You Can’t Treat What You Don’t Test

Before we dive into today's episode, we would like to take a moment to thank our amazing sponsor, Integrative Peptides. They are dedicated to providing high-quality peptide supplements to support your health and longevity journey. Be sure to visit integrativepeptides.com and use the code PODLIFE for an exclusive discount just for our listeners. If you are a healthcare professional, Visit integrativepeptides.ai to sign up for a free wholesale account and unlock preferred pricing and exclusive access. For any questions or assistance, email our customer service team at cs@integrativepeptides.com or text us at 443-732-5272. Your support helps keep this podcast going strong. Thank you, Integrative Peptides. Now let's jump into today's conversation.

People that are unwilling or don't want to give up gluten, and then they see that they have genes associated with celiac disease or inflammatory bowel disease with the consumption of gluten. So it's like, okay, you know, it's not making you feel great when you eat it. If you keep eating it, you might end up with celiac disease. Do you want to keep eating? So it's, it's motivating.

Welcome to the Peptides and Longevity Podcast. Each week we'll dive into groundbreaking science, innovative therapies, and the future health and longevity. Alongside visionary physicians and experts, we'll explore how peptides, cutting-edge medicine, and lifestyle strategies can redefine the way we age. Get ready to transform your health, optimize your vitality, and unlock the secrets to a longer, healthier life. Let's get started. Hey everybody, I wanna welcome you to the Peptides and Bioregulator Summit. Today we have a real special treat. We have Debbie Brick with us from Maxgen Labs. This is a lab that I've used in the past. A lot of my clinician friends have used their lab panels to help patients overcome a myriad of conditions. You can't treat what you don't know. And so I just love that they provide a cost-effective way for us to have the ability to look at markers that are literally life-changing. Debbie is a functional medicine queen. That's how I'm gonna overarch her cuz she has so many certifications and such a dynamic story to get us kicked off with. Debbie, I'm gonna let you give your own rap sheet of the certs you have and then tell us that incredible story you just shared with me. About your husband to get us kicked off.

Thank you, Michael.

You're so welcome.

So I'm a board-certified holistic nutritionist. I'm also certified in functional genomics, autoimmune, paleo, and even heart math. Wow. But I got into nutrition because not only of my own health struggles, but my husband suffered from ulcerative colitis and it was, it had gotten so bad that he was put on medications that they put cancer patients on to suppress his immune system. Otherwise he had bloody diarrhea and he couldn't even leave the house. And it scared me. I'm like, you're going to end up in the hospital and not coming home. You have no immune system. So that's what inspired me to get into holistic health and functional medicine and I'm happy to report that after a little period of time convincing, he listened to me cuz he got sick of being sick. Let's go. And it's been about 13 years. He's been 100% med-free and in remission. He has like the only signs he has that he even had ulcerative colitis was just some scarring that's over.

Incredible. Let's go. What an amazing story. What an amazing wife. I feel like that even just in the man's sphere of living, so many of my male patients had a hard time receiving treatment. So I'm so glad that he was open to an alternative way. I feel like there needs to be like a resurgence of, of the male species, not just trying to pour whiskey on their wounds and think they're okay, but like actually take our health seriously because something like ulcerative colitis is such a painful, you know, existence. I had diverticulitis, so I can imagine how just that acute pain that I experienced, to have something on the chronic side must have been horrendous for him. So kudos to you, way to be a super wife out there and treat your husband. I feel like that's such a powerful story and hopefully inspiring others to get, you know, on the path of healing for sure. And I'm curious, Debbie, on your certification path, because that's a really unique blend of certifications. What got you in the paleosphere, the autoimmune kind of— what, what led you down that specific route? Was that just you studying or your own feeling on being on a paleo diet or you dealing with autoimmune and seeing, you know, changes kind of? I'm, I'm really curious because I've been through the similar thing. I'm on like a cert path when I was an integrative health coach and I just made one specific to the form of healing I wanted to practice.

