hompes method - amazon s3 · hompes method lesson 25 ... •the exact numbers don’t matter. the...

Hompes Method

Lesson 25 –

Nutrient Status Introduction

© Health for the People Ltd – not for reuse without expressed permission

Nutrient Status - Introduction

• As you’re already aware, one of the core principles I teach, whether it’s to you as students, or to clients, is that symptoms in the Seven Areas of Health are caused by a simple equation, which isn’t exactly rocket science.


• So far, we’ve covered bad foods (Hompes Method Level I), bad bugs and bad toxins and you’re now acutely aware of how all that bad stuff can cause problems. Simply working down the red list on the seesaw and removing bad food > bad bugs > bad toxins - usually in that sequence – brings great results for most people in terms of relieving symptoms.


• BUT, it doesn’t necessarily make them healthy. Just because you remove the bad stuff and some symptoms go away, it doesn’t mean your nutrient status has all of a sudden optimised, or that you have removed all the toxins, or that your hormones are balanced, or that your body is making energy in an optimal manner.


• What % symptoms are caused by bad foods?

• What % symptoms are caused by bad bugs?

• What % symptoms are caused by bad toxins?

• What % symptoms are caused by low acid/enzymes?

• What % symptoms are caused by low good bugs?

• What % symptoms are nutrient deficiencies?

• What % symptoms are hormone imbalances?

• What % symptoms are structural?

• What % symptoms are mental, emotional, spiritual?

• WHAT CAME FIRST – excess bad, or insufficient good?


• This is why I advise all clients and patients to check their nutritional status using the functional medicine lab testing that we have in the HM Testing Toolkit! If we have the ability to spot and identify specific insufficiencies, or even flat deficiencies, why would we not urge our clients and patients to do it?!


• I’m going to use this lesson to review the topic of nutrients and nutritional status in the way that I teach it to clients. It’s a review of HM Level I and you’ll also be familiar with the info if you’ve read the Hompes Method book.

The Nutrient Hierarchy

• Let’s begin by asking the question, “how important are all the different nutrients we eat?”


• The body composition of a 70kg man is shown here. Note the water, protein and fat content of the body (total 66kg). Note the small glycogen content in red and then the mineral content.

The Nutrient Hierarchy (second diagram)


• The exact numbers don’t matter. The purpose of the diagrams is to give you an idea of your body’s hierarchy of needs when it comes to nutrition. Water, protein and fat are more important than vitamins and minerals. The body doesn’t store carbohydrate –which is why the CHO content of the body is low –but CHO is used up quickly, or turned to fat, when it’s consumed.


• The take home point is this: water, protein, fat and carbohydrate are more important than vitamins and minerals. You cannot survive on vitamin and mineral pills, no matter how many you take. You must have water and macronutrients.


• If high quality macronutrients are eaten, high quality micronutrients will come packaged up in the food! Unfortunately, because of poor food choices (processed, non-organic) and dodgy gut function, the majority of folk you’ll consult will be deficient in high quality macro and micronutrients.


• Paul Chek has a wonderful analogy for this – some of you will have seen it:

– If you wanted to build a little sailing boat, you wouldn’t get very far trying to hammer rotten wood together with golden nails. That’s the principle I want to get across. The food you eat is your wood; the supplements are your golden nails.

Paul Chek’s Nutrient Hierarchy Analogy

From the book “How To Eat, Move & Be Healthy” by Paul Chek

The Macronutrients (wood)

• Macronutrients are relatively large molecules and are your:

– Proteins

– Fats

– Carbohydrates

– (H2o)

The Micronutrients (golden nails)

• Micronutrients are smaller in size and are your:

– Vitamins

– Minerals

– Cofactors

• Note that there may dozens, hundreds or even thousands of undiscovered nutrient cofactors that we don’t know about.

The Take Home Point

• The importance of this information (i.e. sharing with your client) is to get them to understand that no matter how lazy they are and no matter how much they want the easy path, they simply can’t restore their health using supplements alone.

