Sharing Recent PCOS Research Updates & Celebrating a Milestone!

Text with your questions & comments for future episodes!

We've hit a milestone of 50,000 downloads, and we're thrilled to celebrate this achievement with you! We've been on an incredible journey together, and as a token of our gratitude for your support, we're diving straight into the heart of the latest PCOS research to talk about major changes and studies that have happened in the last couple of years . Fear not, we've made the science palatable, ensuring you're well-equipped with the knowledge to manage PCOS effectively.

Mentioned in the Episode:

To see more on the upcoming PCOS Essentials Academy Group, click here: https://hannah-s-school-09e9.thinkific.com/courses/pcos-essentials-academy

My favorite matcha https://aprikamatcha.com/?ref=wr8dlu4hup

NAC https://s.thorne.com/NRI4c

COQ10 https://s.thorne.com/eFAEK

Fish Oil https://s.thorne.com/MwXez

Inositol https://s.thorne.com/esr0F

Resveratrol https://s.thorne.com/S4z5L

For those interested, below are the PMID numbers for today's episode

The GUT

• PMID: 37208218
• PMID: 37559119

IBS risk

• PMID: 37494961

Cinnamon

• PMID: 35365881

Green Tea

• PMID: 35504067

Antioxidants

• PMID: 36437750

CoQ10

• PMID: 35941510

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View updated links:
We are celebrating the factthat the podcast has now maybe

(00:27):
not at this exact moment thatI'm recording, but probably by
the time this podcast comes outhas officially hit 50,000
downloads over the course of itslife, and that's very exciting
milestone.
A lot of podcasts don't make itpast the first.
I think the statistic is likethe first five or six episodes
or something like that.
It's just very exciting for meto see things come to fruition,

(00:51):
something that I put a lot ofeffort into and I hope has
provided a lot of value.
One of my favorite things iswhen I meet a new client or
somebody DMs me or something andthey tell me that they are a
podcast listener and that theylove my podcast.
I'm like, wow, you know aboutmy podcast.
It's so amazing to me I knowI've said this many times before

(01:12):
, but it's so crazy to me thatyou might be in your car or
you're cleaning or something andyou're listening to me talking
right now, because I'm just upin here in my little office by
myself wearing my comfy shirt,because it's Labor Day right now
when I'm recording this andjust talking to myself

(01:33):
essentially.
But I do always have this kindof person in my mind that I'm
hoping is listening and gettingvalue out of the things that I'm
saying.
So if you're here, if you'vebeen here for a while especially
, thank you, I appreciate you.
I thought what can I do tocelebrate this milestone and
usually big milestones of thepodcast?

(01:54):
I like to kind of take a lookbackwards and just sort of
reassess, because a lot haschanged for me in my personal
life, in my professional life,just as a person.
I've grown up and changed quitea bit, and the last when was
2018?
Was that five years ago?
I should probably do the math,but it's been a while and so a

(02:18):
lot has changed for me.
I became a mom.
During that time, I took mywork totally virtual and now I
do group programs and socialmedia and it's completely
different.
So I like to do little episodesevery once in a while where I
kind of get wax nostalgic andthink about what's changed and

(02:40):
what's different and rather thanwaste everyone's time by
getting too sentimental here,what I thought I would do
actually is I just got the ideato kind of go search on PubMed.
Pubmed is the NationalInstitute of Health Research
website where you can pull upabstracts and things of

(03:00):
different research studies.
Anyway, dorky people like mespend a lot of time on there but
it's kind of like the premierplace for do your own research
and getting good qualityresearch rather than just
Googling something.
So I got the idea that perhapsI should go and search PubMed

(03:21):
from the last few years, sinceI've done a real deep dive, and
see if there's anything newthat's come about that might be
interesting to share with youall.
Because one of the things thatalways amazes me is just how
much PCOS the understanding ofPCOS and the nature that it has,

(03:43):
or the relationship that it hasto our nutrition and lifestyle
just how much that has changedeven since I got my master's
degree or since I startedpracticing nutrition or since I
was first diagnosed.
So much has changed.
It hasn't been that long of atime, right, it's been you know
what 15 years, something likethat.

(04:04):
So the fact that the researchand nutrition landscape for PCOS
looks so different now than itdid even maybe six or seven
years ago is always so amazingto me.
And you know it's hard whenyou're being a practitioner and

(04:24):
you're working day to day andyou're you know you're helping
people it's not always easy tokind of stay up to date with all
that.
So I thought, well, that mightbe fun.
I'll go look back and see ifthere's anything you know new
that's dropped that I haven'tseen, or any more further
conclusions on different thingsthat I've kind of been following
for a while, and update youguys.
So I'm going to try to make thisreally, in layman's terms, easy

(04:48):
to understand.
You know I'm not going to liketry to go over your head too
much with scientific jargon,because if you've ever tried to
read research studies you knowit can get a little bit intense.
I'm going to try to keep itsimple to understand and I'm
just going to skim through someof this stuff just so you can
kind of see.
But if you want the links tothe actual abstracts and then

