January 16, 2025 • 32 mins
Enjoy this encore episode with Amie Skilton as she takes us on a deep dive into Gallbladder health.
This episode reveals why we are seeing a surge in gallbladder diseases and removals, particularly among younger individuals.
We discuss how your daily choices and environmental toxins may be putting your gallbladder at risk, and learn the surprising ways estrogen itself plays a pivotal role in gallbladder function. We connect the dots between gallbladder issues and broader health concerns like diabetes and liver disease, emphasizing the dire need for a shift in awareness to safeguard this vital organ.
Navigating the murky waters of gallbladder management, Amie tackles the array of treatments available for those facing gallbladder distress.
This episode goes beyond the quick fixes, shedding light on the deeper causes of gallbladder woes. We highlight that, often, the real solution lies in preventative care and early intervention—strategies that could spare you from the operating room and promote long-term well-being.
About Amie
Amie Skilton – is a functional medicine practitioner of almost 20 years and a well-known educator in naturopathic medicine. For over 15 years, I’ve had the privilege of appearing on conference stages, TV sets and – more recently – laptop screens via Zoom. In that time, I’ve had the honour of presenting more than a thousand keynotes to functional medicine practitioners, integrative GPs, holistic pharmacists and the general public.
In 2017, I had the plot twist of my life. I developed an environmentally-acquired illness (CIRS or ‘mould illness’) and, amongst other discoveries, realised my naturopathic, nutritional and herbal toolkit was only as valuable as my environment was healthy.
I’m now a qualified Mould Testing Technician and continue studying building biology and the various ways in which the built environment has a profound impact on human health. So my educational repertoire has expanded to include environmental health hazards and functional medicine strategies.
Connect with Amie
Website: whatthenaturopathsaid.com
Want to hear more from Amie?
- Listen to Amie's other podcast, Healing Mould Biotoxin Illness.
- Practitioners watch the Gallbladder webinar free here: Rethinking Gallbladder Health with Amie Skilton
Shownotes and references are available on the Designs for Health website
Register as a Designs for Health Practitioner and discover quality practitioner- only supplements at www.designsforhealth.com.au
Follow us on Socials
Instagram: Designsforhealthaus
Facebook: Designsforhealthaus
DISCLAIMER: The Information provided in the Wellness by Designs podcast is for educational purposes only; the information presented is not intended to be used as medical advice; please seek the advice of a qualified healthcare professional if what you have heard here today raises questions or concerns relating to your health
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Music.
This is Wellness by Designs,and I'm your host, andrew
Whitfield-Cook, and joining ustoday is Amy Skilton, and we'll
be discussing why thegallbladder is so important.
Hi, amy, welcome to Wellness byDesigns.
How are you?
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Andrew, I'm very well , thank you, and thank you so
much for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
It's our pleasure, I gotta say.
It's so great to see yoursmiling face and thank you so
much for your time.
Now we're going to be talkingabout the gallbladder today
because you've got an upcomingseminar happening with Wellness
by Design correct.
Take us through this.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Yeah.
So the webinar that I'm goingto be covering off, which
includes gallbladder stuff, isall about the importance of
detoxification and the differentaspects of detoxification, but
a lot of people understand therole of the liver and the gut
and the kidneys, and so thisparticular educational piece is
(01:19):
really going to be focusing onthe importance of the
gallbladder and how to supportit, why it often runs into
trouble and what to do about it.
And the reason I wanted to chatwith you today is gallbladder
disease is on the rise.
In fact, when you look at thestatistics, it's terrifying how
much of a problem it's becoming,and I say that in part because
(01:42):
the main remedy for that tendsto be just to cut the
gallbladder out, but there aresome significant consequences to
that.
So I thought you and I betterneed to have a chat and share
with everybody why looking afteryour gallbladder is so
important and why you want totry and avoid having it removed
(02:02):
if you can.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Well, let's talk about some statistics.
What are we talking about herewith regards to incidence,
prevalence and, indeed,different types of gallbladder
disease?
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Well, just focusing on having the gallbladder taken
out for a second.
We know that over about 15years, so between 2004 and 2019,
here in Australia there werealmost 1.1 hospital admissions
from symptomatic gallbladderassociated disease and more than
(02:40):
three quarters of thoseresulted in the gallbladder
being cut out.
In New Zealand it was not toodissimilar.
So, proportionately speaking,over that same time period there
were 163,000 plus admissions tohospital with gallbladder
issues and just over 98,000 ofthose resulted in the
(03:04):
gallbladder being removed.
And we know when we look atstatistics from other countries,
for example England, the numberof gallbladder surgeries
happening there between 2000 and2019 have actually increased by
80.4%, annually increased by80.4%.
(03:26):
And we also see other reportswhere gallbladder issues, in
particular gallstones, were morean issue for someone in their
40s, 50s or 60s, and now it'smore prevalent in those in their
30s and 40s, and even teenagersare having their gallbladders
removed.
Now, that was unheard of it'sjust it.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
It's amazing how, you know, back in my day of nursing
and and I'm going to bepolitically incorrect here
because we there's an acronymand that's the acronym.
So forgive me, but the acronymback in my day of nursing was
FAT40 FEMALE Fertile andFlatulent right, and that was
(04:16):
this, you know, very probablymisogynistically designed
acronym.
But the 40 has now gone down to20s.
That's what I think is reallyinteresting.
Um, it's just amazing how timeprogresses and I and I
understand you know COVID,lockdown, things like that.
(04:37):
People are more sedentary, butit's not just that we're talking
from you know the 2000 waybefore COVID.
So something else is right yeah, definitely there.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
There are a lot of things happening and I think
it's a tricky one to unpack,although in the webinar I'm
certainly going to go through alot of that.
But I guess, to point towardswhat you said, like in
naturopathic college it it wasfair, fat and 40.
So, like light skin istypically is certainly where I
was from at the time, acondition that affected
Caucasians more predominantly,but certainly for female and
(05:16):
fertile I think.
Touching on that, we know thatestrogen is a risk factor of
that, so elevated levels ofestrogen, and that can happen
because of poor estrogenmetabolism.
It can be a result ofxenoestrogen exposure, which, of
course, we're gettingincreasingly more so through,
you know, pesticides, herbicides, foods, personal care products
(05:38):
and of course, a lot of womenare opting for, you know, the
combined oral contraceptive pillas a form of contraception or
for other reasons, and then HRTat the other end of their
fertile window in terms of alife chapter.
So those are definitelyincreased risks.
Certainly, age is an increasedrisk, but I think age is partly
(05:59):
an increased risk because one ofthe things that contributes to
cholestasis or sticky bile,sluggish gallbladder function,
is toxicants.
