LowCarbUSA Podcast

James and Doug discuss the health benefits of organ meats, and the fact that their consumption, particularly in the U.S., has declined over the past several decades. This is unfortunate, according to James, and is due in part to several misconceptions people have about organ meat. “Organ meats are the most nutrient dense foods on the planet, and we're not eating them,” He said. “In essence, organ meats are Mother Nature's multivitamin. I believe that eating nose to tail is one of the most important things in a person's diet. Currently 92% of the U.S. population is nutrient deficient.”

James explained how we miss out on benefits when we only eat muscle meat and skip the organs. He also acknowledged that many people fear the taste of organ meat or have some other reason for avoiding it. He said one common misperception is that consuming organs will result in vitamin toxicity, such as from too much Vitamin A. “That’s actually not true,” said James. “When the vitamins are coming from a whole food source, the body will absorb what it needs, and get rid of what it doesn’t need.”  “Another myth you hear a lot with organ meats is that organs are the processing and storage site for toxins, and that's actually incorrect as well,” he said. “Organs are more like a filter than a sponge. Their job is to process and convert potentially toxic byproducts into more water soluble forms that can be excreted.”

James developed Pluck as the perfect gateway into eating organs because it doesn't taste like organ meat. “What you taste is the savory, deliciousness of umami (the fifth taste). Eating organs support the health of your organs.”  He explained that the nutritious Pluck seasoning tastes great and will help even picky eaters develop a liking for organ meats. He said that consuming the Pluck seasoning consistently was a form of micro-dosing that would confer nutritional benefits, and that a reasonable goal would be to eventually add organs to the diet for maximum benefits.

If you've ever been interested in easily measuring and tracking your level of nutritional ketosis over time, and in using these results to help you better manage your metabolic health and fat burning , you will be fascinated by Episode 93 of the LowCarbUSA^® Podcast.

The Biosense® device measures breath acetone, which is produced as a byproduct of ketogenesis. The concentration of acetone in the breath indicates one's level of nutritional ketosis. The Biosense® system is intended for self-testing of acetone and is intended for home (lay user) or professional use in the management of patients seeking to reach or maintain nutritional ketosis.

Dr. Parrella is a family physician and obesity medicine specialist. She is a nationally recognized expert and frequently invited speaker, educator and strategist for universities, hospitals, communities, and businesses. An Associate Professor in both the Department of Family Medicine and the Department of Surgery, she is the Chief of Lifestyle Medicine, the Medical Director for Rush University’s Center for Weight Loss and Lifestyle Medicine, and the Director of Strategic Planning and Implementation within the Department of Surgery.

Jim Howard is a 27-year MedTech executive focused on value creation with novel approaches to patient care. He is passionate about behavioral changes in chronic diseases, putting healthcare in the hands of patients. Throughout his career, Jim has had great success scaling companies and attracting capital with disruptive digital health and software devices, including AR/VR, genomics, cardiovascular, and clinical decision support. He has used non-traditional strategies in the successful development of global health tech companies.

You can connect with BioSense on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or on their website.

Ede Fox, aka. The Black Carnivore discusses how by 2015 she had reached an all time high weight of 246 lbs, she was in a lot of pain and decided she really need to do something about it.  She had a go at the keto diet and found that even before she really lost a lot of weight, the pain was going away and the brain fog lifted and her life was improving immensely.  She went on to lose about 80 lbs which she was really happy with but continued to suffer from certain health problems that she learned had cleared up for a lot of other keto diet adopters, but not for her.  Her asthma and eczema and other allergies were still uncontrolled and she was taking a bunch of medications to control them.

She started to hear about the carnivore diet and she first decided to try a beef and butter diet she had heard about.  It was supposed to be for 3 days but she decided to do it for 2 weeks and by day 2 she said she felt phenomenal.  All her allergies cleared up and she knew that this was going to be home base for her, diet wise from then on.  She's gone on to create a community for other black people who wanted to try this way of eating to provide the support they really need.  You can reach out to her for help or to learn more on Instagram @BlackCarnivore.

Today we talk with Brett Ender (aka @MrSollozzo) and hear how he reversed debilitating ulcerative colitis by adopting a carnivore diet.  He had started to notice symptoms while at college but while serving an internship after that and commuting 4 hours a day by train to and from New York City.  He started to notice more and more blood in his stool but was too embarrassed to mention it to anyone and just assumed it would heal on its own.  But it just got worse and worse and at its peak he was going to the bathroom 30 times or more a day and effectively he was just passing straight blood!  Finally he tells a doctor and ends up on a drug called REMICADE which does help but it is $65,000 per infusion and he is told he will need an infusion every 6 - 8 weeks for the rest of his life.