(05:12):
from there some of them are free, full text, like you can just
literally go read the wholestudy, so we have to pay for.
Anyway, if you want the linksto those.
You can find them in thedescription box.
I'll put a list of them andkind of look what the topic was
that was covered.
So we're going to get into that, and we're going to do that
today, and so I hope that soundsfun to you If it does stick

(05:34):
around.
Before we get into that, though,just a couple of housekeeping
announcements.
It is you were listening tothis on Tuesday, september 5th
2023.
And that means that officially,enrollment is now open for the
PCOS Essentials Academy GroupProgram.
So this is a four week groupprogram that I am running with

(05:57):
Hannah Mule, who runs theconscious nutritionist accounts
on Instagram, tiktok.
She's also a PA, physiciansAssistant.
She is a dietitian.
She is a PCOS nutrition expertlike myself.
When her and I love to rungroup programs together, we have

(06:18):
very complimentary strengthsand we've run.
This will be the fourth groupprogram that we've run together,
and so what it's going to be isfour weeks where we meet live.
Now I know, because I get thisquestion a lot people are like,
well, I would like to join it,but I don't think I can come to
the live meetings, and that'stotally fine.
Every group program we've everrun, we've had people from other

(06:40):
countries.
You know people outside the USor whatever who couldn't be on
the recording at the recordingtime because it was the middle
of the night for them or theyhad to work at night or whatever
, and so we do record everymeeting and we post them the
next day.
So if you're enrolled in theprogram, you can do that, you
can watch the recordings andyou'll still have access to like
the group chat and you knowyou'll be able to get your

(07:04):
questions answered by Hannah andI.
The way it kind of works is thatwe divide up the four weeks
into four lectures.
They're about an hour long,usually go a little longer
because we do question andanswer sessions.
We try to keep the groupsfairly small.
Usually we have anywhere from10 to maximum 20 people that
we've had in the past.

(07:25):
So we try to keep things on thesmaller sides, that you can get
more individual attention andeither Hannah or myself will do
a lecture on DCS topics that are, you know, important and will
guide you through it the waythat we would if you were a
one-on-one client.
You know it's coaching just ina group setting, right.
So we will teach you all of thespecific information that you

(07:47):
need to know and from there youwill have the opportunity to
integrate that material with usto help.
So, whereas a self-paced courselike my course is PCOS
foundations or functional PCOSor something like that, you're
doing all that work on your ownwithout access to really anybody
to you know, bump things off ofor ask questions for you know

(08:13):
if you get confused or whatever,you're kind of on your own.
This is a situation where whatyou're paying for for the most
part is not just the informationbut that access.
So you know you get access tofor one, a two, for one special
me and Hannah and we're bothexperts in PCOS nutrition and we
both bring differentperspectives, but her and I also

(08:34):
are on the same pagenutritionally about the very
vast majority of things when itcomes to PCOS.
So it's a lot of fun.
We always get really positivefeedback from the women who have
been part of the groups beforeand we stay close and you know I
love to hear how they're doing.
We've had pregnancies come outof the groups, we've had people

(08:56):
regulate their cycles, we've hadpeople clear their acne.
Everybody pretty much leavesthe group at least feeling a lot
more energetic and just a lotmore balanced, and so it's a
great.
It's going to be a great program, since it's four weeks.
We are going to be jamming alot of important information,

(09:20):
but we're going to make surethat you guys have everything
that you need so that you knowwhat to do.
It comes with meal plans,grocery lists, recipes for every
day of the program and alongwith, like, a lot of different
resources and documents and justdifferent things to kind of
help you integrate.
You'll have access toeverything for a full year.
So even if you can't attendlive, you got access to it.
Okay, enough of my little spiel,but if you are interested in

(09:42):
joining us, enrollment is goingto close on September 15th, so
you don't have a terribly longtime to decide, and if we fill
up, we will close registration,and we've had to do that before.
So definitely get on it Ifyou're interested.
It is a little bit more budgetfriendly than some previous
groups we've run, just becauseit's a bit shorter.
So anyway, if you've beenwaiting for that, here's your

(10:05):
chance.
The link to the page with allthe information is in the
description box of this episode,so check it out.
I would really love to see you.
I love meeting everybody in thegroup.
So I think it's a lot of fun.
Okay, let's get into today'sepisode, shall we?
Let's go.
So I'm going to pull up mylittle Google Doc that I have
here where I went through thesedifferent research studies and

(10:27):
kind of divide them up by topic.
Just because a research studyexists does not mean that it's
well-designed or that theconclusions are accurate.
And this is one reason why justbecause you see one study come
out doesn't mean that everybodychanges their opinion.
Good example of this is theduck out eggs.

(10:48):
Right Over the last like 30years, nutrition science has
flip-flopped on eggs.
Are they good for you?
Are they bad for you?
Are they going to raise yourcholesterol?
Are they not going to raiseyour cholesterol?
Like, what's the deal?
And this is because, with eachresearch study, research usually
starts in animals, then itmoves into human studies,
smaller human studies, then itmoves into larger human studies.