Yeah. So when I first started, you know, they're always like, oh, you should have a niche. You should have a niche. And I would take everybody on and my niche was going to be inflammatory bowel disease because I was very passionate about it because of my husband. Um, and many people that came to me, most people that came to me were really, really sick. They had been to many physicians, conventional doctors, they were getting no help. They were told it's all in their head, sent back home with medications, feeling very hopeless. These were actually my favorite clients because they were at a point where you have to be willing to make the changes. You have to be at a point where you're sick of being sick and you're willing to do it because it's, it's all gut health and diet and lifestyle changes. Makes the biggest impact. And so I wanted to learn how best can I serve the autoimmune community. And that's when I signed up for the Autoimmune Paleo program and had wonderful results from that, helping— I'll never forget, one of my favorites was a client with multiple sclerosis and she had like the the shocking in her hands and her feet and face, and she couldn't take a warm shift, take cold showers, she couldn't exercise. And she was unwilling to be that restrictive to go on, because it's restrictive initially. But no, I'm like, you only have to do it for 30 to 90 days and then we can start adding foods back in. Anyway, she, she said, no, I don't want to give up my eggs. I know it's not eggs, but then eventually she made some improvement, but not a lot. And then she decided to do the autoimmune paleo and which removes eggs. And then one of the first foods she added back in after she was, cuz all her symptoms went away, she was feeling great. And then added eggs back in and the shocky came back in her face. She never thought it would've been eggs, but it, it's just a great way to elimination to pinpoint what foods are affecting a person negatively. Cuz even foods that can be healthy. Might not be the best choice for, for some people based on their, their genetics, their disorder, their disease. So it's, it, it just why I went down that path of, uh, Auto Paleo because of the wanting to help people a lot. Wow.

That's awesome. I love that. I can't believe how many people are so affected by eggs. It's unbelievable. I, I read all the studies where like eggs would feed viral replication or Some people didn't have the ability to break down sulfurs correctly. And so they're, they can just be wreaking havoc on your health. And it's one of those things where you would never imagine, cuz on the flip side, everybody says eat, you know, a dozen eggs a day and it'll balance your brain neurochemistry and help omega-3 balancing, all that kind of stuff. And it's like, if it's toxic to you, it's gonna really mess you up. And so you gotta know, you know, you gotta have the right proper testing, the proper, you know, elimination style of eating. You've got to really put in the work to know like what, what's affecting my body. So I love that. That's actually a beautiful segue. I'm curious, Debbie, so you're, you're on this incredible path, you're helping people heal just like the story you shared. What led you all the way to MaxGyn or how did you find their labs? Or, you know, I, I love Chad, the founder. He's been a great friend of mine for a very, very long time and I've spent countless nights with him nerding out and having fun in Vegas and wherever our conferences were. He's just the best human man on the planet. And so I'm curious, how, how, how'd you get connected with that crew?

Yeah, so I'm on a private Facebook group for functional medicine practitioners and, and it was basically when he first started out with MaxGen, I saw a post on there about genetic testing and I was like, genetic and I was super intrigued and right from the get-go. So I've pretty much been using them since they very, since he launched, pretty much like within 6 months of when he launched. I, I'm like, I wanna do this in my practice. And when I started using it in my practice, it was, it was a game changer. I mean, I went from working with people for months and months and months on end. To having a blueprint of their DNA so that I had a direction. Because, you know, you know, when you bring people in, there's so many different dietary paths. And even like autoimmune paleo was great, but it's not low histamine. So that didn't work for everybody. And so, you know, you're spending time, let's try this way of eating, let's try that way of eating. Let's try this supplement. Let's— and maybe that didn't work. And supplements are expensive. And so when, when my clients would purchase supplements and they didn't work or they reacted negatively to them, that I was like, oh, didn't wanna waste their money. And so the genetics takes all that guesswork out. And now we have a blueprint of, okay, now I can see where there's food intolerances. I can see where there's toxins. Where there's, you know, potential oxidative stress, glutathione issues. And it shows you like the, the path of the direction of which to go. And also supplementation. Some people are genetically predisposed to low levels of folate, B12, vitamin D, vitamin A, vitamin E. And it's in the test will, will show you along with symptoms to look for, um, foods that include those nutrients. And it's set up in order of importance. So like when somebody gets the MaxGen test or a practitioner uses it in their practice, it's beautifully designed where it's all laid out. The foundational section, you start with the foundational section, what's in the foundation. Sleep, diet, toxins. I mean, that's what you have to focus on. Then it gets into, you know, oxidative stress and then methylation. Sometimes people jump right to methylation.

Yeah.

And if you're working with somebody that's very ill or very toxic and you jump right to methylation, it could really backfire.

