Digital Social Hour - Unlocking Nitric Oxide: The Secret to Disease Prevention | Dr. Nathan Bryan DSH #659

Episode Date: August 23, 2024

🚀 Unlocking Nitric Oxide: The Secret to Disease Prevention! 🌿 Ready to dive into the groundbreaking science behind nitric oxide and why it's essential for your health? Tune in now to the Digital Social Hour with Sean Kelly and special guest Dr. Nathan Bryan, an expert who's spent over 20 years studying this vital molecule. 💡 Discover how your oral microbiome, stomach acid, and even your daily mouthwash could be impacting your body's ability to produce nitric oxide—crucial for preventing heart disease, stroke, and Alzheimer's! 🧬 Packed with valuable insights, this episode is your gateway to understanding how lifestyle choices impact your health at a cellular level. Don't miss out! Join the conversation and learn how to naturally restore nitric oxide production for a healthier life. Watch now and subscribe for more insider secrets. 📺 Hit that subscribe button and stay tuned for more eye-opening stories on the Digital Social Hour with Sean Kelly! 🚀   #NaturalSupplements #PlantbasedDietTips #NaturalRemedies #RestoreNitricOxideLevels #OralHealthAndNitricOxide   CHAPTERS: 00:00 - Intro 00:30 - Importance of Nitric Oxide 05:00 - LinkedIn Advertising Credit 06:50 - Harmful Effects of Mouthwash 09:16 - Importance of Oxygen for Health 09:59 - Hyperbaric Oxygen Chambers Benefits 12:41 - Managing High Blood Pressure 17:09 - Maintaining a Healthy Microbiome 19:14 - Testing Nitric Oxide Levels 21:28 - Nitric Oxide's Role in Alzheimer's 23:18 - Genetics and Disease Connection 26:29 - Nutrient Deficiencies in Modern Diets 29:14 - Dietary Choices and Health 29:41 - Impact of Sedentary Lifestyles 30:29 - Mouthwash and Fluoride Risks 33:09 - Closing Thoughts on Health 34:09 - Thanks for Watching   APPLY TO BE ON THE PODCAST: https://www.digitalsocialhour.com/application BUSINESS INQUIRIES/SPONSORS: [e-mail]   GUEST: Dr. Nathan Bryan https://www.instagram.com/therealdrnathansbryan https://drnathansbryan.com/   SPONSORS: Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/social Deposyt Payment Processing: https://www.deposyt.com/seankelly   LISTEN ON: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/digital-social-hour/id1676846015 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/5Jn7LXarRlI8Hc0GtTn759 Sean Kelly Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seanmikekelly/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

All the nutritional epidemiology on things that are good for us can be accounted for by the production of nitric oxide. So if you don't have the right oral microbiome or you don't have stomach acid because you're taking in acids, then this completely shuts down the body's ability to make nitric oxide. People who have been on an acids for three to five years have 40% higher incidence of heart attack, stroke, and Alzheimer's. Holy crap. And all that can be explained by shutting down nitric oxide production. All right, guys, we got Dr. Nathan Bryan here. We're going to talk about the importance of nitric oxide, which prior to researching you, I've never really heard about it. So I'm excited for this one, man. Thanks for coming on. Thanks for having me. Yeah,

it's something you've studied for 20 years now. A little bit more than 20 years. Yeah, made a career out of it. Wow. You've devoted your whole career to this. So let's dive into this. What have you researched about it? Well, I got introduced to the field of nitric oxide in the late 90s, shortly after the Nobel Prize was awarded for its discovery. So the scientific and medical community knew it was an important molecule, important discovery. But because it's a gas that's produced in the lining of the blood vessel and it's gone in less than a second, 25 years ago there wasn't a lot of techniques or analytical methods where you could detect physiological amounts of nitric oxide. And then perhaps most importantly, we didn't really understand how humans made nitric oxide. We didn't know what went wrong in people that could make it, and then we had no way to restore the production of this molecule. So that was really my work over

the past 25 years is how's this molecule made naturally, what goes wrong in people that can't make it, and then how do you fix that problem. Right. And now you've studied it extensively and there's some links with causing disease, right? Yeah. So the basic sciences and even the clinical science tell us that the loss of nitric oxide production precedes really the structural changes we see in cardiovascular disease. And it's the earliest event in the onset and progression of most, if not all, chronic diseases. So when you lose the ability to produce nitric oxide, your blood vessels become constricted. You basically lose the ability to deliver oxygen. Your body sees an increased inflammation, immune dysfunction, and oxidative stress.

