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Inflammation

Alzheimer’s disease, inflammation, stress and candida: Dr. Rudy Tanzi at IHS 2016

By Trudy Scott 17 Comments

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I spent last week in New York city at the Integrative Healthcare Symposium Annual Conference listening to some truly brilliant speakers and would like to share some highlights from the wonderful presentation by Rudolph Tanzi, PhD : What Can Alzheimer’s Disease Teach Us About the Brain, Mind, and Self?

Dr. Rudolph Tanzi is the Vice-Chair of Neurology and Director of the Genetics and Aging Research Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital, and serves as the Joseph P. and Rose F. Kennedy Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School. 

Dr. Tanzi co-discovered three of the first Alzheimer’s disease genes and has identified several others in the Alzheimer’s Genome Project, which he directs. He also discovered the Wilson’s disease gene and participated in the discovery of several other neurological disease genes.

The focus of his research is in identifying and characterizing the genetic and environmental factors involved in neurodegeneration in Alzheimer’s disease and autism.

Dr. Tanzi shared this fundamental information:

  • the Alzheimer’s disease pathology begins in all of us after the age of 40
  • two thirds of those with Alzheimer’s disease are female
  • and women are especially susceptible after menopause  
  • head injuries increase the risk
  • these genes predispose us to the disease: APP, PSEN1, PSEN2 and APOE

Most of the above apply to me (I know I have the APOE gene) but I’m less concerned about Alzheimer’s disease that I have ever been and this is based on what was shared later in his presentation.

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Dr. Tanzi’s whole presentation was fascinating and the section on fungi/candida, although concerning, was promising because we can do something about candida. This is the paper he shared: Different Brain Regions are Infected with Fungi in Alzheimer’s Disease with this question: Are clinical microbial pathogens triggering Alzheimer’s disease?

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It was really interesting to hear that

  • the amyloid is an antimicrobial agent in the brain and provides protection against the candida/fungi
  • and that that the amyloid plaques also provide protection against Borellia, periodontal bugs, Herpes Simplex 1 and other infectious agents

What was most encouraging was this:

  • your brain can handle tons of amyloid plaques and tangles and yet not develop Alzheimer’s disease.
  • the big deciding factor seems to be inflammation
  • “resilient brains” had plaques, no inflammation and no Alzheimer’s disease!

So these are some of my thoughts:

  • Tanzi did share that many people with Alzheimer’s disease suffer from depression and agitation. Here is a paper I retrieved; it does state that depression is worse when benzodiazepines have been used and we know benzodiazepines have been found to contribute to dementia so we need to consider this too.
  • We also know anxiety is a factor in Alzheimer’s disease and this study “showed that anxiolytic behavior…is predominantly due to cox-2 mediated neuroinflammation induced neurodegeneration in the brain.”
  • Some of the same underlying causes of anxiety and depression seem to be underlying factors when it comes to Alzheimer’s disease – like candida and inflammation – and there is something we can do about this. We can get rid of the candida and can use natural methods to reduce inflammation starting with eating an anti-inflammatory diet with wild oily fish, no gluten, no sugar and reduced carbs.    

Dr. Tanzi also shared these for preventing Alzheimer’s disease:

  • Social engagement (this is why addressing pyroluria/social anxiety is important – interestingly zinc, vitamin B6 and evening primrose oil are anti-inflammatory)
  • Learning new things
  • Reducing emotional stress and deep sleep (this is where my work with the amino acids comes in – interestingly I found this study that discusses how enhancing GABA signaling can prevent cognitive decline in mice with the apoE4 gene)
  • Exercise (also so beneficial in anxiety and depression)
  • And nutrients like ashwaganda and cat’s claw (to address stress and kill infections/candida)

Clearly I have more reading and researching to do! As you can tell I love putting all the puzzle pieces together.

