Natural Health And A Culture Of Fear

Magnesium Stearate Is Not Dangerous - Stop The Hype

Earlier this week I received an email from a supplement company whose products I use with clients very often about magnesium stearate.

It was about misinformation being spread online that stearic acid is some sort of poison which damages the digestive system and prevents absorption of nutrients.

The email stated:

It seems that a very small minority of nutritional supplement marketers and manufacturers, including a brand in the professional supplement realm, have decided it is in their best interest to disparage the vast majority of nutritional supplement companies.  They are doing so by reporting false claims regarding a formulation ingredient that supplement manufacturers use to assure homogenous, multi-ingredient nutritional supplement blends.  Without optimal blending of therapeutic agents one cannot consistently produce products with maximum health benefits, and which meet label claims.
 
The ingredient in question is stearic acid, also commonly referenced as vegetable stearate and/or magnesium stearate.  I fear the net effect of these negative marketing efforts is to scare the general consumer away from the use of any nutritional supplements.

I have three points to make out this.
1) Stearate acid is safe
2) The dangers of using fear to sell product
3) Should I be scarred to say anything about this?

Stearate Acid Is Safe

A  Dr. Myatt has posted an extensive and very scholarly video on youtube about this. Click here to watch.

If you have any questions on magnesium stearate please watch above video. There is really no need for me to repeat the same information put forth by D. Myatt.

Designs For Health also has a fact sheet available at this link

Not to mention the anecdotal evidence

If magneseum stearate was so dangerous, it would cause illness among all the millions of people consuming supplements with it.


Besides, I (and lots of my colleagues) have helped many people who have digestive issues with these supplements. I am repeat lab tests of clients, showing huge changes in secretory IgA and inflammatory markers for GI after taking supplements with magnesium stearate. And I'm just one of thousands of practitioners who sees this.

Using Fear To Sell Product

When people start educating themselves about health, something happens... they learn our world is full of poisons; Flu shots, GMO foods, xeno-biotics in plastic, metals in tap water, amalgam fillings, antibiotics, pesticides, acrlyimides, etc...

The fact of the matter is that our species has created a very toxic world, and now we are paying for it with our health.

With that being said, is there really any reason for people to spread fear about things that are safe?

Honestly, it seems that a reflex develops where you just tell someone some sort of chemically sounding name is dangerous and they'll jump on board.

This has been somewhat demonstrated with the hydrogen dioxide petition experiment. This was made more well known when Penn and Teller got people to signs a petition to ban water, by calling it "hydrogen peroxide."  In some respect I find this piece to be a propaganda smear against environmentalism, as I think members of any philosophy (environmentalism, a religion, libertarianism, the democrats, the republicans, or any of "ism") will tend to just automatically jump on board with other people claiming to be of the same philosophy.

Nonetheless, the point is that simply telling people who are interested in natural health that some dangerous sounding chemical is dangerous, will get many to believe it, regardless of the actual science.

What I see with the magnesium stearate smear campaign is a few people in the field of natural health, trying to make money, by telling the public that what I, and my colleague recommend to patients is dangerous.

Just about anyone in natural health who uses supplements, is recommending products with magnesium stearate. So while it is not an attack against naturopathy, it is my extension an attack on the supplements recommended and sold by most naturopathic doctors.

Seriously. Most Naturopathic Doctors are good hearted people. Most put themselves tens of thousands into debt, in order to get a degree because they want to help other people. I think it's disgusting to claim that the products they use are dangerous. I don't want people who are taking supplements given by a qualified practitioner to flip out and throw them away because of something they read from Dr. Mercola. I'm sorry, but I think sabotaging patient relationships with their doctors, with false information is dangerous. Dangerous because we are talking about supplements that people need.

Should I be afraid to voice my opinion?

A major person who has pushed the attack on magnesium stearate is Dr. Mercola. My first thought honestly, was that I should say nothing. Because Dr. Mercola is very popular. Maybe someone who is considering making an appointment with me will see I don't agree with Dr. Mercola and then not see me. After all (as stated in above video that I linked to), many people will automatically believe anything Dr. Mercola says, without any fact checking.

