← Extend Podcast with Darshan Shah, MD
Extend Podcast with Darshan Shah, MD
157. Dr. Tania Elliott: Allergies, Immune Health, and Hidden Toxins in Your Home
01:03:53
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- [00:03]
A
Welcome to xtend with me, Dr. Darshan Shah. A podcast dedicated to cutting edge science research tools and protocols designed to help you extend your health span. Having become one of the youngest doctors in the country at the age of 21 and trained and board certified at the Mayo Clinic, I've accumulated three decades of practice as a board certified surgeon and longevity expert. Over that time, I've discovered that a mere 20% of health knowledge yields 80% of the results. When it comes to your health span, we are living in a new era where we are creating a new healthcare system no longer focused on disease management, but achieving optimal health and vitality. Join me as I interview world renowned experts offering you a step by step guide to proactively avoid disease and most importantly, extend your health span. Most people think about their immune system only when they get sick, but immune function is constantly shaping inflammation, energy, gut health and long term disease risk. Subtle symptoms like bloating, skin changes and rashes, fatigue or even recurring infections are often early signals that the immune system is out of balance. In this episode of Xtend, I am joined by my good friend Dr. Tanya Elliott. She's a double board certified physician in internal medicine and allergy and immunology. She's a true expert in our immune system. She focuses on immune health, environmental exposures and the root cause of chronic inflammation. Dr. Tanya Elliott combines clinical expertise with practical strategies to help identify how modern lifestyle and toxin exposure are disrupting immune function at scale. We're going to unpack how the immune system actually works, why allergies are increasing, and how gut health and environmental toxins drive chronic inflammation and what you can do to reduce your exposure and restore balance. We also explore immune deficiencies, advanced therapies like ivig, and how to think about prevention in In a world full of hidden triggers, Dr. Elliott brings her expertise in immunology to really unpack allergies for us. And this is a topic that is not often talked about in podcasts. So I'm really happy that she was able to join me for this one. Allergies are a problem that many of us suffer needlessly and is truly affecting our underlying health and our immune system function in the long term. I'm very excited for you to hear this episode with Dr. Tanya Elliott. Hey everyone, before we dive into today's episode, I wanna talk about something that you hear me talk a lot about your bioma. And I want to tell you how I'm approaching this situation right now with all of the patients that are calling me from listening to this podcast. So what happens is every day, patients are writing to me saying they feel exhausted, they can't lose weight, they're having brain fog, and they see their doctor, and the doctor tells them all their blood work is normal. But the problem is this doctor usually is only checking about 10 to 15 biomarkers that only tell you if you have a disease developing. Meanwhile, your body has 160 different systems that are running. Then all of these have blood tests that we can test on how effective they're working for you every single day. So if someone is not close to one of my clinics, one of my next health clinics, then I tell them, go to their local laboratory and get on Function Health. Function Health gives you access to 160 different biomarkers, the same kind of comprehensive testing that we do at all of our next health clinics. And if you tried to get this on your own through your regular doctor, it can cost you thousands of dollars. Hormones, inflammation, toxins, nutrient levels, they're all tracked over time in this one platform called Function Health. They could even help you get an MRI scan or a CT scan if you want one. So what I love most about this company is that they don't have a crazy incentive to do this. Function doesn't push supplements. They don't have pharmaceuticals they're trying to get you to take. You're just getting the data, and you're getting insights from the data, and you can bring this data to a clinic like ours, and we then have the information that we need to tell you how to improve your health. Membership is now only $365 a year. Literally, it's just a dollar a day. And right now, if you're one of my listeners, you can get a $25 credit towards the membership. You just go to the link in the bio or go to functionhealth.com drshaw and use the code DrShaw25 for a $25 credit towards your membership. Dr. Elliot, I'm so glad we finally made this happen.
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B
I know we've been trying for a while. We got it on the books.
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A
I know. Ever since I met you, I've been like, I gotta get on the podcast. And I came out to New York today, and you're from around here, and here we are.
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B
You're in my hood.
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A
I'm in your hood. Exactly. So one of my biggest reasons for having you on the podcast is you're so eloquently spoken about a lot of different topics. And so I kind of feel like we're going to be talking a lot over the next few years on this podcast. We're going to start off, though, with your specialties. So you're double board certified internist, you're an immunologist, and the immune system is this kind of black box for most people. Right. I think people think about their immune system in the context of how do I not get sick? Maybe they're thinking about allergies. Some people do understand their immune system is protecting them from cancer as well as. But there's so much around the immune system, and in fact, in our world now in the longevity space, immune senescence and immunoaging, we call it, is really the primary driver of longevity, right?
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B
Yeah. Yeah. You know, people often just think, oh, my immune system, if my immune system is down, I'm going to get sick or an infection. But, like, the immune system is basically a whole bunch of signals and signaling proteins that impact basically every single cell in our body.
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A
Right.
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B
So you can think about immune system in three buckets. One would be, yes, protection against infection. The second is when my immune system determines that something external in the environment is something foreign and fights against it. And that's really what happens with an allergy. And then the third bucket is your immune system determines that something internally within your own body is the enemy. And that's really where you fall into autoimmune disease. So that's kind of helpful way to think about the role and the function of the immune system.
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A
Got it. So if we're talking about that third bucket where your immune system is actually fighting against your own body. Right. I think that's where a lot of chronic disease occurs, too.
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B
Absolutely.
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A
Specifically around chronic inflammation. Right. So can you maybe walk us through that process? How does that, how does chronic inflammation start? How does then the immune system start attacking our own cells? And then where does that transition occur to autoimmune disease? I know that's a massive question.
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B
Yeah. You know, our. Our immune system, when it's working well, is in balance. And then there are lots of different levers that could disrupt and impact that balance. So one thing that can disrupt or impact that balance would be effect on your gut and your microbiome in your gut. And, you know, I really do think that so much of our health really starts with the gut as it relates to longevity and also as it relates to our overall immune health. And so when you have a disturbance of the right types of bacteria in your gut, or if you have an increased amount of toxins, environmental toxins in your guts, talk about microplastics and Toxins from ultra processed foods and things like that, right? Then the immune system balances off. And remember, the immune system is just a whole bunch of different signaling molecules. So then you just get this overload of one type of signaling that is a danger signal. And the danger signal is inflammation. And so it started often starts in your gut and then you slowly, slowly get this tipping point of being in an inflammatory state. And that's all well and good and fine if you're able to flush out those toxins, right? Or if you're able to restabilize. But when you can, and you're constantly getting these insults and these hits, and these insults and these hits, the immune system is like, okay, I'm ready to fight. And your immune system becomes in fight or flight mode, meaning it produces more inflammatory cytokines. Cytokines, just a fancy word of inflammatory proteins that start attacking. And first they're starting to attack the things that are foreign, but then they get into overdrive, right? Where they're not just attacking the foreign things, but then they're starting to attack normally occurring things. They're just like, everything's an enemy, right? Because when you're in fight or flight mode and you're fearful and you're scared, which is often what happens to your immune system. And it's like, okay, you know, where else is there an issue? Where else is there a problem? Let me put out a fire. It becomes hypersensitive or oversensitive to things that are normally just supposed to be present and occurring in your body.
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A
Right? Right. And how can someone tell if they're in this imbalance of the immune system? Are there blood markers they can get? Are there other signs?