(11:09):
One good sort of way to look forresearch is to start by looking
for what are calledmeta-analyses.
Meta-analyses are when peoplelook at the wider body of
evidence of various researchstudies on a particular topic
and then they analyze all ofthat and put that into a

(11:30):
research study.
So it's kind of like condensingdown.
The condensing down and weedingthrough the evidence of
multiple research studies.
Meta-analysis is one of thebetter things to look at when it
comes to just looking forresearch evidence of something.
Anyway, meta-analysis is a goodplace to start when you're

(11:52):
searching for a large body ofevidence condensed into a pretty
package for you to sort of read.
That's what I pulled today.
I went and I put meta-analysisfrom the last couple of years.
I went back into 2021.
I was going to go all the wayback to 2018 when the podcast

(12:13):
started, just for kicks, butthere was too much.
I got tired after going to 2020and I'm like okay, I know the
research up until that point,let's just go 2021 to today.
Specifically, I picked outstudies that related to
nutrition in some way.
Of course, there are tons ofstudies that have come out on
the role of metformin, forexample positive stuff with

(12:36):
metformin or metformin andspironolactone together versus
just metformin alone, thingslike that.
There are studies on birthcontrol.
There are studies on I saw someinteresting studies on IVF
miscarriage rates, someinteresting studies on cancer
risk.
Surprisingly, almost themajority of the studies were
about nutrition in some way,that they were about a certain

(12:57):
supplement or they were about acertain element that related to
nutrition.
We pulled some studies on thegut.
We pulled some studies onweight loss.
A lot of the weight loss onesin the next category, which is
nutrients, in general overlap.
Most PCOS studies are going toaccount for weight in some way.

(13:17):
Then I have a whole category onnutrients, which is mostly just
different components of plantsor supplements themselves.
Then we pulled some lifestylestudies.
There's a study on exercise,study on sleep, that kind of
stuff.

(13:38):
I just did a little sampling ofwhat I thought was the most
interesting.
Definitely not all of it, buthopefully you will find some of
this interesting.
A lot of this is reallyfascinating for me just to watch
the change in what's being said, because when you read an
abstract from year to year, youcan watch the change in the

(14:02):
scientific communities viewabout different things over time
.
If you look back 10, 15 yearsstudies on the gut and PCOS,
it's going to be very like amixed bag controversial, not
enough evidence whatever.
Now we're finally starting toget some meta-analysis that are
really confirming a lot of thethings that nutrition

(14:24):
professionals have been sayingabout PCOS for a long time,
which is that inflammation andgut health are intricately
connected, the catch-22.
Cool thing, but also bad thingabout that, is that nutrition is
something that plays anintegral role in our gut health.

(14:45):
That's good if you're wantingto change your nutrition and
you're working on it.
It's not great if you want topretend that nutrition plays no
role.
But I just find it veryinteresting how these studies
were actually related to diet,exercise, nutrition in some way,
because when I was diagnosedwith PCOS, the consensus at

(15:07):
large was that it played no roleat all.
It was almost seen as hokie orpseudoscience to suggest that
changing your diet could doanything for your PCOS.
But now we know, of course,that PCOS is primarily
lifestyle-based, at least if youwant to modify it.

(15:28):
Of course there's a geneticcomponent.
There's questions to beanswered about.
Why do some people develop PCOSversus others, even if they eat
the same diet?
Well, because there's thegenetic component here.
But when it comes to managingsymptoms and reducing symptoms,
it plays a huge role, to thepoint where most of these
studies are about differentthings that can be done with a
diet or different supplementsthat can be taken, and

(15:49):
supplements are usually justdifferent herbs or they're
different foods concentratedinto little pills.
So let's get it, shall we?
I think I've been ramblingabout this long enough.
So a couple of the studies onthe gut were interesting.
So the first one was looking atmicrobial diversity.

(16:11):
So what does that mean?
In our digestive tract,specifically our colon, is a
community of bacteria and otherorganisms, not just bacteria.
There's also fungi in there anddifferent stuff, but bacteria
make up the majority of it.
And these bacteria are alldifferent types, species

(16:33):
whatever, and they kind of existin a harmony or a balance with
each other.
And depending on your diet,your life, even things outside
of your diet like stress, trauma, exercise, all those kinds of
things they can all manipulatethe balance of those gut
bacteria.
And the importance of that isthat those gut bacteria play a

(16:56):
very large role in your immunesystem, your immune health.
About 80% of your immune cellssort of reside there, in that
bacterial environment, and so ifthe bacterial balance is off or
the diversity is decreased,meaning you don't have as many
bacteria in there, then thoseall spell out sort of negative

(17:22):
for the rest of your overallhealth, including and especially
your inflammation levels,because your gut and your immune
system play a big role in thatsort of creation of inflammation
.
We know that in PCOS we tend tohave low grade inflammation
going on.
So this meta-analysis foundthat over 14 studies

(17:45):
demonstrated that those withPCOS possess significantly lower
microbial diversity comparedwith control.
So that means, compared topeople who don't have PCOS
healthy adults who don't havePCOS those with PCOS tend to
have a lot less diversity, so alot less bacteria, which means
that their guts are not asresilient, their immune systems
may not be as resilient, andthat could feed into more

(18:08):
inflammation.
Of course I'm making jumps here, but that's where I usually
take any kind of gut study IfI'm trying to figure out how can
I implement this kind ofinformation into the change that
would occur in a person's body.
It's what can I do withnutrition to increase the
diversity?