The Cake Analogy

• Another analogy I use is that macronutrients are like a cake. Micronutrients are like the icing on the cake. If you bake a terrible cake that falls apart when you take it out the oven, it’s gonna be really tough to put icing on it!

• Let’s take a brief look at the main nutrient groups, baring in mind we’ll cover them individually in separate lessons when we cover nutrient level testing and that we’ve covered them already in HM Level I. Again, this is a brief explanation as I’d give it to clients.

Protein and Amino Acids

• Every tissue is made of protein (skin, hair, bone, muscle, tendons, organs, etc.)

• Amino acids are essential for energy production.

• Every enzyme is a protein.

• Antibodies are proteins.

• Detoxification requires enzymes.

• Neurotransmitters are amino acids.

• Certain hormones are an amino acid structures.

– What symptoms could develop from AA deficiencies?

Protein and Amino Acids

– Low energy levels (even chronic fatigue)

– Depression

– Anxiety

– Memory and concentration problems

– Low thyroid function (which affects everything!)

– Allergic symptoms

– Digestive symptoms

– Inability to detoxify properly

– Loss of muscle mass

– Increased body fat

SYMPTOMS IN ANY OF THE SEVEN AREAS OF HEALTH.

Fats and Fatty Acids

• Major structural chemical

• Primary constituent of cell membranes (the brain of the cell – see Bruce Lipton)

• Brain and nervous system (myelin is 70-85% fat)

• Major fuel source for cellular energy production

• Repair chemical

• Immune system

• Root chemical for hormones

• Food for the heart

• Antimicrobial activity in the gut


• Dry skin (e.g., feet/face/general) • Scaly or flaky skin (e.g., legs) • Cracking/peeling fingertips & skin (e.g., heels) • Lackluster skin • Small bumps on back of upper arms • Patchy dullness &/or color variation of skin • Mixed oily and dry skin ('combination' skin) • Irregular quilted appearance of skin (e.g., legs) • Thick or cracked calluses • Dandruff or cradle cap • Dry, lackluster, brittle or unruly hair


• Soft, fraying, splitting or brittle fingernails • Dull nails - lack of surface shine • Slow growing fingernails • Dry eyes • Dry mouth/throat • Inadequate vaginal lubrication • Menstrual cramps • Premenstrual breast pain/tenderness • Excessive ear wax • Excessive thirst • Allergic (e.g., eczema/asthma/hay fever/hives)• Crave fats/fatty foods• Stiff or painful joints

Carbohydrates and Sugars

• The primary role for CHO and sugar is, of course, the production of the body’s energy units (ATP) through cellular respiration. Dietary CHO is broken down into basic sugar molecules (e.g. glucose and fructose), which are then converted through glycolysis and the citric acid cycle to make energy. If people don’t eat enough CHO, the possible health effects are global because everything depends on energy.

Vitamins

• Vitamins are essential for the proper function. They are essential for life. Our bodies are unable to synthesize vitamins – with the exception of some B-vitamins that are manufactured by “good” bacteria in the gut - so they must be obtained from food.

Vitamins

• Vitamins primarily act as “helpers” in the body’s metabolic pathways. As with all nutrients, they are essential for energy production, immune function, neurological function, detoxification, growth and repair.

Vitamins

“In 2002, the standard-bearer for mainstream US medicine, the Journal of the American Medical

Association, published a report from Harvard researchers acknowledging that “most people do not consume an

optimal amount of all vitamins by diet alone.”

Cited in Sinatra & Roberts: Reverse Heart Disease Now, p. 93.

Vitamins

• Vitamins can be either fat-soluble or water-soluble. Fat soluble vitamins dissolve only in fatty substances. Water soluble vitamins – you guessed it – dissolve in water! We’ll be covering each nutrient group in separate lessons.

Vitamins

• In The Hompes Method book I created a (non-exhaustive) table that illustrates the main functions of each vitamin, along with symptoms of deficiency and the risk factors for development of significant illness/disease with ongoing deficiency. The following slide contains a summary of three nutrients from the table – vitamin A, beta-carotene and vitamin D.