I’ve also got more to share from Dr. Tanzi’s talk and will do so next week. Stay tuned for more information on his “three- dimensional human stem cell-derived neural culture system that recapitulates Alzheimer’s disease plaque and tangle pathology.”

Feel free to ask questions and share your thoughts in the comments section.

 

Pyroluria and chronic fatigue syndrome: is there a link?

By Trudy Scott 21 Comments

pyroluria and chronic fatigue

Last week I blogged about the social anxiety condition called pyroluria (Pyroluria, high mauve, pyrrole disorder, malvaria, elevated kryptopyrroles and social anxiety) and received some great comments on this and the other pyroluria blogs.

One question on this blog: The Anxiety Summit: How zinc and vitamin B6 prevent pyroluria and social anxiety was related to Chronic Fatigue Syndrome/CFS so I’ve decided to share this and some additional information I was able to find.

Hi Trudy, I’m calling from Melbourne Australia, I was wondering if you have had any of your clients present with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome as well as pyroluria. I have just recently been diagnosed with CFS, I also have ADHD. Someone on a CFS forum that I belong to told me about pyroluria and said it is common in ADHD and CFS sufferers. While the link between ADHD and pyroluria is well documented, I haven’t been able to find any information regarding a connection between Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and pyroluria. I notice that there is an overlap of symptoms in the two conditions. I have all of the symptoms of CFS and many of the symptoms of pyroluria. I’m very interested in hearing your views about CFS and how it relates to pyroluria if at all. — Tom

I was not aware of a CFS/pyroluria connection until now but see there is some research showing how CFS and mood disorders/anxiety can have related causes and one of them is inflammation:

An intriguing and hitherto unexplained co-occurrence: Depression and chronic fatigue syndrome are manifestations of shared inflammatory, oxidative and nitrosative (IO&NS) pathways

Low zinc is a factor in pyroluria and depression and of course we may also see low zinc in CFS:

Lower serum zinc in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS): relationships to immune dysfunctions and relevance for the oxidative stress status in CFS

I find this paper very interesting since many of these same nutrients are commonly low in folks with anxiety and depression: Nutritional strategies for treating chronic fatigue syndrome

A detailed review of the literature suggests a number of marginal nutritional deficiencies may have etiologic relevance. These include deficiencies of various B vitamins, vitamin C, magnesium, sodium, zinc, L-tryptophan, L-carnitine, coenzyme Q10, and essential fatty acids.

I’m surprised the above paper didn’t mention iron anemia.  This is very common with pyroluria.  This paper: Iron insufficiency and hypovitaminosis D in adolescents with chronic fatigue and orthostatic intolerance found this

In patients presenting with chronic fatigue and/or orthostatic intolerance, low ferritin levels and hypovitaminosis D are common

These are just a few of the links I found by doing a very quick pubmed search. There are likely many more.

Everything is so connected and inter-related! And it’s interesting how certain deficiencies can manifest in certain ways – one person may find themselves with a CFS diagnosis, someone else with arthritis and yet someone else with heart disease. I think we need to be thinking about addressing nutrient deficiencies, balancing biochemistry and getting healthy, perhaps more just than addressing a diagnosis.

If you score high on the Pyroluria Questionnaire I would suggest simply addressing the pyroluria which may have some ripple down effects and actually improve the symptoms of CFS.

Now the next post will have to dig into the link between ADHD and pyroluria. Stay tuned.

In the meantime, I’d love to see your comments/questions if you can relate to any of this. Also, please do share in the comments if you know you have pyroluria and find the nutrients have eliminated your social anxiety and inner tension symptoms, and have also helped your CFS.

 

The Anxiety Summit – Psychoneuroimmunology, the new psychiatry

By Trudy Scott 9 Comments

Kelly Brogan

Dr. Kelly Brogan, MD. Holistic women’s health psychiatry was interviewed by host of the Anxiety Summit, Trudy Scott, Food Mood Expert and Nutritionist, author of The Antianxiety Food Solution.

