Skin & Stress with Dr. Jessica Krant, MD., MPH

Welcome to the Mind Body Space podcast, where you can boost your resilience with research-backed tools to stress less and be happier as you move toward your highest potential. Resilience, the ability to bounce back from life's challenges faster and higher, is a skill that you can learn and practice. The episodes fall into 3 subcategories: Highest Potential, where you're going to get evidence-based tips from my monthly conversation with Fiona Murden, an award-winning author and Chartered UK Organizational Psychologist. Optimize Me, where you'll get cutting-edge practices for best health and peak performance from mind-body and lifestyle medicine. And Take a Chill Pill episodes will guide you through a relaxation response, an antidote to chronic toxic stress, so that you can soar under pressure. I'm Dr. Juna Bobby MD. I'm a board-certified physician and a mom of two amazing kids. 10 years ago, I left one of the most prestigious medical practices in Manhattan to dedicate my career to teaching the science of resilience to students who are curious about accelerating change in their own minds and lives for peak performance and wellness. My experience teaching high-performing students of all ages at Juilliard Pre-College, NYU, Columbia, and many other organizations have led me to the creation of my newest digital courses, Plan to SOAR, SOAR Under Pressure, and Top Down Resiliency training for individuals and organizations. And the great reviews are rolling in. Sign up for more info at toptownbrain.com. A portion of all proceeds go to those students in need. I'm so honored to have with me today Dr. Jessica Crant. She's a board-certified dermatologist and certified lifestyle medicine physician. She is also certified in integrative dermatology and double certified in life and transformational mindset coaching. She studied design and visual arts at Harvard College, where she graduated magna cum laude, and she got her MD, medical doctor degree, and master's degree in public health at Columbia University.

Wow, can you say overachiever? You know what impresses me the most though about Jessica is that she is so kind, big-hearted, and she's always there to help.

Just one of the most generous people that I've met.

Hi Jessica, how are you?

I'm doing great, how are you doing?

Thank you so much for being here. I'm so excited to have you on because summer's right around the corner and we love to talk about skin right around now on this podcast. And as you know, this podcast is about resilience. For, um, peak performance and to have resilience under pressure. So a lot of times our skin can show a lot of stress. I know that you got boarded in lifestyle medicine in 2018, so you've been a lifestyle medicine physician for 3 years now. Yes, and, uh, I'm actually sitting for the boards this year.

Very exciting. I love it. We'll talk more about why we love it so much.

Absolutely. You know, you're one of the top dermatologists in Manhattan. Obviously, that's impressive enough, but you got into lifestyle medicine. How did that happen for you? Like, what made you start to turn?

You know, I've been in practice longer than people realize.

'Cause you look so beautiful and your skin is gorgeous, which we will talk about.

Thank you, thank you. You know, I fool people probably sometimes, but I also fool myself. And life, you know, just caught up with me. And I had my own practice, and then for a few reasons, my very Manhattan geography and real estate-related reasons, related and finance reasons. I decided at the time it was a good idea for me to transition into working with this larger group in Manhattan, and it's a fantastic group, but it also hit in a time of life when I was going through some personal challenges and the world in general, especially America, was going through some cultural and political challenges, and I was starting to feel a lot of stress. My friends were feeling stressed and burned out, and, and I was noticing it took 2 years in, I realized I was not enthusiastically promoting myself, my business, my work on social media as much as I had been in the past. I used to be such a great marketer, was really all over social media, and it took me a while to realize that I had completely stopped posting about my services and come in for Botox and here's what we love to do to help you feel more beautiful and clear up your skin and all of that stuff. I had just ground to a halt and I was really distracted by what was going on in the world. And I realized that we were all getting burned out and overwhelmed and run down and very stressed. And I thought, I have some friends that are really professional political activists, and I wanted to support their work, and I wanted to do more to help. And I thought, well, I'm not really gonna go become a full-time activist. I'm a physician, I'm working. But I said to myself, you know what? I am a doctor, I'm a healer, and I do have something to offer. Myself, my friends, and the community, and hopefully, you know, the world. And that is wellness, healing, and a great— a broader perspective on how to protect our resilience and our stamina to be able to get through all of these challenges that humanity is facing right now, to help us stay well.

So you wanted something other than Botox to help people, like, with their stress, right?

