the mechanisms, and it really explains why, as naturopathic doctors like ourselves, we're able to help people at a deeper level by addressing the gut because we know for a fact now it connects to every area of the body.

Yeah. Now we have the science to prove. What we taught and saw hundreds of years ago was like, we need to be paying attention. And the thing with leaky gut is it doesn't show on, like, standard blood work or an endoscopy or a colonoscopy. They can't see it. So, of course, in standard care, they're not going to diagnose it because they can't see it on the standard test.

Right.

What do you. What do you find? Like, how do. How can people find out that they have leaky gut, that this is even something to be thinking about.

Yeah, well, I think first off, they have some, you know, a classic history and classic symptoms. You know, the patients that walk in and they got multiple food sensitivities, you know, that's a tip off. They probably have leaky gut if they've been on pain medications for long periods of time. There's many, many studies showing that causes leaky gut. People unresolved digestive conditions. So many studies done on irritable bowel syndrome, for example, you know, on the most common digestive conditions, good chance you have a leaky gut. People under high stress for long periods of time, people have been on antibiotics, steroids, things like that. These all make you very susceptible to leaky gut. So often based on the fact you've got symptoms in various parts of the body beyond the digestive system. You know, you got joint pain, muscle pain, brain fog, fatigue, where you're not responding to treatments, maybe you typically would. Those are tip offs that you could have leaky gut. And yes, there are tests we can use, you know, integrative doctors. You can measure certain proteins called zonulin, the body releases when it's trying to repair leaky gut in the small intestine. You measure on a stool test, there's blood tests. So there are ways you can objectively, you know, measure it and see what's going on.

Exactly. I love this and I love that you're mentioning irritable bowel syndrome, because this is a classic where a lot of times people are diagnosed with irritable bowel syndrome, but then they're maybe sent out the door with just medications to keep their bowels moving more regularly or to help with some of the discomfort. But it's not really getting at the root cause of what is this irritable bowel syndrome really about. And so when we identify leaky gut, then we actually can offer people solutions. Right. It's like, then this is like the gateway to actually solving, as you're mentioning, not just gut health issues, but whole body health issues.

Oh, absolutely. So irritable bowel syndrome is one of the most common reason people go to the doctor, just in general, especially gastroenterologists. And so, as, you know, people get the abdominal discomfort, gas and bloating, they might get constipation, diarrhea, or an alternating version of that. And research shows a high percent of these people do have leaky gut. You know what happens? People with irritable bowel syndrome, they start going on restricted diets, which can help Them, but, you know, it's a hard thing and it's stressful to do, you know, indefinitely. And so as providers, if we help them peel up that leaky gut, then they can expand their diet, get more nutrients, decreases their stress. So as I tell patients, I mean, you know, people aren't born with leaky gut, typically. Now, some infants may be because, you know, the mother is on medications, antibiotics, or maybe there's, you know, certain circumstances, but something we develop over time, usually, number one diet, number two, medications, and number three, stress. So the beauty is we can reverse it. We have stem cells it all over the body, but we have them deep within our small intestine where the leaky gut occurs. And I was very interested to find the literature. They now know that within two to three days, the stem cells can regenerate the whole small intestine. Now, of course, that's assuming you're providing the environment where damage isn't still occurring. But it goes to show the regenerative properties of your gut, man.

The, the body can actually make new intestinal cells. And as you're pointing out, this leaky gut is in the small intestinal cells. I'd love to hear your explanation because a lot of people think, oh, is leaky gut, Is that mean diarrhea? What does that mean? Where what's leaking? Where?

That's a good question. That's a good question. And so leaky gut, what it really refers to, there's a certain section of small test and where your absorption takes place. And there's two. I won't get into too much details, but there's two ways that absorption takes place. One is we have these villi, these projections in the small intestine where absorption occurs through these villi. That's actually what gives all the surface area to the small intestine. People are very, you know, interested to find out that the small intestine surface area is the size of about almost two tennis courts because of these villi projections which get more surface area. So absorption occurs through them. And then there's also absorption between.