Then he stared to hear that a carnivore diet approach might help him and when he heard doctors like Shawn Baker talk about it he though it might be worth trying.  He started to notice improvements .  Before long all his symptoms had evaporated.  But he was still on the REMICADE and experiencing a lot of bad side effects from it.  He had to work really hard to convince his doctor to take him off it but finally he did and it's been plain sailing every since!!

At a time when nearly 90 percent of our human population is metabolically unhealthy, we were extremely interested to meet Jaron Lucas, who has devoted his career to helping dogs regain their health through proper nutrition.  Jaron sat down with LowCarbUSA^® co-founder Doug Reynolds for an incredibly informative podcast interview.

After personally discovering many of the health benefits after implementing a ketogenic diet for himself, Jaron wondered if he could use what he learned to improve the health of his own dog by changing the formulation of the food he served. “I discovered that the pet food industry is a very large industry with many really terrible products in it, including dry kibble. After doing a good amount of research, I started to believe strongly that we could create something better.”

So he co-founded the Yumwoof Natural Pet Food company along with two others who, like him, had spent years working in the tech industry. The stated mission of their company is to increase the health span of dogs through the creation of healthy food for dogs.  “We went back, and we looked at NIH studies that have been done over the last 10 to 15 years,” said Jaron, “and we looked at the AAFCO (Association of American Feed Control Officials) dog food nutrient profiles with the goal of creating an industry-leading low carb dog food.”

He discovered that many of the most popular brands of dog food are loaded with nearly 50% carbohydrates, a fact that does not align well with the primarily meat-based diet that dogs historically consumed.  “One of my biggest pet peeves in the pet food industry is the marketing lie that rice and potatoes are good for your dog,” said Jaron. “There no scientific evidence to show that dogs were digging potatoes out of the ground and eating them. They're just chains of simple sugar molecules that raise blood insulin levels, and cause the same kind of damage in dogs as they do in humans.”

He talked with Doug about the surging rates of obesity in dogs, which he says is caused by diets containing too many carbohydrates and the feedings which, in many cases, are too frequent.  “We’re seeing a 60% obesity rate in dogs,” he said. “When dogs eat too much (carbs), they can't store it anymore in their fat cells. Diabetes rates have almost doubled over the last 20 years in dogs.”

According to an article Jaron recently wrote, “...canine diabetes is up 79% since 2006, 56% of dogs are now classified as obese, and almost half of dogs over the age of 10 will develop cancer.”  He explained how he and his partners have created a recipe that includes important vitamins and minerals dogs need, as well as other ingredients such as antioxidants and MCT oils.  “Might that help them live longer?” The answer is yes,” said Jaron. “There have been many studies done to show that dogs with more antioxidants in their diet benefit.”

Discussing a study that compared dogs that ate a processed diet, (dry kibble) to dogs that ate a natural diet of whole foods, he says, “Unsurprisingly, the group of dogs who were eating whole foods had doubled the microbiome diversity than the other dogs, which is associated with greater longevity,” said Jaron. ”We are trying to apply this latest nutrition evidence to fulfill our company mission of extending the lifespan of all dogs.”

He went on to explain how popular dog food companies exploit the current labeling requirements, specifically the fact that carbohydrates do not need to be listed per FDA and AAFCO requirements.  The reason, according to Jaron, is motivated by profit. Carbohydrates in the form of rice and potatoes are cheap, and their use leads to larger margins. he also explained how many brands use ingredients like beef meal, chicken meal, fish meal, and other byproducts to make their products more profitable. “Not a lot of people know this, but beef meal is where they just take the beef bones and put them through a highly processed manufacturing process to extract all the protein that's left. There’s a lot of ultra processing going on in the creation of most dry kibble.”

“This is a topic that's really important to me,” said Jaron. “The largest pet food companies who manufacture dry kibble are also effectively in control of the regulating body in pet food. I think that a grassroot action is really the only way that we can achieve change.”  He has launched a petition aimed at getting United States lawmakers to add carbohydrate nutritional information to pet food labels. “This is really a passion project for me,” he said, “I think we need to work to bring a greater level of honesty to the pet food industry, for the benefit of consumers and their dogs.