I wanted something other than Botox, and I wanted a way to feel that I was part of the solution instead of doing something that at the time was starting to feel a little bit superficial and not as meaningful for me. And I— it just took me a while to understand what was happening, and then I started to hunt around for different systems of training myself to be able to offer this. And lifestyle medicine, I'll just jump to the end and say that lifestyle medicine hit everything that I really believe in and wanted to know more about and be able to offer and had none of the extra things that may not have so much evidence or maybe a little more fluffy. So I went right for it and I have not regretted it.

And now you're speaking at their conference this year, right?

I'm so honored to have been invited. I'm gonna be the first dermatologist they've ever had speak about the effects of lifestyle factors on skin health and anti-aging. And it's a big honor.

Amazing. And so skin is our biggest organ. People don't think of it as an organ, but it is.

In the old days, originally when scientists were first looking at skin, they really thought it was like a dead envelope that was just around us to hold everything in. And then some really brilliant researchers realized that it was a living organ. And now we know it's the home of our, one of our most sophisticated immune systems and the source of stem cells and just so many other brilliant and amazing things that are in my favorite organ.

I love it.

I did work in a dermatology group in medical school. I would, I treated people with UV lights for psoriasis. Oh, wow.

You really went to the hardcore stuff. Yeah, that was an amazing treatment.

It was as a medical student. And I remember all the law students from NYU would come in at the end of the year, like around May, and they would have plaques all over because they were so stressed. And of course, since then, I've, you know, I've read Jon Kabat-Zinn's study on where they did mindfulness in the UV box versus when they didn't, when they listened to the recordings and meditated and they healed faster. You know, their psoriasis cleared up faster.

So it's really amazing. Psoriasis, among some other skin conditions— I would probably say all, but some are proven to be directly related to stress and stress management. So psoriasis is a big one for stress.

What about acne?

Acne and all other inflammatory skin conditions are also flared up by stress. Absolutely. Stress affects the skin in multiple different ways at the same time. First of all, it— stress flares up, triggers cortisol, the stress hormone. And cortisol acutely, when it's brand new, it helps us. It helps us function. It helps us focus in a stressful moment. But when it becomes chronic stress, cortisol starts to trigger inflammation and damaging molecules that do attack our skin. Stress also affects our sleep quality, and poor sleep also affects our skin. And that, you know, just— that's just a couple of the ways that stress management can really help us from the inside out.

Cool. You said so many things that are exciting to me. So, um, okay, so sleep affects your skin, and how does that do that? I mean, I know that sleep— if I don't have enough sleep, sometimes even my hair looks worse.

Which is weird, but, you know, there's one study that's not the hugest study, but I always refer back to it because it, it was one study that proved that beauty sleep is real and that when we don't sleep well, it physically shows up in our appearance even the next day. So that's, you know, a real thing over time. Of course, chronic sleep deprivation affects our skin's ability to remove toxins and to repair damaged DNA. That's what it's doing overnight while we're sleeping. And if we don't get enough sleep, the toxins can build up, the DNA doesn't get fully repaired, and we can continue forward into a pattern where our skin is breaking down more than it's rebuilding. And that, of course, shows up as skin disease and higher risk for cancers and also more signs of aging. Wow.

Okay, so get your beauty sleep. And of course, in lifestyle medicine, we're supposed to get 7 to 8 hours, right?

Right. I think we say 7, right? 7 minimum for adults.

But for teenagers, they need at least 8, if not more, sometimes 10 if they're athletic. Which I know nobody gets.

Right. I think it's funny with teenagers, they physically need more sleep, but they also are biologically driven to stay up later and not want— not be able to wind down. But then they have school, which gets them up early. So I do think our teens are, you know, underserved in terms of sleep, that's for sure, in our, in our, in our society.

And do you think for teens and college students, like, the lifestyle factors like sleep and eating processed foods and the stress, does that increase acne? Does that increase bad skin? Because I know some people are adamantly against that. They're like, "No, diet does not affect your skin." And I disagree, but I want your expert opinion.

You know, I'm a skeptic and I don't, like to follow the brand new science headlines because as we know they change a lot and sometimes they literally flip-flop back and forth. So for all of my training I was really one of the "Oh, diet doesn't really have a direct effect on the skin" people because that's what I—

Well, that's what they taught us.

That's what I was taught. Exactly. And part of the reason for that is it's very hard to do real high-quality nutrition research. Because it's extremely difficult to tease out exactly what people are eating, the timing of the eating, have people keep track of it. You know, if we try to ask people to do it from memory, memory is notoriously poor. If we want people to keep track as they go forward and write everything down, it's first of all very hard to keep up with that, and second of all, having to be conscious of what you're eating and writing it down affects people's choices as they go forward. And they're eating whole meals and they're eating lots of things at the same time and they eat different things every day. So it's really hard to tease out what is affecting the skin and, you know, other, other organs in terms of nutrition research. Therefore, it is very difficult to come up with a clear conclusion.