So, whether that's frompersonal care products or from
agricultural industry or, youknow, from any of the other
hundreds of sources that we getthat from.
We know that those things,especially the lipophilic ones
(06:22):
that are eliminated through thegallbladder, accumulate over
time, and they accumulate alsowith the increase in weight,
which is often something thatoccurs alongside aging.
So you know those are issues.
We know there are also dietarycomponents that need to be
addressed.
You know the increased riskfactors of things like diabetes
(06:42):
and insulin resistance, anyissues with cirrhosis or even
liver infections and parasites,and one of the other areas I'm
going to be touching on in thewebinar is the impact of
mycotoxins on the gallbladderand how that contributes to
cholestasis as well.
But certainly for women if allother you know confounding
factors are equal women are moreat risk than men because of the
(07:07):
estrogen factor.
In fact, women are diagnosedthree times more often than men
with gallstones like before theage of 40.
But by the time they're 60, therisk is actually starting to
draw closer, unless, of course,they're on estrogen therapy like
HRT, and certainly anyone who'scarrying extra weight, male or
(07:31):
female, will have increasedestrogen levels.
Ironically, though, rapidweight loss also can trigger
issues with gallstones and thegallbladder as well.
So you know you have to reallytreat it with such respect and
consider it to be, you know, apartner of the liver, as opposed
(07:52):
to just a sack that sits therebehind the liver collecting what
the liver creates.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Absolutely.
I'm so glad back at thebeginning there you were talking
about toxicants, and one of thesort of issues I've been
pondering myself is we always,as humans, we tend to go that
equals that, that to that,rather than that to that, to
that, to that, to that, to that,right.
So now, forgive me, thosepeople about, those of our
(08:19):
listeners can't see me pointingaround the room to various
points before you know, insteadof A to C, it's A to Z.
So, for instance, in Australiawe still have on our shelves an
endocrine disruptor chemicalcalled triclosan and it's been
(08:41):
shown to affect thyroid function.
It's been shown to affectthyroid function and thyroid
function, if it's decreased, canlead to high cholesterol and
high cholesterol can lead to aseed in the gallbladder.
And do you see?
So there's this whole thingabout with the toxicants.
It might not be a direct, thatequals that.
(09:01):
It might be around the sort ofborder bit still has an issue
with gallbladder disease totally.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
You've got direct influences, you've got indirect
influences and then you've gotthe cumulative effect of
multiple influences.
You know we don't live in apristine toxicology lab.
When we're exposed, where we'reexposed to one thing at a time,
we're being assaulted frommultiple sources in the air and
our water and our food and ourpersonal care products and our
(09:29):
home cleaning products, with,you know, all kinds of toxicants
and some of those are willinglyonboarded and some of them
aren't.
For example, pollution ifyou're living in a big city or
near a main road and your liverand of course all of your
detoxification organs have todeal with that.
But, as you so eloquentlypointed out, sometimes it's a
(09:50):
direct inhibition of theautonomic nervous system and
gallbladder contraction or anincrease in, you know, the
viscosity of bile.
Or, in the example you gave,there's this domino effect that
are, you know, multiple stepsremoved.
That ultimately also influencesthe health of the gallbladder.
And this is what makesfunctional medicine so wonderful
(10:10):
and also so tricky to practice,because you have to be such a
great detective and actuallyreally put all of those like,
elucidate all of those variablesand address them all to have a
successful result.
And I think that's why removingthe gallbladder seems to be
such a popular choice inallopathic medicine because all
(10:35):
of the other methods thataddress gallstones and of course
gallbladder disease is not justgallstones but just using this
example, you know tend toreoccur and that's because the
underlying causes haven't beenaddressed and so they're like
well, what's the point inremoving the stones and leaving
the gallbladder Cause?
They'll just come back.
Sure, if you don't deal withthe underlying cause and you
(10:55):
know, I tell my clients surgeonscan cut out everything but the
cause.
And I guess the sad reality iswhatever was contributing to
those gallbladder issues alsodoesn't get addressed when you
remove the engine oil light.
That's indicating, hey, we'vegot a problem here.
Speaker 1 (11:11):
Yeah, I have to disagree with you on one point.
I explained it in the mostfumbling way possible.
You explained it eloquently.
But notwithstanding that, justa point I'm pondering is I
wonder if people, One of thepossible I don't know to what
(11:32):
degree, but I wonder if one ofthe possible factors involving
why sorry, leading to why womenmore women have gallbladder
disease than men, is simplybecause of the size of the tube
of the common bile duct in menversus women Bigger bodies,
(11:52):
bigger aortas, bigger vessels,bigger common bile duct.
I don't know, but I justpondered that and I don't know
why.
Anyway, so when we're talkingabout, you know, why not cut it
out?
Like, I totally understand thatif you've got a blocked common
bile duct, it's not a medicalemergency that you've got on
(12:12):
your hands, it's a surgicalemergency.
Having said that, having saidthat, we should be taking care
of an important I'm not going tosay necessarily vital, but an
important part of our bodiesthat's due to our normal
function.
You know, it's kind of like weused to just think, ah, cut out
(12:34):
the appendix Now we don't.
So is there any movement in thethinking of the importance of
the gallbladder?
Speaker 2 (12:48):
It does vary country to country and I think it varies
also depending on the patientpopulation and how educated they
are and perhaps also resources.
You know every medical system isset up differently and there's,
you know, likely in othercountries, like it is here
things that are covered by, youknow, medicare and then other
options you've got to pay out ofpocket.
(13:09):
So I think it's a combinationof things, but I really think
ultimately, what it comes downto is people are presenting in
an acute state of distress thatneeds to be addressed and they
are not getting appropriate care, either pre or post, to address
how they ended up in there, andthat's not the surgeon's job
(13:31):
either up in there, and that'snot the surgeon's job either.
And so I can absolutelyappreciate why a surgeon, when
given the choice of justremoving the stones and clearing
out the common bile duct andleaving everything there versus
because actually, by the way,you don't actually, you know,
end up without gallstones aftergallbladder removal and an.
(13:51):
In actual fact, in some of thestats that I looked at, only 18%
of patients who've had theirgallbladder removed remain free
of symptoms.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
Yeah, and up to 72% of patients can end up with
gallstones in the common bileduct after the gallbladder is
removed, because the source ofthem wasn't addressed, and so I
know if this was to happen to me, depending on you know, when it
was discovered.