Well, this is my opinion of Dr. Mercola:

• 99% of the information he puts out in his newsletter is great. Dr. Mercola is one of the leaders in this country when it comes to spreading information on natural health. Personally, I've read his newsletter for years.
• I also believe that Dr. Mercola is a good person, who is doing his best to help people improve health. Because I have issues with his views on magnesium stearate, that doesn't take away from everything else he has done.
• Dr. Mercola uses fear to sell product. For example, the headline of his latest newsletter was
  "The Popular Meat That May Be Too Contaminated to Eat." The newsletter uses fear to pull in the reader. But it's not just this days newsletter. It's virtually every days newsletter. After a while I stopped reading most of his newsletters. Often by the fear mongering headline I can guess what the article is about. I also don't think it's healthy to start each day with fear and negativity. I mean, sure vitamin B12 deficiency is common, but do we really need to read "Warning: Potentially Life Threatening Vitamin Deficiency Affects 25% of Adults."
  
  

Psychiatric Drug Prescritions - Our Culture Needs to Question Itself

Top 25 psychiatric medications

Doctors wrote 47 million prescriptions for Xanax in 2011 . Followed by 37 million for Celexa.

It's amazing how many prescriptions are written for such mind altering substances. In my opinion this is medical insanity. A paradigm that creates such wide spread use of chemicals that are designed to poison the brain is deeply dysfunction.

Additionally, critiques against the widespread use of psychiatric medications is repetitive, but in the face of such medical madness worth repeating.

1) Patients are not warned about "addiction" to the medications, which has been relabeled by the psychiatric industry with names like "continuation syndrome."

What I have learned from my clients is that not only are they not warned about any possible dangers of these medications, they are pressured by doctors into taking them. I have had numerous clients tell me, when they refused psychiatric medications their medical doctors would give them all sorts of reassurances that the drugs will work, and are safe. This is clearly not true to anyone who does a brief search online for dangers of these medications.

To really be honest about this, if a patient is told that a drug such as Celexa is safe and doesn't have withdrawal effects, they are being lied to.

2) The diseases are not real.

OK, anxiety and depression are real. Real feelings. They are not medication diagnoses. People are given medications to fix chemical imbalances that don't exist

3) What does this say about our society as a whole.

We live in a very unhappy culture. All out technology seems to do little make people happy. Why do we need all these drugs? Why are we drugging children?

The real answers to these questions will take us quickly outside of the narrow realm of health and into psychology, sociology and economics.

Years ago PBS aired a Frontline investigation into drugging of children:

 This is one of the most disturbing documentaries I've ever seen. In fact, I never watched the whole thing because I could not stomach the insanity and, perhaps I should say evilness of doctors and the system. This is an obvious example of not only the medical establishment turning being a child into a disease, but a failure to undergo any sort of assessment. 

Perhaps a reason why psychiatric drugs are liked, is that it lets our culture scapegoat fictional "chemical imbalances" in the brain instead of really looking at what we are doing wrong. Why are we so unhappy? Why are we so anxious? What is causing people in our society to suicide? What do so many young people resort to self harm?

The brain doesn't just become a scapegoat for the clueless psychiatrist. It becomes a scapegoat for dysfunctional families, school, and I would extend the dysfunction to our sociology-economic system in general. In a would of such amazing technology, why are Americans so unhappy and poor while working so much harder then they did 50 years ago. Why can we not use science and technology to created a would that provides for objective human needs? That being physical needs and psychological needs?

As shown in the film Zeitgiest Moving Forward, our society, on a foundational level is not designed to provide for objective human needs. 

But no reason to really reexamine our paradigms, if you feel unhappy go and get Celexa.

4) Ignorance of natural health is a driving force behind psychiatric medications.

People will be prescribed psychiatric drugs to mask psychological problems, Candida, hypothyroidism, metal toxicity, protein deficiency and other health problems. This is what I see. Often people will take such drugs for years, only to find out later that what they really have is some other problem.