Psychoneuroimmunology, the new psychiatry

  • The role of inflammation in anxiety and depression
  • Hormones and where the endocrine system fits in
  • Where inflammation comes from
  • What a healthy microbiome looks like
  • Natural lifestyle interventions to reverse symptoms and favorite nutraceuticals
  • Why psychiatrists don’t know about this

Here are some snippets from our interview:

What psychoneuroimmunology refers to is essentially the inherent inter-connectedness between multiple systems. So, it’s about no longer looking at psychiatry as a head up phenomenon, which at best can result in limited outcomes and at worst, can be quite dangerous. And what psychoneuroimmunology implies is that there is a relationship between neurology – so, between brain science – and the immune system. It is sometimes called psychoneuroendocrinology – it also sort of ropes in the gut and the endocrine system with the implication being that you cannot treat one without knowledge about the others. So, I think it’s very exciting and really is a term that embodies functional medicine, or naturopathy at its best.

What many are speaking about is something called the cytokine model, which has been around since 1991, the first paper hypothesizing about this model. So, it’s been a growing literature for some time. And what it refers to is essentially it looks at depression or anxiety, for example, as this non-specific sort of fever that tells us actually very little about what’s causing the body to react, but tells us that there’s is an expression of imbalance and that the body is working to recalibrate. So, there’s some sort of stressor or triggers or assault and the compensatory response on the part of the body is what we are seeing as these psychiatric symptoms.

Cytokines in the blood, or inflammatory messengers, such as CRP, IL-1, IL-6, and TNF-alpha are predictive and linearly related to depression and anxiety, especially in women.

Here is Dr. Brogan’s wonderful blog post on the topic of Psychoneuroimmunology, the new Psychiatry

What is driving this inflammation? How does it get kicked off? And how does it induce depression? With the limited clinical applications and revelations that came with the completion of the Human Genome Project in 2002, we have begun to focus on where we have outsourced our physiologic functions.

The microbiome has become an important consideration, and particularly, the gut, which houses at least 10 times as many human cells as there are in our bodies, and 150 times as many genes as are in our genome. These microbes control many vital operations and are responsible for synthesis of neuroactive and nutritional compounds, for immune modulation, and for inflammatory signaling.

Here is one of the studies on how traditional diets can impact the microbiome: Intestinal microbiota, probiotics and mental health: from Metchnikoff to modern advances: Part II – contemporary contextual research

researchers reported less potentially pathogenic bacteria, yet a far greater degree of biodiversity and microbial richness in rural Africans living a traditional lifestyle and consuming traditional high fiber foods

If you are not already registered for the Anxiety Summit you can get live access to the speakers of the day here www.theAnxietySummit.com

The Anxiety Summit – Microbes in the gut and psychobiotics as a potential treatment for anxiety and depression

By Trudy Scott 20 Comments

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Dr. Ted Dinan, MD, PhD. Professor of Psychiatry at University College Cork was interviewed  by host of the Anxiety Summit, Trudy Scott, Food Mood Expert and Nutritionist, author of The Antianxiety Food Solution.

Microbes in the gut and psychobiotics as a potential treatment for anxiety and depression

  • Varied ways in which anxiety presents
  • Anxiety as a co-morbid condition e.g. irritable bowel syndrome
  • Microbes in the gut and the influence on emotional activity
  • Non-pharmacological approaches to treating anxiety
  • Psychobiotics as a potential treatment and the newest research in this area

Here are some snippets from our interview

Now the brain-gut axis is an axis that we learned more about over the decade or 2, how does the brain communicate with the gut, how does the gut communicate with the brain, and the view of irritable bowel syndrome is that it is as I say a brain axis disorder, an exceedingly common disorder, up to at least 50 percent and some studies suggest much higher rates in terms of the presence of psychiatric symptoms in patients with irritable bowel syndrome. The general view is that at least 50 percent of patients with irritable bowel syndrome have a coexistent or comorbid depression or anxiety.

