The Best Supplements to Reverse Heart Disease

So, for years, people have said it's impossible to reverse cardiovascular plaque. And guess what? When you go to see most docs, they'll tell you that again today. And we still get comments on that on the channel. But I've become a poster boy for the reality that that's just not true. It is possible to reverse plaque now. And I'm not the only one saying that. The um the head of cardiology for Harvard said that over 10 years ago in Harvard Men's Health on the internet. Um so we can get way deep into detail on that, but uh I'm not going to start with that bunny hole.

Let's go back and let's talk about the most important things I did. It was lifestyle. It was uh again diet and I found out that I had pre-diabetes like what 80 to 90% of uh 57 to 60 year olds. So lifestyle change is king. But today we're not talking about lifestyle. We're going to be talking about supplements. Do they actually play a role in the process of stabilizing or even reversing plaque? Today we're going to discuss the very best supplements to reverse or at least stabilize arterial plaque and heart disease. Hey Seuss, are you there or are you blurred up? That was such a a cataclysm not being able to be on the show adequately. But anyhow, let's get right to it. Okay.

Um, we have a list of supplements we prepared for you. I'm sorry if I'm look I look a little bit blurry. Wi-Fi issues. You know what that happens when you're live in a developing country. Anyhow, uh, so let's talk about omega-3s. So different studies have shown some benefits and impact on omega-3 fatty acids EPA DHA especially specifically those two on doses up to 1,800 milligrams and showing some reduction at atherosclerosis, improved endothelial function. Um what what are your thoughts on this one? Do you use it? Why yes why to use it? Why not? Uh I just want to hear from you Dr. Brewer.

And I definitely use it. I use um natural forms. I love salmon. I love halibut, but it's very expensive. Um I don't love herring, but I make myself eat them. Pickled peppers. And I just I hate sardines so much I don't make myself eat those. I had to acquire a taste for pickled herring. [Music] Um and I do use supplements. Um, a lot of the statements about supplements, I do understand when people say, "Oh, wait a minute. It's it's too easy for the supplement, the oil and the supplements to go uh rancid." Uh, yes and no. Anyhow, we can go down that bunny hole a little bit later. We got a lot to cover for sure.

And for those who are wondering, well, what's the mechanism or why omega-3s are helping with this process? There are multiple mechanisms. One of them is you see a lot of uh anti-inflammatory actions by minimizing some immune cells going into that onto that. They will also help minimize triglycerides. We use a lot on the omega-3s and even some medical grade omega-3s presentations like like Vascepa to minimize or decrease triglycerides when just a low carb diet is not being enough. It helps establish this the plaque. As you know, we talk about soft versus calcified stable plaque all the time, and omega-3 fatty acids can help make that cap in above the plaque be more thick and less prone to rupture. So, those are omega-3s. Uh, let us in the comment if there's anything else that you want to want us to talk about it. Uh, you want to discuss side effects or any any other stuff on that.

No, just the two things about me, two things about mechanism to remember. Uh the omega-3s are uh sort of a blood thinner in and of themselves. They decrease clotting, which is a key issue, especially when you have inflammation and plaque. The other thing they do is they're anti-inflammatories. So just remember those two things. Fantastic.

And you mentioned uh clotting and if you mentioned clotting, plaque, arteries, there's one supplement you need to discuss and it's that's nattokinase. So there's a positive and a negative on this one. Uh we used it. We we haven't seen significant side effects from it. Uh but there's only one study that even that study is not like strong enough because it was in a randomized control trial. But uh they showed that up to 10,800 fibrin units of nattokinase shown some plaque reversal on carotid intima-media thickness test. So it decreased the amount of plaque on the arteries on the neck on on a couple of hundred people. Um there's a lot of uh uh evidence on the mechanism that has to do again with minimizing inflammation especially minimizing clot and improving fibrin which at the end creates more of that plaque. So uh what are your thoughts on nattokinase? What to what to use it? Why not to use it?

So yeah, it's um we've talked about it a few times and yes, fibrinolytic units it is a clotbuster. Now when you go back in terms of or you know I love origin stories and you hate them but I'm so I'm going so you didn't put it in the slide so I'm going to tell a little bit about it for the geeks and the historians there. Now, who doesn't know that soybeans are a big big deal in Japanese culture? They call them edamame. They just eat the soybean uh salt. They they boil it, they salt it, and I've had plenty of edamame in the past, and I know a lot of people are very anti-soybean. I'm not going to go down that debate. But the other thing that happens, so think about it. Um it comes from a bacterium for the geeks, it's called the bacterium is called Bacillus subtilis. It's a very common bacterium but it it comes uh one of the places that you see it is in rotting soybean Bacillus. Well, guess what you know and that's basic you've heard of taking natto and getting nattokinase. Um that comes from fermented soybean. Now, it's part of the So, what does that do? I mean, why? So, somebody was on on a war sometime at some point and they were carrying their soybeans across to feed their army and the soybeans uh got a little bit rotten and they ate them anyway and maybe noticed that that was actually helping. Again, you know, I'm obviously making up the the origin story for this thing, but what caused that? Well, it turns out there's an enzyme that's created by that bacterium, Bacillus, which does break down fibrin. That's where you get the fibrinolytic units and fibrin is a key component of clots. So, there you go for the geeks and the historians.

Well, I think origin stories can make good movie sequels from time to time and and I think this one it's good if you don't want to. I mean that that's where natto comes from, right? So if you want to do natto, that's where you get a lot of uh nattokinase and you get a lot of vitamin K that we're going to talk about it a little bit later. And also just consider something on regards to clotting. Uh sometimes we think that the clotting only happens when the heart attack is in place. But you have a lot of microclotting happening around the plaque while you are damaging the inner layer of the artery wall. Body is trying to help it help it by creating some patches with platelets and fibrin and creating clotting and and that can heal at the moment but increases the damage at the end. So uh it's such a big issue.