Plus they have hormones in their teenage years.

Plus they have hormones.

But, sorry. Right.

They have like The major hormones. No, absolutely.

Yeah.

So, but now recent modern research and collecting all of the data over the many decades we've been thinking about it has proven that dairy is directly linked to acne for sure. That's the most proven link, especially cow, especially dairy from cows.

Especially milk, even milk and cheese, even if it's not hormone-treated, um, livestock and all that, even if it's grass-fed and all that.

What a great question, because, you know, parents want to choose the healthiest options for, for kids and teens, so they look for grass milk from grass-fed cows or non milk from non-hormone-treated cows, which is probably better. Yeah, but the truth is that cow milk is filled with its own natural hormones from the mom because, as we know, milk is hormonally active food for the baby cow.

Yes.

So even natural pasture-raised healthy, happy cows have hormones in their milk that are as hormonally active.

Yes.

And is meant to help a baby cow develop. And when our kids and teenagers are drinking that, even, even the most pure form of natural cow milk, it has hormones in it, but it also has other things that directly affect skin health. Wow.

Okay. And cheese, you said also.

Yes. What else is in the dairy? I'll just give the headline is that dairy contains milk sugars. Lactose is a sugar and sugar can affect skin. Dairy contains at least two different dairy proteins. One is casein and one is whey. And whey especially affects acne. A lot of times young athletes will be— body— or bodybuilders will want protein supplements, powder or protein bars. And unless they're choosing vegan supplements, those proteins in there are mostly whey protein, which is the dairy protein.

Yes.

And whey protein triggers acne. So that's one of the reasons a lot of young bodybuilders can also be breaking out, even if they're not taking hormone supplements is that they're taking in a lot of whey protein and that triggers breakouts.

Wow, that's good to know. And that brings me to the vegan thing. What about— what do you think about vegan diets? So I've never had breakouts really, to be honest, but I know my skin got worse and I did have some breakouts when I was drinking alcohol. Like, I was drinking, you know, I stopped drinking alcohol altogether like 3 years ago. Just for health reasons and just for brain fog reasons. So I just decided I didn't need it. That helped my skin. And then I went vegan about 3 months ago, and I know that it's cleared up a lot of stuff for me, and my energy levels are amazing compared to before. So just wondering what your take is on—

I'm not a clinical nutritionist, so I would not be specifically advising individuals on dietary choices. But you are bringing me back to the thing I didn't quite finish answering before that I wanted to say when you said, "What about everything in moderation?" Yeah. And when I chose this lifestyle medicine training and path, I must tell you that I entered it as the world's most omnivorous omnivore. I love all food. I ate everything, and I mostly didn't make the healthiest choices. When I went to my first conferences on the lifestyle medicine and on nutrition in health, they were run by the people who are true believers in the plant-based approach and in what we call like the healthy form of being vegan, because you can be very unhealthy.

Yes.

Or you can be very healthy. And that's—

I'm talking about the whole food vegan. Whole food, yeah, not processed vegan.

Whole food vegan. Whole foods, which we can get into more about, a wide variety of whole foods, including a couple of supplements that are important for plant-based people to make sure they take.

Which are B12 and—

Which are definitely B12, no matter what. No arguments about B12 at all. And then a lot of people also do recommend vitamin D because vitamin D can be found in plant foods, but it's not as easy to find.

And calcium?

Calcium can be helpful, but there's controversy about calcium. Taking calcium supplements, it has a little bit of a pro and a con, and finding ways to have calcium in your food is really ideal. But like I said, the nitty-gritty of the rules for what choices to make, it is a little complicated. I do think worth it. I think worth investigating and pursuing, but I don't want to give anybody hard and fast rules during this conversation because we're really just skimming the surface.

Let's talk about you.

So you went vegan or what happened?

You were carnivore.

Oh, yes.

So, okay, so here's what happened. I went to this one conference that absolutely blew my mind in 2018.

Which one was that?

And it was an international conference on nutrition in medicine. Okay. And it was all about stuff I had literally never learned. I never heard about it, I never learned about it, and it was one physician researcher after another giving all of the evidence about plant-based diets and how they affect each organ system. With just like irrefutable, incontrovertible evidence. And there were some talks about the vegan— this healthy vegan diet versus the other diets: keto diet, DASH diet, you know, there are a few out there.

