Why are we getting sicker? Dr. Brandon Lundell

In this episode of the Crackin Backs Podcast, we are thrilled to welcome Dr. Brandon Lundell, a leading expert in functional medicine. Functional medicine has become a buzzword in the healthcare community, embraced by chiropractors, DOs, and MDs alike. But what does it really mean, and where did it all begin? Dr. Lundell breaks down the definition and origins of functional medicine, exploring how it has evolved into a comprehensive approach that integrates both Western medical practices and natural therapies.

Join us as Dr. Lundell shares his personal journey into functional medicine and how his practice has grown to focus on treating the root causes of health issues rather than just the symptoms. With years of experience, Dr. Lundell discusses the most common nutritional deficiencies he encounters, the signs and symptoms they manifest, and whether these deficiencies have geographic or national trends.

We also delve into the critical role of blood chemistry in uncovering early signs of chronic conditions and its importance in preventive care. Dr. Lundell explains how this often-overlooked tool can be a game-changer in early detection and health maintenance.

Finally, we explore the complexities of managing endocrine disorders. Dr. Lundell provides insights into the challenges faced in this field and how his approach differs from conventional practices, offering a fresh perspective on holistic health care.

If you want to learn more about Dr. Brandon Lundell and his work, check out his website and YouTube Channel. Tune in for a thought-provoking episode that might just change how you think about your health!

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Transcript

Dr. Spencer Baron: 0:00

Music. Welcome to the cracking backs Podcast. Today, we have Dr Brandon Lindell with us, pulling back the curtain on functional medicine. Ever wondered what this buzzword really means and why it's making waves in both chiropractic and medical communities. Dr Lindell breaks it all down, sharing his unique approach and journey through the secrets behind common nutritional deficiencies and how blood chemistries can actually catch chronic conditions early on, plus hear his game changing approach to managing endocrine disorders that often challenge conventional thinking. Don't miss this chance to learn how you could take control of your health like never before.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 0:47

We're excited to have Dr Brendan Lindell on our show today. He's a seasoned expert in functional medicine with over like 15 years of experience. And you know what, Doc, I think a lot of people really don't understand the term functional medicine. You know, we hear that a lot now, and, you know, I honestly don't know if, if it's a chiropractic term, a medical term, it's an independent term. So just to start to show off, can you teach us what this term actually means? Yeah,

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 1:18

yeah, functional medicine, kind of my elevator speech for functional medicine is, you know, the term functional medicine is, we are more concerned about restoring proper function than we are, you know, treating disease. So the general idea is that dysfunction in organ, cells and tissues, far precedes disease by years, even decades and so. So by restoring optimal function to every cell, to every tissue, to every organ, then disease just simply can't exist because everything is working in harmony and everything is working optimally so. So functional medicine is, is using tools, the best of Western medicine, the best of any kind of medicine, natural medicine, to assess and to make sure that everyone is optimally, you know, fortified. So we look at lab tests, and we look at nutrition levels. We look at, you know, is the mitochondria dysfunctional? Is the microbiome dysfunctional? What? What is the most you know, sub optimal or dysfunctional system that's happening in the body? So that's kind of my elevator speech to get to get a little deeper into its origins. It's, it's not really necessarily a chiropractic term, but I do believe that chiropractors make the absolute best Functional Medicine and practitioners, it spans all of the disciplines. You know, medical doctors, dos, nurse practitioners, pas are all practicing functional medicine, and it does mean different things to different people, unfortunately, but at its at its core, it The term was coined by Dr Jeffrey bland and and he started metagenics back in the day, and so, so very nutrition oriented. And, you know, he's a PhD, and he brought together a lot of smart medical doctors and chiropractors and and in the late 90s, really is when this functional medicine kind of term started to grow and and and coalesce and congeal into something that ultimately became the Institute of functional medicine. I think that's sort of the was the earliest version of functional medicine training. So, so yeah, it's, it's a, it really is more and more becoming an understandable, recognizable term, but we still have a long way to go in making education and making practitioners really standardized and really, really good at what they do, so it's all over the board, unfortunately right now,

Dr. Terry Weyman: 4:13

yeah, and for those listening, because you'll see MDS in the area saying that they're functional medicine doctors and chiropractors say functional medicine, and acupuncturist and like you said, everybody under the board, is this a special degree that all these doctors are going to taking classes to get a specialty degree, like a chiropractic degree, or MD or a do? Is this a specialty degree? So if you say you're functional medicine, do you have to have a board certified degree in this