Um, vitamin K2, we're just going at right after it. Uh, people think, okay, vitamin K2, it's going to pull calcium out of the bones, out of the arteries and put it on the bones, back in the bones. So, minimizing arterial calcification, especially the MK7 form. Um but we reviewed research a few uh like last year where it looks like uh vitamin K2 actually has more like a role on uh insulin resistance and uh evidence is still developing. There are a few studies here and there where they're testing doses from 90 micrograms up to 360, 400, even 500 micrograms of MK4 and some studies even measuring some MK MK7 I'm sorry and some studies even measuring using 45 milligrams of MK4 for your osteoporosis. So uh what are your thoughts on vitamin K2 when to take it when not to take it?

So again, some association with uh fermented foods, some association with uh meats um as well as some uh vegetable components. So yet that's as you said that's what you hear. You hear that it it something about it actively takes uh calcium out of arteries which everybody quote everybody knows air quotes is bad. Well, it's better than having soft plaque, but again, that's not a bunny hole to go down right now. Um, what actually appears to Here's what I think. I think that it actually helps with pre-diabetes, diabetes. I have found a study and there there are a lot of studies going on right now. I I expect within the next few years, we'll get much much better information about this. But there was a study at one time done by somebody who was obviously thinking the same thing I was. Um they looked at middle-aged men and they didn't give um 100 micrograms. These small doses that uh that you see they gave 400 micrograms and uh they saw significant improvement in pre-diabetes in those men. Now, it also appears to um so so what's this stuff about about calcium? Well, it also appears to impact a couple of um enzymes in that are in involved with calcium deposition and calcium uptake in bone. Osteocalcin for example uh and um I'm blanking on the name of it right now. M matrix GLA protein. Yeah, matrix. Exactly right. MGP matrix GLA protein and those two are activated by vitamin K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K K2. When they do, osteocalcin is involved in um putting calcium in bone tissue and MGP matrix GLA protein is involved in taking that calcium out of artery walls, soft tissue.

Fantastic. And and we'll go back to the conversation about clotting. Sometimes whenever we say vitamin K, people might think about clotting clotting because vitamin K1 it's involved in the in the clotting cascade. That's not the case with vitamin K2. Even though they're both uh vitamin K is from the German word coagulation with K. Vitamin K2 doesn't it's not involved on coagulation. So there you go with another origin story. Well, I learned from learn from the best the vitamin K uh from the German word coagulation. Correct.

So, how much do you recommend and why? So, as I mentioned in there, I don't recommend these little wimpy 1,000 microgram doses. Um because the only evidence You mean 100? You mean 100, right? Yeah. I mean, I'm sorry. I mean 100. I don't recommend those. I recommend four times that amount. And as we've also said, unlike niacin or vitamin D3, there doesn't appear to be an upper danger limit. So in fact, we there's plenty of evidence, especially in people with um osteoporosis, that megadosing helps with bone health. And megadose is what what 45 milligrams 50 mg which is what 150 times these 100 microgram kind of doses.

Fantastic. So um there's another one vitamin C and E which I have seen uh a lot of hype on regards to vitamin C and uh on paper there was a six-year study that shows some small reduction on carotid intima-media thickness test using this protocol 250 milligrams of vitamin C and 136 international units of vitamin E but it was it was a mild effect, gotta say it was more like more than even reduced more like slow progression question. Although on paper you can say uh we have seen that vitamin C and vitamin E have a lot of uh anti-inflammatory effects. They have a lot of antioxidant um properties. They might help reduce inflammation. I know we don't necessarily prescribe a lot of vitamin C and vitamin E. Vitamin C we know also kind of interfere with some of the new glucose monitors and so it help it can mess up the tracking on on that. But what are your thoughts on this one? Um what what is holding off on using more of this?

So um with it's a good point you brought up the vitamin C and a lot of um a lot of play that gets there's a Pauling theory. It's after Linus Pauling and you got to admit he's a very smart guy. I think isn't he the guy that won two uh Nobel prizes? Only guy that ever did. And he had this theory that cardiovascular disease was all vitamin C related. And he went into this detail about vitamin C and its use in keeping collagen, in other words, connective tissue uh well organized. The theory is really good. Uh, however, the evidence as as you mentioned, Jesus, the evidence just doesn't seem to pan out. Now, vitamin C and vitamin E are both, as we know, the some of the classic versions of antioxidants. What's the number one uh form of inflammation in among humans? Oxidation. Where does it come from? Incomplete burning of carbs. Why? Because over half of us 18 and older have poor metabolic function. What is that? We can't metabolize carbs very well. Our insulin receptors begin to fail us. So why did what's the biggest growth space in um in supplements? Antioxidants. Now um is that and vitamin C and E are two of the the biggest antioxidant vitamins. So that's where some of that comes from.

Fantastic. And I personally don't think that doses of vitamin C 250 and I mean these doses are very very safe even if you want to try it despite knowing well how much that's going to help. I don't think it's going to help as much as lifestyle of course, but if it's within your budget, what I will do, I'll just I just put I just pour a lot of lime juice on everything.

Um, vitamin B. But but you call it lemon. That's lemon in Spanish. Yeah. What you call what you call lime for us, that's not that's not a that's not a lime. But that's very confusing. I was at a restaurant with Jesus and he want he kept asking for lemon and she kept bringing him lemons and he kept say wait a minute that's not a lemon that's a that that's a that's lima which is lime lima there anyhow uh conundrums of language.