And Mediterranean.

I, I the skeptic, I the reluctant follower, I'm slow to adopt science information, I was convinced. And not only that, I was fed the most delicious conference food I have ever had. It was all completely vegan and so delicious. I just did not at all feel deprived.

Oh, I'm going to that one with you next time.

Of course, I had the luxury of somebody making it for me. But it was a really good introduction to, hey, You can do this and it's delicious. You're not deprived and it is definitely the healthiest way to go. So I left that conference and I really jumped into it. And then I will tell you that a few months later, I fell out of it and I spent, you know, 8 months or a year not really following it again. And then in November of 2019, I said, okay, time to get back to being healthy. And I switched back to whole food plant-based, and I have been since. So now it's been about 18 months. Wow. And from November 2019, I— this isn't really related to, you know, most of your audience probably, because I know they're really organized, healthy go-getters.

No, everybody needs help.

I have to say to everybody that just by following one rule, which was that I don't eat anything from animals now, I've now— I've lost 38 pounds. Wow. And I lost 34 of those pounds, like, in about 3 or 4 months.

Wow.

And I'm so grateful that I happened to have started this journey before we really got into the pandemic because I had my one rule. And that's all I could manage emotionally, was just one rule.

No animal products. That was your one rule.

I couldn't be measuring food. I couldn't be counting calories. I couldn't be measuring portions or controlling what time I was eating. It was— that was just going to be too much to expect from myself with so much anxiety and stress. But I, I had already been practicing the— my one rule.

Well, that's amazing.

And so I let it carry me through I just stuck to that. I wasn't too strict about all the other potential smaller rules.

Okay.

And so, but what—

so, but your other major rule is that you weren't eating processed food, right? Because that's the unhealthy vegan. Like, if you're eating like chips all day, that's vegan chips. That's not going to help you be healthy, right?

So my main rule was no animal products, and normally my second rule is no processed at all.

Okay.

But I gave myself— that's why I'm saying I really just stuck to my main rule, because I did give myself some treats. And like, my version of a treat, if I was very feeling very worn out or stressed, would be to have some pasta or have some really healthy bread, which I technically is processed and you normally would minimize it or avoid it. I did not eat whole bags of potato chips and things like that, which are technically vegan.

Yeah.

And I didn't really have, you know, I could eat a whole gallon of sorbet, like a non-dairy sugar dessert.

Okay.

And I wouldn't do anything like that. But if I occasionally wanted something cooked in a little bit of oil or had a little bit of salt, I would do it, where normally that would not be 100% included in my version of the super most healthy eating.

Well, that's an amazing story. And I wanted to— I was going to ask you, like, how did you feel after you went vegan versus before? But now I know because you felt a lot lighter and probably more energetic, right?

When, when my office reopened, I decided that I was going to walk to work and back, and it's a 3-mile walk. I, you know, never would have occurred— never would have considered walking like that before. I just was in a much more couch potato kind of—

you mean before lifestyle medicine or after veganism, or after you lost weight, you felt more—

while I was losing weight and eating only plants, I just had more energy.

Yes, that's amazing.

Yes. And, you know, also like of course we know, I was fitting into my more fun clothes that I felt better in and it just really made me feel so great that I was doing something so good for my health, by the way, that also helps animals. And the planet. And happens to also be good for the environment. So for me, the fact that all three of those things align and are also the best for me is, makes it really hard to imagine that I will ever go back. Wow.

And also I found that after 2 or 3 days on a vegan diet, my energy was going through the roof. I mean, literally 2 or 3 days. And then my palate changed. I don't really crave any of that, you know, but I have to say, I just didn't like the texture of meat more and more. I just couldn't even chew meat. And that's why I kind of stopped. Stopped. I mean, I do care about the environment and all that, but I have to say, I literally can't stand that feeling of chewing meat. I don't know.

Oh, that's interesting. But, uh, that's interesting.

But I've been really happy, and, and I lost 15 pounds in like a month or so.

Amazing, right?

I'm still— yeah.

And you're not— and you're getting more, more nutrients.

Yeah.

Than you ever had before.

But how long had you had that extra weight for before you went vegan?

I have, I have gone up and down in my weight over the years. A few years before hitting that Lifestyle Medicine conference, I had been involved, pretty heavily involved in Beachbody.

So I was doing a lot of, a lot of working out.