If you've got the luxury oftime and you're not in so much
pain, you can obviously usethings like lithotripsy or oral
(14:26):
medications to dissolve thestones, or both, whilst you're
addressing the underlying cause.
If I was, to say, present at anemergency department with an
acute gallbladder attack withgallstones, I would be begging
to have the stones removed andeverything else left intact.
But the current, you know,state of medicine in the Western
(14:47):
world is such that, you know,the people who are presenting to
emergency for acute treatmentdon't know where to go to
actually get the underlyingcauses dealt with, because they
think that medical system is oneand the same when it's not.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
Is there any advancements in medicine to
preserve the actual bile, sorry,gallbladder, whilst expressing
um, expressing, if you like, thegallstones, or is it?
Yeah, is it that theendothelial lining is so, uh,
(15:24):
impacted by whatever you know?
It is whether it beinflammation, whether it be
infection that they just go.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
No, let's take it yeah, look, I think there are
variables there, that sometimesa surgeon isn't going to know
about it until they get in thereand, as you pointed out,
endothelial tissue damage with arisk of infection can certainly
present problems, make it morecomplicated, require antibiotic
use and may end up resulting inthe gallbladder being, you know,
(15:54):
needed to be removed anyway.
But look in terms of like thedifferent options you'd have
medically, there are oralmedications that have been shown
to dissolve some gallstones,and these are classic compounds
found in bile, and so bare bileacid is another, I guess,
(16:16):
natural version of that to thinthe bile and allow the
gallstones to dissolve, andthose medicines are really well
tolerated.
But they can be slow to work,so totally not appropriate in an
acute gallstone attack and ofcourse, isn't treating the root
cause either either.
But someone with a grumblinggallbladder, that could
certainly be part of theirtreatment plan.
(16:38):
But, as you just alluded to,there is something called a
percutaneous cholecystostomytube which actually is
essentially a drain where theycan move galls, use it to move
gallstones out of the area andkind of massage it out if the
gallstones are bigger.
(16:59):
So, as you said, they can beanything from the size of a
grain of sand all the waythrough to a golf ball.
Now, in terms of passing astone like the common bile duct
isn't big enough to pass.
You know anything too, andessentially, if it's over one
and a half centimetres,typically they'll use
(17:19):
lithotripsy, which is a type of,you know, ultrasound waves that
breaks the gallstones intosmaller pieces so you can pass
it.
But there's also a and I don'tknow if I would opt for this one
but they can also inject asolvent which, of course, is
highly toxic, but in this casethere's a one-off to actually
(17:42):
dissolve the gallstones.
It can cause a lot of pain, itcan cause serious side effects
as well, so, you know, and it'salso a bit risky for the doctor
administering it as well.
So it's probably not anyone'stop choice.
But certainly endoscopicdrainage you know, a tube to
actually move them out, or usingultrasound would be options
(18:05):
that I would consider beforegoing for surgery.
And ideally, I thinkrecognizing gallbladder issues
earlier on is really kind of theway to go.
And this is where preventativeand naturopathic and functional
medicine comes into its own.
Decades of you know, earlierred flags and earlier signs that
um have been pointing to thattheir gallbladders in need of
(18:39):
help, um, so maybe we shouldhave a chat about some of those
I think that's.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
I mean, this is obviously where we need to go.
I was going to say before wemove over to that, with regards
to the um, uh, the solvents thatare used, I was going to make a
glib comment about thedegreaser that you get from the
cheap shop, but I couldunderstand the surgeon's issues
(19:08):
safety issues regarding thatwith leakage around the
insertion point into thegallbladder.
Regarding that with leakagearound the insertion point into
the gallbladder.
Obviously, that would be alsodependent on the type of stone.
Most of them are cholesterol,but there may indeed be salts
that are in there as well, andso that requires a different
(19:32):
approach.
So I'm really interested inlithotripsy, because that used
to be reserved for renal disease, but that's interesting.
I wonder if they're using it indifferent sorts.
So, moving on with regards tosymptoms, we talk about the
classic shoulder tip pain andthings like that.
That's more of a grumblinggallbladder.
(19:52):
If you have a gallbladderattack, it's you'll know it.
But let's talk about thesenuanced symptoms.
What are we looking at here?
Speaker 2 (20:01):
so I guess, um, as you mentioned that pain, there's
a couple of places people canexperience pain and it kind of
depends if there's stones thereand also what size they are.
So, um, one of the classicplaces to experience discomfort
is um underneath the bottom ofthe right shoulder blade and
(20:22):
that's really sort of umdirectly over where the
gallbladder sits.
But we can also see painradiating or actually presenting
as a primary, like the top, topof the right shoulder.
For some people, if there'sissues with stones and the
common bile duct, it can be abit more central, so sort of
right at the bottom of that ofthe sternum, like behind the
(20:44):
stomach where it sort of crossesover towards the pancreas.
But there are other signs ofpoor gallbladder function or
poor bile flow.
So number one would be the colorof your stools.
So if you're having what wewould call a perfect poo, it has
(21:04):
a particular texture, aparticular shape, a particular
size and also a particular color, which is a dark brown and a
dark brown is.
The dark brown is is caused bythe bile and the changes in the,
in the pigments of the bilethrough the like, the metabolism
of digestion.
(21:25):
Anytime we see any of thoselighter colors, we know that
we're either not producing goodquality bile or there's
something impeding the flow ofbile and therefore it's not
coming through and coloring thestool in the same way, and so
that would be one big hint.
A second big hint would be ifthe stool, or, like after a
(21:49):
bowel motion, you're seeing agreasy film on the water in the
toilet bowl.
So obviously undigested ormaldigested fats, in particular
stools that are high in fat,will often float rather than
sink.
Now, that's not a definitivepoint, because we can also see
that with microbial fermentation, but you know, if it's floating
(22:10):
and you're seeing some of thoseother things, the red flags,
know if it's floating and you'reseeing some of those other
things, um, the red flags, um,other red flags are.
You feel unwell after fattyfood, so you might feel nauseous
, you might even vomit, um, youmight feel a bit headachy or a
bit off, you might find itreally just sits in your stomach
(22:30):
really awfully and affects yourdigestion and your bowel
motions.
And if that is you, it's likelythat you now avoid fatty foods
and fatty meals and eat more onthe low fat side to avoid
triggering those symptoms.
So those would be sort of thebig ones there.
But also we can see issues withfat metabolism appearing on the
(22:54):
skin.
So we can see sclerosis in thesclera of the eyes.
We can also see lipomas, oftenaround the eye area but
sometimes elsewhere on the body,and they're just, you know,
technically a tumor, but theyare basically just fatty tissue,
so fat coming out of your bodybecause it's not coming out
through the gallbladder, whereit's meant to come out.