I like that staged approach. It's, it's a powerful way to kind of remove it or take the guesswork out as a practitioner to sort of top, top of funnel going down. 'Cause that's, I've seen it time and time again, practitioners wrecking a patient's body on the methylation side and pushing pathways before removing things that are basically starting the breakdown. And you can't go backwards in healing. You've gotta to, to follow a correct path. And I'm curious, Debbie, is the panel called The Works, is that like the one for everybody or is there different ones at MaxGen that you guys offer? I know The Works personally because Chad allowed me to run The Works on myself and just like you said, look at that breakdown for me was enlightening. So, but do you guys offer different ones or how, how does that work?

Yeah, so The Works is the most popular one. It actually, Contains 3 panels, the function panel, the food panel, and the fitness panel.

Okay.

So they also offer the, uh, function panel by itself. That's the largest part of the test, and that's gonna show methylation, oxidative stress, hormones, histamine intolerance, neurotransmitters, Alzheimer's disease risk, cardiovascular. And then the, um, the food section. And I believe you can get the food section separate. I believe that, yeah, the food is separate and the fitness. I don't think that one is separate. I can't remember off the top of my head. I know they changed it a little bit, but you can just get one or the other, but the, the best value really is the, is the works because you're getting everything. And when I work with people, I, I do the works because I want to see the food section. And also I believe it's very empowering. It's great that the function parts, obviously it's most important, but the food part I like because people that are unwilling or don't want to give up gluten, and then they see that they have genes associated with celiac disease or inflammatory bowel disease, consumption of gluten. So it's like, okay, you know, it's not making you feel great when you eat it. If you keep eating it, you might end up with celiac disease. Do you want to keep eating? So it's, it's motivating. So that's why I love that. And it also looks at lactose intolerance, peanut allergy. That one's actually an allergy. And then there's, there's insulin resistance markers, how the body responds to fats, whether they could— and then it really was so cool as it gets specific as to which dietary path would work best for that person based on their DNA. So it looks at, it takes the whole algorithm. And so the test tests for around 220 genes, gene SNPs. So, but in the beginning pages, it lays it out where it puts the person's results based on those 220, you know, the sections of the genes in those each section. And it will actually show them what would a keto diet work well for them. Mediterranean would be best. And even a hunter-gatherer. And even a DASH diet is for people that have predisposed to high blood pressure. But, you know, when keto was really big, it's still probably pretty big, but now there's, there's many different pathways or dietary paths that people can go on. But I had people come to me where it's like, oh, my, my husband did keto and lost all this weight and he feels fantastic. I tried it and I gained weight and I felt terrible.

Oh yeah.

Because genetically she did not respond well to a keto keto diet. So that's what's cool too. So that's the food. And then the, the fitness part will look at— shows the— how people respond to exercise and their risk for injury and things like that, which is pretty cool. So as far as blood sugar, inflammation, um, and, uh, injury risk.

We will get right back to the episode, but first, a quick thank you to our sponsor, Integrative Peptides. If you are enjoying today's conversation and want to support your health longevity, visit integrativepeptides.com and use the code PODLIFE for an exclusive listener discount. That's integrativepeptides.com, code PODLIFE, P-O-D-L-I-F-E. Now back to the episode.

Got you. And I'm curious, what's the— because I've used all kinds of labs over the years in and out of different functional, you know, medicine practices that I've worked as an integrative health coach and read labs for a long, long time. But what, what do you find is the difference between just drawing out a blood serum and going and, you know, basically spending the price of a small car to get markers that I feel like when you run something like The Works on the genetic side, you still get a really clear layout, but you're not literally laying up half your life savings to purchase a test. Do you find that the accuracy or the efficacy over the years that you've used it, it's, you know, similar if not even better than having to run these, you know, if you ran 220 markers on a standard lab, I mean, it's going to cost you, you know, $10,000+— it's going to cost you a lot of money. So I'm curious the difference, and also what's the technology— and you do not have to get complex for us— but what's the technology that MaxGen is using in order to run so many markers but keep that cost so low?

Yeah, so to answer the first part, what's amazing about genetics is they never change. So your DNA is your DNA. So it's a one and done. So some— so you put the money out, you don't have to do it again. Unlike lab work is only going to show you. And I love, I love lab work. I love blood work and all that, but it's showing you a snapshot in time. And so I've had, I've had clients come to me with like a lot of gut issues and inflammation. And they're like, I'd like to get stool testing and organic acid testing and hormone testing and this testing. And I'm like, okay, that's gonna cost you probably over $1,000 minimum for, for just those tests. And as great as they are, and I, I love those tests, they're showing you how you're already, you already know you don't feel well.

