Dr. Justin Marchegiani and Evan Brand talk about dandruff in today’s podcast. Learn what causes it and explore other possible underlying health conditions like gut infections involving bacteria, yeast, fungus or parasites.
Gain an understanding on how functional medicine practitioners approach this kind of problem including their clinical strategies and the testing involved. Get very helpful information regarding the products that they have found effective to address dandruff and the supplements they recommend to improve health conditions related to dandruff issues.
In this episode, we cover:
06:32 Antibiotics and Dandruff
07:27 Fungus and Refined Sugar
14:25 Birth Control Pills Effect and Dandruff
23:03 Hair Loss and Thrush Issues
32:16 Glutamine and Leaky Gut
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Very cool. My wife and I brought our new baby to his first wedding. That was pretty exciting. First wedding with the new one was fun and he did a great job.
Evan Brand: Oh, good. Ain’t it great when you go out on public and the baby is good, isn’t that great?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. Totally. How’s your baby doing?
Evan Brand: Oh, she’s great. She’s actually— she's got her molars coming in.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Oh, wow!
Evan Brand: So she's very incessantly crying this morning. Uh— but wife texted me and said the baby knocked out. So naptime is a good time. That’s great, man. Very cool. Well, we chatted kinda in our early part of the show talking about what we’re gonna talk about today, really. And we kinda discuss that dandruff is a big issue that's been coming up in our clinical practice. We want to talk about kinda what is and just some of the clinical strategies that we utilize to approach it and to help address it from a root cause functional medicine perspective.
Evan Brand: Yeah. Something I think we should hit on first is what's the conventional approach is? Is it dermatologist that people are getting refer to? Like what's the rabbit hole would you say that people end up on with the dandruff problem?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: So dandruff typically uses excessive shedding of kinda the skin on the scalp. And it tends to be fungal driven. Of course, there are natural diet things that help, right? Good fats, good proteins, like the digestive, the hydration component. All those things are important, but the infection component is really important because you can have the diet stuff all dialed in and that may not be enough to get rid of that infection component. And sometimes the— the fungal overgrowth that—that’s there could be there from a deeper infection. It could be there from H. pylori or blasto or deeper parasite infection. So, it's important we keep our eye on what could be there in the scalp area, but also what other bigger infections could be promoting that overgrowth.
Evan Brand: Yup. So, if you go to conventional doc and you just happened to bring up dandruff, what are they going to do? You think they’ll just refer you out to a dermatologist in then they’ll give you some steroids for it? What would the conventional approach be? That way we have something to contrast it to our functional medicine approach.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. So your conventional approach is gonna be head and shoulders or sell some blow. That’s gonna be the general conventional approach. They may give you uh—a uh—you know, systemic antifungal medication that they see other kinds of things happening there. That’s gonna be the general consensus.
Evan Brand: Yeah.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: So the first thing that we’re gonna look at is we would probably lean more towards a anti-fungal kind of shampoo that's herbally-based like tea tree or lavender or uhm—neem. These are some of the really good antifungal shampoos that are out. We’ll put some of the links below couple of the ones that I like are Art Naturals and Purely Northwest. We’ll put some links below here, so people can access them. We—I use those in my clinic a lot. You can also just get some pure you know, apple cider vinegar. You can mix a little bit of coconut oil. You can even do a little bit a tea tree and put it straight and kind just gonna do a little scalp massage and get right there in the scalp. That can be helpful, too. Uhm—but some other shampoos that are out there that already to go. So that's another good option for you. Just, if you don't want to have to deal that.
Evan Brand: Cool. So let's talk about testing. I mean this is always our philosophy. “You’ve got to test, don’t guess.” If you've got a fungal issue, we talked about parasites. So we want to look into the gut and in the organic acids testing. Wouldn’t you say that be an important one for this, too?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. I like the organic acids because because you can kinda look at fungus that may be more systemic. So when we look at a gut test, we may see various species of fungus in the gut. We may see Candida. We may see geotrichum yeast. We may see other types of Candida species. These are different species of yeast. And again, yeast is like the big umbrella. Fungus is the big umbrella and then we have some species of yeast there kinda under that big umbrella of fungus. So fungus is the big umbrella, yeast is the— the smaller kind of umbrella. And again,s mold like different molds that you may see like aflatoxin mold or ochre toxin. These different compounds are also kinda under that fungus mold umbrella as well, right?