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 4:44

you do there's, there's a couple different ways to get certified in and of itself. You have to have to practice functional medicine. You have to have a license in some other you know, discipline a license to practice. So you can't be licensed solely. Functional Medicine. So it becomes a sub discipline of whatever you know, original license you have. I went through school, and I did my chiropractic at Parker, and I also did my acupuncture diplomate as well. And then I went to naturopathic school as well. So all of that got me the foundation, but I still needed some extra functional medicine specific training. And you know, there's a lot of different terms. It could be back in the day before functional medicine became really popular, it was holistic medicine or integrative medicine. So there's a lot of cross terms that mean very similar things. And ultimately, it's, it's really looking at the true causes and cores of illness and dysfunction and and not just throw in a medication or, you know, even, even even herbs. It's a lot of naturopathic training is you have a sore throat, okay? Well, what herb you know is going to help with the sore throat? And that's great, but that's not functional medicine. Functional Medicine really is okay asking deeper questions. Well, why did you get sick in the first place? Is there something wrong with your immune system? You know? Is there some deficiency there, or are you more stressed than you should be, right? So it's getting a lot deeper than saying, Well, you know, take some, you know, take some cat's claw and, you know, you're good. That's, that's, that's great. And that certainly is better than taking an antibiotic in most cases, but, but it's still not functional medicine. And the true essence of the word, and those of us that have been practicing it and teaching it like I do, that's, that's the real essence of functional medicine.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 6:54

You know, that's great because, you know, we see terms start out one way, and and they turn they get thrown into another category. You know, holistic used to be a medical term, then it became a chiropractor term, and and so I think every, every couple years, and then the public trying to keep up with all this terminology, it's gotta be so confusing. What inspired your journey into the functional medicine with all your backgrounds and what you said, and how do you have you seen it evolve with these terms changing, the confusion happening? How do you see it evolve over these last years, at blending the Western and natural and Eastern? How do you see it evolving over the last couple of years?

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 7:33

Yeah. Well, first question, how I got into it? Yeah. I think, like a lot of people, I had a very personal experience. I graduated college and took a year off and traveled. Thought I was going to go into law school. And, you know, the universe had had other plans. I started to I was working in a bookstore. I was working in a very large bookstore in Denver called the tattered cover. And, you know, really huge bookstore back then, you know, book books were more bookstores were able to make it back then. And and I, I started having my own health issues and becoming more aware that, you know, gosh, I didn't feel good when I ate this. Or, you know, I feel anxious today. What happened? So, you know, I've always been an athlete, so I've always asked that question of like, hey, what can I do to optimize my health? But, but, but my body was definitely going under, undergoing some changes. So I read a book. I picked up a book at the bookstore called eating alive, and written by a naturopath up in Canada, and he started talking about in the book Candida, and how when you eat certain things, you feed Candida, and the Candida gets in, you know, secretes things that get into the rest of you. I mean, this is back in the, you know, late 90s, early 2000s When, when, you know, this wasn't, these weren't household, you know, terms like they are now. And and it really was like a light bulb. It really was an epiphany. I remember reading the book going, I want to know how the body really works. I want to know everything there is to know about how the cell functions and when you feel a certain way. There's got to be a reason. What is that reason? I mean, it's there. It's got to be a scientific factual thing, or an energetic factual thing, it's there. So that started me off on the journey. And I looked at chiropractic schools, I looked at naturopathic schools, even looked at at medical schools. And ultimately, I met a chiropractor who was doing, you know, this kind of holistic medicine. He was, he was an AK doc, and he was doing muscle testing, and he was doing this Vega machine, which tested your energy and your systems and your organs. And he was doing acupuncture, and he also did chiropractic, and he he treated the whole body truly the holistic medicine. He. Treated the whole body in whatever method and tools he had and what, what was, what was needed. And it really was like, Yes, this is it. This is what I want to do. So, so I, I went to chiropractic school, and I often, I often laugh because I say that, you know, I actually paid attention in biochemistry, because I knew this is what I wanted to do. You know, a lot of us in chiropractic school just, we just got through biochemistry, and we got through just, just okay. You know, I don't know if I'm going to actually need this in my practice, but, but I loved it. I actually scored the highest possible score in pathology and board and boards one and so and I went to the Colorado chiropractic college. I don't know if you guys remember this. It was a brief College in Denver, and it was amazing. We had, we had medical doctors as staff. It was, it was designed to be a truly integrative chiropractic program, which was perfect. And I'm, you know, I'm from the Denver area, so we had a great education the first two years, and then, and then 911 happened, and the school was owned by the University of Tokyo, and they, I think they got freaked out, and they pulled out. And, you know, it was then I transferred to Parker, but, but it's too bad we we almost had a really cool and we did, we did grand rounds at the University of Colorado hospital, like it was really cool. It was really integrative. Yeah, that's awesome. And I remember in my second year, we were doing a neurology Grand Rounds, and we were side by side with the medical students. And and the doctor was asking questions about, you know, aphasia and things like that, and all of the chiropractic students, we had the answer like that. And, and at the end of it, he's like, What school are you guys from? And we're like, we're from chiropractic school. And he's like, that, I can't believe it. You guys are smarter than most, you know, second year medical students. So, wow, it was, you know, we get, we do get a lot more neurology, I think, in our in our classes, and so that's, that's one of the reasons why I think chiropractors do make the best holistic practitioners and functional medicine practitioners, because we truly treat the whole body right. That's that's ingrained in us from from day one. And we have tools chiropractic and, you know, those tools that a medical doctor or a PA, you know, just can't have. And I don't know about you, but, but I love in my practice, when we when we get to biochemistry, balanced out. And I like to do that first. Then when we start to do the the adjustments that that's like everything, it makes everything come together, the body, you know, the lymph system, the immune system, the gastrointestinal system, the nervous system, you know, chiropractic kind of just brings all of that together and without functional medicine, I believe that, you know, chiropractic is less effective, much less effective, because the old saying goes, you can't adjust your way out of a b 12 deficiency, right? No matter how many adjustments you make, you're not going to absorb more B 12, you know, you might increase vagal nerve function, which can help absorption and digestion. So I get that, but, but, yeah, it really does meld very, very well together. So if any chiropractors are out there wondering about, how do I add functional medicine to my practice? It's really, it's really simpler than you think. It does take a little bit of education and takes a little bit more time running blood work, and, you know, going over the labs with the patient. But man, when you really see a patient, you know, come and do the blood work, and you explain it to them like, this is, this is why I'm not feeling so good. This is why I'm I've been suffering for with chronic fatigue for 15 years, or with autoimmune disease, or with, you know, just brain fog, or, you know, whatever it is, and, and you help it make sense, you know, for them, and they're, they're like, oh yeah, this, this makes, this makes total sense. And they're on board, you know, they become a lifetime patient.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 14:19

