Grain Brain and More. Wheat, Carbs, and Sugar -- Your Brain and System's Silent Killers from David Perlmutter, MD

Taking the printing presses and cash registers by storm most recently is Grain Brain by David Perlmutter. I'd first become aware of it on Facebook, but saw the cover displayed at the impulse aisle/waiting area where the lines form at the ever-popular Natural Grocers (formerly Vitamin Cottage).  

Dr Perlmutter also wrote The Better Brain Book , Raise a Smarter Child by Kindergarten, and Power Up Your Brain. He is board-certified in neurology, the president of the Perlmutter Health Center in Naples, Florida and cofounder and president of the Perlmutter Brain Foundation as well as a Fellow of the American College of Nutrition. He's received numerous awards including Humanitarian of the Year from the American College of Nutrtion and the Linus Pauling Award. 

So I thought I'd bring a variety of topics I found interesting on the Internet here into one long place for our YOUsers to streamline their search for information but also know where we found it from so you can link out if you like what you see. You'll see that he has been a contributing author at HuffingtonPost dot com, which had a nice variety of topics, I've tried to bring a smattering to show here to encourage you using that as a resource if it appeals. One I selected is about vitamin D, in order to remind that it's not 'just' about grains and sugars that he speaks and educates.

I put his topics lower down below in this thread, and start with Jesse Kornbluth's topic from Huffington Post about the book as I loved the lead-in about almost not graduating high school. Considering Jesse Kornbluth earned successes in life which now include his website The Head Butler, which is concierging entertainment and health and all kinds of information, whereas I conceirge health (that sometimes goes into it's effects on mental wellness). I hope readers 'listen' if that caught their attention about his academic performance in the past in case it resonates about themselves or someone they know, particularly if they're the guardian adult for a child.  -YOU're a detective as well as doctor as we teach YOUsers at Lumigrate. 

Link (please go if you enjoy this information)  www.huffingtonpost.com/jesse-kornbluth/drop-that-whole-wheat-bre_b_4631108.html [1]

"Drop That Whole Wheat Bread! No More Cereal" Grain Brain, A #1 Bestseller, Says: 'Abandon Gluten!' I came close to not graduating from high school because I was a total idiot in science. At college, to satisfy the Science requirement, I took Evolution because it was said to be even easier than "Rocks for Jocks." It wasn't.

Can I evaluate a book on diet? No way. I am a huge fan of Nina Planck's Real Food [2]because it doesn't make one-size-fits-all claims and then blind the reader with science -- it reads like common sense. David Permutter's Grain Brain: The Surprising Truth about Wheat, Carbs, and Sugar--Your Brain's Silent Killers is beyond me. It's full of technical writing. Very well written writing, but well beyond me.

I have read an analysis of Dr. Perlmutter's book and his theories [3] by James Hamblin in The Atlantic. It's not an outright condemnation. It's not a kiss on the lips. It's a 30,000-foot look at a book that, Hamblin says, starts with a hypothesis and fills its pages with proof.

The hypothesis is not complicated -- run screaming from gluten and you'll not only feel better, you'll be doing your brain a favor -- and that, perhaps, is why Grain Brainis a mammoth bestseller. Published in September, 2013, it immediately appeared on the Times "Advice, how-to and Miscellaneous" bestseller list and moved quickly to #1. It's out in 15 countries. It's in its ninth printing. A cookbook is soon to follow.

Dr. Perlmutter has great credentials. He also has great media presence. Watch:

The question: Is Dr. Perlmutter on to something? Or is he to diet what Malcolm Gladwell is to packaging academic research into reader-friendly servings of trends? In this case, does one size fit all? I can't tell. So... we talked.

JK: Atkins. Pritikin. South Beach. Then Michael Pollan said: "We are corn walking" -- and high fructose corn syrup was Satan. Then Paleo. Now Grain Brain. As in self-help books, we have "diet fatigue" -- and we start to suspect that the primary benefit is to the author's bank account. Please explain why your approach to health is, as you say, "a game-changer."

