The Dr Louise Newson Podcast - 016 - The Importance of a Plant-Based Diet - Edward Joy & Dr Louise Newson

Episode Date: September 24, 2019

Edward Joy has over 20 years’ experience as a complimentary healthcare practitioner, as an ethnobotanist Edward spends much of his time studying the components of plants in an aim to understand their nutritional benefits but he also adopts naturopathy into his practice.   Edward contributes regularly to articles for Only Natural and Holistic Therapist magazines. His  informal lectures and herb walks are attended by health professionals in the UK and throughout Europe from Ireland to Italy.  For the past 12 years Edward has worked closely with the Naturopathic Supplements Company, Bionutri, where his work includes procurement and product development. Working with an ingredient is one thing, ensuring the ingredient has benefit is Edward’s particular point of interest.   In an informal conversation with Dr Louise Newson, Edward Joy discusses the way herbs influence our health, particularly when integrated into the diet.  Edward Joy's Three Take Home Tips: When it comes to the menopause, don't deny it. Don't look for foods and herbs that can 'turn back the clock', look for ways to support and facilitate this time in your life. Think about supplements but do your research and look for the best quality. Be true to yourself! Be honest about your diet and nutrition and the areas you might be able to improve.

Welcome to the Newsome Health Menopause podcast. I'm Dr Louise Newsom, a GP and menopause specialist, and I run the Newston Health Menopause and Wellbeing Centre here in Stratford-upon-Avon. Today I've got a nun doctor here, which is always exciting for me. So I've got Edward Joy, who is a botanist and also a naturopath. And he's come here just to talk about something that is. is probably a lot of people think about but don't know much about, including myself. So I'm hoping the next half hour I can be enlightened too.

So welcome. Thanks for coming. Thank you, Louise. So talk to me about your journey and how you've got to do what you do now. Well, I've worked as a holistic practitioner in one way or another and with the health food industry for 20 to 25 years. And my interest really started out simply. with health foods, buying and selling health foods.

And later on in my work, in my early 20s, I was diagnosed with lymphatic cancer. Oh, gosh. And over a period of two years, the prognotists got more and more difficult to treat. The disease was either too responsive or not responsive enough to chemotherapy. and eventually we decided to stop treatment. Gosh. And moved on to see how I could treat myself in an integrative way. So how old were you then?

I was 21. So huge things are going on. Were you at university then? Or where were you in your life then? I just left university and I had been travelling around the world. I returned. very thin, very tired, and, you know, unpicked the problem and it was deeper than I imagine. Wow, so really scary. That's going on in your mind.

Yeah, very scary. But it was one of those times where you find, at your lowest, you discover things, interests that, you know, create a whole new world for you. Yes. And really my work ever since then has been very much about, that experience and getting out and over that experience. Yes. So you've turned a very negative experience into something positive that's helping lots of other people as well. But it's interesting because I often say to patients when they're at their lowest, you will look back and sometimes I think there's a reason for, you know, why something's happened and you can't see it at the time. And perhaps if this hadn't happened,

you wouldn't be doing what you've done. Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean, my interest has never been and will never be to treat cancer. No. That's not my work. No. But understanding the pathways that led to my own problems and seeing the lifestyle inhibitions and dysfunctions that lead to other people's dysfunction, diseases, are very much my interest.

And what I see is the major missing link in people. lives is their nutrition. Totally. And I think what I see as a result of my own experience is there are always opportunities to find the way back. Yes. But what we find is often something else that is dressed up as the way back. And it doesn't actually lead to a solution.

It often leads to a lesser representation of what. what actually nutrition is. Yeah. Which is sort of one of the struggles of our modern world. It's huge, isn't it? And I, as a medical profession, I can embarrassingly sit here and tell you that I don't think I had any lectures about nutrition

as an undergraduate, certainly not as a postgraduate. I was taught about the main food groups, clearly how important they are. But very little. And I was sort of my medical school in the 80s, So a lot of it was low-fat diets, how good they are, how fat is evil. And wow, hasn't that changed? And for me, nutrition is such an important part of my personal life,

but also my life with patients as well. And I think we're probably a similar age. But, you know, what we ate in the late 70s, early 80s, when we were growing up, is very different to, well, actually it's what I feed my children now, but it's very hard for me to go and shop like my mother used to. and it's a real problem. And people don't always know how to eat properly. They get scared, don't they?