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B
So oftentimes again, the gut is a primary source of that. So symptoms like constipation, diarrhea, your IBS type symptoms, you can also get inflammatory markers and inflammation on your skin. And I always like to say, like, you know, look at your reflection, right? Look at what's going on in your body if you don't recognize your reflection. Your skin, all of a sudden you have skin rashes, your stomach, all of a sudden you have bloating, your joints all of a sudden are swelling. Right? This is your body reacting to something and saying, hey, I'm not in balance. And the inflammatory markers are starting to go. So fever is another sign. Fatigue, constantly feeling run down, brain fog is another one. So your body just like isn't, just isn't feeling right, Right, right.
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So I think, you know, understanding that when you're just not Feeling good. And you can't point it to any one particular infection or some problem. Likelihood is that there is some chronic inflammation going on, most likely starting from the gut.
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B
Yes. And look, the skin is another site, right? Your skin is your largest immune organ in your body. And so when you're exposed to something through your skin, this happens often with allergies. When the primary exposure is the skin, the body's gonna say, if I'm exposed to this thing again, it must be something bad. It must be something foreign. And we see that often with food allergy, where something like peanut. If the primary source, source of exposure is through the skin and then you eat it, you're more likely to have an allergic response to it. And we can talk a little bit more about that later. But generally speaking, signs of inflammation, signs of your immune system being overactive, fever, redness, swelling, and sometimes itching.
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A
Okay, and then how are people's guts unhealthy? Like, what is causing the microbiome disturbances? You mentioned toxins. So can we dive into, like, all the different causes that people should be looking out for?
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B
It's really tough because we're still learning more and more about the microbiome. But basically, like, we are made up of billions of bacteria, maybe even trillions of bacteria. That's what we are. We're just a bunch of walking bacteria, and we need to make sure that that bacteria remains in balance. But there's this whole world of, like, understanding that we really have only scratched the surface. That's why, like, you know, some of these microbiome tests and optimization protocols and things, it's like we're just scratching the surface. But we do know, generally speaking, which things are good for our gut and generally speaking, the bad bacteria that cause infection. But, like, we're just scratching the surface.
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The science is so new right now on this.
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But in terms of the things that we know are not good for our gut, anything that's going to not be able to be biodegraded would be one area. Right? And we talk about, like, plastics and microplastics. That's one bucket. That's one area. The other area would be foods that we're unable to digest. As in, like, these are synthetically created, synthetically made products in ultra processed foods. And I always say to my patients, if you're looking in the back of a label and there's more than five ingredients, and the rest of the ingredients are a bunch of words and labels, words that you can't understand, that's ultra processed, throw it away. Don't use it.
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Yeah.
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Also, if the food looks very different from what it looks like in nature, then that's ultra processed also. But these are things that, like, our body doesn't know what to do with. The bacteria is like, what the heck is this foreign thing? How am I supposed to break this down? And like our digestion is, bacteria is doing that work. Right. And then they're secreting different proteins and enzymes to help break things down. But if it's something that's completely foreign, that's lab made, that's synthetic, your body's not gonna be able to break that down. And similarly, you can absorb toxins through your skin. Right. Synthetic fragrances are a big one. And think about like, and we're putting them in very sensitive areas underneath our arms, on our face. And again, it goes to like, if you look at a whole bunch of ingredients on your personal products and they're words that you can't describe and understand, and it's 1, 2 hydroxy, methyl, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, like, no, sorry, those are preservatives, those are additives. Those are things that, that our body doesn't know what to do with. And so when you're exposed, those are true foreign things. And when you're exposed to those foreign things, your body is like, this is a danger to me. I'm categorizing it the same way I would a bad bacteria. I'm categorizing it the same way I would a virus. This is something that should not, you know, this is not naturally occurring in nature. I don't recognize this. So I'm going to attack it. And then once it gets into attack mode, it starts attacking the rest of our cells too.
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A
Yeah, yeah. You know, I think about a lot of these skincare products. They have endocrine disrupting and immune disrupting chemicals in them. And you know, we started using skincare from adolescence. Right. Like the first, even childhood. Right. And a lot of these products are laden with chemicals that are disrupting our immune system.
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B
It's the biggest concern for me. Like, sun protection is important. Yeah, it's important. Right. We don't want to get sunburned. We don't want to end up with skin cancers. We don't want to end up with melanoma squamous cell. We don't want any of that. Sun protection is important. Sunscreen is a whole other category. We've got mineral based sunscreens which provide a barrier. Fine. And then there are chemical sunscreens and those chemical sunscreens. A number of those ingredients are banned in other countries. They're not banned here. And we're slathering them all over babies. Yeah, we're slathering them all over our children's skin. And this is the most sensitive skin. They're going to absorb all of that. And it's not that we're going to see an immediate effect. We're going to see the effect generations later. Right. So I'm concerned about the overuse of sunscreens and chemical based sunscreens. I always recommend protective clothing, keeping your child in the shade. And also 10 minutes of sunshine every day is important to maintain our vitamin D levels. It's. Haven't we noticed that imbalance? Right. Where vitamin D is, where everyone's vitamin D deficient. And we're also just telling everybody under the sun to slather themselves in sunscreen. And sun is the enemy. Yeah, okay, I'll stop that whole diatribe. And you know, similarly, so that those are sunscreens and our personal products and then similarly, the stuff that we're putting into our guts. So you know, when we talk about like BPA that was lining baby bottles. Right. You're not going to see that impact immediately. You're going to see it in generations. So what do we see? We see now 30 and 40 year olds with colon cancer.
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Right.
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Exponential increase in colon cancer. I can't. So it's observational. We're never going to do a randomized controlled trial to be like, here, have a bunch of forever chemicals and let's see what happens to you in 20 years. But like when, when we look at what was popular in that, you know, in children at that time and now what? These populations are suffering from increased risk in GI cancers. I don't see how you can deny it. And also fertility issues are another huge one. So we say immune disruptors and hormone disruptors. Right. Two things that are plaguing our population that we can understand are the increase in fertility issues in women and men in their 30s and 40s. And then similarly the increase in colon cancer exponential in the last 10 years. It's gotta be something we're ingesting. It's gotta be something we're exposing ourselves to.
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A
Yes. Yeah. It's so great that you mentioned this because, you know, we kind of turn a blind eye to all these chemicals because we don't see them every day. They're like hidden in every product. Like you mentioned BPA lining baby bottles. It's lining every bottle. Every bottle and every can and every. So many things. It's like ubiquitous right now.
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And the other thing is how we've gone to this culture of like disposable, disposable things. Right?
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Everything's disposable.
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Everything's disposable. You look in other countries where there, there aren't these issues and like they reuse everything. Their recycling bins are like this big, you know, they're not like overflowed recycling bins with stuff that's just completely disposable. So I really think that we as a country and a culture need to go back to reusable. Not just for the environment, but for our overall health. Because these plastics are dangerous. And the chemicals coating them to make everything smooth and easy to use and dispose of are harming us.
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Yeah. And I think people need to realize, like if you drink out of a plastic water bottle, yes, that's very obvious, that's made out of plastic. But even paper cups are lined with a thin lining of a chemical.
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I know.
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That is based on a plastic as well.
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I got very upset about that. Cause I was like, oh my gosh. All my to go coffee cups, Right. I'm like, oh my, look at this waxy coating on the inside of it. Oh, man. Garbage out. Not using it.
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Yeah, you gotta stop using those too. And you know, you mentioned microplastics as well. We should probably talk a little about. Microplastics also are now becoming an emergent threat too.