Vitamin B. So vitamin B complex. There's a there's a 3.1 year study where they showed not reversal of plaque, but actually a slower progression on calcium scores and this was done compared to a placebo group. So very interesting because uh we use a lot of vitamin B complex especially the methylated one which helps minimizing one potential oxidant or oxidative stress agent called homocysteine. So homocysteine has been linked to uh damage of the endothelial wall of the arteries, the inner layer of the wall artery wall and promotes arterial plaque. So this complex of vitamin B especially vitamin B6, B9 and B12 have shown some benefit on that regard. Um do you want to talk about vitamin B's a little bit?

Sure. So it's a really good point and I'm glad you went there. Um the big thing with vitamin B is antioxidants. Now why would I say that is and is that one of the classic antioxidants? Classically no. Those are you know AC and E that we we mentioned earlier. But you got to ask the question what is the most physiologic response? What does the body do for antioxidation? Uh the human so you go back to chemistry class and oxidation is combining oxygen with something. If you if you go to the Boy Scouts that's called burning. Uh if you go to a your a local uh car shop, that's called rust. All of those things, oxidation, rust, burning, it's combining with oxygen. Now, how do you combat that? Well, with in in the chemistry class, you you combine it with hydrogen. You know, the two hydrogen combine with the one oxygen atom and they form H2O, water. So that's how you antioxidize something. Well, the human body doesn't do that. It uses again for the geeks, the the especially those of you that are familiar with organic chemistry, we use our human body uses methyl groups. Why did I go down all that long path to get to methyl groups? Because that's what the human body does. And what is all that got to do with vitamin B? The vi the B complex vitamins are how our body stores and pools and transports methyl groups. So you may have already heard of this. You just may not be connecting the dots yet. You may have heard of MTHFR or methylation. And MTHFR is the enzyme involved in methylation. Methyl for the geeks again methyl tetrahydrofolate reductase. Now why is that such a big deal? Again if if you look at the majority of us humans uh you're going to see less than than perfect insulin resistance. Therefore you're going to see less than perfect burning of carbs and that's causing oxidation poor burning of carbs. So our body has to to do its own internal antioxidation. Again, that depends on methyl groups and that enzyme MTHFR. Well, it just so turns out or it turns out that there's genetic variation in that that enzyme uh MTHFR. Over half of us are what we call poor methylators. So yes, our body still tries to use uh methyl groups to put out that fire. Um that in incomplete burning of those carbs. Um but yes, it's not as good as some folks. What is the best way to deal with that? Methylated B complex. So we use a lot of methylated B complex supplements again as an antioxidant.

Yeah. And the next step on that protocol whenever vitamin B's are not helping reduce homocysteine, there's another type of support which called trimethylglycine or betaine which can also provide some of those methyl groups to minimize that process of oxidation. I always say it's it's not like that's the main root cause of inflammation and heart disease, but it's one that gets neglected very often and might be one of the the points to to to help out. And also related to homocysteine, there's one more supplement uh Kyolic garlic, that's the name of the brand. Uh we talk about aged garlic extract 2500 milligrams a day. They did a 12-month study a few um dozen patients that showed some improvement especially on those inflammatory markers and also they did some they found some slower progression on calcium score as well. um that that's a study that actually but was authored by Matthew Budoff which you might have heard of now with the lean mass hyperresponder um um controversy. The problem with that study though it was that it was funded by the same people who produce the Kyolic garlic. So I will put a mark on that just just so you're aware whenever there is funding related to that our eyes open and we start questioning although there are independent studies on aged garlic extract that show benefits on minimizing blood pressure and as you know high blood pressure can create some mechanical damage in the inner layer of the artery wall causing even more inflammation and damaging the vessel. So your thoughts on aged garlic extract?

Well, Jesus, if you had actually gone back and watched all of our videos years before you came on board, I did one on that very same study. Nobody watched those. I know it. But it was on Matt Budoff and his garlic study. Yeah. And yes, it was very, very interesting. And it's not um it's allicin. We talked about that in a recent video. Not A L L I S O N. Not the girl's name. A L L I C I N. It's part of the chemical in garlic. So there you go.

Now it looks like I'm starting to blur up. Is that right? You are blurry. Your camera keeps doing that. It was my my Wi-Fi first, but your camera keeps going out of focus, and I don't know how to fix it just yet. Anyhow, we're going to have to talk to our tech team again. We thought we had all that fixed. Yep.

And and the other one is vitamin D3. This one I know you use a lot. Even though there's not enough evidence to support on a on a clinical trial that vitamin D will reverse heart disease per se or that's going to stabilize plaque. We keep using it a lot just because there are some studies suggesting that vitamin D can help stabilize plaque on mice. but also more studies and even broader and more robust research showing that if you reach levels of vitamin D3 somewhere closer to 50 to 100 nanograms per milliliter the risk of cardiovascular disease actually can go down. So what are your thoughts on vitamin D3? Why to use it and why not to use it?

So you're bringing up a good point when you talk about the challenges in some of the science. Sometimes you're never going to get the perfect study. For example, um we're not going to get the perfect study in another area. Uh seed oils, everybody's, you know, so many people are so angry about seed oils and see them as a big issue. At the end of the day, the clinical trials have not been done and probably never will be done. Um another place where you see this is um, oh, what's CoQ10, taking CoQ10, especially for folks that are taking statins, but just overall for metabolism, CoQ10 is logically something that's very important to the health of our mitochondria. You're just not going to see from a science perspective a study that actually completely demonstrates it. Same thing with vitamin D3. And there's a there's a lot of debate about D3 and how much you should use. And again, it's um there's a huge amount of data supporting use of D3 for uh things ranging from diabetes to depression to uh overall metabolic health. And um unfortunately, you're just not going to see clinical trials that support it. I use it. There's no question. I keep and I I keep my vitamin D levels between 50 and 90, not 40 and 60.

