Show Notes

• Functional Diagnostic Nutrition website
• Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Certification Course
• Unstress Episode with Dr Sandeep Gupta

Timestamps

• [00:00:00] – Introduction and acknowledgement of traditional custodians
• [00:01:34] – Reed Davis introduces his background in functional health
• [00:04:06] – The impact of stress on health and disease
• [00:07:45] – Understanding catabolic vs. anabolic states
• [00:11:38] – How stress affects the immune system and digestion
• [00:20:37] – The role of the liver in detoxification and its connection to stress
• [00:29:00] – Importance of saliva testing for hormone and stress analysis
• [00:48:32] – Food sensitivities vs. allergies and their impact on health
• [00:55:37] – Identifying mitochondrial dysfunction and metabolic chaos
• [01:02:04] – The challenge of a holistic health approach in modern medicine
• [01:06:50] – Reed Davis on the biggest challenges to individual health today
• [01:10:42] – Conclusion and call to join the Unstress health community

Reed Davis: Stress, Health, and Functional Diagnostic Secrets

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to Unstress. My name is Doctor Ron Ehrlich. Now, before I start, I would like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which I am recording this podcast, the people of the Eora nation and pay my respects to their elders, past, present and emerging. Well, today we explore health at a very granular level. At a functional level, in fact, working out how your body functions is a really important step in not only understanding how to stay healthy, but if you have been diagnosed with the disease, finding out what went wrong and how you can fix it. My guest today sheds some wonderful ashes, some wonderful insights, and takes us on a wonderful tour of functional health, Reed Davis. Reed is a board certified holistic health practitioner and a certified nutritional therapist. He’s an expert in functional lab testing, and he shares that expertise in a wonderful episode today and also on holistic lifestyle medicine. He’s the founder of Functional Diagnostic Nutrition and the Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Certification Course, with over 4000 graduates in 50 countries. Look, it’s a wonderful conversation. I so enjoyed talking to radar. There was so many pearls in this in this interview. I hope you enjoy this conversation I had with Reed Davis. Welcome to the show, Reed.

Reed Davis [00:01:35] Thank you, Doctor Ron, it’s a pleasure to be here.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:01:38] Reed. We’re going to talk we’re going to cover quite a few topics here today, but I wanted to start with stress, because stress is a term that people use a lot. And I and it means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. What does stress mean to you?

Reed Davis [00:01:55] Well, in 2001, back when I was getting started, I read an article that 50% of all diseases are caused by stress, including 80% of all doctor’s visits. And so it’s a huge, huge, huge thing. And I started studying it that long over 20 years ago. So I over the years have categorised stress into different. Places where we interact with it, if you will, or the ways we get stressed up. Most people think automatically when you say stress about the mental, emotional, you know, their jobs or their kids or their relationships or their finances or you know, something bothering them in that way. But it includes way beyond that. You go up above to psycho spiritual. I think not having a purpose in life is stressful. People get up with no purpose and they’re all stressed out all the time. But what I also found out in my ten years as a clinician is that there is physical stress, there’s pain and aches and old injuries. Matter of fact, if I had to see what my particular nemesis is, it would be the very will use body that I am walking around in and, you know, from injuries and things like that. Everything from motorcycles to kickboxing to surfing and skiing and, you know, all the silly things you do as you, before you get old enough away. Not wise enough. But then there’s a course, and this is my background. Before the health space was environmental law and conservation, and I studied the environment, and I realised about the number of chemicals that were killing all the birds, bees, water, trees, things. And that’s how I got into the health space, by the way, as I started wondering what’s it doing to people? So you have the major categories might be mental, emotional, physical and chemical or biochemical stressors. And there’s a lot to unpack and sort out there. But when you ask me a question I’m going to give you the answer. In this complex case, it might sound we’ve actually made it quite simple to understand. And, we could go from there.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:04:07] Well, this actually is music to my ears. Red, because, you know, we’ve taken not a dissimilar approach to stress myself in my own practice and in my own writings and podcasts, but it’s always so interesting to talk to somebody who has similarly explored it. But but a different perspective. And adding to that knowledge, let’s dive in a bit deeper and talk about how these various stressors might actually affect, our health. I mean, we know they do, but. But how?

