April 14, 2022 • 32 mins
We’ve all heard the phrase “an apple a day keeps the doctor away,” and there is some truth to that common proverb. Dr. Angie Sadeghi is a Board Certified Gastroenterologist who advocates for treating and preventing disease through plant-based nutrition. In this episode, she joins Alicia to discuss how simple changes to our diets and lifestyles can prevent diseases as we get older. They also explore how to avoid myths around fad diets and how maintaining your gut health can boost your mood. Join them as they examine the profound impact that nutrition can have on the health of you and your future self.
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
What is it really gonna take to heal ourselves, our communities,
and our planet. I'm Alicia Silverstone, and this is the
real hell many of us were taught to think. If
I get sick, I can just go to the doctors,
get some medicine, and I'll feel better. But what if
(00:26):
you could do something to stop yourself from getting sick
in the first place. What if we find ways to
give our bodies the natural medicine that it needs. In
this episode, I talked to dr Angie Saedegi, a Board
certified gastro entrologist who is a diplomat of the American
Board of Internal Medicine and the American Board of Gastro Entrology.
(00:50):
So without further ado, let's get into the real heal Hi,
dr Angie, I am so excited to have you here
and have this conversation that we're about to have. I'm
very inspired by your journey, so thank you for being here.
(01:11):
It's my absolute pleasure, Alicia. I grew up watching your
movies and I think you you're just a brilliant, beautiful soul,
beautiful inside and out, and it's such a pleasure to
be talking to you today, and it's quite surreal, but
here I am. I thank you for choosing me on
this show. Oh, thank you. UM can you please describe
(01:34):
who you are to our listeners. Yes, so, I am
a plant based gastro and urologist. UM. I am mom
to a fourteen year old boy named Bjan. We live
in Orange County, California. My practice is in Newport Beach, California,
and I try to just basically, um, do my thing.
But it's kind of a beautiful thing because as a physician,
(01:58):
I've realized that I can help so many people with
their health through this plant based eating. So I have
integrated my nutrition and lifestyle into this practice of gastro
entrology and um. So it's kind of an exciting thing
I've going on here and I'm really happy to share
(02:18):
my knowledge, um with the listeners today. Thank you. Okay, so,
why don't you just first explain what is gastro and
trology and that's all gut health. But how do you
explain it? Yeah? So, the g I track is starts
from the mouth and ends with the anus, So mouth
(02:39):
to anus. We have several digestive organs, including the liver
and the pancreas. So the mouth, the esophagus, the stomach,
the small bell, the pancreas, the liver and the colon
and all of that is basically the gastro intestinal system.
I can't wait to get to the plant based stuff.
Of course, I'm dying to talk to you about that,
(03:00):
but I'm curious about what it was like doing your
job prior to understanding plant based nutrition. You know, the
patients that came in, what were you dealing with, and
then how did you treat them? And then crossing over
to how it's so different now. Yes, So I became
a vegan seven years ago, and before that I was
(03:22):
a board certified gastro intrologist and internist. But I didn't
really realize how much literature is out there in regards
to the importance of gut health and in regards to
disease prevention in an association with nutrition, I had no idea.
I mean, people ask me, like, did you go vegan
because you studied medicine and you learned all this nutrition
(03:45):
in school and and figure out how important it is
I was I They're always shocked to hear my answer. No,
I'm an ethical vegan. And what happened is when I
chose to become a vegan because of the almost I
looked into the literature and realized that the health benefits
are there, it's just not emphasized upon. So I realized
(04:09):
how hopefully powerful I can be in the clinic setting
if I could prevent disease and focus on disease prevention.
We all need to at some point seek Western medicine,
and it does miraculous things. You know, if you have
something wrong, you go to the hospital. If you have
a cancer, we can cut it out, you can get chemo.
(04:31):
If you have a g I bleeding, we can go
in there and caulgorize the bleed and clip it and
stuff the bleeding. But the focus should be prevention, right,
So we help our patients in the clinic setting before
they get hospitalized, before they have the need of having
all these procedures and surgeries done. So it all started clicking,
(04:54):
and I realized how important lifestyle is in prevention and
in particular nutrition. When I go to the hospital to around,
I realized that nine out of ten diseases I am
dealing with could have been prevented with lifestyle. If patients
would eat a plant based diet, if patients stopped smoking
(05:17):
and drinking excessive amounts of alcohol just right there, and
maybe working out three times a week, just right there.
You could eliminate of diseases I see in the hospital.
Thank you. I imagine I'm so excited imagining you in
your office with your ten or fifteen patients a day,
and if they come in and say, this is what's happening,
(05:39):
and and then you start, Let's say seven years ago,
you maybe wouldn't have talked to them about the prevention, right,
you would just go straight to treatment. And so now
I'm imagining you sitting there going, Okay, here's what we
can do before we do this, this, and this, you
have a chance to fix this. We can change your diet,
you can start exercising, you can stop doing this and that,
(06:00):
and if you're with me, we can stop you from
having this surgery or this medication. Right. And then the
question is how many of them do they how many
of them listen to you? I would say the majority
of patients make changes. I don't think that. For example,
if I'm seeing a hundred patients, I would rather see
(06:21):
ninety of them make changes than ten of them go
a nd percent pot based. Yes, when I first started,
I was very gun cole about like turning every single
one of my patients vegan. I've realized it's just a
little bit too unrealistic and people have to get there
on their own terms. I am now a little bit
softer with the softer approach, and I try to just
(06:43):
explain the science and give them time and it will come.
It's just you just have to plant the seeds. Yes,
I love everything you just said and planting the seeds.
So have you had the variance I'm sure you have
of patients coming in and being so vulnerable with where
(07:06):
they are and their health and really looking to you,
and then you get them on the plant based diet
or there or whatever, and they see changes and then
they're healed and you get to have that amazing experience. Yes,
so over sixty of the population is lactose intolerant. So
(07:27):
one of the things I see is when people come
in with severe diarrhea, uncomfortable bloating in yes, and altered
bell habits um kind of like IBS symptoms. One of
the most miraculous things that happens in a g I
clinic is when they come in and you ask them
to stop consuming dairy and they come back and they
(07:47):
think you're a genius and that there's such a good talctor.