And those are the hallmarks of every chronic disease, whether it's heart disease, you know, Alzheimer's, vascular dementia, diabetes. It's really the inflammation, the immune dysfunction, and oxidative stress that causes the damage. So the medical community thought years ago that if we could really suppress the inflammatory response, restore blood flow, get oxygen and nutrient to every cell in the body, then the body would heal itself, right? We're regenerative by nature. Right. And that's really the role of nitric oxide today is it basically addresses all the root causes. So, it dilates blood vessels, it improves oxygenation, reduces inflammation, and all the hallmarks of chronic disease.

And have you found out what causes the body to stop producing it? Yeah. So, there's two primary pathways how the human body makes nitric oxide. There's an enzyme in the lining of the blood vessels. It's called nitric oxide synthase, and that enzyme, under normal healthy condition, converts an amino acid, L-arginine, into nitric oxide. But the older we get, the less functional that pathway becomes, and it's due to a number of things. It's the Western diet. It's lifestyle. It's really eating an inflammatory diet and causing oxidative stress. And then the other pathway, you know, we can get nitric oxide from the diet.

And it really explains the mechanism of a plant-based diet, the Japanese diet. All the nutritional epidemiology on things that are good for us can be accounted for by the production of nitric oxide. So that dietary pathway is dependent upon the oral microbiome. It's dependent upon stomach acid production. So if you don't have the right oral microbiome or you don't have stomach acid because you're taking in acids, then this completely shuts down the body's ability to make nitric oxide. Wow. So when you take the Tums. Yeah, all the Tums, you know, the proton pump inhibitors, things like Prilosec, Prevacid, Nexium, the Omeprazole. The pink one, though,

is that the Pepto? Yeah. And so what happens is it basically completely shuts down nitric oxide production. And we now have data showing that people who have been on an acids for three to five years have 40% higher incidence of heart attack, stroke, and Alzheimer's. Holy crap. And all that can be explained by shutting down nitric oxide production. Wow. So that's an aha moment. But the other, I think the biggest effect we're seeing in people who use mouthwash, you know, the oral microbiome, the bacteria that make up the microbiome in the mouth is

critically essential for not just breaking down, you know, food and part of the digestion process, but there are bacteria that live on the crypt part of the digestion process, but they're bacteria that live on the crypts of the tongue that are responsible for producing nitric oxide. So two out of three Americans wake up every morning and use mouthwash, and two out of three Americans have an unsafe elevation in blood pressure. Holy crap. And so we and others have published probably 10 years ago that this is what's responsible

for the elevation in blood pressure. It's destroying the oral microbiome, shutting down nitric oxide production. Your blood pressure goes up, you develop erectile dysfunction, you lose the protective benefits of exercise. Dang. So it's bad news.

I mean, you know, we know that we shouldn't take an antibiotic every day because of the destruction it does on the... This is an ad by BetterHelp. What are your self-care non-negotiables? It's hard to make time for the things that keep you healthy. But being consistent with self-care is like working a muscle. And when life gets crazy, that muscle keeps you strong.

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That's linkedin.com slash social. Terms and conditions apply. LinkedIn, the place to be. The intestinal microbiome. Right. Same principles apply with an the place to be the intestinal microbiome right same principles apply with an antiseptic in the mouth if we're using mouthwash every day we destroy the microbiome and bad things happen that's crazy i used to use it daily now i use a natural one so are you talking about mainly like the chemical ones yeah the chemical ones all alcohol based mouthwash so scope blisterine chlorhexidine that says antiseptic, it's non-selectively killing all bacteria.

Wow. The good guys, the bad guys, it's destroying the microbiome and their consequences to them. That is crazy. Yeah, I used to use, I think, Listerine every day, man. Damn. Yeah, well, I mean, believe the commercials. Yeah, it says it kills 99.99% of the bacteria in your mouth. And that's a true statement, but it's not a helpful statement. Right.