Brendan, I want to really connect with the audience that are not doctors, and go through some clinical conversation with you and add some specifics to you know, nutritional deficiency, deficiencies and conditions that that any of us that are listening or watching can relate to something. So what are some of the most common conditions and deficiencies, you see, and how would you treat them?

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 14:43

Well, you know, let me just jump right into kind of, what I believe is the the crux of most diseases, which is, which is the mitochondria. You know, the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell. And. And it produces energy. It produces ATP. It allows our genes to function. It allows, you know, the every, every tissue and organ, to communicate with each other. So we truly live in a world that is very destructive to our mitochondria. You know, from day one, from electromagnetic frequencies and and stress and nutritional deficiencies, and then our poor diet and inflammation and sugar in our diet, like the mitochondria, ultimately takes the big hit, and it gets expressed differently in different tissues. When your mitochondria starts to fail in your brain, you start to get brain fog, and, you know, you just don't feel yourself. And you get, you can get mood disorders. You get depression. You can get anxiety. When, when you when it's in the gut, you're, you know, you get bloating, and you get, you know, constipation, diarrhea, or you just don't feel well. You don't feel like you're absorbing well, when it affects your muscular system, you just feel tired all the time. When it affects your immune system, you can get autoimmune. And so a lot of what we do is assessing your mitochondrial function. And really that comes down to just a couple things. One, something called leaky gut affects the mitochondria, and we've all heard leaky gut unless, unless you've been under a rock for the last 10 years. But, you know, that has become really, really important term, and a it's a misunderstood term, but I think the idea that people get about leaky gut is, is is when you don't eat well and you have bad bacteria, things start leaking into your gut that shouldn't be there. You know, bacterial byproducts and undigested food particles and the chemicals in our food, they start leaking into to our systemic immune you know, body, not just our liver, but our systemic you know, blood and crosses the blood brain barrier and, and that's really all those toxins and chemicals, damage the mitochondria, damage our cells, and, and it can, it can cause hormonal problems. It can cause infertility. It even caught, you know, contributes to things like autism. A big, a big passion of mine is that if we want to be healthy, we have to, you know, start out healthy, right? We can't start behind the curve when we're born. And so there's a discipline called preconception planning, right, or preconception health. And the idea is getting a mom and a dad as healthy as possible has proven to make that baby healthier throughout the baby's lifespan, no matter what happens postnatally, it's that, it's that you know months before and during conception that determine so much about your genes, and so much about how that baby is going to function for the rest of that baby's life. So the scientific discipline is called the developmental origins of health and disease. So so your how your childhood and adult health is pre programmed in the womb. So, so that's, that's a big passion of mine, and, and, and we have to continue that conversation. That's a conversation that I think a lot of people don't understand, that hey, how you feel right now, whether you're 20 or 30 or 40 or 60, actually had a lot to do with what happened in the womb. Doesn't mean that you can't change it, and you can't, you know, mitigate it. But let's not have our kids start off 10 steps behind the curve, you know, and trying to play catch up and fighting things like asthma and allergies and add and autism and mood disorders and eating disorders and addiction. Let's not have them pre programmed and set up for those things. Let's have them pre programmed and set up for for health and vitality and happiness. And so it's it's pretty simple. It's really going through a functional medicine program and addressing any areas of imbalance back to the mitochondria, which also affects preconception health. The the main way to protect the mitochondria and to support the mitochondria are good quality B vitamins and and antioxidants, things like an acetylcysteine, you know, green green tea extract, grapefruit seed, extract Alpha Lipoic Acid, glutathione precursors. These are the things that help your mitochondria repair and rebuild, but it is different for everybody. So any of listeners out there who, who you know, want to go through a functional medicine program? Yeah. Just make sure that that practitioner really is versed in in assessing your labs and and not just throwing supplements at you. But what does your body really, really, really need so, so yeah, that mitochondrial health is I've been doing this for almost 20 years now. It really does all roads lead to, in some form or another, how to support your mitochondria.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 20:26

