Why Fatty Liver Is So Common And How To Heal It

Coming up on this episode of the Doctor's Pharmacy.

So if you want to get rid of fatty liver or avoid it, do not eat anything with high fructose corn syrup. In fact, there's one thing you can do to radically change your life is avoid every single food product with high fructose corn syrup.

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Hey everybody, it's Dr. Mark Hyman. Welcome to the Doctor's Pharmacy, a place for conversations that matter. And today I'm bringing you a special feature of the Doctor's Pharmacy called Health Bites. And these bites of information are to improve your health because taking little small steps daily can lead to significant health changes over time. Now, there is a very common disease out there that you might never have heard about that affects so many people, 90 million Americans in fact, and it's a major risk factor for heart disease, diabetes, cancer and dementia and lots more, and it's called fatty liver disease or non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. Now, what causes it? Well, in a word, sugar. And not just any sugar, we're going to talk about the kinds of sugar, so pay attention because this is an easy thing to fix, but it's deadly and it affects so many people. So we're going to cover how to find out if you have it, what causes it, and how to fix it. so what is fatty liver? Well, essentially, you know what it is because you've probably eaten it as foie gras or pâté. Okay, this is actually food that's created by force feeding ducks or goose, geese, whatever, starch. They basically, it's very sad, it's horrible actually, it's cruel, but they take A big pipe, they stick it down the duck's throat, and then they force feed them corn, which is basically carbohydrate, which turns to sugar. And that starts this process in the liver called lipogenesis, meaning production of fat, which is the body's normal response to sugar. We also think for so many years that fat causes you to be fat, but it's actually not fat that causes you to be fat, it's starch and sugar. and not just any kind of sugar. We're gonna talk about fructose in a minute and why it's such a unique factor in fatty liver disease. So bad news, you don't want foie gras for a liver. Basically, foie gras means fatty liver in French. And the biggest cause in America, guess what, is soda. Soda. Which is a huge portion of our calories in America. There are literally billions and billions and billions of servings of soda consumed in America each year. And that's what's driving so much of this problem. So it's not just that it's soda, but what's in the soda. We're going to talk about what's in the soda and why it's so bad in a minute. But first, I want to tell you how do you know if you have fatty liver? Well, sometimes you can get your blood test when you go to your doctor, get your liver test done, but they're typically going to be normal, even if you have a fatty liver, unless it's really, really bad. Now, there are better tests and some tests are more sensitive for fatty liver. For example, there's a test called AST, which is a liver test, also GGT, another liver test. If these are even at the high end of normal or a little high, I would be concerned. I also would say that there are other tests that are more sensitive. For example, a liver scan, there's something called a fibro scan, which looks at the liver like an ultrasound kind of scan. and it can tell you the degree of fatty liver and the fact of how bad it is if you have scarring or not in your liver. You can also do an MRI of your liver, and I've had that done as part of a total body screening MRI, and your liver fat should be less than 2%, mine was, but I see people with liver fats of 20 or more, which is quite concerning, and that is the big risk factor of all the diseases we talked about, 'cause it generates inflammation, it prevents you from detoxifying, it makes you have worse cholesterol, it worsens your blood sugar, it worsens insulin, it creates this whole cascade of problems that's a consequence of eating too much starch and sugar. So this cascade is really driving insulin resistance, diabetes, prediabetes, and basically causes all this organ fat all around your belly, this belly fat. And this dangerous belly fat is what really drives so much of the heart disease, diabetes, cancer, dementia that we see today. It'll cause things like high triglycerides or low HDL. It'll cause small cholesterol particles that you can see on a special scan called NMR, lipids or cardio IQ from and lab core Quest, which routinely do these tests now, and that puts you at high risk for heart disease. Certain populations might be more susceptible to this genetically. For example, Latin Americans have much more risk. I, I went to a conference on obesity, and it was in troll on obesity in children. And I saw this guy who was a, a GI liver specialist there. And I'm like, well, why are you here? He says, well, we're now seeing fatty liver in 12 years old. and they're on the transplant list because their livers are so scarred from drinking so much soda for so many years. That's scary to me. When a teenager needs a liver transplant from drinking soda, we have a problem. So what I would say, you know, you don't want a liver transplant. And the good news is the good news is you can actually fix the problem. There aren't really any medications to fix it, unfortunately, but there's a lot of lifestyle things, a lot of diet things a lot of supplements and a lot of foods that can make a huge difference in fixing fatty liver. So it's not only what you don't eat, meaning starch and sugar and high fructose corn syrup, but also what you do eat, all the detoxifying liver supporting foods that we're gonna talk about in a minute. So what food should we particularly be concerned about? Well, there's been a lot of research lately about fructose and fatty liver and fructose is absorbed differently than regular sugar. It just goes right in. And high fructose corn syrup, the difference with high fructose corn syrup, unlike for example fruit which has fructose and glucose but it's all packed in a fiber matrix with lots of vitamins and minerals and lots of phytochemicals and lots of antioxidants, doesn't get absorbed super quickly. That's okay, eat fruit. But when you have high fructose corn syrup, it's free fructose, it's not bound to the glucose molecule, because sucrose basically.

Is.