There are consequences to that. So I tell people, look, just to produce nitric oxide, you've got to stop doing the things that disrupt it. If you're using mouthwash, stop using mouthwash. Fluorinated toothpaste is a huge problem. You know, fluoride is an antiseptic. And it's a neurotoxin, and it shuts down your thyroid function. Holy crap. They use it to clean your teeth. I know. I mean, we have is an antiseptic. And it's a neurotoxin, and it shuts down your thyroid function. Holy crap. They use it to clean your teeth.

I know. I mean, we have to get rid of that. Fluoride is one of the most toxic substances on the periodic table. Dang. So get rid of fluoride. Stop using mouthwash and get off antacids. What about hand sanitizer, like Purell and stuff? Yeah, look, I mean, the bacteria that live in and on our body outnumber human cells 10 to 1. So anything you do that disrupts the microbiome, whether it's on the skin, whether it's in the mouth, the gut, you know, has consequences.

So, yeah, I tell people don't. There's a hygiene hypothesis of disease. Right. Right. We live and they try to live in this pristine, anti-dermaphobic society. And that has consequences. So tell people don't use antibacterial mouthwash. Don't use antibacterial lotions, soaps. The bacteria that live in and on our body are there to do specific things. And mainly it's things that humans can't do. So it's

a true symbiotic relationship. Wow. No more soap in the bathroom. Well, you can, I don't want to discourage people from bathing or brushing their teeth. You just have to maintain the ecology of the microbiome. Yeah. And really preserve it because it's really essential for the health of the human host. Wow. This is great. Great to know because I've never seen someone talk about this nitric oxide thing. So it's cool to see you bring it to light, man.

Well, you know, I think it's one of those things that, you know, it's a relatively new discovery in the medical literature. Nitric oxide was only discovered, you know, in the early 80s. Nobel Prize was awarded in 1998. So now we're 25, 26 years post Nobel Prize. And there's starting to be a growing awareness around this. And I think as we start moving our technology through drug trials and getting drugs approved, nitric oxide focused therapies approved and on the market, then there'll be a growing awareness because I truly believe that there's not a single indication where nitric oxide would

not be beneficial. Wow. Yeah, because Gary Brekker says the lack of oxygen is the root cause of all disease, right? Yeah. So we need oxygen to make nitric oxide and we need nitric oxide to deliver oxygen. Right. to make nitric oxide and we need nitric oxide to deliver oxygen. And, you know, we had some studies in FDA clinical studies during the virus pandemic and people were losing blood oxygen saturation. Yeah.

Right? So even though they're breathing 21% oxygen, they couldn't deliver that oxygen. Wow. And the people that were getting sick, not just from the coronavirus, but from seasonal flu for the past 150 years are the same people, the people that can't make nitric oxide. So if you can't make nitric oxide, you can't fully oxygenate, you become immunocompromised, and that puts you at risk for viral infections, bacterial infections, cardiovascular disease.

That makes sense. So if we could restore the production of nitric oxide, we could improve blood oxygen saturation from 76 to 98 in eight minutes. Simply by breathing room air. No need for supplemental oxygen and certainly no need for mechanical vents. What do you think about those hyperbaric oxygen chambers? Do you use those? Yeah, no, I have a hyperbaric chamber in my home. Look, the clinical data on hyperbaric oxygen is irrefutable. And the reason it works is because when you pressurize oxygen, it basically improves the solubility of oxygen,

the amount of oxygen dissolved in blood. Not really improving the oxygen carrying capacity of the red blood cell, but dissolved oxygen. And when you do that, you improve nitric oxide production. Nitric oxide is what tells our stem cells to mobilize and differentiate, and that's what leads to improved healing, whether it's wound healing or recovery from concussions know, concussions or brain injury, things like that. Yeah. I want to try one of those out. They look really cool. Yeah. No, look, there's nothing that's more beneficial than that. Oxygen is absolutely essential. You need nitric oxide to deliver oxygen. You need nitric oxide to mobilize stem cells. That's how we repair and regenerate cells. Have you looked into these waters?

I know there's water bottles too that like oxygenate the water. Yeah, look, the water industry is huge. And, you know, if you can restructure the water molecule and you can improve the solubility of oxygen in that water, then obviously you're going to get enhanced delivery. But what's missing in a lot of this are the electrolytes because most people are dehydrated at the cellular level. So the cell has to take up the water. Water follows an osmotic gradient. So I think it's important that water have some electrolytes in it to improve cellular hydration. I wonder if this one does.