We would like to thank Stark roast for making the best organic coffee and supporting our efforts to keep you healthy and happy. Click on the link to start enjoying your fresh roast today. I'd like to further qualify something you mentioned earlier and how profound it is, and you're the first person that we've had on any of our shows that has mentioned kind of prepping for the, you know, conception, which I strongly believe that people should prep before surgery or any kind of procedure as well and get the maximum health. But it's very interesting that you said this because my former wife and mother of my two boys, my first boy, yeah, she she did not have any chocolate through all her her nine months. Yeah, that child, my son, Hunter, hates chocolate, avoids it like the plate. What kid hates chocolate? Right? The second child, we got cocky, you know, she had her chocolate and loved it. That kid can't get enough chocolate. We thought, Oh, my God, he's gonna have juvenile diabetes, right? So I think what you're saying is profound, and it means it was worth repeating, but in a more dynamic, that's great storyline.

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 21:54

So it's true, and imagine that being repeated 10s of 1000s of times on your genetics. So the things that moms and dads do before birth and during gestation, before conception and during during gestation, leave permanent marks on the genes. This is a discipline called epigenetics. It's the term. It's the the factors above and beyond the genetic code, right when you, when you you know when you're when you're conceived, you get, you get the genetic code from your mom and your dad. You really can't do much about that, by the way, you get most of your genetic code for your mitochondria from your mom. The mitochondria actually has its own DNA and its own, you know, code, and that actually comes more from the mom than than from the dad. But when you this, this term, epigenetics, things that the things that you eat, absolutely do program, there is a researcher called Chatzi in Spain, and they did University of Spain. They did, you know, probably 10 to 15, we're going into the 20th year now, where they looked at the mother's diet, and then they looked at fetal outcomes, all else being the same mother's weight and socioeconomic class and all that stuff, when the mother adhered to a strict kind of Mediterranean type of diet, lots of vegetables, you know, no junk food, good clean proteins, good clean carbohydrates, good clean fats, the babies had almost no eczema, you know, up up to their 20th year now, like, like, we're saying We're we're in the 20th year of following these kids and correlating it with diet and and so the kids, though that were born of moms who ate more junk food, more dairy. Dairy was a big factor. So if the mom ate a lot of dairy, the kids were likely, more likely to have asthma and autism and add and and eczema and those things. So just what the mom eats during birth, guess what? Here's the real kicker, postnatal. Postnatal diet had no effect. In terms of the outcomes, I shouldn't say no effect, but it had a lot less effect. What was done in the womb was was by far more predictive than than postnatal diets and postnatal factors. So as I said in the beginning, it's not too late. Because a lot of people hear this and they're like, oh my, it's too late for me. I mean, my mom was like, who knows? She ate McDonald's every day. That's maybe that explains it's not too late. It's never too late. It just means that you're probably going to have to work a little bit harder, you know, to to overcome some of those things, but, but yes, you know chocolate, or, you know, vegetables. It even actually comes down to thoughts, I don't. To talk the whole time, but there's this really, really cool study that highlights the epigenetic factor, so I'm going to try to explain it. It's a little bit complicated, but imagine mice, okay, and what they did was they knocked out a serotonin gene, right? So when you knock out a serotonin gene. It makes the mice more anxious, just like, you know, humans do if the serotonin systems aren't functioning properly, right? So, I so many people are on SSRIs because the serotonin systems have become, you know, abnormal for that's a whole different conversation of why. But functional medicine can treat that too, without without drugs and medications. But so they would take, they would take one mouse that we call that a wild type mouse that doesn't have the knockout gene. Okay, we take a wild tap mouse. Now they, what they did was all of these wild type mouse that that mice that don't have the knockout gene. They actually took their embryos, okay, and replanted it into, you know, different. They replanted it into the mouse that had the knockout gene. Okay, so the mouse did not the the the embryo will say that was not genetically programmed for anxiety at all. It did not have the gene for anxiety when it was gestated in the wild type mouse, no problem. The baby was, you know, the mice. Mouse was born and it was normal and healthy and smart. Well, as smart as those mice could be right. But then when the wild type mouse, the genetically pure mouse, if you will, was was transplanted into an anxious, you know, serotonin knockout mouse, Mom, what do you think the baby was born? What do you think the baby was born, expressing its genetic, you know, inheritance, or expressing more anxiety. It was actually expressing more anxiety, just like the mouse that was had the knockout gene. So the factors because the mouse was stressed and secreting chemicals of stress that actually crossed the placenta barrier and and programmed that that pure, if you will, genetically more pure mouse to have those traits. So just like you were saying the chocolate you're not crazy, that is exactly, you know what happens. And so I know that puts a lot of of pressure and a lot of stress sometimes on mothers. Fathers don't get a free pass either, because they actually have to start earlier our sperm, the sperm that gets ejaculated, usually starts being produced six months before we actually ejaculate it. So alcohol in the father has been shown to predict things like autism, if the if the father is drinking more alcohol for six months before conception, if the father exercises more that's a better outcome for for the baby, because we are epigenetically programming our sperm For for those six months before conception. So I like to give I like to have people give me about six months before, before they really start conceiving, especially if they've had problems conceiving. Half of all infertility issues come from the Father, not just the mother. So the sperm is, you know, has these marks, these DNA marks, and we can actually test that in sperm. You know, how, how damaged is your sperm, not just your sperm count and your sperm motility, but how damaged is that DNA? Are the chromosomes normal? Are the chromosomes slightly abnormal? And we there are simple things you can do, changing your diet, eliminating alcohol, eliminating sugar, fixing, fixing your microbiome and and, you know, doing antioxidants like CoQ 10 and acetylcysteine. Man, that is, you know that that makes a huge, huge difference. So, yeah, I love this topic, because if we want our species to survive and thrive, we really need to start turning this thing around. So that is