Ken Berry, MD, speaks with LowCarbUSA^®  co-founder Doug Reynolds about the proper human diet, as well as the importance of getting to know the people behind the screen, by meeting others in person at live events.

Dr. Berry was a presenter at the hugely successful Low Carb Boca Conference, and will be presenting at the upcoming Low Carb San Diego Conference to be held August 25-28. Tickets to the San Diego event are now available at a special early bird price. Use code 'EarlyBirdSD' to save 35% on tickets, spectacular low-carb-dinners, and CME/CMHE credits if you register now.

"If you try to feed a highly processed modern diet to us, we get fat, we get sick, we get pre-diabetic, and we get fatty liver," said Dr. Berry. "Well, in that same vein, I think there's a need for human interaction, a need to be part of a tribe, a need to meet new people, and form lasting meaningful relationships in person. I think the research is very clear that that's very important for overall mental health..."

Dr. Berry said he believes social media can help people learn about health and nutrition, and can help them make important connections, but ultimately there is no substitute for actually meeting other people in person.

"When you meet people in person, it's almost like a family reunion," said Dr. Berry. "It's the coolest thing, you've never met these people in your life, but you feel like you're at a reunion of family or old friends. It's like I've been following you for two years on Instagram, it's so wonderful to meet you in person. I think it takes those social media relationships to the next level, a deeper and more meaningful level. I think it's almost magical."

The new relationships one makes at an in-person event can be life-changing, said Dr. Berry.  "You're going to walk away with a cell phone full of new contacts, new cell phone numbers, and new email addresses... I would encourage everyone, if you have not been to one of these low carb events, save up your money, I promise you it is an investment in your long term physical and mental health, to be part of this tribe. Take a friend with you, find a buddy who maybe doesn't live in the same town, but is also interested in low carb and say, Hey, let's go to this thing, let's meet there and make some new friends."

Martha Tettenborn is a Registered Dietitian and a Health Coach who was going through life quite 'smug with her health' as she puts it until one day she found an unexpected large lump in her abdomen and was diagnosed with stage 1 ovarian cancer.  It had ruptured and so she required surgery and then 6 rounds of chemo to take care of any cancer cells that might be floating around and seed new tumours.

The thought of the side effects of chemotherapy  terrified her so she started searching for what she could do and she learned that the use of fasting might help to mitigate the side effects of the treatment.  To describe it simply, she says that fasting makes your heathy cells go quiet and the cancer cells can't downregulate and become stressed so the chemo drugs seek them out and leave your healthy cells, which are in 'Stealth Mode', alone for the most part.  So the side effects are drastically reduced and the treatment itself may also be more effective.

Martha is not able to function as an RD outside of her home state but she has developed what she calls a Cancer Doula role where she is able to provide support and comfort for anyone going through treatment.  She has written a 'Keto Fasting Protocol' which is available for free on her website

She has also just published the book, 'Hacking Chemo' - getting through chemo with a keto diet, targeted therapeutic fasting and a kick ass attitude.

One month after Maggie Jones' 40th birthday, she was diagnosed with terminal, stage 4 lung cancer that had spread to her eye, liver, four tumors in her brain, and more than a dozen lymph nodes throughout her chest, neck and abdomen. Her prognosis of six to eight months with conventional treatment seemed optimistic.  Her doctors were focused on making her comfortable.  She was dying.

Dr. Philip Ovadia is a cardiothoracic surgeon who found himself becoming morbidly obese and running the risk of ending up on his own operating table. He came across the ketogenic diet and the concept of carbohydrate restriction initially at a conference where Gary Taubes was talking.  "What he was saying made a lot of sense", Dr. Ovadia says and so he started researching more and reading Gary's books and in the end adopted the diet and lifestyle changes for himself.  Now he has lost more than 100 lbs and has taken his health back.

On top of his surgery practice, he now has a lifestyle consulting business where he helps people to get healthy and stay off his operating table.  He has written a book to that effect, "Stay Of My Operating Table", and you can learn more about him and even get in touch with him through his website.

This is such an amazing story!  Bethany McKenzie is a mom on a mission to tell the story of how she manages her son's Type 1 Diabetes through diet and lifestyle in spite of the resistance from the doctors and supposed specialists.  "I just tell my story in a very common way", she says and in doing so she is reaching so many people with the message that they don't have to accept the suffering and anguish experienced by most Type 1 families following the current Standard of Care.

