Dr. Greg Eckel covers cutting-edge therapies aimed at extending healthspan and lifespan. The video discusses cold plunges, saunas, hormone optimization, and peptide therapies, examining how each may improve health outcomes and support longevity goals.
Chapters
In this module I want to share some cutting edge therapeutics that are. Some are old, some are new, but all are exciting. And we're going to start with an old one, which is tempering. This is a term that comes out of Russia, but it is temperature, hot or cold. We've got cold plunges, we've got the iceman Wim Hof, really popularizing cold baths. But you know you have on the tragus here you have a branch of the vagus nerve. So a component of balancing your vagus nerve or parasympathetic activity is coming from cold plunges. So the cold plunges really come about around thermoregulation. And really the studies of hibernating bears and brown fat. What we found with cold plunges and cold therapies, cryotherapy, etcetera, is that it stimulates the body to mobilize the brown fat. The brown fat is the fat that is stuck between the organs. It creates structure, but if that gets to be too plentiful, it can also cause all kinds of decay and deterioration of the internal organ network. So it stops the flow of energy or qi, but it also makes your body less efficient. So cold plunges, cold therapeutics stimulate metabolism, wake it up, and it helps you shed the brown fat that is very hard to get rid of otherwise. Then on the opposite end, we have Rhonda Patrick and some of her research on saunas. And looking at four to seven saunas a week reduces all cause mortality by 47%. It is a big number. By just taking a sauna a night, 20 minutes of a hot sauna increases your heat shock proteins, helps cleanse the blood, turn off senescent cells and helps you live a longer, more happier life. Duration and frequency and temperature matter here, so it is more frequent, at least minimum effective doses. Four saunas a week at 20 minutes. Of course, it's better if you go to seven that you get increased odds in your favor for doing it every day of the week. And you might be saying, oh, I don't have the time for that. How do you not have the time? It's a 20 minute indulgence that will statistically extend your lifespan and your health span. Temperature matters here too. You want to get them above 140 degrees, ideally up to 170 degrees Fahrenheit is the ideal number. Now you might be wondering, well, what about infrared? What about wet sauna versus dry sauna? Infrared will stimulate your cells to release more toxins and basically it helps them vibrate at a higher frequency. Waking them up and in essence helping your detoxification pathways. So there is benefit to infrared in saunas as well. So it's not just a temperature dependent component as far as benefit. Again though, looking at the research, it is on temperature and on frequency of use of the saunas. On the topic of fat, we can actually measure the viscera fat. Well, what does that mean? Right. We have different fat economies in our body. The viscera is the central core of your body and the viscera surrounds all of the organs. So you've got around the stomach, around the liver, around the intestines. And the studies are showing that in abundant or in excess of visceral fat increases your risks of all cause mortality, meaning dying of anything. So we want to measure and also reduce the viscera fat and we've got the technologies that help with that. Talking about thermogenesis with the saunas and or the cold plunges. So the hot or cold therapeutics to help reduce the viscera fat. Another area that is really exciting is called hot therapeutics, which is hormone hormone optimization therapy. So a lot of doctors are still practicing HRT hormone replacement therapy. As we age, we know our hormones decrease with age. Testosterone predominantly for men, estrogen, progesterone for women as they go through menopause. Well, there is this component we can optimize the hormone production for our age and for our performance. And so looking at much tighter ranges that are agreed upon by medical societies, but really most importantly on patient feedback on how do they feel. How do you feel? We want you to feel optimized, we want you to feel youthful. You know, pick an age. I've picked 28 for myself and my hormones actually reflect that. This has been around for 70 years. We have 70 years of research on peptides and, and peptides are small chains of amino acids. Amino acids come from proteins, but these small chain amino acids, these are like little programs that we can give your body to run a certain program from. You know, one of the most common peptides that everybody knows about is insulin. This has been used in practice forever. Well, what is that? That is a peptide. It's very safe and it's effective. I believe the peptides are going to be the new hormone optimization therapies in the next decade. Why? Because they're safe, they're effective and they work in the peptide therapy world. One of the ones that I want to highlight is Epitalon study out of Russia. They showed a decrease of Cardiovascular illness by 40% over a 12 year period. Reduces all cause mortality from cardiovascular disease and you get a 12 year reduction, which is, that is earth shattering news. 12 years of a reduction. It also increased telomere length by 30% which is a longevity factor in and of itself. So this is a natural small amino acid chained peptide that you take that runs a program in your body that increases your lifespan and decreases your risk of cardiovascular illness. Another peptide that I want to highlight here is CJC epamorelin and it increases growth hormone so you can't be on this forever. So there is some caution with the peptides but it's a trifecta here. It reduces body fat, increases muscle strength and increases your sleep quality which those three things as we age, all of those, I don't know somebody that is aging that wouldn't benefit from those three areas of their health. Another peptide that I want to mention here is GHK copper. And this one, it repairs the DNA at the cellular level and it increases the tension on your skin, it decreases wrinkles, it can help your hair grow. It will also help your wounds heal. So this one is a great one. It's a topical that you can put on with some really tremendous benefits. Another one is called BPC157. This is body protectant compound. And this is the heal like a wolverine peptide. We'll use it for tendon and ligament and muscle repair. You can also take it internally. It'll help heal the intestinal lining. So if you have any food sensitivities or allergies, Crohn's, any inflammatory bowel disease, that will help there too. So it's a very big repair molecule. Longevity is really the end product of a healthy lifestyle. This is not something that we're going to be able to supplement towards. We are wanting to change your foundational awareness of what it means to run this organism. Now remember, this is all built upon the foundations. The non sexy stuff. You've gotta move your body, you gotta watch what you're putting into your mouth like food wise you gotta watch the thoughts that you're having up there because that is creating your tomorrow. And if you're just getting the same things in, you're not going to get a different result out. And now we have therapeutics that we can put into the body that that will help it run better. You know, in the longevity realm it's kind of considered more is better right now. Like oh well if this one thing is good, I'm going to take all of this other stuff. In reality that doesn't play out clinically, I really will default into a Chinese medicine lens, where we call it the Zhang of the formula or direction. There's an emperor or empress, some generals and assistants, everybody lined up to move your body in a direction. What is good for you is not good for your partner or your friend or your parent, but what it's good for you. And you need somebody that understands, that can individualize and stack these therapeutics together to actually get you results in the real world.
