Essential Blood Tests to Analyze Your Health | Podcast #305
Regular blood testing is one of the most important ways to keep track of your overall physical well-being. Getting tested at routine intervals can allow you to see how your body changes over time and empower you to make informed decisions about your health. Here’s Dr. J and Evan talking about the areas to check aside from the usual blood tests we know.
A conventional medical doctor will typically recommend that you get routine blood work, but this is the bare minimum. There are several significant reasons you may want to get blood tests more often than that. Either you want to optimize your health or to reduce the risk of disease and health complications.
What are some routine tests and others that you should ask or know? Aside from CBCs (Complete Blood Count), Dr. J and Dr. Even pointed out enzyme markers, cholesterol tests, blood sugar tests, liver markers, thyroid panel, and so on. It will help your doctors make a differential diagnosis and dive into the root cause of your present health status. To know more, check out this podcast.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani
In this episode, we cover:
3:12 Conventional Side of Blood Works
12:14 Thyroid Panels
17:56 Blood Glucose
23:50 Adrenal Issues
29:33 Lipid Panels
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: We are live. It’s Dr. J here in the house with Evan brand. Today, we’re gonna be chatting about blood tests that we use to help assess our health and help us get better. So we’re gonna be chatting a little bit about kind of intro blood tests, what the best tests are kind of what our perspective on that is, Evan, how are we doing today, man?
Evan Brand: Doing really well excited to dive into this topic, I went, got my blood work. And I got my wife’s blood work done on Friday. And I just want to give a brief little note on how you and I run blood work as clinicians because it’s very easy. And it’s so convenient, because we don’t have to go and beg a GP or an MD and say, Hey, please, please, doctor. I mean, you and I’ve heard countless stories. Yeah, I asked my doctor to run this, they wouldn’t run it, I asked my endocrinologist to run this, they wouldn’t run it. With us, the accounts that we have with our credentials, were able to order and create customized lab panels. So you and I both have created customized blood panels that with a click of a button, we can go boom, order it for anyone, whether it’s ourselves, or our clients or patients, and then we get an instant requisition form. We go straight into labcorp request, you check in, you sit down, they call your name, you hand them the paper, you get the blood draw, you go home, it is so amazing. Every time I get my bloodwork done, I’m like, wow. And I didn’t have to get anyone’s permission to do that. But my own.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Isn’t that nice? Yeah, it totally is nice. Also, there’s the big insurance scam, right. So because we have accounts directly with the lab companies, we can order tests, and typically we get, you know, an 80 to 90%. You know, discount in price compared to what the insurance would bill. So like my typical thyroid panel, full thyroid panel that I charge my patients probably around $120. And the insurance would typically charge a patient for that well over $1,000. So then patients, most patients don’t get 100% coverage, right, especially if you’re not in network, and then the doctors can’t ever retest, but once every six months, so then you’re you’re stuck not being able to ever retest. But they think, Oh, I’m gonna get coverage for this. And then they get 90% coverage, and they end up paying more money. For the for the 90% coverage, even though they paid 100% cash, it had been cheaper. So that’s kind of the insurance scam. And then the problem with that is they can’t retest but once every six months, so they’re kind of stuck. So yeah, it’s really nice to be able to order what the patient needs and to be able to reorder and reassess. Based on a time that is good for us. Not good for the insurance companies. That’s kind of nice, right?
Yeah. And you’re kind of we’re kind of circumnavigating that conventional system where you’re waiting two, three months, and then you get a bill in the mail and you’re like, oh, medical bill, What’s this about? And then it’s like, oh, you owe 700. with us. It’s all transparent. It’s up front, you pay, boom, boom, boom, you’re done. I’ve already paid for it. I know that I’m not spending another penny. And the turnaround time is insanely quick to like one or two days, typically on some of these panels are running. So let’s go into some of the details. Now, let’s quickly compare and contrast. I think you and I have a lot of fun. Like where we did our conventional functional medicine vers conventional medicine, gut workup. Let’s talk about the same with bloodwork. So if you go to your doctor, and you have them say, hey, Johnny, we’re going to run your blood. What is that going to look like?
So conventional medical doctor, they’re typically going to do a CBC, they’re going to do a metabolic panel, they’ll probably do a lipid panel that’s usually going to be at maybe a year analysis, that’s kind of it. So like on the CMP they’re kind of looking at liver enzymes. They will look at some electrolytes on the liver on the CMP as well. Those liver enzymes electrolytes, maybe some protein markers there, they’ll probably look at glomerular filtration kind of some baseline kidney function with creatine and and bond. The kit the liver markers are going to be a lt and as to the liver enzyme markers, the gallbladder is ggt but probably look at some bilirubin your electrolytes are going to be sodium chloride, potassium magnesium, all serum not not intercellular which is a difference Okay. And then on the red blood cells are going to look at red blood cells RBC some adequate hemoglobin that’s part of the CBC right complete blood count which is going to help be helpful for anemic patterns right low iron right, although also run indices which are MC VMC, HMCHC right me corpuscular volume me corpuscular hemoglobin me corpuscular hemoglobin concentration. When those markers go high, that tends to mean that we’re dealing with B vitamin issues like b 12, full eight issues, and we call that megaloblastic anemia. So we have two kinds of anemia. As we look at big cell anemia is right we tend to be more B vitamins stuff. And then small anemias. We tend to be more on the red blood cell hemoglobin hematocrit, low iron side, and then we have immune markers, whether it’s neutrophils, lymphocytes, eosinophils, monocytes, and basophils, which could be from bacterial issues, parasite issues, gut inflammation issues, viral issues. And then I would say on top of the CBC, that’s pretty much it and then your limits. So total cholesterol, triglycerides and then of course, your LD vldl pattern, and then there’s some add ons that we may talk about whether it’s c reactive protein for inflammation, fibrinogen, for inflammation, homocysteine for inflammation, methylation, vitamin D. and we can kind of go into each one of those in regards to what we think is important on the functional side. But you know, the whole lipid thing is, it’s kind of overplayed, right people think that lipids are a really important issue now once you start going over 200 or so on the total cholesterol, and that may not be. And we’ll talk about the ratios and the perspective that we add to when we look at it.