Reed Davis [00:04:38] Well, it’s quite amazing. You know, I’ve heard over and over again in the health space that all disease begins in the gut. Even Hippocrates, the father of medicine, disease, begin. I don’t believe it. It begins with stress, but it circles around to the gut so often and so commonly that it could be looked at that way. And of course, there’s a lot of symptoms associated with gut and, digestion and all the things we could go into any, any level of this you want to. But what I’ve done is study the hormone, immune digestion, detoxification, lab markers. So I’m considered a very experienced lab testing guy. I’ve run thousands and thousands of lab tests on thousands of people. And so I started years ago, 25 years ago, and I started recognising patterns of how was stress measuring the stress hormones that starts the initial breakdown of the body. And sure, the other dominoes will fall just like you can predict it. It’s so it’s so reliable. This idea of stress causing a cortisol to DHEA imbalance. And what that means is that you’re catabolic. You’re going to be in a catabolic state versus anabolic. You could understand this very clearly and I’m not sure the level of your audience. But you know kids they’re anabolic. They’re growing. So they’re naturally anabolic. They get over anything really quick. They cry for a few minutes and then they’re out playing the next minute, even with pretty serious booboo sometimes, but with, with adults, you know, and the accumulated stress. And it doesn’t matter, right? Whether it’s mental, emotional, physical or chemical biochemical, your body responds the same. You go out of balance into it, more catabolic. And if you’re an older you are you’re kind of starting to lean that way. Your body’s breaking down more than it’s building up. So these hormones have to be in balance to be healthy. And we strive for that. We measure that. That’s part of our therapy, if you will, is to balance the catabolic anabolic mostly through lifestyle. But of course, what happens when you have chronic stress, some of it you don’t even know about. Matter of fact, a very interesting thing about stress and looking for stressors and root causes. There’s a recent study from the University of California, San Diego. This, which is where I live, you know. And it says that the original stressor that started this downward spiral doesn’t even have to be there anymore, you know, but it’s that stress of whatever form can start these downward spirals. It screws with metabolism. Catabolic anabolic leads to the next, domino. Now what? People who are under stress will notice. And I could stop and take questions, and or I can continue to move on.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:07:36] No. Go on I loving this. I loving this whole this whole catabolic anabolic balancing beam is really a very nice way of looking at it. Please go on.

Reed Davis [00:07:45] Well, it’s it’s one way to start the investigation because I’m a lab guy, so I like to look at labs and, and you’ll see this catabolic anabolic impulse. The next thing to go. In the right there in the same metabolic pathways downstream from the cortisol in the DHEA is the sex hormones. So people with who are all stressed take your 4550 year old working maybe two jobs plus kids, plus spouse plus, you know this just maybe they’ve got a couple old injuries from somewhere and they’re using, personal care products, household cleaning products, and exposed to things that are exposed. So now you’ve got all the the mental, emotional, physical and chemical stressors. Guess what? As the catabolic anabolic gets out of works, the next thing that goes to sex hormones. Next thing you know they have load low libido. They can’t put out the put on the muscle anymore. And, they’re tired and fatigued for no good reason. And you haven’t really earned it. Like to say, you know, through exercise or something. Just walking around tired. Well, that’s not normal. That’s not healthy. And those are signs that people have. They know this about themselves. They know there’s a downward spiral somewhere. They can’t quite put their finger on it. They may have even been told by some practitioner somewhere, nothing’s wrong with you. Your bloodwork looks normal, but we have different little sneaky ways of looking at these markers and, discovering the downward spiral of anabolic catabolic. And now the sex hormones. Your testosterone is low. You’re, you’re you’re in early menopause. You’re having trouble with your periods because your oestrogen and progesterone are also out of balance. So you have the the stress hormones, you have the sex hormones. And then the next thing that’s going to fall, if I may.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:09:43] Please.

Reed Davis [00:09:44] Our immune system. And again, I’ve run thousands of labs and thousands of people hormone immune digestion, detoxification, energy production, nervous system, on and on and on. And I’ve used saliva, urine, blood, stool and kind of sorted that out. What can we use hopefully to make it very convenient and people to be done at home, even some of this lab work. And so you see the catabolic anabolic stress, sex hormones, all those issues, then the immune system. And so when because cortisol suppresses it’s called secretory or secretory depending on where you’re from. IGA secretory aka which is the main ingredient in the immune system of the gut. So the lining of the small intestine in particular. And other mucous membranes have this secretory which is there to defend against things. And you also have the normal biases. You have good and bad flora. So this gets affected by stress. Believe it or not just stress alone. And it does. The body doesn’t care where it’s coming from. Your hormones your immune system start to downward spiral so you get less. You’re less of a defence system. And what happens is it biases gets we call it dis biotic or you have a dysbiosis. So instead of you know the preferred range for for the good flora versus unhealthy flora is 80 or 85 to 15 or 20% roughly. You know this I’m just saying not good.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:11:24] Well, I might know it. I may know it, but I think our listeners, you know, I would like to hear it. And just to stop you for a moment, because a listener may have heard it and missed it. You were talking about secretory IGA immunoglobulin A as a marker.