DP: Two reasons. One is that this "revolutionary new dietary plan" has only been around for 2 million years. The big diet experiment is what goes on now: low fat, high carb. Second, when the AMA Journal did diet comparisons, it recognized that high fat, low carb is the best diet for everything from brain health to heart health.

JK: Your book is full of surprises. "Having diabetes doubles your risk of Alzheimer's disease."

DP: Correct. When your blood sugar is elevated, it increases inflammation in your brain -- and that is the cornerstone for advancing Alzheimer's.

JK: The brain has no pain receptors. If it did, what would it tell us?

DP: It would respond to inflammation. And inflammation is the trigger for Alzheimer's.

JK: You write that Advil and Aleve are associated with lower risk for Alzheimer's and Parkinson's. Prednisone and other steroids aren't.

DP: Steroids are directly toxic to the hippocampus, the memory center of the brain. They are absolutely to be avoided.

JK: Cholesterol isn't bad?

DP:: It's the raw material from which your body makes estrogen and Vitamin D. The war on cholesterol is unfounded. It is fundamentally important for every cell in your body -- every cell in your body makes it. If you argue cholesterol is bad for you, are you saying that God or nature is wrong?

JK: I take Lipitor. Sometimes I remember that it may cause short-term memory loss... but I had no idea that, as you write, "Statins may lessen brain function and increase risk for heart disease."

DP: Keep in mind that in early 2012, the FDA mandated that the manufacturers of statin cholesterol-lowering drugs include patient information indicating that these drugs can lead to cognitive problems -- including memory loss.

JK: What is the worst of these four choices: A slice of whole wheat bread. A Snickers bar. A tablespoon of white sugar. A banana.

DP: The wheat bread -- it increases blood sugar more than table sugar. What you want to look at here is the glycemic index: how high blood sugar elevates and for how long. That's why these products are so devastating.

JK: How hard is it for you to watch all the advertising that exalts whole grains?

DP: People are down on what they're not up on. I have no vested interest. Humans never ate grain for 99.5% of the time we've been on earth. Diets have traditionally been focused on fat and protein.

JK: I think of my 97-year-old mother. She asks, 'Why do you spend so much money on organic food?' I say, 'I'm buying the food you grew up on.'

DP: Right. This is the first time in history that we've flipped our diet priorities -- and it's the first time in history our children are not expected to live longer than their parents.

JK: How does a smoothie become as sugar-intense as a soda?

DP: It depends on what you put in. A smoothie with kale, broccoli and apple -- no problem. The trouble comes when people think of sugar and carbs based only on foods, not drinks -- 12 ounces of orange juice contain 9 full teaspoons of sugar.

JK: You write about the antioxidant "hoax."

DP: Every week there is a latest and greatest health fix. The bottom line: the anti-oxidant potential of these juices is nothing compared to the antioxidants made in your body by your DNA. There are foods that will amp up your DNA: turmeric, green tea, coffee.

JK: What are the three most important things we can do for better health?

DP: Cut the carbs. Increase consumption of dietary fat. Avoid gluten. And give me four: continue aerobic exercise.

JK: What did you have for breakfast?

DP: A 3-egg omelet (whole eggs) with mushrooms and spinach. Coffee with whole milk.

JK: As for you, what medications do you take?

DP: I'm 59. And I take nothing.

[Re-posted from HeadButler.com [4]]

Now, topics from Dr Perlmutter at Huff Post: Human Memory -- 

www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-david-perlmutter-md/human-memory-why-do-we_b_808909.html [5]

Again, Dr Perlmutter at Huff Post, this time on Alzheimer's Prevention: Reducing Your Risk

... and the link, with encouragement to go for seeing the bells and whistles and all they offer at the source site:  www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-david-perlmutter-md/alzheimers-prevention-reduci_b_822619.html [6]

Alzheimer's disease might well be considered an epidemic in our country. With more than 5.3 million Americans diagnosed with the disease and that number expected to double by 2030, it makes sense to ask ourselves what can be done to prevent this devastating disease. According to a recent Medscape report [7], the costs associated with Alzheimer's disease globally are staggering at an estimated $604 billion, or a full one percent of the world's gross domestic product.