(23:17):
They would be sort of the mainones.
There are other things likeoften, you know, chemical
sensitivity, alcohol sensitivity.
We can see on blood testsbilirubin being elevated, alp
being elevated.
You know there's a few otherbits and pieces that we can sort
of see occurring clinicallyspeaking and I will go over all
(23:40):
of that inside the webinar forclinicians that will be
attending.
But you know, if you've noticedthat maybe your liver enzymes a
little bit wonky, but there'sno other real reason or your
bilirubins, you know, over 10, Iknow that the reference range
is a bit more generous than that, but anything over 10 to me
would be, you know, indicativeof some sort of sluggishness.
(24:01):
And you know, these types ofsigns appear decades before you
end up with, you know, in theemergency room with a gallstone
attack.
So you know, I certainly, as aclinician, wouldn't be allowing
a client to write that off asacceptable.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
No, no, but With regards to bilirubin and raised
amino sorry, alt, wasn't it?
Speaker 2 (24:28):
Well, actually.
Ast and ALT, but also, yeah,alkaline phosphatase too, yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
Right so, with regards to raised LFTs, right.
So is that early or late stage,like how early can we pick this
up?
Speaker 2 (24:42):
Look, it really depends because, as you know,
you know it's not one variablethat tends to be driving it, and
so you know, if there is toxicin accumulation, would we see
LFTs go up first and bilirubincome later?
Sure, but sometimes I see LFTslooking fine but bilirubin
starting to sneak up to 12, 13,15, 16.
(25:03):
And they're not having jaundicesymptoms yet, they're not
having light-coloured urine yet.
But that, to me, is a sign thatthere is difficulty with
elimination, which, of course,is predominantly through the
bile.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Yeah, so unconjugated bilirubin.
Okay, and I'm just trying tothink about patient pictures
here.
So when we're thinking abouttherapies, uh, how, how heroic
do we start off here?
Speaker 2 (25:35):
do we go gently, gently or do you go, nah, let's
go bullet a gate well, if youwould like all the juicy details
, you can come to the webinar,but what I would say is you do
want to take a very systematicand considered approach, because
the last thing we want to do istrigger a gallbladder attack,
and I know there's a lot of, youknow, gallbladder flushes
(25:58):
online, but for every personwho's found that helpful, I know
someone else who that triggereda trip to the emergency
department.
So, again, if you're not inacute pain but you've got
grumbling pain, or maybe you'vegot some of these earlier signs,
and perhaps you're going to gohave an ultrasound and just see
what's happening and youdiscover something, but you're
asymptomatic.
Really, you actually want tostart with the gut, because 25%
(26:23):
of all detox starts there andany gut gastrointestinal
inflammation down regulatesdetoxification in the liver, and
so you can't really come from aliver or a top-down approach if
you haven't already done somegut work and support and, given
the state of most people's guts,skipping that part wouldn't be
advisable.
Even though it feels like anextra step and maybe not such a
(26:46):
necessary one, I really do thinkit is.
And then from there,withdrawing anything alongside
that, withdrawing anythingthat's contributing to toxic
body burden inflammation.
You know, for some people, theseissues can actually arise
because they don't eat enoughfat, because fat actually
(27:06):
stimulates the gallbladder tocontract, and so you know, if
someone's on not eating enoughfat, increasing dietary fat to
start moving the gallbladderalong.
There is a lot around theautonomic nervous system and the
vagus nerve and how thatsplenic branch actually operates
, and so you know, is thereanything structurally a
chiropractor needs to addressthrough the thoracics?
(27:28):
Is it a nervous systemcommunication problem?
Is it that they lack, you know,bitters in their diet, because
that's a primary stimulant ofthe gallbladder as well.
You know there's so many movingpieces that you want to take a
holistic approach, but I wouldalso be including if stones have
been identified, or I'dactually be encouraging clients
(27:50):
to ask for an ultrasound to seewhether they have them or
whether it's just viscous bile.
I would then be applying thingsthat help to dissolve the
gallstones before we do anythingto try and stimulate the
gallbladder to eject itscontents.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
So I know we don't want to give too much away
because of the seminar, but canyou give us a couple of hints
and tips here?
So we've got things like, forinstance well, we've got things
like the.
There's the cholesterol triad,where you look at the level of
cholesterol, the amount oflecithins and the amount of gall
, gall salt, bile salts.
So we can do certain simplethings there, like lecithins and
(28:28):
taurine and vitamin E,tocotrienols, what else Well, I
mentioned bitters, so bittersand dietary fat help to
stimulate the gallbladder.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
So, you know, even just really gentle things like
lemon juice and water, or applecider vinegar and water before
foods, increasing your bit ofgreen vegetable intake would be
helpful.
We know that dietary lecithinand choline helps to emulsify
those crystals.
What else would I consider?
(29:04):
I also be make checkingsomeone's fiber intake.
We know that only one and ahalf percent of australians eat
the recommended amount of fruitand vegetables, and so whilst
we're all meant to be gettingaround 30 grams of fiber a day,
most people are getting roughly9 to 12 grams, and then what
we're seeing there isreabsorption of a lot of these
(29:25):
things back into the liver,which is kind of double handling
everything.
So you know these things soundkind of flimsy and weak in the
face of, you know, say, agallstone attack.
But these can all be, you know,contributors to, or the absence
of them, contributors to whyyou ended up with, you know, a
sluggish gallbladder, obviouslyfor women, especially making
(29:46):
sure they're not being exposedto endocrine disrupting
chemicals, in particularxenoestrogens, making sure
estrogen metabolism is operatingas designed um, supporting gut
health, of course.
And then there are bitter herbsthat a herbalist might use
Dandelion roots are reallypopular one, and certainly you
(30:06):
can get dandelion root tea fromthe supermarket.
But herbalists might call onthings like gentian or globe
artichoke.
But again, those things youwouldn't touch until you knew
there weren't gallstones or thatthey were small enough that
they could be passed safely fromthe common bile duct.
And you would use other manualtherapies to help with that,
(30:27):
like lymphatic drainage, castoroil packs.
Um you know, enemas might becalled upon as well okay, you
know one herb that I.
Speaker 1 (30:37):
I totally take your point about confirming without a
doubt that their gallstones areless than I had the cut off at
one centimetre.
So anything over a centimetre Iwouldn't touch Goff, See ya,
but particularly if it wasgravel or sludge.
But they were gettingcontraction pain, that sort of
(30:57):
griping pain after meals,particularly a fatty meal.
I used to love the use of wildyam.