Reed Davis [00:11:40] Absolutely. That’s why it’s so easy because you can get it, believe it or not, from the same saliva test that we got your hormones from. So we now have learned to add secretory or secretory IGA to the saliva test with the starting the whole chain of events. So with one lab you’re already seeing the catabolic anabolic the sex hormones. And now you’re even peaking into the immune system. Now it’s not enough if you want to go deeper. But you’re getting a clue here that wow, there’s a lot of stress and it’s throwing things off and your body’s breaking down before your time. And it’s that’s why your sex hormones are off. And your either your periods, your fertility, your early menopause or with males, you know, all the things they go through. So it’s like that. And oh, by the way, with the reduced secretory IGA, you’ve got to just buy doses. So that will produce, produce its own set of symptoms heartburn, gas, indigestion, bloating, diarrhoea, constipation or the famous alternating diarrhoea and constipation. And so you’ve got now a person who doesn’t just feel old, you know, and low libido and can’t put on muscle and is tired and maybe even a little foggy thinking thrown in, you know, now you’ve got digestive issues as well. And it can just downward spiral from there. So what I’ve learned to do is the lab work that like, you know, we do multiple lab work to look at this entire cycle, if you will, of stress being the overriding causal factor, various kinds of stress. And there are other causal factors. Diet, wrong diet, for instance, or even worse chemicals than what we’ve already mentioned. And so on. And so you get the, care about, again, about sex hormones, immune system, digestive problems. And then as it continues a downward spiral, the I think the medical term is bigger, better bugs, bigger, better bugs. Come along. You’re parasites. You’re overgrowth of bacteria, like serious stuff and even fungus and these kind of things, especially depending on exposure, of course. So now you’ve got. Worser things living in the gut. Not just a dysbiosis and weak immune system, but because it’s weak. Well, critters will move in. And they can cause problems of their own. The very toxic, you know, they produce were called lipopolysaccharide or LPs. And that’s a form of toxin that will end up going through your whole body. And it’s a neurotoxin as well. It can cause severe, problems with neurochemistry. You know, the brain chemistry and neurotransmitters and all kinds of things. And I could add in as many layers as you like, because let’s just take, for example, with the dysbiosis. Too much bad versus good flora. Well, you need like 80%. Even 85% good flora to break down protein. So now you’re not breaking down protein. Protein is your amino acids. Those are the building blocks of almost everything in your body and including neurotransmitters. So now, if you also feel sad on top of all of this, you go and get, you know, a low libido and I can’t build muscle and I’m tired and I have heartburn, gas and just bloating and that makes me sad.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:15:08] Well, yeah. Well, it’s an interesting use of word their breed, because it’s often an acronym for Standard American or Australian Diet two.

Reed Davis [00:15:16] Oh yeah. Absolutely. Yeah.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:15:19] So this is great.