Vitamins

Vitamins

• Vitamin deficiency is such an obvious cause of symptoms and illness, yet the medical system attempts to use pharmaceutical drugs to paint over the cracks caused by these deficiencies. It’s just about as crazy as it gets.

Minerals

• Nutrient minerals (dozens of them) serve a multitude of functions in the body. Given the nature of such a diverse array of functions, it is not surprising that symptoms and illnesses develop when mineral levels drop too low or shift out of balance.

Minerals

• Take magnesium, for example, which is known to play a role in more than 200-400 chemical reactions. A small drop in magnesium levels has the potential to cause problems in any or all of those metabolic processes! Then, consider that according to one study, 57% of the US population does not meet the recommended daily allowance for magnesium.

[Community Nutrition Mapping Project. 2009-07-29. Retrieved 2012-02-11.]

Minerals

• If we assume other nutrients are being consumed in lower than-optimal levels, it’s not hard to see why people might develop symptoms and diseases through mineral deficiencies…

Minerals

“Across all demographic strata in industrialized nations, nutrient element deficiencies are recognized as being

involved in the pathogenesis of many health conditions, including heart disease, hypertension and cancer.

Populations such as the elderly, pregnant women, small children and immune-compromised patients are

particularly vulnerable to essential element deficiencies.”

Metametrix Laboratory Clinical Reference Manual, p.36

Minerals

• In the same way as I’ve summarised the functions of key vitamins in The Hompes Method book, I also created a quick reference summary of functions and deficiency symptoms for eight key minerals. Here’s an excerpt:

Minerals

Minerals

• It’s also important to point out that minerals, in particular, can also cause problems when present inexcess. The consequences of elevated nutrient levels can be just as detrimental to the body as a deficiency.

Minerals

• Some examples include:

– Chromium is essential for helping to maintain blood sugar balance, but is associated with dermatitis and even cancer when present in excess.

– If magnesium or potassium levels are too high, symptoms such as nausea, vomiting and diarrhea may occur.

– Elevated calcium can resulting symptoms such as hypertension, premenstrual syndrome and cardiac arrhythmia.

– Iron can be extremely topic in excess, but it’s necessary oxygen transport and energy production.

Micronutrients – Deficiency Research

• “People with low levels of retinol, beta-carotene, vitamin E and selenium are more likely to get cancer.” – Serum retinol, beta-carotene, vitamin E and selenium as related to subsequent

cancer of specific sites. Comstock GW, et al. Am J Epidemiol 135:115-21, 1992.

• “Supplemental vitamin D reduces the risk of colon cancer by half compared to dietary vitamin D which reduces it 12%.” – Calcium, vitamin D, and dairy foods and the occurrence of colon cancer in men.

Kearney J, et al. Am J Epidemiol 143:907-17, 1996.

• “The area of China with the lowest micronutrient intake has the highest rate of cancer. Supplementation with vitamin E, selenium and beta-carotene lowers the rate.”– Vitamin/mineral supplementation and cancer risk:Internationaal

chemoprevention trials. Blot WJ. Proc Soc Exp Biol Med 216:291-6, 1997.


• “90% of women and 71% of men get less than the RDA for vitamin B6.” – Dietary vitamin B-6 intake and food sources in the US population:

NHANES II, 1976-1980. Kant AK, et al. 1990.

• “Men with the lowest amount of vitamin C have a 62% increased risk of cancer and a 57% increased risk of dying from any cause.“– Vitamin C status and mortality in US adults. Loria CM, et al. Am J Clin

Nutr 72:139-45, 2000.

• “Lutein and zeaxanthin reduce the incidence of cataract by 22%.” – A prospective study of carotenoid and vitamin A intakes and risk of

cataract extraction in US women. Chasan-Taber L, et al. Am J Clin Nutr70:509-16, 1999.


• “American children have inadequate levels of vitamin E.“

– Vitamin E status of US children. Bendich A. J Am Coll Nutr 11:441-4, 1992.

• “Flavonoids protect against stroke.”

