The Root Causes of Hashimoto's: Toxins, Gut Health, and Infections with Dr. Isabella Wentz

Hi everybody, I'm Dr. Sanda Moldovan, periodontist and nutritionist. Welcome to the Holistic Dentistry Podcast, the show that gives you the tips and tools to detoxify your mouth for a healthier body as we explore together the root cause of disease. Remember, you're not healthy until your mouth is healthy, so take care of it in the most in a natural way. Hi everyone. Welcome to another episode on the Holistic Dentistry Show. I'm your host, Dr. Sanda Moldovan, and I'm here in beautiful Cannes for the debut of Shield. And with me is Dr. Isabella Wentz, uh, who's here enjoying this beautiful beach. And we're here to talk about health. Dr. Wentz, welcome to the show.

Oh, Dr. Moldovan, thank you so much for having me. What a joy to be here with you.

I want to tell everybody a little bit about you because You've really transformed the way you practice medicine. You are a solution-focused integrative, uh, pharmacist dedicated to finding the root cause of chronic health conditions. You actually had your own struggles with thyroid. So let's start with that and tell us a little bit about that. What happened?

Sure. So in full disclosure, I was never interested in the thyroid gland during pharmacy school. I thought it was this very boring little organ and people tended to lose function as they got older. So I was expecting this would happen in my 50s or 60s, right? However, I got diagnosed with an autoimmune thyroid condition in my 20s after almost a decade of some confusing debilitating symptoms. I had chronic fatigue that kept me sleeping for 12+ hours a night. I had trouble getting outta bed in the morning. I had panic attacks, anxiety, irritable bowel syndrome, carpal tunnel in both arms. Like my symptom list just went on and on, and every few months I felt like I had new symptoms from acid reflux to not being able to go to my yoga class because of the carpal tunnel. I felt like my life and my world was just getting smaller and smaller. And so at a certain point I was already a practicing pharmacist and I realized that not all doctors are created equally, and I ended up getting the diagnosis of Hashimoto's thyroiditis and subclinical hypothyroidism.

Wow. Was that recognized right away?

It took almost 10 years to get a proper diagnosis because doctors didn't do the correct tests for me. So they looked at my TSH level, which is something that gets elevated when you don't have enough thyroid hormone circulating. However, during the first 5, 10, 15 years of Hashimoto's, that TSH level might come up normal, it might fluctuate. And so depending on the day you test it, you might not be able to find this autoimmune thyroid condition. It wasn't until a doctor tested my thyroid antibodies, which were in the 2000+ range, the normal range being under 35, is when I got that Hashimoto's diagnosis. Wow. And it was a doctor that did a little bit more investigative work, and this explains so many of the symptoms that I had had.

Is it common for doctors today to test for, uh, thyroid antibodies?

No, they will only test for thyroid antibodies if the TSH test comes up elevated. Or too low. Now the tricky thing is, again, those thyroid antibodies are gonna show up before the TSH changes. So 5 to 10, 15 years is the average time for it takes a woman to be diagnosed even though she's having fertility challenges, panic attacks, anxiety, hair loss, weight challenges, feeling fatigued. And so it's a, I feel like it's a complete crime. I feel like everybody, every woman of childbearing age should be able to get their thyroid antibodies tested. And this should be an annual test to see your baseline and if they've been elevated, because you can actually do something about those antibodies. Mm-hmm. Get the autoimmune inflammation down and prevent the need for thyroid medications. Not to mention all the symptoms that you can have for years.

So you were struggling for 10 years?

Almost 10 years.

And then you discovered you had these antibodies. What did you do next?

Being a pharmacist, I was super excited to get on thyroid medications. I was like, this is gonna help. Yes. Medicine. Unfortunately, it wasn't the miracle pill I was looking for. And so this is how I became a thyroid expert, was really through my my own journey trying to figure out, you know, what are the fish oils? What are the snake oils? What this whole world of integrative medicine. I started going into published research on PubMed. I started going into patient forums. I started going to integrative doctors, trying different things on myself to see what I can do to feel halfway human, right?

Yes.