But other times people end up on a cocktail of various psychiatric drugs for years that they are unable to get off of. They continue to see the prescribing doctors and fiddle around with this drug and that, possibly changing doses, but never really getting healthy.

Of course, every case is different, but from experience many of these people may just have food allergies, Candida, some hormonal issues, need for folate, or something else which it totally treatable with natural medicine.
 

The Candida – Psoriasis connection

 Psoriasis is not caused by a steroid drug deficiency

Typically conventional medicine treats psoriasis with steroids. While this may help symptoms, it is entirely useless in addressing the cause of psoriasis. In other words, psoriasis is not caused by a deficiency of topical corticosteroids.

Several times I have seen psoriasis patients who were actually surprised when I mentioned the possibility of candida. In actuality the relationship between psoriasis and chronic candida overgrowth is understood by many in natural health.

Additionally, there are research studies backing this up. So there should be nothing controversial about considering candida in a case of psoriasis.

Studies that show link between Candida and Psoriasis:

Incidence of Candida in psoriasis – a study on the fungal flora of psoriatic patients

This study found candida in 72% of the psoriatic patients, but in only 46% of the controls. Also, they found candida in 78% of the saliva samples of the psoriatics but in only 50% of the controls.

A 1994 article “Microorganisms and Psoriasis” reported completely, or almost completely clearing psoriasis in 50% of 126 patients, using antimicrobial treatment.

Interestingly, this article covers other organisms that may be factors in psoriasis besides Candida albicans. These are:

• Malassezia ovalis
• group A beta-hemolytic streptococci
• group B beta-hemolytic streptococci
• Enterococcus faecalis
• Pseudomonas species
• Klebsiella species
• Bacillus cereus

While I don't entirely agree with their method of treatment, and would prefer a more natural route (using herbs instead of drugs, the "Candida diet", liver support, etc...), this is still an excellent article on the microbial triggers of psoriasis and treatment.

What about studies that found no relationship between Candida and Psoriasis?

A study from 2003; Microorganisms in Intertriginous Psoriasis: No Evidence of Candida culture took culture samples from psoriac patients and found no evidence of Candida. Therefore, the study recommended that Candida not be treated with anti-fungal agents, and instead be treated with topical steroids.

However, upon actually looking at how the study was conducted, the samples for culture where taken from the actual psoriatic lesions.

From the perspective of a natural health care practitioner who has experience with Candida patients, this is not surprising. The link between Candida and Psoriasis is not so direct. In other words, the psoriatic lesion is not a candida infection. Rather, this is the body's response to an internal overgrowth of candida, which is generally traced back to the digestive tract. It is the candida in the digestive tract, which releases toxic by-products and triggers the immune system that causes the body to produce psoriasis lesion as part of a response. Therefore, cultures for candida should be from stool, not the skin, and treatment with anti-fungals should be directed at the digestive tract as well. 

Of course, a comprehensive history should be taken as well, and if some thing comes up in history that leads case in a different direction other than Candida or similar microbial overgrowth, then other triggers should be considered as well. Candida is not the THE CAUSE of psoriasis in all people. It is just a likely trigger.  

The Validity of Saliva Cortisol Testing

For 30 years saliva has been used as a reliable, cheap and effective way to measure the body's major stress hormone, cortisol.

Although use of saliva cortisol is by no means limited to natural or "functional medicine," that is probably where it has been used the most. Natural health care practitioners will often give patients saliva test kits to measure cortisol and hence their stress response.

Nonetheless, if a patient happens to then go to a medical doctor with the results, they may be told that there is no validity to saliva tests.

I want to make these points very clear:

1) If a medical doctor says there is no validity or reliable way to measure cortisol through saliva that doctor is ignorant. 

In such a case what that doctor really should do, is tell their patient that they are not familiar with saliva cortisol testing.