And it's absolutely scary. No, I think it's not only scary, but through that supermarket system, through that the modern system of buying food, actually the way that we do things now, it makes it very difficult to think holistically about what we're eating because we are very much channeled into this way of doing things. And we're not, it's not only that we are time poor, we're told we're time poor.

Totally. I totally agree. I mean, I work very hard, but my children have home-cooked meals every day and everyone says, well, how do you do it? Well, I've got a freezer, actually. And I, you know, it's very easy if you know what you're doing. But I think we very much, you go in a supermarket, there's low fat, whatever is labelled. People think that's it.

And people don't realize the amount of sugar even in savory food, do they? No. So people say, well, I cook really well. I have a ready-made sauce that I put on my vegetables. Well, what's in that sauce? Well, I'm sure it's fine. No, actually. You know, and I think people are miseducated, aren't they, for the wrong reasons, which is a shame.

I think they are. And I think that the constitution of food and our awareness of the constitution of food is what is really missing, you know. how different that can of sauce is to the ingredients that could make up the thing that it's supposed to represent. And the things that are missing, not just the things that are added, you know. Absolutely. If you're talking about a pasta source, then the oregano, the rosemary, the parsley that represents a decent source. sort of Italian sauce, it's not just there for character. It's not just there to fit in with what it is to be Italian.

It's there because it's part of the synergy that makes up a decent plate of food. And the reason that makes a decent plate of food to my mind is because it sort of fulfills a need for basic nutrition at the same time. So because herbs are so important, aren't they? And so many people say, well, it's too hard to grow them. You know, a lot of people have dried herbs or even frozen herbs. Just explain for those people who don't know the difference or if there are differences between them,

if they aren't growing them themselves, what should they do? Well, I think people have sort of two different points of view about herbs. Either herbs are the domain of the medical. herbalist who's sort of mixing up potions in an apothecary or herbs are the things that gather dust in a corner of the kitchen and and and and and and and and and and and I think both of those ideals do basic herbalism as part of everybody's life they do a great disservice because where I think we really miss out on herbs is embracing them as part of our diet every day. Now, we often talk about the new super food or the new super herb that's on the on the marketplace.

But those also do herbs a disservice because to my mind in my research and my study and in my wider understanding about herbalism and nutrition, the best herbs, the herbs that do people the most good, other herbs that aren't classed as medicinal. herbs. They're herbs that are considered every day as part of a normal diet. Because I think where herbalism is at its most successful is where it fits in to basic nutrition. Yes. It fits in little shortfalls in basic nutrition. I can give you, I can give you two examples. Yeah, please do. In a wide group of herbs, say dandelion, lemon balm, peppermint, green tea, you find a flavon called luteolin. And luteolin often is associated with herbs that have a lemonish or limeish sort of aroma. And there's another flavon that we associate with the same. smell of herbs that have an appelly scent. So herbs like chamomile, parsley, they have a flavon inside of them

called apigenin. And apigenin, for one thing, smells of apples, but it also, it has, it has quite a distinctive taste that it imparts. So those two flavonings, bones, we might look at them as part of their characteristic in medicinal herbs, but that couldn't be further from the truth because their role is fundamentally nutritional. They fulfil part of the diet of the epithelial cell. They're a fundamental part of the diet and energy behind the human epithelial cell. And you'll know that epithelial cells make up getting on for two-thirds of our overall tissue. So they're quite important.

But these flavones that sit inside of these herbs are not classed as nutrients. They're not essential nutrients or vitamins, but they are fundamental to our health. And what I see with them is that we are an animal that has come from a background where we would, graze throughout the day on green leafy vegetables as part of our diet. That is who we were. And it's actually who we still are. And we have to account to that history. And with a diet like that, we would get apigenin and luteolin in tiny little doses throughout our lives. And it would

fulfill our need for those phytonutrients. But where that gets lost is when we're not grazing through the hedgerow, we're going down to the supermarket. And we think about nutrition. We think about macro nutrition, the big nutrients. We think of micronutrition, the vitamins and maybe the fatty acids. Yes. But those have always been a.

part of those fundamental phytonutrients and they're sort of the missing link as I see between nutrients being genuinely synergistic. And I think really in the greater scheme of things, if there is, if I could point to one thing that we miss, it's the herbalism inside of nutrition. She's so interesting, isn't it? Because certainly thinking, reflected to my biochemistry lectures, it was about the three main food groups, and then we learned all about the vitamins and even looking at my daughter's biology books.