Evan Brand: Yup.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: So getting to your question—Those are some of the big ones that you may see. Now, the benefit of the organic acid test is we have some markers that are more systemic base. So we have the D-rabanose. It’s an interesting marker that looks at fungal overgrowth from a systemic perspective. So, sometimes we see people to get the stool test back and they’re maybe okay from a fungal perspective, but when we look at the organic acid urine, we may see that the D-rabanose is on the higher side which tells us there maybe some kinda fungal thing going on at a systemic level and sometimes we may see it systemically but not on the gut. So that's a good marker, too, for treatment.
Evan Brand: Yep, cool. Yes, so, Justin and I, between us both, we run thousands and thousands and thousands of stool and organic acids testing. I would say, Justin, tell me if your assumption is different. Nine out of every 10 people have a yeast and/or a fungal problem. Whether it's to the level which can cause extreme issues or not. Maybe it's not nine out of 10 that have an extreme problem, but someone somewhere, nine out of 10 is gonna pop up with something that needs to be addressed in that category
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. 100%. I think there’s some –there’s always some gut component. I would say the majority is a gut component. And most people with a gut component, uh—yeast is gonna be present. I find that yeast as the primary issue isn’t more common—it’s—actually less common, I should say. Where it’s more common is there’s a deeper, infection like a parasite or bacterial infection that’s of a higher level.
Evan Brand: Yeah.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: And yeast is kinda there, kinda like you see these sharks and you see these underlings that kinda suck to the shark’s belly.
Evan Brand: Yup, right.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: They're kinda like that. They’re just there as the underling and you get these bigger, stronger kind of critter that is the primary focus.
Evan Brand: Oh, by the way, I don't know if this is true, I heard from a client of mine last week, supposedly, diagnostic solutions is coming out with a new panel that can be added to the GI-MAP where we can actually test for worms including pin worms.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: That's awesome! I’m really excited. Worms are definitely a concern. I know we've talked about, you know, we use –we add in worm wood. We added mimosa pudica, various herbs like that to help with a lot of these worms as well.
Evan Brand: Yeah. So, that’s true. We’re gonna have some really good extra clinical nuggets in our hand.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Hundred percent.
Evan Brand: So—I wanted—I wanted to mention antibiotics. So, somebody does have dandruff and we could also convey that message to other issues with the hair, the skin, the nails.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Uh-hmm.
Evan Brand: There's probably a history of like a urinary tract infection, right? So like these yeast and fungus that you're talking about. If that's affecting the vaginal area for a female and they get put on some type of natural antifungal or probably a conventional anti fungal. That stuff’s gonna come back with a vengeance. They may end up doing antibiotics therapy, too. And that's not good. That's gonna create a lot of room for the yeast and fungus to overgrow and all of a sudden, you've got the clean up crew that has to come post-antibiotics.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Hundred percent.
Evan Brand: We’re not big fans. Like if you can avoid antibiotics, if your life is not in danger, then you could probably go ahead and say skip them and go to the natural remedies instead.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: A hundred percent. So of course, the big thing when we deal with any type of fungus is really cutting out refined sugar. So, if we could look at our carbohydrates, we kinda draw a line down the middle. We have like real food carbohydrates on one side of the fence, and then we have refined sugar carbohydrate with extra added sugar to the carbs on the other side. So, basically, draw that line, anything that’s refined sugar, we throw out, and then the left side, I kinda break it down into starchy, non –starchy, okay? So, starchy being like sweet potatoes, squash, white potatoes. Non-starchy could be our veggies, uh—broccolis, brussel sprouts cauliflower, kale. Those are our non-starchy. And then basically, we have our high sugar fruit and our low sugar fruit. High sugar fruit are gonna be more tropical things—bananas, pineapples, mangoes, right? Those kind of things. Then we have our lower sugar fruits— berries green apple, grape fruit passion fruit. Those kind of things. So we try, number one, stay on the non-starchy carbs primarily. And the low sugar fruits. So typically, 1 to 2 servings a day even on an anti-fungal approach is gonna be okay. Some people they go to the excessive and cut everything out but there's some clinical evidence that these fungal critters may go into the spore-like state where they’re now kinda in hibernation mode. It may make it harder to kill them. So, we’ll actually have 1 to 2 servings of fruit in there. We may even actually up the carbs even more during the killing to bate them out. We want to wake up that bear so it's not hiding in its cave all winter, uh—so we can hunt them down, so to speak.