Dr. Spencer Baron: 29:27

that is fantastic. Thank you. Let me ask you, I'm not sure if you get a lot of client or patients from out of state or different locations or even in telemedicine, if you do telemedicine, but do you notice deficiencies being geographical or national? You know, nationality?

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 29:47

Yeah, that's a great question. I do, I do treat, you know, patients, you know, in other states, even in other countries. And well, let me start more globally, and then I'll. Start going more locally, but globally. Yeah, it's interesting. You know, some cultures are much healthier that I have noticed than Americans. That's not, that's not, you know, groundbreaking news by any means, but it is interesting. England tends to have a lot of similar diseases that than us. Whereas Denmark and Switzerland, they tend to be healthier, Australia tends to be, you know, a little bit healthier, although, as they're adopting more and more Western diet, that's that's not, you know, the case, but, but, yeah, I find that, you know, different, different parts of the world do have more health issues. So as we get to the United States, I find that living in more urban areas does come with more potential health problems. And I think that that is maybe access to, you know, more processed foods and more toxins, more more pollutants. And that's a huge also, you know, back to the preconception, but that's the other thing, you know, we have all these endocrine disruptors that are swimming around in we can't see them, we can't touch them, smell them, taste them, you know. So we think that they don't exist, but they do, and they're everywhere. They are everywhere, you know, phthalates in your deodorant or in your, you know, Cologne, stuff that's impregnated in our in our shirts and in our clothes. To be anti, anti deodorant, you know, or anti you know, you know, sweating and and we Yeah, clothes are actually a big, big, big part of, if you, if you ever buy athletic wear, a lot of it is impregnated with chemicals to keep it from, from smelling. And, yeah, yeah. Under Armor has a lot of that stuff, and they don't tell you, but if it does, if you see that, it says, you know, antiodorant or anything like that, you know. Then, then you know that there's probably some chemicals in there, but packaged foods and, gosh, you know, microplastics. Here's a little fun fact, the average, the average person in this country anyway, eats a credit card's worth of plastic every week, every week now, now that certainly can be debatable scientifically. I mean, the studies, this was studies that came out of the Environmental Working Group and and and other, you know, the University of Australia did these studies, and you know, whether you agree with that ultimate, you know, that's five grams of plastic. Everyone can agree we are getting micro plastics. We can't, you know, that is in everybody's blood. When, when we do studies, micro plastics are in blood, and those microplastics break down, and they are really hard to remove from your system. And you know, we're not talking about tiny shards of plastic. We're we're talking about, you know, the actual chemicals of plastic getting into your system and getting into each cell and passing through the cell membrane. And it does damage the mitochondria. It does damage the endocrine system. So, you know, that's a huge cause of low testosterone. You know, for males throughout the lifespan, there's a really good book called Countdown by a PhD researcher called Shauna swan. Her name is Shauna Swan, and she highlights how most of the endocrine disruptors, most of the chemicals we have and are exposed to, you know, 90% of them are either pro estrogenic and or anti androgenic so so males really get the a lot of the brunt of this chemical World and and. So this is why autism is five to one, male to female, because these endocrine disruptors get into the system and disrupts how testosterone is supposed to develop the male brain. You know, females require testosterone as well for development, so they have more issues, too, more metabolic issues, typically, but, but, yeah, it really affects so she measures, she measures testosterone exposure in utero through something called the anogenital distance, right? It's the distance between the anus and the genitals in newborns, and you can predict how fertile that that baby is going to be based on that a no genital distance and so, and I'm sure you guys have heard that right now, males a 20 year old. Male sperm count is, is the same right now as a 65 year old 50 years ago. I heard this, yeah, it's the same as a 65 year old 50 to 60 years ago. And so, you know it is, you know that we, there's a lot of things we can do, you know, to change this. It's never too late, but, but I think getting this information out is, is really, really important. So and all the male listeners out there who are like, you know, why at 30 did I test for low testosterone? And then they, and I see this all the time in my patients, and then they, you know, medicine has no other tool. They're like, well, here's, here's some testosterone for you. All right, you might feel better, but first, first of all, it's not functional medicine. Functional Medicine asks, Why? Why do you have low testosterone? Why do your testes not work? Let's, let's figure out that out. And let's, let's work with that. And why do your receptors on your cell not work? Let's work with those issues. And in, at least in my practice, 95 98% of cases, we're able to restore normal, healthy amounts of testosterone. But, but, man, it can take. It can take a while. No matter what age you are, it can take three, six, you know, nine months and and so a lot of people don't want to wait that long, right? So, like, yeah, just give me the testosterone shot. That's great. But any, if anyone has ever done that, they they can tell you, they feel great in the beginning and then, and then they're right back to where they were, or worse, you know, six months or a year later, because the the problem didn't get fixed. And then you actually become testosterone resistant. You become resistant to the testosterone just like you become resistant to insulin, because your body is now swimming in it. There's too much, and the body will become resistant to it. So pretty, pretty fascinating.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 37:03