The villi. We have this layer called epithelial cells. So absorption, it takes place in two areas. But when the, these cells, these epithelial cells are sliding with a small intestine becomes damaged from the reasons we talked about, you start absorbing particles that you shouldn't, certain parts of bacteria, toxins get absorbed, and as a result, two things happen. You get inflammation right in the intestinal wall. So I can give you obviously, digestive problems and absorb some problems, but Then you absorb these things which shouldn't be absorbed into your bloodstream. And there's this fancy word that they use called translocation, which means, you know, these bacteria particles and other things, they travel in the bloodstream to your joints, to your muscles, to your brain, to your heart, whatever. And then the immune system sees them as foreign invaders, mounts their response like it should. It creates an inflammatory response as you can get inflammation problems anywhere in the body.

I mean, this is, I've seen quotes in research that says that even 50% of people with leaky gut don't even have digestive symptoms, they just have symptoms, other areas of the body.

That seems to be true. I know when I've tested, you know, hundreds and hundreds of patients over the years, just kind of almost a standard testing. We're doing stool tests and other things. Yeah, I mean, it's, it seems to be the opposite. I mean, most people do not show, you know, a normal absorption in the small intestine.

Yeah. And I look at it as like a mild, moderate and severely. He got like to some degree, as you talk through the causes, we start to go, oh my gosh, we're all getting exposed to some of these. Even if we're being careful, we, a lot of us still have stress and different exposures. So it's like we're all going to have some degree of leaky gut. And so to become aware of it and start being proactive and be like, okay, how severe is it and what can I do to start solving it? So maybe let's just touch on that a little bit. Like, what do you start recommend? And I know people are going to be able to go to your book and learn all the details. And the summit, we're going to be talking about the gut summit here because the gut summit's coming up and I want to make sure everybody knows to go there to learn more. But like, what would you, what do you start to have people think? Like, if they're like, okay, well then how do I start healing this leaky gut? What am I going to need to do?

Yeah, good point. Well, you know, anything people can do to improve their diet. What I mainly do with patients, because a lot of people can follow it and there's again, there's different diets you can do. I use a modified Mediterranean diet. You know, the Mediterranean diet is the most well studied diets, rich in antioxidants and plant foods and fiber and all that, omega 3s, olive oil, but modified because as, as we both know, American grains just aren't healthy. Number one, most American grains, you can get some healthy ones, but the average ones people eat are not healthy. The pastas and the breads and all that. Um, and when I was writing the book, there's a tremendous amount of research on gluten sensitivity and gluten allergy being very well studied for triggering leaky gut. So I do that. And then number two, we get people on prebiotic foods, foods which feed the good microbiome in the gut, which helps to heal up the lining. So, for example, there's one probiotic called or good bacteria, called Akkermansia. And in the research, it's been shown to cause signaling to the small intestine, causing the small intestine to repair. So if you're low in certain good bacteria, again, you don't get those signals for the gut to repair. So prebiotic foods, you know, garlic, onions, artichoke, things like this, feed the good bacteria foods, cultured foods, sauerkraut, yogurt, these things provide the good bacteria right in the diet. So we do that and then we go into, like, speed things up using nutrients shown in research to heal the gut lining. The amino acid glutamine has some very good studies on it. So we like to use that. We use aloe vera extract, dgl, type of licorice extract that helps to soothe and heal the lining. Slippery elm, vitamin A and zinc and vitamin D are very important for gut healing. So we kind of do a conglomeration of nutrients, you know, at least for a few months, to speed up the healing. Now, if people have chronic digestive problems, systemic, chronic health problems, we may do it longer than that.

I've done a lot of detoxes over the years, and many of them made me feel a lot worse. Not only that, but I've had a lot of patients come in and tell me how after doing a detox, they have a stomachache and headache and they can't sleep and they're feeling anxious.

And I'm like, I can't just recommend.