The other thing to remember about vitamin D3 is everybody on not everybody, but everybody else that I've heard has said, "Oh, you can get it from sunshine." And they even have lines. I think one of them goes through like um San Francisco and somewhere in Georgia or South Carolina and it says if you live below that line you never have to take you're in the uh latitude where you get enough sun you never have to take vitamin D3. I had somebody just two days ago who said yeah I live in the sun I don't have to I don't have to take it or he thought that he was not a 60-year-old it wasn't an aging problem he was in his early 40s and his D3 was 25 low even by standard uh uh means. So don't depend I think we must be the only people well certainly the only people that I've heard on the internet who are testing people on a regular basis and finding sunshine is not enough. It's not.

Yeah. And I know there's controversy behind um if sun exposure will increase your risk of skin cancer. I've seen plenty of evidence that should suggest it is. Um can you minimize that with other methods? Yeah, definitely. But uh increase sun exposure, especially if you're when you don't you don't have enough melanin, enough of that protein in your skin, that will increase your risk. Um I know there's there's some people saying that's not the case. I mean personally I don't think I I think there is risk if you you expose yourself too much to the sun. It's radiation at the end. Anyhow uh we suggest 5,000 units every day but measuring levels. So we make sure that you are within that range from 50 to 90.

There's a lot of uh whenever we discuss vitamin D3 there's a bunch of comments about uh it's not about that you need to meet certain ratio between vitamin D3 and K2. Do you have an opinion on that? No. Well, I I I it's a bunny hole I don't want to go down because you and I we've actually done videos looking at this ratio. And as you know, I don't recommend taking any of these standard um combinations because typically the um the K2 is too low in them. That's the that's the only issue like we we rather than measuring ratios what we suggest is okay get to your levels of vitamin D3 that you need and get enough vitamin K2 which usually is 400 micrograms or even more. That's our perspective. That's that's the only thing. And so that's why we don't look at the ratio that much.

So uh there's one more thing that I didn't mention and I'm sorry I'm going backwards on this but it has to do with nattokinase. And it's a very popular question that we do need to address. Uh, can you combine nattokinase with um aspirin? Yeah, I don't I have never seen I've done it many times uh and have never seen a problem with it. All right, so there you hope. And of course, if you're starting to have uh some bruises and bleeding, well then yeah, you have to go back in either nattokinase or aspirin and and see what's going on. We the risk of bleeding can increase just with aspirin alone. So that's it.

So, want to talk about the riddle for today before we answer questions from the audience. Before we do, I had a comment about quote baby end quote aspirin. Uh, and I saw and I wanted to make that comment. We we have used that term too. One of our viewers um pointed out it's not baby aspirin, it's low-dose aspirin. And I thought I made the face like you're making right there, Jesus. And then I read the rest of the comment. She said her nephew uh baby died from taking aspirin. Oh, I can I can Yeah. So I can understand why somebody says that detail is very important. That's very emotional. Like it was Yeah. It hit me like a ton of bricks. Yeah. And also I mean it it might sound obvious for us who are on the medical system but there's only very few situations where you will give aspirin to a baby or to a children like those are contraindicated unless very specific diseases where you can try it. So yes, what we're talking about is 81 in the US 81 milligram dosage of uh aspirin. Uh in Canada and a lot of Europe it's 100 milligrams. What is it in Mexico? 100 we have 100. We don't have the 81. Yeah, it's 100. Yeah. I don't know how they come up with the 81. I think that's just like typical very typical. So, somebody did a really good skit on that. I I can't remember his name, but he was talking about all the goofy things about US metrics, pounds instead of kilograms. I I wish I were a good It's a classic one. I've seen it. Yeah. Hilarious. It's hilarious.

All right. So, that's about it. So, let's talk about the riddle. So, those for you, if you're new to the channel, we do a riddle every week to to uh give something in return to our channel members. And if a channel member doesn't solve it, we give it away to whoever solves it first. So, here is the riddle. And by the way, the last time the last time Joey Teague won the riddle and we already got in contact with him to give him the prize. So, want to discuss this one today? People think I move calcium around to keep it from hardening where it's found, but surprise, that's not my main fame. I help your insulin play the game. What am I?

All right. So, uh, remember if you are a member of the channel, we're going to prioritize your comment, especially if you haven't won before so more people can get access to that prize. Uh, if a member doesn't have the answer, we'll be happy to go with the next person who has it. Uh, so, um, this is the prize. Uh, looks like Alan Turner, I think. So, I think I think also we had Joe SXM got it, but Joe SXM already won it before. Okay. Unless I'm I'm mistaken, but I I believe he he did already. So, what do they get with the box if they win? And I think I I would agree with you. I think it's Alan Turner. So, you see Alan Turner has this small icon next to his name. Yeah. Alan, call the office 8597211414. We'll be happy to send the box over uh over if you live in the US. Of course, unfortunately, we cannot ship abroad just yet.

Um, so what do what does Allan get? You know, it's funny the uh this is a product. We sell it. Uh people will say this is a commercial, but the first thing I'm going to say is uh don't get it. Don't get the box unless you're very serious about metabolic disease. And and I'm it sounds like I'm joking. I'm not. I'm serious. And this is a very serious type. The reason I'm saying that is it's a serious type of uh of evaluation. It's not 30 seconds pee in a cup or pee in a in a bottle and see it turn blue. It's uh you're actually doing an oral glucose tolerance test with it. You do uh use some some state-of-the-art grip strength tests. you're looking at uh your heart rate uh heart rate variability, heart rate recovery after exertion uh using calipers to look at body composition. So it's a again it's a much more serious type of um of evaluation program. A couple of other things to think about if if you're again just looking at tiptoeing into looking at metabolic health. Uh, I would consider something more like supplements. Again, as we've talked about today, we know supplements can help. Um, but supplements are easier. It doesn't take, you know, it doesn't take two hours to go through and and understand your your level of metabolic disease. The other thing to consider is if you're wanting to get serious about whether or not you have metabolic disease, um, but don't want to go through this component, you may want to just go ahead and sign up for, uh, for basic care or for some, uh, some coaching. You do get an hour of coaching with this evaluation program. It's one of the more valuable pieces of it. It's coaches that work with us, been trained by us, supervised on a regular basis by us. We spend, unlike most medical clinics, we spend an hour and a half to two hours per week with all of our coaches, all of our medical people going over clinical stuff to make sure that the quality that we provide is the best.