Evan Brand: Yeah, so the way you talk, it sounds pretty good. It’s like, oh, wow, that’s a lot of stuff. But truthfully, there are rarely issues that show up on just standard bloodwork. Now, if you have more of the functional training that you and I’ve had regarding blood chemistry, you can kind of, I guess you would just say pick through the CBC with a fine tooth comb, and you can really look and maybe find some functional issues, like for me, I know that I you know, for a very long time, my hematic crit, you know, I’ve always had the hematocrit be a little bit high, which, based on some of the training you and I’ve had, it would indicate that there’s probably a dehydration issue. And that’s tough. You know, it’s, it’s, it’s tough to stay hydrated. And so even if I mean, I’m sipping on water all day, but you know, I’ve heard there’s a big influence on anti diuretic hormone, and all of that when you’re exposed to mold toxin, that’s a conversation for another day. But anyway, unless you’re really looking with a with a fine tooth comb, conventional bloodwork doesn’t reveal much. And you may see a little bit of this a little bit of that, but it’s not, I’m not making too many protocol decisions based on a CBC I would say.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: So when I look at blood, it can give me a good area of where to where to look next, or where to dive in deeper, which is helpful. And then if we look at it, using the optimal reference range, or a functional reference range, we can definitely glean better information. So the problem with most conventional medical doctors, they’re looking at blood through a pathological range, they’re trying to pick up like major disease patterns or pathological patterns. And so how it works is you have to show you have all people kind of fit in what’s called the bell curve. And the typical range is going to be two standard deviations to the left and right, this is represents about 95% of the population fit into the so called normal. So you have two and a half on the high two and a half on the low that are on the high or low side, pathologically, right. And so the problem with that range is it as people get more unhealthy and sicker. And as those sick people tend to test more, what happens to the lab reference range over time, it gets wider. And so it becomes more encompassing, it’s like having a bad field goal kicker and you make the field goal every year wider and wider and wider and closer and closer to compensate for the lack of, you know, good kickers out there. So it’s kind of like that. And so what we do is we kind of narrow up that range a little bit, and that narrower range helps us pick things out before it becomes a problem. So let’s kind of go over a couple of things. So with women or people that are vegan vegetarians, women, because they bleed more when they’re when they’re at menstrual age, right, typically 50 or below 48 or below, they can be more anemic. So we may look at things like lower red blood cells, right, red blood cells, you know, below 4.2 or so we may look at hemoglobin below 12, we may look at him at a crit, you know, in the mid to low 30s as a sign that there could be some low iron issues brewing, we may also run an iron panel, it’s not typically run, but we may run things like ferritin, or iron binding capacity. Or we may look at things like iron saturation to get a window of low iron, for instance. And that’s commonly missed, because what most conventional Doc’s do is, their threshold for low iron is really low. And there’s a lot of women I see in vegetarians in general that could be on that lower side could be a little bit anemic, and then they’re not going to be able to carry oxygen throughout their body adequately, which makes a huge difference in energy and stress and and mitochondrial function and thyroid function because you need to be able to carry oxygen to have good energy.
Evan Brand: Yeah, let’s go into some of the more let’s let’s, let’s break some of the stuff down. But before we break it down more, let’s hit on what are the things that that we’re going to run and so I’ve got my panel pulled up that I ran. And so I’ll kind of run through some of these things. But as you mentioned, ferritin that’s typically not going to get run I’ve rarely rarely seen fair to run by anyone. The iron saturation as you mentioned the iron binding capacity. That’s really wrong. That’s right to be ti BC. Often on your bloodwork, the vitamin D. I mean, my God, it’s so important, but yet vitamin D to this day is still not commonly run. Nope. And if they run it, they may run the wrong one. I’ve seen people where they don’t run the 25 o hydroxy. tryptophan, they’re going to run like the even the beat the D two. They’re going to run the What is it? Ergo?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, the vitamin D too. Yep, Ergocalciferol.
Evan Brand: Yep, yeah. Ergocalciferol? Yeah. So you have a vitamin D, they may run the D two and you’re like crap I needed to d3.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, the [inaudible]. The animal base kind of the d3 is the more active form. The D two is the more plant synthetic form, typically made from lanolin. A lot of times, that’s the D two, that’s the ergocalciferol. Ah, so vitamin D is really important. And then the range on that is pathological as well. They want above 20. Why? Because they’re looking for rickets, right, the bone bending disease, right, because d3 helps absorb calcium and helps a calcium get into the bone. So we want 50 to 70 or maybe 70 to 100 if we’re autoimmune or cancer risk. So vitamin D is a big one, I would say also on the CBC, we may be looking at immune cells, if I see low white blood cells, you know, below four and a half. There could be some you know, deficiency issues if there’s high white blood cells, you know, greater than seven and a half there could be some immune stress. Now we look at the, the immune cells, how do we look at those never let monkeys eat bananas, that’s the mnemonic device and doctor at school we learned so neutrophils we want to see, you know, below 60 lymphocytes, we want to see mid reference range when we see high neutrophils or low neutrophils and elevated lymphocytes. That’s a common h pylori or bacterial infection pattern. If we see elevations in eosinophils, greater than four, we’re thinking potential parasites or chronic environmental allergies by sea monocytes, greater than 10. I’m thinking some kind of intestinal inflammation. So we there’s different, you know, patterns you may look at, when we look at some of these immune cells. That’s very important. But unless it’s very high, they’re typically not going to say much. And if it’s very low, they typically don’t say much either there.
Evan Brand: Yep, so also more advanced thyroid markers. It’s very, very sad how many people go to even an endocrinologist and they may only end up with a free T for possibly a free t three, but even that’s not guaranteed. Maybe a total T for you may get Of course, TSH is going to be on there. But you and I are definitely going to be running like thyroid globulin, I mean obat antibodies, we’re going to be running t TPO, thyroid paradoxus antibodies, maybe TSI, sometimes if we think there could be something else going on next. And then you’ve got the uptake of T three, what else you got? You got reverse t three that we’re going to be looking at. That’s an awesome marker. And that’s never run.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. So when it comes to a thyroid panel, you already mentioned it, most conventional endocrinologist and primary care are going to run TSH because that’s the major screening brain hormone, not a thyroid hormone majrooh. It’s not a thyroid hormone, but it’s a major brain hormone that talks to the thyroid and you’d be lucky to get a T for total after that. But we know downstream is a lot of conversion issues and even patients that have normal TSH, guess what, especially if they’re on Synthroid, which is a synthetic thyroid medication that’s just T for many of them can’t make that conversion. And that’s a problem too. And so you can have adequate T for good TSH and low t three. And you may have a lot of thyroid symptoms. So it’s really important that we look at things complete. And don’t even get me started on thyroid antibodies, because that’s almost never run and thyroid antibodies are the major mechanism why most people sideway glands aren’t functioning properly because their immune systems have beaten the crap out of their thyroid for a very long time.
Evan Brand: And we’re talking what I mean, you’d say probably over half of cases of hypothyroid are probably autoimmune based on what I’ve seen, what would your guess be?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, I would say that and some may not even come back on the lab test, but it’s very helpful to be able to look at those we run TPO antibodies and thyroid globulin antibodies. And so my full thyroid panel nevitt, some kind of a TSH, T for free and total t three free and total TPO antibody, federal globulin antibody, and we may run a reverse d3 or an uptake. Those are all okay markers to add to. So that’s kind of your complete thyroid panel. Let me just piggyback to the CVC. Is there anything else on the CDC? I think we hit it all there. We can go to the metabolic profile now if you want.
Evan Brand: Yeah, well, you mentioned like earlier, like CBR active protein c reactive protein, I guess it kinda depends. I mean, sometimes that standard, but a lot of times that’s not an hscrp is, you know, going to be the same same section of the inflammation panel on your blood. So hopefully you get those two run together.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, usually CRP and cardio CRP is basically the same thing CRP, they’re just, they’re breaking the number down typically below two, I think the cardio CRP, they typically don’t do it less than two or so. So when they you do a highly sensitive CRP, they’re just breaking it down into a smaller number. Let’s go we want to see that below one that’s great as a good marker of systemic inflammation. And fibrinogen is great. We have for highly inflamed, we may see a lot of clotting happen. And fibrinogen looks at clotting factors, which is helpful. So if we don’t have good fatty acids, good omega three omega six ratio or a lot of inflammation, a lot of trans fat, high blood sugar cells tend to agglutinate they get very sticky. And so it’s nice to see where that stickiness that stickiness level is. And homocysteine is also another measure of blood inflammation because it’s homocysteine is an inflammatory metabolite. That typically happens when there’s not enough B vitamins B six and four And B 12. In their active form, that can be a big inflammatory issue there too.