That my patients do a program that's going to make them feel worse. So I finally decided to design my own detox program. It's a 14 day detox program that's not like other detox programs out there in several ways. One is that I'm focused on helping you to get the toxins out in a safe and effective way, using nutrients, antioxidants, and supporting our natural detoxification pathways in the body. Also, I'm helping you to decrease your exposure to toxins by learning the ways that you've been exposed to toxins and how to change your day to day lifestyle to decrease your toxins over time. And I'm helping you to look not just at chemical, environmental toxins, but also emotional and energetic toxicity. And yes, it's possible to accomplish all of this in 14 days. I have so many patients who have done the 14 day detox and report back to me how much better they feel. And I think it's also because I help you to know what to eat. You are getting adequate food that tastes good, good plus protein shakes that I developed that are good for your body, that your body knows how to use these nutrients and take them in and use them to help you safely detoxify without feeling worse. Also I help you to balance your blood sugar levels, get better sleep and introduce things like meditation, bio feedback and other types of stress recovery into your day to day routine. So I just am so excited about it. I want to make sure you know about this 14 day detox. I'm going to put the link, you can find it at drdani.com forward/detox-program but.

I'll also put the link below so.

You can find the 14 day detox program at Dr. Donnie.com I look forward to guiding you through this detox so that you can actually feel better on your way to better health.

Awesome. Oh my gosh, that's such a great summary. And for people to know that it's like, it's important to individualize as well, right? Like to go, you know, you use these tools but listen to your body and individualize it. So and to know that, like how do people, what do you find that people know that their gut is healing. Right. Like how do you, I mean I'm thinking, okay, you start feeling better, but what do you notice with your patients that they start to, you start to go, oh, okay, their leaky gut is healing.

Yeah. Well first, usually you can see the improvements in the digestion. Usually the gas and bloating improves, the bowels are moving better. Then we usually hear from patients like the energy level starts to improve, the brain fog improves. And then usually the last thing that starts to improve, although you know, it could happen even within 30 days. You know this chronic joint pain, they had chronic muscle pain, they had inflammatory type symptoms, autoimmune symptoms start to be alleviated as well. So usually we see that kind of pattern. How about you? Do you see something similar?

Yes. And I love, like it's sometimes such a pleasant surprise when all of a sudden patients Go who? I. They're like something they never expected to get better. Right. They're like, who knew that that joint pain was ever going to get better? Are those. And they start. You almost like to have to pay attention to what's missing. Right. Oh, I stopped getting headaches every day or my sinus infections went away or, you know, like. Right. Like things that they weren't even expecting, the allergies decrease or. I mean, I work a lot with women with HPV and other, you know, chronic or even like fertility issues improve when we heal the gut. You know, it's amazing. It's like something you wouldn't even think is connected is absolutely related.

Well, that is true. And I did, I do talk in the book, like you said, about the connection between leaky gut and the microbiome and hormone balance, which a lot of people wouldn't expect. But that research is there and like you said, we see other things like skin health, hair health improves, which makes sense because you're improving absorption, getting better nutrients, you're getting less inflammation. But what I found in the mainstream literature, which we've always recognized, essentially they have found a gut access to everywhere in the body. So the gut to the skin, the gut to the eyes, for example, the gut to the sinus, the gut to the mouth, the gut to the thyroid, the gut to the lungs, the gut to the liver, the gut to the bones, the joints, muscles. I mean, in the men they found it to the testicles, women they found it to the ovary. So as you said, you can improve virtually every organ system, every cell in the body by addressing the gut health. And.

Amazing. And you touched on it a little bit. But I want to talk a little bit more about the microbiome because I know you cover that in the book in the Summit as well, where we, you know, like, we're talking about how, okay, the intestinal cells health. But we also now are so aware, and of course there's tons of research on the healthy microbes that should be living in our gut and they work integrately with the intestinal lining to keep us healthy. So tell us more about that. Like, what is the research showing us about the microbiome and how can people start to understand the importance of a healthy microbiome?

