Dr Bastomski’s Thoughts:
When pursuing strategies to assist in detoxification of the liver, it helps to broaden your approach to include the following basic areas of a functional medicine approach to healing a chronic condition, whatever it’s name:
1. Blood sugar stability. About 51% of the population is sensitive to carbohydrates and blood sugar balance issues. These are the folks who crave sweets, get sleepy after a meal, get cranky if too many hours go by with out eating or who crave sweets after a meal. Basic blood tests may or may not yet show blood sugar problems, but answering yes to the above four items will give you a good clue that you are in or out of this important category. If you are in and you have disrupted sugar balance issues, then it can easily effect your weight, mood, sleep and energy level. Solution? Eat more of a paleo diet lifestyle. Take a few nutrients to assist your bodies increased needs of certain vitamin and minerals. There are nutritional supplement formulas out there for the range of blood sugar problems from low blood sugar – hypoglycemia – to high blood sugar – diabetes.
Click here to read my full article about Toxic Liver
2. Food allergies/sensitivities. Probably the majority of people with a chronic condition have a food sensitivity as a significant part of their underlying mechanism of why they are in an inflammed state. These food sensitivities are typically hidden and will only manifest them self if you avoid the food for a minimum of two weeks and then reintroduce them in a strong way. The two main food groups that people have issues with are gluten and dairy. So if you want to try a detox diet for a couple of weeks to see if your health improves you start with eating whole foods, minimal packaged and canned foods, avoid dairy and gluten and of course all added sugar foods. There are blood tests that can be helpful in identifying your food sensitivities as can in office muscle response testing, which we can rapidly do for you as part of a basic office visit.
3. Hidden infections. Almost all chronic conditions will have as a component of of dysfunctional state, an overgrowth of one or more problematic microbes, such as yeast, mold, bacteria or viruses. These are situations which are ongoing in a quiet way – there is no acute fever, or illness going on but their is ongoing damage being done. A couple of examples – you can have hepatitis C infection of you liver going on for decades and not know about it until the damage is quite bad. Likewise if you have diabetes, then a recent study shows that you have a shift of the normal bacterial flora of your gut toward allowing more pathologic microbes into it’s fold.
4. Toxic accumulation of chemicals and toxic metals such as mercury, lead, cadmium, aluminum and nickel to name a few of the frequent ones. We unfortunately live in a toxic environment. A new born baby today has in its blood about 280 toxic chemicals, about 100 of which are cancer causing and about 80 of which are toxic to the brain and nervous system. That is our reality. You add to that burden by not eating healthy foods on a daily basis. Your gut and liver take up most of the insult from this situation and again the way you address it is by handling all four of the above topics not just the fourth one.
If you would like to discuss help with understanding and treating underlying dysfunctional issues and exploring other effective methods of natural healing, please do not hesitate to contact me anytime to schedule an appointment.
Sincerely,
Dr. Jacob Bastomski
Dr.Jacob Bastomski, a board-certified chiropractic neurologist, has served the Santa Barbara area since 1981. As a Santa Barbara chiropractor, Dr. Bastomski seeks to improve health through functional neurology and clinical nutrition.
Please contact us anytime at 805-569-5000 if you’re looking for a holistic approach to alleviate your Sciatica or lower back pain, especially if traditional medical approaches have failed. Less severe back pain may only require one to five spinal adjustments. Dr. Bastomski’s Back to Health Wellness Center is located at 1900 State St. Suite H in Santa Barbara.