Evan Brand: Yeah, that was a problem for me. Actually, I did have elevated homocysteine couple years ago and started hitting some more Foley and it fixed it. So it was fun to see how the blood correlated to that.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, you know, we’re going to try to get as much of that which we can do leafy greens and high quality, you know, essential fats and meats, right, but that’s good. And so metabolic profile, we may look at liver enzymes that could be helpful patients that have a lot of insulin resistance and inflammation, you may see an elevation in liver enzymes. What does that mean? That could be a non alcoholic, fatty liver, non alcoholic steatohepatitis, that’s Nash or non alcoholic fatty liver, meaning your liver has stressed not from alcohol, but from typically too much fructose and junky carbs. So the liver is a people think the liver is just a big filter for toxins. No, it also has a major effect at regulating blood sugar, and is also a storage site for sugar, especially fructose. So when you over consume fructose from high fructose corn syrup, or, you know, just too much carbohydrate, in general, the liver really gets stored up. And then when that liver fully gets saturated, overly saturated with fructose, for instance, you start having all these up regulations of inflammatory enzymes called the the junk enzymes, the J, the J and K one enzymes, and you see a lot of inflammation and a fatty liver there, and you see it an ultrasound. And so that’s a common marker seen those elevated liver enzymes, and it’s good to be able to look at that.
Evan Brand: Yeah, I don’t know if you’ve tested bloodwork much with people like in the middle of a protocol. But I’ve had a couple interesting cases where, while using binders, we’ve seen liver enzymes go up. And it could have been also parasite protocols and things like that, that were kind of interwoven with detox protocols. But I’ve seen liver enzymes temporarily go up during that. So I don’t know if you pay much attention to that. But I’ve seen it and they always go down as soon as it protocols over so.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Even with some killing herbs, like worm woods, a common one that we may see a little bit of elevation and liver enzymes, people that are sensitive, some of the killing herbs, it could be a little bit of stress, is it just the herbs? Or is it the dead debris that is now mobilized from the killing of those microbes, it could be both. That’s where adding things like binders can be very helpful just to kind of put handcuffs on those critters and escorted out of the body versus kind of having it go back into general circulation. also adding an extra glutathione support can be helpful too. Just to really support and tone if I deliver those are very important too.
Evan Brand: Yeah, well. And it’s common for you and I to use some sort of a liver gallbladder support too. So we may be throwing in like some extra taurine or Mathionine or beet powder artichoke. And there’s many, many things that I say milk thistle already NAC. So there’s a lot of stuff we can do. But yeah, I just figured I mentioned it. Because if someone’s listening and you happen to do blood work in the middle of a protocol, it’s possible that the levels may you may look at him and go, Oh, my God, my liver enzymes, but it will go back to normal relatively quick after killing protocols over.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Exactly. Also, we may look at glucose, blood glucose is going to be on a metabolic profile as well. CMP panel, I don’t love it as much, because most people that are going to get a blood test and they’re getting pricked in the arm of the big needle, or they kind of stressed. Yeah, and so that the cortisol from that can really increase their blood glucose. So I like getting a really good blood sugar kit like this. And then you can measure your blood glucose during the day. So here’s my little kit here. And so I have I use the keto Mojo now because it measures ketones, so I’m a little meter, I have my little pricker here from my finger, and then I have the blood glucose and the ketones. So this one right here is the blood sugar. And this one here in the lighter blue, this is my ketones. So it’s kind of nice to have those. So I can test my blood sugar before I eat. And then I can do a one two hour three hour and play around with my blood sugar. The whole goal is the more you keep your blood sugar down after a meal and bring it back to baseline within two or three hours, the less insulin you’re making, the higher it goes up and the longer it takes to come back down, the more insulin you’re making. So it gives you kind of a good window how you’re responding to food.
Evan Brand: Yeah, what I wanted to point out is that you’re doing more functional analysis of glucose versus if you just go into your doctor once every six months, you get a morning fasted glucose, that’s just not enough information.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: It’s not because the whole goal while you’re just checking morning glucose is because you’re thinking your food, so out of whack, that your glucose is now elevated as a result. Now the problem is most people haven’t eaten in 12 hours. So for your glucose is still be out of whack. 12 hours later, the problem has to be pretty severe number one, and then number two, a lot of times it can be elevated not because of food, but because of stress hormones in the morning. And so the stress hormones, people say oh, I’m at 105. Yeah, but it just could be a good cortisol response in the morning called the dawn phenomenon that’s raising that glucose. That’s why you want to check it against your foods during the day. If you have a blood glucose issue. You’re going to see one and two hours later, it’s chronically elevated, and it’s taken a bit of time to come down. So that’s a better marker. Make sure you’re handling glucose okay.
Evan Brand: Yep. How about hemoglobin A1C, this is something that for diabetics, obviously, this is hopefully going to be regularly checked. But for your average person that maybe has some issues, A1C is probably not going to be on your standard blood panel.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: I don’t love A1C, I used to like it. I don’t love it as much, I find that when people’s blood cells live longer, because they’re more healthier, they have more time to accumulate blood glucose. So the A1C it’s a part of the hemoglobin and they’re looking at the coding, the coding of glucose on the outside of the hemoglobin, right? So imagine, like, you know, when you, you know, you go up into your car during allergy season, you can see like a big fixed swath of like pollen on the car, they’re kind of looking at the swath of glucose on the outer part of the human lobe. And now the problem is, the longer your red blood cells are hanging around, the more time they have to accumulate that blood sugar. So it can be helpful to look at something. But if you’re, if you’re a little bit on the higher side, or like, let’s say 5.5 or so, let’s say under six, but 5.5. And up, it may just because your red blood cells are a little bit more healthier. So like, for instance, with my anemic women who may have a ton of blood sugar, right, a lot of carbs, because maybe they’re vegetarian or vegan. Guess what? When you’re anemic, your red blood cells die faster. So all my anemic women have A1C super low, like in the forest. And so it’s not going to be a great marker when your red blood cells don’t live that long, and we see it with our anemic patients.
Evan Brand: That’s a good point. Good point.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: If I see someone six or higher, yeah, it’s helpful, you know, but when you’re kind of in that subclinical zone, you’re going to typically have to go back to one, a meter like this, to really look at it. And then also look at your fasting insulin, which is a better marker, because that’s going to give you a better window, how much insulin you’re making frequently.
Evan Brand: Yep, good point, that analogy is perfect. The pollen on the car. So good job there.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Right. And if you leave your car out there a lot longer, you’re gonna get a lot more pollen. It’s kind of like that, right?
Evan Brand: I’m always under five though, no matter what with a one C, I’m always right. 4.9. Somewhere in there.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, I’m pretty low, too. I’m always like, right in the low fives. 5’1 5’2. But I’ve seen a lot of patients in my career that have that have really good diets that have tested their blood sugar, have good insulin, and they’ll still have a little bit higher on the a one C and I’m just like, yeah, it’s just it’s missing some people. That’s all. It makes sense. The question is, what’s the mechanism? And that’s what it is.