It's sad that they had never heard it from anyone else,
but they're like, I feel so much better, Thank you
so much. I mean, that's literally what I do, at
least it first visit people with gas bloating of donald
paint diarrhea. I test for two things. Lactose intolerance, which
basically it's the easiest way to do it as absence.
(08:10):
Go for one month without consuming any dairy products, and
I say, read the labels because dairy is obviously a
subsidized food and it's a cheap filler. I asked them
to meticulously read labels and avoid the dairy for a
whole month. And they come back and I check for
Celiac disease because that's one of the other reasons people
(08:31):
get voaded. So they come back and you know, um,
they're like, Wow, I stopped eating dairy and I'm feeling
so much better. This is fantastic. But yeah, I mean
it's pretty cool. A lot of people are vulnerable because
they're suffering, they're having g I problems, they're having discomfort
and irritable bowel syndrome, gastro softage of reflux, and so
(08:55):
people are vulnerable and um they're willing to listen. People
do get fooled into eating more meat if they're having
diarrhea because they think they assume that fiber causes diarrhea,
but it's actually not true. Fiber bulks SysTools, the most
natural product you could consume too. If you're actually having diarrhea,
(09:15):
it bulks your stool, and if you're having constipation, it
helps alleviate the hard stools. So here we are having
a poop conversation, right lovely. Anyhow, it's very important to
improve your diet when you're having these types of problems
by eating more plants and getting that fiber in your diet.
(09:38):
They do incorporate more plants in their diet. And sometimes
I get my dieticians to help, because whereas I'm good
at saying eat more plants, I'm not good at giving
them a script of here's what you need to eat.
I get my dieticians involved and we make changes. We
help them incorporate more more plants. And another really awesome
(09:59):
thing I want to talk about is it's not just
helping the GI tract, is it. I mean, if you
asked some of my cardiology friends, they would tell you that, actually,
there is so much research out there, more than gas
or intestinal research. There is so much cardiovascular research out there,
and how Mediterranean diets plant based diets can prevent heart disease.
(10:22):
So I feel like, secretly I could be a cardiologist
because I'm kidding, but I'm helping them with their GI track.
But they're also preventing cancers everywhere else heart disease, which
is the number one killer in the US. So anyway,
it's just all around good. I think it's also really
(10:56):
interesting and brave that you put plant based on your door.
You I didn't realize that you were advertising it as
what's what's the practice called Institute of Based Medicine. Yeah,
so I was thinking you were sort of getting somebody
in there saying, oh, I have these problems, and then
but now they already know when they walk in what
they're getting. So oh, yes, it's all over my website.
It's all over everything because and people are very curious.
(11:20):
I mean, I have about fifty of my patients or
my patients before I changed their name. It used to
be Anti City m Dink and now it's it's a
famous mediciance, a lot of them new. But the new
patients come to me and they asked me what does
this name mean? And and explain to me. And then
I'm like, I'm glad you asked because we used to
talk about nutrition. But that's so wonderful that they're willing
(11:42):
to come. They must, you must be referred to people
or somehow they're arriving at your door. And to not
be turned away because of that is a really really
beautiful thing. It is so funny thing. A couple of
people thought, we, uh, sell marijuana, but it's it's really
(12:03):
cool that, uh, the words plant based need to be
incorporated into everyday life and people have to know what
that is. And so I was, yes, a little brave
because I had to make a decision um to name
it that and hopefully not deter people. But then I
was like, but who's there for people who want to
(12:23):
go plant based? And they want to plant based, Let's
say about fifty of people who are like looking online,
it actually attracts them because they're like, oh, she is
incorporating nutrition. And so you know, a lot of times,
in order to be innovative in your field, in order
to revolutionize your field. You have to take a little
(12:44):
risk and you have to be brave, right, And I
have my idols. I watched them and how they run
their practices and businesses, and they had original ideas and
they weren't afraid of it. And that's how I see it.
Um It might turn off a few people, but no
business can be all to everyone. And I realized that,
(13:06):
and I just want to touch the lives of people
who are interested. And that's a fantastic opportunity and I'll
take it. That's beautiful. I wanted to just mention you
had said earlier something about this, and it's always boggled
my mind. And I think many people have no idea
that most doctors have no nutrition experience at all, that
(13:30):
there's a two week optional course in medical school for nutrition,
and I don't think people understand how insane that is.
That what you do with your forks three times a
day is the most powerful thing you're going to do
to your body. There's nothing more intrusive. You're giving your
body fuel or you're giving it, you know, toxins, And
(13:54):
for doctors to not have that in their repertoire, to
not understand the body holistically and look at a body
and say what caused this? Oh, it's food you eat
every day? Got it? If they don't understand that, which
they don't, and they're just looking at you going, oh,
you have cancer. Great, you can try this medication, we
can do this operation, we can do this thing. You know,
(14:16):
not for cancer, but for all of the things. They're
not looking at the body in a holistic way to
say what is causing this. They're just looking at how
do I stop those symptoms? And stopping those symptoms just
leads to other symptoms and other symptoms and other symptoms.
So true, and so I just wanted you to speak
to that because you're one of the rare. I mean,
luckily they're they're being born everywhere. They're more and more
(14:37):
people are waking up to this, But I don't think
most people understand that. For reals, your doctor doesn't. You
know more about food probably than your doctor unless it's you. Yeah,
it's so funny because even that very limited nutrition that
they offer in medical school. I skipped every class because
I was like, oh my god, like, why do I
have to know this? Like I didn't, I skipt every class.
(15:00):
I was like, this is so silly, I'm gonna be
a doctor. I don't care about this, and I like
literally was like, it's like, teach me more pharmacology and
microbiology and anatomy and this garbage. Oh my god, it's
so weird. Don't ever say anything like that because it
comes back at you and like it's like an avalanche.