Fantastic. And that's what you get with the box. We still have the debut price 169.50. And if you get additional kits, uh, like the second and moving forward, you can get it for almost 119.99. Uh, you mentioned supplements and I got the green line to show this. Oh, so on the description you will find a link for the supplements if you want to uh take a look at them. Dr. B already developed his. We worked with an specific provider. There was even a trip over there to see the how they are producing all of that that's all produced on the US to to make sure that is the highest quality possible we could get because we know supplements that's a big issue the quality side. So we have now labeled Dr. Brewer's brand. You don't need to buy it. Just take a look at it. And if you're skeptical about the the source you're getting well we we have one under Dr. Brewer's label. And you know Dr. B will not sponsor anything that he doesn't trust in. Well, we noticed that we had somebody come out of the blocks and buy a bunch of these already. It was me. Exactly right. Exactly right. So, so yep. Uh take a look at those if you want to uh want to consume them. Do you think you need them? That's a good option. Um even though you're selling the supplements, the one thing that we will always say there's nothing that beats lifestyle. So, you can take all the supplements you want, but if you're not doing the work, you're not changing the the way you live, it's not gonna work. Uh, any any thoughts before we go to Q&A?

No. Let's see that uh high dollar water ball. All right. [Music] So, a lot more work per dollar out of that water ball than I did out of you. Well, there's no doubt about it. I cannot discuss with that. Uh, but I'm a work in progress. Maybe in a few decades you will see some results. Uh Russ, when you become a boomer, when I become a boomer and you are on your one on uh when you're 130 for those I got to interrupt and say this. Sure. Um we got so much grief on that last video on legs about uh you don't grow older to become a boomer. You were born a boomer. Yeah, I get it. We were we were being dummies. I I was being a dummy. Well, yeah. I'm always going to be a millennial, I guess. That's right. Roose, new member. Thank you so much for becoming a member. So, the way you you become a member is you click next to the subscribe button. There's a a button that says join now. Um, you get some perks like you saw, we we give preference to people who are members to answer the riddle and get a chance to win that metabolic risk assessment box. Uh, you get your an your questions answered first. And also, we have a weekly video every Wednesday. uh where we answer your questions on different videos that we post. So you have a you're a member and you post a question, you're a premium member, we'll answer that question first. And we don't even we don't have any premium members questions, we will answer questions from other members. So that's just an extended thank you for supporting the channel. That was after we had members like we didn't create this for have to have more members. We had we already had members and we just wanted to say thank you.

Uh Joe SXM, when I asked my cardiologist about Clearly, Clearly is the AI CT angiogram that measures the type of plaque in your coronary arteries on your heart. Uh he said that they do the PET scan to measure blood flow. In your recent video, you mentioned PET for flow. Might they be advanced on imaging? PET scans have been on on medical um care for a while now. Do you have an opinion on that?

Yeah, they tend to show more metabolism as you mentioned flow. They don't show plaque and they don't show plaque um especially plaque um consistency or more what we call morphology how whether the plaque is stable or not. Yeah. And they involve some of those may involve some radiation. They are really good to measure blood flow as a cardiologist say uh on severe cases they might help. I'm not saying they won't but unfortunately they will not tell you how much soft plaque you actually have which is the dangerous kind. So uh yep we don't use we don't use PET scans. We don't use PET scans just because of that.

Uh Joam, maybe Clearly for plaque and type and PET for flow. Yes. Like if you want to know the blood flow, uh PET scan can can give that information for sure. And and as we've discussed, your typical especially interventional cardiologist is all about they're a plumber. They're all about flow. And again, we're much more about inflammation than flow.

Fantastic. Rick Folia, good morning from Atlanta. And uh need to just give some mention Aspen. We had some links here in the chat. We might want to put those links separately so people know which one is for the supplements because you see it's it's going to be messed up and another one for for the kit if you want to try the kit. Usually usually the kit goes first. You analyze your own situation and then you get the health coaching because that's going to help you clean out your lifestyle and supplements goes last. But if you think you already have a good handle on your lifestyle, you can go straight to the supplements.

Uh with a wood ring, hi doctors, this is a bit off topic, but how do you deal with hypoglycemia on a low carb diet? I've had four episodes this year and I know you had had few as well. You mentioned that when you were changing your lifestyle and started low carb diet and started getting some those low sugar episodes, candy in pockets or or what to do? I I did answer that in writing, Woody. That's a great question. And I did try the candy in the pocket business because I started getting a couple of them too. A couple of them are just ended up being one of them especially significantly dangerous. Um I was out I was on a long bike ride. It was like a 20-mile ride down uh south of Nashville and there's a lot of hills there. Um and there's also cars on the same road so you really don't want to get hypoglycemic there. That was the time when I I was early into that process. I used uh I had a couple of pieces of candy in my pocket. I used both of those. They tasted awful because I wasn't eating sweets like that anymore. And they lasted about five minutes and then I was bonking again. Bonking is a is a distance athlete's term for getting hypoglycemic. Um so no, I I didn't do that. I I started uh carrying more um uh things in my pocket that had protein, like a beef stick had protein and especially fat in it, and it tended to burn better. Um the other thing was I just got through it. Um after about six months, I just didn't have those again. Haven't had them since.