Evan Brand: Yep. Makes sense. You hit the you hit the dawn phenomenon. So you know, cortisol that may be run via blood, although we don’t really like blood cortisol too much. We really like more functional analysis of cortisol, like with urine or possibly saliva?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Oh, yeah. And part of the reason why we don’t we don’t like it, is it because when you’re measuring a stress hormone, while creating a stress response, ie putting a needle in my arm, you may influence that a little bit, right? And so that’s kind of the reason why we don’t love that. And even if you’re like, Well, you know, do the adrenals make cortisol fast enough after the needle happens to show in the blood? Well, it’s not just that it’s the fact that you’re anticipating it happening. Therefore, you’re replaying that stress in your mind all the way up to the doctor’s office to go and then the elevator getting into the you’re already making that stress hormone while you’re anticipating what’s going to happen.
Evan Brand: Yeah, you go in the friggin lab with the scientific fluorescent lights above your head. It’s all awkward the quiet they got some like drug commercials on in the waiting room, Justin, and they call your name come on back. Yeah. So and, you know, also Not to mention, too, that that’s just a snapshot, right? I mean, that doesn’t tell us anything about what’s happening at two or 3pm when you’re complaining of that midday crash. So I really am not too interested about what happened at 8am. I’m really want to know what what’s going on at 2pm when you’re saying you need that third cup of coffee.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Exactly, yep. 100%. So it’s, it’s really important that you’re kind of on top of that. So I think we hit some good blood glucose stuff, we hit some liver enzymes we hit. I’m thinking here, we hit some of the electrolytes. electrolytes are good, too. So sodium and chloride are really good ones. Now when I see patients that have adrenal issues, you could easily have low sodium and high potassium, or you can just kind of have lower minerals all together. Now the serum is not going to be the best marker for testing minerals. So when you see your minerals out of balance, you know, it’s a big issue, but you could still have mineral issues. And the serum be okay, because it really matters what’s in the cell. Not necessarily what’s floating around in the blood. So think of interesting Imagine you’re in a pool, okay? The pool is serum. Okay, you’re in the little floaty. You’re in the little inner tube, right? So it’s you in the inner tube, right? You and the inner tube and the water in the inner tube that’s intercellular. The water outside of the inner tube is extracellular serum. So that’s kind of how you think of it. So when we test some of these nutrients, it’s better to get a sample of the water in the inner tube with you that’s intercellular versus the water outside of the inner tube. That’s serum.
Evan Brand: Yeah, and how do people get that? What is look like?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Well, you can like we can add like a red blood cell serum or a potassium serum on some of these panels, we may run like a spectracell, or a Nutri eval or an ion panel that looks at more intercellular nutrients, we may look at different tests that allow us to do that. But there’s not too many add ons for conventional testing like quest or labcorp. Outside of I seen a blood cell magnesium is good. You can do a potassium if you wanted. So there are a couple that you can do to get a window into that.
Evan Brand: Yeah, I was gonna say I looked through all the options for the conventional labs, RBC magnesium, I think that was about it. I think that’s all I could find.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: So yeah, not too much. But it’s something you know, because magnesium is a big one, right? And with magnesium RBC, we want to see a greater than five on that one, red blood cell magnesium greater than five. So that’s helpful. And then, of course, we mentioned magnesium surround, we want that greater than two. And then your minerals, you want them somewhat mid reference range, once we start going under 100 or so I think like sodium, it’s like 104 is kind of mid range. If you’re under 104, it could be a problem, potassium, I forget the exact ranges in it, but I want them all about mid range. In regards to the reference range.
Evan Brand: What do you feel about using conventional bloodwork to do like omega three omega six fatty acid panels, I know, there’s some Doc’s that are just so obsessed with all these ratios. But, you know, truthfully, if you’re doing the things that we’re discussing with our clients and patients for nutrition, you’re going to pretty much be optimized anyway. I don’t know what that would tell you. Besides, hey, maybe you need to do a little more this or that?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, it’s a great question, I think, look at the person’s food. Like someone could have really good diet, but let’s say the meat and the eggs aren’t pasture fed. Well, that could easily be the reason why your omega six to three is off a little bit. Or it could be that you know, you’re just doing too much plant fats, and those plants or from coming from, you know, omega six bass plants soy or canola or safflower. So if you’re doing good fats, like coconut oil, and olive oil and avocado stuff, which are monosaccharides are Yeah, so those are, yeah, those are MonEl fatty acids versus like, vs. poly, which is like a fish oil, right. And then so the fish oils, you have omega threes, right, which are going to be like, the ones that are we talking about that are going to be more on the anti inflammatory side, right? These are the Polly’s. And then of course, the Omega sixes are going to be more on the vegetable side. These are going to be also Polly’s but they’re going to have six bonds, these are going to be your safflower canola, these are going to be your soybean oil, all of your plant based fats, most in the most of your plant bait fast, to extract the fats from them with the olive oil or maybe an avocado, you tend to have to damage the fats, they tend to be more damaged, they tend to be more on the Omega six side. And when you get when you eat plants by themselves, you’re not getting that concentration of fats. And so you tend to not have that high omega six to omega three, when you’re doing just vegetables by themselves. Okay. And so we can just look at how much fish you haven’t per week, how much pasture fed eggs you have in a week, how much steak or meat that is grass fed, you haven’t per week, and then you can kind of look at it relative to what’s high on the Omega sixes like the knots and the seas and the refined vegetable oils. And you can kind of get a pretty good assessment of where you’re at, which is like kind of for one or less. So four times omega six to one is pretty, it’s pretty. Okay. And you can always run that omega three to six tests on the blood too. Does that make sense?
Evan Brand: It does. Yeah, I just find that it’s not a huge needle mover. So I don’t run it too often. I mean, I think it’s cool to check in you could call it kind of a lie detector test as somebody says they’re doing everything that’s dialed in, but then you find out that Oh, they’ve been coconut grass fed steak, but it’s been in this healthy heart oil blend that they found on the shelf and it was a safflower canola combo. You’re like, Oh crap, then we missed it. And you got to get off of that stuff. So yeah, I mean, I was just gonna say so it’s not really a standard thing. For me at least you know, I’m not running into often with people but-
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: But it’s there it’s an option and then it’s something if someone wants to run we’ll run it and so we have the polyunsaturated which is the fish oil or on the omega three side, right. And then we also have things like flaxseed oil, but it has to get converted to the to the higher up fatty acid so you know, omega three fish, and then you get to get some mega three from cows that are grass fed as well.
Evan Brand: What about particle size on a lipid panel? So we talked about that briefly. It’s just a good add on that most people don’t do and our friend jack Wolfson, he discusses particle size and I think it’s something that more people are asking questions to their doctor about but it’s still very uncommon to run.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: People that have a cardiovascular history. Just want to run it to begin with. I think it’s okay. I can almost always tell you what your particle sizes if you’re eating good health saturated fatty acids like coconut oil and grass fed butter. And you’re getting meats that are like good quality fish, good quality grass fed beef, egg yolks, you’re keeping a lot of your junky fats down a lot of the refined sugar down and a lot of the trans fats down, you’re going to have a large, you’re going to have a particle size A, which means large and buoyant and fluffy, right? Think of a like you want an ad on your test. And then you have the small dense atherosclerotic particle size B, think B for bad, and the B for bad, more trans fats, more inflammatory, processed vegetable oils, more refined sugar. And so with patients, I almost always can look at their diet. And guess what that will be to begin with. So if I do a dietary check and do a diet recall, what’s what’s the average day look like? And I look at that and I get a window, it’s pretty easy to predict that. And so we’ll run it for patients that have a cardiovascular history, and they just want to know, but for the most part, it’s not hard to predict it.
