Join Dr. Martin in today's episode of The Doctor Is In Podcast.
TRANSCRIPT OF TODAY'S EPISODE
Announcer: You're listening to The Doctor Is In Podcast, brought to you by MartinClinic.com. During the episode, the doctors share a lot of information. As awesome as the info may be, it is not intended to diagnose, cure, treat, or prevent any disease. It's strictly for informational purposes.
Dr. Martin: Well, good morning everyone, and once again, welcome to another live this morning and it's good to have you all come on with us when you can. Guys, how often have I talked to you about zinc? Probably not enough. One of the reasons I don't talk about zinc is because I'm assuming you're eating your zinc. Zinc is found in the animal kingdom. When you eat meat, you get zinc. When you eat eggs, you get zinc. When you eat cheese, you get zinc. So I'm assuming you're eating it. But I was reading a study recently about people who are lacking zinc today. And obviously if people buy the vegetarian and vegan, you buy that you're going to be low in zinc. Okay? And zinc is essential. Zinc is essential. And again, I don't talk about it that much because I'm assuming my audience knows that they better eat EMC.
They better eat from the animal kingdom. And the animal kingdom is the superior kingdom of food. It's not even close, guys. And again, one of the reasons is zinc. Okay, let me give you a few signs because I used to look for this in the office signs that you were low in zinc, okay? A lot of times people that were telling me when I studied chronic fatigue syndrome, oftentimes these people were very low in zinc. Now, they also had leaky gut, so that could be a reason, but you got digestive issues. Could be low in zinc. But the number one thing that I used to watch for in zinc deficiency was people who were getting sick all the time, cold after cold, flu after flu, just couldn't go very long without getting sick. Recurring urinary tract infections, for example, I know they had candida, but they often were low in zinc.
I said, you're not eating enough steak, man. You got to eat more steak. But oftentimes I'd give 'em a supplement. This is one of the reasons I created the multi nutrient, used to be called blood boost because we put a good zinc in there in the formula. So here are signs that you're low, your immune system not working properly and you're sick often. Now that can be, look, all of these things can be other conditions, but I used to watch for this, so people that were sick all the time, recurring viruses, colds, the flu never seemed to go long without getting sick again. And by the way, on the other side of it that people tell me they never get sick. Good for you. But look, sometimes your body, you get a bug and your immune system has to go into super work and it's actually good for it, okay? When kids get sick, good, you want their body to use that immune system, and every once in a while it's got to just sort fire on all cylinders and fight a bug. But when you get older and you're sick all the time, it's a sign that yeah, you can have other conditions, but one of them is that you're probably low in zinc.
The other one is skin. Skin conditions. Whenever I had a patient that had psoriasis, eczema, now you guys know this. I always start with the gut. Always start whenever you see something on your skin. A dermatitis, eczema, psoriasis. I look at people's skin all the time and in the office, like very observant. Let me see, you got eczema there. Low in zinc, low in zinc. Temporarily I might give them even a supplement of zinc, and you had to clear up their leaky gut. Always mouth ulcers. You see it Ulcers around the mouth, ulcers in the mouth. People that get those kinds of things usually are low in zinc, taste and smell. Remember during COVID, they were talking about you lost your taste and smell and that was part of the virus, but the other part is that if they were smart, they would've been giving you zinc, but they weren't that smart.
They would've been giving you vitamin D and zinc. Low testosterone in men, oftentimes low levels of zinc, even brain like zinc's, important, depression, libido if you're anxious all the time, it just seems to knock out the zinc in your body. Your body stores zinc, but you need to replenish that, and I would rather you eat zinc. There are just some things that I would rather you eat rather than supplement. So generally I tell people, unless they are super deficient to eat zinc, you get it when you're in the animal kingdom. The other thing that really hurts zinc levels is alcohol. And so I always tell patients, be careful you're low in zinc and alcohol will make you even lower in zinc, so be careful with that. Meds, diuretics, even nonsteroidal anti-inflammatories and NSAIDs often made people low in zinc, like if you're taking medication all the time.
I used to see it in seniors so often. I had them on the blood boost. I had 'em on the multi nutrient because they were so low. They were taking so many medications like diuretics, blood pressure medication, thyroid medication, seniors, statin drugs, big time. Knock out the zinc in your body, antacids. Well, think about it. If you are taking an antacid, if someone's taking an antacid, they're not absorbing zinc properly, might be helping with your acid reflux, but it's not fixing the problem. It's actually making the problem worse, and now you're not breaking down that protein properly and you're not absorbing zinc properly. So I just thought I would bring that up because it's such an important thing and sometimes I don't talk about it. I just assume you guys are eating your zinc, okay? You're already eating it When you have a steak vitamin S, you're getting zinc, you're getting zinc, you're getting the right iron.