You know it was popularisedback in the day.
It was popularised as a sort ofphytoestrogen.
I used to use it for liverbecause it's a smooth muscle
relaxant.
It was brilliant yeah beautiful.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
I loved it.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
It's fantastic.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Yeah, so any time you were doing some sort of active
flushing or gallbladderstimulation, something like that
would be imperative to usealongside that.
And certainly you know thereare essential oils like caraway
and peppermint that also canrelax smooth muscle that you
could consider.
So you know, as you can see, itdoes require a very coordinated
(31:44):
and holistic approach and sortof in the right order as well,
to avoid causing more problems.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Beautiful Amy look forward to this seminar as usual
.
I know it's going to becomprehensive, but thank you so
much for taking us through justsome of the finer points, some
of the more practical points ofwhere we can help patients today
.
Thanks so much.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
Yeah, thanks, andrew.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
And thank you everyone for joining us today.
Remember we'll have all theshow notes and every other
podcast up on Designs for Healthwebsite.
I'm Andrew Whitfield-Cook.
This is Wellness by Designs.
Music.
This is Wellness by Designs,and I'm your host, andrew
Whitfield-Cook, and joining ustoday is Amy Skilton, and we'll
be discussing why thegallbladder is so important.
Hi, amy, welcome to Wellness byDesigns.
How are you?
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Andrew, I'm very well , thank you, and thank you so
much for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
It's our pleasure, I gotta say.
It's so great to see yoursmiling face and thank you so
much for your time.
Now we're going to be talkingabout the gallbladder today
because you've got an upcomingseminar happening with Wellness
by Design correct.
Take us through this.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Yeah.
So the webinar that I'm goingto be covering off, which
includes gallbladder stuff, isall about the importance of
detoxification and the differentaspects of detoxification, but
a lot of people understand therole of the liver and the gut
and the kidneys, and so thisparticular educational piece is
(01:19):
really going to be focusing onthe importance of the
gallbladder and how to supportit, why it often runs into
trouble and what to do about it.
And the reason I wanted to chatwith you today is gallbladder
disease is on the rise.
In fact, when you look at thestatistics, it's terrifying how
much of a problem it's becoming,and I say that in part because
(01:42):
the main remedy for that tendsto be just to cut the
gallbladder out, but there aresome significant consequences to
that.
So I thought you and I betterneed to have a chat and share
with everybody why looking afteryour gallbladder is so
important and why you want totry and avoid having it removed
(02:02):
if you can.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
Well, let's talk about some statistics.
What are we talking about herewith regards to incidence,
prevalence and, indeed,different types of gallbladder
disease?
Speaker 2 (02:16):
Well, just focusing on having the gallbladder taken
out for a second.
We know that over about 15years, so between 2004 and 2019,
here in Australia there werealmost 1.1 hospital admissions
from symptomatic gallbladderassociated disease and more than
(02:40):
three quarters of thoseresulted in the gallbladder
being cut out.
In New Zealand it was not toodissimilar.
So, proportionately speaking,over that same time period there
were 163,000 plus admissions tohospital with gallbladder
issues and just over 98,000 ofthose resulted in the
(03:04):
gallbladder being removed.
And we know when we look atstatistics from other countries,
for example England, the numberof gallbladder surgeries
happening there between 2000 and2019 have actually increased by
80.4%, annually increased by80.4%.
(03:26):
And we also see other reportswhere gallbladder issues, in
particular gallstones, were morean issue for someone in their
40s, 50s or 60s, and now it'smore prevalent in those in their
30s and 40s, and even teenagersare having their gallbladders
removed.
Now, that was unheard of it'sjust it.
Speaker 1 (03:51):
It's amazing how, you know, back in my day of nursing
and and I'm going to bepolitically incorrect here
because we there's an acronymand that's the acronym.
So forgive me, but the acronymback in my day of nursing was
FAT40 FEMALE Fertile andFlatulent right, and that was
(04:16):
this, you know, very probablymisogynistically designed
acronym.
But the 40 has now gone down to20s.
That's what I think is reallyinteresting.
Um, it's just amazing how timeprogresses and I and I
understand you know COVID,lockdown, things like that.
(04:37):
People are more sedentary, butit's not just that we're talking
from you know the 2000 waybefore COVID.
So something else is right yeah, definitely there.
Speaker 2 (04:50):
There are a lot of things happening and I think
it's a tricky one to unpack,although in the webinar I'm
certainly going to go through alot of that.
But I guess, to point towardswhat you said, like in
naturopathic college it it wasfair, fat and 40.
So, like light skin istypically is certainly where I
was from at the time, acondition that affected
Caucasians more predominantly,but certainly for female and
(05:16):
fertile I think.
Touching on that, we know thatestrogen is a risk factor of
that, so elevated levels ofestrogen, and that can happen
because of poor estrogenmetabolism.
It can be a result ofxenoestrogen exposure, which, of
course, we're gettingincreasingly more so through,
you know, pesticides, herbicides, foods, personal care products
(05:38):
and of course, a lot of womenare opting for, you know, the
combined oral contraceptive pillas a form of contraception or
for other reasons, and then HRTat the other end of their
fertile window in terms of alife chapter.
So those are definitelyincreased risks.
Certainly, age is an increasedrisk, but I think age is partly
(05:59):
an increased risk because one ofthe things that contributes to
cholestasis or sticky bile,sluggish gallbladder function,
is toxicants.
So, whether that's frompersonal care products or from
agricultural industry or, youknow, from any of the other
hundreds of sources that we getthat from.
We know that those things,especially the lipophilic ones
(06:22):
that are eliminated through thegallbladder, accumulate over
time, and they accumulate alsowith the increase in weight,
which is often something thatoccurs alongside aging.
So you know those are issues.
We know there are also dietarycomponents that need to be
addressed.
You know the increased riskfactors of things like diabetes
(06:42):
and insulin resistance, anyissues with cirrhosis or even
liver infections and parasites,and one of the other areas I'm
going to be touching on in thewebinar is the impact of
mycotoxins on the gallbladderand how that contributes to
cholestasis as well.
But certainly for women if allother you know confounding
factors are equal women are moreat risk than men because of the
(07:07):
estrogen factor.
In fact, women are diagnosedthree times more often than men
with gallstones like before theage of 40.
But by the time they're 60, therisk is actually starting to
draw closer, unless, of course,they're on estrogen therapy like
HRT, and certainly anyone who'scarrying extra weight, male or
(07:31):
female, will have increasedestrogen levels.
Ironically, though, rapidweight loss also can trigger
issues with gallstones and thegallbladder as well.