I don't know. But that's good to know because sometimes I feel in Vegas, it's easy to feel dehydrated because it's so hot. Oh, yeah. My lips are chapped and my skin. Well, that's the first sign. If you develop chapped lips, then that's the first sign of hydration. Yeah.

And what's the fix for that? Just drink water? Yeah, but it's the right water, right? I mean, if you drink distilled water without any electrolytes, then you're basically pulling the minerals and electrolytes from the bones from your body. Distilled water. So we have to do, yeah. So you have to use some, you know, some electrolyte-rich water

that, number one, that's clean. Tap water's awful. Right. You know, it contains fluoride and contains a lot of drug metabolites. So you have to drink good, pure, and clean water with some electrolytes so you can actually get the water

and the hydration inside the cell. I just had a doctor on, Dr. Pompa. I don't know if you know him. Oh, yeah. Yesterday. And he was saying if you shower with tap water for 10 minutes, it's the equivalent of drinking nine glasses of tap water. Well, no, that's exactly right, because you're heating your water up to, what, 104, 110 degrees, so you're volatilizing all these fluoramines and chloramine. You're enhancing absorption, not just dermal absorption, but absorption through the

respiratory system, because you're obviously breathing in the shower. Yeah, so I think one of the most important things people can do is get a home filtration system and remove all those toxins from tap water. I'm looking into some right now. Which one do you use? I use a technology from a company out of Florida called pH Prescriptions. Okay. They take the bad stuff out.

They remineralize the water. So it's not just taking out the bad stuff, it's repleting the minerals that are necessary. But I think that's critically important because, you know, it's not just the water you're drinking, it's the water you're cooking in, it's the water you're bathing in. So we have to have good clean water. Yeah. There's a lot of people with high blood pressure right now. Is that because of the nitric oxide stuff too? Yeah. So what we're finding and what we've published on is that, you know, the, so hypertension is the finding and what we've published on is that, you know,

so hypertension is the number one risk factor for the number one killer of men and women worldwide, which is cardiovascular disease. So nitric oxide is a vasodilator, right? So it keeps the blood vessels open and soft and compliant. So when we lose the ability

to produce nitric oxide, you get vasoconstriction. So now you have the same volume of blood going through those smaller pipes, so you increase the pressure. So if we can restore nitric oxide production, you can restore normal blood pressure. And then in 2019, we published a similar paper showing that people who use mouthwash, it causes their blood pressure to go up. And this explains resistant hypertension. Because if you have high blood pressure, you go to your primary care doctor, your cardiologist,

he's going to put you on different classes of antihypertensives. And these are what's called ACE inhibitors or ARBs. This affects what we call the renin-angiotensin system, so it's kind of a kidney issue. Or they put you on a calcium channel antagonist, a beta block or diuretic, different classes of drugs. But yet 50% of the people that are prescribed these drugs don't respond with better blood pressure management. Even though they're treated in sometimes polypharmacy, two to three different blood pressure medicines, their blood pressure doesn't normalize. Wow. And what we found is that it doesn't normalize because their high blood pressure is a symptom of oral dysbiosis.

Wow. So then when we ask them, you start asking your patients, hey, do you use mouthwash? Well, yeah is a symptom of oral dysbiosis. So then when we ask them, you start asking your patients, hey, do you use mouthwash? Well, yeah, two out of three people say yes. You have fluoride in your toothpaste. 99% of the people say yes. So then if you get people off mouthwash, get rid of the fluoride, allow the oral bacteria to repopulate, improve the diversity in the ecology, then your nitric oxide production can proceed, your blood pressure normalizes, and now for the first time in the history of medicine, we can get people off drugs.

Wow. Instead of putting people on more drugs. Wouldn't that be a sight? No, I mean, that's never been done before in the history of medicine. And that's really the power of what we're doing with nitric oxide, because now our whole philosophy in developing therapeutics is not based on pharmacology, which is developing a synthetic compound that inhibits a biochemical reaction. Our intent was to understand the mechanism of disease to the extent that you could fix it. And what we're finding is that it's really the loss of nitric oxide production. And so in 2007, we published a paper showing that nitric