Yeah, I mean, it's very true. Matter of fact, you know, the pharmaceutical companies have caught onto this and they're researching just, you know, furiously to try. And I don't pick these things apart and come up with drugs that alter the microbiome because what they found with the microbiome is the same thing, obviously we've known for a long time in the gut. And then what happened with research is found you can help digestive conditions by improving the microbiome in the gut. And then they found, you know, there's this direct connection between the microbiome and the brain and it goes both ways. So here, you know, your, your thoughts and attitudes and belief systems, all that you can affect your gut, but the other way around they're finding anxiety and depression and other, you know, challenges mentally can be improved by improving change in the microbiome. Now they have found that we actually have a unique microbiome in different organs of the body. So for example, I found you have a microbiome in your eyes, you have a micro, a different microbiome in your sinus, for example, in your mouth, which, you know, dentistry is a big thing now because we found the microbiomes off in the mouth. They're more prone to cavities. Gum disease can affect the heart and all that. So now they're finding there's unique microbiomes. The different organ systems of the body are unique. However, the great influence comes from the gut because we have this, you know, gut access, you know, influencing everything in the body and different microbiomes. The other interesting thing I found, the research, you know, the microbiome we always used to refer to these, you know, about a hundred trillion bacteria in the body and the gut, which, as you said, work symbiotically. But now they found the microbiome goes way beyond that. We have a microbiome, so we have naturally occurring yeast in our gut, which when in ballots, help us in health ways. When they're imbalanced, they cause all sorts of problems both in the gut and systemically. They have found that viruses are part of the microbiome, so, you know, it's continuing to be alert, more in depth. And so there's a symbiotic relationship, but in the end, all goes back to the same thing. We're going to have a balance with these bugs when we're doing the naturopathic things. You know, the proper diet, stress reduction, exercise, getting the right nutrients, supplements, things like that. Still goes back to those foundational things.

Yeah, it's like just recognizing the inner connectivity to within our bodies. Like that's what you've been really describing. And I love that, that you're like, hey, there's such a connection between. Because we, in standard medicine, we kind of go to just the, the gastroenterologist for our gut and we go to the psychiatrist for our brain, but it's actually all interconnected within our bodies. And by addressing the leaky gut in the microbiome, getting them back into balance, we can restore balance in our connections within our body. But what you're also just saying now is it's about creating that interconnection to our whole environment, even outside of our bodies. Right. Of like to our food, in our, and our exposure to nature and our, on the world around us. Right. It's like, brings us to this awareness of like that interconnectivity that can really help us heal.

Absolutely. And that's why it's holistic. Doctors taking that whole rounded approach always works best because there's so many different factors involved in our health, even our gut health, microbiome and all that. You know, it's interesting you brought up like, you know, the brain and all that, you know, the literature now, they, they have found that you produce more melatonin in your small intestine than you do in your, in your brain. Well, they found you produce more serotonin. A lot of people heard the word serotonin, which a lot of antidepressants work on. More serotonin by far is produced in your small intestine cells than in your brain. So yes, you cannot feel good, look good if your gut health is not in order.

And it's, and there's so many things that impact it and it's so common to be like, if we get an infection of some type, it's like you go into urgent care and you're right there with another antibiotic and steroid on it.

Boom.

It's gonna set back your gut health and your microbiome. So it's, what do you recommend for patients when, you know, like if, when they get an infection or if they have to take those medications, like how to keep you active.

Yeah, I don't know why they're still not doing in mainstream medicine, but yes, if, when, if I'm prescribing, you know, antibiotics to a patient or they're getting them somewhere else, I always put them on a high dose probiotic, at least two hours away from the antibiotic, and then I have them continue for at least another month after that. If the patient's had problems in the past with digestive problems like irritable bowel syndrome, or maybe women with recurring vaginal yeast infections, or people get, you know, skin yeast infections, I'll put them on antifungal herbs or an antifungal medication simultaneously. So they don't relapse again.

Yeah.

