Video Transcript:
Our next Ask the Doctor question comes from one of our viewers. They say, “Hello, Dr. Melissa. I have a burning question. Doing extensive research, I heard one integrative doctor, Amy Myers, strongly suggest to stay away from fermented food/supplements if you have a fungal infection. Is that right? I’m subscribed to a whole bunch of Organixx fermented supplements, and I love them. Should I continue using them while fighting with the ringworm I got from a feral kitten we adopted recently? Thanks.”
So, this is a fantastic question, and I’m excited to clear up the inconsistencies of information, as well as clear up what we know clinically through scientific research and studies on mushrooms.
So, the first thing I want to clarify is we have two topics. We have fermented supplements, fermented food – the fermentation process is separate from mushrooms specifically. And so, one of the things I want to kind of clear up is a common question that I hear from patients, who are adamant, like, “I can’t take X, Y, and Z functional mushroom,” or, “I can’t take this fermented food, because so-and-so said,” or, “I read that fermented foods and/or mushrooms can cause candida overgrowth.”
So, to clear that up, that is absolutely false information. We do know there are some cross-reactions between mushrooms and fungal infections in the body. But overall, there’s no sort of clinical research that shows that a fermented food and/or a mushroom that is either in raw form that you grab at your grocery store and put on your salads or eating in assorted foods or consuming in a supplement form, liquid or powdered form, will contribute to a candida overgrowth.
Fermented Foods Support Immunity & Provide Greater Bioavailability
So, what I want to clarify is that fermented foods are going to help support your immune process. And one of the things that I really love about Organixx and our supplementation fermentation process is that we will ferment a lot of our supplementation in a very powerful adaptogenic dense liquid that is part of that fermentation process. So, it actually gives greater strength and potency to the bioavailability of the supplement form, but also enhances the stress balancing. It enhances immune response and actually helps your body beyond just that key target area that we’re focusing on.
Address Gut Health & Its Impact on Immunity
So, when it comes to fermented foods, I have to say one of the things that we’re looking at with any type of fungal infection or immune disabling, either we are seeing a weakness in the immune system, maybe a dysregulation of the immune system, or a heightened immune response, (i.e. autoimmunity), we need to zero in on the gut. And so when we talk about the gut, the gut is all about your microbiome – the degree of healthy bacteria in your gut that can help calibrate your immune response, your mental health, can help balance out your hormones. There’s an assortment of things that our microbes, the little bacteria, will do in our body. And they will signal to make certain hormones, to have certain chemical reactions occur. And they support a healthy immune state.
So, when we’re talking about adding in a fermented supplement, like many of the Organixx supplements you’re taking, what I want to recommend is to continue to take them, because that fermentation process, especially in the adaptogenic-rich liquid, you are going to get a huge immune boost. And so the immune factor with the fermentation process and the bioavailability actually is going to really support your immune system, so that you can eradicate the ringworm, or you can eradicate and recalibrate the body’s candida reaction.
Internally & Topically Treating a Fungal Infection
Now, when it comes to a fungal infection, I always recommend internally supporting your system, bolstering and supporting a very dense, rich microbiota, as well as topically supporting your skin microbiome. So one of the things that we’re dealing with, when we have an infection, let’s say ringworm or even candida that might be presenting on the skin, is we want to look at addressing both the internal microbiome in your gut and also your skin microbiome.
So, your skin microbiome can be supported by topical probiotics. I mean, honestly, it’s not anything crazy to apply just clean, plain, probiotic-dense yogurt. You can also apply things like aloe vera. Apple cider vinegar is really good. That’s a fermented process that will recalibrate your skin microbiome, as well as also adding immune-boosting colloidal silver. There are gels of colloidal silver that you can apply on the skin.
And so, there are multiple ways to use both internal resources and topical resources to combat yeast infections of the scalp or the skin or folds of the body. I also recommend using the Magi-Complexx oil that has three really powerful antioxidants. There’s a lot of good skin healing nutrition and antiviral, antimicrobial properties, as well as antifungal properties, in those three oils that could be really helpful.
So definitely, act accordingly, in terms of taking the right actions with ringworm. You don’t want it to get out of hand. And just know that there are a lot of different ways that we can combat it internally and externally, so we bolster up your immune system so that it can expel the ringworm infection.
Keep Taking Your Fermented Supplements & Mushrooms
So, I hope that’s helpful. And just know that fermented foods and supplements with fermentation are very powerful, as are mushrooms. So, mushrooms are definitely not something that we want to shy away from. The mushroom kingdom is so vast that there are so many wonderful benefits from consuming the fruiting bodies of mushrooms that also help to support the recalibration and the balancing of our immune system, so that we’re more apt to fight the unhealthy fungal infections or unhealthy bacterial imbalances that can arise in our body for an assortment of reasons.
So, I hope that’s helpful. And I want to continue to encourage you to keep taking the fermented supplements here at Organixx. There are so many wonderful benefits. And I’m excited to answer any other questions you might have. So, thanks for asking the doctor today.