oxide is a hormone. So similar to hormone replacement therapy in men using testosterone, we have to replace and replenish and restore the production of nitric oxide gas. And that's what we do. So we call this restorative physiology. It's not pharmacology, it's restorative physiology. It's understanding how the body works and then giving the body what it needs to actually do its job. I would love to see that. Yeah, no, that's the power of nitric oxide. And I'm convinced it'll change the landscape of medicine and will change the world and will certainly change the current management of chronic disease. I hope so. Because whenever I would get prescribed antibiotics, I would feel so bad the whole week because

it's just destroying you. Yeah. No, look, I mean, if you have an infection, a severe infection, antibiotics are necessary. They save thousands of lives or millions of lives over the course of 100 years. But the problem is there's always collateral damage. It's like dropping an atomic bomb on somebody. You're going to kill the bad guys, but you're also going to wipe out the good guys. So now what we have to do is, and part of our efforts in working with the dental community

and working with infectious disease experts is, how do we create a technology that selectively kills pathogens while maintaining the non-pathogenic commensal communities? Then we can be selective about killing the bad guys, maintaining the good guys. And what we're finding in microbiology is that if you can maintain a healthy microbiome, whether it's in the mouth, the gut, in women, in the vagina, or on the surface of the skin, then those good guys are kind of like the cops, right? They keep the bad guys at bay.

But when you start destroying that and causing a lot of chaos, then the bad guys outcompete the good guys and you develop problems. So what we're trying to do is selectively kill the pathogens while maintaining the ecology of the good guys. What's your advice to women to keep a healthy microbiome? You know, it's not just selective to women. It's anybody, right? So I think the microbiome, the bacteria that live in and on our body, the microbiome project was finished more than 20 years ago. So we have a clear understanding of which bacteria are beneficial,

which are not, in different parts of the body. The skin microbiome is obviously much different than the oral microbiome, which is completely different than the bacteria in the colon. And so it's a balanced diet in moderation. It's a lot of fiber, so we can get short-chain fatty acids. And it's basically eliminating anything that's antiseptic. So don't use antiseptic mouthwash. Get rid of fluoride in your toothpaste. And really selectively use, don't use antiseptic mouthwash. Get rid of fluoride in your toothpaste.

And really selectively use, don't use antibiotics unless you absolutely have to. If it's a life-threatening illness or infection, then obviously antibiotics are extremely important. But you have to support the microbiome. You can't kill the microbiome. So for women specifically, I think the data is clear out there with douching will, you know, destroy the microbiome and doing that once a month. So we have to support the microbiome. We can't eradicate it. We can't kill it because those bacteria that live in different parts of our body are there for a reason.

Wow. And they're there to support the health of the human host. Any supplements you recommend? Yeah, so I've got a history of, you know, we've had nitric oxide supplements and different product technologies in the market for the past 10 or 12 years. But our product technology is different than anything else out there. There's been nitric oxide products on the market for 25, 26 years. Yeah. The problem is 95% of those products don't do anything with nitric oxide. So what we've done is completely different.

If your body can't make nitric oxide, then we do it done is completely different. We want, if your body can't make nitric oxide, then we do it for you. We deliver this bioactive gas. We do it in the form of an orally disintegrating tablet. We make a fermented beet powder where we optimize the nitric oxide. You put it in water, it generates this gas. And we make a topical nitric oxide for skincare, fine lines and wrinkles. Nice. But yeah, so if your body can't make it, my products do it for you. And we basically restore the body's ability to make it on its own.

Is there a way to test how optimized your body is in making it? Yeah, I developed a salivary test strip about 15 years ago. And it was the first and only non-invasive diagnostic, really point of care diagnostic for nitric oxide deficiency. So I think it's still a useful tool.

But the problem is there's false positives. So you apply the saliva into this test strip, and if it turns bright pink, then that tells us that your body's making nitric oxide. Then it's oxidized to a molecule called nitri, and we can pick that up through these saliva tests. The problem is are the false positives. So if you've got an active oral infection,

whether it's symptomatic or asymptomatic, this initiates in a local immune response. The immune cells are generating a lot of nitric oxide, and it's a false positive. So you may be increasing nitric oxide production in the mucosa of the gingival tissue from an oral infection, but systemically you're completely depleted, devoid of any nitric oxide.