But looking beyond the economic impact, the emotional costs borne by the families of Alzheimer's patients is incalculable -- and I speak from personal experience.

Alzheimer's is a disease for which there is no effective treatment whatsoever. To be clear, there is no pharmaceutical agent, no magic pill that a doctor can prescribe that will have any significant effect on the progressive downhill course of this disease.

But can it be prevented? A recent article appearing in the The New York Times entitled,"Years Later, No Magic Bullet Against Alzheimer's Disease" [8] clearly led readers to believe that nothing a person could do could change the course of destiny if Alzheimer's was in the cards. The report summarized the findings of a 15-member group of scientists who spent a full day and a half reviewing the medical literature after which they concluded that any retrospective studies evaluating Alzheimer's disease risk were not up to the gold standard of scientific testing. That is to say that they basically concluded that the extensive body of research that looked back in time to determine who would and who wouldn't get the disease were simply not good enough to meet their standards. The only tests the group considered valid were so-called double-blind placebo-controlled studies in which one group gets a treatment moving forward while another gets a placebo. After a period of time, the two groups are compared and conclusions are then drawn as to the effectiveness of the treatment. This type of study obviously works great if you are testing a drug which could generate revenue, while it is hard to imagine anyone sponsoring this type of study for a lifestyle change like exercise or dietary modification which, if proven effective, wouldn't translate into blockbuster sales.

But retrospective studies have long been deemed fully acceptable for health related recommendations. Take for instance the recommendation that people should wear seat belts in the car. This well-founded recommendation is based on the studies that looked back and revealed that a person's risk of serious injury in a car accident was much reduced if that person had been wearing a seat belt. Obviously, we wouldn't need to do a double-blinded study to prove this point, or ever even consider doing so. The point is, retrospective studies are powerful and meaningful.

That said, the most well respected peer-reviewed medical journals dealing with Alzheimer's disease have long published reports that have demonstrated in great detail who is at risk for the disease. For example, at the 2006 meeting of the American Academy of Neurology, Dr. Rachel Whitmer, a research scientist at Kaiser Permanente of Northern California, showed that individuals with high amounts of body fat had a risk of Alzheimer's increased by 293 percent compared to low body fat when followed up to 27 years after their initial evaluation. Another study [9] following 1200 people from 1986 until 2006 found that those who exercised regularly saw a decreased risk for developing Alzheimer's disease by about 40 percent. This study joins countless others relating exercise to reduced risk for the disease and is bolstered by the report [10] just last month showing actual increase in size of the brain's most important memory structure, the hippocampus, induced by aerobic exercise. This is critically important as this is the area of the brain that first degenerates in Alzheimer's disease. As the authors stated,

Exercise training increased hippocampal volume by two percent, effectively reversing age-related loss in volume by one to two years.

Homocysteine is an amino acid compound that is toxic to the brain much as cholesterol damages the coronary arteries. But unlike the drugs used to lower cholesterol, homocysteine is lowered to normal levels with nonprescription B vitamins. Research has shown that even mild elevations of homocysteine have a dramatic role in increasing Alzheimer's risk. A level of just 14 was associated with doubling of the risk for the disease as described in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine, and reviewed in a National Institutes of Health press release [11] stating,

People with elevated levels of homocysteine in the blood had nearly double the risk of developing Alzheimer's disease, according to a new report from scientists at Boston University. The findings, in a group of people participating in the long-running Framingham Study, are the first to tie homocysteine levels measured several years before with later diagnosis of AD and other dementias.

The bottom line is that this author, a practicing neurologist dealing with Alzheimer's disease on a daily basis, believes we need to expand the public awareness that modifiable lifestyle factors have a profound role to play in determining who will or won't get this disease. For now, we are being told to pretty much live our lives, come what may and hope for a pharmaceutical magic bullet. But the science tells us otherwise, and gives us hope that we can indeed take action today to reduce our risk for Alzheimer's disease.

www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-david-perlmutter-md/gluten-impacts-the-brain_b_785901.html [13]

As I said, above, I included one other to show that Dr Permutter and Huffington Post are resources on information beyond the category of grains and carbohydrates and blood sugar.