You you do some fasting sometimes or you do fasting and what Jesus did uh prolonged fasting and go out and play soccer. Yeah, you can really stress it and get more like that. But again, you just consider um either slowing down, taking a nap, which I've always been able to do. People get frustrated with me saying, you know, why don't you take a nap? Well, naps have always worked for me and uh if you can do that, you can get beyond it. But just uh keep an eye on how well you're you're getting fat adapted and make sure that you're doing it safely.

Yeah, I think that's the main process and I would be curious to know if you had those episodes and you actually measured it because sometimes people confuse low blood pressure with low blood sugar just because both can cause some some dizziness and and weakness. Well, that was another point and you'll see that people get used to what I would call running hot when they get insulin resistant. they and they start getting used to where their blood sugars are like 100, 120, even more. And then when their blood if you're used to that kind of blood sugar and you go down to six in the 60s, especially the 50s or even 70s, you do you get your body's just not used to it. You get real panicky. Uh, but once you get fat adapted, again, a few months of this, and you you can you can wear a a CGM, like a Libre, and you can see your body going down to like even into the 50s. You can even wake up and see your body in the 50s, and you feel fine. So, it's all about adaptation.

Fantastic. Uh, have you done any videos on PE uh pulmonary embolism? My friend died of one and another just had an attack. Can they mimic heart attacks or cause heart pain? That's a great question. Do do you wanna give it a shot or?

Yeah. PE pulmonary embolism. It's a clot that goes to the lungs and that's a big deal. It can be lethal. Don't mess around with it. Uh it can mimic a a heart attack in that you often get pain in the chest. It's this often this crushing kind of pain similar to what you get with a heart attack and you get difficulty breathing. All things that you can get with a heart attack. Do not mess around with those symptoms. Nobody wants to go to, you know, to stop their life and go to the ER because there's no place that's not fun as much as an ER. Maybe no place. ERs are not fun. Emergency rooms or emergency departments, but don't mess around with chest pain and difficulty breathing.

Yeah. If if you're too far down the road, yes, you need to be aware of those. Uh on on the emergency room, there's certain types of pain that will let you know that this is more likely a a pulmonary embolism versus a heart attack like the chest pain that goes right through the middle from one side to the other or uh the difficulty breathing or just tachycardia heart uh uh um increased heart rate. But even even with that situations, they need to run tests to identify what's the real problem and and it because they can be very very similar for sure. Uh but the are I know you don't you you do all of the stuff for members, but real quick, Tom Ripley. Sure. Uh I'm not you when I say bonk, I'm not using the UK meaning of the term. I don't know what that does that mean. Can you can you say it and keep it under 18 PG level? No, I can't. Okay. So, I suspect that that was my suspicion. Okay.

So, wasi raw garlic or garlic capsules has same effects any supplements to reduce cortisol? So, those are two questions. Have you seen the same effects in raw garlic versus garlic capsules?

Yeah, the the the thing about well are so part of the question is are garlic capsules do they work? And I think overall yes. I mean again we're talking about the chemical allicin. We're not talking about uh anything more magical than that. And you can get that with any of these. The thing about aged garlic is you get rid of some of that uh biting garlicky taste and smell. Mhm. I So did the allicin. I I got a professor that never got sick. Not not a flu. We even had the uh influenza epidemic a few years ago. I was at med school at the time. I I got it and survived. Uh but but my professor didn't. And I asked him like how how did he manage to do that? And he said that he always ate two pieces of garlic every day. There you raw. I was like I was very impressed by that. Um usually people that do that are well known for that. Yep. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely for sure. I I I was safe because he was a tall he's a tall guy so I never actually experienced that side effect.

Um any supplements to for cortisol? We just launched a short this week about ashwagandha. So ashwagandha is probably one of the best ones uh to reduce cortisol. Measuring cortisol is like a tricky thing because it can be high, low, has a lot of it's not like a reliable measurement unless you find a pattern of cortisol high all the time. Um, and Guacas is mentioning waking up in the middle of the night with racing heart is a sign of higher cortisol levels. Any supplements for good night sleep?

Well, racing heart at night can be a bunch of things. I'm I I'll be I'll be bold to say that's cortisol. Do you have any ideas on Yeah, you know, one of the most common is sleep apnea. If you can't breathe, your body gets panicked real fast. And that's what happens with sleep apnea uh uh episodes. Your body thinks well, not only does it think, it cannot breathe. And so that's why you wake up. So, if you're waking up with a racing heart, one of the first things I would do is get a sleep study. Okay. Uh hash not medical advice. We can't provide medical advice on YouTube. That's just uh and for supplements, before going to supplements, I will do exactly what Dr. Brewer said. And if you cannot do a sleep study, maybe just go deep down into sleep hygiene and some strategies and try to fix it that way. some some small things like sleeping on the side and not using the phone, uh minimizing liquids, uh just uh maybe getting those one of those pillows that align with your head so it's always like this and you don't you don't have that problem. That's good. And then if you look at supplements, magnesium 308, L-theanine, uh, H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H H 5HTP and even Ashwagandha that might help but I would say as usual supplements are just kind of a the last line just to add something extra, not necessarily to fix it.

With a wood ring, if you have plaque, does it make it easier for more plaque to form even if it's hardened? That's a great question. Uh, I think this goes back to that study that got heavily criticized and dissected um on Gil Carbal's channel of plaque begets plaque. Yeah. From our friends Nick, Dave, Adrian. And uh what are what are your thoughts? I think nobody really knows for sure the mechanism. Uh I suspect that the issue is if you've got the age, the genetics, and the

Uh, body composition to be forming plaque, then you're more likely to continue forming plaque. Now, some you could certainly see a mechanism where just having plaque makes it easier to form more plaque, but I I think I don't think anybody really argued with the first part of Nick and black begets black. What they were arguing with was APOB and LDL don't. Yeah. Exactly.