(15:22):
It's like, oh my god, the one class that I
should have paid the most attention in. And it's like,
the funny thing is that I am now more interested
in all of that than the other stuff. You know,
you start being diagnosed, and by the way, you can
cruise through your forties and not have problems. But let
me tell you, as a doctor, if you're not watching
(15:43):
what you're doing when you're fifty five, things are going
to break down. I don't care who you are. If
you're not watching your diets, if you're not exercising, if
you're drinking too heavily, if you're smoking, bad things are
going to happen. And and people tell you, well, my
great grandfather lived to be ninety and he smoked. Yes,
(16:04):
there are outliers, but don't live by that because it's like,
statistically speaking, you're gonna be in trouble, and like you said,
you know your you hit your fifties and sixties. It
starts with chess pain and like coronary disease, and then
suddenly you're something called clodication. You're walking and you're not
getting good cirticulation Eric Telda's function, can't breathe. Then suddenly
(16:27):
your legs swell up and bad things keep happening, and
then you go to the cardiologist and you're taking the
aspirin and the blood thinners, etcetera, etcetera, and then you
start having a GI bleed. Of course, right then we
fix the g I bleed and we put you on
some other medicine because they gave you. Right. Yeah, it
happens all the time. And I'm not suggesting that you
(16:50):
don't listen and not take the medications because you could die,
but I'm just saying that it leads to other problems,
and then then you take other stuff, and then one
day you wake up and you're on fifteen medicines, and
the side effects of medicines can be bad too. I'm
not dissing medical care, not not saying it's bad to
take medications, but I'm just saying if you're not taking
(17:11):
care of yourself, then you will have to. And then
it becomes a continuous thing, and it builds up, things
get layered and more complicated, and you develop more and
more diseases and more and more side effects. So I
am hoping that people who are watching and listening know
that what they do on a daily basis, as far
(17:33):
as lifestyle, can prevent some of the complications in in
the old age not old, I mean, sixty five is
not old. And and a lot of people tell me, well,
I would rather live my life than have to like
eat healthier all the time, and you know, I just
want to live my life well. And I always tell them, listen,
just I wish that I could take you to the
hospital with me one day and so you could round
(17:55):
with me to see that these people are not living
their life. Their living ten many years of misery in
and out of the hospital, getting dialysis, getting their hearts
stented on the surgery table, all the time, getting scoped
and this and that, and it's just not living, it's
surviving and it's no fun. All I'm saying is you
(18:17):
could prevent so many of these diseases by just putting
more plants on your table. That's it. Yes, it's really
really simple. It's hard for people to imagine, I think,
but when you've experienced it, it's it's so simple and
it's so miraculous. Um there's a quote just to sum
(18:38):
up what you said really beautifully, but you kind of
just said it. But you said, I want to leave
a legacy of a doctor who prevented disease in her
patients using the mastery of combining integrative medicine, Western and
Eastern medicine, rather than simply using pharmaceuticals. So you've said
that beautifully. Thank you. You've also said what you kind
(18:59):
of already said again, but you said it beautifully. Almost
every single disease I diagnose and treat in the clinic
has something to do with diet. You were given certain genetics.
I love this, But genetics load the gun and nutrition
pulls the trigger. There's not even one single disease I
can think of as far as the gastro intestinal tract
is concerned, that doesn't have something to do with nutrition.
(19:20):
I think that is so important, and I think I
um Dr Selstein had I think he's the one who
first said that genetics loads the gun and nutrition pulls
the trigger. I really believe in that it's And by
the way, if if you are listening and you have
some kind of a disease, don't feel bad or guilty
that you did something wrong. Things can happen, Like there
(19:41):
are a lot of genetic diseases that we have no
control over. But I just want people to know that
it's a very small percentage of disease that's directly related
to genetics environmental causes. And by saying environment mental causes,
just remember nutrition is a huge part of it. Are
the most common cause of chronic diseases like diabetes, like hypertension, hyperlipidemia,
(20:06):
and heart disease and gastro intestinal disorders. And like a
lot of people are like, well, I mean I know
a vegan who had cancer. Well yeah, it's like anyone
at any time could develop a disease. But what you
have to remember is most of the data is showing
that eating a plant based diet can prevent so many diseases,
(20:28):
and there are outlies. I feel so responsible at least
do you ever think about this, Like, like I always
get all my screening tests and I'm always careful because
you know, when you're devout vegan and you promoted God forbid,
something happens. People are like she was vegan. I want
to mention that even if I one day die of
(20:49):
a certain disease, I still want to say that it's
not about me. It's not about this one person. It's
about if you review the science and if you review
the data, eating a pump based diet is essential in
keeping a healthy But I think it's really important what
you're saying. I think that there are many I mean,
if I think about the examples of my life of
(21:11):
people who had leukemia, lupus, cancer, heart problems, someone who
had you know, it was two hundred pounds overweight, the
people that I have encountered on my healing journey who
have changed their lives, that those numbers far outweigh the
one or two people that you hear who happen to
(21:32):
maybe be sort of vegetarian who also died. They do exist.
But but when you see the amount of healing that
occurs through this lifestyle, and and then you just have
to look at the stats. I mean, in the kind
diet the book I wrote, I just pulled all the
Harvard Medical stats and at that time, the current medical
journals where you don't have to look far to see
(21:53):
how much a plant based diet benefits everything from A
to Z. So if you're looking statistically, if we're looking
at data, you're gonna find the one or two that
are not going to benefit, but the massive amounts of
numbers that are benefiting are so extraordinary that you can't
ignore it. I'm trying to think if there's any big
(22:29):
myths that I'm specifically thinking about paleo diet and the
Kato is it the cato diet keto that people love
to say really helps And I mean it definitely helps
with losing weight because you're restricting your calories. But in
terms of being actually a healthy thing, do you have
any brilliant information that you can share for people about
(22:50):
why those are not healing and healthy? Yeah? I mean
Alicia went when the carnivore diet came out, I laughed.