(18:28):
So what we know about that isthat bacteria the good kind of
bacteria especially love fiberand they love different plant
nutrients, like they love thingslike polyphenols, which are
plant components.
They love all kinds of stufflike that.
So basically, we feed it morefiber, we feed it more veggies

(18:49):
and fruits and fresh plant-basedfoods, and that's how you
increase your diversity.
So it's really actually simpleat the end of the day.
A little harder to implement Oneof the studies that I found.
I don't think I included it inthis, but one of the studies
that I found was a study of thediet to those with PCOS.
It was based on a diet recall,which has its weaknesses, but

(19:09):
compared with those who didn'thave PCOS, what they did find
was that those with PCOS tend tohave, overall, significantly
lower levels of fiber in theirdiet.
They just weren't choosingfiber-rich foods.
And one of my frustrations withnutrition science in general
and kind of like the wholeoverwhelming viewpoint of those
with PCOS, is that we tend to besort of looked at as like we're

(19:32):
the problem.
It's because we're not eatingright that we are having these
problems, and the reality is alot more gray than that.
It's complicated because Ican't say 100% that we're not,
on average, playing a role inthis because we are.
I mean, the studies sort ofdemonstrate that again and again

(19:53):
that those with PCOS tend tochoose diets that are not as
beneficial for their PCOSsymptoms.
On the other hand, what is thereasoning for that?
I think a lot of that has to dowith the drivers, these
hormonal drivers, that sort oftrigger more starch cravings,
insulin resistance, triggeringmore sugar cravings, those kinds
of things that it pushes otherthings out of the diet.

(20:15):
There could be a lot of reasonsfor it, but to say that it's
all just your fault, the waythat you're eating, is an
oversimplification.
But to say that the way thatyou're, to say that, on average,
those with PCOS are eatingsuper, super healthy, done and
to suggest that they're not isblame or whatever, both of

(20:36):
things are not true and both ofthese things are true.
There is an element ofresponsibility here in,
specifically in fiberconsumption, which we can see in
a lot of studies.
So that's what this one says.
It says lower levels ofdiversity.
Then there was another studythat found dysbiosis in PCOS,

(20:57):
which we already knew, but itwas nice to see a little bit
more.
Dysbiosis would be imbalancedbacteria in the gut, and so what
the study says is that gutdysbiosis in PCOS, which might
be characterized by thereduction of short chain fatty
acid producing and bile acidmetabolizing bacteria, suggests

(21:18):
a shift in the balance to favorpro inflammatory rather than
anti inflammatory bacteria.
Essentially, what that sayingis that, because of the
imbalance of the gut bacteria,the particular way in which they
are imbalanced, which is drivenby a multitude of factors, diet
choices being one, those withPCOS tend to have bacteria that

(21:39):
are more inflammatory, sothey're producing more
inflammation via the gut, whichcould have told you that, but
it's nice to see it on a minuteanalysis though.
So those are the ones that havecome out on the gut in the last
couple of years.
Now one more kind of related tothe gut is about IVS risk.
So any girly with PCOS can tellyou that the majority of us are

(22:03):
dealing with some IVS or someirritable bowel stuff not
everyone, but most of us are andso this analysis indicated that
that is likely the case.
So it revealed an almost twotimes higher risk of IVS in
comparison with controls.
So they looked at.

(22:27):
They said there's a significantassociation between PCOS and
increased odds of IBS.
However, more high quality andwell controlled research is
essential to increase therobustness of our conclusions.
So we've known that there's alink between PCOS and IBS for a
while, and now we've got somestronger data to suggest it, but
it's still not strong enoughfor them to come out and say yes

(22:49):
, absolutely, with PCOS you'reprobably really at risk for IBS.
Nevertheless, interesting tosee, all right.
So then there were a couple ofstudies that were specific about
nutrients and weight loss, andI found these interesting.
There was one cinnamon thatshowed that the results of the
study showed thatsupplementation with cinnamon
significantly reduced BMI andbody weight, and the impacts

(23:12):
were greater in doses of morethan or equal to three grams a
day.
So this one was reallyinteresting because it's like a
ton of really high qualityevidence that cinnamon impacts
much else, but it did definitelyshow an increase in body weight
which long term could improveinsulin resistance.