It was, um, now I can't even think of her name, but she was The one who had the 21 Day Fix. So that was a— and that really worked for me. I lost a lot of weight. I got in amazing shape. But that was— and that was basically based on portion control, which I've decided I don't ever want to do because I like to eat. And I— the way I eat now, I can literally eat as much food as I want at any time.

Yeah, but are you eating like a lot of fruit? I've seen a lot of— some vegans just eat a ton of fruit. I don't know if that's great for you. I mean, I try to vary, you know, a lot of vegetables and fruit, and I use Dr. Greger's Daily Dozen. Do you use that?

I know it in the back of my mind, but I don't want to have to follow a list. So I, I do eat a lot of fruit. I allow myself to eat whatever fruit I want as much as I want because I learned from Dr. Greger and others.

Yeah.

That if it's whole fruit and it contains the fiber and the water and the vitamins, that your body does not recognize it as what we would think of as bad sugar.

Yeah.

So I have no restriction on fruit, and I use it for my— for a refreshing breakfast, which also hydrates me in the morning. And I use it for dessert when it's, you know, 9 o'clock at night or 10 o'clock at night, and I'm craving what would normally be something like ice cream.

Uh-huh.

I take pieces of frozen cut-up fruit out of my freezer and I just eat those as much as I want. And it's very satisfying because it's cold, it's juicy, it's sweet, just like ice cream would be.

I love it.

I love it. So, and what about your skin? Did you see any changes in your skin?

I, my skin has settled down. I didn't really have a, you know, at the age I happened to be at, I wasn't having a lot of skin issues. And I've through my life not had a lot of terrible problem with my skin, but I definitely noticed it kind of settled down a little. It depuffed a little bit and got a little brighter. And, you know, people comment on my skin all the time.

Your skin looks amazing.

Your skin is so amazing. Oh, it's because you're a dermatologist. And I just, you know, sometimes I bite my tongue and I don't say, actually, I'm not doing anything to my skin. I'm too— I'm honestly too lazy for that. The truth is I'm too lazy.

Well, you told them now on this podcast, so now they know why.

That's right. It is— I fully attribute any of my skin glow and looking younger now to the fact that I'm not eating inflammatory foods that are causing me to— my body to hold inflammation, be swollen, be puffy, be red, be flaky, be breaking out, because I'm getting these healthy nutrients from the nuts, the seeds, the vegetables, the, the fruits.

Awesome.

And, you know, my son is back from college, and, you know, he had a little bit of, uh But, you know, he turned 21 this year, and so I think he was drinking a little more than usual and maybe partying a little at the end, which is all great. But I would highly recommend anybody who's, you know, home for summer to consider going vegan, even for a little while. I don't think it has to be a long time to, you know, notice the benefits.

It's also, I would say, probably easiest to try it first in the summer because our bodies crave cooler, fresher foods in the summer. It's easier for us to eat salads and fruits and enjoy vegetables more. And I think in the winter, we start to crave more of those denser comfort foods. That's true.

That's absolutely true. Yeah.

So I think summer's a great time. And what you said about alcohol, Yes, let's go back to that. I wanted to just specifically address it because lifestyle medicine as a field, there are 6 formal pillars of healthy lifestyle choices. One of them is nutrition. It's food as medicine. One of them we've talked about a little bit is sleep and healthy sleep. One of them is physical activity and exercise. One of them is stress management. And mindfulness. That's a pillar by itself. One of them is healthy relationships and healthy social interactions and social support. But the sixth pillar is actually minimizing toxic substances. And they mainly talk about smoking and alcohol. I include pollution, environmental toxins, and toxins in our skin products.

Mm-hmm.

But alcohol really is a toxin. I'm sorry to say.

No, don't be sorry. I, I—

research now shows, brand new research has overcome this myth floating around that 1 or 2 glasses of alcohol a day is healthy for men and 1 is healthy for women. And the global overarching research now shows that any amount of alcohol more than zero is actually bad for us overall. So especially for skin, alcohol causes inflammation, it causes bloating, it causes our skin to be dried out and irritated, and it can actually be one of the main triggers for a skin condition that is very hard to manage.

Is it cystic acne?

It's cystic acne. For cystic acne, I think can be a factor because when we're drinking alcohol We're also tending to not sleep well and we're not eating healthy.

Uh-huh.

But alcohol directly is a risk factor and a trigger for rosacea.

Oh, okay.

Which comes in many forms, including just redness and flushing of our nose and cheeks.

Mm-hmm.