2) The debate on saliva cortisol testing has nothing to do with differences between functional medicine/ holistic medicine/ naturopathy / eastern medicine or anything else you'd like to call it and conventional mainstream medicine.

In reality, such lab testing is far within the scope of anything that can be called "western medicine." Not only that, it has been accepted by mainstream western medicine.

The use of saliva cortisol testing is actually a guideline in the practice of mainstream endocrinology! See link to Journal of Endocrinology and Metabolism abstract

Among the many studies done on saliva cortisol in the last 30 years, this one also stands out as well.

Melatonin and cortisol assessment of circadian shifts in astronauts before flight.

 3) Most medical doctors don't understand cortisol, stress and the circadian rhythm

Many times medical doctors tell patients things which are just simply not scientific with regards to such testing. This includes:

• "Cortisol doesn't affect your health."

In truth cortisol is the body's stress hormone. If this true then stress itself doesn't affect health. At this point, the fact that stress greatly impacts health is accepted by everyone in health and proven over and over in countless research studies.

• "Timing of testing cortisol doesn't matter"

In truth cortisol is closely linked to our circadian rhythm. In a healthy person it will be about 10 times higher upon waking then at night. Cortisol may even be normal one time of the day, but wildly out of reference range another time. Cortisol must be tested multiple times during the day, and at the correct time. (the above article citing use of saliva cortisol to test for Cushing's disease, is very clear to tests it late at night, not morning or afternoon, as people have blood cortisol tested then.)

• "There is no science behind this"

There is overwhelming scientific support for saliva cortisol testing (and other saliva tests as well). A cursory glance at clinical studies will show that. I have linked to two studies in this blog article, but it would not be difficult to link to dozens. 

Great Video on Causes of Depression

Causes of Depression

Psychetruth on youtube recently posted an excellent video: 

What Causes Depression and Suicide? Brain Chemical or Human Needs? Psychology & Self Esteem

 Often, one of the most difficult parts of even discussing a problem such as "depression" is how the field of psychiatry has redefined it as some kind of physical illness. 

But depression is not a physical illness like cancer or the flu. You can not see it, or touch it. There are no lab tests for it. Depression is a feeling. Depression is also caused by something else. The feeling depression can not be caused by the disease depression. That does not make any sense.

The cause of feeling depressed is either going to be psychological or physiological. Also, we have to keep in mind that we are one unit, the psychological and physiological do affect each other. 

This video by Psychetruth does a great job at going over the psychological causes of feeling depressed. The truth is more complicated then simple trains of thought that come from drug companies that one "has depression," or has a "chemical imbalance." 

However, once the truth is understood, actions can be taken to help someone who feels depressed.

Statins May Be Linked to Fatigue

A new study shows that cholesterol lowering statin drugs may be linked to fatigue.

As stated in the article:

"People who were taking statin drugs were more likely to experience decreased energy, fatigue upon exertion, or both, when compared with those who were not taking statins. The effects were more pronounced among women.
This fatigue during exercise reported in the study is different than a rare and potentially fatal side effect associated with statins. Rhabdomyolysis can cause severe muscle pain, liver damage, kidney failure, and death. "Fatigue is still quite important in and of itself," Golomb says."

Commentary:

This should not be surprising to anyone, as statin drugs inhibit the body's production of Coq10. Coq10 is needed for the mitochondria inside our cells to produce energy. So it makes sense that a drug which lowers Coq10, can lead to fatigue. This very obvious cause of fatigue was not mentioned in the article.

In addition, there are very popular drugs and have been used for a long time now. Patients reporting fatigue as a common side effect should be very apparent.

Popcorn packed with anti-oxidants - commentary

A new study has come out that popcorn is full of anti-oxidants!

So what's wrong with this study?

How about the fact that popcorn is a food which just about should NEVER be eaten.

Don't get me wrong, a small amount of organic popcorn is ok, but what goes into most popcorn?

1. Puffed corn. Basically, this is simple carbohydrate.

2. "Butter" and other additives.