Evan Brand: That's a great point. So if a ketogenic— if a ketogenic diet has been the norm for someone, we may need to bump up carbs a bit, maybe add a little bit of fruit back. And there's been a lot of demonizing of fruit lately, which I'm just not really a fan of that. I think there's a lot of value there.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Again, it’s all individual. If you're super over weight, you have a lot of markers for insulin resistance, your waist size is greater than 40inches for male, you know, up 20 pounds too much weight on there, then, yeah, that may make more sense to limit it or at least focus on the lower glycemic, low sugar variety, right? Low fructose variety. Maybe keep that fructose below 15g a day. That makes sense. But if you're pretty active and pretty healthy weight, I'm fine with it. Hand—couple of handfuls about a day, that’s not a problem.
Evan Brand: Yup, good. So you mention the diet peace, now, some talk about diet as if he could cure you of these problems. I mean, I don't really agree there where if you just follow this Candida diet, all of a sudden your problems are going to go away.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: I think if someone is like, you know, they’re kinda like dipping their toe in the functional medicine field like, “Is this worth it?” Well, just start with the diet stuff and see how much you get accomplished with that. If someone is having a lot of refined sugar and a lot of refined carbohydrate, right? Remember that line I drew? Refined carbs and then whole food carbs? If they’re having a lot on this side and they cut that out, they may see a significant improvement, which is great. And they may cut the grains out as well, which is great. But uhm—that maybe that last 20 or 30%. Or if there’s a deeper infection, uhm—that will have to be removed as well. So if it’s purely a fungal overgrowth that you may see a good improvement, but there may be some stuff still lingering. If that’s the case, then we got to dig deeper. Put on our clinical hats and you wanna definitely reach out to someone like myself or you, Evan.
Evan Brand: Yeah. Well said. I guess my point—I wasn't trying to pass the diet piece. I guess my point is that a lot of people sell these books, promoting certain diets as if you can magically eradicate all of your gut problems. For me I got maybe 80% better so I dealt with IBS for probably 10 years, maybe even 15years. I mean, I had always had irritable bowel problems. Once my diet was better, my gut problems were there, but then when you first took a look at me, you said, “Evan, you’ve got parasites. And that’s something that no matter how much kale and broccoli I ate, I wasn't going to get rid of parasites.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Or grass-fed meats. Yeah. Exactly. I get that. So, we’re kinda biased because we see a lot of people that already come to us, they got their diet on track and we got to dig deeper on top of that. So, I get where you're coming from, for sure.
Evan Brand: Yeah. But the low hanging fruit that is the diet. And then we—we’ve, you know, Justin and I often have people that come to us that have been doing like a Paleo template or even like uh—autoimmune Paleo and they’re still sick and that's where you say, “Okay, good. You've got the diet in place. It has to be in place, perfect.” Now, let's dig deeper and that's where we gonna find this other stuff.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Hundred percent. So we hit the uh—we hit the fungal component of dandruff. We talked about the excessive shedding of the skin on the scalp. You know, a lot of babies have it. It’s called cradle cap or seborrhea dermatitis, tends to be fungal-based. Again, with my kiddo, or just really giving just real, good-quality breastmilk, but also what the mom eats has a huge effect on the breast milk.
So my wife has kinda have a good Paleo template, really on point. We give our kid probiotics as well. He gets the infant strain probiotic. I know your daughter did the same thing as well, which helps a lot, too. And surprisingly, our baby’s had you know, zero acid reflux, zero spit up. So I think that that's really made a big difference as well.
Evan Brand: Cool. That's awesome. Yeah. So mom's listening, this could apply to babies, too. Now, do you have any evidence on this? Like a mom passing a yeast or a fungus overgrowth to the baby via breastmilk? I’ve heard that was Lyme’s disease and co-infections, you know, the spirochetes can pass through the breast milk but I just wonder about you know, the yeast. Could you pass a yeast through the breastmilk?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Well, that may or may not be the case. I'm not really sure. There may be some data on that. Uh—my biggest concern is a lot of the infants that are gonna be fed formula, if you look at a lot of the ingredients, it's about 50% high fructose corn syrup.
Evan Brand: Oh, God.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: If you look at the amount of sugar that's in a lot of these uhm—formulas, it’s the same amount that’s in a Coke.
Evan Brand: Yup.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: You just gotta be careful because that's not really the best thing for your child. And then a lot of it is gonna be GMO, too. And there’s evidence of uh— Mercury on getting into a lot of these high fructose compounds due to the extraction process. That's not good either.
Evan Brand: Wow. So I’ve talked with a couple practitioners who do like a microscope—
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Uh-hmm.