Reed Davis [00:15:20] Well that’s one more stressor. So now I could go a couple ways with this. but with the downward spiral what we see happening is now the, the gut lining itself becomes so weak that it starts to we call it hyper permeability as you know, or leaky gut. So you start to leak with this week mucus bury the secretory items diminished. And you’ve got all these, unwanted Beyonce living there, and they’re producing toxins and even biofilms. It gets kind of, nasty in there, and it starts leaking through into the bloodstream, called the humoral system. And unfortunately, initially it’s contained in the hepatic portal system. So it’s still going to get caught and go to the liver. For the most part, it’s not going to just go throughout the whole body, not right away. There are there ways that if they’re fat soluble, they can go through the leg teals and into the lymph system. But let’s just stick with the liver, which is going to carry most of the weight of these toxins and immune complexes and unwanted particles, if you will. So, you know, the liver is a pretty big organ. They call it the grandfather in Chinese medicine. And its job is to do additional filtering and processing and excreting of the waste products, purification. And it’s supposed to let good things go on. Actually, it sends it back to the heart, which is then pumped out to the rest of the body for all the nutrients and the good things. And so. When it’s congested. And that’s the term we use. It’s easily measurable, by the way, in a simple urine test. Congested liver. Look at urinary bile acids or if you have it, urinary bile acid sulphate. So that means that bile is spilling. Or is bile supposed to be it’s made in the liver to carry the toxins and unwanted things out. So it goes to the gallbladder is actually used quite intelligently by the body to help with digestion. You know, the, the the bile and like piece from the pancreas mixes together. It’s a very good surfactant and digestive aid. But what happens if you have this congested liver too much? Your liver can’t process it all so quickly. So it’s sort of spilling over into the bloodstream. These bile acids, and they’re easily picked up and, by the kidneys and excreted, which is a good thing, but we can measure it. It makes it easy to measure. So now someone has come in and they’ve said, hey, man, I’m all stressed out and I don’t know what to do. And I’m drinking all this coffee all day long just to stare. Then they tell me I have to drink alcohol just to get to sleep and, you know, and and on and on this stuff. And again, they’re carrying all the stress around a lot of it. They can’t even identify and, and we see the, the, catabolic anabolic compounds, the sex hormone issues, the immune system starts to slip. And then of course, you get, worse, worse and worse. Sure. If those are great words in Australia, but but, you know, you you, you get my message that people are in this downward spiral. Now, your digestion isn’t working. Now, you’re not really getting nutrients out of that great food you’re spending all that money on or growing yourself or whatever it might be. And so you’ve got the symptoms, you’re self-medicating. And it just if you can’t intercede on yourself and change, some things can get pretty serious with the now. Because when you get leaky gut and dysbiosis, dysbiosis, leaky gut and, liver that’s spilling over, which again, is pretty easy to detect. Well, that can start the immune system really on fire and your body can start attacking itself, which is called autoimmunity. And, you know, there’s just I don’t know, I think 151 different autoimmune diseases. Yeah. Maybe there’s new ones. And then it’s, it’s I read that somewhere because you can’t keep up with all the data that’s coming up. Yeah. But it’s a, it’s a, it’s a joy to be able to take people back to the beginning and show them that, that there’s a reason and you can try to take control of these things and control of your life. And I would just want to finish by saying are where I think our job is, is to teach people the data, get them the data. That is their data that belongs to them doesn’t belong. The doctor doesn’t belong to the hospital or office. Remember the heck you’re going. It belongs to you. And if you track it over time, you can catch things very early, long before you become diagnosable. These are called subclinical conditions, as you well know. And then do something about it. So we could talk about the doing about it. And we’ve got a program for that too. But the idea of living yourself out of what you lived yourself into, if you have the data and the awareness and the motivation to make some changes, we’re certainly here to help you.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:20:38] All right. I love, I love that. I love that. I mean, jeez, you know, I’ve often said that if I had a choice of what, I would go back and study. I wouldn’t do a PhD in anything. I’d go back and study physiology and biochemistry, because that would help me understand why people get sick and how to make them better. And you’ve given a beautiful ten minute, summary of of just that. There’s so much to unpack in what you’ve just said. And, and interestingly, when we talk about normal ranges, you know, when doctors look at that, oh, now you’re within the normal range that is determined. If I’m not wrong, by looking at population studies and finding what is average in the population, not what is ideal. Is that a fair comment?

Reed Davis [00:21:24] Very fair comment. Average or possibly the mean, which is a little different, you know, than average. But it’s if you’re in range, you’re okay. If you’re out of range, you’re not okay. Well, that’s a pretty, silly way to look at, well, is it.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:21:41] There of particularly saying that the vast majority of the population are not. Well, so it’s very reassuring to be told you’re like that. But maybe I mean, most people want to be better than that, so, you know that, isn’t it?