Um, I was able to eventually get my Hashimoto's antibodies into remission and get rid of all my symptoms. I have two beautiful children now. Yay. And I'm not tired anymore.

Yes. I love it. And how do you help patients today?

These days I really focus on education, so I've written five books so far. My first book was Hashimoto's: The Root Cause. It became a New York Times bestseller, and it was all of the research that you need to get yourself better when you have Hashimoto's. The second book is called Hashimoto's Protocol, which is a 90-day plan that helps people reverse their thyroid symptoms. And I share a lot of information online and I have courses and I also have a supplement line to help people figure out what's triggering their thyroid condition and how to get themselves back into balance. I also do some client work and coaching. However, my, my goal was never to become like a concierge practitioner where only like very rich people could access my services and whatnot.

Mm-hmm.

Because there's so many people with thyroid disease and they're not getting the care that they need. So my goal is to get the information out there for free or for as little money as possible. So my website and my social media, my books, these are very low-cost resources or free resources.

Thank you so much for being so generous. You know, as a, as a dentist, actually see more and more young women with Hashimoto's. Do you see an increase in Hashimoto's?

It's interesting because there's always the question, are the diagnostics getting better or are we actually having more of a disease? Right?

Mm-hmm.

And so looking at a, a study done in Italy a few decades ago, they actually looked at the blood of people that was frozen from, you know, 20, 30 years ago and today's blood, and they found that the rates of thyroid antibodies actually increased, right? And so we do see an increase in thyroid antibodies with modern life.

Yeah. What do you think that's coming from? Like, is there a specific thing in this, you know, lifestyle that we live in? Is it stress? Which one is that?

Gosh, I mean, there's a lot of different triggers. That can be traced back to thyroid health. But if I had to choose one, I would probably say environmental toxins. So the thyroid tends to accumulate iodine and also is, it's an accumulator of toxins. And so toxic exposure can really lead our immune system to be dysfunctional and that can lead to autoimmune thyroid disease. But there's also food sensitivities. Our food quality is not what it used to be. There's the omega-3 ratio, so we're constantly eating things that are inflammatory to us and which creates autoimmune disease. There's the stress component. Stress does tend to precede many health conditions. We know that. Yeah. Of course there's gut health. A lot of the food additives and toxins in our food, as well as infections that we might be exposed to, these can actually lead us to have gut dysfunction. And so I, I have about 6 different categories that I look for when I'm trying to help a person figure out their root cause.

Amazing. I wanna go back to what you mentioned on toxicity because I talk a lot about the mouth being one of the big sources of toxicity for people. Is that something you look at? Do you know that any, are there any mouth triggers that actually can trigger, uh, autoimmunity for thyroid?

Yes, actually, uh, biological dentistry is, I'm a big proponent of, of that and helping people figure out their root causes. Sometimes the root causes are in their mouth, like a root canal, for example. That's been tied to thyroid cancer, thyroid nodule, autoimmune thyroid disease. I would find dental x-rays, if they're done without a thyroid shield, they can actually cause thyroid dysfunction. Fluoride in our water supply and in our dental products, what not many people realize is that it has, um, a mild thyroid suppressant activity. And so it used to be used for an overactive thyroid.

Wow.

And the dosages we can get from our filtered water, or the dosages we can get from fluoridated water that's not been filtered on a daily basis. This can actually lead to thyroid suppression. There are interesting studies, just large population studies done in communities that add fluoride to the water supply versus the ones that don't. And the fluoridated communities do tend to have higher levels of thyroid dysfunction and hypothyroidism. Beyond that, we can have periodontitis. Mm-hmm. The, the infections associated with periodontitis and that inflammation has been tied to Hashimoto's and then mercury amalgams. So mercury is a potent thyroid toxin and in some cases when people have these antibodies that they form to mercury, this can cross-react with their thyroid. So yes, absolutely. Wow.

Amazing. And I'm so glad you brought up the fluoride issue because right now there's a, you know, a big lawsuit going on between IOMT. We're trying to— the Biological Dental Society, we hired attorneys and we went all the way to the Supreme Court level. And the Supreme Court recognized that there's no amount of good fluoride in the water, of safe fluoride in the water. And the hardest part right now is trying to get the fluoride out of the water. They already established that, but the ADA is actually trying to fight against it, saying no, fluoride is just fine. We got to leave fluoride in the water. Yes. So what are your thoughts on that?