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Yep. And that, I mean, what are microplastics? Like, what does that even mean? And we. The reason why they're becoming a threat, they're always there. We just didn't have the technology to look at it. So now we have fancy technology, right. These electron microscopes, we put things underneath electron microscope, and we're like, oh my gosh, this stuff is everywhere.
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What is that? It's a piece of plastic. How did that get done?
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And it's again, it's not about like we need to look at, okay, we didn't know that this existed before because we didn't have the technology to look at it. And we didn't understand the effects because all of these things were new. But let's look back at the populations who were exposed to this. Right. And then the populations before them who weren't exposed to it, like our parents. Right. And then you say, okay, within this population, what are these people suffering from? What conditions, what diseases and things are were they suffering from? What can we do differently? Well, let's get rid of these things that were introduced to the masses 2030 years ago, Teflon pots and pans. The nonstick pots and pans are another one.
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A
Exactly.
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You want to hear something I just learned, which I'm like, oh, my gosh. Teflon coated pasta.
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A
What do you mean?
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B
See, this is the thing. What do you mean? Right? Because the pots and pans, this is what we talked about, right? Where like, plastics, you're like, okay, plastic water bottle, I get it. But water. Where is Teflon coating other things that we're regularly using? Well, the machines that are used to cut pasta.
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Oh, my gosh.
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What are they coated with? Teflon.
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Oh, no.
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How frequently are those machines changed? Right. And the reason they're used, they're Teflon is because it makes the process of, like, the dough going through the machine, it doesn't stick as much. Right. And then the cutting is easier. So, like, the pasta has a nicer shape and consistency. So now I'm like, oh, my gosh, I have to make sure that all my pasta is bronze cut. So the machine is made out of bronze. Most of the commercial pasta makers use Teflon coated machines.
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Wow.
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So it's like, where does this end? And it becomes frustrating because it's like, well, what? How can we be protected of these things? If you know the Teflon story, right? Dupont knew it was an issue from the 1950s, when women working on an assembly line were having issues with their. With birth defects.
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Yes.
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Right. So they took all the women off of the assembly lines. They said, you can't work in these factories anymore. So women were not allowed to work in the factories anymore because they knew Teflon was dangerous. Fast forward the 1960s. The happy pot and the happy pan, right? They were promoted to every single kitchen in America as a happy pot and pan. And every woman in America was cooking with them happily, right? And this was like the American family cooking with these nonstick pots and pans. Even though dupont knew it was an issue, even though the EPA flag that it was an issue, it was a challenge. There are warnings, right? Fast forward another 10, 15 years before we said, oh, nonstick pots and pans are bad. So now we're talking 1990s, 2000s, right? And now there's all the residual Teflon deposition, I like to call it. So I'm calling it. You've heard it. You guys have all heard it today. Make sure that your pasta is not coated with Teflon and make sure you opt for bronze cut pasta.
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A
Yeah. You know, for anyone interested in this dupont story, it's it's really, really mind blowing. What the chemical factories, the chemical producing companies of the world have gotten away with. Well, not even of the world in the United States. They get away with so much in the United States that they would not get away with in other countries. And we just keep allowing it to move forward.
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B
Yeah.
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A
Like even with like PFAs, like we know this is a forever chemical. That's a huge problem. But now they're allowed to make other versions of it that are just as bad, but they're not regulated again.
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Exactly.
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So it just keeps going and going.
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There's BPA that we, that we say BPA is bad. Okay. Then we just use bps.
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Exactly.
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Which is just another synthetic formulation. And this is why it's like this is, this is the current environment. So all we can do as clinicians is help people become smart consumers.
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A
Right.
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B
And look, the truth is like I had Teflon coated pasta in my drawer up until yesterday, so I didn't even know either. And you can't drive yourself crazy with every single thing. Right. You've got to be, you've have to accept the fact that there are going to be exposures and there's going to be new things that we learn. I say it in council to my patients, the big things that are not a huge thing for you to swap out or change now that you're aware of it. Swap out and change it. Cook with cast iron, cook with stainless steel. Don't opt for any of these nonstick coatings. Get glass Tupperware, like make the big changes. Don't go crazy if it's like, oh no, this one thing. But stay aware.
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Yeah.
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B
And like, let's just say we don't learn an ounce of this in medical school. So it's all the work that we're doing trying to research, trying to understand and then also piecing together that observation, those observational studies. Right. To say colon cancer, plastics, bpa, all the other things that like, were just ubiquitous when we were growing up, now we're seeing the impacts, you know.
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A
Yeah, that's so true. You know, James Van Der Beek is one of my favorite actors from Dawson's Creek. I remember that show.
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B
I know, I loved that show.
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But you know, sadly he just passed away from colon cancer at a very
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young age, you know, and 48 years old.
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48 years old. But he's had it since I think he was five, six years.
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Yeah. least.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you know, we're told that the first colon cancer screening you should get is at 45.
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B
Used to be 50 up until a couple of years ago, and now look. But look how long it took United States preventive task force to actually say, oh, we're seeing lots more colon cancer. Instead of age 50, let's shift this back to 45. And I advocate that it should be even sooner, because think about how many people come to you with gut issues.
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A
Yeah.
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B
Almost every single person I know has an ibs type of symptomatology. Almost everyone I know.
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A
It's mind blowing. And when I was. And I did medical school, like, you know, 30 years ago, you would rarely see people with gut issues. And then now it's like everybody has it. And I think you're right. It's a lot of it has to do with these hidden chemicals in our foods.
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B
And, yeah, they come to me, right? And they're like, I have a food allergy. It must be something. It must be something I'm eating. You know what? We might find that it's not the gluten sensitivity and people feel better when they stop eating pasta, it's that they stopped eating teflon pasta.
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A
Yeah, yeah.
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B
You know, it's stuff like that.
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A
It's mind blowing. And, you know, colon cancer is really. All cancers are a disruption of your immune system. It's just your immune system was not able to detect this cancer soon enough to prevent it from turning into a cancer. Right.
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B
And perhaps because your immune system is too busy fighting all the other foreign things, and it's distracted. And so the last bucket, I should say, of what happens with your immune system, and specifically with cancer is your immune system is not keeping cells in check.
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Right.
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And it's not saying, hey, let's get rid of this. It's sort of falling asleep at the wheel.
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A
Right?
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And then these cells overgrow and over proliferate, and that's how you end up with tumor.
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A
Yeah, it's so true. It's really a huge problem. And I think colon cancer is also like the canary in the coal mine. I think colon cancers are probably easier to develop because the tissue of our gut is turning over every few days. Right. And so this is some of the most active tissue, and so it has a higher propensity to get cancer. But I think we're gonna see more cancers just throughout every tissue in our body.
- [24:14]
B
There was a study that recently came out looking at the bacterial distribution in young people with colon cancer, and they're tracing it now back to a particular bacterial exposure in childhood, a particular type of E. Coli in childhood. So I'M wondering also if it may end up being similar to the H. Pylori stomach cancer story, which is H. Pylori is a bacterial infection that is the most comm. Cause of stomach cancer. I'm wondering if now we're going to identify bacterial strains in the colon that are risk factors for colon cancer as well.
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A
Wow. Yeah. I mean, that would be incredible if, if we found something that was leading to this. But to your point, I do think that, you know, we need to modify what we're putting into our body urgently, like now, and just become more aware. Right. And what's great about swaps is most people, like, once you trade your plastic Tupperware for glass, you're not going to go out there and just buy new Tupperware every day.