(23:33):
And since I know that weightloss is such a hard thing for a
lot of us, I just thought thatwas interesting.
So maybe add a little bit morecinnamon to your diet.
The other study was on green tea, which you guys know I'm a
lover.
Matcha is just powdered upgreen tea, by the way, if you
didn't know, so it's a littlebit stronger than just green tea

(23:53):
on its own.
But they found with regular Ithink it was daily consumption
of green tea that they found asignificantly lower body weight.
They found differences in bodyfat percentage, body mass index,
daily caloric intake, waistcircumference, hip circumference

(24:16):
and waist to hip ratio and theyfound that green tea has
potential positive effects forthe reduction of weight.
And they say we reasonablyexpect this to be an option of
adjuvant treatment and PCOSclinical management.
So they are stating that theyexpect that down the line.
It may be common to hear youknow, oh, to have some green tea

(24:39):
every day.
That's great for PCOS.
You know how we talk aboutexperiment tea it's great for
PCOS.
Now they're going to say greentea.
I mean, if you look at likePCOS influencers on Instagram,
this is already happening.
We're already talking aboutmatcha all the time, you know,
and it's not just because mostof us can make a commission off
of selling some matcha, which wecan.
You know, my favorite month isalways linked and I do make a

(25:02):
little commission when peoplebuy it.
But the reason that I got on thematcha train and I got it so
much is because in my personallife, I started drinking matcha,
not for PCOS, but just like ingeneral, because I'm kind of
anxious with caffeine, and so Iwas looking for a little pick me
up that wasn't going to likemake me really anxious, and I

(25:24):
also wanted to get more likeantioxidants.
And I think it was anotherperson who I follow, who she
always.
She did like her matcha latterecipe and I was like, what's a
matcha latte?
Maybe I should try it.
So I started drinking it and Irealized I really liked the
taste of them after I got usedto it.
At first it tasted like grass,but I really started to like it

(25:44):
and I liked the way I felt on it, and so the more that I
incorporated, the more regularit became as part of my
lifestyle.
I have a matcha just about everyday and I've done that for the
last few years and it has reallypositively impacted me in a lot
of different ways my energylevels, my concentration, my
focus.

(26:04):
I think it's helped my skin alot.
So I talk about it so muchbecause it's helped me so much,
and it's helped a lot withdifferent people, sometimes for
me too.
So anyway, I think it's stufflike that is easy to share about
, because I know it worksanecdotally for me and I've seen
it work for a lot of clientsover the years, and so anyway,

(26:25):
it's cool to see some sort ofpreliminary evidence coming out
about green tea specifically forPCOS.
So those studies were basicallyfocused mostly on weight in
PCOS, though Now the rest ofthese studies on nutrients are
more focused on overallparameters of PCOS.
So different symptoms that aregoing on in PCOS, different

(26:46):
blood work markers, and what'scool is that different ones of
these kind of impact differentthings and they don't not every
study tests for every singlemarker, right.
So we don't know, like some ofthese, if they would have
impacted other ones too, butit's just kind of cool to see
the differences.
So this first one here is juston antioxidants.

(27:07):
In general, antioxidants arepresent in most plant based
foods leafy greens, berries, allthose kinds of things.
So they found that supplementswith antioxidants, which would
be I don't actually know thespecific antioxidant supplement
that they used, but there are alot of different antioxidants
out there People use, often inacetylcysteine.

(27:30):
That's one that I recommend alot because it helps produce
glutathione, which is a keyantioxidant vitamin E, I mean.
They're they're right.
But what they found was thatantioxidant supplements
significantly improved insulinresistance, fasting insulin
levels and fasting glucoselevels, so improve the blood
sugar balance in those with PCOS.

(27:53):
But they did not find anyevidence that improved lipid
profiles in PCOS, except fortriglycerides, which I thought
that was interesting becausetriglycerides are the ones that
we're the most worried about,right.
So still kind of a net positivethere.
But they're always looking when,when it comes to specific
nutrients or supplements,they're always kind of looking

(28:14):
for something that maybe theycould potentially, I think, make
into like a like a prescriptionI mean, I don't know that to be
100% the case, but that's sortof like what I'm assuming and so
they're measuring differentmarkers, because this is this.
Does it do enough that it wouldbe worthwhile to kind of like

(28:35):
recommend that people takesomething like this all the time
?
And, yeah, antioxidantssignificantly improving insulin
resistance parameters.
That's important for PCOS.
So, rather than go out and lookfor an antioxidant pill, which
you could exist, the best way toget more antioxidants would be

(28:56):
to increase the diversity ofyour diet.
So we always talk aboutsomething called eating the
rainbow, which means that eachindividual fruit and vegetable
you know how they're alldifferent colors, right?
You get your red bell peppers,you get your leafy greens, you
got what else?
There's all kinds of differentthings and they're all different
colors.
Each of those different colorsactually represents a different
nutrient, a different type ofantioxidant or polyphenol or

(29:19):
other plant component that'sgoing to be beneficial for your
body.
So the best way to get moreantioxidants is just to actually
eat more plant foods so you canget.
I just found that interestingbecause if you increase the
antioxidant content of your diet, you can see a direct
connection between the fact thatit might also improve your

(29:41):
insulin resistance and I justthink that's really cool.
So another one is on CoQ10,which has been around and sort
of the ethos about PCOS for awhile and the conclusion says
that based on the currentevidence, it could be considered
that the addition of CoQ10 is asafe therapy to improve PCOS by
improving insulin resistance,increasing sex hormone levels so