Well, it's interesting. I'm European, so I grew up in Poland and one of my cousins is a dentist in Poland and she, she asked me, she goes, Isabella, is it true that in the US they just add fluoride to the water instead of telling people to have better dental hygiene and not eat as much sugar?

Shocking, but it's true.

But I mean, yeah, I mean, we are subjected to being medicated without our consent. So if I don't want a medication in my water supply, then I have to filter that. I'm a pharmacist. I'm a proponent of using the right medicine for the right person at the right time in the right dosage. I do not medicate people without their consent.

Yes. You bring up a good point. It's like, how is this even allowed? Because fluoride is a medication. Sometimes people write prescriptions, unfortunately, for, for children, uh, less and less so now. But how is this even allowed without a consent? So I hope the ADA is listening, the American Dental Association, because they're wasting really the ADA membership dollars to find a battle that is totally unhealthy.

And I also feel if people want to add fluoride to their routine, they can absolutely do so. So they can have that choice. If they believe in it, they can purchase fluoridated water, there are fluoridated drops that can be given to children, not that I would advocate for that, um, fluoridated toothpaste. So people can absolutely make that choice, but again, it shouldn't be the government trying to make those choices for us. In thyroid health, also excess iodine in the salt supply has been recognized as an environmental trigger for autoimmune thyroid disease. And again, you have to be kind of like the weird person with a tinfoil hat and get noniodized salt when you have a thyroid condition. And so many people struggle with thyroid issues. 1 in 5 women at some point will be diagnosed with a thyroid condition. And so this is very, very common. And we're poisoning up to 20% of our population with things from, you know, well-intentioned public health officials, right?

You also bring up mercury, which is a big problem in dentistry. Europe has banned mercury fillings to be placed in United States, unfortunately not. And a lot of times I get angry dentists when I post that mercury is toxic, we shouldn't be using it. Mercury is just fine. There's no problem. So what kind of studies have you seen there? What have you seen in your patients regarding mercury toxicity and thyroid health?

What I've seen is the MELISA test. If they're positive on that MELISA test, then if they have their amalgams removed in a proper way, and we can, perhaps you can speak more to that than I can, then their antibodies will actually go down. Their thyroid antibodies can reduce. If they are negative on that MELISA test, that might not be the highest priority for them, but that's an indication that there is some immune reactivity with those mercury amalgams if that test comes up positive.

Interesting. So you see just by, just through the removal of mercury filling and replacing 'em, or, or you also help 'em do some detoxification?

I'm a big proponent of supporting liver pathways. One of the things that I found accidentally with my clients that works wonders is supporting their liver. And typically what this looks like is doing sauna 4 times a week for 30 minutes a day over the course of 2 weeks. And then I put them on a 2-week liver protocol where we utilize like N-acetylcysteine, milk thistle, a lot of these nutrients that serve as cofactors for the different metabolic pathways, like, you know, glucuronidation and glutathione conjugation and so on and so forth to remove toxins from our body. And so over the course of 2 weeks, I see about an 80% improvement rate in people with Hashimoto's and thyroid dysfunction as far as their symptoms go, just because that toxic backlog starts to get moved out and it's less forceful on the body than doing something like a, like a juice cleanse or chelation therapy.

Mm-hmm.

But generally speaking, you would wanna make sure that if you do have amalgams or any kind of toxins, you would, you would go through a process of getting them removed properly. Otherwise, you can actually make yourself sicker.

Absolutely. And the IAOMT has a great protocol that we follow in our practices to remove mercury safely so we don't inhale it or swallow it during the process of removal. In as little as 2 weeks, you actually see a change in the way people feel.