- [25:10]
B
Right. You're like, great. I've got, you know, so for me, it's like, make your home healthy and beautiful and it's a fun experience. Like, I have a guide that everyone can download for free. It's your healthy home guide. And room by room, I walk you through these swaps. But it's like a fun way to make your home look nice and beautiful.
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A
Exactly. Yeah. I mean, it's a great way to look at it. So, you know, they found microplastics in carotid vessel samples. So, you know, we do this surgery called carotid endarterectomy, where we take out the inside of the carotid blood vessels through the blood vessels that go to your brain. And when you look at them under an electron microscope, like you mentioned, we can see plastics in the blood vessel wall surrounded by inflammation. And so microplastics are causing inflammation definitely in the carotid blood vessel, but probably throughout your entire body.
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B
Yep. And here we are looking at like the end state byproduct of that, which is like an elevation in your bad cholesterol. Right. The LDL cholesterol, which is likely a result of your body responding to inflammation. Yes, right.
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A
Yes, exactly. Yeah. And so I think we really gotta put a spotlight on toxic exposure because it is a big problem right now. It's invisible and there are ways to mitigate. I'm a big fan of the pareto principle. There's 20% of actions you can do to detoxify 80% of your life and just gotta figure out what they are
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B
and just do them 100%. Absolutely.
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A
So this guide that you have, the room by room guide.
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B
Yeah.
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A
Where can they download it from?
- [26:36]
B
Just go on my website. It's just tanyallianmd.com it's for free. And it walks you through just each room. How to create a healthy home environment, the healthy swabs. The other thing I talk a lot about is your indoor air and your indoor air quality. Right? Because we're talking a lot about toxin exposure through the gut, the GI tract and through the skin with our personal products. But there's the indoor microbiome, which is the air that we breathe and that is affected by the type of furniture you have, the types of fabrics that you keep, the types of rugs that you have. So it walks you through room by room, how to make healthy home choices. Like perfect example is have real plants instead of fake plants. Those plants are made with like synthetic glues and plastics, right. That then off gas and create something called a voc, a volatile organic compound that then is suspended in the air and impacting the air that we breathe. Where you sleep and your bed and your bedding choices are really important. Bamboo sheets are a no no for me. I don't know if you know this, but Walmart and Kohl's were both sued because they were promoting bamboo sheets a few years ago as non toxic healthy sheets. They're the healthiest sheets you can have. Have you ever seen what a bamboo plant looks like? Yeah, they're like, it's impossible to break. They're really strong pieces of wood. Right. So how does those bamboo plants turn into the softest, healthiest sheets on the planet? They don't. They become, they're super, super heavily processed with lots of really bad chemicals that are very dangerous for the workers that are doing the processing. And they had all kinds of diseases and then they also off gas and are toxic to your skin and toxic to the air. And I mean you can look it up at Walmart and Kohl's were both sued for these claims that these were healthy sheets. And good for you. So if you're choosing sheets, make sure that they're Oeco Tex certified to make sure they have that certification. Which basically means that the process by which these sheets are made and the fabrics are, are made into something soft, are environmentally friendly and truly healthy, both for the workers and for the people that are utilizing them. And I always recommend 100% cotton or linen sheets.
- [28:38]
A
Yeah, cotton or linen even for your clothing, right?
- [28:41]
B
Yes. Oh gosh, don't get me started on the synthetic clothing. And don't. You shouldn't sweat in synthetic clothing either. None of these fabrics are meant to be heated. And when they are heated, like don't go in the sauna with like your sports bra and, you know, bike shorts and what have you, because they're not meant to be heated. And when they get heated, they off gas and that's when they can penetrate into your skin, which is already porous because you're sweating.
- [29:02]
A
Yeah. Wow. Lots of things to think about.
- [29:04]
B
And this is the problem. Then people follow me and they're like, oh, my gosh, Dr. Tyrant told me not to do this either. And it's like the 8020 principle. Right. And so those 20% of changes is what we're really looking for. Those big buckets, those big things, those aha moments, like, ooh, I have an excuse to buy new sheets. Great, I'll do that. I'll buy some cotton sheets. As opposed to this complete overhaul of your life where you then just get overwhelmed and you have analysis paralysis where you don't know what to buy or what to eat or what to touch.
- [29:32]
A
Yeah. Just do one thing at a time. That's why I just tell people, you know, I think the other place where we're consistently and constantly lathering chemicals on our body is in our skincare products as well. You'd already mentioned, you know, sunblock, but it's really all skincare products.
- [29:48]
B
Absolutely. You know, just get a bottle of olive oil.
- [29:51]
A
Yeah.
- [29:52]
B
Use it for your. Do what Cleopatra did. You know, like, use it for your hair. Use it for your skin. It's great. People, you know, beef towel is another one that people use. I'm a fan of all natural products. Also, like, we put so many preservatives in our products so they have a longer shelf life. So maybe get used to things that don't have preservatives and then swapping them out more frequently. And the fewer the ingredients, the better.
- [30:15]
A
Yeah, yeah. And then I have people also kind of scan the barcode on their products with like an app. There's Yucca, there's Think Dirty. These apps are really good at telling you how toxic the ingredients are and then even suggesting products that are non toxic.
- [30:32]
B
Yeah. And so, like, and as a general rule for me, I tend to opt for plant based products. Also, it's important for people to understand the difference between unscented and fragrance free.
- [30:43]
A
Yes.
- [30:44]
B
Unscented by definition means that companies are allowed to put chemicals into something to eliminate the smell and eliminate the scent. Okay. Fragrance free means it is free of all fragrances. The other thing that's so. So if you have a fragrance allergy, fragrance free is important. But then there's this whole, like, not all fragrances are bad. If you don't have a fragrance allergy. But there are two types of fragrances, synthetic fragrances that are made in the laboratory and natural fragrances from like plant based products, things that just have the, you know, naturally occurring in nature. So for me, like, I don't have a fragrance allergy, so I don't want to do fragrance free. I like scents, I like smells, but I opt for naturally occurring fragrances and essential oils and things like that. And I think people get confused there because they're. Oh, well, you know, essential oils also have a fragrance and that could be bad. Only if you have a fragrance allergy. Only if you react with skin issues, eczema, rashes, itching, or having nasal congestion or things like that. Otherwise, generally speaking, for the population, I'm not a fan of synthetic fragrances, which are things that are made in the laboratory because those are the ones that tend to be associated with hormone disruption and fertility issues and endocrine disruption and things like that. Oh, does that make sense?
- [31:56]
A
Yes, absolutely. But you just blew my mind when you said unscented means that there are chemicals put into the product to remove a scent.
- [32:04]
B
You got it.
- [32:04]
A
I just thought unscented being that they didn't add scents to it.
- [32:07]
B
There are things. They are company is technically, technically allowed to add additional ingredients and chemicals in there to mask the scent. So it should be mask scented. Is that a word? It's not unscented.
- [32:21]
A
Chemically unscented, correct?
- [32:22]
B
Yeah, that's right.
- [32:23]
A
So like an unscented candle is not a healthier candle. It might have additional chemicals to remove the scent of wax or whatever.
