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I am delighted to bring you another interview with my colleague and friend Walter Crinnion, N.D. The subject for this podcast is phthalates.

Phthalates are plasticizers and they are used everywhere in our life. From plastic grocery bags to garden hoses to shower curtains to children's toys and food wrapping, we are all constantly being exposed to phthalates.

Phthalates are not like other environmental toxins. Most environmental toxins get in our body and are sequestered in our fat and do their mischief that way. Phthalates do not persist in our body and have a very short half-life of approximately one day. Therefore if you are able to avoid phthalates for just 5 days, levels of phthalates in your body will be markedly less.

In this interview we talk about how you can do that.

The link to the Environmental Working Group is here:

and their fabulous cosmetics database is here.

Phthalates are linked to many common medical conditions that we are seeing in our environment that appear to have no cause. This ranges from endometriosis, to uterine fibroids, to ADHD in children, to reduced fertility in men in our society, and all the way to breast cancer.

And yet, by just changing your environment with the products you use the foods you eat and cleaning up your house and personal care products your levels can significantly drop. In this interview you'll learn how women with the highest levels of phthalates in their body were four times more likely to get breast cancer. One would ask why the FDA does not regulate these products more closely. If there was a food that was causing a breast cancer rate increase of 400% certainly the FDA would become involved. [Read more…]

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I am just back from the Institute of Functional Medicine (IFM) conference entitled Applying Functional Medicine to Detoxification. 

In this podcast, I share with you my excitement about the many things that I learned that complement what I already do in my practice of medicine.

The speakers included Dr. Kristi Hughes, ND, (pictured above with me) who is the Associate Medical Director of the Institute for Functional Medicine. She organized a wonderful conference with three other speakers.

The speakers were Dr. Jeanne Drisko MD, Kenneth Bock, MD, and Rick Mayfield, ND. The four doctors taught us about how environmental toxicity is overwhelming our body's ability to cope with the toxins and contributing to the development of the wealth of diseases that we see in today's society.

Dr. Bock is a famous physician who is treating autistic patients with great success. He pointed out to us that one in 91 children are being diagnosed with autism. One in 11 children are being diagnosed with ADHD, and one out of every four children suffers from respiratory or other allergies. [Read more…]

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I am delighted to bring you this new podcast of my interview with my colleague Dr. Neal Barnard, discussing the organization of which he is the founder and president, The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine. (PCRM)

They have over 12,000 physician members and over 120,000 lay members.

PCRM does clinical research and work with diets to see how diet can benefit diabetes and heart disease and other major diseases.

The other side of PCRM is the ethical side. They look at why medical researchers still use animals for experiments that could be better accomplished without animals.

After much work, PCRM has virtually eliminated the use of animals by most medical schools for teaching medical students. 

PCRM brings in non-animal techniques to do research which is now very validated. With modern techniques such as tissue banks which are very sophisticated research can be done without using animals. [Read more…]

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In today's show I have the privilege of interviewing Dr. Neal Barnard, on the subject of a whole food plant based diet.

As many of you know, I have been a vegetarian for the last 40 years. But starting May of this year after taking the course at Cornell University for health professionals on a whole food plant based diet I changed to being a vegan. My health improved, my well-being improved, and very importantly to me, my cholesterol improved without the use of pharmaceutical drugs.

Dr. Bernard and the organization he founded and of which he is still the president is the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, is an organization that educates doctors and patients about the benefits of a whole food plant based diet.

http://www.pcrm.org/

Dr. Bernard has been the author of many books including the most recent 21 – Day Weight Loss Kickstart, which is a book which helps people try a vegan diet for 21 days. Within 21 days most people will notice improvement in their health but this diet. [Read more…]

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In today's show I review some of the latest findings on the relationship of vitamin D to many increasing problems in our country and the world. As you know the Vitamin D winter has begun for the northern two thirds of the United States and for all of Canada and northern Europe.

I am delighted that Fraser health care home residents will now be getting vitamin D on a regular basis. This is a “ nursing home" in British Columbia, Canada. At least 200,000 falls are recorded in seniors each year in British Columbia and they expect that number to double as baby boomers age. Vitamin D is associated with an increased incidence of falls and the resultant consequences which can often include death for the senior that breaks their hip.

They will be giving the residents  20,000 IU weekly of vitamin D and then following them over time to see if the incidence of fractures is reduced.  I am very excited about this project as I think it is necessary that all seniors be given an adequate dose of vitamin D not only to protect against osteoporosis but also to reduce the incidence of falls and fractures. As many of you know I've written about this in my book and in my blog posts. [Read more…]

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In part 2 of my interview, Dr Crinnion and I talk about harder to get rid of environmental chemicals including solvents and pesticides.

Dr Crinnion gives some easy tips on reducing your body burden and  we talk about taking certain nutritional supplements to help with keeping the burden down. 

I am so pleased that Dr Crinnion has agreed to come back for more discussion of environmental medicine. I am hoping to have him as a regular guest on the show.

You can buy his book Clean, Green and Lean here.

Dr Crinnion’s website is here.