We’re gradually I think learning more about the pathology underlying irritable bowel syndrome and we and others have published a number of studies show that for instance patients with irritable bowel syndrome have high levels of cytokines. Now cytokines are chemicals that are produced by the immune system and there are certain cytokines that are caused pro-inflammatory. They give rise to inflammation or are the product of inflammation. And certainly there is now good evidence that many patients with irritable bowel syndrome do have very high levels of these pro-inflammatory molecules in their blood stream. The molecules would be molecules like interleukin 6 and CNF-alpha.

Here is the quote from Dr. Dinan’s article that was co-written with Dr. John Cryan and called Psychobiotics: How Gut Bacteria Mess with Your Mind

In the 20th century the major focus of microbiological research was on finding ways to kill microbes by antibiotics. This century the focus has changed somewhat with the recognition of the health benefits of bacteria, not just from an immunity perspective but from a mental health one.

Here is some of Dr. Dinan’s research:

Do interactions between stress and immune responses lead to symptom exacerbations in irritable bowel syndrome?

co-morbidity with mood disorders such as depression and anxiety is common in IBS

Psychobiotics: a novel class of psychotropic.

Here, we define a psychobiotic as a live organism that, when ingested in adequate amounts, produces a health benefit in patients suffering from psychiatric illness. As a class of probiotic, these bacteria are capable of producing and delivering neuroactive substances such as gamma-aminobutyric acid and serotonin, which act on the brain-gut axis. Preclinical evaluation in rodents suggests that certain psychobiotics possess antidepressant or anxiolytic activity. Effects may be mediated via the vagus nerve, spinal cord, or neuroendocrine systems. So far, psychobiotics have been most extensively studied in a liaison psychiatric setting in patients with irritable bowel syndrome, where positive benefits have been reported for a number of organisms including Bifidobacterium infantis. Evidence is emerging of benefits in alleviating symptoms of depression and in chronic fatigue syndrome. Such benefits may be related to the anti-inflammatory actions of certain psychobiotics and a capacity to reduce hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity. Results from large scale placebo-controlled studies are awaited.

This is the recent resistance training anxiety study I mentioned: The anxiolytic effects of resistance exercise

This research has shown that resistance training at a low-to-moderate intensity (<70% 1 repetition maximum) produces the most reliable and robust decreases in anxiety.

If you are not already registered for the Anxiety Summit you can get live access to the speakers of the day here www.theAnxietySummit.com

The Anxiety Summit – Gluten’s impact on the inflamed brain: reducing anxiety and depression

By Trudy Scott 32 Comments

Tom

Dr. Tom O’Bryan, DC host of ‘The Gluten Summit – A Grain of Truth’ is interviewed  by host of the Anxiety Summit, Trudy Scott, Food Mood Expert and Nutritionist, author of The Antianxiety Food Solution.

Gluten’s impact on the inflamed brain: reducing anxiety and depression

  • Terminology and why it’s not called gluten intolerance but sensitivity
  • Is gluten sensitivity just a fad and the recent FODMAPs research
  • The multitude of diseases and symptoms caused by gluten sensitivity
  • Gluten sensitivity as a contributing factor to psychiatric manifestations/anxiety/depression and new 2014 research from Italy
  • Suicide rates in kids with celiac disease (even when they quit gluten), and kids celiac camps
  • The conundrum with testing
  • Doing an elimination and then challenge?
  • Can anyone eat wheat or should we all be gluten-free

One of my favorite quotes in my anxiety food talks is this one from a 2012 paper by Jackson and Fasano called Neurologic and psychiatric manifestations of celiac disease and gluten sensitivity

gluten sensitivity remains undertreated and underrecognized as a contributing factor to psychiatric and neurologic manifestations.

Here are some snippets from our interview:

73% of kids with celiac disease have social phobia, 63% still have social phobia on a gluten-free diet. You have to also heal the gut and address nutritional deficiencies

No human on the planet can digest gluten! Whether or not it causes symptoms like anxiety or depression or arthritis why eat anything that would cause inflammation!