I was like, ha, that's never gonna take I never
heard about that one. When did that happen? Oh? Yeah,
there's this crazy carnibor diet where these people eat like
only meat. And I was like, well, it's obvious that
people will know that they become vitamin deficient and it's
(23:14):
fiber deficient and they will be ill. But sure enough,
it's actually it has taken off. So there are a
lot of fat diets and I think it initially starts
because you're right, it takes off because any diet you
do that restricts calories, you can lose weights. So and
everyone's trying to lose weights, so they try it, and
(23:34):
you know, they can drop a few pounds, but they
don't realize that if they continuating that way, it can
be detrimental. So I see it all the time, people
going keto, people going, you know, cutting out carbs, which
it's fine if you're cutting out refined sugar, but it's
really important to understand that fiber is pretty essential for
(23:55):
your gut health and you shouldn't cut out fiber rich
foods like beans. A lot of people think that they
should cut out beans and fruits, which makes no sense.
But making a blanket statement cut out carbs, which happens
all the time right leads people to thinking that they
should eat fruits. And if you read the literature, actually
(24:17):
people who eat a punt based diet are usually have
a healthier weight, and you can probably lose more weight
if you do a whole food pan based diet rather
than cutting out these awesome foods like fruits and vegetables. So,
to be honest with you, it's just very difficult to
teach people not to fall for these fat diets because
(24:39):
they read a book or they follow someone they admire
on Instagram, right, and suddenly you have to undo or
help them unlearned what they've learned. So fiber is pretty
essential for the gut. Right. So in the old days,
I remember when the Atkins diet came out. I've tried
(25:00):
it when I was a teenager, and I was so unhealthy, Alicia,
I was so I dropped a few pounds for my wedding,
but I got dark circles under my eyes. I started
getting back pains, and I think I had kidney problems
from the protein load I was I was eating. I
was eating like crazy stuff, like really fattening stuff. And
you know, I was probably consuming a ton of saturated fats, right,
(25:23):
and saturated fat increases your cholesterol and causes heart disease.
I remember I was listening to somebody talk about nutrition
and they were pro ketope and they said that carps
are completely unnecessary. I mean, can you imagine someone saying
that in a nutrition class that you know, you don't
even need carps to survive. As long as you eat
(25:43):
protein and fats, you should be fine. There's a study
that came out that showed that if you don't eat
fiber and you don't need enough fiber, then the gut
gets eroded and you're actually basically killing the gut mucosa
and you're exposing yourself to disease and your gut can
(26:04):
become damaged. So populational studies came out about the GOT
microbiome and how people who eat a majority plant based
diet have a healthier GOT microbiome. And now we know
the importance I've got microbiome, and there's so much to
be learned about this still, but you know how important
it is to eat fiber and feed these little guys
(26:25):
the microbiome fiber because that's what they thrive off of.
So more and more studies are coming out, and so
it's point to seeing us to the direction of eating
more plant based. I wanted to talk a little bit
about how the gut is related to the mind, because
if I eat sugar and then I stop eating sugar
(26:46):
the next few days, I feel really agitated, and and
I wish I wasn't so sensitive, but it's because I'm clean,
so my body reacts really intensely to these things. After
going vegan, and then later I did do a big
cleanse and changed my whole being. I mean, it was
like a whole another layer of cleaning out because now
I was just my heart was so open, my mind
(27:09):
was so clear, and there was a there was a
real balanced nature to my emotions. Everything was just balanced.
And I do believe that the food that you eat,
when you sit down to eat your plate of food,
it can mess with your mood or it can make
you feel really grounded, clear minded, happy. Your food can
(27:31):
make you happy. Chewing your brown rice can make you happy.
And I don't think people understand the connection between what
you eat and how it truly affects you're because your
gut affects your brains. So can you speak about that
a little bit? Yeah, So, as in regards to the
brain gut connection, it turns out that the brain and
(27:51):
the spinal cord have the most nerves. The most nervous
system lives in the brain and the spinal cord, and
the gut is the second most innervated organ So there
are a lot of nerves and neurotransmitters that connect the brain,
which sends a signal through these nerves and wires through
the spinal cord into the gut, and there's connection going back.
(28:15):
It's like imagine train tracks that come from the brain
into the gut and trains that go back to the gut, right,
So it's all through molecules and neurotransmitters. And neurotransmitters are
the signaling little molecules that take the signal from the
gut into these nerves that take the signal back into
the nerve nervous system into your spinal cord and the brain.
(28:37):
So there's a huge connection, right. So it's no wonder
that a lot of patients with irritable bowel syndrome have
a history of depression and anxiety. I think about six
of patients with IBS have some kind of depression and anxiety.
And it's very important to know that these very important
feel good ner transmitters, the majority of them are actually
(29:01):
made in the guts. So, for example, of the serotonin,
which is a very important ner transmitter, is made by
the gut cells. So the environment of the actual gut
where signals are being sent back to the brain is
very important. If you're keeping a healthy environment in your
(29:21):
gut and promoting the production of feel good um molecules,
then it's going to end up generally giving you a
good feeling. And if you are nurturing your gut, eating
the right foods that heals the gut, that helps the
production of these feel good ner transmitters, you could very
well improve your mental health. And so I always always
(29:46):
teach my patients this brain gut connection and the importance
of eating healthy. And we need more studies to to
study this, and it's not very easy to study, believe
it or not. But I can tell you lifestyle may
it's a huge difference just by if you're drinking too much,
if you stop drinking, which kills off the GOT microbiome,
if you stop smoking, and if you eat plant based
(30:09):
it's a tremendous I mean, it's just that tremendously changes
your mood. And I have to say, I think it's
all because of the connections that we have in our
gut with our brain through these neural transmitters that take
the signal into the brain and back. Well, thank you,
Dr Angie for explaining that Sarah Tonin is made in
(30:30):
the gut. I'm sure that that explains a lot for
a lot of people. Thank you, Thank you so much,
dr Angie for this. I'm so happy speaking with you.
I'm so excited about everything you said, and um ever
so grateful for what you're doing in the world and
(30:51):
the love that you're spreading and the healing that you're spreading.
So thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, and
I appreciate the opportunity to dig deeper into this episodes
topic and resources. Visit the kind life dot com. The
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(31:14):
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What is it really gonna take to heal ourselves, our communities,
and our planet. I'm Alicia Silverstone, and this is the
real hell many of us were taught to think. If
I get sick, I can just go to the doctors,
get some medicine, and I'll feel better. But what if
(00:26):
you could do something to stop yourself from getting sick
in the first place. What if we find ways to
give our bodies the natural medicine that it needs. In
this episode, I talked to dr Angie Saedegi, a Board
certified gastro entrologist who is a diplomat of the American
Board of Internal Medicine and the American Board of Gastro Entrology.
(00:50):
So without further ado, let's get into the real heal Hi,
dr Angie, I am so excited to have you here
and have this conversation that we're about to have. I'm
very inspired by your journey, so thank you for being here.
(01:11):
It's my absolute pleasure, Alicia. I grew up watching your
movies and I think you you're just a brilliant, beautiful soul,
beautiful inside and out, and it's such a pleasure to
be talking to you today, and it's quite surreal, but
here I am. I thank you for choosing me on
this show. Oh, thank you. UM can you please describe
(01:34):
who you are to our listeners. Yes, so, I am
a plant based gastro and urologist. UM. I am mom
to a fourteen year old boy named Bjan. We live
in Orange County, California. My practice is in Newport Beach, California,
and I try to just basically, um, do my thing.
But it's kind of a beautiful thing because as a physician,
(01:58):
I've realized that I can help so many people with
their health through this plant based eating. So I have
integrated my nutrition and lifestyle into this practice of gastro
entrology and um. So it's kind of an exciting thing
I've going on here and I'm really happy to share
(02:18):
my knowledge, um with the listeners today. Thank you. Okay, so,
why don't you just first explain what is gastro and
trology and that's all gut health. But how do you
explain it? Yeah? So, the g I track is starts
from the mouth and ends with the anus, So mouth
(02:39):
to anus. We have several digestive organs, including the liver
and the pancreas. So the mouth, the esophagus, the stomach,
the small bell, the pancreas, the liver and the colon
and all of that is basically the gastro intestinal system.
I can't wait to get to the plant based stuff.
Of course, I'm dying to talk to you about that,
(03:00):
but I'm curious about what it was like doing your
job prior to understanding plant based nutrition. You know, the
patients that came in, what were you dealing with, and
then how did you treat them? And then crossing over
to how it's so different now. Yes, So I became
a vegan seven years ago, and before that I was
(03:22):
a board certified gastro intrologist and internist. But I didn't
really realize how much literature is out there in regards
to the importance of gut health and in regards to
disease prevention in an association with nutrition, I had no idea.
I mean, people ask me, like, did you go vegan
because you studied medicine and you learned all this nutrition
(03:45):
in school and and figure out how important it is
I was I They're always shocked to hear my answer. No,
I'm an ethical vegan. And what happened is when I
chose to become a vegan because of the almost I
looked into the literature and realized that the health benefits
are there, it's just not emphasized upon. So I realized
(04:09):
how hopefully powerful I can be in the clinic setting
if I could prevent disease and focus on disease prevention.
We all need to at some point seek Western medicine,
and it does miraculous things. You know, if you have
something wrong, you go to the hospital. If you have
a cancer, we can cut it out, you can get chemo.
(04:31):
If you have a g I bleeding, we can go
in there and caulgorize the bleed and clip it and
stuff the bleeding. But the focus should be prevention, right,
So we help our patients in the clinic setting before
they get hospitalized, before they have the need of having
all these procedures and surgeries done. So it all started clicking,
(04:54):
and I realized how important lifestyle is in prevention and
in particular nutrition. When I go to the hospital to around,
I realized that nine out of ten diseases I am
dealing with could have been prevented with lifestyle. If patients
would eat a plant based diet, if patients stopped smoking
(05:17):
and drinking excessive amounts of alcohol just right there, and
maybe working out three times a week, just right there.
You could eliminate of diseases I see in the hospital.
Thank you. I imagine I'm so excited imagining you in
your office with your ten or fifteen patients a day,
and if they come in and say, this is what's happening,
(05:39):
and and then you start, Let's say seven years ago,
you maybe wouldn't have talked to them about the prevention, right,
you would just go straight to treatment. And so now
I'm imagining you sitting there going, Okay, here's what we
can do before we do this, this, and this, you
have a chance to fix this. We can change your diet,
you can start exercising, you can stop doing this and that,
(06:00):
and if you're with me, we can stop you from
having this surgery or this medication. Right. And then the
question is how many of them do they how many
of them listen to you? I would say the majority
of patients make changes. I don't think that. For example,
if I'm seeing a hundred patients, I would rather see
(06:21):
ninety of them make changes than ten of them go
a nd percent pot based. Yes, when I first started,
I was very gun cole about like turning every single
one of my patients vegan. I've realized it's just a
little bit too unrealistic and people have to get there
on their own terms. I am now a little bit
softer with the softer approach, and I try to just
(06:43):
explain the science and give them time and it will come.
It's just you just have to plant the seeds. Yes,
I love everything you just said and planting the seeds.
So have you had the variance I'm sure you have
of patients coming in and being so vulnerable with where
(07:06):
they are and their health and really looking to you,
and then you get them on the plant based diet
or there or whatever, and they see changes and then
they're healed and you get to have that amazing experience. Yes,
so over sixty of the population is lactose intolerant. So
(07:27):
one of the things I see is when people come
in with severe diarrhea, uncomfortable bloating in yes, and altered
bell habits um kind of like IBS symptoms. One of
the most miraculous things that happens in a g I
clinic is when they come in and you ask them
to stop consuming dairy and they come back and they
(07:47):
think you're a genius and that there's such a good talctor.
It's sad that they had never heard it from anyone else,
but they're like, I feel so much better, Thank you
so much. I mean, that's literally what I do, at
least it first visit people with gas bloating of donald
paint diarrhea. I test for two things. Lactose intolerance, which
basically it's the easiest way to do it as absence.