Evan Brand: When you look at the blood and they’ve seen little—little balls of yeast basically in the serum of the blood. So I just wonder, “Huh, wonder if any of that actually gets into the system where— where mom pass it to the baby or not.” Well, I have to keep asking, keep digging. That is just my curiosity, but—
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: I think it's a really great question here. And I've I think clinically, it makes sense. I see a lot of women that have poor gut issues and their child can get it. You know, they’ll get thrush with that white coating, so to speak. And they’ll get kind of a yeast issue where they get a lot of kind of a diaper rash stuff and that can happen as well. Like with our child, we’ve had no real yeast issues not even any diaper rash. We just kinda—like a couple of times, my wife will put a little bit of coconut oil there. We have some natural stuff. Yeah, we put there. But outside of that, he’s—you know, my son Aidan has been doing great on that side of the fence.
Evan Brand: That's great. All right, so we hit the diet piece, we talked about antibiotics as a potential problem leading up to this. I would say birth control pills could be a factor, too. I’ve have had a lot of women— I don't know the exact correlation or causation. I don’t know if that’s doing something with progesterone and estrogen that—that's causing the dandruff for what it is. Do you have a take on that of why birth control pills could be a factor?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. Birth control pills have an effect of alkalizing. So we can alkalize the urinary track. It has effect in alkalizing the guts and fungus likes to be more in an alkaline environment. And now everyone’s like “alkalize your diet” right? Well, a lot of these bacteria and we’ll just say fungus's and bacteria, they like more alkaline environments. If you look at what probiotics do, probiotics actually add acidic load to the intestines. Like if you look at acidophilus, it literally translates to acid loving or acid producing. If you look at a lot of the really good fermentable drinks, a lot of them are very high in various acids, whether it's glucuronic acid or uhm—
Evan Brand: Acetic acid.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Acetic acid, which is the main acid in apple cider vinegar and it’s not a surprise that acids like apple cider vinegar are used to treat fungal issues in the hair or they’re used to treat UTI issues as well. People will then utilize the Apple cider vinegar before meal to help with digestion and also acidify the urinary tract, too. So, a lot of these things are very helpful to decrease the critters and it changes the environment in the gut. So, good probiotics actually spit out more CO2, right? They spit out more of these really good acids to help get the gut into an environment PH wise with these critters can't thrive, so to speak.
Evan Brand: Ahh. Okay, got it. Yes. So birth control pills, the antibiotics, maybe the prescription Diflucan's or other prescription antifungals that you could've been on before making these strains more resistant. We talked about the sugar in the diet we talked about the gun infections, looking into those for bacteria and yeast fungus, parasites, getting your gut check with functional testing, not conventional testing. We talked about getting the urine organic acids for looking into the yeast and measuring it that way because stool test often gives us a false negative.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: We may even look at blood, too. We may look at candida antibodies like IgA, IgG, IgM. We may see those on the higher side, which could just mean there’s more of a systemic issue. And it’s nice to know because if we don't have any gut stuff going on or we don't even see any organic acids stuff, you know, typically, you’ll see some organic acid. You’ll see the D-arabinose there.
Evan Brand: Yeah. So what do you say to a person when they say, “Oh, Justin, can I just go buy a bunch of herbs and just start randomly throwing stuff from the kitchen sink at this problem and see if it works?”
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Well, the bigger issue is most people that have these symptoms, they have a whole bunch of other things, too. It's very rare that you're like, “Oh, my only chief issue is dandruff.” Or some kind of fungal issue, right? It's mood, energy, sleep. If you're female, there’s probably some cycle imbalances, whether it's menstruation issues or mood issues or breast tenderness, back pain. Whatever's happening there and then you have this. So there's a constellation of the different things happening. And body systems, they function and dysfunction together. So, imagine a beautiful orchestra going, right? And one instrument starts going off. Let’s call that one instrument our fungal overgrowth or uhm— our scalp kind of a dandruff issue, right? That’s our one symptom. That’s our one imbalance. Well, it doesn't take long before the rest of the orchestra starts singing out of tune as well.
Evan Brand: Yup.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: And that's what I'm referring to when we talk about the other hormonal issues that go out of balance. And then when we start having gut issues, then we can start having more leaky gut, which then can create more immune stress, then we can have more malabsorption and low stomach acid and enzymes and nutrient deficiencies, which then affect neurotransmitters and other hormone pathways. So you can see how this thing can really spiral out of control pretty fast. So, that's why it’s good always digging deeper to really get a good body system audit of all the other things that are happening.