So you know you have to reallytreat it with such respect and
consider it to be, you know, apartner of the liver, as opposed
(07:52):
to just a sack that sits therebehind the liver collecting what
the liver creates.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
Absolutely.
I'm so glad back at thebeginning there you were talking
about toxicants, and one of thesort of issues I've been
pondering myself is we always,as humans, we tend to go that
equals that, that to that,rather than that to that, to
that, to that, to that, to that,right.
So now, forgive me, thosepeople about, those of our
(08:19):
listeners can't see me pointingaround the room to various
points before you know, insteadof A to C, it's A to Z.
So, for instance, in Australiawe still have on our shelves an
endocrine disruptor chemicalcalled triclosan and it's been
(08:41):
shown to affect thyroid function.
It's been shown to affectthyroid function and thyroid
function, if it's decreased, canlead to high cholesterol and
high cholesterol can lead to aseed in the gallbladder.
And do you see?
So there's this whole thingabout with the toxicants.
It might not be a direct, thatequals that.
(09:01):
It might be around the sort ofborder bit still has an issue
with gallbladder disease totally.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
You've got direct influences, you've got indirect
influences and then you've gotthe cumulative effect of
multiple influences.
You know we don't live in apristine toxicology lab.
When we're exposed, where we'reexposed to one thing at a time,
we're being assaulted frommultiple sources in the air and
our water and our food and ourpersonal care products and our
(09:29):
home cleaning products, with,you know, all kinds of toxicants
and some of those are willinglyonboarded and some of them
aren't.
For example, pollution ifyou're living in a big city or
near a main road and your liverand of course all of your
detoxification organs have todeal with that.
But, as you so eloquentlypointed out, sometimes it's a
(09:50):
direct inhibition of theautonomic nervous system and
gallbladder contraction or anincrease in, you know, the
viscosity of bile.
Or, in the example you gave,there's this domino effect that
are, you know, multiple stepsremoved.
That ultimately also influencesthe health of the gallbladder.
And this is what makesfunctional medicine so wonderful
(10:10):
and also so tricky to practice,because you have to be such a
great detective and actuallyreally put all of those like,
elucidate all of those variablesand address them all to have a
successful result.
And I think that's why removingthe gallbladder seems to be
such a popular choice inallopathic medicine because all
(10:35):
of the other methods thataddress gallstones and of course
gallbladder disease is not justgallstones but just using this
example, you know tend toreoccur and that's because the
underlying causes haven't beenaddressed and so they're like
well, what's the point inremoving the stones and leaving
the gallbladder Cause?
They'll just come back.
Sure, if you don't deal withthe underlying cause and you
(10:55):
know, I tell my clients surgeonscan cut out everything but the
cause.
And I guess the sad reality iswhatever was contributing to
those gallbladder issues alsodoesn't get addressed when you
remove the engine oil light.
That's indicating, hey, we'vegot a problem here.
Speaker 1 (11:11):
Yeah, I have to disagree with you on one point.
I explained it in the mostfumbling way possible.
You explained it eloquently.
But notwithstanding that, justa point I'm pondering is I
wonder if people, One of thepossible I don't know to what
(11:32):
degree, but I wonder if one ofthe possible factors involving
why sorry, leading to why womenmore women have gallbladder
disease than men, is simplybecause of the size of the tube
of the common bile duct in menversus women Bigger bodies,
(11:52):
bigger aortas, bigger vessels,bigger common bile duct.
I don't know, but I justpondered that and I don't know
why.
Anyway, so when we're talkingabout, you know, why not cut it
out?
Like, I totally understand thatif you've got a blocked common
bile duct, it's not a medicalemergency that you've got on
(12:12):
your hands, it's a surgicalemergency.
Having said that, having saidthat, we should be taking care
of an important I'm not going tosay necessarily vital, but an
important part of our bodiesthat's due to our normal
function.
You know, it's kind of like weused to just think, ah, cut out
(12:34):
the appendix Now we don't.
So is there any movement in thethinking of the importance of
the gallbladder?
Speaker 2 (12:48):
It does vary country to country and I think it varies
also depending on the patientpopulation and how educated they
are and perhaps also resources.
You know every medical system isset up differently and there's,
you know, likely in othercountries, like it is here
things that are covered by, youknow, medicare and then other
options you've got to pay out ofpocket.
(13:09):
So I think it's a combinationof things, but I really think
ultimately, what it comes downto is people are presenting in
an acute state of distress thatneeds to be addressed and they
are not getting appropriate care, either pre or post, to address
how they ended up in there, andthat's not the surgeon's job
(13:31):
either up in there, and that'snot the surgeon's job either.
And so I can absolutelyappreciate why a surgeon, when
given the choice of justremoving the stones and clearing
out the common bile duct andleaving everything there versus
because actually, by the way,you don't actually, you know,
end up without gallstones aftergallbladder removal and an.
(13:51):
In actual fact, in some of thestats that I looked at, only 18%
of patients who've had theirgallbladder removed remain free
of symptoms.
Speaker 1 (14:03):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (14:05):
Yeah, and up to 72% of patients can end up with
gallstones in the common bileduct after the gallbladder is
removed, because the source ofthem wasn't addressed, and so I
know if this was to happen to me, depending on you know, when it
was discovered.
If you've got the luxury oftime and you're not in so much
pain, you can obviously usethings like lithotripsy or oral
(14:26):
medications to dissolve thestones, or both, whilst you're
addressing the underlying cause.
If I was, to say, present at anemergency department with an
acute gallbladder attack withgallstones, I would be begging
to have the stones removed andeverything else left intact.
But the current, you know,state of medicine in the Western
(14:47):
world is such that, you know,the people who are presenting to
emergency for acute treatmentdon't know where to go to
actually get the underlyingcauses dealt with, because they
think that medical system is oneand the same when it's not.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
Is there any advancements in medicine to
preserve the actual bile, sorry,gallbladder, whilst expressing
um, expressing, if you like, thegallstones, or is it?
Yeah, is it that theendothelial lining is so, uh,
(15:24):
impacted by whatever you know?
It is whether it beinflammation, whether it be
infection that they just go.
Speaker 2 (15:30):
No, let's take it yeah, look, I think there are
variables there, that sometimesa surgeon isn't going to know
about it until they get in thereand, as you pointed out,
endothelial tissue damage with arisk of infection can certainly
present problems, make it morecomplicated, require antibiotic
use and may end up resulting inthe gallbladder being, you know,
(15:54):
needed to be removed anyway.