(08:10):
Go for one month without consuming any dairy products, and
I say, read the labels because dairy is obviously a
subsidized food and it's a cheap filler. I asked them
to meticulously read labels and avoid the dairy for a
whole month. And they come back and I check for
Celiac disease because that's one of the other reasons people
(08:31):
get voaded. So they come back and you know, um,
they're like, Wow, I stopped eating dairy and I'm feeling
so much better. This is fantastic. But yeah, I mean
it's pretty cool. A lot of people are vulnerable because
they're suffering, they're having g I problems, they're having discomfort
and irritable bowel syndrome, gastro softage of reflux, and so
(08:55):
people are vulnerable and um they're willing to listen. People
do get fooled into eating more meat if they're having
diarrhea because they think they assume that fiber causes diarrhea,
but it's actually not true. Fiber bulks SysTools, the most
natural product you could consume too. If you're actually having diarrhea,
(09:15):
it bulks your stool, and if you're having constipation, it
helps alleviate the hard stools. So here we are having
a poop conversation, right lovely. Anyhow, it's very important to
improve your diet when you're having these types of problems
by eating more plants and getting that fiber in your diet.
(09:38):
They do incorporate more plants in their diet. And sometimes
I get my dieticians to help, because whereas I'm good
at saying eat more plants, I'm not good at giving
them a script of here's what you need to eat.
I get my dieticians involved and we make changes. We
help them incorporate more more plants. And another really awesome
(09:59):
thing I want to talk about is it's not just
helping the GI tract, is it. I mean, if you
asked some of my cardiology friends, they would tell you that, actually,
there is so much research out there, more than gas
or intestinal research. There is so much cardiovascular research out there,
and how Mediterranean diets plant based diets can prevent heart disease.
(10:22):
So I feel like, secretly I could be a cardiologist
because I'm kidding, but I'm helping them with their GI track.
But they're also preventing cancers everywhere else heart disease, which
is the number one killer in the US. So anyway,
it's just all around good. I think it's also really
(10:56):
interesting and brave that you put plant based on your door.
You I didn't realize that you were advertising it as
what's what's the practice called Institute of Based Medicine. Yeah,
so I was thinking you were sort of getting somebody
in there saying, oh, I have these problems, and then
but now they already know when they walk in what
they're getting. So oh, yes, it's all over my website.
It's all over everything because and people are very curious.
(11:20):
I mean, I have about fifty of my patients or
my patients before I changed their name. It used to
be Anti City m Dink and now it's it's a
famous mediciance, a lot of them new. But the new
patients come to me and they asked me what does
this name mean? And and explain to me. And then
I'm like, I'm glad you asked because we used to
talk about nutrition. But that's so wonderful that they're willing
(11:42):
to come. They must, you must be referred to people
or somehow they're arriving at your door. And to not
be turned away because of that is a really really
beautiful thing. It is so funny thing. A couple of
people thought, we, uh, sell marijuana, but it's it's really
(12:03):
cool that, uh, the words plant based need to be
incorporated into everyday life and people have to know what
that is. And so I was, yes, a little brave
because I had to make a decision um to name
it that and hopefully not deter people. But then I
was like, but who's there for people who want to
(12:23):
go plant based? And they want to plant based, Let's
say about fifty of people who are like looking online,
it actually attracts them because they're like, oh, she is
incorporating nutrition. And so you know, a lot of times,
in order to be innovative in your field, in order
to revolutionize your field. You have to take a little
(12:44):
risk and you have to be brave, right, And I
have my idols. I watched them and how they run
their practices and businesses, and they had original ideas and
they weren't afraid of it. And that's how I see it.
Um It might turn off a few people, but no
business can be all to everyone. And I realized that,
(13:06):
and I just want to touch the lives of people
who are interested. And that's a fantastic opportunity and I'll
take it. That's beautiful. I wanted to just mention you
had said earlier something about this, and it's always boggled
my mind. And I think many people have no idea
that most doctors have no nutrition experience at all, that
(13:30):
there's a two week optional course in medical school for nutrition,
and I don't think people understand how insane that is.
That what you do with your forks three times a
day is the most powerful thing you're going to do
to your body. There's nothing more intrusive. You're giving your
body fuel or you're giving it, you know, toxins, And
(13:54):
for doctors to not have that in their repertoire, to
not understand the body holistically and look at a body
and say what caused this? Oh, it's food you eat
every day? Got it? If they don't understand that, which
they don't, and they're just looking at you going, oh,
you have cancer. Great, you can try this medication, we
can do this operation, we can do this thing. You know,
(14:16):
not for cancer, but for all of the things. They're
not looking at the body in a holistic way to
say what is causing this. They're just looking at how
do I stop those symptoms? And stopping those symptoms just
leads to other symptoms and other symptoms and other symptoms.
So true, and so I just wanted you to speak
to that because you're one of the rare. I mean,
luckily they're they're being born everywhere. They're more and more
(14:37):
people are waking up to this, But I don't think
most people understand that. For reals, your doctor doesn't. You
know more about food probably than your doctor unless it's you. Yeah,
it's so funny because even that very limited nutrition that
they offer in medical school. I skipped every class because
I was like, oh my god, like, why do I
have to know this? Like I didn't, I skipt every class.
(15:00):
I was like, this is so silly, I'm gonna be
a doctor. I don't care about this, and I like
literally was like, it's like, teach me more pharmacology and
microbiology and anatomy and this garbage. Oh my god, it's
so weird. Don't ever say anything like that because it
comes back at you and like it's like an avalanche.