Reed Davis [00:21:56] It’s so there’s, there’s this weird word called optimum, which I’m not sure I love it so much, but pretend it’s okay to use and that there’s an optimum level for you. Whoever’s listening for you within that range. So in the range of a broad population, it might include people 20 years younger than you and 20 years older than you. With different experiences, different exposures. And they’re all in there. So what’s optimum for you may maybe discoverable. And there’s what we call a functional range for you. And it could be age related gender related. It could be a lot of things. But it’s not anywhere in the range is good. We know that for sure. And so because as let’s say, you, take glucose, you’re climbing, you know, and you might. And the problem with the climbing is that hardly anyone is tracking now versus three years ago versus three years before that versus three. So where are you going? Because, you know, blood sugar metabolism is really critical for health. I mean, it’s just almost the root of all evil if you want. And so, you know, it could be said that that could be said. So. So who’s tracking? Now in America, everyone switches jobs and that switches their insurance and that switches their doctor. So the new doctor is looking at the old doctor’s tests and the person isn’t really empower people are just sort of poking along and, and oh, well, you know, you know, depending on what the physician might say and as long as you’re in range, you’re okay. But what if you say you’re 80 to 90? Those are the American measures. And and you’re fine, but then you’re. Oh, so you’re at 95. Well, that’s still within range, but it’s climbing. And then the next year. And you’ve switched doctors now, and no one’s looking at the old ones and you’re not tracking. Well, it’s 95. It’s 195, 100 and you’re still okay. And when it gets to 105 or hundred ten, you might finally here. And this is over a period of years. Well, you’re just becoming, less efficient at metabolising glucose. Your diet’s not changed. So it’s you that’s changed. You are losing. You’re getting insulin sensitivity issues and other problems. And so. So when it’s under ten, you might hear from a physician. Hey, you better watch this. Or I’m going to have to medicate you. And then and that’s the answer. So now when you if you don’t change it I’ll say do some diet and exercise. Watch the carbs or something. And if you do maybe you’ll make a difference. But if you don’t it’s just going to continue to climb. And of course then you’re going to have you know, all of a sudden you’re on metformin because, you know, you need some, insulin sensitivity, assistance. And, and you see what I’m getting at? So that’s what I think is one of the major problems with standard medicine here or anywhere in the U.S. it’s why by countries. And so you’ve got no one track. So you’ve lived yourself into that glucose metabolism problem and you can live yourself out of it if you can get the data. So I’m not I’m like the guy that’s for you getting your own data. And I run thousands and thousands of lives. I’ve trained over 4000 people how to run labs and look at it this way. Because remember, we don’t diagnose and treat any specific disease. That’s the realm of licensed medical practitioners. But we can still use the data for lifestyle changes. That’s it’s legal in all 50 states. And we have lots of practitioners in Australia and in New Zealand and in Canada, of course, in the United Kingdom. And.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:25:52] I definitely I definitely see the value in, in tracking with the same organisation. Your, your, your tests and seeing how that changes over. This is something that I’ve noted in in my own bloods, you know, blood tests over the years, the change. And it is that change within you as an individual that is so critical. You mentioned, you know, there are four areas of testing saliva, blood, urine and stool. And, you know, obviously there are some of them are more accessible than others. Let’s let’s start with with saliva as an example. What can we what can we learn from our saliva. What kind of and what can we learn from it?

Reed Davis [00:26:37] Well, lots of things because it’s a bodily fluid and it has the chemicals and hormones and all kinds of things in it. We’re mostly concerned with the hormones, with the catabolic anabolic. Because you can get cortisol, you can get DHEA, you can get all the sex hormones or most of them from saliva. And so you would just basically drool into these little tubes and send them into the lab.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:27:02] Not having, not having eaten for is that we.

Reed Davis [00:27:05] No no, no, you do it throughout the day. You would do what we call we want your circadian rhythm. So you could do a morning, noon, afternoon and Night-Time. If you wake up in the middle of the night, you could always do that too. We take a look at melatonin, which is another hormone you can measure in saliva. And again, you can you can look at insulin. You can look at as I said, the secretory ita, you know, part of the immune system. So there’s lots and lots you can get from saliva that’s without going into digestive enzymes and the pH level of it and all this other stuff that could be important. But when you just want to look at stress and the effects of stress, you would look for those hormones. Now the cell saliva makes it bioavailable. You’re only looking at what your body’s use. None of it’s bound up. It’s all free hormone. So it’s not bound up by sex hormone binding globulin or the problems you have with blood testing. Plus morning, noon, afternoon, night time. Who would go to the doctor and get for venous punctures in a day? That alone would be so stressful. It would throw the risk results off. You know, if you’re measuring the effects of stress. And so, so I was convenient. It’s affordable. And it’s something you can control yourself. And it doesn’t take, a medical license to interpret the results. From a functional point of view, there’s no diagnosis in it. That’s why physicians, for the most part, aren’t using it. They prefer blood. They call that the gold standard. And it might be the gold standard when it comes to hormone replacement theory. So if you’re just trying to. Well, here’s what’s low and let’s replace it. Blood works very good. No, but we’re looking for what’s going on with the body. How stress affected you? What’s it done to your hormones? And it’s a different approach. We’re actually, you know, a different sandbox altogether. I love that.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:29:00] I love the idea of. So you would be testing with four, 4 or 5, four different vials throughout the day. I mean, I think that’s that’s very accessible and would be very interesting. I mean, I’ve never done that myself. And I think that would be fascinating.