But look in terms of like thedifferent options you'd have
medically, there are oralmedications that have been shown
to dissolve some gallstones,and these are classic compounds
found in bile, and so bare bileacid is another, I guess,
(16:16):
natural version of that to thinthe bile and allow the
gallstones to dissolve, andthose medicines are really well
tolerated.
But they can be slow to work,so totally not appropriate in an
acute gallstone attack and ofcourse, isn't treating the root
cause either either.
But someone with a grumblinggallbladder, that could
certainly be part of theirtreatment plan.
(16:38):
But, as you just alluded to,there is something called a
percutaneous cholecystostomytube which actually is
essentially a drain where theycan move galls, use it to move
gallstones out of the area andkind of massage it out if the
gallstones are bigger.
(16:59):
So, as you said, they can beanything from the size of a
grain of sand all the waythrough to a golf ball.
Now, in terms of passing astone like the common bile duct
isn't big enough to pass.
You know anything too, andessentially, if it's over one
and a half centimetres,typically they'll use
(17:19):
lithotripsy, which is a type of,you know, ultrasound waves that
breaks the gallstones intosmaller pieces so you can pass
it.
But there's also a and I don'tknow if I would opt for this one
but they can also inject asolvent which, of course, is
highly toxic, but in this casethere's a one-off to actually
(17:42):
dissolve the gallstones.
It can cause a lot of pain, itcan cause serious side effects
as well, so, you know, and it'salso a bit risky for the doctor
administering it as well.
So it's probably not anyone'stop choice.
But certainly endoscopicdrainage you know, a tube to
actually move them out, or usingultrasound would be options
(18:05):
that I would consider beforegoing for surgery.
And ideally, I thinkrecognizing gallbladder issues
earlier on is really kind of theway to go.
And this is where preventativeand naturopathic and functional
medicine comes into its own.
Decades of you know, earlierred flags and earlier signs that
um have been pointing to thattheir gallbladders in need of
(18:39):
help, um, so maybe we shouldhave a chat about some of those
I think that's.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
I mean, this is obviously where we need to go.
I was going to say before wemove over to that, with regards
to the um, uh, the solvents thatare used, I was going to make a
glib comment about thedegreaser that you get from the
cheap shop, but I couldunderstand the surgeon's issues
(19:08):
safety issues regarding thatwith leakage around the
insertion point into thegallbladder.
Regarding that with leakagearound the insertion point into
the gallbladder.
Obviously, that would be alsodependent on the type of stone.
Most of them are cholesterol,but there may indeed be salts
that are in there as well, andso that requires a different
(19:32):
approach.
So I'm really interested inlithotripsy, because that used
to be reserved for renal disease, but that's interesting.
I wonder if they're using it indifferent sorts.
So, moving on with regards tosymptoms, we talk about the
classic shoulder tip pain andthings like that.
That's more of a grumblinggallbladder.
(19:52):
If you have a gallbladderattack, it's you'll know it.
But let's talk about thesenuanced symptoms.
What are we looking at here?
Speaker 2 (20:01):
so I guess, um, as you mentioned that pain, there's
a couple of places people canexperience pain and it kind of
depends if there's stones thereand also what size they are.
So, um, one of the classicplaces to experience discomfort
is um underneath the bottom ofthe right shoulder blade and
(20:22):
that's really sort of umdirectly over where the
gallbladder sits.
But we can also see painradiating or actually presenting
as a primary, like the top, topof the right shoulder.
For some people, if there'sissues with stones and the
common bile duct, it can be abit more central, so sort of
right at the bottom of that ofthe sternum, like behind the
(20:44):
stomach where it sort of crossesover towards the pancreas.
But there are other signs ofpoor gallbladder function or
poor bile flow.
So number one would be the colorof your stools.
So if you're having what wewould call a perfect poo, it has
(21:04):
a particular texture, aparticular shape, a particular
size and also a particular color, which is a dark brown and a
dark brown is.
The dark brown is is caused bythe bile and the changes in the,
in the pigments of the bilethrough the like, the metabolism
of digestion.
(21:25):
Anytime we see any of thoselighter colors, we know that
we're either not producing goodquality bile or there's
something impeding the flow ofbile and therefore it's not
coming through and coloring thestool in the same way, and so
that would be one big hint.
A second big hint would be ifthe stool, or, like after a
(21:49):
bowel motion, you're seeing agreasy film on the water in the
toilet bowl.
So obviously undigested ormaldigested fats, in particular
stools that are high in fat,will often float rather than
sink.
Now, that's not a definitivepoint, because we can also see
that with microbial fermentation, but you know, if it's floating
(22:10):
and you're seeing some of thoseother things, the red flags,
know if it's floating and you'reseeing some of those other
things, um, the red flags, um,other red flags are.
You feel unwell after fattyfood, so you might feel nauseous
, you might even vomit, um, youmight feel a bit headachy or a
bit off, you might find itreally just sits in your stomach
(22:30):
really awfully and affects yourdigestion and your bowel
motions.
And if that is you, it's likelythat you now avoid fatty foods
and fatty meals and eat more onthe low fat side to avoid
triggering those symptoms.
So those would be sort of thebig ones there.
But also we can see issues withfat metabolism appearing on the
(22:54):
skin.
So we can see sclerosis in thesclera of the eyes.
We can also see lipomas, oftenaround the eye area but
sometimes elsewhere on the body,and they're just, you know,
technically a tumor, but theyare basically just fatty tissue,
so fat coming out of your bodybecause it's not coming out
through the gallbladder, whereit's meant to come out.
(23:17):
They would be sort of the mainones.
There are other things likeoften, you know, chemical
sensitivity, alcohol sensitivity.
We can see on blood testsbilirubin being elevated, alp
being elevated.
You know there's a few otherbits and pieces that we can sort
of see occurring clinicallyspeaking and I will go over all
(23:40):
of that inside the webinar forclinicians that will be
attending.
But you know, if you've noticedthat maybe your liver enzymes a
little bit wonky, but there'sno other real reason or your
bilirubins, you know, over 10, Iknow that the reference range
is a bit more generous than that, but anything over 10 to me
would be, you know, indicativeof some sort of sluggishness.
(24:01):
And you know, these types ofsigns appear decades before you
end up with, you know, in theemergency room with a gallstone
attack.
So you know, I certainly, as aclinician, wouldn't be allowing
a client to write that off asacceptable.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
No, no, but With regards to bilirubin and raised
amino sorry, alt, wasn't it?
Speaker 2 (24:28):
Well, actually.
Ast and ALT, but also, yeah,alkaline phosphatase too, yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
Right so, with regards to raised LFTs, right.