Evan Brand: Yeah. And when you see it, are you just tweaking dial? Like, if you see a bunch of small dense particles, or are you coming in? Are you using any kind of like plant sterols or anything like that, to help with it are you just tweaking diet, and then it fixes itself?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: It depends how acute the patient is. But if it’s if it’s not acute, meaning the patient’s not dealing with a heart issue right away, then we’re going to just tweak the diet, and that’s going to take care of it, we’re going to add an extra omega three fatty acids from fish oil, we’re tweaking the diet, we’re getting the carbs down, we may be adding extra nutrients to manage blood sugar and manage inflammation. And then usually within a month or so you’re gonna see a big change. After we retest. Awesome, yeah, usually once you get about 100 good meals, then you’re going to see a big shift. A good average person is doing about 21 meals a week, right? So three a day times 721. So four to five weeks, once you get 100 meals in, if you can get them close to in a row. Your body has a huge shift in physiology.
Evan Brand: It’s amazing how quick you can change stuff I knew. I mean, sometimes we get impatient because like what the detox piece like that takes longer. I mean, I’m here I am a couple years in detox and mycotoxins. I’ve still got some going on. So, you know, with that, it’s like, oh, man, you get impatient. But luckily, with the blood, it’s a quicker turnaround time sounds like.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Oh, totally, man. It’s really important. So I think we hit some of the big markers today. I would say one other one for lipids. You know, I don’t really care if cholesterol is a little bit on the higher side, just I try to make sure the cholesterol to HDL ratio is ideally you know, four. So if the if your Triggs are sorry if your total cholesterol is 200, and your HDL is 60, or what’s that ratio to the math, put my calculator 200 divided by 60, that’s 3.3. That’s pretty darn good. Usually, when you’re under three and a half, that’s half the average risk factor. Okay? When you let’s say you’re at 242 40 divided by 60. On the HDL, now you’re at four. And so I like to look at the total cholesterol to HDL because HDL is what recycles cholesterol. Okay? So if you have good recycling lipoproteins, ie HDL, that’s a good sign. And then I’m also going to look at my trigger to HDL ratio, we want that under two. But if we can have a closer to one, that’s wonderful, what does that mean? Take your trig number, let’s say your trig numbers at 60. Let’s say your HDL is at 50. Well, what’s that? What’s that number? Well, we do 60 divided by 50. We’re at like, 1.2. That’s good. So we want to under two but closer to one’s ideal. That’s a really good marker. That’s my insulin resistance inflammation marker for my limits. So I’ll look at trade over HDL. That’s a really good marker.
Evan Brand: Yeah, you know, I talked to jack one time about the, the blood and I said, When do you start getting freaked out regarding total cholesterol, because if you talk to a conventional cardiologist, they’re they’re brainwashed on that 200 number. And he says that he’s got people up in the 450s, that he’s not worried about 1%, like total cholesterol being 450. And it’s not an issue. So he just talks about, like he said, ratios, inflammation associated with it, you know, then you get into more trouble. But I mean, the total number, I mean, he acts like it’s just minimally important.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, on its own, I would be a little bit concerned once you start getting in the mid 300. Just because that’s that could be more hypercholesterolemia. And that’s not necessarily a diet thing, that’s more of a genetic thing where you’re making a lot more cholesterol. So I personally would get a little bit more concerned with that and I’d be monitoring that. But it’s hard to really jack up your cholesterol when you’re keeping inflammation down. Like I just did a blood test for my lipids last month, and my cholesterol my total cholesterol and you know what I eat man? I good fats, good proteins, good eggs, good fatty acids. And my total cholesterol was at 165.
Evan Brand: Whoa, yeah, I was like a 202.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, 165 my my trades were at 60. And my HDL is we’re at 50. So I had like a 1.1 1.2 ratio for trigger over HDL, which is great. And so most of the cholesterol, you’re gonna Ahead is gonna be made by your body. So when it starts getting too jacked up and your diets good, you know, we want to look at thyroid hormone, maybe that could be a big thing. And there could be a hypercholesterolemia genetic issue, and we can always run a genetic test for that to see what’s going on. And if that’s the case, what are natural things you can do to get your cholesterol down, you can do higher dose berberine to make sure your thyroids check, you can also do some potential plant sterols as well. But get that check. So my philosophy if it goes a little too high, I’m curious, I’m worried about the hypercholesterolemia piece.
Evan Brand: Yeah, and I don’t mention that 400 number just to get people off the hook. I just thought it was interesting that that’s what he was saying. And he’s probably talking like, you’re in big trouble if you get to that point. But But anyway, so that’s rare, though.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: That’s super like these are very, very rare situations, you know, sub 1% of the population are going to be there. My never seen it ever. I have two patients with that. But most people already know about it, because someone in their family already had been picked up previously. Yes. So most people already know what especially today, you know, maybe 3040 years ago, not as much, but people that have had those issues have already been picked up. They already know genetically, if it’s in their family, and then once you know genetically, if it’s in their family attend to get tested for it.
Evan Brand: Yep. Right? Well, let’s wrap this thing up. So as we mentioned, bloodwork is a piece of the puzzle. If you go to a practitioner, and they’re like I’m going to analyze your blood and tell you everything you need, they’re wrong, because you mentioned some of the clues into the immune section about parasite infections and all that. However, I will speak for you and say that you’re not going to depend on that bloodwork solely to identify parasites, you’re still going to be running comprehensive genetic DNA based school panels, you’re going to be running organic acid panels to look and deeper. So yes, you may look at those things. And I think it’s awesome that you gave us some insight into that, however, I’m not going to go to a guy who’s going to look at the blood and say, Yep, you’ve got parasites, let’s put this protocol together, I’m going to want more data. So blood is just part of that data. And it can be helpful, especially when you’re working with autoimmune people, because you and I like to look at these antibodies, and it’s very fun and satisfying. And it makes you look better when you could have a a woman come in with a TPO of 1000. And all you do is fix her gut and our TPO antibodies go down to sub 200. That’s exciting.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Totally, that’s huge. So I think today is very great, great podcast, because we’re talking about actual things. We want people to kind of like say, Hey, you know, what’s it like to be inside Dr. J, and Evans head, and this is kind of it. And everything that we look at, we’re kind of like a detective, we’re putting like checkmarks in the column over here that support us going in this direction, or going in that direction. So we add up all of our checkmarks, right, and we’re kind of create what that differential diagnosis is, and what tests we’re going to do to dive in deeper in in whatever those avenues where those check marks are adding up. So that’s kind of inside of our head, we’re walking through you through our thinking. And if you want to dive in and reach deeper, you know, into work with a practitioner, like Evan or myself, you can head over to EvanBrand.com, you can schedule a consult with Evan or myself at JustinHealth.com. And you can schedule we are available worldwide to help y’all with your functional medicine and natural health care needs. And if you want to get to the root cause we’re going to be the best person to to look at anything else you want to highlight here today.