Evan Brand: Yup. Well said. I'm so glad you—you said it so eloquently. I did a rant at the end of my podcast that I put up last week and I just told people like, “Look, please, don't wait until you hit rock bottom. Don't wait until every body system is falling apart and then you reach out.” Like you and I work with those complex cases all the time. But if you’ve got one thing like it's anxiety or little bit of depression or little bitt of gut issues or little bit of skin issues, it's so much better to start getting tested and start digging deep then, as opposed to waiting until you're symptoms list is 20 pages long. You’ve been suffering for 20 years, then you hit rock bottom, then you decide you want to get better. I'll tell you, it will save people a lot of money and a lot of suffering if once you see these problems a little tip the iceberg poking out, address it, then don't wait until like you said you’ve got anxiety, depression, PMS, irritability, mood swings, rage, poor sleep and dandruff to top it all off.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Hundred percent.
Evan Brand: Please. And that's not even to benefit us. It's to benefit you. You know, we've been so booked up that we aren't necessarily begging you, “Hey, please come see us.” It's not like that. It's the fact that, “Hey, look, I just want to save you some suffering and save you some time.” Justin and I came from our own health journeys as well and if we could just give you one piece of advice and maybe I'm not speaking for him, so I’ll let Justin give his— his feedback, too. But If I could say one thing, it would be if you've got a weird symptom, there's probably some other stuff going on that you just have to find and fix.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Hundred percent.
Evan Brand: Like me, I had to wait until I'd lost about 25 pounds. I had terrible sleep. I woke up, I wasn't feeling rested. I had a lot of stress. I had some anxiety problems even to the point of a panic attack. I called Justin up one day, “man, my heart’s beating out of my chest. I can't stop my heart.” You're like, “Well, how much stress do you got going on? I was like, “ a lot” And he’s like, “how are you sleeping?” I’m like, “haven't been sleeping very well” and then he’s like, “what's going on with your gut?” and I was like, “Oh my Lord, every body system is affected” My gut has been affected, my brain, my stress response is broken. I was like, “this ain’t even me, I’m even an anxious person. What's going on?” And you go, “Oh, it's parasites, Evan.” So, for me, I had to learn the hard way. I had to wait until my symptoms piled up so much that I was falling apart to then fix it.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Hundred percent agreed. I think we’re at that the point in our careers where we realize that there's probably uh— more people out there that we see online with the you know, the millions of downloads we get every few months, that were not gonna be able to help anyone— everyone, so to speak. And there's just too many people out there to help that— you know, we really want to put as much free content out there and if we can just get most of the people to just apply the free stuff, that is going to be huge. And we’re gonna make a huge difference in the world just by itself.
Evan Brand: Yup.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: I think we’re really just getting really good actionable information and I think the key thing I want to push to everyone listening, if you can walk away with just one action item, “Hey, I’m gonna do this.” or “I’m gonna add this component.” or “I’m gonna add this diet shift or this lifestyle change, or this supplement change” I think that you’re gonna make yourself better and healthier after every podcast.
Evan Brand: Agreed. Cool. Do you want to hit some questions for a few minutes?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. We’ve got some questions.
Evan Brand: Okay, cool.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Everyone writing questions, if you can kinda keep the questions framed towards the conversation, I mean, you know, you can kinda do a little politician pivot where you’re like, “Hey, dandruff” and then you’re on adrenals, right? We could kinda do that, so to speak. But I'm just trying to keep it connected to what we’re talking about as possible. If it’s so disconnected, we’re just gonna have to skip over the question.
Evan Brand: Yup, yup. Well said. Okay. Yes. So a lot of those were like off-subject questions. Let’s see.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: I got one here about—let me see, I’ve got Gerald’s question here. Gerald was on my G.I. Clear 2, positive for H. pylori. I feel like it's returned. If add Masika to the G.I. Clear 2 what dose should I take per day? Typically, two caps TID, two caps, three times a day and we need to retest, Gerald. Make sure the infection is gone. Make sure there's no residual infections. We want to look a little bit deeper to at your partner or any dogs or pets in the house. Uhm— partner for sure is the easy one because that can, you know, you can go get that reinfected back and forth. So we need you to retest and then do GI Clear2 and the pure Masika, 2 caps TID and get that retested.
Evan Brand: Well said. Yeah. I had that a few weeks ago. A lady, she said, “I feel like my—my gut’s backtracked. I got off your herb. So, what's going on?” and I said, “Well, now it's time to test your partner. And sure enough, there is the H. pylori.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yup.