(15:22):
It's like, oh my god, the one class that I
should have paid the most attention in. And it's like,
the funny thing is that I am now more interested
in all of that than the other stuff. You know,
you start being diagnosed, and by the way, you can
cruise through your forties and not have problems. But let
me tell you, as a doctor, if you're not watching
(15:43):
what you're doing when you're fifty five, things are going
to break down. I don't care who you are. If
you're not watching your diets, if you're not exercising, if
you're drinking too heavily, if you're smoking, bad things are
going to happen. And and people tell you, well, my
great grandfather lived to be ninety and he smoked. Yes,
(16:04):
there are outliers, but don't live by that because it's like,
statistically speaking, you're gonna be in trouble, and like you said,
you know your you hit your fifties and sixties. It
starts with chess pain and like coronary disease, and then
suddenly you're something called clodication. You're walking and you're not
getting good cirticulation Eric Telda's function, can't breathe. Then suddenly
(16:27):
your legs swell up and bad things keep happening, and
then you go to the cardiologist and you're taking the
aspirin and the blood thinners, etcetera, etcetera, and then you
start having a GI bleed. Of course, right then we
fix the g I bleed and we put you on
some other medicine because they gave you. Right. Yeah, it
happens all the time. And I'm not suggesting that you
(16:50):
don't listen and not take the medications because you could die,
but I'm just saying that it leads to other problems,
and then then you take other stuff, and then one
day you wake up and you're on fifteen medicines, and
the side effects of medicines can be bad too. I'm
not dissing medical care, not not saying it's bad to
take medications, but I'm just saying if you're not taking
(17:11):
care of yourself, then you will have to. And then
it becomes a continuous thing, and it builds up, things
get layered and more complicated, and you develop more and
more diseases and more and more side effects. So I
am hoping that people who are watching and listening know
that what they do on a daily basis, as far
(17:33):
as lifestyle, can prevent some of the complications in in
the old age not old, I mean, sixty five is
not old. And and a lot of people tell me, well,
I would rather live my life than have to like
eat healthier all the time, and you know, I just
want to live my life well. And I always tell them, listen,
just I wish that I could take you to the
hospital with me one day and so you could round
(17:55):
with me to see that these people are not living
their life. Their living ten many years of misery in
and out of the hospital, getting dialysis, getting their hearts
stented on the surgery table, all the time, getting scoped
and this and that, and it's just not living, it's
surviving and it's no fun. All I'm saying is you
(18:17):
could prevent so many of these diseases by just putting
more plants on your table. That's it. Yes, it's really
really simple. It's hard for people to imagine, I think,
but when you've experienced it, it's it's so simple and
it's so miraculous. Um there's a quote just to sum
(18:38):
up what you said really beautifully, but you kind of
just said it. But you said, I want to leave
a legacy of a doctor who prevented disease in her
patients using the mastery of combining integrative medicine, Western and
Eastern medicine, rather than simply using pharmaceuticals. So you've said
that beautifully. Thank you. You've also said what you kind
(18:59):
of already said again, but you said it beautifully. Almost
every single disease I diagnose and treat in the clinic
has something to do with diet. You were given certain genetics.
I love this, But genetics load the gun and nutrition
pulls the trigger. There's not even one single disease I
can think of as far as the gastro intestinal tract
is concerned, that doesn't have something to do with nutrition.
(19:20):
I think that is so important, and I think I
um Dr Selstein had I think he's the one who
first said that genetics loads the gun and nutrition pulls
the trigger. I really believe in that it's And by
the way, if if you are listening and you have
some kind of a disease, don't feel bad or guilty
that you did something wrong. Things can happen, Like there
(19:41):
are a lot of genetic diseases that we have no
control over. But I just want people to know that
it's a very small percentage of disease that's directly related
to genetics environmental causes. And by saying environment mental causes,
just remember nutrition is a huge part of it. Are
the most common cause of chronic diseases like diabetes, like hypertension, hyperlipidemia,
(20:06):
and heart disease and gastro intestinal disorders. And like a
lot of people are like, well, I mean I know
a vegan who had cancer. Well yeah, it's like anyone
at any time could develop a disease. But what you
have to remember is most of the data is showing
that eating a plant based diet can prevent so many diseases,
(20:28):
and there are outlies. I feel so responsible at least
do you ever think about this, Like, like I always
get all my screening tests and I'm always careful because
you know, when you're devout vegan and you promoted God forbid,
something happens. People are like she was vegan. I want
to mention that even if I one day die of
(20:49):
a certain disease, I still want to say that it's
not about me. It's not about this one person. It's
about if you review the science and if you review
the data, eating a pump based diet is essential in
keeping a healthy But I think it's really important what
you're saying. I think that there are many I mean,
if I think about the examples of my life of
(21:11):
people who had leukemia, lupus, cancer, heart problems, someone who
had you know, it was two hundred pounds overweight, the
people that I have encountered on my healing journey who
have changed their lives, that those numbers far outweigh the
one or two people that you hear who happen to
(21:32):
maybe be sort of vegetarian who also died. They do exist.
But but when you see the amount of healing that
occurs through this lifestyle, and and then you just have
to look at the stats. I mean, in the kind
diet the book I wrote, I just pulled all the
Harvard Medical stats and at that time, the current medical
journals where you don't have to look far to see
(21:53):
how much a plant based diet benefits everything from A
to Z. So if you're looking statistically, if we're looking
at data, you're gonna find the one or two that
are not going to benefit, but the massive amounts of
numbers that are benefiting are so extraordinary that you can't
ignore it. I'm trying to think if there's any big
(22:29):
myths that I'm specifically thinking about paleo diet and the
Kato is it the cato diet keto that people love
to say really helps And I mean it definitely helps
with losing weight because you're restricting your calories. But in
terms of being actually a healthy thing, do you have
any brilliant information that you can share for people about
(22:50):
why those are not healing and healthy? Yeah? I mean
Alicia went when the carnivore diet came out, I laughed.
I was like, ha, that's never gonna take I never
heard about that one. When did that happen? Oh? Yeah,
there's this crazy carnibor diet where these people eat like
only meat. And I was like, well, it's obvious that
people will know that they become vitamin deficient and it's
(23:14):
fiber deficient and they will be ill. But sure enough,
it's actually it has taken off. So there are a
lot of fat diets and I think it initially starts
because you're right, it takes off because any diet you
do that restricts calories, you can lose weights. So and
everyone's trying to lose weights, so they try it, and
(23:34):
you know, they can drop a few pounds, but they
don't realize that if they continuating that way, it can
be detrimental. So I see it all the time, people
going keto, people going, you know, cutting out carbs, which
it's fine if you're cutting out refined sugar, but it's
really important to understand that fiber is pretty essential for
(23:55):
your gut health and you shouldn't cut out fiber rich
foods like beans. A lot of people think that they
should cut out beans and fruits, which makes no sense.
