Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - #249 BITESIZE | How to Improve Your Gut Health, Your Immunity and How You Age | Dr Jenna Macciochi

Starting point is 00:00:00 Today's Bite Size episode is brought to you by AG1, a science-driven daily health drink with over 70 essential nutrients to support your overall health. It includes vitamin C and zinc, which helps support a healthy immune system, something that is really important at this time of year. It also contains prebiotics and digestive enzymes that help support your gut health. It's really tasty and has been in my own life for over five years. Until the end of January, AG1 are giving a limited time offer. Usually they offer my listeners a one-year supply of vitamin D and K2 and five free travel packs with their first order. But until the end of January, they are doubling the five free travel packs to

Starting point is 00:00:51 10. And these packs are perfect for keeping in your backpack, office, or car. If you want to take advantage of this limited time offer, all you have to do is go to drinkag1.com forward slash live more. Welcome to Feel Better Live More Bite Size, your weekly dose of positivity and optimism to get you ready for the weekend. Today's clip is from episode 125 of the podcast with immunologist and author Dr. Jenna Machoke. In this clip, Jenna explains how our immune system plays a central role in our health, our well-being and our longevity and describes some simple things that we can all do to help keep it healthy.

Starting point is 00:01:51 pretty much every chronic long-term health complaint stroke condition that we have in many ways the immune system plays a central role and i don't think people realize that no no why do you think that might be i mean we've just always maintained this lens through which we look at the immune system as protecting us from infection. And then suddenly you start to dive into the field of immunology and you realize it's not just protecting us from infection, it's doing a whole array of other things. And I kind of like to move away from that military analogy we often have about the immune system as going out to battle off the germs because most of the time it's not doing that most of the time it's kind of like your housekeeper right now as we sit here it's working hard it's involved in so many processes you know

Starting point is 00:02:35 like cells in your body have a finite lifespan so eventually they die and they have to be disposed of and special immune cells are removing those and keeping things tidy they're repairing damage when it happens even if there's no infection it's like a mobile brain i think it's it's very dynamic and it's listening integrating all these signals from our environment from inside us and then producing the appropriate response to kind of keep things in balance yeah and what's fascinating for me is that it's not something passive that we have no influence over there is a lot that we can do a lot of it quite simple stuff that can positively impact how our immune system works a lot of people talk about gut health these days

Starting point is 00:03:25 but i don't think people understand the immune system's linked to you know they think the gut is separate but i i often teach uh doctors about this triad between our diet our gut bugs and our immune system and how they all sort of cross talk oh definitely yeah there's bi-directional communication between you know diets and gut bugs diets and immune system and how they all sort of cross talk oh definitely yeah there's bi-directional communication between you know diets and gut bugs diets and immune system and gut bugs and immune system together it's like this so you know if you if you make certain dietary choices you're going to improve the health of your gut bugs which is going to improve the health of your immune system yes exactly just empowering right because we can do something about that yes your gut bugs the microbiota at the interface of your digestion and the rest of your body are one of the key educators of the immune system and again this is something that's

Starting point is 00:04:17 probably exploded in the field of of immunology in the last 10-15 years. So if you take an experimental animal model where the animals have a reduced or a minimal collection of good bacteria in their gut, their immune system doesn't develop. And they're very impaired in how they can respond and heal. And even things like, you know, protection from cancer, because our immune system is the main cancer surveillance system. So these bugs are helping to educate and teach and mature our immune system. And this happens potentially in utero before we're born, but predominantly when we enter the world because we go from a relatively sterile. There is some evidence that there may be some bugs in the placenta but we go into this hugely germy world and suddenly our immune system has to cope with

Starting point is 00:05:14 that because it's got all these receptors on it to to detect pathogens as being problematic so it has to learn to tolerate those because you know most of the bugs around us are safe and harmless and we need them because they're helping us and that's actually how the immune system develops isn't it it is by exposure to the environment around it to the bugs around it to sort of give it that sort of ongoing education so it starts to learn, oh, I respond to this. I don't need to respond to that. Exactly. I often say that, you know, the immune system's made, it's not born. There's maybe a percentage in the genetics that we inherit, but then it's made, it's

Starting point is 00:05:56 built throughout our life and it changes throughout our life. That's a lovely idea. It's made made not born we can we can build and we can sort of develop it the way we want to if we give it the right inputs yeah these bacteria they help protect the gut barrier to keep it very nice and tight and stop any bacteria going into the body because they're only good bacteria if they're in the right location so they're not meant to cross over the gut and enter our body yeah because then they become a problem but one of the biggest things that they're doing to help our immune system is they're they're eating our food and i often think your diet's only as good as your microbiota in your

Starting point is 00:06:41 gut because they are they're the interface they're eating your food they're helping you to produce these vitamins and minerals from your diet but they're also producing these post biotics um and people might have heard of prebiotics and probiotics but post biotics are basically the metabolic waste of the bugs in your gut so they're producing stuff that is their kind of you know waste product of eating your food like short-chain fatty acids is the classic one i i used to work on these when i lived in switzerland um and looking at how they influence um inflammation in the gut and beyond so short-chain fatty acids are kind of a metabolic byproduct of the bugs in your gut. And they directly bind to the immune cells at that site.