(30:03):
it increased FSH, folliclestimulating hormone, reduced
testosterone and improving bloodlipids, so reduced
triglycerides, ldl and increasedHDL, which is sort of like your
good cholesterol.
So CoQ10, I've been using withclients for a while when it

(30:23):
comes to supplementation.
One of the key things toremember is that just because it
says that it contains CoQ10 onthe bottle doesn't mean that
it's going to be that helpful,simply because supplements are
not super well regulated with.
Well, with a lot of thingsthey're not really well

(30:43):
regulated.
But a big thing that I findpeople doing is they're just
like oh, I should take CoQ10.
Okay, and they go on Amazon andthey're like CoQ10, they just
search and then whatever is likethe cheapest one that comes up,
they're going to buy that.
The potency is important.
So with something like CoQ10, Imean, you can get ranges of

(31:04):
milligram amounts, and thecheaper the supplement generally
, the less potent it is.
So if you could be takingsomething every day and it might
be helping, but if the potencyis not strong enough, is it
really going to do that much foryou?
This is why, when it comes tosupplementation, I'm big on kind

(31:27):
of a you get what you pay forattitude, and I know that that
gets tough with.
Supplements can be veryexpensive, especially good
quality ones.
That's why I recommend all mysupplements through Fullscript,
which is a practitioner,specific sort of supplement
wholesaler, I guess, and theyonly carry certain brands that

(31:51):
like are more what we would calltherapeutic grades, so they're
going to be higher potency,higher quality, they're going to
be third party tested so theydon't have like a bunch of lead
in them and stuff, which is abig problem in supplement
industry.
Anyway, that's another storyfor another time.
Thank you, be careful abouttaking any of this information
and being like okay, I'm gonnago to I don't know HB and buy
like the Nature-Made CoQ10.

(32:12):
It may help, but if you'relooking to really target
something specific in PCOS oryou want to take a supplement
and it actually do something foryou.
I generally think like stickingto one thing that you can pay
more for the higher quality,more potent version of, as long

(32:34):
as it's safe to do so, don't getyourself into trouble.
Taking too much of something isthe better option than being
like I'm gonna take this reallylow quality CoQ10 and this and
this and this and this and thisand that You're gonna get more
bang for your buck by just spend60 bucks on the really good
CoQ10 and, just you know, don'tdo the other stuff or do the

(32:56):
other stuff later or fix yourdiet or whatever it may be.
Another study on curcumin showedthat the ingestion of curcumin
decreased body mass index.
Love.
That for us improved thefasting glucose, the insulin
resistance cholesterol and,interesting enough, c-reactive

(33:17):
protein, which is a marker ofchronic inflammation.
So that was cool.
You know one sort of littlepiece of evidence that curcumin
could be potentially somethinghelpful for inflammation.
We've known this in the sort offunctional nutrition space for
a long time.

(33:38):
A lot of the anti-inflammatorysort of compounded supplements
that you'll see on somethinglike full script if you search
like inflammation are going tohave curcumin in them.
There's a product that I use alot for like if I get like a
headache or something that has alot of curcumin in it and it'll
knock it right out, becauseit's kind of a similar effect to

(33:59):
ibuprofen, right, but just likein a more in what more natural
way.
So anyway, I thought that wasinteresting.
There was also a study onomega-3s which come from fish
consumption, and this one foundthat if you didn't take the fish
oils for more than eight weeksit could improve the insulin

(34:22):
status a bit.
But you would get the mosteffective use of that fish oil
supplement for alleviatingmetabolic issues if you took it
for longer than eight weeks.
And I included this one becausewe've known forever that eating
more fish is like good for you.
Everybody talks about that,right.
But what I thought wasinteresting was their kind of

(34:43):
conclusions here that, based onthe different studies, they
could tell that you know thestudies that were shorter it
started to show maybe a littlebit of improvement, but the
longer that the person took thefish oil, the more improvements
happen.
That makes logical sense, right.
But a lot of nutrition studiesor supplement studies,

(35:03):
unfortunately, are kind ofdesigned in a very short period
of time, and there's a lot ofreasons for that.
People are not super compliantabout taking things and it can
kind of mess up the study andwhatever.
But what I always tell myclients as a practitioner is
like if you're going to do asupplement, give it three months
at least before you give up onit or before you change

(35:24):
something else.
Just because supplements arenot like prescription
medications, they can work.
They can do a lot.
If they couldn't, then therewouldn't be so many warnings,
warning labels about them andstuff.
If they were totally benign andcouldn't do anything for you,
they just flushed right out ofyour body.
There wouldn't be so manyproblems with people, I don't
know, overdoing it on vitamin Dor whatever.