He shares recent research published in BMC Medicine. The study looking at Italians with non-celiac gluten sensitivity, found that 68% of participants felt “a lack of well-being” and 39% experienced anxiety. In the large majority of patients, the time lapse between gluten ingestion and the appearance of symptoms varied from a few hours to 1 day.

No human on the planet can digest gluten! Whether or not it causes symptoms” like anxiety or depression or arthritis “why eat anything that would cause inflammation”

The gluten-FODMAPs discussion and non-celiac gluten sensitivity is a fad:

Dr. O’Bryan summed it up like this:

it took two studies to do this but it appears to be the FODMAPs in the wheat that cause the GI complaints (the bloating, the gas, the abdominal pain) but it’s the proteins that cause symptoms in the brain and other parts of the body

I write about gluten often. Here are some additional links for you:

Last year Dr. O’Bryan hosted the fantastic Gluten Summit and you can grab a copy of one of the interviews here: Dr. Marsh’s Gluten Summit interview: Why the Early Stages of Celiac Disease Must be Taken Seriously

If you are not already registered for the Anxiety Summit you can get live access to the speakers of the day here www.theAnxietySummit.com

The Role of Inflammation in Stress, Anxiety and Depression

By Trudy Scott 10 Comments

NTA-Conference-2013

“Inflammation: The Fire Within” is the theme of the annual conference of the Nutritional Therapy Association. It will be held in Vancouver, WA on March 15, 16, 17. I’m thrilled to presenting on Friday from 10-11:30am and my topic is “The Role of Inflammation in Stress, Anxiety and Depression.”

This presentation will provide health and nutrition professionals with current, evidence-based information the role of inflammation in stress, and on anxiety and mood disorders. It will explain:

  • the negative impact of pro-inflammatory junk food, trans fats, feed-lot meat, pesticides, gluten, fructose and caffeine on stress, anxiety and depression
  • the recent research supporting the anti-inflammatory benefits of real whole food, the Mediterranean diet (for both reducing inflammation and reducing and preventing depression, fish and fish oils (with some exceptions), dark chocolate (with some caveats), probiotics, zinc and vitamin B6
  • the links between social stress and inflammation
  • the effects of maternal inflammation on anxiety and social behavior of offspring
  • the links between pyroluria (see the pyroluria questionnaire here), social anxiety and oxidative stress
  • how inflammation leads to low serotonin and mood issues

It’s quite incredible how much of an impact inflammation has on mood disorders and how simply taking steps to lower inflammation can have a positive impact. What is equally fascinating is that so many of the foods and nutrients that eliminate anxiety and depression also lower inflammation! The body is quite amazing in its ability to heal when provided with the correct nutrients!

I will also be exhibiting and will have delicious 100% certified Organic Tulsi Teas donated by Organic India and great for stress-relief and you guessed it… inflammation! Do come and try some yummy lemon-ginger or licorice or find some in your local grocery store. We’ll also do zinc status testing because zinc is key for alleviating anxiety, stress and depression. I’ll also have DVD sets and copies of my book The Antianxiety Food Solution for sale. And I’ll also be offering Lidtke samples of the amazing amino acids tryptophan (for low serotonin) and DPA/Endorphigen (for low endorphins and comfort eating). These amino acids also help with inflammation!

And I’m thrilled that my friend and colleague Mira Dessy will be joining me at my booth. She is a Nutrition Educator, Real Food Advocate and author of the fabulous new book The Pantry Principle: How to read the label and understand what’s really in your food (find her here and on facebook here).

The event has many great speakers and will be a content-rich educational three days. You can learn more and register here:
http://nutritionaltherapy.com/events-resources/nta-conferences

The sessions will be recorded and available for purchase from Nutritional Therapy Association if you can’t make it to the live event.