- [32:31]
B
Oh my gosh. Fragrance free. And that is the only thing that's actually something that is a monitored. Like you can't slap that on a label unless it's actually free of fragrances. Right. That's one of those things that's, that's monitored by the government. Right. Hypoallergenic is another thing I can't stand. It's like, you know, put all over, slapped all over all of these labels. There's no regulatory body that determines if something's hypoallergenic or not. Okay. And no such thing as a hypoallergenic pet. I hate to break it to everybody, but as it relates to hypoallergenic products, companies have as much leeway as they want. It is a marketing term, okay. To allow, you know, they can put that on. There's also something we're seeing a lot more of, which is like the Sensitive Skin series, right?
- [33:13]
A
Yes.
- [33:14]
B
So what A lot of these companies are doing is they're taking the most likely fragrance allergens. Right. Because you could be reactive to, like, one type of fragrance or two types of fragrances, but it's usually like you're reactive to a fragrance like Ylang Ylang oil or whatever it is. Right. Or tea tree oil. Like, that's your allergy. But generally speaking, if you're allergic to one, we test you do, like, a fragrance mix. And if you're allergic to one fragrance, we say up for fragrance free. So these companies are taking, like, the most common fragrances, the top 70 common fragrances, and not using those.
- [33:46]
A
Got it.
- [33:47]
B
And then they're using whatever other synthetic fragrances that they want in the ingredients. So, like, no, stop. And hypoallergenic, the same thing. They'll look at the most common contact allergens. There's something called the American Contact Dermatitis Society.
- [34:00]
A
Okay.
- [34:01]
B
And they actually rate. They give Contact Allergens of the year. Every year somebody wins an award.
- [34:06]
A
You know, that's an award that you don't want.
- [34:08]
B
Yeah, exactly. Lanolin was a contact allergen of the year one year, which is actually made from sheep's wool and is found in aquaphor, which is a really common baby product. So that was one contact allergen of the year.
- [34:19]
A
Oh, my gosh.
- [34:20]
B
All different ones. And so the American Contact Dermatitis Society has this list of the most common contact allergens, like the top 20. And so a lot of brands that say they're hypoallergenic don't have one of those. Top 20.
- [34:33]
A
Got it.
- [34:34]
B
But, you know, they could have the 21st, the 22nd, the 23rd most common allergen. Maybe one company interprets hypoallergenic as saying we don't have the top five common allergens, like, so there's no regulation there.
- [34:45]
A
So you really have to just look out for yourself. And I think, you know, a lot of it, too, is just seeing if you have an allergy to it. Once you have an allergy to it, just avoid it.
- [34:53]
B
And understand the difference between someone who has an allergy to something versus chemicals that are harmful for you that no one should be putting on their body. And that's like the biggest fragrance, right? Synthetic fragrance, not good. Naturally occurring fragrance, good. If you have a fragrance allergy, don't have either.
- [35:09]
A
Right, right. That's a really great breakdown. Let's take a quick break from this conversation. I want to talk to you about something that rarely gets airtime in the performance space. But you should know about it. About 95% of Americans aren't getting enough fiber, and most of them have no idea. In fact, 70% think they're already hitting their daily target. Fiber is one of those things that get written off as basic, but the science tells a very different story. Gut health drives long term performance. And fiber is what makes gut health possible. It determines how well you absorb the nutrients from your food, how stable your energy is throughout the day, and how effectively your body controls inflammation and recovers from training. If your gut isn't functioning at a high level, everything else that you're doing, the supplements, the workout, the sleep protocols, is working at a fraction of its potential. And that's why I'm using momentous fiber. It's a complete three in one formula with soluble fiber, insoluble fiber, and prebiotic resistant starch. Most fiber products only contain one type, which means they're only solving one part of the problem. This formula is designed to strengthen the gut, support digestion, and help stabilize blood sugar for steady crash free energy, clean, minimal ingredients, no additives. And it's also independently NSF certified for sport. It comes unflavored or even in a cinnamon flavor that's really tasty and mixes easily into a shake or even just with water. Head over to livemomentous.com fiber and use my code DrShaw for up to 35% off your first order. The link is in the show notes. You know, why are so many people experiencing more allergies nowadays?
- [36:52]
B
That's a good question. It goes back to some of the behaviors that we did when we were younger, when we were kids. Right. Where like maybe not, maybe not necessarily our generation, but I would say like, you know, people in their 20s or 30s, their parents were chasing them around with hand sanitizer and antibacterial everything. Antibacterial hand soap running around with hand sanitizer. Ooh, don't get germs on you. Right. And what happens is when you do that early on to a child, before the age of 12 months, it's killing off both the bad bacteria and the good bacteria. And when your body doesn't get exposures to that balance of bacteria, you skew allergy.
- [37:31]
A
Yeah.
- [37:31]
B
And the reason is your immune system is learning. It's a critical time. The immune system is learning, like what's good, what's bad. So the population that's least likely to develop allergies are people who grow up on a farm and people who have multiple siblings. Why? Because they're exposed to all Kinds of germs, and their immune system develops properly. So when you put kids in a bubble and you kill off all of their exposure bacteria, right, this hygiene hypothesis, and you keep them in this very, very clean, sterile environment, their immune system gets bored. And then what happens is it doesn't know what to react to and what not to react to. So it's starts to react to things that are normally occurring in the environment, hence allergies. Hence, you go outside, you smell some pollen, you smell some roses, and all of a sudden you're sneezing. Because that's actually your immune system. Right. These are your TH2 cells of your immune system that historically were meant to fight against parasites. So it is a compo. And so your immune system is not exposed to the right things. It's skews more towards this TH2 response. And then it starts just attacking things that are normally occurring in the environment. So another interesting proof point for this is when you look in undeveloped countries and you look in Africa, like India, allergies are not a thing because their Th2 immune system is too busy fighting off real parasites.
- [38:50]
A
Right, right.
- [38:50]
B
And so they're not being like, oh, pollen, sneeze this, that, like they're busy. That immune system is properly engaged to fight against parasitic infections. And then our TH1 cells are our immune system cells that fight against bacteria and viruses.
- [39:04]
A
Right, got it. So I did not realize TH2 is a specific system that we evolved with to fight parasitic infections. And parasites are not really a thing in the United States anymore that I know of. Right. I mean, you don't talk about, you don't test for them, you don't talk about them very often. But I mean, are they a thing or is it just that now we've so effectively eliminated parasites from our day to day that the TH2 system is
- [39:31]
B
now it's not doing much and it's bored and it's twiddling its thumbs and then it's like, ooh, I'm going to start reacting to things normally occurring in the environment. I'm going to start reacting to foods that got initially exposed through my skin. I'm going to start reacting to things that are getting into my nasal passages, like pollens and trees and stuff. And then that's how allergies develop. The other thing that's. And again, it all relates to that, the proper type of exposure to bacteria and things that are, you know, within that first 12 months of life. Including exposure to the vaginal canal during birth.
- [40:06]
A
Yes.
- [40:07]
B
And so we see a correlation between babies that are born by C section and allergies in that population.
- [40:14]
A
Really.
- [40:14]
B
Whereas children that are born through the vaginal canal and have that initial important exposure to good bacteria have fewer allergies.
- [40:21]
A
Right.
- [40:22]
B
And that's not to say you shouldn't do C sections for an emergency. But again, 20 years ago, working women. Right. 20, you know, anywhere 20 years ago till today, you just do an elective C section. You're like, I don't wanna be stretched down there. I also have a work meeting. I want my hair done. I wanna look good for the baby photos. Right. And we were doing it for convenience. And now you see this generation of children with an increased incidence of allergies.