Evan Brand: Maybe just one frequently asked question, Well, I’m not where you live. Does that matter? Well, in the US, it doesn’t matter at all. We can run like a blood comprehensive blood panel, we can run that anywhere now. We’ll try to help people internationally in regards to providing maybe some codes or things like that to help people. But at least for the us know, you location does not matter. We haven’t had any issue with that. I think New Jersey for a while was getting a little more strict. But beyond that, no. I mean, nationwide, it’s a piece of cake. So as we talked about the beginning, create a panel, send a requisition form to your email, print it go get your labs drawn, you’re done. It’s awesome. percent was in New York, or was in New York or New Jersey was one of them.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, both.
Evan Brand: They’re both difficult. But was it for blood? Or was it for some of the functional or was it-
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: For blood, but there are some still some Malin fingerprick tests that we have accessible to deal with patients like that. So we still have options for them. Maybe not quite as much. And then if they’re near the Connecticut border or the Pennsylvania border, we have also options there too, but we still have some mail and stuff. That’s helpful.
Evan Brand: Cool, cool. All right. Well check out the sites JustinHealth.com. EvanBrand.com. We’ll be back next week. Take care.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Excellent. Have a good one, y’all. Take care. Bye.
References:
Audio Podcast:
https://justinhealth.libsyn.com/essential-blood-tests-to-analyze-your-health-podcast-305
Thanksgiving Celebration, Healthy Ingredient Substitutes | Podcast #205
It’s the holiday season: a season of gathering, celebration, thanksgiving. Where there’s occasion, there are also foods. Part of preparations should not only include serving the best in the menu but also the idea of a healthy ingredient substitute. It’s also the cold season, a time to plan about how to boost the immune system.
Today’s podcast talks about the healthy substitutes for Thanksgiving, what to do when you get sick, proper nutrients, herbal medicines, and immunosuppressants. Watch and learn how to boost the immune system through the geeky advice of Dr. J and Evan Brand. Sharing is caring!
Dr. Justin Marchegiani
In this episode, we cover:
00:24 Healthy substitutes for
10:31 What happens when you get sick?
15:15 Building up TH-1.
19:44 Blood tests.
24:21 Sickness via airplane.
26:31 Amino acids without meat, quinoa, or dairy.
32:12 Cyst in the upper arm.
35:05 Immunosuppressant drugs.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Hey there, it’s Dr. Justin Marchegiani. Hope everyone is doing phenomenal. We just got off here the thanksgiving day holidays. Evan, how are you doing, how was your thanksgiving?
Evan Brand: Thanksgiving was great. I think I probably got gluten somewhere along the way but, I feel like a lot of us probably did. Even though I tried, and I did tick my special enzymes to break down my– my gluten exposure, the DPP4 enzyme. So hopefully I mitigated some of my risk.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: That’s great! Now
Evan Brand: Yeah I was jealous of your Apple Woods smoked. I mean, that sounded delicious. I just did a standard turkey in the oven that was in a little bag with
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, so I got a– it’s still right there, that’s my smoker.
Evan Brand: Ooh.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: So you can see it with my like 18 pound pasture-fed, grass-
Evan Brand: Cool.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Fructose sprouts, bacon,
Evan Brand: That’s great. Yeah, I did mostly meats. I did do some sweet potato. One of our cousins had made like a sweet potato dish with brown sugar and cinnamon, and it was so good. I was like, “Dude, how much sugar is in this? It taste a little too good.” It almost like turn it into a brown sugar glaze on the sweet potato. And uh– I was just tracking my blood sugar for fun over the weekend. And– I’ll tell you, I feel much, much better with starch. I think I’ve gone too low carb. You know, we talked a lot about lower carb–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Totally.
Evan Brand: Ketogenic diets and, there’s
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, totally. Uhm– again, starch can be really helpful for people’s blood sugars and adrenals especially if you’re more ectomorph. Uhm– you know, you may really benefit with a little bit of extra carbohydrate. Uh– for desserts, for me, i did an apple cake. And I was uh– using uh– tapioca flour which is like
Evan Brand: Yeah, my wife made some pumpkin muffins with almond flour. And I wanna say she did some arrowroot
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah.
Evan Brand: Flour arrowroot,
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah.
Evan Brand: I’m not really into like super sweet stuff like cookies, or cakes or–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah I don’t like the– the s– the too sweetest well. I think you can make a lot of these desserts and really keep the sugar and the carbohydrate content down, so that’s great. Any other tips or substitutes that you did over
Evan Brand: I mean I– I– I wanna say, I gotta divert back to the enzyme piece because–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yup.
Evan Brand: –enzymes are kind of my insurance policy.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Uh-huh.
Evan Brand: There’s several that you and I manufacture and use. And a lot of our enzymes have the DPP4 enzyme in there which does break down gluten. So, if– you know, people, if they’re trying to stay away from gluten, they don’t wanna offend the family, or– they just– they’re family just straight up
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Uh-huh.
Evan Brand: –like a joint pain flare, or something–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yup.
Evan Brand: You almost feel paralyzed like you can’t go to family events. So I– I– I would
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: On my
Evan Brand: Yeah.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: And then no complaints. They didn’t even know which tells you, right, that you can eat this way, that you can find healthy substitutions. And it totally can fly underneath the radar.
Evan Brand: Yeah it doesn’t have to be–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Uh-huh.
Evan Brand: You don’t have to have a billboard that says– that it’s this, that and that. And then it has to be so quote, “different” to your family members. It can be a totally normal diet.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: 100%. So those are some good substitutions, you know, potatoes– I’m okay with. Ah– high quality turkey, you now, up the quality, right? That’s a big one. Uh– I also say
Evan Brand: Uh– I– I– I would like to have some wild turkey, you know, I was on a hunt, I was almost going to get a wild turkey, but I had so much fun watching them, that I had the potential to shoot one with my bow and I passed, ’cause it was just so fun watching all these little turkeys talk to each other. They weren’t little–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: That’s great man, very cool. So we talked about today, you know, it’s the holidays, it’s– cold season, what can you do to boost your immune system? I’ve done a couple articles in the past than this. If you go to justinhealth.com, you put in uh–, “What to do when you get sick”, its a part 1 in a part 2, check that out. We’ll be kind of going over some of the clip notes today. We have some previous podcast on these topics as well. I’m getting over a cold now, I mean, I just have a little bit of
Evan Brand: Yeah, Vitamin-D, that was– I mean that’s the low-hanging fruit. Now, if you’ve talked about dosing like, what, 50,000 a day for a few days. I know typically you’re only doing what, maybe 5 to 8000 on a regular basis though.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: For Vitamin-D, I have ratcheted up a hundred thousand I use for three days. Right now I’m just on 10 to 20,000 which okay, as well. Well right now I’m doing Vitamin-C up to 8 to 10 grams a day,
Evan Brand: Sound like you need to take your own advice. [laughs]
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Well I’ve been doin’ it. I have a– a product called ginger
Evan Brand: You gotta get that good stuff. You’re still doing the– the bottled stuff which is great. But I think you’re probably getting some compounds we may not even fully understand when you’re doing it fresh like you are.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, the potency when it’s fresh is– I mean, you can just– you’d know because the spiciness is out of control, that’s why you want a little bit of lime, and a little bit of honey, ’cause it really kind of curls– it kind of curves off that spiciness makes a little easier to handle.