You're all your B vitamins, including B12. You get it all in your diet. Now, I often, you guys know this, I talk about supplementing all the time, especially B12. A lot of people just, even though they're eating steak, their B12 levels are not optimized. Those got to be optimized. Vitamin D levels have to be optimized. Okay? Now, I really enjoyed reading this article on mitochondria and we talk a lot about mitochondria because those are your battery packs, right? You got billions of them. Now, I might've brought this to you before. I don't remember if I have or not. Where do you have the most mitochondria? Okay, close your books. I'm giving you a little test. Where are the most, I'll give you two places. Where are the most mitochondria found battery packs. You got 'em all over the place. They're in all your cells, but where do you have the most?
Okay, Tina heart. Okay, you get a star Gary heart? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Carol got close. Sue liver. Close. Thea gut. Yeah, Gary Brain. Okay, Derek, I love you guys. Heart. Kathy brain. It's heart and brain. Okay, Marianne gut look. That's close. So is the liver. You need a lot of mitochondria. Maria, I can't say you're wrong. Okay? I'm just going to say some of you are more right? Okay, because the gut has a lot of mitochondria. The gut cells have huge amount of mitochondria. You need it. It's an energy center. Think of a power plant, but the brain and the heart has the most mitochondria. Now I want to give you why we love the sun so much, okay? According to this research in an article I was reading in sunlight, so just if you go out in the sun, if you got sun today, I want you to think about energy.
You get a lot of energy from the sun, but this is even more important. Do you know that in sunlight your body regenerates and makes mitochondria just getting out in the sun? You make another 3 billion with a B mitochondria, you make new battery packs in the sun. Guys, aren't we just fearfully and wonderfully made? We are human solar panels. We're meant to get in the sun. Isn't it crazy when people tell you don't go in the sun When Johnson and Johnson told you to stay out of the sun, it's going to give you cancer. My word, you make new mitochondria. Think of how important that is for your brain. Think of how important that is for your heart. Think of how important that is for your gut. Think of how important that is for your liver. Yeah, because these are energy centers, the brain being the most, because the brain, 25% of all energy your body produces reduces is for the function of the brain. Headquarters. You're feeding your brain with zinc, with steak, but with the sun, you're making new mitochondria. Now, don't you think that might be important for even in dementia and Alzheimer's, your brain shrinks with a lack of sun, the mitochondria, I just love it that there's some simple things that you and I can do that are so important. The sun, and you don't have to go bake. You just need to get 20 minutes this morning. Okay? What a beautiful day. Just getting sunlight in your eyes.
We'll make melatonin. Oh, oh, oh, guys, it's not complicated. Okay, let's see. I've got to get another study here. So that was on mitochondria. Isn't that fantastic guys? Just on the importance of the sunlight, what it does, I was reading an article on stress and cortisol. Cortisol is your friend till it's not, okay? Cortisol is on your side till it's not. Cortisol is so important because it wakes you up in the morning. It gets your body going, it gets your blood sugar going, cortisol's on your side till it's not, and it's not when it's overused. When cortisol don't get turned off, and man, we have a tsunami of problems with cortisol today. I'll tell you guys, my practice changed so much that I even wrote a book about it, okay? There was two hormones that wanted you dead. I wrote a book about it. Tony, Jr.
And I, we wrote it, but he said, dad, isn't it incredible? You're measuring cortisol and it's unbelievable. You're measuring insulin and it's unbelievable. People are killing themselves with two hormones that were meant to have part-time jobs, cortisol and insulin. One is food, insulin. We're carbo. Holics. We're sicker than we ever have been as a population. It's incredible. We might live longer, but we're not healthier. We have more chronic disease in North America than you can shake a stick at. People are so sick. Well, there's two big reasons insulin overused, fattens up the liver. We talked about that and cortisol stress. Listen to this, okay? This was a study that came out. What ages you faster than smoking? Now, one thing we all agree with, I don't think there's any doctor on the planet that wouldn't agree with this. Smoking's bad for you. We know that.