She bases her management strategy on Dr. Bernstein's book call The Diabetes Solution.  She has created a foundation to help other parents to implement this strategy with their children.  Her journey led her down a path to where she decided to make a movie.  "I felt I needed to get this story out to parents all over the world", she says.  She found a director and went and filmed a bunch of families with kids with Type 1 Diabetes who were managing their condition this way.  She got permission from Dr. Bernstein to use the title 'The Diabetes Solution' and the movie is streaming on iTunes, AppleTV, Google Play, Vimeo (for international folks) and Youtube.  You can learn more about the work she is doing and her foundation here.

At our last in-person event in Boca Raton in January 2020, Tekla did a great presentation on food labels and all the ways she felt they came up short, not only in terms of content but also on what foods had labels on them.  For instance, why shouldn't we see labels on apples and bananas.  Maybe not on each one but at least at the display in the grocery store.  If people saw how much sugar was in these fruits they might reconsider eating them.  And that's another thing I didn't know and that is that food labels don't always show the amount of sugar in an item other then the added sugar.  So orange juice, for instance, often comes with a label showing zero grams of sugar as there is no added sugar. But we all know how frighteningly high OJ is in naturally occurring sugar and as we also all know, sugar is sugar, naturally occurring or not.

She also feels the labels should highlight the quality of protein.  Just showing grams of protein is not enough, we need to know the makeup of the protein and what essential versus non-essential amino acids are in there.  That is critical.

If you want to contact here about the project or just learn more about the project and how food labels could be better, you can find her on her website.

Alison Gannett was an organic farmer and professional extreme skier travelling the world competing and one day she was cooking bacon at home and it caught on fire.  Her husband walked in to see her admiring the flames and realised they were really in trouble.  After a CT scan they found an orange sized tumour in her brain.   It was a type of terminal brain cancer and they reckoned she had around 6 months to live.  She refused to take this lying down and worked with Dr. Nasha Winters to reverse her insulin resistance via dietary interventions and today the brain tumour is gone and at 56 she says she feels better than when she was 20.

Her main focus these days is on teaching people about how their DNA can have a profound effect on their health.  She identifies certain genes that could be causing problems and then how tweaking your diet and lifestyle can negate the effects of these genes.  She goes into detail about a few genes like the ones that affect the processing of things like dairy, lactose in particular, coffee, chocolate and the ApoE4 that affects how we processes saturated fats and how people carrying that gene are more inclined to develop Alzheimer's.  She also touches on the study of epigenetics where we can learn how to turn certain genes on or off, again, through diet and lifestyle changes.

You can reach her through her website: https://alisongannett.com/

r. Alexandra Sowa is a dual board-certified physician of Internal Medicine and Obesity Medicine, helping thousands of patients through her practice in New York.  Seeing a growing need for patients to easily be able to get access to relevant lab tests that can help diagnose as well as track responses to interventions, she has created the concept of at-home testing.  Once the kit arrives at your door a simple finger prick is all that is required to collect the samples which can then be mailed off to the lab and the results come back days later.  For me, the most exciting test she offers is insulin.  Before, it was such a task to find a doctor who would even order an Insulin test for you and then after the doctor visit you had to physically go to the lab to get it done.  Now that is a thing of the past.  Listen to this awesome chat we had with her about this new concept and if you want to contact her or order a test kit you can find her at:

Website: alexandrasowamd.com

Instagram: @alexandrasowamd

One of the things we have not really addressed before is the role of reduced carbohydrates in wound care and infectious diseases.  As a physician trained in these areas as well as obesity medicine, Dr. Ravi Kamepalli is working to improve patient outcomes with keto(genic)-based nutrition. "Insulin Resistance is the core problem," he said, "and I've found that cutting carbs really helps a patient to heal."  He says that while clinical trials are important, we also need to do n=1 trials.  We need to move from the mass medicine mindset and narrow it down to personal health.  That is where healthcare is going, and that is where we have to empower doctors."

You can follow him further by finding his website 'https://nobadbugs.com' and you can find links to his social media accounts at the bottom of the page.

Allen Green weighed in at 403 lbs at age 49 when he discovered the concept of carbohydrate restriction and the ketogenic diet.  Now he has regained his health, is off all his medications, of which there were many, and he has lost almost 200 lbs to boot.  He discusses how he got to that point in the first place and what it was that made him decide that it was imperative that he correct the situation.

He  talks for not being able to go on theme park rides with his kids and not wanting to play basketball with his young son as he was literally afraid of tripping and falling on him and killing him.  As with most of us, he is now super motivated to pay it forward and try to help others who are in a similar state to the one that he was in to recover and get their lives back.