She's just done her GCSEs. Again, it's very much like that. No one will talk about anything else. And I make my children a tomato. It's a standard Thursday night meal. They have this tomato sauce. But I put in butternut squash. I put in spinach.

I put in corgettes. I've put in lentils. I put in food that they would never have on their plate. And in fact, I was talking to my eight-year-old this morning and we were talking about the importance of fruits and vegetables and she was listing what she liked. And I said, but Lucy, you've always, you've also, for years, eating all these other foods and I reel them off. And she looked at gas. I said, no, but they're all in that tomato sauce. And my mother sometimes says, oh, when I've bought a homemade, a ready-made tomato sauce from wait-hose, it will be fine. No, absolutely not. It's completely different, but it looks the same, it's red.

You know, it goes on the pasta, it's fine, but actually isn't that different? And I think it's, but if you haven't got that knowledge of, it's just a bit of green colour, isn't it, a herb, what's the difference? You know, why do I need it? Yeah. But actually, just to explain how simple, you know, it's very cheap herbs, aren't they? They're very cheap, very effective, and they taste lovely as well. They transform the foods we eat into something that is far more complex.

Yes. And I think in our obsession with, you know, coming up with the vital components of nutrition, we miss the nuance of phytonutrition. And I think that is a shame. You know, I've had the same experience with my own son. He says to me, I hate garlic. I hate garlic. But he doesn't realize that he probably gets through personally half a bulb of garlic a week. You know, I mean, he doesn't, he has no conception that that's part

of his diet and a fundamental part of his diet. And in reality, he loves garlic just as much as I do. He sees, he sees its importance. And I reckon he knows when garlic is not part. art of his because it forms part of the the flavor balance of his food

catalogue if you like so that is really where herbalism should sit in people's lives but it's missing and it's not just been missing for a little while it's been missing

for quite a long time in you know we are experiencing a generation now who have never had a good diet. You know? I know. I mean, when you look at the incidence of childhood obesity, it's a huge problem. And certainly recently they announced again, didn't they, that obesity is one of the

commonest risk factors for all types of cancer. Yeah. It's overtaken smoking. It's horrendous what we're doing to our planet. It's really awful. And I do look at my children and think they're very spoiled because I cook for them. and they've got to learn because they're going to be, you know, they're the next generation, aren't they?

And it's so easy now to graze on the wrong food and to eat badly, which it wasn't so easy 20, 30 years ago. But it's really a concern, isn't it? It is a concern and it's frustrating that we're not getting anywhere with it. Yes. You know, every year that goes by, the problem gets worse and more solutions are presented and the problem persists. And I think that at some point we have to say,

actually we just need to start embracing what it is to be human. You know, not just this constant outsourcing and allowing other people to take responsibility for our own health. that there is a great part of nutrition that asks somebody to embrace their system of health. And I think in part we need to start to do this as part of a solution. We need to say to people, you know, your health is, if you can have it, is the best thing you're worth. Of course it is. Absolutely. I mean, I'm very privileged being a doctor and I obviously see all sorts of people.

But, you know, without health, we're nothing, are we? No. And it sounds so corny. But, you know, my middle daughter had sepsis a couple of years ago, and the type of sepsis she had was a 40% mortality. And you're in that hospital looking at your daughter being so poorly. And it's not about money. It's not about anything.

It's just if you don't have health, that's it. You know, and we know how fragile our lives are. Anyway, very depressing. Let's move to something. a bit more happier. So tell me about how you got your training or how you've learned so much. Well, I think my earliest training was in my grandmother's kitchen. Right.

And I think that that was a pretty good training ground. My grandmother was the daughter of a doctor. She was grew up in India. And she was fascinated by herbalism throughout her life. But she applied herbalism in very much the way that I am talking about today, that it is part of nutrition, not something separate to nutrition. And really that is where I come from. You know, my later life, particularly when I was unwell,

was spent studying naturopathy, studying botany, understanding what it is about plants. that has this effect on us. And learning where we fit into all that, that is still today my great point of research that actually, and what I'd gotten from that is that actually, we're not so different to everything else.