So you raise an interesting question. I mean, we hear more and more about this. You know about transgender issues and or however you want to refer to it as, I'm not quite sure, but what you were saying about how hormone levels are changing in men, in boys, yeah, and, and in females, and a lot of it is chemically related to the food or the thing that they wear or the lotions and so on. Yep. Do you think that is having I always am wondering, is it, is that having an effect and, and, or we're just seeing it more because of, yeah, you know, Internet access and, you

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 37:48

know, yeah, yeah, exposed to it more, yeah. Well, you know, this is definitely sort of a chopping block kind of question, you know, I want to tread lightly, right? Because we want to be careful not to pathologize, you know, transgender issues, and say, oh, yeah, it's, it's bad because of the environmental, you know, we, we, I want to be careful not to say, yeah, it's, it's because of some kind of pathology, and therefore, it's abnormal and bad. I don't think that is what what we're saying, and that's not the point of the conversation. But when we look at the scientific literature, in the body of scientific literature, we do see that these endocrine disruptors absolutely affect our you know, our development, our sex development, and and so I think that however you, you, you accept it. I you know we, we have to accept it, and we have to understand that this is a part of our modern world. But when we look at other species, for example, we see the same things happening. And we have seen the same things happening for about 70 years now, since the advent of our chemical world. You know, Silent Spring by Rachel Carlson, was written in the 60s. She was a PhD research, actually, no, she was just some, some, you know, random person to housewife, I think. And then she started making, you know, doing all this research about how these endocrine disruptors are affecting other species. So, in in frogs, in in amphibians, crocodiles have been studied in birds, we do see more ambiguous genitalia. We do see actually in other species, their ability to switch back and forth like frogs can switch back and forth between males and females depending on the environmental cues. So. Yeah, so, so not pathologizing, but just understanding that it we do live in an endocrine disrupting world, and we can't bury our heads and say it doesn't exist, and we can't pretend that it's not having an effect, so it is having an effect. And it has an effect both on our fertility as well as our, you know, hormone production, which can then certainly lead to, you know, maybe some gender identity issues or or confusion, or, you know, it can, at the very least, just make it, make it more pronounced, even if that was still going to happen. I think back to your question. I think it's also a combination of, you know, like they say this with autism. Well, is autism really increasing, or are we just becoming more aware of it and diagnosing it more well, maybe a little bit of both, but, but there's no doubt that we're having a dramatic increase in autism, and it keeps increasing so, so whether we're talking about neuro neuro development, again, not to pathologize, but as a scientist, Isn't it okay to ask, Why? Why are we seeing? You know, doesn't mean that these kids, whether they're dealing with transgender issues or whether they're dealing with, you know, autism, they all deserve to be honored and loved and cared for and supported, but as a scientist and a researcher and a clinician, what is happening to our environment, what is contributing to the rise in all of these things? Because, you know, I have a friend who's, you know, who's going through a lot of that and and, you know, the at that point, the point isn't okay. We want to, you know, tease out the pathology and fix you, right? That's not, that's not what we're trying to do at all. But how can we support you? How can we make this an easier transition and and remove the other ill effects of these endocrine disruptors and just make making people as healthy as possible. One of my favorite, favorite books that really just like eating alive, chain, you know, change the course of my career. This book changed the course of my practice, and I read it in 2012 it's called our stolen future, and it's written by four PhD MD researchers on endocrine disrupting chemicals, one of whom is actually become a really good friend of mine, Fred bombsol, because I met him actually at an Environmental Medicine conference. Environmental Medicine is the study of our environment and how it affects our body, and, you know, chemicals and EMFs and those kinds of things, but, but I, in doing my research and developing my lectures and my functional medicine program that I teach, I kept coming Across this guy's name, Fred vomsol. He was doing 20 some years ago. He was doing research on BPA, right, which we all know is a bad endocrine disruptor. He was doing the same thing that researchers did with diet. He was saying, Okay, let's, let's measure the levels of BPA in mother's urine when they're pregnant, and then let's follow and now it's in its 25th year. Now let's follow the offspring and see if we can see trends. The mothers who had higher BPA in their urine, the offspring were more likely to be obese and overweight. BPA

Dr. Spencer Baron: 43:57

for the listening the lay audience is good bit BPA. BPA

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 44:01

is Bisphenol A. BisphenolS are used in all plastics, all packaging. It's used in even lotions. It's used anytime you see plastic. And so when I was talking about micro plastics earlier, these are the chemicals that that are in our body. Now, I'd like to say we see a lot of BPA free now, right? This water bottle is BPA free, or this container is BPA free. Well, unfortunately, that doesn't guarantee that it's safe, because what they use are what we call an environmental medicine, regrettable substitutions, right? They substitute it with unfortunate, regrettable, you know, so BPF or bps, which are actually less studied, and now, as the research is coming out, they're more harmful, because we live in a world in the United States, this actually started with Carnegie and Rockefeller. Have people that come in all the tech is that air purifiers going in the background. And I have people that come and, and I've actually had friends tell me, like, why I feel like I can breathe so much easier in your house? Why? What? What? What is that and? And sure enough, I'm like, well, we've got air purifiers, and we use, you know, cleaners that don't irritate the pulmonary system.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 50:25