Mm-hmm.

Where we run the genetics and now we have your DNA. Now let's, let's do that first and change your diet, lifestyle, environment, get you, get you feeling based on your DNA. And then we'll go from there. I never run those other tests.

Wow.

Because they're already feeling better because we're making the changes based on their genetics. So I feel that it will, at first it's very affordable, but it saves them so much time and money and frustration. Because of, you know, their genetics, but the, the testing, it is great, like Labwork. So I do recommend specific markers being tested, but most of them are covered by insurance. They're usually covered by insurance. So genetics are not diagnostic, they're a predisposition. So when people look at their genetic test and it says, oh, you know, potential, like low vitamin D, low folate, low B12. That's not saying they are low. It's saying they're genetically predisposed to that. So what do we do? We, so I recommend we do the dietary lifestyle changes and maybe some basic supplements, nothing crazy. And then I recommend that they get tested like about 3 months down the road to see, do we need to boost up? These nutrients. Is it, you know, is that gene expressing where we need to give you extra whatever, or if they have symptoms too, that can also give us a clue as to whether a gene's expressing.

Wow.

And then as far as the way the test thing is done, it's just saliva, a simple cheek swab. And they have a, I forget what it's called, but there's a little vial with some liquid that preserves The sample. So it's just a swab. They swab the inside of their cheek 20 times, and then you snap off the head into the vial, send it to the lab, and MaxGen owns the equipment. So the DNA never leaves the facility. It's never goes to a third party or sold or anything like that. Yeah. So the security to that, it's for Max— the security is extremely important to NextGen. And one of the reasons why Chad started this company was because he was working in a functional medicine practice and they were using like 23andMe. Mm-hmm. And they were selling it on the backend and that's why they can sell the tests for like whatever, like it is $69 or, yeah, you know, cheap like that because they're making money selling the person DNA. And that's like your blueprint. I mean, that is your fingerprint. That's like, you know, and so the other thing too is it's funny, he'll say we have probably about 1,000 SpongeBobs in the system. He doesn't, he doesn't care. He doesn't, you can put whatever name you want. In fact, I do practitioner consults for MaxGen. And when a practitioner signs up for a consult with me, it asks for the vial number. If, or the sample ID number. If they put the person's name, I can't even look it up.

Wow.

I'm like, I'm, I, I said, they're in the system as a number. I need that number. I can't look it up if you don't give me the number.

Hmm. See, I love that. I respect that so much. You literally led right into my next question, which was with data privacy and DNA. Like there's all kinds of news stories coming out about 23andMe and all them selling our information and just like you said, it's the blueprint of who we are. It's like, I don't want that going to some random company or some Human Longevity Project or whatever they tout it's for. That's so sacred to us, you know. So I appreciate that. That was one of the first things Chad told me where he was like, I'm going to change it up, Mike. I'm going to do something completely different. A lot of people in the industry don't do this because they want a kickback from what's being sold. And so I just, I really appreciate that because he pushes the the savings still onto us compared to a standard blood test, but we know that our DNA is safe. We know that every test ran through MaxGen. So I'm curious if, if it's a one and done, Debbie, and we're like, if I ran the works for you to utilize MaxGen, is it really like a one-time snapshot and then that's what you look at? Then you move to blood tests and you kind of play with that lab. Do you ever come back to MaxGen for a, a retest in any sort of period of time? Like, is there epigenetics that shift with different dietary or supplements? 'Cause I know that like peptides can up and downregulate gene expression. Same with bioregulators. There's certain substances in nature that have the ability to cut in and off of, of genetic expressions. Even if, let's say, we make those dietary changes and oxidative stress markers go down or we're not as overreactive. Can you see shifts in the test, uh, over a period of time? Like, do you do it every couple years or do you have a recommendation for that?

The only thing that would change would be like updating the test and adding different genes.

Okay.