- [40:48]
A
Yeah, it's so true. So if someone is undergoing a C section, there's a technique they'd use now. Right. To expose the child to the vaginal bacteria. Any woman who's thinking about going through a C section, which is obviously having one done emergently, they should do this. Right. Is the swabbing.
- [41:04]
B
Yes. Yeah. Where it's literally lathering your kid in the bacteria that. From your vaginal canal.
- [41:10]
A
Right, right. Yeah. So. And do most OBGYNs do this right now?
- [41:14]
B
I don't think this is something you have to advocate for and talk about because, again, because we're so, like, siloed in the type of medicine that we practice, OBGYNs are not thinking about, is this going to increase this child's risk of allergies? Right. That's the pediatrician and the allergist problem.
- [41:28]
A
That's so true. I know. So. Yeah. And then it's like a later problem to deal with with. With allergy shots and all of these things.
- [41:37]
B
Yeah, yeah. And peanut allergy is another. It's another perfect example.
- [41:40]
A
Yeah, we'll talk about that one. Yeah.
- [41:41]
B
So there was a recommendation made by the American Academy of Pediatrics before we knew. Right. It wasn't like they did anything bad. It was just like when we were all about this hygiene hypothesis and eliminating and reducing potential exposures. If you eliminate an expo. Potential exposure to something, then it won't be a problem down the line. Elimination of exposure to something only matters if you already have an allergy to something.
- [42:04]
A
Right, right.
- [42:05]
B
So what we did is we inadvertently created an increased risk of allergy because we said to parents, do not introduce peanut until after the age of 2 years old. Partially choking hazard. Right. That makes sense. Partially because we thought it was going to increase the risk of food allergy. And we said, okay, if tree nuts are, you know, a little bit higher on the list at that point it was maybe a 2%, you know, of the population had a peanut allergy. We don't want it to get any higher. So let's just not introduce peanut. Let's just keep kids away from peanut. So what ended up happening was older siblings are still having peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Right. And so the initial exposure for these children was through the skin. And the gut is a very immune tolerant organ. Right? You get it through the gut, you break down pretty much anything. The skin is not. The skin is like, oh no, this is something foreign. So you think about those peanut particles and through contact, right? Got into, you know, kids skin or at least this is the theory, right. That's how the exposure occurs. Likely a skin based exposure. And then when the child did eat peanut, it was like, oh wait, that was that weird thing that got exposed to my skin. And so like that's kind of the theory of how children developed allergies. There's also, you know, the propensity in your family and genetics and things like that. Other things that increased allergy profiles in general. We talked about the C sections.
- [43:24]
A
Yes.
- [43:25]
B
Birth through C sections. So it's kind of a perfect storm, right? Use of antibiotics in infants before the age of 12, 12 months. Use of antibiotics by the mom, the pregnant mom. Right. Because again, we're destroying all of the good bacteria along with the bad bacteria. So now you're set up with this perfect environment. You now have removed this food that is ubiquitous and very common among soldiers, siblings and everything. Right. And now these children when they are introduced are like, whoa, that's something foreign. What's really now incidents of peanut allergies was up to 10%.
- [43:56]
A
Sure.
- [43:57]
B
Another thing that's important caveat is like they're not all the kids have peanut allergy. Pediatricians start doing the tests. Some kids that have a stomachache or this or that, that don't actually have an allergy to peanut like we've, we're testing a lot more. So that kind of conflates the number. But here's the good news. We recognize that there is an issue. We say now early introduction of peanuts. We've been saying that since 2017. I remember I was on Good Morning America in 2017 when the guideline came out. Dan Harris and we say now early introduction of peanut. Right. As early as 4 months of age start introducing peanut powder, peanut protein and moms eat peanut. And we're actually for the first time study just came out a couple of months ago. We're actually for the first Time seeing a decrease in the incidence of peanut allergy in children.
- [44:44]
A
Amazing.
- [44:45]
B
And so it's proved the point too. So early introduction is key. Early exposures are important. And we can't overdo it with oral antibiotics and we can't overdo it with antibacterial everything.
- [44:55]
A
Yeah. And the whole peanut allergy story is a big lesson learned, that it's fine for kids to go out and play,
- [45:01]
B
let them roll in the dirt, get dirty. You don't have to shower them every night either.
- [45:05]
A
Yeah, yeah.
- [45:06]
B
I just kind of felt with my mother about this. She's like, why don't you wash your kids every night? I'm like, because it's important for them to be dirty.
- [45:11]
A
Yes.
- [45:11]
B
And it didn't go over with her, but too bad.
- [45:15]
A
You're the immunologist, you should know, right? I love it. Yeah, it's kind of like this complete, like, reframing of the whole hypothesis around germs. Right. I mean, thank God we have the germ hypothesis because we were going into surgery without washing hands, you know, a few, like a hundred years ago. So we know that eliminating germs is important in certain scenarios, but not every single scenario. Right.
- [45:41]
B
Well, there's good guy germs and bad guy germs, and we don't want the bad guy germs to, you know, win over the good guy germs. But the problem is when you take antibiotics unnecessarily, when you use antibiotic hand wash and hand soaps and cleaning products unnecessarily, then you're killing off all the good guys too. Those mild mannered good guys are just getting swept away. And then that's when your body either has over proliferation of the bad guys or the immune system is like, hey, what's going on here? Right. There's this balance, this homeostasis has now been disrupted. And your immune system's like, all right, who's good, who's bad? I don't know anymore. I'm just fighting against everything.
- [46:17]
A
Right, right, right. You know, another thing I think about a lot too. It's not allergies, but it's kind of adjacent is. I have a lot of patients now that are just, you know, I'm doing quotes, always getting sick. Right. And people seem to be suffering from some sort of upper respiratory illness two weeks out of every month almost. And why is that occurring?
- [46:38]
B
We have not been very good as allergist immunologists as talking about primary and secondary immune deficiencies.
- [46:46]
A
Yes. Okay.
- [46:46]
B
So if you've had a sinus Infection requiring oral antibiotics more than four times in a year. You should undergo testing of your immune system to determine if you have the right number of immune system cells in your body. One and two, if you have the right number, whether or not those cells are functioning properly. So we're just like, not properly screening. And what ends up happening is that people have these recurrent inf. And because of, again, the way that our healthcare system is so siloed, you know, you go to your internist for one infection, you go to your longevity doctor for another infection. You go to the urgent care for another infection, you do telemedicine for another infection. So people are not realizing and seeing, like, oh, my gosh, this person is getting sick recurrently. That's one too, is most doctors. You know, there's only 3,000 allergists, immunologists in the country. And we don't very. We don't talk about what we do often. So, you know, people don't even know what the workup should be.
- [47:39]
A
Right.
- [47:40]
B
And you should be testing. It's called quantitative immunoglobulins, meaning these are the proteins that are created by your immune system cells to fight against bacteria. And then you should also look at your CD4 and CD8 cells, which are T cells that fight against viruses. You need to look at those overall numbers, and then you need to look at the function. And by looking at the function, you basically say, you know, have you been vaccinated in the past? Right? Yes. You look at those vaccine titers and you say, have you mounted the appropriate response to that infection or have you not mounted the appropriate response to that infection? And then oftentimes we'll do a test where we try to stimulate those immune system cells. And if they're not stimulated, then we know that they're not functioning properly. Why they're not functioning properly could be something genetic, it could be something environmental, but there's a good treatment for it, which is we give you back some of those immunoglobulins, Right. Those immune system cells in a pooled form so that you have them in your system to then fight against infection. But it's a really common thing, primary immune deficiency, that we're just not. We're just not talking about and we're not diagnosing.