Starting point is 00:07:30 And they help educate them and teach them to tolerate anything that you're throwing down your mouth. Because we're not supposed to react to that because it should be benign things that are going in there. But they have to help strike that balance that if you did get some kind of food poisoning they also can identify the bad bugs so they help create an environment that's what we call tolerogenic so it's encouraging tolerance of the food that you're eating and there's a very kind of dynamic interaction between these bugs and the immune cells and i'd say what happens in the gut is not just staying there this influence this sort of tolerogenic influence of things like short-chain fatty acids is also being absorbed into your bloodstream and helping regulate the immune system

Starting point is 00:08:16 one of the key things that is often not linked to your immune system but i'd say it's like massive for the resilience of your immune system is fiber so pills and and potions and whatever are not full of fiber but the fresh produce is full of fiber and people might be thinking why is fiber important for your immune system different bugs need different forms of fiber and we find it in all the plant-based foods so it's not just the fruits and vegetables nuts and seeds legumes beans pulses and and whole grains and it's about trying to bring in the diversity i think in the last few years there's a publication about the sort of trying to get 30 different plant-based foods into your diet because it's per week yeah because it's about the diversity

Starting point is 00:09:06 but also it's that includes i think lentils and nuts yeah you know and you know i think it's very achievable yeah once people have it in their mind exactly yeah to do it and they're very common in in traditional diets i remember growing up you know my mom would would add lots of different um grains and beans and pulses to spin things out as she put it so that you could make a dish go a lot further and so now that's something that i do as well the joya de tavola which is an italian phrase for enjoying being at the table linking food to emotions because endorphins from enjoying being at your table with your family, your friends, or even on your own and just enjoying the meal. Endorphins can alter the

Starting point is 00:09:52 function of our immune cells because they have receptors for those on them. So those feel good hormones that actually helps nurture things like the Tregs, the regulatory T cells. So bringing the food together with the emotion and enjoying that, that's so, so important. I mean, we haven't had a kitchen for the last four months, so we've had no table, no joy, but we've still been trying to cobble together as a family, you know, little meals on the floor. You know what? I'm so delighted to hear you speak about these things because I think these are things we've missed in health advice. It has been too reductionist. Eating at a table with your community, your tribe has kind of always been a part of human culture. And I think if you sort of extend the argument that you're making, it's kind of always been a part of human culture. And I think if you sort of extend the argument

Starting point is 00:10:46 that you're making, it's kind of like, well, you could potentially eat the same foods feeling stressed out and lonely. Yeah. And the same food might have a different response if you're eating it with good friends when you're feeling relaxed and calm. I know I've heard you talk about before that stress impacts the the microbiome the gut bugs but it also impacts the

Starting point is 00:11:12 cortisol receptor doesn't say it's yes yeah it's kind of like you're constantly revving your engine but you've got your foot on the brake at the same time and we have ways and means of switching off the stress response but that circuit gets worn out a little bit when it's constantly at play and everything just starts to get off balance from then and because you know our immune cells have receptors for all of the different hormones stress chemistry they're being influenced by that as well it's influencing the production of fresh new immune cells from the bone marrow so things like cortisol can have a sort of dampening effect on that and there's a concept of the immunological space i'm not sure if you've heard of this but we only have

Starting point is 00:11:57 so much space in our body for immune cells and over your, your immune cells proliferate when we see an infection, and we sort of gather up more and more immune cells until it becomes full. And we kind of have to wait for the old ones to die off before our body can produce fresh new ones. And older immune cells are more likely to go wrong. So we need to have a way of getting rid of the old ones and bringing in the new ones. and so this kind of balance can be really interrupted by being stressed out all the time. Is there anything you do yourself having experienced the negatives of burning the candle at both ends you're really trying to say yes to everyone and do everything. Oh it's the hardest lesson yeah getting pneumonia yeah when you couldn't do anything

Starting point is 00:12:45 what if you as an immunologist yourself but also as a human who's susceptible to the same practice as all of us what have you changed i've tried to be a bit more open because i hate seeing in in the wellness sphere people looking like their life is perfect and i just think we all get it wrong it's still my learning curve but it's just on my radar now that I'm always experimenting. I'm learning how to say no. I think having boundaries was one of the biggest things

Starting point is 00:13:12 I learned as an adult. Why are we not teaching kids this in school? And saying no is okay. And there's a time and a place for projects if I want to get involved. And it can't be now because that compromises my time as a mother or my time spent with family or my time just, you know, being on my own or doing the

Starting point is 00:13:32 things that nurture my day, then I have to say no and let go of that. And I guess that's like, you know, the catharticism of writing or some ways of you know putting a narrative to what's stressing us out has a release to it and that you can feel that you know like a big physiological sigh that your body is making when you're like okay and once the decision's made you move on from it i've said no to that it's sad and i wish i could say yes but i don't think about it the next day when i've moved on and other things are you know it's very free I wish I could say yes but I don't think about it the next day when I've moved on and other things are you know it's very freeing actually you know something I've struggled with for years and it's I'm getting much better at it but it's it feels good yeah looking after your

Starting point is 00:14:17 immune system it's really important yes and I would say taking care of your immune system is for life. It's for the long game. You know, immunity is really entwined with how we age. So, you know, if you want to live a long and healthy life, we are as a population living much longer than the generations before us. But we're not necessarily living better. we're not necessarily living better you know i don't necessarily want to live forever but i want to be able to enjoy my years and feel well and not be sort of burdened with chronic disease and we can't bulletproof ourselves but there's definitely things we can do now that that are for the long game hope you enjoyed that bite-sized clip. Have a wonderful weekend.

Starting point is 00:15:05 And I'll be back next week with my long-form conversational Wednesday and the latest episode of Bite Science next Friday.

Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - #249 BITESIZE | How to Improve Your Gut Health, Your Immunity and How You Age | Dr Jenna Macciochi

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