So what we have to do is rely on symptoms. There's a hierarchy of symptoms now, which we recognize as nitric oxide deficiency. The first thing that shows up is erectile dysfunction in men and women. So if you can't make nitric oxide, you can't dilate the blood vessels of the sex organs, you don't get engorgement, you don't get an erection. Wow. A lot of guys have that too. 50% of the men over the age of 40 self-report ED. age of 40 self-report ED. And that's self-report. Self-report. So it's a gross underestimation. It might be 80%. That's right. And now we're seeing 20, 25-year-old kids reporting with severe erectile dysfunction. Yeah.

I mean, so it's a huge problem. So that's the first sign and symptom. We call that the canary in the coal mine. And then if you don't correct it, if you have vascular dysfunction in the blood vessels of the sex organs and you've got dysfunction in the blood vessels of the heart, the brain, it's systemic disease. So that if you don't correct it, then you start to see an increase in blood pressure. If you don't correct that, then you start to see a disruption in insulin signaling. And then you get insulin-resistant type 2 diabetes. If you don't correct that, then you cannot no longer control the blood flow to the brain, so you develop vascular dementia, Alzheimer's.

Alzheimer's is not considered diabetes type 3. Oh, is it? So that's the end result of complete nitric oxide deficiency. You get insulin resistance, and you lose the regulation of blood flow to the brain. So with our nitric oxide drug and nitric oxide product technology, we improve insulin signaling, potentiate

glucose uptake, restore blood flow to the brain, and Alzheimer's goes away. So you can reverse it? We're doing that now in FDA clinical trials. So our trial design is to see if we can take patients with early onset Alzheimer's, start them on our drug therapy, and best-case scenario, slow the progression. Or worst-case scenario, slow the progression. Best-case scenario, completely stop it and regress disease.

That would be cool. And I'm pretty confident based on the mechanism of action of nitric oxide, how we deliver our drug therapy, that it'll completely eradicate Alzheimer's as we know it today. That would be amazing. Because it's been previously thought that once you have it, it's forever, right? Yeah, that's right. And all Alzheimer's drugs have failed today,

despite billions of dollars in research. And the reason those drugs have failed is because they're after the wrong target, right? They're going after, they're targeting drugs toward the beta amyloid plaque and the tau tangles. Those are consequences of disease. They're not the cause of disease. So if you don't have adequate blood flow and you can't bring glucose in, which glucose is the primary fuel source in the brain, then you get protein misfolding. And those manifest as amyloid plaque and tautangles. So if we can normalize blood flow, potentiate insulin signaling, you get the good stuff in, you take out the waste material, there's no protein misfolding, you can maintain regular

perfusion of the brain and Alzheimer's doesn't occur. Yeah. I have the Alzheimer's gene break. I used to fear it a lot, but the more I learn about it, it seems like it's preventable if you live the right lifestyle. Well, yeah. You know, you can't blame disease on genetics anymore, right? Unless it's an inborn area metabolism and you're born with it. But this whole field of epigenetics where you can, you know, turn genes on, turn genes off, just because you have the blueprint for defective gene necessarily doesn't necessarily mean it's going to be expressed. So yeah, I think, you know, it certainly makes you more susceptible and at risk for developing these certain conditions. But I think if we take proper steps

and do the right things, it doesn't necessarily mean you're getting, it's not a death sentence and it doesn't necessarily mean you're going to manifest. Yeah. No, it scared me at the time because on 23andMe, they say you have a 50% chance. I'm like, damn, that's high. But it's lower with the right lifestyle, I feel like. Yeah, no doubt. Look, diet and lifestyle is the key. We've got to eat a balanced diet in moderation.

We've got to move. We've got to exercise. And then we've got to stop doing the things. The human body is much smarter than we are. The human body is smarter than docs, smarter than medicine. We just have to get out of the way. The human body is smarter than docs, smarter than medicine. We just have to get out of the way. The human body is regenerative by nature. Give the body what it needs, remove from the body what it doesn't need, and the body heals itself. It's really that simple. Medicine has become way

too complicated. Let's get back to the basics of biochemistry and physiology and let the body do its job. Yeah. It sounds like you lean more towards the Eastern style. Well, I think, you know, I've been in academia for 20 years and I taught in medical schools, taught future physicians. So what we've learned is that this Western model of medicine is very ineffective, right? We spend more money per capita than any industrialized nation in the world. And we have the sickest population. What does that tell us? We can't keep doing the same thing and expecting different results. Well, I look at what stood the test of time, right? When you look at Eastern medicine, traditional Chinese medicine, you know, Ayurvedic medicine, this type of medicine has lasted thousands of years, right? And it stands the test of time because it's

effective. If something isn't effective in perpetuating life then it basically it falls out of society right but these modalities have survived thousands of years and it's based on basically giving the body the essential nutrients it needs so what i've learned in in 25 years in academia is that people get sick for two reasons and two reasons only the body's missing something that it needs, nutrient deficiency, or it's exposed to something

that it doesn't need, toxins. So if we eliminate toxins from our body and replete missing nutrients, then the body heals itself. And we know that 75% of Americans are deficient in magnesium.