Vitamin D: The Multiple Sclerosis Connection

www.huffingtonpost.com/dr-david-perlmutter-md/vitamin-d-benefits_b_818912.html [16]

Current estimates report that about 300,000 Americans have been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS) with an incredible 10,000 new cases being diagnosed each year. While there is a small hereditary component, by and large, most cases seem to just happen without an identifiable cause. Over the past few decades, the medical literature has focused on the possibility of some infectious agent playing a causal role and candidates have included the bacteriumChlamydia pneumoniae, as well as various viruses including Epstein-Barr and human herpes virus type six.

MS is considered an "autoimmune disorder," meaning a disease characterized by the immune system reacting against the body. In MS, this misdirected immune response is directed against myelin, the protective insulation coating around brain neurons. Ultimately, collections of damaged neurons form a hard or sclerotic plaque in the brain and appear in multiple areas -- hence the name multiple sclerosis.

The mainstay of treatment for MS these days is the use of so-called "immunomodulatory therapy," or treatments designed to modulate the overactive immune response. Common approaches using this approach involve the frequent injection of various forms of synthetic interferons. This approach has been shown to reduce the risk of new events or exacerbations of MS by as much as 28-30 percent. Unfortunately, this type of medical intervention is often associated with significant side effects and reports of patients feeling "flu-like symptoms" in as many as 78 percent of cases.

One interesting observation that has puzzled MS researchers over the past 30 years is the peculiar geographic distribution of the disease. It turns out that people who spend their early lives in northern latitudes have a significantly increased risk for developing the disease. More recently it has been demonstrated that the same is true in the southern hemisphere. So the farther away you live from the equator, either north or south, the more at risk you are for developing MS.

In trying to unravel this relationship, scientists concluded that perhaps living farther away from the equator might relate to MS risk because of a lack of sunshine. It is known that sunshine has a role to play in immune function, so scientists thought that perhaps a lack of sun exposure during winter made people more susceptible to the disease. But one other connection to sun exposure began to emerge. It is known that one of the key physiological events triggered by sun exposure is the body's production of vitamin D. Interestingly, research clearly demonstrated that MS patients have remarkably lower levels of vitamin D compared to non-afflicted individuals.

NOTE: Vitamin D can be toxic in large doses. People with MS should be aware of these findings, but should also discuss them with their neurologist.

These findings dovetailed nicely with the newly emerging reports expanding the understanding of the role of vitamin D in human physiology, not just for bone health, but as a key player in immune function as well. To put the idea of vitamin D's relationship to MS to the test, researchers in Toronto -- led by Jodie Burton, M.D. -- studied 49 MS patients for one year. Twenty-five of the patients received vitamin D in a dosage increasing up to 40,000 units daily, which was then reduced over the one-year period. The control group was given no vitamin D supplementation.

The results of their study, published in a recent issue of the journal Neurology [17], were astounding. The group receiving the vitamin D demonstrated a remarkable 41 percent reduction in new MS events, a figure that markedly exceeds what is claimed by the standard drug treatment discussed above. What's more, the treatment group actually demonstrated improvement in physical function, a finding not seen in the control group.There were no meaningful side effects in the group receiving the vitamin D treatment and researchers demonstrated that blood calcium levels remained perfectly normal throughout the test, even at the very highest dosages of vitamin D. This was an important part of the study since concern has been raised that high vitamin D levels might increase blood calcium levels. The authors reported:

We have demonstrated that vitamin D intake well above current recommendations and (vitamin D) levels well beyond the physiologic range, do not expose patients with MS to adverse biochemical or clinical events. Compared to a control group whose intake of vitamin D generally exceeded North American recommendations, only those on the treatment regimen had evidence of immunologic effects.