Please send questions that you may have for Dr. Crinnion to me at questions@askDrSoram.com. Or you can call my question line at 310-499-0275.

Was this interview helpful to you? Do you plan on making changes in your exposures to environmental chemicals? Will you be talking to your children about these exposures and how they can minimize exposures? Please leave your comments in the box below.

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The environment we live in from the air we breathe to the water we drink to the food we eat to the personal-care products that we use on a daily basis is affecting the health of everyone. Every day, in my practice, I work with patients examining and helping them to reduce their body burden of these chemicals in order to help their health. 

Naturopathic doctors have led the way in our understanding of how these chemical affect our health and how to reduce the load we have already gotten. 

This is the first of what hope will be a series of interviews with Walter Crinnion, N.D., a noted naturopathic doctor, who specializes in Environmental Medicine.

Dr Crinnion has been on the board of directors of the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians and was the recipient of their first award for in-office research in 1999 and was awarded it a second time in 2002. He has been on the adjunct faculty of Bastyr University (Seattle, WA.), the National College of Naturopathic Medicine  (Portland, OR.), and the University of Bridgeport School of Naturopathic Medicine (Bridgeport, CT.). He is a professor at the Southwest College of Naturopathic Medicine (Tempe, AZ.) and the chair of their Environmental Medicine Department.

He is the author the book Clean, Green and Lean: Get Rid of the Toxins That Make You Fat and he has a website at http://www.crinnionmedical.com/

In this part 1 of our interview, Dr Crinnion and I start with my question “Do environmental toxicants really affect our health?” and move into the role of Mercury in human health and the exposure to it that we get in our diet from fish.

We then move on the talk about Phthalates and how easy it is to reduce our exposure to them and cleanse our body of them. we get in our diet from fish.

We then move on the talk about Phthalates and how easy it is to reduce our exposure to them and cleanse our body of them. 

Have you had your blood mercury checked? If you had elevated levels, what have you done to reduce them and have you been able to reduce them? Do you know what phthalates are? What have you done to reduce your exposure to them?

I look forward to your comments which you can write below or you can ask your questions by contacting me at questions@askdrsoram.com or by calling our question line at 310-499-0275.

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This is part two of my interview with Dr. Mark Pimentel, an Associate Professor of Medicine at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles California. Dr. Pimentel is the Director of the Gastrointestinal Motility Program and Laboratory at Cedars-Sinai medical center.

In the last podcast I talked with Dr. Pimentel about the diagnosis and treatment aspects of Irritable Bowel Syndrome and our current understanding of Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth as its cause.

In this part two of my interview, I talk with him about the causative factors in this condition, additional aspects of treatment, and the direction that Dr. Pimental's research is taking him to get a deeper understanding of Irritable Bowel Syndrome.

You can buy Dr Pimental’s book here.

Do you have friends and relatives with Irritable Bowel Syndrome? Are they aware that SIBO appears to be the cause? What symptoms do they have? How are they treated for their symptoms? Have you made them aware that SIBO is the most likely cause and is relatively easy to treat? Please let me know in your comments below or email questions to me at questions@askdrsoram.com.

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Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) is the most common chronic medical condition worldwide with 15% to 20% of all populations suffering from IBS.

In the United States, over 60 million people of all ages suffer from IBS.

Other studies show that 30% of all health related costs in people with Gastrointestinal problems are due to IBS. Although it is an important disease, just by the sheer numbers of people with it, it does not kill people. For this reason, research for this condition is not as extensive and not as funded or widely discussed as conditions with major emotional impact like breast cancer and heart attacks.

Mark Pimentel MD has been my friend and colleague for several years and I am delighted that I had the opportunity to interview him about his work with  Irritable Bowel Syndrome and Small Intestinal Bacteria Overgrowth (SIBO). 

Gas, bloating, abdominal distention are such common symptoms in our society today. This is confirmed by the number of commercials on radio and television for a vast variety of digestive complaints.

In this podcast I interview, Dr. Mark Pimentel, an Associate Professor of Medicine at Cedars – Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California. He is the Director of the Gastrointestinal Motility Program and Laboratory at Cedars – Sinai medical Center.

In my interview I discussed Dr. Pimentel's participation in the discovery and recognition that Irritable Bowel Syndrome is not a psychological condition, but rather a condition that is being recognized to be caused by bacteria in the small intestine. This condition is therefore called Small-Intestine Bacterial Overgrowth or SIBO for short. 

I was delighted to be able to interview Dr. Pimentel because I diagnose so many hundreds of my patients who were told they had Irritable Bowel Syndrome and treat them effectively with appropriate antibiotics and dietary therapy.

Because this interview was long, I have divided it into two sections.

In this, the first part, I discuss with Dr. Pimentel how the diagnosis is made, which antibiotics work best, and the diet that works best for the treatment of this condition.

Next week we will go on to Part 2 of the interview.

You can buy Dr Pimental’s book here.

Do you have friends and relatives with Irritable Bowel Syndrome? Are they aware that SIBO appears to be the cause? What symptoms do they have? How are they treating their symptoms? Have you made them aware that SIBO is the most likely cause and is relatively easy to treat? Please let me know in your comments below.