Glucose plus fructose. That's what sucrose or table sugar is. But when you actually separate out the fructose and the sucrose, you end up with this free fructose. And it's often not just a 50/50 with sugar, with for example glucose, it's maybe 75% fructose. And that's what you see often in sodas or anything with high fructose corn syrup. So if you wanna get rid of fatty liver, or avoid it, do not eat anything with high fructose corn syrup. In fact, there's one thing you can do to radically change your life is avoid every single food product with high fructose corn syrup. Just get rid of it. There's no need for it. It's super toxic and it has no health benefits. In fact, it has a lot of harms and it's just a sign of poor quality food. So make sure you get rid of all of that. And it's in everything. It's in salad dressing, it's in tomato sauce. I mean, there may be more servings of high fructose corn syrup in your tomato sauce for your pasta than there is in two Oreo cookies. so get rid of it. No exceptions, 100%. If you make one rule about diet, no one's gonna argue with that, like nobody, whether you're a vegan or paleo or raw food or low fat, high fat, low carb, high carb, nobody's gonna say high fructose corn syrup is good for you. Second is starch. So it kind of doesn't matter what it is, if it's starchy or sugary, it's gonna be also a problem. Remember the ducks who were force-fed corn, foie gras? Well, that is a form of starch. And it sounds like, oh, corn's good, what's wrong with corn? But actually, even whole grain corn is a problem. Whole wheat or whole grain flour is a problem. It's just starch. And when it's broken down like that, it's a problem. Now, if it's in whole kernel bread, like whole kernel rye, or whether it's in, you know, whole beans or whole grains, not as much of a problem, especially if you eat it with a matrix of food, of protein and fat. It's mostly absorbed, has fiber in it, very different. But if you eat any of that floury starchy foods, it's going to drive fatty liver. And that's what's really, what's really driving this. I've written a lot about this. I've written all my books, the Blood Sugar Solution, the Detox Diet, Food, what the heck should I eat, the Pegan Diet. I go a lot into all this, but it's basically, you know, below the neck, your body can't tell the difference between a bagel and a soda. So when you're eating a bagel or having a slice of bread, you think you're doing okay, and you're not. And you just, you need to think of it like a treat. or a drug? I mean, do I have alcohol? Yeah, rarely. I'll have a drink, but I don't have it every day at every meal, which is what we do in America. Also, you want to do things that really help to heal your liver. Now, first is getting rid of the bad stuff. Obviously, you go to starch, sugar, processed foods. Next is up the good fats. Fat heals your liver, particularly MCT oil, which is a derivative of coconut oil. That can be very helpful. But avocados, olive oil, nuts and seeds, I mean, even saturated fat from from meat, not a bad problem. Chicken, fish, lots of good oils like macadamia oil and obviously the omega-3 fats are so important. And they're anti-inflammatory and they they help heal the liver. Exercise also exercise will help your body fix its metabolism, fix the insulin resistance and reduce inflammation. Supplements also super important. And I really recommend people do the right supplements for their liver. And there's a bunch of them. If you have a fatty liver, you want to focus on these. one is N-Acetyl Cysteine. This is one that helps you make glutathione in the body. Glutathione is one of the most important detoxifiers and antioxidants in the body. Sadly, there are government agencies that are looking at, quote, turning N-Acetyl Cysteine into a drug and only available by prescription, which would be a tragedy because it's very safe. It's a supplement, but it works so well they're considering a drug, which doesn't make any sense to me. But anyway, that's what's happening. But n-acetyl cysteine is super important. Lipoic acid, another important antioxidant that helps liver. Milk thistle also, it's a great herb that you can use to help heal your liver. And there are other ones like dandelion greens and artichoke hearts and rosemary spices, curcumin, lots of things you can use to help boost your detox system. And of course, you also need all the B vitamins, B12, folate, B6 to help zinc, selenium, magnesium all help your liver heal and repair. So make sure you get those nutrients. Make sure you get the superfoods. The other family of foods I really love are the Brassica family. These are the broccoli, collards, kale, arugula, daikon radish, all help garlic and onions, another great family of foods that contains sulfur, cilantro, parsley, all these are super detoxifying. So make sure that one, you check for fatty liver. If you have a little bit of belly fat or you diet as high in sugar, starch or high fructose corn syrup, there's a pretty high chance you have it. So go get some liver function tests, check a liver scan, see what's going on, and then cut out this high fructose corn syrup, cut out the starch and sugar, dramatically reduce it, eat all the helpful detoxifying foods, and make sure you take the right supplements to boost your pathways for detoxification and heal your liver. Things like lipoic acid, N-acetyl cysteine, milk thistle, of course, magnesium, B vitamins, selenium, zinc, and also you can eat all these other superfoods like the cruciferous vegetables, the garlic and onion family, they're super liver supporters. So just remember this is affecting so many people, probably a third of America, almost never diagnosed, but killing millions and millions of people a year. And there's no reason for it because it's 100% preventable and 100% reversible. So I hope you liked that health bite for today. Be sure to share it with your friends and family on social media and we'll see you next time on the Doctor's Pharmacy.

Hey everybody, it's Dr. Hyman.

Thanks for tuning into the Doctor's Pharmacy. I hope you're loving this podcast. It's one of my favorite things to do and introducing you all the experts that I know and I love and that I've learned so much from. And I want to tell you about something else I'm doing which is called Mark's Picks. It's my weekly newsletter and in it I share my favorite stuff, from foods to supplements to gadgets to tools to enhance your health. It's all the cool stuff that I use and that my team uses to optimize and enhance our health. And I'd love you to sign up for the weekly newsletter. I'll only send it to you once a week on Fridays. Nothing else, I promise. And all you have to do is go to drhyman.com/picks to sign up. That's drhyman.com/picks, P-I-C-K-S, and sign up for the newsletter and I'll share with you my favorite stuff that I use to enhance my health and get healthier and better and live younger longer. Hi everyone.

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