Evan Brand: That's why she’s been getting re-infected. It took three rounds to get rid of it.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Totally.
Evan Brand: Alright, let's go over to the next one here. There was one from Ovi. We’ll call it uh—I don't know how to pronounce that full name. “Any tips on reducing hair loss and thrush when coming off of HRT as a female?”
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: So— that would be helpful to know. I mean, imagine, I'm just coming guessing this is menopausal female, okay? So, you know 53-54 and up. So depending on kinda where the hormonal imbalance is, it’d be good to know if there is an estrogen dominance present or if we’re just having low estrogen and low progesterone and everything’s kinda in the tank. So, typically, when I think hair loss, though, I'm leaning more on the thyroid side. So, I'd want to know where the female hormones are at or if you’re cycling or not. So, if you want to comment on that, that’d be helpful. Uh— number two, really looking at the thyroid component because the thyroid has a huge effect on the hair follicles, stimulating the hair follicle to grow. And then number three is the gut component because that's where we digest and break down a lot of the nutrients and amino acids and fatty acids that become the building blocks for our hair. So I want to look at those three places first.
Evan Brand: Well said. So I'd also add on looking at ferritin levels, too.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah.
Evan Brand: See if there's some type of anemia problem. You hit the thyroid so in—
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: And when I say thyroid, though, that includes all that consolation because iron is very important for making thyroid hormone, so if you have a history, if it’s menopausal female and she's not vegetarian or vegan, doesn't have a history of endometriosis or fibroids or excessive menses, it’s probably not an iron issue.
Evan Brand: Good. Good. And then when you talk about the thyroids, too, so this is also including the antibody. So make it sure that there's no Hashimoto's at play coz we see that a lot. Justin and I find that many people with autoimmune thyroid, the hair, like nine times out of 10 it's a problem.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yup. Exactly. We’ll add in collagen peptides, too. Just this collagen is uh—it’s just great. It’s a great building block and then if it’s in peptide form, it's already super easy to digest. So, give a little plug for my Tru Collagen on that one.
Evan Brand: Yeah. Check it out. Alright. Gerald had a follow-up question for second round of H. pylori eradication, should it be a 30 day protocol or 60 days?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. Typically, a minimum 30. You can't go wrong with just a 30. It just depends on what other infections were present along with that, but if it’s just the H. pylori, let’s say 30—30 to 45 is typically good.
Evan Brand: Yup. Nice. Alright. Mossimo had a question here, “Are sustained-release essential oils and herbs necessary as opposed to the liquid oil taken internally? It’s kind of a confusing question. I didn't know there was such thing as a sustained-release essential oil, but what were talking about for this conversation would've been like a topical. So like Justin mentioned about those brands of the tea tree oil shampoos and such—
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah.
Evan Brand: That would just be a couple of drops on the scalp. Use some type of Jojoba or avocado or coconut oil.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah.
Evan Brand: And try to dilute that so it doesn't burn your scalp.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Totally. In my line, we have GI Clear5, which is an emulsified form of oregano. That is more enterically coated. So it does open up more in the small intestine than the stomach. A lot of the fungal issues tend to be more on the stomach. I’m sorry—
Evan Brand: Oh, yeah.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: It tends to be more in the small intestine. H. pylori more in the stomach. Evan Brand: Yeah. I forgot about the—the oregano oils.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yes.
Evan Brand: I guess when I read essential oils, I was thinking just like your standard oils that you diffuse.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: That’s why I’d like to have some of my, you know, oils or some of my herbs taken on an empty stomach just so it can get fully out of the stomach into the small intestine where it can really help. It and really help can be little more effective.
Evan Brand: Yeah. Alright. So, Samuel had a question. “What’s your take on taking CBD with no THC for inflammation? I take it for the first time and noticed a huge difference in relaxation.” I’ll hit this one.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah.