Yeah, so you mentioned earlier about autism, and I just want to stake a claim. And what we're realizing is that, yes, the the incidents and finding the autism in children has increased, yet the testing has stayed the same. So people think, Oh, we've created more acute ways of figuring out, you know, that they're on a scale, but no, you're absolutely right. The testing has stayed the same, at least for the last 10 to 15 years, but we're seeing it more and more, and it's a little scary. So I want to get into asking you about, you know, for, for those of us you know, doctors and patients that are listening, you know, what are key lab workups that you would routinely ask for as a, you know, basis for Your you know, discovery, yeah, you know, obviously there's ones that are a lot more specific, but generally speaking, because I get asked all the time by late people, what you ask my doctor to do? Yeah, that's

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 51:29

a great question. I don't know if I'm able to do this, but people, people can certainly contact my office. I can give them a list of labs that I that I have, I won't see a patient without these, these set of labs, and you can get it at any, you know, major hospital or, you know, lab core quest, you have to have a doctor's order. And I do this for people all over the country, but it does. You know, when you go to your traditional PCP, you know your traditional medical provider, they may run what I call the malpractice panel, meaning that it should be malpractice to run these small, little tests and then give you a clean bill of health, right? That's like, kicking your tire before you start your car. And be like, Yep, it's good. We're going, you know, I'm, I'm a pilot, and I've been a pilot since I was a kid, and I fly airplanes in my, you know, limited spare time. But we, we have a saying, you know, of someone who is really lazy, a pilot who's really lazy, and we say, kick the tires, light the fires, like that's their pre flight inspection, instead of checking the gas and checking, you know, all of the that's, don't worry. That's not how I fly, but, but, you know, we have these, you know, people who just just do this really cursory checkup, and that's kind of going to your PCP provider. So if you get your liver enzymes and you get your kidney enzymes checked, and you get your cholesterol and you get your what you know, just checking to make sure you're not anemic, that's good, okay, that is what we call the disease model. Lab tests are designed in traditional medicine to catch disease. They are not designed to assess optimal function. So we have to expand those labs and change the lab ranges, by the way, because the lab ranges are designed to only catch something when you're in a disease state. So, for instance, fasting blood sugar is a common one that everyone tests. The normal range is, you know, 65 to 99 if you got a 98 score, every medical doctor in the country will be like good job, you know, or would just wouldn't mention it, because you're within the normal range. Well, actually, when we look at large studies, millions of people, data points, we see that for every point above 85 you actually have a 6% increase of developing diabetes. So at 98 right? You know, you're basically at a 75 to 80% chance of developing diabetes within the next five years, right? Five to 10 years, if you didn't do anything, right? And so, so we have more tools we have, like continuous glucose monitors, but even then, the ranges. So all of the listeners out there, remember, even if you get a good blood work, you have to look at different ranges, not the disease model ranges, but the optimal function ranges. And I've written a textbook of. Reference Manual on optimal ranges. So so people can take their blood work and say, Hey, am I? Am I optimal? And if not, why? What might be happening. So, assessing glucose, assessing a marker called hemoglobin, a 1c which is traditionally only done for diabetics. And again, that's like saying, Well, you know, I'll give you breaks once you hit the brick wall, right? You know, that's not, that's not helpful. So hemoglobin, a 1c same thing. The most people are insulin resistant, or what we call pre diabetic. I actually don't like the term pre diabetic, because it implies that you're fine, you're pre disease, you're just, yeah, you're getting a little close, right? No, you have a a disease process. You have a dysfunction, which is insulin resistance, which can lead to, not only heart disease, but it's the major contributing factor in Alzheimer's, Parkinson's dementia, you know, and and studies show if your hemoglobin a 1c is high in your 30s, you're more likely to have dementia in your 60s and 70s. So it's what you do when you're younger, not what you know, just what you do when you're older. So, so I would say, assessing your blood sugar, through fasting blood sugars and through hemoglobin, A, 1c the other marker that almost no one does in the traditional medical field is a marker called homocysteine. You know, we do other things too, vitamin D, getting your vitamin D checked and your full thyroid panel and getting some inflammatory markers, like CRP. So if you know, all of those are important, but I want to spend a few minutes we have left on homocysteine, because I think it's the books have been written on it, and it has been called the greatest single indicator, not only indicator, but the greatest single indicator of whether you are likely to live long or die young, you know, and how well you live. So homocysteine has traditionally been thought to be just a cardiovascular disease marker, and it is not. It is one of the most important markers in a biological process called methylation, right? A podcast on functional medicine would not do functional medicine justice if I didn't talk about methylation. Methylation is the second largest biochemical reaction we have in the body, and not to get down the weeds in the biochemistry of it, but we need methylation to do everything in the body, to process hormones, to make proteins, to turn on and off genes, right? So, so cancer genes need to be turned off by the methyl groups, and so homocysteine, if it's elevated above an eight or nine in most people, means that you're not methylating very well and and I just want to say that having a normal homocysteine doesn't guarantee that you're methylating really well, but methylation is supported by really the only way to Support methylation is to take pre methylated B vitamins. Okay, pre methylated B 12, pre methylated folic acid, activated b5 so taking a multivitamin might be enough for some people, if they have pre methylated forms. Most multivitamins over the counter don't so you have to see that methylcobalamin, that methyl group, or methyl folate, you have to see that methyl group in there. But a lot of people, about 60% of Caucasians, need even more support. And this also goes back to preconception. This is a method that methylation is so, so important in in reversing, you know, the the autism and even schizophrenia and all that stuff. So supporting autism becomes a key biochemical marker and process in that so, so anyone who wants to get that blood work, you know, you do need to see a functional medicine practitioner typically, because if you go to your doctor, you say, I'd like home assisting. They're like, Well, why? You know you're you didn't have a heart attack because, because, you know, maybe they heard about it in board. Maybe they remember that from board, boards exams and when they went to school. But they certainly don't practice with it, and they certainly don't know what to do about it if it's high.