I think magnesium is a cofactor in 87 biochemical reactions. 95% of Americans are deficient in magnesium. I think magnesium is a cofactor in 87 biochemical reactions. Dang. 95% of Americans are deficient in iodine. Wow. Which is normally needed for iodine. I need to start taking that. Yeah.

The Western diet has no iodine. How do you get iodine? Seaweed, kelp. A lot of most Americans don't do that. Japanese are replete in, and that kind of explains their longevity. And then things like selenium, chromium, you know, the foods that are grown in America today have 78% less nutrients than they did in the 1940s. Oh my gosh. So we're a nutrient deficient society, plus we're exposed to countless toxins from the foods we eat to the environment,

you know, the air we breathe, you know, occupational hazards and toxins. So we have to be able to identify toxins that may be present in the body, eliminate them, and then do micronutrient analysis, figure out what you specifically may be missing, and then replete that missing nutrient. Then the body is designed to heal itself. So if nutrients keep getting depleted from food, does that mean everyone's going to have to start taking supplements? It's almost impossible to get enough nutrients from the foods we eat today.

You know, we did a survey, a multi-city survey in 2015. We published this. But, you know, there are regional differences in the foods we eat from New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Raleigh. And so it's based on the soil conditions. It's based on, you know, the application of herbicides and pesticides that basically deplete the bacteria that are essential for assimilating nutrients into plants and vegetables. So there's a whole field of agronomy that basically tells us the best way to grow food. But the problem has been the pressures of feeding a growing planet population is at the expense of nutrient density.

We don't do soil crop rotations anymore. We've been programmed to eat organic. Organic means that you can't have herbicides or pesticides, but organic restricts nitrogen-based fertilizers being added to the soil. So if there's no nitrogen in the soil, you can't assimilate nitrate, and you can't assimilate other nutrients. So organic is good because you're not getting exposed to toxins and herbicides or pesticides, but it's really difficult, if not impossible, to eat enough organic vegetables or foods and get the nutrients we need

to support normal metabolic activity. Wow. I didn't know that. So organic foods are lacking nutrients. That's right. Holy crap. Yeah. You never hear that anywhere. Yeah. I tell people, you know i'm fortunate i live on 800 acres i raise my own beef i grow my own vegetables but every year i do soil samples and send it off and figure out what does this soil have in it and what's missing and then what's missing i fertilize i replete that missing nutrient that's cool and then you know you don't have herbicides or pesticides but you've got nutrient nutrient-dense food. Yeah, the herbicides are big. The pesticides are just killing people.

It's getting in the water now. Yeah. It's in 60% of rainwater. Yeah. That's crazy. No, it's, I mean, as I said, we live in a very toxic environment. And so we have to eliminate the best we can exposure to these toxins. And it's very difficult because they're everywhere, as you said.

Yeah, chemtrails. Yeah. Used to be a conspiracy, but now they're just open about it. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I was in Costa Rica for a couple of weeks ago, and you know you don't see it, and it's really a magical place. It's one of the blue zones, right? But you certainly don't see the chemtrails.

You're surrounded by nature, food fresh from the source. You know, the restaurants will take the food, and it's also in Peru and South America. Yeah. You know, the crops they harvest the food, and it's also in Peru and South America. You know, the crops they harvest that day, they're brought to the local markets. You cook them up. It's magical. Sounds so good.

Yeah. I wish we had more of that here, man. Well, I think we're going to have to learn to do that. We're going to have to be self-sufficient. Yeah. And, you know, whether it's a backyard garden that you control the conditions and be able to grow your own food,

I think it's essential for good health. Yeah. What diet are you on right now? You know, I'm not a big fan of extreme diets. I think there's benefits of a straight vegan, straight carnivore diet. I'm kind of more of a ketogenic. I eat a lot of meat. I try to eliminate simple carbohydrates, throw in some vegetables.