You know, we behave in a way that is separate to everything else in nature. And we even mold nature to suit us better. Yes. But when it freely comes down to it and when it comes down to our basic needs, we need nature. We need every aspect of nature to function as well as it can because without it, we can't function. Absolutely. And that's really where nutrition comes in because our nutrition is what attaches us.

to planet Earth. We are bound to the earth by our nutrition. You know, we are essentially made up of the same components that make up the world that we live on. And then we are stimulated and nourished by the other things that grow on this planet. So we are in every way a part of that whole system. And what I have learned, particularly, in the last 10 years is that where we miss those links, we open up a pathway for disease, for dysfunction. And that is where the problems in many people's lives begins. Absolutely.

And I think as a doctor, more and more my work is looking at disease prevention rather than disease treatment. And if we, no, I'm not, I'm not sitting here saying we can eradicate all diseases from a healthy diet. But actually we can eradicate a lot. And we had a very interesting lecture recently at the British Menopal Society conference about, is obesity a disease? And all of us thought, no, it's not. But actually, it leads to so many diseases and it can be thought of a disease process. And even certainly with my menopause work, the menopause is not a disease. Women will all go through it if they live long enough, but it will lead to other diseases without that fundamental estrogen

in the body increases risk of heart disease. and osteoporosis. And nutrition is so important. As I said to you before, we started the podcast, we recently did a survey looking at women's experience of their menopause. And only 24% had been given any information about their diet and lifestyle, which I think is shocking. It's really important. It's not just about medicine. But a lot of women and men probably are, I talked to very confused about the whole natural side of things. So a lot of people say to me, well, they don't want HRT because it's not natural. And so they'll go and buy some supplements because they're natural. And I have this whole discussion saying, well, there's a lot of plants out there that

aren't safe. Arsenic, for example, isn't safe. Lots of drugs are made from plants. So they're not, although they're made in a factory. So there's this whole sort of mind shift, isn't there, about what's safe and what isn't safe. And then there's the whole sort of supplements argument. People say, well, I don't need any supplements because I eat a really good diet. Or other people say, well, I don't need to eat a good diet because I'm getting some, I take a multivitamin. Yes.

So what's your take of all of that? It's a fascinating and complex issue. And I think there are these problems that you have to overcome. There's a massive amount of misinformation about what is a supplement, what is a medicine, and whether a herb is safe. And, you know, there's also the problem of quality. A lot of people import things from far away countries with the hope of them acting in a certain way.

They can either do them an awful lot of harm. And often in the best situation, the thing that they were buying in the first place wasn't even in there. Yes. And they end up just being con. Because this is what I often say to people, if I prescribe you something and certainly, as you might know, a lot of HRT is derived from the yam, the root vegetable, but it is regulated, I know what's in it. Whereas I've seen people literally with carrier bags of supplements, they've got often from the internet, and you have no idea what's in them.

And even if they're labelled the same supplement from different companies, they often contain different amounts of the product, don't they? Yeah, absolutely. I've always been very sceptical and cool. cautious about the principle of people coming away with a bag full of supplements. Absolutely. You know, I think that nutrition, I think we sometimes behave like nutrition has changed in the last 40 years, but in reality, nutrition hasn't changed in the last 30,000 years. Yes, yeah, yeah. And actually, the rudiments of it are quite simple.

And I believe there is never a nutritional case for somebody leaving a shrubon. with a bag full of supplements. I do believe that there is a fundamental place for supplements in the modern diet, particularly with regard to disease, disease prevention, but not treating a disease. And I think that's where people get things wrong. Yes. And I'm misled. I think that a supplement in its...

its best form can act on the nutritional pathways of an individual and that they can open up many of those nutritional pathways, whether that is with pure nutrients or it is supported by phytonutrients. In many places, probiotics can be involved. Absolutely. Amino acids, minerals, they all play their role in our nutrition, whether that is our gastrointestinal nutrition supporting our microenvironment or our internal

system, a systemic nutrition. So I think that where I stand in the whole scheme of things is that the best person to regulate medicine as a medic

because as you well pointed out, when you recommend a medicine, there are certain things about that medicine, that you know. Yes. There are certain concentrations of that medicine and certain things that you can expect to see.

There are a lot of things that happen when people take medicines that are not very nice. But that is part of a controlled system that can be monitored. The problem with the frontier mentality that is brought very often by the internet is that people,

can end up trying to treat a disease with material that cannot be regulated. Absolutely. And it can do them harm. And it's a real worry, isn't it? Because it seems to be escalating more and more women come and they're telling me about things that they buy and it's from companies I've never heard of and they, you know, especially with the menopause because a lot of menopause or women are very vulnerable. We, you know, I had symptoms for a few months and I was desperate for any help.