3. Genetically modified franken foods. Most corn is genetically modified.
I usually refer people to the Institute for Responsible Technology for information about genetically modified foods.

So popcorn is not healthy, unless it's from organic corn, eaten in moderation, and not full of all sorts of additives. However, a big bag of movie theater popcorn is not healthy.

But this study isn't just about popcorn. It's about how researches can take a complex question (such as if a food healthy) and use reductionist thinking to focus on only one aspect of it, ignore lots of other information, and come to a misleading conclusion.

Although to be honest - it's not even the researcher's fault. I blame WebMD for taking this paper and giving it an intentionally misleading headline. Of course this is a big problem in health today. Both from conventional and natural health. Any little factoid can turn into a misconstrued headline.

What is truly misleading, is many more people with read the headline, than the article. And how many people will read the article and consider the other side of the story?

A few years ago there was a research study that showed GMO corn can lead to organ failure. What if that was given a headline such as "Popcorn causes organ failure and death." Would that be honest.

Often, the truth about nutrition is much more boring than any headlines. Eat real food, not too much, mostly plants. Of all the nutrition books, dietary advice, seminars, lectures, radio shows and everything I've heard about nutrition, 90% of it can be summed up in just that.

Raw Food Made Easy Book Review

When going through my library for great health books to recommend, Raw Food Made Easy for 1 or 2 people, by Jennifer Cornbleet is on the top of the list.

What makes this a great book?

1. Not preachy and over the top telling you that you must only eat raw food. Eating raw food is important. Generally, most people need to get more raw food into their diet. However, eating raw food should not be turned into a cult. Unlike some other raw food books, this doesn't do that.
   
2. The recipes are easy to make. Many raw food books have rather time consuming recipes. This book truly is raw food made easy and will not just sit on the bookcase unused, because the recipes are too time consuming.
   
3. Lots of expensive, raw food "cooking" equipment is not needed. A food processor with S blade and blender will be helpful. But you will not find the majority of recipes demanding you first go out and spend hundreds on fancy juicers and dehydrators.

Any negatives with this book?

None. This is a great book to help busy people incorporate more health, raw foods into their diet. 

Study Finds SSRIs May Cause Babies To Have Smaller Heads

Researchers found an association between SSRIs such as Paxin and Prozac and preterm birth. “We found prenatal exposure to SSRIs was associated with decreed growth of the head, but not decreased growth of the body,” said head researcher Hana El Marroun.

Although this does become more complicated.

They also found that depressed women, who were not taking SSRIs, babies had both smaller heads and smaller bodies.

The researchers also point out that anti-depressants are only one possible treatment, and that psychological treatment could be used instead.

Comments:

No one really knows what SSRIs do, or how they affect the whole body. The idea that SSRIs work by affecting brain serotonin is not just unproven theory. It's a bad theory. Anytime you hear a doctor or medical researcher talk about how SSRI produce certain effects by working on serotonin, they are basically just speculating.

What we do know, is that SSRIs affect the brain, and the rest of the body in numerous ways, creating long lists of “side effects.” Medical doctors and psychiatrists often do not warm patients about these numerous side effects, which include horrible withdrawal symptoms that force patients to remain on these toxic medications.

It would not be easy to calculate the amount of harm done (to mothers and their babies), by giving pregnant women SSIRs, instead of proper health care.

In case of depression, I recommend a full medical history be taken, followed by steps to treat the person. What treatment might be depends upon individual circumstances. There is no cookie cutter protocol in natural health. The following list is some common problems and treatments. This is not a complete comprehensive list.

• Therapy for psychological issues.
• Hormonal imbalance (low/high cortisol, hypothyroidism)
• Poor nutrition, including low protein, amino acid deficiency, low vitamins B6, B12, folate, magnesium or generally poor nutrition
• Inflammation
• Infection
• Toxicity
• Eliminating allergenic foods
• Poor digestive function, including but not limited to poor absorption of nutrients, or candida
  
  
  
  
  SOURCES: Hanan El Marroun, Ph.D., department of child and adolescent psychiatry, Sophia Children’s Hospital, Rotterdam, the Netherlands; Michael O’Hara, Ph.D., professor, psychology, University of Iowa, Iowa City; March 5, 2012, Archives of General Psychiatry, online

Statin drugs, cholesterol, depression and reductionism.