I don't drink sodas. Typically, I try to avoid sugar. But yeah, a lot of protein, some vegetables, very little carbs. Nice. Have you done any studies on sedentary lifestyles? Yeah, look, I mean, that's a major problem too. And exercise is one of the most potent activators and stimulators of nitric oxide production. And that's why exercise is medicine because it, you know, it lowers your blood pressure, it prevents the inflammation, it prevents the onset and progression of cardiovascular disease.

And all that can be explained by the stimulatory effects on nitric oxide production. So if you're not moving, you're not activating this pathway and you develop endothelial dysfunction, that's really the start of nitric oxide deficiency. Wow, that's concerning for me as a podcast host sitting down eight hours a day. Yeah, no, that's the problem, right? Most people go to their office for eight hours, they get in their car,

they drive home and they sleep for six, seven hours and there's no exercise. We're not moving anymore. Right. And there's consequences to that. So, you know, and the other thing, the people that try to do right by eating the right foods, getting exercise, if you use mouthwash, you actually lose the protective benefits of exercise. Wow. That's crazy. Yeah. And I was on the doctor show, I guess, probably two or three years ago,

where we revealed that. So even if you just try to do all the right things, but you use mouthwash or fluoride, you're getting none of the benefits of that. mean that's almost everyone no it's every yeah it's two or three americans and i think the statistics are probably global a lot of the fluoride stuff i try to push it out it gets shadow banned on social media yeah look a lot of the things that are out there that especially in the nitric oxide field what we do is very disruptive no right so there are a lot of big companies and a lot of people who don't want to see this. Because when you start to realize that medicine is a business, then you have the number one rule of business is don't lose a customer. And so if you start seeing technology being introduced where you can start getting people off prescription medications and really making them better and not dependent upon pharma, then that's disruptive. Yep. Right? And same thing to a lot of these big pharma companies who have consumer product goods divisions like mouthwash, toothpaste, billions of dollars of revenue.

Yeah. I think Cuban took a big step with his company, you know, going after those pharmacies, charging a thousand X on their drugs. So that was really cool to see. But look, the biochemistry and physiology of the human is very well described and very well elucidated. We have to get back to that and support the normal body functions and eliminate things that are disrupting it. And things like fluoride are extremely dangerous. They're toxic.

Things like antacids are not only toxic, they're deadly. You know, the COX-2 inhibitors like the Vioxx and Celebrex of 25 years ago were taken off the market because they were causing heart attacks and strokes. But yet, things like Prilosec, Prevacid, they're still on the, in fact, you can get them over the counter. Yeah. People pop those tums like candy, man. Yeah. And so, it has consequences. And I argue that they should be taken off the market.

Because when we look at the risk-benefit quotient, right, what is the benefit that they're providing at what risk? And really, they provide no benefit, maybe for the acute symptomatic relief of gastroesophageal reflux. But the risk, taking these chronically, 40% higher heart attack, stroke, and Alzheimer's. So if there's very little benefit and all risk, then the decision's easy. And it's not just, I mean, I use that for any decision I make, whether it's the daily decisions I make or certainly if I'm, what drug therapy I may be taking. What are the benefits? What are the risks? If there's no benefits, it's all risk. It's very easy. If it's all benefit, no risk, again, it's very easy. When it's a balance, you have to figure out for yourself and make a personal decision.

Do I need this drug to provide the benefit to me but mitigate the risk? I love that. Dr. Bryan, it's been really enlightening learning from you. Anything you want to close off with or promote? No, I encourage people just to find out about nitric oxide. I think it's one of these things that, you know, it's up and coming. As we build awareness, people are going to start to realize, you know, this is a critical molecule and I need to start paying attention to it and really get a clear understanding of, is my body making nitric oxide? And then obviously we have product technology to do it for you. But

you know, I send people to my educational website. It's drnathansbryan.com. I do a monthly blog. There's some videos on there that'll teach and inform you about nitric oxide. I have them on the YouTube channel, on social media. So just tell people to get informed. And that's the beauty of what you do because we're providing awareness to people on topics that they otherwise wouldn't know about. Absolutely. Thanks for this, man. Yeah, thank you.

I think people will change their lives and stop using mouthwash. That's right. Let's do it, guys. Thanks for watching. See you tomorrow. Thank you.