Absolutely. One of my clients was somebody that struggled with multiple chemical sensitivities, so she couldn't even go past like a Yankee Candle store without feeling physically ill. Wow. And we put her on the liver reset and it was right around Christmas and she said, I feel so much better. My brain fog fatigue has lifted and I can go shopping at the mall with my daughter. Like I can actually exist in this world without everything making me so sick. When you think about all the chemicals that we're exposed to with, we, our body has an its own way to detoxify and that's through our liver, through our urine, through our stool, through our sweat. And when a person is hypothyroid, they're never gonna complain about this, but they're not gonna be sweating. So they're losing that detox pathway. A lot of times they're constipated, so they're losing that detox pathway and a lot of their hormones and medications and everything they've been exposed to kind of recirculates and the liver gets this unfair burden. And what ends up happening is they become nutrient deficient from a lot of the amino acids and from a lot of the cofactors that are required for proper liver function. And so just giving them that support makes such a big difference. And I mean, better muscle composition, people losing weight without trying, their skin improving, all of these weird things like really, really improve within just 2 weeks when you just support their liver and like clear out that toxic backlog a little bit, right?

Mm-hmm. Absolutely. I would love to hear your thoughts on oral infections. Let's say a root canal infection or a tooth infection. Can that affect thyroid health?

Absolutely. Any kind of infections, what we have to think about is there's gonna be some kind of proteins on the bacteria or the virus, and they can cross-react with proteins on our thyroid gland. And so the immune system's gonna recommend— the immune system's gonna recognize that infectious organism by these protein structures. And what it does is it catalogs this and then it'll say, okay, see these three? Sequence amino acids, this is what we're gonna attack. And if there's some cross-reactivity, like let's say a part of the thyroid has these same 3 amino acids in a row, then the immune system's gonna attack the thyroid while it's attempting to clear the body of that infection. H. pylori, the bacteria that causes stomach ulcers and acid reflux, Borrelia that causes Lyme disease, are 2 of the ones that have been very much described in the literature. But there are many, many others with cross-reactive sites.

And you know what's interesting? I do cavitation surgery, which are chronic infections in the jawbone, and I test every single one of them. And we do find H. pylori in the jawbone and Borrelia as well in the jawbone. And I haven't compiled all the data yet, but I've done probably a few hundred cavitations that I've biopsied this way. And I'm curious to see if there is a correlation also with health, like thyroid. I think more, more papers. We need to solidify this connection between oral health and thyroid health.

Absolutely. And I would love to help you spread the word because this is such important work that you're doing.

It's so true. And, and you know, on our show we actually have patients that are listening and I know they're getting so much benefit from what you have to share. So thank you for being here. But we also have dentists and hygienists. Who, who are not even thinking that thyroid can even affect, or things in the mouth can affect thyroid health. Interestingly, your last book, you're focusing on IBS, Finding and Treating the Root Cause of IBS. So how come the shift?

Well, it's actually not a shift. It's more of an expansion of my work.

Okay.

When I have worked with thousands of people with Hashimoto's and autoimmune thyroid disease, a big part of what's going on is gut dysfunction. Dr. Alessio Fasano has found that for every case of autoimmune disease, 3 things need to be present. One of them is going to be a genetic predisposition. The second one is gonna be some kind of a trigger, so potentially an infection or maybe a toxin that we're exposed to. And then the third piece is going to be intestinal permeability, also known as leaky gut. And really my work with clients and educating my community has focused on We can't really change your genes, right? Not, not this day and age. Yeah. Maybe in the future we can try to figure out what some of your triggers are and we can try to reduce those triggers. Maybe there's a toxin, maybe there's a food sensitivity, maybe there's an infection that you have. We're gonna try to figure it out and address it. That's gonna be a part of it. And then the third piece is we can always work on your gut. Even if I don't know what the trigger was, even if it's some viral infection that your body can't necessarily clear, that autoimmune is gonna express itself when you have your intestinal permeability happening. And so people are like, well, intestinal permeability, what are the symptoms? And basically the symptoms are abdominal pain, bloating, constipation, diarrhea, urgency, or a person can be, can be asymptomatic. Now, if you've heard those symptoms and you have worked in the realm of diagnosis, or maybe you're a patient, you probably realize those are IBS symptoms. And so there's a lot of different causes of IBS. I've identified about 30+ causes, and addressing IBS can help a person's digestive symptoms improve, but also it can help their skin improve. It can help their brain function, their mood improve. It can help improve their thyroid function. It can help their— prevent autoimmune disease. It can get their fertility markers optimized. And even randomly it can improve TMJ. So like, yes, there's just this big connection with the gut. And I found with my thyroid patients, I've always working on their gut. So I wanted to get the information out there for people with other conditions that need to heal their gut.

