Portland, Oregon chiropractic, nutrition, functional medicine, functional movement and clinical hypnosis

Switching to a low-fat, predominantly plant-based diet from one high in fat, processed foods and sugar is a process that I whole-heartedly support in my Portland chiropractic, nutrition and functional medicine clinic, Optimum Function. In addition, I really look towards the gut as my main avenue of treatment. Very often, I treat patients functionally by healing any gut inflammation, replacing enzymes and acids that may be depleted, naturally removing any unwanted bugs (or sending them to a medical doctor if the “bugs” are a bit too hardy for natural interventions), and replacing and nurturing the beneficial bacteria that lives in everyone’s gut or gastrointestinal tract.

Well, a few studies have come out suggesting that a high fat and sugar diet alters the population of microbes (bacteria etc.) living in the gut in less than a day. Even more astounding is that the microbes that tend to thrive on this diet are linked to obesity, according to new School of Medicine research. The study was based on transplants of human intestinal microbes into germ-free mice.

Over time, mice that received the transplants, (who were also on a junk-food diet) became obese. Using the latest DNA sequencing technology, the researchers found that mice on the high-fat, high-sugar diet had more microbes and microbial genes devoted to extracting calories from their standard American diet (S.A.D.). These microbial genes were switched-on when the mice switched to the diet high in fat and sugar.

The study, published in Science Translational Medicine, documents the intimate relationship between diet and the dynamic variations in the community of intestinal microbes that can influence metabolism and weight.

The research also paves the way for using humanized mouse models to tease apart the contributions of human intestinal microbes and human diets to obesity and its converse, malnutrition.

The mice ate low-fat, plant-rich diets in the weeks leading up to the transplants. The mice continued to eat a low-fat, plant-based diet for one month, and their stool samples were analyzed one day, one week and one month after the microbe transplants. Using DNA sequencing tools that allowed the researchers to take a census of the gut bacteria, the researchers found that the microbe transplants were remarkably successful: The mice carried a collection of bacteria that mimicked the human donor’s.

After one month on the low-fat, plant-based diet, half the mice were switched to a high-fat, high-sugar “Western” diet. Stool samples from all the mice were analyzed 24 hours after the diet change and then again weekly for two months.

“We were surprised to see the rapid shift in the microbial communities of mice on the high-fat, high-sugar diets,” Turnbaugh said. “Assuming it takes four to six hours for microbes to move through the intestine, this means that the initial shift in the microbial community occurred 18-20 hours after exposure to a Western diet.”

Interestingly, when the researchers transplanted the gut microbes from humanized obese mice into germ-free mice, the recipients gained more fat even when fed low-fat diets, compared with mice that got human microbes from mice fed low-fat diets. The researchers also showed that gut microbes and their genes can be passed down from generation to generation, suggesting that it is possible for mothers to pass their microbial communities to their children.

Well, this information helps to explain why my “4R” treatment protocol works so well:

Removing any offending substances; like those found in a high fat, highly processed and high sugar diet

Repair any gut inflammation

Replace nutrients lost from a non-functional gut in addition to replacing enzymes and HCL until the healed gut can do so on its own

Reinoculate the gut with a good balance of bacteria and other microbes. Now, there’s been some research showing that we really don’t reinoculate the gut when we take pro-biotics. What taking pro-biotics and prebiotics does is it allows the “scales to be tipped” a bit in favor of the beneficial microbial environment.

Well, that’s it, there are many things that can be caused in whole, or in part by an imbalance of the microbial terrain of your gut. Obesity is one of them……. imbalanced gut microbes can actually pull more calories from the food you eat.

Resources:

• http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120318757&sc=17&f=1001
• http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/health/article6913376.ece
• http://www.itwire.com/content/view/29364/1066/

Share on Facebook

Tags: gut bacteria, nutrition Portland, obesity, Portland chiropractor, pro-biotics

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 28th, 2009 at 10:45 am and is filed under Chiropractic, Nutrition. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.