Evan Brand: I'm a huge fan. I just posted a YouTube video. If you haven't checked it out, look it up, Samuel. I went to uh—a hemp form here in Kentucky one of the very few hemp programs that has been approved by the state government. And the guys making super high quality CBD and the guy is— so he used it on his son who is having hundreds of seizures per month and now the kid is like 12 years old and hasn't had seizures in years just from CBD no THC. I think the THC does have benefit. I hope that there's a couple of bills that are trying to get through for 2018. I hope we can federally just decriminalize cannabis across the board because I have talked with people, especially in the pain department, where when they add a little bit it of THC in, all the sudden their fibromyalgia or chronic pain does get better, which isn't achieved just by the CBD by itself. So I think both would be awesome.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. I’m not a huge fan of the THC side uhm— I think it can have some really good benefits if you're going through cancer treatment and have extreme nausea and/or extreme pain and the CBD is not helping enough. I think it can be helpful like if we’re choosing you know, THC over chronic dose of the pain medication or opiate or like a lot ibuprofen, I will definitely reach for the THC component you know, over—over the rest. My biggest thing is just uhm— number one, there's some potential memory side effects, cognitive side effects. Number two, I would say making sure that you're not having to incinerate every time, right? Trying to do of a vaporizer or some kind of other medium that's not involving the incineration, which exposes the poly aromatic hydrocarbons, the heterocyclic ABGs, the carcinogens that are produced. And uh—the CBD obviously is better just because it's a less psychoactive, but if you can you know— epileptic stuff, autoimmune stuff, anxiety, mood stuff, the CBD for sure. THC more on the—if the CBD is not working and you need the pain or you have a lot of the nausea stuff that may be better.
Evan Brand: Yup. I mean with the THC, I don't—I mean I'm sure there's tons of people that still combust, but you really don't even have to anymore. There are so many different drops and tinctures and potions and such that you don't have to burn. You don't have to burn the herbs anymore. And people don't want to get high, too. So you could do like a 20% CBD like a 1% THC and you’d probably feel really good.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. I hate the feeling of being high. I’ve only done it a few times in my life, but I'm tired and I just get the munchies. I’m fatigued and I just get really hungry. It’s like I don’t need that. I want to be energized and alert. And I think a lot of the negative studies on marijuana, too, is number one, you really have to make sure you're not getting pesticide exposure.
Evan Brand: Exactly.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: And you have to kind of faired out the burning and the incineration of the leaf.
Evan Brand: Yeah.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: I think if you pick, take those two components out, I think you'll see a lot of those confounding variables showing negative results in those studies in proof.
Evan Brand: For me, a vaporizer change my life. When I had IBS, the only thing before I knew about by diet changes that help me was a vaporizer. It would slow down my bowels since I was having so much loose stool. It would regulate the bowels better stomach cramps, stomach pains would go away so I had a lot of hands-on experience— super helpful.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Go ahead, I’m sorry.
Evan Brand: I just have to say, I don't vape anymore currently. One is it's impossible to find a good source in Kentucky. Now, if I go to Colorado and I could find some good organic, high-quality, I'm gonna take a sample, that's for sure. But for me, I just— I can't find a good source here. So I do stick with the—the CBD drops, which is legal, too. You know, it’s another thing. It's— it's legal in all 50 states, the CBD is.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Totally. And uhm—just kinda –I think a lot of marijuana, maybe not the CBD, because that's more the— the non-psychoactive. I think a lot of marijuana is used you know, to cover-up emotional stress uhmm—you know to the kind of numb yourself out from whatever's happening in your life. So we just gotta make sure that you're not using it to avoid reality, so to speak. But there is a lot of drugs out there that are very dangerous and have a lot of side effects and kill a lot of people. So if we’re choosing marijuana over these drugs that kill a lot, I will always choose the drug that doesn't have the profile of killing people, right?
Evan Brand: I’ll pick it over alcohol, too.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah.
Evan Brand: If I had somebody say, “I wanted to drink a bottle wine every night” or “hit the vaporizer, do a couple of drops of a tincture” The alcohol for me is gonna be a bigger problem coz it’s gonna create the leaky gut situation.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. I mean if you’re drinking excessively, if you’re having a glass or two and it’s organic, you know, you’re probably fine with that on the alcohol side. But if you're going you know, four glasses a night and then it’s consistent, yeah, they’ve done studies. I think it was a Giuliani report they looked at like the highest ranked college students in the country and they say you know, what do you prefer, alcohol or marijuana as a drug of choice? And the kids that have the highest grades were choosing the marijuana and their main reason was the hangover. They could wake up the next day and studying, get their work done.
Evan Brand: Makes sense. Let’s see if we have any other on-topic questions here. Do you see any others?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: See here—see, we can find some things that we can connect to our little politician side stepped here.