Evan Brand: Yup. So, ah– in terms of other stuff, or immune, people talk a lot about bone broth, but here’s the thing I’ve noticed with bone broth is, if you’ve got something going on in your gut, or you’re somebody who’s like a really histamine intolerant person, or you think you’re having like a histamine reaction, the bone broth could flare people up. So I’ve had people say, “Hey, you know, I’ve tried this bone broth, everybody, you know, promotes it and talks about it, and I’ve tried it and I got worst. I had more sinus issues, I had itchy eyes, a runny nose, or this or that”. So I think bone broth is in the category of these good nutrients but then it could have a– a disclaimer with it. Which is at if there is a histamine reaction it’s possible you may react to it.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, so, when you’re sick, one of the big things that happens is, it’s common to have a little bit of nausea. And that nausea is there because your body has a– enhanced re– recycling immune cell effect when you fast. And this could be super helpful. So when you’re– when you’re sick, it takes a lot of energy to digest food. So your body naturally wants to be in a fasting state because it can recycle your immune cells. So if you’re fasting, and you’re nauseous, one of the best things is one, the ginger tea is– is excellent ’cause ginger actually helps with nausea, and that could help your appetite a little bit. There’s a reason why chicken soup’s been baked, right. What’s chicken soup? You’re getting a nice broth forearm. Ideally you’re getting a lot of minerals and amino acids in the broth, which is really easy to digest and handle as long as there’s not a histamine issue, that’s amazing, ’cause you’re getting all these nutrients really bile available. You’re getting proteins that are already easy to digest, it’s pretty easy to syrup down some really good organic chicken than a soup form. Not a lot of chewing– uh– much easier on your digestive system. And then of course you could even throw some vegetables in there, some celery, some carrots, things like that as well, but much easier on your digestion. And that way you can at least get some food in there not quite feel as nauseous, and then if you do the ginger tea, the ginger’s a– a natural antitoxin that will help with the coughing. Number 2, it will help at drainage and help get the sinuses to drain out. And then number 3, it’s highly
Evan Brand: So, wild cherry bark changed my life. I have to get some last year. I don’t remember exactly if it was throat– throat soreness or swollen lymph nodes or just a cough or what it is. But I ac– I think in your ginger syrup as well there’s probably some–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yup.
Evan Brand: –probably some wild cherry bark in there.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: You’ve done your test in there as well cherry bark and ginger. That’s nice, and it can kinda like gargle with that and that hits the back of my throat–
Evan Brand: Yup.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Uhm– the ginger tea – I really like ’cause
Evan Brand: Astragalus too, you can go pretty high, I mean, you could go 6, 10, 15, 20 grams with it. Uh– the Chinese, they were using astragalus in the base of their soup. So I’ve heard of extremely high dose astragalus.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Here’s my astragalus right here I’ve been knocking out of the park, so, I have astragalus in my
Evan Brand: Adding some extra ___[13:31] astragalus.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, extra astragalus roots. 600 milligrams per two capsules, and again, this is
Evan Brand: Yup. Now, in terms of astragalus, I mean, it is an amino modulator so this is not saying everyone in the world can go straight to astragalus and hit it high dose because it does modify the immune system. So, you know, you could try it, just on your own, but if you notice there’s something’s not right, work with a practitioner because we’ve had clients before where they’re taking all these immune-stimulating herbs, and they’re actually making their autoimmune condition worse. So, if we’re talking
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: People that are more uh– autoimmune scenarios, maybe the ones affected the most by it. So some autoimmune– so like a lot of the
Evan Brand: Cat’s claw–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: –they really bump up TH– cat’s claw, they really bump up that TH-1 side of the immune system. And the TH-2 side, that’s the humoral, that’s the
Evan Brand: Yeah.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Medicinal mushrooms are gonna be immune billers. Herbs will be really good immune supporters, really bumping up your immune system as well. And then you have things like ginger which can actually deactivate viruses, you have silver which can actually help break down viruses and bacteria. And be very careful too because– a lot of people, they mistake a viral infection from a bacterial infection, there is really harsh in the difference. And especially if your doctor’s not doing a culture, like, you know, testing you for strap or testing you from– from pneumonia, you know, you may get treated with antibiotics for a viral infection that it won’t be darn thing on. And the only real viral things that are out there is gonna be
Evan Brand: Yup.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: It’s not doing anything to increase, you know, your TH-1 or your TH-2 immune activation, right. TH-1, that’s the special forces, that’s the navy seals, that’s the delta team, that’s the army ranger, those are the people that are going first line. TH– that’s TH-1. TH-2 is the second line, this is the infantry that comes in after all that intel comes in, you know– you know–
Evan Brand: Good, good. Now, oregano oil, I think we should mention that too just because it’s such an easy thing that can kill such a wide variety of bad guys. So you can kill viruses, you can kill bacteria. We use it often to help kill some other gut bugs too. Parasites even, you know oregano maybe in one of our protocols. And then you mentioned the silver, which is awesome. I know some of the protocols you’ve talked about you’ll combine silver with oregano. Garlic would be another extract–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yes.
Evan Brand: –that we use it’s great for candida. You know, you could have–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yes.
Evan Brand: –candida overgrowth. Let’s say
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, and if you are taking things that will have an effect on parasites or bacteria, like, I’m taking some goldenseal, I’m taking some silver. So that may have an effect on my gut bacteria, and non-silly a bad thing but we wanna be careful of what’s called the rebound overgrowth. If we kill some good stuff, right? We wanna make sure that we fill it up with some good probiotics. So, you know, if you are doing a lot of killing for a week or two, you may wanna come in there with, you know, some probiotics for a week or two. And or just work on consuming some good fermented foods during that phase, whether it’s– you know, some
Evan Brand: Yup, good point. You may wanna get this conversation elsewhere but I thought we should mention some lab testing. So, I wanted to mention some blood work and things you may wanna look for on blood work that can help you indicate what could be going on. An easy one would be white blood cells. I had a woman this morning, we were looking at her blood. Her white blood cell count was around 2, and reference range, I don’t remember what it was but it was extremely low white blood cell count. And so, we guarantee there’s probably some chronic infection. Maybe parasites going on based on GI symptoms. Uhm– Vitamin-D status, very easy to check. You wanted 25-Hydroxy Vitamin-D, not the 1– comma, you don’t want that one. You want the 25-Hydroxy, not the
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Right.
Evan Brand: What else would you say to look at on– on blood– on blood counts or
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: So, things you can do to
Evan Brand: Turkey tells me too.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Turkey tells great, I mean, a lot of these 1,3 beta glucans in there are great for the immune system. There’s compounds in the reishi called triterpenes that can actually help deactivate viruses, which is great. It’s a really great immune supporting, immune building, have been used for thousands of years. There companies out there that have like
Evan Brand: Uh– I wi– I– I was like my brain was in the whole another department on the blood work. I was gonna ask you, is there anything on blood work? [crosstalk]
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: So, yeah– so you mentioned– I mentioned the medicinal mushrooms to boost up the immune system, you could also do cat’s claws while on
Evan Brand: Yeah.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: It’s that’s where we wanna really boost up the immune system, low sugar. Uhm– sugar can decrease immune function. And a lack of sleep, typically 12 hours of sleep when you’re acutely sick is gonna be essential to really help let the immune system rest. When you’re sick,
Evan Brand: So– let’s mention some functional test for a little bit. ‘Cause if you see that the white blood cell counts low, maybe you’ve known that your white blood cell count is chronically low, maybe that’s related to your current sickness, but you may have to dig deeper. So, I would say organic acids testing, ’cause we can look at your bacterial load, see if you have bacterial overgrowth, we can look for candida, see if there’s a yeast or fungal component, we can look at
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yup.