And if someone said to me right, Louise, take this. It will cost you £300 a month, but it will really transform you. You're so desperate you would do it. Yeah. But you don't know what's in these products. And that's what's really scary. So getting good advice is really important, isn't it? Yeah, I think getting good medical advice and getting good nutritional advice are part of getting to a healthy platform.

Yeah. You know. And they are not the same thing. thing. No. You know, there are situations where people get into where the menopause affects them in a way that it opens up all manner of different, different symptoms that they can't control and they can't live with, they can't work with.

Absolutely. And getting on top of that nutritionally is a very different thing to getting on top of that medicinally. Absolutely. And I think in the best environment, the two systems can support each other beautifully. And I think what is what is has really been missing from modern medicine is the ability of those three things to come together because they're natural partners. Yes. And there's some really key doctors doing some great work trying to improve nutrition, health and education and trying to bring nutrition into medical schools, which is really, is really.

important because, you know, there's no point me treating someone, for example, with an HRT patch and then going and eating McDonald's every day or smoking 20 a day and not exercising. It's, you know, we've got to look beyond the box. And I think as medics, we sort of have been channeled into giving people prescriptions, which is good, don't get me wrong, but it's only part of treatment for all sorts of diseases. And also, like you say, more important, importantly, preventing disease. None of us want to go to a doctor. No. So we want to stay away.

No, no. Absolutely. I think in all cases, you know, if we're talking about the menopause, you're dealing with something that is part of the natural process of life. You know, going from one state in the endocrine system to another. Yeah. It's a transitional phase. It's absolutely is. And I think what also is that hopefully,

for many women will be 30 years in our menopause and it's the longest time that will be in this sort of state. You know, some women will be pregnant, some women will, or a lot of us have periods. But then suddenly we've got this big chunk of time and I really feel if we can optimise our health in that time by having the right nutrition, the right health treatments, potentially hormones,

looking at what's missing in our diet, looking at any supplements, it can make a huge difference because it should be a really positive time of a woman's life and sadly for too many women it's not. Oh, nice. So, well, that's been really interesting and I think has been great literally food for thought for a lot of people hopefully. Just for the last couple of minutes, can you just give me three take-home facts that you think would be really interesting for listeners to reflect on from our conversation and your work

that you've done? Well, I think, first of all, I would say that particularly when thinking about the menopause and thinking about treating the menopause, often when you think about herbalism, people think about the herbs that will try and make them feel like they were 10 years younger. And that part of treating that system is very often about turning back the clock. You can't turn back the clock. And what I think you can do really well is support the transition. So I think my take home point would be to say, facilitate it.

Don't try to deny it. You know, it's part of life. And there are things that can be done from every angle. So, you know, going out and reaching out for the herbs that are adaptogenic or trying to look for something. think that he's going to stimulate you to be something else. What's the point in the end? And so I think I would probably leave it at that. I would say,

keep the herbs nutritional, if that's what you're going to do and look to support your basic nutrition with nutrients, with supplements, because in their best form, they can really help you. They're not.

I recognise that there is a problem with supplements. I really do. And I've worked in the health food industry long enough to see how dark it can be. But we live in an age that is not a particularly natural state of affairs. And supplements can form part of what it is to fulfil our nutrition. needs. So I think my second take-home point would be to say, think about supplements, but think about the best quality, the best supported, the best researched, the supplements that don't

look to bypass your nutritional pathways, but look to fulfill them. I think that is two points. I'm not sure I can manage to find a third. We'll have still all that. I think the third one maybe is about being true to yourself. And I see a lot of women who tell me their diets really healthy. And then when I'll ask them, you realise that it's not. And we all can think that we're better than we are. But actually, what's the point?

You know, I think it's about being honest to ourselves because it's our journey. It's our life. It's not up to my husband, what I eat or how I live my life. It's mine. And I think when you take ownership and your responsibility, for your health, for your diet, for your nutrition. That's when you start to make changes, I think. So maybe I could have that.

I appreciate it. Yeah, that one's fine. Thanks, Ed. That's been really interesting. Thank you very much. That's been pleasure. Thank you. For more information about the menopause, please visit our website

www.w.menopause doctor.com.