And it causes an extreme version called— which causes that lumpy nose that we associate with pictures of people who are alcoholics. That's called rhinophyma.

But you have to be like really heavy drinker for that, right?

For many years for that, you have to be a heavy drinker but also genetically prone to the rosacea. And I just want to also backtrack and say there are many triggers for rosacea— dietary triggers and genetic triggers. So when you see these faces, it does not mean that somebody's an alcoholic, but Alcohol can be a major trigger for it. So if you are drinking and you notice that your face tends to be red, reducing the alcohol can settle the rosacea down. While we're on the topic of alcohol, alcohol is also one of the known direct triggers and links in psoriasis.

Mm.

So a lot of times It's sort of a vicious cycle and it's a very sad situation because people who have a terrible problem with psoriasis, it can be really socially debilitating and make people very self-conscious. So they may soothe that stress and anxiety with a variety of things that tend to make the psoriasis worse. One of them is alcohol. One of them, other proven triggers for psoriasis is smoking.

Oh yeah.

And a third proven association and trigger for psoriasis is actually what they, they say obesity. They use the word obesity, but extreme overweight is its own trigger for psoriasis. So if patients, if people are able to get their diets managed and healthy and lose some weight, the weight loss itself helps the skin clear up because obesity— yeah, obesity is an inflammatory state, as you're saying.

Yes.

Smoking and, and alcohol, those three do affect the skin so directly in a situation like psoriasis.

And then of course it affects sleep, so then you're getting less sleep, so then that affects your skin too, right?

It's—

alcohol, as I'm sure you've talked about, is really disruptive.

But now what about marijuana? Because now it's legalized and it's everywhere. So do you know, have any data on that?

I don't have any data on marijuana as an inflammatory issue, or— I, I don't know. And I'm sure that there are people out—

yeah.

And you know, then we're also coming— but are we, are we talking about the smoking?

Are we talking about ingesting the chemicals, uh, I think a lot of people, right? A lot of kids.

So there's so much. Yeah, there's so much to talk about. Yeah, I— that one I don't know yet for skin.

Well, I guess we're gonna find out soon because it's gonna be pretty much everywhere.

Well, don't get me started on having to walk down New York City streets and smell other people's decisions.

Well, I'm just worried about the drivers.

Right?

Okay, so awesome. So that was an amazing story. Thank you for sharing that with us about your health, your own health. And I'm so happy that we can have a vegan lunch together when we meet in person.

Yes, that'll be amazing.

And I can't see myself going back either, but I, you know, I don't like try to push it on people. It's really what, you know, feels good for you. And what you need in your body at the time, you know?

Well, I like to say I truly agree.

But the science is indisputable, like you said. It literally, you know, there's so much evidence.

Right, I do wanna say I like to talk to people who are plant, I say, I use the word that I made up, I thought I made it up, plant curious. I don't expect people to magically become vegan. But I say don't think of it as taking things out of your diet. Don't start by feeling like you're not allowed to eat certain things. My approach is add in. Add in piles of fruits and vegetables. Add in nuts and seeds. Add in more beans, more legumes, chickpeas. Make that more conscious in your dietary choices. If you have room for the other stuff too and you want it, Go ahead, but let's crowd, let's gradually think about crowding it out.

Mm-hmm. And I mean, there are genetic differences for people. So some people could, you know, eat some meat and have the Mediterranean diet and be healthy for, you know, 100 years, right? So it just depends on what you need at the time.

Right. Of course, nutritional science, like I said, is very, very complex. And so many different lifestyle factors and genetic factors go into everything.

But if you're having issues with inflammation or, you know, weight gain, all of these things that we talked about, I think people should definitely give veganism a try. I—

right, whole food plant-based diets can be valuable, can be valuable for many.

But people, people are shocked though when they find out like oils are also part of the process. So, you know, you try to limit that. Anyway, that's for another story, right?

I know I'm not bringing up all— I'm not bringing up the scary details. As you said, we're not trying to say that convert immediately today, but definitely investigate.

Okay, that was awesome. Thank you so much for being here, Jessica, and I will talk to you again about some of the questions that our listeners had.

It's my pleasure, and I look forward to coming back any time. It's been an honor.

That was Dr. Jessica Cramp. She practices lifestyle medicine and dermatology in Manhattan. Her greatest joy and passion right now is guiding people to their optimal health. Tune in to Dr. Krantz's new podcast, Save Your Own Skin, and please follow her on Instagram @DrKrantzTheSkinMD. You can also find more information about her on Art of Dermatology, .com.

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