- [48:45]
A
Yeah, I think it's a huge problem, actually, in my clinic specifically, we're giving people this IVIG now.
- [48:51]
B
That's what it is, Right. That's the treatment.
- [48:53]
A
Right. Because it's such a huge problem. And I mean, I would Say IVIG is one of those, like, pretty rarely talked about treatments out there.
- [49:01]
B
And it's so important, it's giving you back pooled immunoglobulins, which is what your immune system should be making. Immunoglobulin sounds like a weird globule, mucus, something. It's just a bunch of proteins. Right. And those proteins are really important to fight against viruses and fight against infections. So IVIG is giving you back those immune globulins, which is a much more natural thing to do than giving someone antibiotics constantly to fight infections. And also, we know antibiotics are not going to work against viruses. Right. So give yourself back the things that are deficient that are missing. Right.
- [49:33]
A
Help your immune system fight.
- [49:34]
B
Exactly. Get your immune system back in check. That's. That's the value of ivig.
- [49:39]
A
Got it. So this testing that you do to test the number of T cells, which you mentioned a few times, and also immune globulins, this is quantitative immune testing. Studies that are. Where is this available? How can you get it?
- [49:54]
B
Quest LabCorp. It's really just a matter of your provider, your doctor, like knowing to order those tests.
- [50:00]
A
Right, right.
- [50:01]
B
And even some of the commercially available, you know, offerings that are out there where you can get your labs drawn and done don't even offer these things.
- [50:08]
A
They don't.
- [50:09]
B
Again, you know, this is our job as allergist immunologists to educate more around the signs and symptoms of primary immune deficiency and then also how to evaluate and test for it.
- [50:18]
A
Right, Exactly. Other than IVIg treatments, how often if someone has primary immune deficiency, should they be getting IVIg or should they only get it when they're sick? Or how do you look at.
- [50:28]
B
It really depends on like the severity of the infection, the nature of the immune deficiency. We also use IVIG in scenarios where people have autoimmune issues and autoimmune disease. Again, it's like reestablishing that balance because your own immunoglobulins are not functioning properly. They're over functioning and fighting against your own system cells. So you're like, hey, here's what a healthy batch of immune system proteins look like. And you put that into your body.
- [50:54]
A
Got it.
- [50:54]
B
So the frequency can be anywhere around when you're around the time, you know, when you're sick, to a regular cadence of every four to six weeks. Sometimes it's every three months. It really depends on the nature of the immune deficiency and the severity.
- [51:08]
A
Got it. And for someone who's constantly getting sick, it's important for them to see an immunologist that understands this and that could potentially get.
- [51:16]
B
Yes. And two things should be ruled out. The most common thing that a third of adults have are allergies. And untreated allergies increases your risk for infection.
- [51:23]
A
Got it.
- [51:24]
B
If you think about it, your immune system is constantly congested. So you constantly have all this mucus and you're coughing and you're having inflammation. Right. And bacteria and viruses love that environment. They're like, ooh, cozy, warm mucus that I can hang out in. So it's really important to keep allergies under control because untreated allergies and undiagnosed allergies increases your chances of having infection.
- [51:47]
A
Got it.
- [51:48]
B
So that's one bucket allergies as a contributing factor. And then the second piece would be, are we missing a primary immune deficiency? Whether it's the total number of immune system cells that are off or not. Not the number. The number looks good, but it's the function. They're not functioning properly.
- [52:04]
A
Got it. So you said there's three buckets, Right. So the primary immune deficiency rule out allergies. What's the third bucket?
- [52:10]
B
Oh, did I say three buckets?
- [52:11]
A
I think you said three buckets.
- [52:12]
B
Oh, no.
- [52:13]
A
So there's two buckets.
- [52:14]
B
Okay.
- [52:15]
A
I love it. And then. So this is really important because I think not a lot of people know about primary immune deficiency. They don't know about ivig, but this is available, and we're doing IVIG at our clinics now because of just the sheer prevalence of people getting sick all the time.
- [52:30]
B
There's a third bucket. I'll tell you the third bucket. Secondary immune deficiency. Right. So primary immune deficiency is, for some reason, my body is not. My immune system cells are not functioning properly. Secondary immune deficiency is something external is causing my immune system cells to not function properly. Most common cause would be someone who's chronically on steroids, like prednisone or something, the inhaled steroids, like asthma inhalers and things like that, which then suppress your immune system activity. Or if you're on certain medications for certain autoimmune diseases and things like that, it's basically an external factor that's causing your immune system to be downregulated and muted. And we call that a secondary immune deficiency.
- [53:11]
A
Got it. Got it. Which is so crazy, because a lot of times for allergies, people will give you steroids.
- [53:16]
B
Exactly. Because we want to calm down that, like, inflammation that's occurring where the truth is, you need to identify what your triggers are. Avoid those triggers. And there's also a cure for allergies, which is allergy and immunotherapy, where we retrain your immune system. Your immune system is smart. We train your immune system to no longer be allergic. And so you can get that in the form of an injection. You can also get that underneath your tongue or sublingual drop underneath your tongue. And so you could even do that from the comfort of your home. 75, 80% of people cured of their allergies. So there are natural. 80% of people, wow, no longer allergic.
- [53:52]
A
And these are. So I've seen these offered online now too. Like there's companies that will send you these boxes of your sublingual drops, or shots, I think as well. Right?
- [54:02]
B
Not shots, because the shots need to be done in a monitored setting in the allergist's office. Because we are giving you small amounts of what you're allergic to. So there is a chance that you can have an allergic reaction and in some cases a life threatening allergic reaction. That's why you're on like a certain protocol where we give you small amounts each week and we watch and we monitor you and we say, okay, look good, next week we can increase the dose. Next week we can increase the dose a little bit more. But for pet allergies, for tree pollen, dust, you name it, you could undergo immunotherapy through injections.
- [54:34]
A
Got it.
- [54:34]
B
Then there are the drops underneath the tongue where the biggest risk is like a local reaction, a little bit of swelling or something like that. But you don't see the systemic reactions or anything life threatening. The problem with some of the online companies is just do your research because a lot of them don't have the potency that's strong enough to truly get you to a non allergic state. So one warning sign would be if you have a company that's like, oh, you're allergic to trees and grasses and pets and, you know, mice, let's create these droplets. Right. With all of this in there, there's no way to treat you effectively to four different things. You'd be drinking gallons of this stuff to get the concentration, the right concentration. So you want to look for companies that really look at the major allergen that's causing most of your symptoms. So at most two allergens in those drops, and that's online companies or even in person because there are doctor's offices that are giving you snake oil. Also, being the informed consumer to say, hey, are you going to be able to get up to therapeutic concentrations here? If you're including more than one or two allergens. Right. Cause you don't wanna be sitting there chugging all this, all these drops right on your tongue. There's only so much you can do.
- [55:46]
A
God, there's so many things available now. I can't even. Like, I'm learning so much from you that I've. Even as a doctor, like, I feel like these things are just things that I've heard about but not really implemented in my clinical practice. Because, you know, like, when someone's having problems with, like, allergies, hypersensitivities, reaction, we send them to an immunologist. But, like, you're right. There's only. There's not too many immunologists out there. So most people just give up to try to wait for an appointment.
- [56:15]
B
Yeah. And a lot of allergists will just practice allergy and then they know you see the immunology piece.