Statin Drugs = Less Depression?

A recent study found that of 965 heartdisease patients, those who were taking statin drugs where less likely to be depressed.

The study then follow the 776 of those patients who were not depressed.

18.5% of the 520 patients on statins became depressed by follow up.

28% of of the 256 not on statins became depressed by follow up.

This was translated into a 38% reduced risk of developing depression.

Statistical Manipulation?

Medical studies do not need to lie to be misleading. Statistics can be manipulated in all sorts of ways. In this case, the 38% reduced risk of developing depression sounds impressive. But lets look at this study using another statistic, the number to treat (NNT).

The NNT is the number of patients who need to be treated in order to prevent one additional bad outcome.
In this case the NNT is 10.5.

So according to this study, 10 ½ people would need to be treated with a statin drug, in order to prevent one incidence of depression.

But Don't Statin's Cause Many Side Effects?

Yes they do! Side effects such as liver damage, elevated liver enzymes, rhabdomyolysis, diabetes and much more! In fact, and reasonable review of the negative effects of statin drugs would be quite lengthy, and beyond the scope of what I wish to write about in this post.

Why might statins lower depression?

Inflammation can divert tryptophan and 5-HTP into inflammatory cytokines instead of serotonin. Therefore, taking anti-inflammatory medications or supplements may improve mood in some people. I don't know if statins make anyone feel better, but this is at least a possible explanation.

However, considering the numerous side effects of statin drugs, and the fact that over 10 people needed to be treated in this study to see one positive outcome, plus the negative effects statins do have on cognitive function, and a plethora of natural anti-inflammatory supplements, using statins in this way would be simply foolish.

Even the study itself says, that this does not mean statins should be used solely as anti-depressants. However, headlines and a few statistics can be taken out of context, to make statin drugs seem like better options when treating high cholesterol.

What is wrong with this approach to medical research?

This study is an example of the extreme reductionism in medicine. A large population is selected, along with a few variables, and then some general result is given.

However, feeling “depressed” is a mulch-factorial phenomena. Contributing factors include psychology, toxicity, infection, inflammation, nutritional statues, and even musculo-skeletal problems. Mufti-factorial problems demand individualized solutions. Even a study showing improvement of 90% of patients, does not necessarily tell a physicians if that treatment will help the patient in-front of them.

You can only treat people, not feelings

Depression is not a disease per se, it is a feeling. It makes no sense to treat a feeling.

You can only treat a person who has those feelings. I'm not saying this to belittle "depression" as if it's a non problem. In fact I take mental symptoms very seriously. My point is, if we really want to develop successful treatment plans then we need to start out by being honest about what we are dealing with.

If one person is depressed due to metal toxicity, and another due to psychological abuse, then very different treatments are needed. Not a generic drug (or supplement) that treats depression.

But this is what psychiatry does, when it calls the feeling "depression" a disease in and of itself and throws mind altering drugs at the feeling.

Language and the distortion of reality

The very thought of "treating" a feeling per se, is mind boggling nonsensical.

Terms such as ""treating depression" become imbedded into language, and changes how we think.

Language is not just a means of communication and thought, but actually sets the boundaries in which thought can take place. If vocabulary assumes a false paradigm, then it may become almost impossible to see the truth.

The distorted idea of treating a feeling, instead of the person who has the feeling, is handed down to us by psychiatry. For example, psychiatrists call DSM labels diagnoses. In truth, the DSM explicitly states that none of its labels is a diagnosis. Psychiatrists know these are not real medical diagnoses. Nonetheless, they use such terms manipulate language and how people understand reality.

This is why I often put terms such as “depression” and “anxiety” in quotes. I do not wish to add to the confusion.