– Dietary flavonoids, antioxidant vitamins, and incidence of stroke: the Zutphen study. Keli SO, et al. Arch Intern Med 156:637-42, 1996.

What’s “Normal”?

• What actually constitutes optimal vitamin (and all other nutrient) levels? This is a difficult question to answer for varying reasons:


• First, recommended daily allowances (RDA) for vitamins (and other nutrients) keep people disease-free, not in optimal health. For example, it’s recommended that we take 65mg vitamin C per day to prevent scurvy, but 65mg is a tiny amount of vitamin C. I personally take 2,000-3,000g per day.


• As you saw in the lesson on heavy metal detoxification, some doctors administer intravenous vitamin C in mega-doses to help clients detoxify from neurotoxins such as mercury and lead. There’s simply no way that 65mg vitamin C per day is adequate to protect from the onslaught of stress and toxins present in our environment, so the RDA’s must be ignored (tell your clients and patients this).


• Second, it’s hard to know exactly how much of a specific nutrient the body needs is that each person’s requirement for a particular vitamin, mineral or other nutrient is likely to differ, depending on his or her:

• Genetics

• Stress levels

• Toxic burden

• Metabolic state and lifestyle

• Specific deficiencies that have developed over time


• A professional 85kg athlete likely needs more nutrients than a 50kg office worker and a mercury-toxic patient will need more antioxidants than someone who’s not “toxic.”


• Third, Dr. Roger J. Williams, who discovered vitamin B5, wrote a book called Biochemical Individuality in the 1950s, in which he showed how each person’s nutrient requirements are as unique as fingerprints.


• William L. Wolcott later developed a system of customized nutrition known as Metabolic Typing, a tool that I have been using with clients for more than a decade. This is an impressive system that identifies a person’s individual “metabolic type” and provides a guide for specific nutrient needs of a given individual.


• Roger J. Williams’ book Biochemical Individuality is well worth a read.


• William L. Wolcott’s book The Metabolic Typing Diet is also well worth a read.

Medical Attitudes

• We have a situation in which the western medical system allows folk to become ill and then treats the symptoms rather than the underlying cause. Nutrient deficiencies are rarely considered as a cause of symptoms with the exceptions of four nutrients:

– Vitamin B12

– Vitamin D

– Iron

– Calcium

Medical Attitudes

• Some docs do test for vitamin D, many test for iron levels (but not in a comprehensive enough manner) and some consider calcium status in the context of osteoporosis. It often baffles me that these three nutrients are given attention whilst others are generally ignored.

Medical Attitudes

• On the one hand we have an admission from the system that some nutrients are important, but on the other we’re told we need drugs to cure our illnesses. It makes no sense at all.

Medical Attitudes

• During my research for The Hompes Method book, I came across some interesting statistics. On examining a publicly available UK NHS document entitled “Prescriptions Dispensed in the Community: England Statistics for 2001-2011.”

Medical Attitudes

• I learned that a product called ergocalciferol was the 17th most frequently dispensed prescription item, with 12.8 million prescriptions. Ergocalciferol is vitamin D, or to be more accurate, vitamin D2.

Medical Attitudes

• The NHS clearly sees vitamin D deficiency as a problem but it must be a renegade nutrient because there’s no evidence whatsoever of any other nutrients having been prescribed in the NHS top 20.

Medical Attitudes

• Vitamin D must be the only vitamin that becomes depleted according to the medical system (to add insult to injury, vitamin D2 is not the most effective form of supplemental vitamin D, and nor is taking it in a pill form – I use liquid vitamin D in my practice as it’s much better absorbed.)

Micronutrients – Medical Attitudes

• I then looked at the table for net ingredient cost (NIC) for the top 20 “drugs” in 2011. I found that enteral nutrition was positioned at number three. Enteral feeding refers to the delivery of a nutritionally complete feed containing protein, carbohydrate, fat, water, minerals and vitamins, directly into the stomach, duodenum or jejunum.


• It’s basically the delivery of food through a tube that goes into the nose or mouth and down into the gut. It is used in emergency treatments and in situations in which patients are severely malnourished or unable to eat.