Yes. You know, in my practice I see so many patients with undiagnosed leaky gut and they come to me because I'm a periodontist and I look and we always say leaky gums, leaky gut. And what I found interesting is this one patient who actually disappeared for about 6 months. He had moderate periodontitis. He came back, I remeasured everything. Everything's gone. The inflammation in his gums were gone. I said, what have you been doing? And he also lost 30 pounds. Said, well, you know, I've been working on gut health and I've been working on my leaky gut. And it's amazing, without any dental treatment, his periodontitis had resolved.

Isn't that amazing?

Yes. So there's such a strong connection. The opening of the GI tract being the mouth, it definitely, we see signs. I always say when somebody opens their mouth and we check their mouth, we see the tongue, the teeth, the gums. It gives me a pretty good clue on what's happening with their body.

Yeah.

And then I make the right referral. Hey, okay, I think you need to look deeper here because obviously we can recognize signs, but as dentists, we cannot treat them. So thank God there's people like you where we can send, especially patients like this to get more resources. Anything else that we haven't talked about that you want our audience to hear?

I definitely would say if you have been diagnosed with a thyroid condition, you wanna advocate for yourself and Some people ask me about seeing the best endocrinologist. They can help with the diagnosis part for sure, but oftentimes you do need to think outside of the box. There are nutritional triggers. For example, gluten sensitivity can be a really powerful trigger for thyroid dysfunction that you might need to address. And if you don't get the right thing addressed, you're gonna be struggling with symptoms and you're gonna be get— getting the runaround from conventional medicine. I encourage people to educate themselves. My most popular book is Hashimoto's Protocol. A lot of people have been able to help themselves with that book, just following that protocol, oftentimes working alongside with their practitioners, just helping themselves to get into remission. People will say that thyroid antibodies don't matter and that you only need to measure them once and that lowering them does not make a difference. I respectfully disagree. Lowering your thyroid antibodies can be very, very helpful for many of your symptoms. They are an indirect marker of your autoimmune process and inflammation. There's a dozen ways to reduce them. Figuring out your food sensitivities, getting rid of those infections, helping support your glutathione status. This would be with selenium and acetylcysteine or glu— glutathione. These can be very, very helpful ways to rather quickly reduce the autoimmune component in your body and you start feeling better. You start feeling human again.

Amazing. Where can people find some resources? Where can people find you?

Sure. My website is thyroidpharmacist.com. And that's probably the best place to start if you're looking for articles. I have about 1,000 articles that go into deep connections. So I have a periodontitis article that— how that connects with thyroid disease. I have a gluten article, I have a selenium article, I have an article on how to reduce your thyroid antibodies, which thyroid labs to ask for, pretty much any thyroid symptom. What are the specific steps you need to do to resolve that symptom, whether that's fatigue, hair loss or weight loss. So I hope that resource can help people take charge of their own health. 'Cause I know I was sick for many, many years. I lost most of my 20s to chronic illness, and I want people to be able to live their best lives and enjoy life and have a vibrant life.

I love it. Yes. Dr. Isabella Wentz, thank you so much for being on the show. I know everyone listening has gotten a lot of amazing resources from you and amazing knowledge that can help themselves or somebody close to them. So for everyone listening, if you know somebody who has Hashimoto's or autoimmune issues, please share with them this episode and go ahead and comment at Dr. Sanda on Instagram or on our YouTube channel for any other topics that you might want to listen and see how oral health is connected to overall health. Until next time, stay healthy. Thank you so much for joining me this week. Please make sure you check out the show notes for any links mentioned in the show. If you like today's show, please invite your friends to listen as well. That would mean a lot to me. Do you have a question you'd like me to answer? Message me on Instagram @DrSandaMoldovan. This is Dr. Sanda Moldovan, and remember, your mouth is the gateway to your health, so take care of it in the most natural and best way possible.