But making a blanket statement cut out carbs, which happens
all the time right leads people to thinking that they
should eat fruits. And if you read the literature, actually
(24:17):
people who eat a punt based diet are usually have
a healthier weight, and you can probably lose more weight
if you do a whole food pan based diet rather
than cutting out these awesome foods like fruits and vegetables. So,
to be honest with you, it's just very difficult to
teach people not to fall for these fat diets because
(24:39):
they read a book or they follow someone they admire
on Instagram, right, and suddenly you have to undo or
help them unlearned what they've learned. So fiber is pretty
essential for the gut. Right. So in the old days,
I remember when the Atkins diet came out. I've tried
(25:00):
it when I was a teenager, and I was so unhealthy, Alicia,
I was so I dropped a few pounds for my wedding,
but I got dark circles under my eyes. I started
getting back pains, and I think I had kidney problems
from the protein load I was I was eating. I
was eating like crazy stuff, like really fattening stuff. And
you know, I was probably consuming a ton of saturated fats, right,
(25:23):
and saturated fat increases your cholesterol and causes heart disease.
I remember I was listening to somebody talk about nutrition
and they were pro ketope and they said that carps
are completely unnecessary. I mean, can you imagine someone saying
that in a nutrition class that you know, you don't
even need carps to survive. As long as you eat
(25:43):
protein and fats, you should be fine. There's a study
that came out that showed that if you don't eat
fiber and you don't need enough fiber, then the gut
gets eroded and you're actually basically killing the gut mucosa
and you're exposing yourself to disease and your gut can
(26:04):
become damaged. So populational studies came out about the GOT
microbiome and how people who eat a majority plant based
diet have a healthier GOT microbiome. And now we know
the importance I've got microbiome, and there's so much to
be learned about this still, but you know how important
it is to eat fiber and feed these little guys
(26:25):
the microbiome fiber because that's what they thrive off of.
So more and more studies are coming out, and so
it's point to seeing us to the direction of eating
more plant based. I wanted to talk a little bit
about how the gut is related to the mind, because
if I eat sugar and then I stop eating sugar
(26:46):
the next few days, I feel really agitated, and and
I wish I wasn't so sensitive, but it's because I'm clean,
so my body reacts really intensely to these things. After
going vegan, and then later I did do a big
cleanse and changed my whole being. I mean, it was
like a whole another layer of cleaning out because now
I was just my heart was so open, my mind
(27:09):
was so clear, and there was a there was a
real balanced nature to my emotions. Everything was just balanced.
And I do believe that the food that you eat,
when you sit down to eat your plate of food,
it can mess with your mood or it can make
you feel really grounded, clear minded, happy. Your food can
(27:31):
make you happy. Chewing your brown rice can make you happy.
And I don't think people understand the connection between what
you eat and how it truly affects you're because your
gut affects your brains. So can you speak about that
a little bit? Yeah, So, as in regards to the
brain gut connection, it turns out that the brain and
(27:51):
the spinal cord have the most nerves. The most nervous
system lives in the brain and the spinal cord, and
the gut is the second most innervated organ So there
are a lot of nerves and neurotransmitters that connect the brain,
which sends a signal through these nerves and wires through
the spinal cord into the gut, and there's connection going back.
(28:15):
It's like imagine train tracks that come from the brain
into the gut and trains that go back to the gut, right,
So it's all through molecules and neurotransmitters. And neurotransmitters are
the signaling little molecules that take the signal from the
gut into these nerves that take the signal back into
the nerve nervous system into your spinal cord and the brain.
(28:37):
So there's a huge connection, right. So it's no wonder
that a lot of patients with irritable bowel syndrome have
a history of depression and anxiety. I think about six
of patients with IBS have some kind of depression and anxiety.
And it's very important to know that these very important
feel good ner transmitters, the majority of them are actually
(29:01):
made in the guts. So, for example, of the serotonin,
which is a very important ner transmitter, is made by
the gut cells. So the environment of the actual gut
where signals are being sent back to the brain is
very important. If you're keeping a healthy environment in your
(29:21):
gut and promoting the production of feel good um molecules,
then it's going to end up generally giving you a
good feeling. And if you are nurturing your gut, eating
the right foods that heals the gut, that helps the
production of these feel good ner transmitters, you could very
well improve your mental health. And so I always always
(29:46):
teach my patients this brain gut connection and the importance
of eating healthy. And we need more studies to to
study this, and it's not very easy to study, believe
it or not. But I can tell you lifestyle may
it's a huge difference just by if you're drinking too much,
if you stop drinking, which kills off the GOT microbiome,
if you stop smoking, and if you eat plant based
(30:09):
it's a tremendous I mean, it's just that tremendously changes
your mood. And I have to say, I think it's
all because of the connections that we have in our
gut with our brain through these neural transmitters that take
the signal into the brain and back. Well, thank you,
Dr Angie for explaining that Sarah Tonin is made in
(30:30):
the gut. I'm sure that that explains a lot for
a lot of people. Thank you, Thank you so much,
dr Angie for this. I'm so happy speaking with you.
I'm so excited about everything you said, and um ever
so grateful for what you're doing in the world and
(30:51):
the love that you're spreading and the healing that you're spreading.
So thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, and
I appreciate the opportunity to dig deeper into this episodes
topic and resources. Visit the kind life dot com. The
Real Hell is an I Heart Radio production made in
(31:14):
partnership with Frequency Media. I'm your host, Alicia Silverstone from
I Heart Radio. Are Managing producer is Lindsay Hoffman from
Frequency Media. Michelle Corey is our executive producer, Jordan Rizzieri
is our producer, and Moani Leonard and Laura Boyman are
our associate producers. Sydney Evans is our dialogue editor, and
(31:37):
Claire bit Of Gary Curtis is our mixer and sound designer.
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