And and whenever you think about plaque, we have we have repeat this uh several times, but we always butcher it. So let's give it another try. We have three types of plaque. You have your soft, hot, inflamed plaque that can rupture and create a clot. On the other side, you have calcified stable plaque that won't break. And in the middle you have mixed black. Let's call it that way, which is in the middle, usually more close to the calcified side than rather than the soft side. But every every calcified plaque comes from somewhere, and that somewhere is usually soft plaque. So you first get inflammation, you start building up that plaque, and then your body tries to heal that by calcifying it, by thickening the upper cap, making those smooth muscles thicker so it doesn't break. The problem is, for every calcified plaque you have, in the corners of that plaque, on the sides, you are likely to keep building some of that soft plaque because there's it might be some inflammation still. Um, so basically to me, yes, if you have plaque, you can still build more plaque. That's why lifestyle is so important to minimize that. Um, and wakas just along those lines, wakasi, plaque reversal is is it for soft plaque or for calcified plaque? And uh, it can also be reversed with lifestyle, diet, and supplements. I know you have a perspective on that.

So one would be, can you reverse your calcium score? So if you have 500 calcium score, you have calcified plaque, can you can you pull that back down? I've actually seen a couple of people do that, and I do not understand what's going on there. I suspect it's in an a complete reorganization of that plaque scarring. When you get uh calcification, it's similar. It's a sign of scarring or um um connective tissue or we call it organi or organizing the u plaque, but it stabilizes it. It it's not going to leak through. It's not going to cause a clot at that point. You know, we talk about plaque reversal all the time, and we and I mention it in the in the U intro, and we talk about the debate and people saying no, no, no, that never occurs, and the fact that yes, it does. But here's part of what I think causes some of that confusion. I think when people actually reverse plaque, it depends on how you define it and what's actually going on. If you look at my and several other people's uh CINT, the size of the plaque as measured um in uh millimeters, it actually shrinks. But I don't think that you're really pulling LDL out of that plaque. I think what you're pulling out of it is those cytoines, that those uh macrofage, those immune cells and immune uh molecules that are creating a whole bunch of swelling and a lot of that liquid. You pull those immune cells, those uh immune molecules out of that soft plaque, you're going to pull liquid out of it, too. And then it's going to shrink. And when it shrinks like that, it is still stable. Fantastic. I I think you explain it really well, and that's kind of the explanation we were discussing. Remember a few years ago when we were all going over your CINT results and we discussed exactly that, why your plaque was certain size and then it shrked. Yeah, that's that's the theory, pulling out that inflammation. So the layer of the artery wall goes down.

Um, Kryptomojito, howdy everyone. Thumbs up of course. Thank you so much. and Dave Murphy just become a member. Thank you so much, Dave. Long time no see. I hope you're doing well. I hope he's doing well. And uh, let me see right here. I saw one question and I lost it that I wanted to here. Right here. This is a great question. Which supplements should not be taken by someone with persistent atrial fibrillation?

Okay, Jesus, the clock's ticking. So there remember there was this study last year where they said, oh, high dose omega-3s will trigger episodes of aphibs, and and they might have a point, especially if you're taking three to four grams every day. Uh, but in that same study said that despite that, the mortality, the the death risk or mortality risk decreased on those peoples with a those people with aphid that were taking omega-3s. And the conclusion for us was like, well, if you're concerned about the episodes, you can just take one to two grams a day, and that will be a safer dose. I know that high dose melatonin can do that as well. I know caffeine can be a problem with somebody who is taking uh who has aphib. Um, I'm not so worried about nattokinase, for example, just because I mean, we discussed the uh antiplatelet effects, not such uh well, more like work work more on fibrin than platelets, but it's not such a severe like to mess up too much on the anticoagulants that you need to take when when you're on a. Are you familiar with John's wart? I've heard of John's wart, St. John's wart. I I've heard of it. I don't know that much about it. We don't use it, but that's kind of the classic uh uh supplements that you see on on med school, on books, because it can mess up with coagulation even more than nattokinase. And there might there might be some others. I would be careful also with magnesium and uh potassium, especially on the setting of kidney disease, because with kidney disease, you tend to have higher levels of potassium, and if you have kidney disease and aphib, and you are taking too much potassium, you're in you're increasing your risk of atrial fibrillation or episodes. A uh harvests, please clarify K2, be specific, MK4 or MK7? Uh, you can do the combination, but the one that's supposed to be more active on vessels as MK7, right? And it's also more long acting. So yeah, you can actually get the same impact with MK4, but you got to give a whole lot more for sure. Uh, Lionus Pauling, you were right, is the person who had the only person to have two Nobel prizes, and he was testing vitamin C intravenously, IV vitamin C. So there you go. And then multigram doses, I think. Yeah, they morph. And I think there's there's still people doing some that. I don't know if that's same thing as scalation therapy, but we had a patient the other day asking for uh if he he could do that on um there's certain places where you get injected all these vitamins with the idea that it's going to help. I'm I'm a little bit skeptical of those.