But as far as like, so for example, I, I got tested for MTHFR. If I test myself again, it's gonna always be the same result no matter if the gene is like, no matter what my health is at that moment, because it's just genetic predisposition. So, so in that sense, no, the only time that, so like, like I've been with them for 8 years. So 8 years ago, the test was much smaller. Mm-hmm. Like there wasn't as many gene SNPs that there are now. We've, we've come a long way with genetics as far as like helping and honing in on the ones that are really. Can really make an impact on health. And that's the other thing I respect about MaxGen and, and like, and what Chad has done is that, you know, he hired a geneticist that was from day one. And that's all the genes on his test are evidence and research-based. So there's some companies out there that they'll have, oh, we test for 2,000 or 200,000 or something like that. And I've looked at those tests. I actually have accounts with several other genetic companies that I've never used. They make you set up an account to even look at the test, which that's another thing that drives me nuts. You can go on MaxGen's website and you can see a sample of all the reports right on there.

I love that.

Finding anything. Yeah. I'm like, why do I have to like give you my firstborn child to get a test? Sample test report. But anyways. But that's fine. But, but you go through those and most of those, they're not evidence-based, they're just noise. And all it does is, in my opinion, it just confuses people because it's not really, they're not really valid. They're just putting them in there to make it look like you're getting more bang for your buck, but you're really not.

Gotcha.

Yeah.

I could see that. Wow. So I, I love this. So we have a cost-effective way to look at extremely relevant things to our health. It really seems like it'd be the top of funnel for us to look at a genetic snapshot first. So if any practitioners listening or any potential client or patient out there, if you've never done genetic testing, this is a great entry point. Debbie, is there a way for them to find out how to get the test? Like if I'm a practitioner and wanna sign up, or if I'm just a client and I wanna purchase, like where do we go? How do we get in contact with y'all?

Yeah, you can just go on, whether you're a practitioner or a consumer, you can go on nextgenlabs.com, their website. There's a place for practitioners that they can go on and, and there's also for for people can purchase the test right from there. There's, there's also a list of practitioners on the website for people that want further and help with not only, I mean, it's, it's designed to make it easy to understand, but it, I always recommend people to sign up with a functional medicine practitioner, especially if they have a lot of health issues to help guide them through and, and work through the test with them. And there's a list of practitioners on their website. They can, contact. There's also education on the, their YouTube channel. We did a live, uh, Chad and I did a live Q&A last month of the most common asked questions about the test. And then we're also going to be doing a follow-up to that because there was a lot of questions we couldn't get to. And I'll be doing that one. That one will be posted soon. And then next month we have another one. We're gonna try to make it more regular. Put more education out there for people so that they feel comfortable with it. There's also a private Facebook page, a NextGen Labs private Facebook page. There's a public one and a private one, a group where there's one for practitioners and there's one, one for consumers where they can join and they can ask questions and post education on there. There's education on the website. So there's a lot of Resources that people can use to get clarity if they need it, um, for the test.

I love that. And I'll tell you guys, just from someone who's worked in a lab and from someone who's been a part of that whole community, there's so much lack of transparency. And so choose people like MaxGen who are completely transparent, even to the point of having access through those platforms to the founder. To ask questions is literally unheard of. So especially in the lab world, there's so much things shrouded in mystery that they don't allow you to have access that just makes you feel uncomfortable when this data is so relevant to how we can change our health and change our life. So I appreciate your time today, Debbie. I appreciate all the information. This was super enlightening and it just is such powerful education for our audience today to be able to empower themselves to, you know, we've said it time and time again, I know through my entire career, but test, don't guess. Like, just look at your markers. Don't be afraid to take a step in, reach out to one of your functional medicine practitioners who use MaxGen, and just let this be a launching point to your health and wellness journey. And yeah, we're just happy to help, and I just appreciate you, Debbie, for taking the time to give us all the MaxGin goodness today.

Yeah, it was my pleasure, Michael. Thanks for having me on. Awesome.

Thank you, dear. Awesome. Thanks, everybody, and we look forward to seeing you on the next one.

Before we wrap up, we want to thank our sponsor Integrative Peptides for supporting this episode. If you enjoyed today's conversation, visit integrativepeptides.com and use the code PODLIFE, P-O-D-L-I-F-E, for a special listener discount. If you are a healthcare professional, visit integrativepeptides.ai to sign up for a free wholesale account and unlock preferred pricing. For any questions, email cs@integrativepeptides.com or text 4437325272. Thanks again to Integrative Peptides and thank you for listening.

Thanks for joining us on the Peptides and Longevity Podcast. If you enjoyed today's episode, don't forget to subscribe, share, and leave a review. It helps us reach more listeners passionate about optimizing their health. For more insights, resources, and updates, visit our website at www.holtorfmed.com. Together, let's embrace a future of health and vitality. Until next time, stay inspired and keep thriving.