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Video Transcript:
Our next question comes from Susanna C. She says, “I have interstitial cystitis and am in a lot of pain much of the time. Do you know of anything I can eat or drink that might soothe the bladder irritation?”
Susanna, I’m so sorry that you’re suffering with IC – that’s what we call it in the medical world. Interstitial cystitis, for those of you not familiar, is a persistent inflammatory state of the bladder and the urinary tract, and we often find that it flares very similar to how folks experience autoimmune flares, like lupus flares and assorted imbalances in pain and irritation. This becomes really challenging because the lower pelvic deep, deep pelvic region, and lower abdomen can be inflamed and just feel uncomfortable, and it can affect not just the bladder, but for women, it can affect the uterus, the feeling of pain in and around the uterus and also the bowels, the large and small intestine. So it just is really, really annoying.
What Can You Drink to Soothe Symptoms of Interstitial Cystitis?
I want today to address specifically your question about what can you drink when you have interstitial cystitis that can help soothe that state of a flaring bladder or the interstitial cystitis flare.
Avoid These Things to Prevent an IC Flare-Up
So first, let’s start with what you should avoid. Avoid coffee, avoid any type of sweeteners, artificial or natural. Avoid any spices, as well as avoid any acidic beverages and also food. Those are things you just want to wipe out of your routine in terms of buying from the store. But really, the low acid approach is critical because that helps ease that inflammatory state.
Beverages to Bring Relief for IC Symptoms
I have found that my patients really experience relief when they add chamomile tea to the mix. Chamomile tea is just very soothing, it is very anti-inflammatory, and it’s just a very neutral beverage. I also find that adding a water infused with cucumber, mint, and pear also has this soothing effect. It’s this really interesting kind of combination between the three. It’s a beautiful tea, I have folks that will make that up, they’ll make a big vat and they’ll put it in the refrigerator and they will drink that throughout the day, and that just helps eliminate the irritation.
A Caution Regarding Drinking Cranberry Juice
Also, we’ve seen success with peppermint tea as well, and even some cranberry, but I have a cautionary warning with cranberry. I prefer individuals to make their own cranberry juices or to grab cranberries and maybe have the whole cranberries, mash them up a little bit, and then add them into a warm tea that you might be making.
The cranberry that we find on the shelves of the grocery stores are not always concentrated, and they’re also really, really dense in a lot of sugar and things that are going to cause irritation. So, a lot of my patients I find are reaching for cranberry because they’ve read cranberry’s great for the urinary tract, but the cranberry that we find in the grocery stores is just even more overwhelming and can accelerate the flare and extend the time of discomfort. So those are some recommendations as far as the beverage.
Foods Beneficial in Lowering the Flaring Inflammatory State
Now, I’m going to recommend a few food items that are going to be greatly beneficial, and then we recommend a supplement that’s been heavily studied in its effectiveness at lowering the flaring inflammatory state of the inner and outer mucosal lining of the bladder. And that’s really the element that has been compromised or is in that flaring state.
Fermented & Dairy-Free Foods
So, what we recommend is eating fermented foods. As many fermented foods as you can get your hands on. This could be nut yogurts. I prefer going dairy-free because dairy will enhance the mucus. If we’re dealing with any type of inflammatory mucosal lining, that tends to be a challenge.
So avoid dairy, but go with fermented foods like kimchi, fermented beets are really great. You can actually drink beet kvass – a wonderful beverage that’s fermented. Even doing your own fermentation. I have folks that will ferment cashew milk or make their own kefir at home, with an assortment of nut sources.
Supplements to Support Bacteria Balance
Then supplementing with probiotics, and I’m going to recommend Organixx, the ProBiotixx here. This is really wonderful because it has a very powerful one strain that systemically is highly beneficial, especially for women.
We find that when women have bacterial imbalances, they tend to wind up, for some reason, inside the urinary tract and in the bladder. I’ve had women of all ages have to get their bladder scoped and then we actually look at the labs, and we find that they have unhealthy bacteria that should not even exist in the bladder. And that tends to be the core reason why women have this persistent kind of inflammation. It’s this bacterium that never got eradicated in the first one- or two-course of an of antibiotics.
The lactobacillus plantarum, that is in ProBiotixx here, this is highly, highly beneficial, and we see through a lot of data that that particular strain is great for women just overall in the urinary tract, as well as the vaginal canal. So I recommend this.
Quercetin is Derived from Turmeric
The other thing that is heavily researched is quercetin, and quercetin is derived from turmeric. It is one of the most powerful ingredients in turmeric, and so I recommend using turmeric in your daily life. I love to recommend it as a spice that flavors foods. You can also add that to a tea as well, and you can supplement, but if you’re going to supplement, the best form of turmeric is to get or consume a fermented turmeric. That is the combination of the fermented foods, plus the anti-inflammatory state of quercetin.
Fermented Turmeric Can Reduce Intensity and Duration of an IC Flare
And I’m really excited to share with you that Turmeric 3D has quercetin in it. It’s the core ingredient. It is a fermented version, and the fermentation process actually has been invigorated by adaptogens, so that will help lower the stress response of your body when you’re in that flaring state, and also you’ll notice a decrease in the flare, the time of the flare, and then you can start to identify some of the triggers in your life.