Okay? Smoking creates an enormous amount of free radicals. What's that? Free radicals is oxidative damage. It's part of the aging process. The example, I love this example. I do because I'm very visual. In order for me to remember something, if my eyeballs have seen it, I like that better. It's one way that I learn and maybe you're like me, take an apple and cut it in half and don't take long, guys. True or false, it don't take long for that apple. Now that you've cut it and oxygen gets to the middle of the apple, what happens? Well, you get a lesson right in front of your eyeballs, the apple age quickly, right? Quickly, by the way, put a couple of drops of lemon juice. Okay? I used to do this all the time in the office. I wanted to talk to them about free radical damage, oxidation.
What happens? How do you age? And we're all aging, okay? You can't put a complete stop to it, but you get oxidative damage. Think of the apple. Put a couple of drops of lemon juice on one side of the apple and watch the difference. It really slows the decay and the aging process on that one side of the apple. Why is it lemon juice is an antioxidant, okay? The number one antioxidant in the world, pine Park extract. Now back to smoking. Smoking is bad for a lot of reasons, but one of the biggest reasons is its oxidative damage to the body. Okay? Lungs, skin, I mean, think of a smoker that you know. See it generally, people don't get away with it. Oh, my uncle, I got an uncle. He lived till it was 105. He smoked every day. He smoked three packs of cigarettes and he drank like a fish, and he lived till 105.
Well, that was by the grace of God, not by any other reason. You think you get away. You didn't get away with that. Okay? There's a good consensus about that. You don't get away with smoking, it's going to kill you. It's going to prematurely age you. Okay? Now, back to cortisol. I get off on little, we tangents little wee rabbit trails and I often have trouble coming back, but I'm back and let's talk about cortisol because listen to this guys. Listen to the what accelerates aging faster than smoking, loneliness. Well, unhappiness, hopelessness, loneliness, unhappiness and hopelessness. What does that do? Creates stress. What does that do? It elevates your cortisol. What does that do? Cortisol is meant to have a part-time job, not a full-time job. We live in a world today that is so stressed out, wars and rumors of wars. Okay guys, and we get a 24 hour news cycle, but it's not even that.
It's not even so much the world out there. It's a person's world. It's not all the world out there, although that's a factor, but a lot of it is unhappiness. No joy in their lives. Hopelessness, guys, these are accelerators of aging because your body wasn't meant to be in that state. Of course, who doesn't have stress, but when it continues on, guys is what I'm talking about when that continues on. Cortisol is an ager. Premature aging of the body. Cortisol accelerates cortisol pours gasoline. I've always liked that expression. Cortisol pours gasoline on the fire, inflammation, cortisol pours gasoline on it. It's an accelerant. It's an accelerant of aging because there's actually a word that's used infl. Aging, okay, inflammaging, I don't now remember, inflammation. Again, it's on your side till it's not inflammation's good for you. If you have a fever, that's good for you, right?
We're always trying to bring a fever down in kids. I used to tell my patients, leave it alone. Don't give them Tylenol to reduce. I know they'll feel a little better, but let that fever do its job. God gave you a thermostat. Let it go up because there's nothing that'll kill a virus or a bacteria like heat the temperature, your body temperature goes up. It's when that inflammation doesn't go away that destroys blood vessels. It's meant to have a part-time job, so stress pours gasoline on it, and they're showing that accelerates aging faster than smoking. So many people today suffer like that. In that article they were talking about when someone loses a spouse, how fast they often go downhill in terms of their health. It's incredible. Any who?
I'm breathing again, you guys, you see, I had you close your books and you pass the test. You guys are too smart. I don't know if I'll ever be able to fool you again, this audience here, you guys are unbelievable and I mean it so stinking smart. It's incredible. I love that, by the way, because guys, I can tell you something and my patients know this. People that came to see me, if they asked me a question, doc, what are you going to do when you retire from practice? I said, I want to teach. I want to teach. I don't ever want to stop working. I want to teach. Okay? Doctor means teacher. That's what it means. Unfortunately, most doctors don't teach. It's sad. They don't. Most physicians who are doctors, they should be teachers, but they don't teach you, and one of the biggest reasons they don't teach is because they don't know. Imagine not knowing much about nutrition or nothing at all. How can you be a doctor and not know nutrition? I don't get it. I promised I wouldn't get excited. Okay, we got a great week. Okay? Send your questions in. If you want to get on q and a Friday, send your questions in to info@martinclinic.com. Okay? Get 'em in. We want to answer your questions, guys. We love that. Okay, talk to you soon.
Announcer: You've reached the end of another Doctor Is In Podcast, with your hosts, Doctor Martin Junior and Senior. Be sure to catch our next episode and thanks for listening!