Evan Brand: She had some bacterial overgrowth. So luckily,
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, and then for me, the only time I ever get sick is– there’s an airplane involved, I’m
Evan Brand: Yeah.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: –if you know, get some of your immune support going, a day before, two days before, get your immune system wrapped up so when you’re there, you’re ready to handle it, you know, bring some like essential oil and hand sanitizer. So if you’re on the plane touching stuff you can get or pull out something and then make sure your hands are– are relatively clean, and not all the– the propylene glycol
Evan Brand: Yeah. Uh– I was gonna mention that actually. You’re talking out traveling in airplanes. So the Xlear is the nasal spray with the xylitol in there, that’s good. And so, if you’re traveling, you could squirt some of that up your nostrils and clean everything up. Maybe there was a virus or something sitting in your nose, but it’s not fully into your system yet, maybe you can rinse that bad boy out, and then prevent yourself from getting sick even if you’re around sick people.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: They have that for silver as well. So you can get those with the silver, kind of nasal injector. So if you are traveling, you can line that nasal canal with some silver. So, if you encounter a virus from a respiratory standpoint, it potentially can get killed off in the process.
Evan Brand: Here is a question from Bridget, “How do you get complete amino acids when you do not eat meat, quinoa or dairy?”.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Well, off the bat it’s gonna be hard. So obviously you can combine it as a vegetarian with rice and beans. Uhm– that’s a reasonable way to do it. Again, methionine and
Evan Brand: Yeah.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: And it’s really easy to absorb.
Evan Brand: Good point– good point. The easy way, get some fish in, organic pastured eggs something like that. I mean, we just find– uh– I guess, here was an earlier question from her, “How do you feel about the blood type A positive and eating turkey and chicken?”. So this is kinda in reference to like a blood- a blood type diet. Those create more fear than they were. I haven’t seen that– that really– depends out the way that it supposed to. We’re “Oh, this is your blood, you’re supposed to react to this, and this, and that food.” I’ve not seen that to be true. Can you speak on it though?
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, so if you look at the blood type and diet. For the most part, you know, you have your type-O, nad you’re type-A, that’s the majority. Ah– “O” is typically gonna be classified by D’Adamo who is the author of that diet and this James and– Peter I think as like your paleo template, right? And then you have type-A, it’s gonna be like your vegetarian-vegan template which I do actually recommends soy in that which I’m not a fan of it at all. And then you kind of have your more balanced type which is B-B is the balanced type which is uh– kind of a balance in the A, and the O. And then AB is kind of a hybrid between
Evan Brand: Right, yeah, I mean, in– in February in Kentucky, when there’s a foot of snow on the ground, you’re not gonna go out there and get broccoli–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Or forest berries, yeah.
Evan Brand: And forest
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Exactly. And then also for– ___[30:50] writes in, “What about for boosting children?”. So in general with my
Evan Brand: Yup. And also, I use Douglas laboratories, has a chewable multi that I often do for kids, it’s like–
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah.
Evan Brand: –a natural on-flavored, they could chew it up, it’s got all your ___[31:56] and B-Vitamins that are gonna be essential your trace minerals to help stabilize blood sugar, that’s all important too. ‘Cause
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah. And then ___[32:13], hey Grace, talking about a cyst in the upper arm, so is this like in the axillary area where the arm meets the breast tissue or just on the arm to– you know, in general? Typically a cyst is gonna be inflammation with some fluid kind of packed in there. The question is, how do they get there? If it’s in that breast tissue, you know, easily, some iodines and topical iodine can be rubbed in if it’s like fibrocystic, you can rub it into that area. Do it after you shower, that can help kind of break some of that cyst up. It just depends what the root cause is, but iodine could be very helpful on the topical side.
Evan Brand: Maybe it’s like a lipoma, you know.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, it depends
Evan Brand: Yeah I guess you could throw in a little turmeric too, some fish oil, other things like that, but yeah, I mean, for us to guess, or for you to
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yup. Anything else you wanted to run by here Evan? Any other questions that you wanted to address?
Evan Brand: I didn’t see any others that were on the immune system stuff. A bunch of other questions maybe we could answer another day.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, ugh– one question here I’ll– I’ll answer about the dog. Veronica wrote in, “What’s a safe and a good uh– to give a dog, after taking a huge dose of antibiotics?”. So, in general, there’s some– some companies out there that make uh– pet probiotics. Mercola has
Evan Brand: Yeah, good– good– good– good advice. There are some professional products out there too, so if you work with a practitioner, ask them, you know, even though Justin and I are not vets, uh– we do have people ask us about
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Absolutely. And then someone wrote in about
Evan Brand: Yeah, well said. And get the testing done too ’cause we find a lot of people with
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Exactly. And people listening, you know, a lot of people are coming in with some great questions that are a little bit off topic, so I’m gonna hold my live FAQs, this week as well, and every week, so, just
Evan Brand: I would say potassium would wanna be part of it ’cause of we’re doing magnesium, maybe you’re trying to get into a sauna. If you’re sick you could be throwing off your potassium, sodium, magnesium. So just having a good electrolyte blend is– is important. I always keep electrolytes around.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Got it. And ___[37:50] about Vitamin-C. So, you wanna just make sure you’re buying from good companies like for instance, the Vitamin-C that I manufacture is all independently tested to make sure what’s in there, what’s on the label is actually what’s in there. So you wanna make sure you just buying from good reputable sources. And liposomal vitamin c is also really good too, little more expensive. I use it on my son, it’s because it’s liquid, it’s easier to get inside of him, but a really good Vitamin-C like my Vitamin-C synergy has like bioflavonoids in there as well which are great. Just make sure you’re buying from a really good source, whether it’s
Evan Brand: Oh yeah we see that every single day. We test people’s Vitamin-C levels on the organic acid test, to say, “Oh, but I was taking ‘XYZ’ that I bought at Walgreens or Target, or Walmart”. If you buy consumer grade products, you’re gonna get consumer grade quality, and that’s not probably gonna be enough. You want professional health care companies which
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yeah, and Vitamin-C, the active constituents of ascorbic acid that I always recommend taking it with
Evan Brand: Yup. I’d say we’re ready to wrap this thing up but if people wanna reach out and schedule call with Justin, they can. His site is
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Absolutely. Guys, give us a thumbs up, give us the share. I’ll be coming back with live Q and A’s so if you have
Evan Brand: Elizabeth did try, I mean, she said, “Yes, I’m– I’m just buying the Whole Foods brand, I should probably switch to yours”. Yeah, check it out, Justin’s got
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Yup, absolutely. And Evan has great stuff as well. Uhm– we wanna really– make
Evan Brand: Yup. Good– good– good job. Alright then, we look forward to
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: You take care, we’ll talk soon. Take care
Evan Brand: Take care.
Dr. Justin Marchegiani: Bye.
Evan Brand: Bye.
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