So is that early or late stage,like how early can we pick this
up?
Speaker 2 (24:42):
Look, it really depends because, as you know,
you know it's not one variablethat tends to be driving it, and
so you know, if there is toxicin accumulation, would we see
LFTs go up first and bilirubincome later?
Sure, but sometimes I see LFTslooking fine but bilirubin
starting to sneak up to 12, 13,15, 16.
(25:03):
And they're not having jaundicesymptoms yet, they're not
having light-coloured urine yet.
But that, to me, is a sign thatthere is difficulty with
elimination, which, of course,is predominantly through the
bile.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
Yeah, so unconjugated bilirubin.
Okay, and I'm just trying tothink about patient pictures
here.
So when we're thinking abouttherapies, uh, how, how heroic
do we start off here?
Speaker 2 (25:35):
do we go gently, gently or do you go, nah, let's
go bullet a gate well, if youwould like all the juicy details
, you can come to the webinar,but what I would say is you do
want to take a very systematicand considered approach, because
the last thing we want to do istrigger a gallbladder attack,
and I know there's a lot of, youknow, gallbladder flushes
(25:58):
online, but for every personwho's found that helpful, I know
someone else who that triggereda trip to the emergency
department.
So, again, if you're not inacute pain but you've got
grumbling pain, or maybe you'vegot some of these earlier signs,
and perhaps you're going to gohave an ultrasound and just see
what's happening and youdiscover something, but you're
asymptomatic.
Really, you actually want tostart with the gut, because 25%
(26:23):
of all detox starts there andany gut gastrointestinal
inflammation down regulatesdetoxification in the liver, and
so you can't really come from aliver or a top-down approach if
you haven't already done somegut work and support and, given
the state of most people's guts,skipping that part wouldn't be
advisable.
Even though it feels like anextra step and maybe not such a
(26:46):
necessary one, I really do thinkit is.
And then from there,withdrawing anything alongside
that, withdrawing anythingthat's contributing to toxic
body burden inflammation.
You know, for some people, theseissues can actually arise
because they don't eat enoughfat, because fat actually
(27:06):
stimulates the gallbladder tocontract, and so you know, if
someone's on not eating enoughfat, increasing dietary fat to
start moving the gallbladderalong.
There is a lot around theautonomic nervous system and the
vagus nerve and how thatsplenic branch actually operates
, and so you know, is thereanything structurally a
chiropractor needs to addressthrough the thoracics?
(27:28):
Is it a nervous systemcommunication problem?
Is it that they lack, you know,bitters in their diet, because
that's a primary stimulant ofthe gallbladder as well.
You know there's so many movingpieces that you want to take a
holistic approach, but I wouldalso be including if stones have
been identified, or I'dactually be encouraging clients
(27:50):
to ask for an ultrasound to seewhether they have them or
whether it's just viscous bile.
I would then be applying thingsthat help to dissolve the
gallstones before we do anythingto try and stimulate the
gallbladder to eject itscontents.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
So I know we don't want to give too much away
because of the seminar, but canyou give us a couple of hints
and tips here?
So we've got things like, forinstance well, we've got things
like the.
There's the cholesterol triad,where you look at the level of
cholesterol, the amount oflecithins and the amount of gall
, gall salt, bile salts.
So we can do certain simplethings there, like lecithins and
(28:28):
taurine and vitamin E,tocotrienols, what else Well, I
mentioned bitters, so bittersand dietary fat help to
stimulate the gallbladder.
Speaker 2 (28:43):
So, you know, even just really gentle things like
lemon juice and water, or applecider vinegar and water before
foods, increasing your bit ofgreen vegetable intake would be
helpful.
We know that dietary lecithinand choline helps to emulsify
those crystals.
What else would I consider?
(29:04):
I also be make checkingsomeone's fiber intake.
We know that only one and ahalf percent of australians eat
the recommended amount of fruitand vegetables, and so whilst
we're all meant to be gettingaround 30 grams of fiber a day,
most people are getting roughly9 to 12 grams, and then what
we're seeing there isreabsorption of a lot of these
(29:25):
things back into the liver,which is kind of double handling
everything.
So you know these things soundkind of flimsy and weak in the
face of, you know, say, agallstone attack.
But these can all be, you know,contributors to, or the absence
of them, contributors to whyyou ended up with, you know, a
sluggish gallbladder, obviouslyfor women, especially making
(29:46):
sure they're not being exposedto endocrine disrupting
chemicals, in particularxenoestrogens, making sure
estrogen metabolism is operatingas designed um, supporting gut
health, of course.
And then there are bitter herbsthat a herbalist might use
Dandelion roots are reallypopular one, and certainly you
(30:06):
can get dandelion root tea fromthe supermarket.
But herbalists might call onthings like gentian or globe
artichoke.
But again, those things youwouldn't touch until you knew
there weren't gallstones or thatthey were small enough that
they could be passed safely fromthe common bile duct.
And you would use other manualtherapies to help with that,
(30:27):
like lymphatic drainage, castoroil packs.
Um you know, enemas might becalled upon as well okay, you
know one herb that I.
Speaker 1 (30:37):
I totally take your point about confirming without a
doubt that their gallstones areless than I had the cut off at
one centimetre.
So anything over a centimetre Iwouldn't touch Goff, See ya,
but particularly if it wasgravel or sludge.
But they were gettingcontraction pain, that sort of
(30:57):
griping pain after meals,particularly a fatty meal.
I used to love the use of wildyam.
You know it was popularisedback in the day.
It was popularised as a sort ofphytoestrogen.
I used to use it for liverbecause it's a smooth muscle
relaxant.
It was brilliant yeah beautiful.
Speaker 2 (31:19):
I loved it.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
It's fantastic.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
Yeah, so any time you were doing some sort of active
flushing or gallbladderstimulation, something like that
would be imperative to usealongside that.
And certainly you know thereare essential oils like caraway
and peppermint that also canrelax smooth muscle that you
could consider.
So you know, as you can see, itdoes require a very coordinated
(31:44):
and holistic approach and sortof in the right order as well,
to avoid causing more problems.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Beautiful Amy look forward to this seminar as usual
.
I know it's going to becomprehensive, but thank you so
much for taking us through justsome of the finer points, some
of the more practical points ofwhere we can help patients today
.
Thanks so much.
Speaker 2 (32:06):
Yeah, thanks, andrew.
Speaker 1 (32:08):
And thank you everyone for joining us today.
Remember we'll have all theshow notes and every other
podcast up on Designs for Healthwebsite.
I'm Andrew Whitfield-Cook.
This is Wellness by Designs.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!