Uh, Dave Murphy, what are your thoughts on C15 or essential fatty acids? I I don't know if you remember that, but we did a live show on C15 a few months ago, and we were discussing how they come up with that fatty acid and um the dolphin story and all of that. And I was I was a little bit uh uh physicious because to me it was like, and you said, "Yeah, let's give it a chance." You you you dug deeper, and then you came up to the same conclusion on, you know what, it's better just to eat Pecorino cheese than paying for a 15 bottle. I am getting it's a great story. Uh, I've heard it several times, the ladies making the rounds on the internet. It's a uh, what was the I've never heard of this before, but actually it exists. It's called a uh um oh, it's an epidemiologist specific for animals. Um, I don't know, a veterinary epidemiologist. And the Navy was having problems with their um their porpuses, their dolphins, and they found that they were sick. She came in and decided it was uh E5 C15. Now, what is C15? We talked about that a couple of weeks ago when we're talking about fats. Uh, it's this is a saturated fat, and C means carbon. So, there's 15 carbons in this saturated fat. There's no hydroxies or double bonds in it. Um, and she said that made them feel better. And she said it's also making humans feel better. And so here's what I had, I tried that um, what's the name of that supplement with C15 in it? I think it's I think it's C15, isn't it? Like that. Oh, well, there's some kind of other name to it. I tried that. Very expensive. It was like, what, a hundred bucks for a month? And we decided, hey, you know what? Why don't I just eat um Pecorino cheese, because it's sheep's milk and it's got a lot of C15 in it. So, I'm not saying that C15 doesn't work. I will say this, that I haven't seen it's not incontrovertible evidence. I'll also say, yeah, you know, they're calling for it to become an uh, what? EFA, essential fatty acid. Not arguing. I I'm a little bit skeptical that there's that much hard evidence on it yet, but I'm still getting it. Um, C15. I'm just getting it through food, butter, Pecorino cheese. Yeah. Sour cream. Sour cream.

Rowan O. Uh, how do you find out if you're a poor methylator? Um, you can do genetic testing. There's there's plenty of genetic testing. Or you can just measure your homocysteine levels, which is easier to do. Yeah, I worked at one of the few uh human genetics labs um that was actually available for retail use and found out that I'm a poor methylator. A simple way to get a good idea is to look at your homocysteine value. If it gets over 10 at any point ever, you're probably a poor methylator. Yep. This is very interesting. I don't think I have ever uh heard of this one. I haven't either. I saw those comments. Oh, Ruben may lower uh vitamin D3. Um might have to do with the cholesterol and not having enough D3 to be in storage, but I I haven't never seen that. And even with patients we have seen, we rarely see patients that start statin and see their levels of D3 going down. We just don't. I'll be curious to know the dose as well. How how how much of a Russian dose was that? Yeah, that's a good point, too. Yeah, that's interesting. Like we haven't seen it happening, but not saying that it couldn't happen.

Um, Harvey Ops, kidney and liver function uh uh CHI, what what is that? What is CHI? Do you have an idea? Neither for Sunshine to work on D3. I don't know. Lots lots. I don't think they're talking about Chicago airport. I don't think so. Rick Folia, the answer to the real vitamin K. Brick Folia usually gets it right, but he he already got a box and then we we said, "Oh, do you want to try a second one?" He was more than kind to give it away to somebody else, so we know. And Leo Aapulko, which it's been a while, she also got it right. Uh, we really uh uh we really appreciate Leo. She has been on the show for several years as well. Fortunately, I had to stick to my own rules. Sorry about that. Anyhow, that's what we have for today.

Um, any any closing remarks, Dr. Brewer, before we leave? No. Um, well, I always say no, and then I always have comments. No, but yeah. No, but there you go. No, but, uh, supplements are a big deal. Uh, I saw a comment in here where it said, uh, all supplements are unproven. Uh, that's not really true. Uh, I used to think that. I u what, 15 years ago, 20 years ago. I also thought supplements for the most part were expensive urine. Um, I think the meaning there is obvious. You know, something that you take, you pay money for it, and you you pee them out, and they really don't do anything. That's not really true. If you actually go in and look at the evidence, you find that supplements have an impact. You know, one of the reasons, you know, there's always you you always hear this thing, follow the money. Where do you think the number one selling statin came from? Uh, red yeast rice. Yeah. Statins as a class came from supplements. Red red yeast rice. What about Vasipa today? Well, that's omega-3. Vasipa came from fish oils. Fish oils. So big far everybody wants to hate on big pharma and say, well, they just know where the money is. They know how to make an impact with a with a drug and they charge too much money. All they're doing is following uh they're looking at supplements and they're looking to find supplements that already have an impact. Then they make a change in it and get a uh an indication from the FDA to make it uh prescription level, and they can charge a lot more for it. So to say that supplements don't do anything is a little bit uninformed. Oh, and also you can see the on the other side, the overhyping of supplements benefits, and and that's why we sometimes we have like a bunch of comments on saying, what about this supplement, what about that one, what about that one? And there's only a few supplements that we recommend on a daily basis. Uh, we have patients that are taking like 20 different supplements, and we're like, okay, well, sometimes they tell us, okay, can you take a look at that and let us know which one should I take and which ones should I don't take, and we are happy to clean that up, just because we know uh we are more inclined to those that will have more more likelihood to actually help, and so you don't have also to waste money and time on those on the ones that don't.

Right, hey sis, you went over an hour again. Well, I don't know what to do with my life anymore at this point. Uh, anyhow, take take a look at your our latest videos. That will help out the channel the channel a lot. And we're planning on on giving you more about food and and and and blood sugar, cholesterol, and all those topics that you love to see on future long forms. We're restructuring the channel once again. So, can I thank you for your patience? A bean spoiler. Uh, spoiler beans. Yes, for sure. Top 10 foods that lower your blood sugar. Correct. Again, people will say there are no foods that lower your blood sugar. They'll probably say that, too. Watch the video and you'll see. Yeah. Let us know. Yeah. All right. Uh, see you. Now, next week, Dr. B will be on vacation. So, but we have a an interview with one of our friends, Zachary Lot, who will talk about CINT next week. So, don't miss out. Oh, and you know, there's a couple of people who are asking about the video. We didn't post this past Saturday. Oh, the chole uh we didn't post. We were planning on doing the cholesterol video. It wasn't ready. We're planning on doing a video on cholesterol, but it's going to take a while. Thank you for your patience. We we've got a couple of them that we're working real hard on. And here's the issue. Um uh we have found in the past that we we're changing our level in terms of production quality and storytelling quality and some other things. And if it's just not high enough quality, we're not going to put it out yet. We're just not. Yep. All right, enough rambling. See you next week, guys. Thank you.