And then do this gut healing like we're talking about. And it's. They can break that pattern. Right. Okay. Let's not have to go through all that repetition because it can feel like a ripe. So I so often I see patients who are just like, right. It's like antibiotics and steroids again and again and again. And we can break that pattern by getting at these underlying root causes. And I love how you're mentioning how the microbiome is, because we're getting used to thinking about the microbiome as the bacteria and how to feed those healthy bacteria. But it's also beyond the bacteria, it's other microbes as well. And how to be less about like, you know, thinking that microbes are all bad. It's how to be like, okay, it's not about that. It's about the right balance, right?

Well, absolutely. Like a lot of patients, we run their stool tests, you know, and they show these bacteria at higher levels and what they should be. And the patient first thinks, oh, what are we going to take to kill those? Like, no, no, no, we're not going to go in there. That box and kill those will probably cause more problems and will help. We're gonna go in there, we're gonna reestablish good digestion and absorption which will change the environment. And then we're gonna, through your diet, maybe supplements, we're going to reestablish health of the good microbes which keep the other guys in check. That works much better. You don't have side effects and it works long term best. So you're right. That's the kind of mindset hopefully medicine gets to at some point, you know, because it's always kind of like the, you know, kill, kill, kill. But in our mindset there's a time to do that, but most cases it's more balance, balance, balance.

Absolutely. I completely find the same thing, Mark. I completely agree and I'm so glad we're getting to talk this through and I'm so glad everybody now has access to your book. So I'm going to have the links with the podcast notes, but it's if they can go on wherever books are sold or definitely Amazon. I know because I bought your book at Amazon, the Holistic Guide to Gut Health. And then the. I'm also going to have a link to your, your online summit, the, the Gut Whole body connection. Tell us a little bit more about that.

Well, we're excited to have you on it. Basically, you know, we've got about 29 experts like yourself and talking about how you can improve gut health, but how it affects all the different systems of the body. For example, you're going to help the people understand how the gut affects hormone balance, especially for the women, how it affects stress and how stress affects the gut. So all these different experts like yourself, I interview. And so no matter basically what people are dealing with, people have chronic illness or people want to prevent illness, this will give them the information, tools, how to understand and implement these things.

So it's like such a resource. So if anything we've been talking about is resonating for you, and you're like, oh, my gosh, now you know, okay, I need to address this. What do I do? Here is some amazing resources where you can get the book and sign up for this. This is a free online summit, so you can sign up and you're going to be listening to all these presentations as Mark just described. So you can really then have a, a protocol for yourself to heal. Right. Mark's like, let's just do this.

Absolutely. I think, you know, from June 3rd to 6th, I'll get bombarded with the ability to listen to all these different experts. If you can't listen to everything, then go to the topics of things that you're struggling with. I mean, I know for a fact, just statistically, we're going to have a lot of women out there who are dealing with chronic skin issues, you know, hair issues, hormone balance, anxiety, depression. And so you cover a lot of that. And so those tools right there are going to be very, very helpful.

Oh, my gosh, I'm so excited to be part of it. And thank you so much. I mean, you really give and give and give, Mark. Like, I just see, like, not only do you see patients all day still after all these years, and then you're, you're writing books, you're producing summits. You're just like, I can see that you're just all about really helping people know how to heal. And that's a beautiful thing that you're giving. So thank you.

Oh, that's very kind of you. Thank you.

Yes, yes. And I hope I get to see you in person soon. But thank you so much for joining us here at How Humans Heal. Is there anything else you'd like to share before we wrap up?

No, I think you covered it well just for people to realize that really strong connection between gut health and whole body health. So if your gut's healthy, then more likely you'll have good whole body health. If it's not. You're going to have problems.

That's the thing, right? Like, this podcast is how humans heal. So it's like, this is perfect because you're like, here's how you can heal. Heal your gut and you're going to heal your whole body. That's amazing. And I completely agree. And I'm so glad to be sharing that with everyone. So thanks again, everyone. Please join us again back here in How Humans Heal for the next episode. And Mark, thank you again for joining us today.

Yeah, thank you.

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