- [56:20]
A
Right, right. So what's a good solution for people that are struggling with allergies? Immune system disturbances, Low weakened immune systems. If they can't get into an allergist or an immunologist, what can they do?
- [56:31]
B
It's. I mean, so going to, like, Resources Immune Deficiency foundation is a good one. The Modell foundation is another one just for education and just see if you meet these criteria for these recurrent infections and things like that. The good news is that there are lots of tests available. So you could, like, go to, you know, questonline.com and get an environmental allergy testing panel. Right. To at least rule those things out.
- [56:54]
A
Got it.
- [56:55]
B
So number one is understanding what your triggers are. A quick hack for that is to say, am I sick at the same exact time every year? And how long am I sick for? So here's an example. I'm sick every mar. You know, every year from March until the end of April. Are you really sick with an infection or is that allergies? So I'll tell you, if you're not having a fever or swollen lymph nodes, the likelihood is it's allergies. It's every single March, which is the start of tree pollen season, and it's lasting longer than seven to 10 days. If it's every year lasting longer than seven to 10 days, and you don't have a fever, swollen lymph nodes, that's likely an allergy. And the truth is you don't really need a test to tell you that you have a tree pollen allergy because that's the only pollen that's present. And you know that your symptoms are Mostly during that time of the year. So then it's how do I avoid that as a trigger? And it's, you know, only opening up your windows first thing in the morning when the pollen counts are the lowest, just to air out. We call burping out your home. Right. Taking off your shoes when you come into the house, taking off your clothes, putting them in the washing machine, coming inside, showering and rinsing all that pollen off, scrubbing in between your eyelashes, because tree pollen could get stuck in between your eyelashes. So those are sort of like the ways in which you can avoid that specific allergen. And then we can talk about how to do that for pets and we could talk about how to do that for dust, basically. Right. So depending on what you're allergic to, you can avoid your triggers. That's first line of treatment and then the second line of treatment. Look, the over the counter allergy aisle is like a $6 billion industry avoiding first generation antihistamines. So, like Benadryl is a no, no, because of all the negative effects of affecting your blood brain barrier, association with arrhythmias, which is heart abnormalities, association with dementia. So, like, that's off. But there are second generation antihistamines that can be helpful on an as needed basis. And then nasal steroid sprays, like your flonases of the world and things like that. Those are effective because they work locally. I'm not a huge fan of people taking oral steroids for their symptoms, but if you're just taking a nasal steroid spray from like March until the end of April, it only acts locally in the nasal passages. That'll be effective for you. Just know that it doesn't work as needed. You have to use it every single day for five to seven days. It's not an as needed medication. What it works is it decreases inflammation in your nasal passages over time.
- [59:12]
A
Got it. Oh, one other hack. I think a lot of people use it.
- [59:15]
B
I do use it.
- [59:16]
A
Just when they're stuffed up, they use it.
- [59:17]
B
But one other hack is you can use Afrin at the same time as Flonase and you don't have to worry about that rebound effect of Afrin. Like we often tell people, oh, only use Afrin for, for three to five days. That's true on its own. You shouldn't use Afrin for more than a week on its own because you'll get rebound where your nasal passages will be like, ooh, I really like that thing that was helping me breathe. And it swells back up again. But if you use Afrin at the same time as Flonase. Afrin doesn't have that effect.
- [59:41]
A
Ah, that's a great hack, actually. And then you were mentioning second generation antihistamines. Are you talking about like Clarita and Zyrtec?
- [59:49]
B
Yeah, Allegra and Zyrtec. Claritin is one of the older second generation antihistamines, so it's kind of weaker and it does still cross over the blood brain barrier. Zyrtec is okay, but in 10% of people, it can make you kind of drowsy. So I say to people, you know, it's basically as effective as Benadryl, but take it at night because some people can get drowsy from it.
- [60:07]
A
Got it, got it. Oh, this is so incredibly helpful for people. And so with allergies, you know, you gave us like a really good protocol that you laid out there. But a lot of the treatment will come from getting this, like you said, treated for the long term. And I think this whole new industry around the drops, I think it could be very useful for people.
- [60:29]
B
I prefer that to medications. Right, because medications, you're masking your symptoms. So it's like a temporary fix. First line of treatment, avoidance of your triggers. Second line of treatment, let's figure out how to train your immune system to no longer react and no longer be allergic. Which is where immunotherapy comes in, Right?
- [60:44]
A
Exactly. And then the last question I had for you on going back to ivig Sorry is people have a hard time finding ivig. There's not too many places that do ivig. We do it at Next Health now just because we saw a need. But where can people get IVIG if they feel like they're getting sick?
- [61:01]
B
Very often it's tough. You have to go to forward thinking clinics that offer this. Otherwise, like, you know, you gotta go like the. If you go to your traditional doctor, right, they're gonna go through this insurance route of this whole rigmarole and you're probably not gonna get approved for it. Like, there are specific qualifications. You have to submit laboratory testing. It's a big pain in the butt. First step is see an allergist, immunologist, get the blood tests. If there truly is that deficiency, then yeah, it'll get approved through your insurance. If not, and you've got these recurring symptoms, go to a forward thinking clinic like a Next Health. It is something that's worth paying out of pocket for. Unfortunately, like, it isn't democratized, it isn't easily available everywhere, and it's a powerful treatment. Incredibly powerful. I'd rather, again, I'd rather do that than just give someone a whole host of medications, have them walk away with a whole basket full of medications. Right. I'd rather treat the underlying cause, which is, hey, my immune system cells are not functioning properly. Let me give you back some of those natural cells. Right?
- [61:57]
A
Yeah. It's so true.
- [61:58]
B
Those natural proteins, I should say.
- [61:59]
A
That's so true. Wow. So much incredible information, Dr. Hellion. You're always such a wealth of information. I learned so much from you every time I talk to you.
- [62:08]
B
I learned from you, too.
- [62:10]
A
It's such a pleasure having you on this podcast. Obviously, we have to have you back because we didn't even get to talk about autoimmune disease.
- [62:17]
B
I know.
- [62:17]
A
Which was like another big topic I wanted to cover. And I want to cover longevity with you. And there's so many things, because the immune system, like you mentioned at the beginning of the podcast, immuno. Aging is a big. Probably the biggest factor in longevity. And so we do need to touch on those. So how do you la. Let's go. Let's do part two next time.
- [62:38]
B
Sounds good to me.
- [62:39]
A
There's so much to learn here and you're such an expert. Where can people learn more from you?
- [62:43]
B
Go. Follow me, Dr. Tanya Elliott on social media. Check out my website. Sign up for my newsletter. I've got a lot of fun updates, including a book, but. But we'll talk about that next time.
- [62:52]
A
Yeah, I mean, when your book comes out, it's going to be a major topic of conversation, so I can't wait for that.
- [62:57]
B
Thanks.
- [62:58]
A
Thank you so much, Dr. Elliot.
- [62:59]
B
Yeah, thanks for having me.
- [63:03]
A
Thank you so much for listening to the podcast today. Please remember to subscribe if you like this episode and give us a good review and share a link with your friends. It really helps to support all of our efforts. I also want to remind you that the information shared on this podcast is for educational purposes only and is not intended to replace professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Please consult with your healthcare provider or physician before making any decisions or taking any action based on what you hear today, especially if you have any underlying health conditions or on any medications. Your doctor knows your personal health situation the best and it's always important to seek their guidance.