(35:46):
So they do something dependingon the potency again, but you're
not going to get very much outof a supplement if you take it.
It's a week or you forget it oryou're just not taking it.
That often.
You're not sticking with it.
You're taking it, taking onebottle of it and then giving up.
They're just not going to domuch for you unless you're

(36:07):
consistent with them.
It's very similar to eatingyour fruits and veggies.
If you're not consistentlyeating your fruits and veggies
every day, it's obviously betterto have one serving of fruits
and veggies a month than to havenone.
But you're going to get more ofa benefit from that sort of
daily habit and change because alot of supplements are, they're
concentrated components of foodand you got to eat a lot of

(36:29):
food to start noticing changes,anyways.
So that's.
I thought that one wasinteresting to include.
Another one that I thought wasinteresting on folic acid.
I found that folic acidsupplementation so folic acid is
a B vitamin that's in a lot ofprenatals, improved BMI, and in
those with homocysteine levelshigher than 15 and in women with

(36:53):
PCOS.
So the reason I included thisone obviously everybody knows
it's good to take a multivitamin, a prenatal I love a good
prenatal.
But what I thought was kind ofinteresting here was and of
course they didn't specificallysay this but the connection
because those with PCOS do tendto have higher homocysteine
levels.
Homocysteine is kind of aninflammation marker, but it also

(37:16):
can be high in those who havethe MTHFR gene mutation, which
is the gene mutation that makesit difficult for you to
methylate or properly break downB vitamins.
And so if you are struggling tobreak down B vitamins and
you're kind of low in folic acidor whatever, then your
homocysteine levels can gethigher.
Your homocysteine levels canalso get higher if you eat a lot

(37:36):
of fast food and things likethat.
But what we kind of see aconnection between is MTHFR gene
mutations and those with PCOS.
So I just thought it wasinteresting that folic acid
improved the BMI in those whohad high homocysteine levels,
because that's indicative ofpotentially methylating issue

(37:59):
and women with PCOS.
So what I'm getting from thatis like potentially more of a
connection between MTHFR andPCOS, right, like maybe being
more at risk for that, which Idefinitely think is probably
true.
And then also the fact thathaving an issue, a genetic issue
like that, with breaking down Bvitamins, could be something

(38:20):
that might inflame you to thepoint where you might have
difficulty letting go of bodyweight and so just simply taking
a B vitamin supplement, even anon-methylated one although I
think a methylated one would beeven better, so that would be
methylfolate, but that couldpotentially help you drop some
body fat.

(38:40):
There are a lot of things likethat with PCOS where it's kind
of mysterious.
It's like well, why is thisperson holding on to so much fat
?
I mean, they're eating theright amount, they're doing this
, they're exercising, they'redoing that these little subtle
sort of genetic things andhormonal things that can get in
the way, and so I don't know.
I just thought that one wasinteresting to include.
I'm going to do an analysisabout anositol.

(39:01):
You guys already know aboutanositol, but it was kind of
cool to see another study sortof showing that the anositols
like you would get in ovozitolthat's the popular one that
everybody talks about but thereare a lot of different
formulations of anositolproducts that are the same thing
as ovozitol, just differentbrands.

(39:23):
By the way, I will link to onesthat I have links for,
supplements that I have linksfor or ones that I have
recommendations for in thedescription of this episode, if
you want to check them out.
And obviously if you buythrough those links, I'll get a
little commission.
So I appreciate it, but I wouldnot steer you wrong.

(39:44):
I will only put links to onesthat I actually use with
different people or myself, onesthat I would trust.
I don't have a link for everysingle one of these things, but
anyway, what I thought wasinteresting about this was that,
even though we've known for awhile that anositol is something
good for PCOS, it's one of thefew supplements that actually

(40:05):
most people agree on.
What was cool was that it foundthat regular use of anositol
was pretty much just as good asmetformin, if not maybe better,
and definitely better if youcombine the two.
I just thought that was prettyneat, because everybody talks
about supplements like theycan't do anything for you or

(40:25):
they're just throwing you, justthrowing your money down the
toilet.
But no, this is showing betteroutcomes or potentially on par
outcomes with even aprescription medication.
So yeah, love that for us.
There was another study on NAC,which, if you guys have listened
to podcasts of mine before,you'll know, is one of my
favorite supplements for PCOS.
I recommend it a lot.

(40:46):
Nac is short forinacetylcysteine and it is a
precursor to glutathione, whichis your body's sort of master
antioxidant.
The reason that I usuallyrecommend taking NAC rather than
just glutathione is thatglutathione on its own is not
real well absorbed, so you don'tget as much out of it, whereas
NAC is going to convert toglutathione in the body and you

(41:09):
tend to get better conversionresults that way, so you get
more benefit.
This is this specifically theywere looking at some hormone
levels in PCOS, so a lot ofthese other ones were looking at
metabolic parameters likeinsulin, glucose, weight, you
know that kind of thing.
But this one was lookingspecifically at hormones.
So it found that NACsignificantly reduced total

(41:31):
testosterone levels, increasedfollicle stimulating hormone
levels which we like andestrogen levels.
Now, if you're estrogendominant, don't get freaked out
about that, because estrogen isa complicated subject.
So this is an increase inbeneficial estrogens, but it's
nice to see that kind of thing.