The other day, Tim Noakes tweeted the following: "Third truly iconic book in low-carb literature. All written by investigative journalists who've done as much for promoting low-carb science as anyone: 'Good Calories Bad Calories' by Gary Taubes; 'Big Fat Surprise' by Nina Teicholz and now 'Ravenous' by Sam Apple. We're blessed!"  Praise doesn't come much higher than that.

This is a fascinating journey where he explores how the life and work of Otto Warburg is intricately woven into the story of the Nazis and Adolf Hitler and how different things might have been had things panned out differently for Warburg.

You can find 'Ravenous' in book stores, and on Kindle and Audible.  You can learn more about Sam Apple on his website and catch him on twitter:  @sam_apple1

Recently Pam and I were approached by Casey Means, MD who is the co-founder and Chief medical officer of a company called Levels which is creating an App to integrate with a CGM and provide a whole lot of added value to basic scan data available in the CGM dashboard.  We go over all the features, like Metabolic Score, that they have implemented in the App to help people understand the implications of what they eat, as well as other lifestyle factors like sleep and stress, on their blood glucose levels and ultimately their metabolic health.

Levels was kind enough to let both of us trial the App for a month and we scheduled this interview half way through that trial so that we would have something to talk about.  Wearing a CGM is a fascinating experience and I feel everyone should have to wear one for at least a month to see how their lifestyle and diet affects their blood glucose levels so profoundly.  Once we had the CGM sensors in place we did regular finger prick comparisons using our trusty Keto-Mojo blood ketone and glucose meter to see if there was a difference.  There was a small difference of about 10 mg/dL but it was consistent and so it was easy to know with some accuracy what our actual blood glucose readings were.  The most important thing you get from the CGM is not the actual values themselves but the trends seen when we ate or drank something and exercised and experienced stress or lack of sleep.

To learn more about Levels and how you might take part in the pilot, visit the Levels website here.

Jackie Fletcher and Louise Reynolds were both morbidly obese at one point but both follow a ketogenic lifestyle now and both have reversed that situation although they followed very different paths to get there.  Louise is a university professor from Australia although currently she is resident in Bangkok.  After trying everything to beat it she finally made the decision to have weight loss surgery.  Determined to use the surgery as a tool, she went through ongoing therapy to help her refrain from the emotional eating she felt had got her there and over the next 3 years she had lost about 90 lbs and was keeping it off but it was hard work.  Then she had a massive motorbike accident which left her with many injuries and incredible chronic pain.  Her mother was that one who suggested to her that she try the ketogenic diet to help with the pain.  She found that one of the side effects was to lose another 40 lbs and, not only that, but she found it was now so easy to stay on track and keep the weight off.

Jackie had also tried everything and besides the weight gain she was a suffering from debilitating migraines (12 or so a month), ulcers and a score of other issues.  She had given up on life and was convinced that any sort of diet does not work until she heard about the book called 'Why We Get Fat' by Gary Taubes and the light bulb went on.  Like most of us she had to find her way with this lifestyle but she started seeing results right away and that inspired her to learn more to do it better.

They are both thriving now and together they produce the Fabulously Keto Podcast where they strive to help others turn their lives around Jackie manages the Fabulously Keto Website where she provides online coaching as well.

Dubbed the "Sherlock Holmes of Health," Mary Ruddick is an internationally acclaimed nutritionist currently based in Africa, where she is studying traditional tribal diets and their impact on health.  She is the Director of Nutrition for CaptainSoup.com, Enable Your Healing, The REIGNS Method, and the Back to Joy Program.   She has been featured with the book, "Beat Autoimmune" and she can be found on several productions from GundryMD, the Food Lies, MeatRx, and the LowCarbUSA Podcasts.

Mary specializes in rebalancing the microbiome by addressing nutritional and epigenetic aspects that underlie various physical and mental health disorders.   She is a specialist in the field of autoimmunity, histamine intolerance (MCAD), mental disorders, and nervous system disorders to include dysautonomia, and seizure disorders.

Having used both lifestyle and dietary changes on her own miraculous healing journey, she emphasizes the balance of both.  Meditation, cold therapy, light therapy, and limbic system exercises are used extensively in her programs.

Mary will be speaking in August,2021 at the LowCarbUSA - San Diego, 2021 event which will BE IN PERSON AGAIN!! 

If you want to get hold of her or join one of her therapy groups, you can do that on her website.