• Well, I found this fascinating – not only did the NHS admit, by definition of prescribing so much vitamin D2, that vitamin D deficiency was a problem, it also spent more money on enteral nutrition than any other “drug” except steroids and statins.


• I’m not sure how you can define water, vitamins, minerals, sugars, et cetera as drugs, but there you go. The moral of the story is this: when you want to keep someone alive in a serious situation, you get nutrition into them, but when people are chronically unwell, you give them drugs. It’s contradictory and a little baffling.


• My research didn’t end there. I wanted to learn a bit more about enteral nutrition, what it involved and how/when it was administered, so I downloaded another document. Commissioned by the National Institute for Clinical Excellent (NICE), this document was produced in 2006 and titled Nutrition Support For Adults: Oral Nutrition Support, Enteral Tube Feeding and Parental Nutrition – Methods, Evidence & Guidance.


• The document Foreword reads:

“Malnutrition is both a cause and a consequence of ill-health. It is surprisingly common in the UK, especially in

those who are unwell. Many older people and those with any long-term medical or psycho-social problems are chronically underweight and so are vulnerable to

acute illness.”


“Even people who are well-nourished eat and drink less if they are ill or injured and although this may only be

short-lived as part of an acute problem, if it persists the person can become undernourished to an extent that

may impair recovery or precipitate other medical conditions…”


“The consequences of malnutrition include vulnerability to infection, delayed wound healing, impaired function

of heart and lungs, decreased muscle strength and depression. People with malnutrition consult their

general practitioners more frequently, go to hospital more often and for longer, and have higher

complication and mortality rates.”


“Surgical patients, who have malnutrition for example, have around three times as many post-operative

complications and four times greater risk of death than well nourished patients having similar operations. If

poor dietary intake or complete inability to eat persists for weeks, the resulting malnutrition can be life-

threatening in itself.”

Nutrition Support For Adults: Oral Nutrition Support, Enteral Tube Feeding and Parental Nutrition –Methods, Evidence & Guidance.


How are they defining “malnourishment”?


• I often wonder why doctors are given virtually no nutrition training whatsoever in their five or more years at medical school. Then I recall how teaching the public to use proper nutrition as a tool to stay out of the doctors’ office doesn’t make big pharmaany cash. Nutrients cannot be patented because they occur naturally.

Micronutrients - Summary

• Optimal health and is not the same as simply being kept away from the doctor’s office. Nor is minimizing disease risk. Many people put up with mild or moderate symptoms without ever complaining to the doctor. These symptoms may be correctible through even a mild or modest improvement in nutritional status.


• When a disease is diagnosed later in life – heart disease, diabetes, cancer, autoimmune, etc. - it’s not likely linked to the symptoms in the Seven Areas of Health that have been going on for years or decades in the patient.


• Many of these symptoms may well have been the result of simple nutrient deficiencies that were easy to rectify by optimizing food intake and gut function. But by the time a “dis-ease” is diagnosed, the nutritional gap that needs to be bridged is generally much greater and takes much longer!

Nutrients - Summary

Nutrients - Summary

• We know extreme nutritional deficiencies cause diseases (scurvy, anemia (Fe, Cu, B12), rickets, pellagra).

• We know the food supply is nutritionally depleted.• We know folk are toxic and under a lot of stress.• We know people have dodgy guts.• We have an epidemic of symptoms in the Seven Areas of

Health, as well as tons of chronic disease.• We know the medical system acknowledges this when it

suits them (D, B12, Fe). • We know the medical system gives people food when

they’re extremely ill or have had a serious accident.• So why do symptoms get treated with drugs and surgery?

Nutrient Resources

Thank You!

• Thanks a million for tuning in. I appreciate your time and I appreciate you choosing me as one of your teachers. We’re going to get straight into how we test for nutrient balance in the next lesson and we’re going to begin with proteins (amino acids) and fatty acids.

hompes method - amazon s3 · hompes method lesson 25 ... •the exact numbers don’t matter. the...

Documents