People tell me they have "depression" or "anxiety" all the time. Those terms are mostly useless by themselves. I have to dig deeper. I Ask them to describe these feelings? Is it in the mind? Is it physical? What systems is it related to? What was going on when all this began?

I need things to be clear, that I am helping them, not their "anxiety" or "depression."

Reductionism

Reductionism is the belief that complex systems can be understood as the sum of all their parts. Reductionism works well in many fields. However, it does not work for complex, dynamics, emergent systems such as the human body. To put it quite simply, we are much more than the sum of all our parts. Feeling depressed can not be reduced down to something so simple as serotonin (although both psychiatry and many people in natural health seem to believe that). I do not wish to dismiss the importance of the 5-Htp > serotonin pathway.  It is simply not the entire story.

The “gold standard” double blind placebo controlled study, is based on a reductionist model. This doesn't make such studies worthless. However, these studies do not have the final say in what specific treatments are needed for a specific individual. Especially since such studies only look at symptoms which large groups of people have in common. The "strange and peculiar" symptoms that we see on an individual basis are ignored. But often it is these other symptoms which show what the individual patent actually needs. 

Instead of reductionist models of "mental illness," we need dynamic models. Models that consider all the multi-factorial conditions that may lead an individual to feel depressed. In the real world, the real question is, "what does this individual patient need." Not what random drug or supplement will have a 30% chance of improving symptoms.

Depression, Infection and Inflammation

A recent study from has found links between depression and infections.

http://news.emory.edu/stories/2012/02/depression_evolution/index.html.

A summary of their findings is as follows:

• People with depression tend to have higher levels of inflammation, even if they are not actively fighting an infection.
  
  
• Researchers have made genetic links between depression and immune system function.
  
  
• Depressed behavior (low energy, social isolation) actually in beneficial to people when they are sick with an infection. This behavior allows the body to use its resources fighting the infection.
  
  
• Stress is linked to depression, by activating the immune system.
  
  
• This may guide future research on depression, especially in terms of how markers of inflammation may predict how people respond to treatments for depression.
  
  

Personal Comments:

Although it's good that the above mentioned study is showing objective evidence for a link between infection and depression, this is really nothing new that many holistic practitioners have not known for years.

This is not only known through clinical experience. Practitioners familiar with organic acid testing know that tryptophan does not necessarily convert to serotonin. In case in inflammation and/or infection it can be converted down the kyurentate pathway, and into pro-inflammatory cytokines.

For a long time psychiatry held the belief that depression was due to a “chemical imbalance” involving serotonin. So they would give drugs which in theory effected the serotonin pathway.

Many practitioners in natural health would basically do the same thing, except instead of giving medications, gave supplements to facilitate serotonin production. These include vitamin B6, magnesium, tryptophan, and 5-htp.

Although this approach has merit and does help some people, it is not universally successful. It is also often based around expensive functional lab test, and supplement programs.

If a practitioner is doing this for depression (and only this), then it might be called natural, but it certainly is not holistic. Again, amino acid labs test, and supplements absolutely have their place, and I do utilize them when appropriate. I am simply saying that in terms of mental symptoms, this should not be a myopic focus.

When working with someone who feels “depressed,” “anxious,” or any other mental symptoms, the first thing I do is take a full history to see what else is going on. Is there a possibly hormonal problem, infection, digestive issue, candida, toxicity, or some other problem? This is what Naturopathy is about, looking for the underlining cause of illness in each individual. In naturopathy, we can treat a person who feels depressed. But it makes no sense to “treat depression.”

Concerns about this study:

While I like the information in the study, over time these findings may lead to treatment strategies I do not agree with.

• Infection and inflammation are just one possible cause of feeling depressed. While even the authors of study clearly agree, conventional medicine often forces treatment to follow a simple path of matching medications with diagnosis, regardless of individual differences.
  
  
• There are already many ways to lower inflammation and boost immune function in natural health. Medications that are both much more costly, and come with numerous side effects may be developed as a first option for depression, when in my opinion, they should be a last option.