(41:52):
People are on the fence, I think, in general about how
beneficial it is for PCOS or not, I think a lot of it has to do,
honestly, with the fact thatthere are different phenotypes
of PCOS.
Those who have more of aninflammatory style of PCOS are
going to benefit more from thoseantioxidants, nac being one of
them, versus if you're veryinsulin resistant, you might

(42:13):
benefit more from other things.
But yeah, I just thought thatwas a nice one to see a little
bit more evidence for NACResponse for resveratrol, which
is also a component of plantfoods.
Resveratrol they talk a lotabout with red wine, right, but
you really get more of it fromthings like dark chocolate or

(42:36):
berries Dark berries, it's kindof that dark grapes, that kind
of thing and so they found thatresveratrol was effective at
reducing levels of testosteroneluteinizing hormone, and DHEA
sulfate, dhea-s.
So resveratrol was also helpfulin combination with other

(43:00):
treatments for hyperlipidemia,so high cholesterol stuff like
that.
So another plant food.
Okay.
So those are the nutrients.
I don't know how long thispodcast has gone on.
It may be too long.
If I put this into two partsit's because I feel like I've
been talking forever aboutreading these studies.

(43:23):
I hope you are, if you arestill here.
You are invested and I love youfor staying.
But last couple things arelifestyle related.
So exercise and sleep.
There were a couple of studieson that that I thought were
really interesting.
So the exercise study foundthat exercise could
significantly lower these serumlevels of C-reactive protein, so

(43:46):
CRP remember that's thatinflammation marker and
especially in individuals whowere older than 30 years of age,
it was really, really helpful.
So we've talked before about asyou age with PCOS, inflammation
becomes more of a problemtypically, and so you need to

(44:07):
alter things to kind of focus alittle bit more on that.
And what's cool is that we knowthat exercise improves insulin
levels, but it's nice to seethat it also can improve
inflammation levels.
They don't specifically say whattype of exercise, just regular
exercise, and the more that Iread about exercise, the less

(44:29):
convincing I find the evidencethat you need to only do gentle
exercises for PCOS.
I've never really totallybelieved that.
What I do believe is that youshould not push yourself too
hard.
I think a lot of us with PCOSkind of have like body image
stuff and we tend to beperfectionists and so sometimes
we can like really overdo it.
You know, I do pole dancing,which is like it's like a type

(44:50):
of acrobatic, so you're up onthe pole, you're pulling your
body and all that.
And I was thinking of back tohow, when I was really really
invested in it, I was going likefour or five times a week and I
kept injuring myself Eventhough all the people around me
weren't.
Well, part of the thing about itis that with PCOS you got to be
gentler with your body.
You have to give your body alittle bit more time to recover

(45:13):
from things.
So there's a fine balance withthat and with not doing enough.
But inflammation is kind of abig key here, because working
out, tearing muscle fibers is alittle bit inflammatory and so
there has to be enough rest andthat's why I'm not like huge on
waking up at 4am to go to bootcamp.

(45:34):
I just don't think it's thatgood for your hormones.
Anyway, that said, any kind ofexercise that you find fun is
going to be beneficial and canhelp to reduce your inflammation
.
The last one was a sleep study,which I love because obviously
we've been talking about stressand sleep and how that impacts
your hormones for a while.

(45:55):
But this one found that,specifically in those of PCOS,
not getting having sleepdisturbances which was more
common in PCOS as well wasassociated with having
significantly higher cholesterollevels, glucose levels, having
a higher BMI all these differentthings that waste circumference

(46:17):
, and so sleep is multifactorial, right?
Sleep disturbances are notalways your fault, especially if
you know if you have a goodbedtime routine and you're
trying to get enough sleep, butyou can't.
That's another issue.
I do have a podcast about that,by the way, you may want to
look back at like, like, if itsays anything about, like,
adrenals, cortisol, that kind ofstuff that'd be interesting for

(46:38):
you.
But having more sleep is goingto be much better for the
balance of not just your energybut also these other factors,
and it just leads, lendscredence, to the idea once again
that getting enough sleep isjust as important as eating well

(47:02):
or exercising for PCOS, becauseif you're not getting enough
sleep, you're raising your riskof this other stuff and it can
be a vicious cycle.
So if you are not gettingenough sleep because you're not
placing it as a priority foryourself, place it as a priority
.
If you're having other issues,look into your adrenals.
Anyway, so those are some ofthe studies.
I hope you found thisinteresting.

(47:22):
I definitely found itinteresting perusing them and
you know, if you've neverchecked out PubMed, you might
love it.
You might have the time of yourlife on there.
So definitely look at it if younever have.
Definitely a much better placeto go if you ever have a
question, rather than justgoogling stuff, because you know
anything can come up on theinternet.

(47:43):
But, yeah, thanks for beinghere.
Thank you guys for being one ofthose 50,000 downloads.
I appreciate you and if youhaven't yet, if you enjoyed this
podcast, please leave a review.
Five Star Reviews really helpedthe podcast.
I'd love to get to 100,000downloads right, gotta have a

(48:04):
motivator for me.
So, yeah, if you haven't donethat, please do.
And if you are interested injoining that group program,
definitely check that out.
Would love to see you and, yeah, thanks for being here.
Talk to you guys soon.
Bye.