Dr. Spencer Baron: 59:46

So it do. I understand correctly, from what I've heard or read in the past about B 12, that your typical B 12 is cyanobalamin and cyan. I mean, it's not a good thing to. It takes, right? Exactly, yeah, how it's been around for so many years, and it's injectables and and people think that's the greatest thing, B 12, B 12 shot. But now you're talking about having methylated,

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 1:00:14

Yep, yeah, either methylated or hydroxylated. So hydroxy B 12, or methyl B 12, cyanocobalamin is a synthetic form and is not natural in the body. The body only has three forms of B 12 that it uses in the body. Methylcobalamin is the first it's 80% of our body's B 12 needs to be in the form of methylcobalamin in order to be used. The second form is hydroxy, and the third form is adenosil cobalamin. So cobalamin is the technical term for B 12. So when you take cheap Centrum right from Costco, you're getting cyanocobalamin. Now, yes, the cyano is, is the same component in cyanide. It is, it is a heavy metal so, yes, it is something that can be dangerous, but, but the most dangerous part of it really is that it contains so little of the actual cyano part of it, you know, but it is the fact that your body has to use other methyl groups in order to activate that B 12. And so you actually can develop a methylation deficiency by taking cyanocobalamin. And same is true with folic acid. The body has to methylate it. And if you're taking a folic acid, that is, you know, your bread or your cereals or other things, that's fortified with just regular folic acid that's synthetic. The body doesn't use that, and it has to rob other methyl groups in the body in order to make that folic acid usable. And so you end up creating a methylation deficiency, potentially. And so, yep, that's that's so true, but now we do have more access to pre methylated vitamins and and B 12 shots. But back to that, so many people do need B 12 because it is the only B vitamin that our gut has to actively absorb, meaning our gut has to secrete a chemical in order to absorb it. All the other B vitamins, they get absorbed, you know, passively, by itself, but B 12, we have to secrete something called intrinsic factor. And a lot of people don't secrete intrinsic factor, especially if you have a bad diet. So and guess what else? I hate to say this, but alcohol also stops the inhibits the absorption of b6 and B 12, and so a lot of people end up developing methylation deficiencies because of their dietary and lifestyle habits. So so that's how we treat it

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:03:02

outstanding. In fact, I'm sure you have tons more information. We've maxed out on our time, and we could probably go on for another couple hours. It was so good and very, very, no, no. It was very, very, very helpful, even what you had what we had covered. So you do telemedicine? Yes, I

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 1:03:22

do. I do do telemedicine? Yep, I maybe come your

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:03:26

client and my mother and my other friends and everything. It was very comprehensive. And there's things that I found on my blood work that have been managed before, but I like what you're what you're providing here. Thank you so much for being on the show. Yeah,

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 1:03:40

you're very welcome. Thank you very much. And yeah, if anyone, you can just go to my website. Dr Brandt. Dr Brandon lundel, and you can, yeah, we'll, we'll be happy to start running some blood work and seeing where you, where you're at. And if any of the listeners want to do that too, we, we love to do that. So thank you again for having me. It's, it's a ton of fun talking about this and and I'm so interested, and so glad that you guys are interested in it. So thank you again,

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:04:10

Doc, you're great. And I'll put all that stuff in the description your show. So make it really easy for people to find you. So we really appreciate your time and your effort. You know, this was fantastic.

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 1:04:20

Yeah, thank you very much guys. And yeah, let's do it again. All right.

Dr. Terry Weyman: 1:04:26

Love it. Take care, buddy.

Dr. Brandon Lundell: 1:04:28

See you guys,

Dr. Spencer Baron: 1:04:32

thank you for listening to today's episode of The cracking backs podcast. We hope you enjoyed it. Make sure you follow us on Instagram at cracking backs podcast. Catch new episodes every Monday. See you next time you.