Evan Brand: Gerald had one, about how do you know if you're eating too many starchy carbs per week? I— I cycle like it depends on the week and depends on activity level how much I’m gonna do.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. I mean it—I think 50 to 150 is a pretty good place for most people to be. And if you're doing a lot of lifting or a lot of CrossFit, then you may need to go up to 250. So I think, look at your height and weight. If you're at a really good height and weight, you’re gonna have more latitude. If you're lifting a lot of weights, I think you can go up to 150 to 200. If you’re doing Ironmans or like you know, those, then you may have to go way higher than that. So I think you really just figure out where your activity level is at. Figure out where your height and weight is right now. 50 to 150's pretty good. And you earn your carbs. So you exercise more, you—and you’re lifting more weights, you can up your carbs a little more and just try to keep it whole food, you’re gonna be fine.
Evan Brand: Here’s another question about glutamine. Should you take glutamine by itself to repair leaky gut or is it okay to combine with protein?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: I mean glutamine is an amino acid, but if you mean like glutamine and then have real whole food protein, yeah, that's fine. I mean in my line, we use GI Restore, which has glutamine and a bunch of their healing things and glucosamine and we’ll mix that and add in a drink, take it on an empty stomach and then patients will still have you know, a really good whole foods meal. Or we’ll add in the collagen as well which is very high in glycine. And glycine's really good for the enterosite healing as well. So you can do either glutamine. I’ll typically only do L-glutamine by itself for patients that are very, very sensitive. We’ll typically add the healing compound in there, you know, the GI Restore, the all the other, licorice, aloe, slippery elm, glucosamine, right? Modify—We’ll all those in together and if that's causing too much sensitivity, then we will do L-glutamine by itself. But they gotta really be sensitive if that's the case.
Evan Brand: Yeah. And that's— I find that pretty rare. The glutamine by itself to me, it just doesn’t move the needle as quick as the combo products like you talk about.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. Only if there’s an allergy issue. And then, the collagen is great. Glycine's a really big building block for healthy gut function, too.
Evan Brand: Nice. Bone broth, too. I think that's another—
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: That is very high in glycine, too. Yup.
Evan Brand: Cool. I think that was it. There were bunch of other questions, but a lot of these were super off subjects, so I don't want to distract from the convo too much.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. So—
Evan Brand: The others—
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: I think we kinda hit everything. I want to go off to— you know, off to uhm the kind of the __ James here talks about this just kind of the cost regarding the organic acid test and keeping it low. Typically, if— if you’re trying to keep the cost down with the organics, let’s do the test once a year. You know, do it once a year. Ideally, if you can do it uhm— twice a year, that's ideal, but if not, you can just do it once a year. That's kinda your—your best bet kinda just fine-tune your program once a year with the organics. That’s probably the best way to make it more cost-effective.
Evan Brand: Yup. Well said. Gerald said that we guys are the best. Change his life. Hey, Gerald, thanks. We appreciate it.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Uhm—Gerald is actually a patient. Glad we could help, Gerald. That’s very good. And one last question, too. Diana talks about doing a podcast on estrogen dominance and progesterone therapy. Hey, you're kinda—you’re too late. Check out the podcast’s show notes. We did a podcast on estrogence dominance and we talked about progesterone and __ augmentation programs that we do with progesterone therapy, too. So check out that podcast, Diana.
Evan Brand: Yeah. Go on either uh—Go on Justin's YouTube. That's probably the best if it's posted there or to check out his site Justinhealth and just type in estrogen. You should find it either way.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: And if you guys enjoy this right now, the best way you can thank us is give us a thumbs up, post, share on your twitter and/or uhm— Facebook. We love it. We just want to help more people and you notice, it’s a lot of people that are out there podcast people, they either hold information back or all they do is spend oh, you know, 90% of the time promoting their products and affiliates. I think 95% of our time is just free intel. Of course, we got a little plug here and there, but we’re 95% free information because we know there's too many people out there that need all this info and we’re just gonna be an open book to everyone.
Evan Brand: Yup. Totally. So, we hope it helps. And if you need to reach out, schedule a consult with either of us. For Justin, check out his site. Justinhealth.com You can look up and click the book an appointment button. Myself, same thing. Evanbrand.com Check us out. Stalk us. Study us. Look under every crevice and corner. Read our reviews. We’re here for you. We’re happy to help if you got this issue going on.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Leave us comments below. Tell us what you like about the podcast and tell us about future podcast that you want to hear. We’re reading them and we get inspired by those comments below. So say, “Hey, I like this about this podcast and I want to hear something about” And tell us that topic we’ll add it to the queue.
Evan Brand: Yes, sir. Good chatting with you.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Everyone, have a great day. Take care.
Evan Brand: Take Care.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Bye.
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