There are an overwhelming amount of triggers. It could be stress, it could be bowel imbalances, it could be food-related. Allowing your body some healing time gives you better access to identify the source or trigger of a flare.
And ultimately, over time, as you add in more probiotic dense fermented foods, and then add an actual probiotic, plus quercetin in the form of raw turmeric, powdered, spice turmeric, tea turmeric, and included in it a supplementation of fermented turmeric, you’re going to notice a massive change in the IC that you’re experiencing.
So, I hope this has been helpful. I’m really excited to hear how you do, and Susanna, know you’re not alone. This affects a lot of women and we just don’t talk about it. So I’m excited to help you on your health journey, and thanks for asking this very wonderful question.
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Video Transcript:
Today, I want to talk to you about choosing the right multivitamin for your daily nutritional supplementation. I get asked by a lot of patients whether they should take a daily vitamin, a multivitamin. My answer is nuanced because it really depends on the type of vitamin, the form of nutrition or nutrients, vitamins, and minerals, and coenzymes and co-factors that are going to be in the supplement, and it also depends on whether it’s food-based or if we’re dealing with synthetic nutrients.
Always Choose Whole-Food-Based
I want to share with you why I like the Multi-Vita-Maxx. This is a whole-based, a plant-based multivitamin that is going to deliver powerful nutrition via fermented ingredients. Let’s talk a little bit about this. You’re going to get 21 unique fermented nutrients, and they are whole plant-based food items that we can open up via the fermentation process. The nutrients, we can get access to vitamin A, and vitamin E, and vitamin D, and then a whole assortment of critical nutrients.
That, in a synthetic version, what I find is a lot of patients actually are dealing with malabsorption or just completely missing the boat on the methylation process within their body and not able to consume those nutritional aspects in the multivitamin. When you are looking for a multivitamin, it’s very important that you look for a whole-food-based multi. What I want to share with you is often you’ll have on the back, so kind of label reading, if you will, is what you want zero in on.
Getting the Facts Straight
You’ll usually have a supplement fact, the element here on the back part of the label. The front is going to be the label, and then the back is going to be supplement facts. If there is not a supplement facts on the back, you do not want to consume that product. That’s number one. There are a lot of multi-level marketing brands that won’t even be transparent about what’s inside the product. That’s step one.
Step two, then you want to assess what nutritional aspects. You want to look for a vitamin A that is a beta carotene source, meaning it’s coming from foods that are going to contain beta carotene – those are yellowy, orangey foods like carrots. And then you’re going to look for a certain type of vitamin A or vitamin E, certain B1 or B2 types. And then you’re also going to be looking at having some magnesium and some other minerals in your mix.
But there will usually be in a whole-food supplement multivitamin, you’re also going to have a whole list of what we call botanical or food-based blends, where we’re deriving all those nutritional aspects from. For instance, in the Multi-Vita-Maxx, there’s a whole segment, it’s organic fermented botanical blend, and that’s 1,080 milligrams of things like organic alfalfa juice powder, organic spinach powder, organic sprouted purple maze, and organic broccoli powder.
That will also deviate or indicate to you that you’re dealing with a whole-plant-based nutritional multivitamin. A synthetic, which is usually what you’re going to find at your drug store, your big box stores like Costco, Walmart, even Target, they’re going to be carrying brands like Centrum, which is a very common consumed multivitamin that literally is not even able to be broken down by your stomach acid and ends up kind of taking root sometimes in the intestinal folds. I’ve seen a ton of folks that when we’re doing scans of their abdomen actually have little particles of these undigested multivitamins.
Filling Nutritional Gaps
When you’re choosing a multivitamin, search for a multivitamin that is going to be whole-food-based, that is going to be plant-based, and that will actually deliver the right nutrition to help fill in what I call nutritional gaps. I love to recommend the Multi-Vita-Maxx. I like to recommend Multi-Vita-Maxx because there are eight organic superfoods and botanicals along with whole-based nutrition.
This is great for supporting your immunity. It’s great for your brain health. It’s really great for your digestion. Overall, this is a good adjunct to eating a healthy diet. No amount of whole-based organic fermented multivitamins are going to replace the need for a good, healthy, organic diet rich in nutrients, rich in colorful foods, mostly vegetables, some fruits, and then seeds, and good healthy fats.
Use a multivitamin like Multi-Vita-Maxx as a nutritional gap resource and choose a more fermented version, which helps open up the bioavailability. For a lot of patients that have sensitive stomachs or find that they burp when they consume a multi or find that digestively they’re not assimilating well, choosing a plant-based fermented multivitamin is the way to max out the absorption. I’m excited to share this tip with you. I hope you find it helpful, and I hope you reach for a multivitamin like Multi-Vita-Maxx.
If you’re not getting all the nutrients and antioxidants you need from food, your best source is whole food vitamins. Organixx Multi-Vita-Maxx contains 21 uniquely fermented vitamins and enzyme-activated minerals that are more “bioavailable” and easily absorbed by your body than the synthetic compounds found in most supplements.