Reed Davis [00:29:15] Yeah. Well, we have I have one of my mentors who lives in Australia, and we have a medical doctor there, who is in the Sunshine Coast, who is our sort of overseer of for Australia. I have trained many, many people in Australia how to do this. And I’m sure we can get you to. Where are you exactly? Right.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:29:37] I’m in Sydney. I’m in Sydney, but I’m not. I’m not in clinical practice anymore. But.

Reed Davis [00:29:42] You don’t have to be. Yeah, yeah. It’s just we could like to help you. So. So. Yeah. So from saliva, it’s mostly the hormones. And it’s a very good medium. Again, convenient, inexpensive and easy to do at home. You don’t have to go see the doctor and get your arm stuck or anything like.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:29:59] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Great. No, no, that’s so this saliva and that. Oh I love the idea of the several vials testing through the day. And God even wouldn’t be a bad thing in the middle of the night to do it once and just.

Reed Davis [00:30:13] See what’s going on. You know, depending, you know, your circadian rhythm is, you know, we’re what we call diurnal animals. We’re not nocturnal. We’re diurnal, which means daytime. That’s how we’re designed. Yeah, I know people work night shift and believe me, things get all messed up. We need, you know, cause no goods up high in the morning to make sure you’re awake and your brain is on in your feed. You’re hitting the floor and you’re off and running. Whatever it might be. Cortisol is very high. Again, it’s your stress hormone. It activates blood sugar metabolism and things like that. It’s it’s good for you in the morning. Now, you wouldn’t want it that high at night. You wouldn’t be able to sleep. And that’s what’s wrong with people is this diurnal rhythm is off. It becomes like a roller coaster for some people. So we want to see that. And by the way, saliva is the only way you can get that because it’s the only medium. It’s real time. So if we met you at 8:00 in the morning, that’s what it is in the morning. Now at noon it’s changed. That won’t show up in bloodwork, which is more of an average throughout the day. And so are you getting a saliva?

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:31:23] Yeah. Right. Is another aspect of saliva that gives us what would just tell you, you know, how how what should it be and what how do you. Yeah, it’s out of balance.

Reed Davis [00:31:34] The the the the digestive. The ten second primer on the digestive system is you’d go alkaline in the mouth. Acid in the stomach, alkaline in the upper bowl and back to acid in the lower bell or, urinary tract. So it goes alkaline acid. Alkaline acid. That’s the normal rhythm. And that’s very important to maintain. Also, people with acidic saliva, there’s something wrong with you and you eat eating wrong for your type and all kinds of possibilities. If you don’t have enough stomach acid, you’re not gonna be able to break down food very well. It’s also very, very important for the immune system goes because you’ve got to kill little critters that come along with your, food and your stomach’s perfectly design, you know, it’s got hydrochloric acid, pepsin. You’re starting to. You’re breaking down the food, and that’s good for digestion. And then the assimilation happens later. It’s also a signal how strong HDL, hydrochloric acid is very, very important. When the stomach gets working on a bowl of food that you just ate, it’s down there and it’s working it and it’s it’s moving it. There’s automatic muscles that are mixing it up, and the acid is actually increasing, and the pH will drop down about 1.2 or 2, which is very acidic. And that’s the signal for for the pyloric valve to open up, to let that food into the small intestine, where you’re going to get the bile and the lipids, which actually back to alkaline. So that’s a good thing to, you know, you start hitting especially the fat, the stomach’s good for protein and polysaccharides, but it’s going to be in the small intestine where your fat breakdown and absorption happens much more, efficiently. Again, the bile and the lips from the pancreas as well from the gallbladder. Storing it in is a favourite to the liver and so on. And so it’s really really interesting.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:33:40] And then we get back into the large intestine which is more acid.

Reed Davis [00:33:44] Back to the yes. Stool should be more acid. Now you talk about small small variations but like after the stomach because that’s that’s the strongest one obviously. And so, we’re looking at a lot of that more as Sub or consequential to the other lives that we do. So you asked for about saliva and I told you it’s convenient and inexpensive and it’s real time so you can get the different times of the day. And it measured really tiny amounts really well. These are all certified labs. They’re highly regulated. They have to be producing good and they get checked out all the time. So we confident in our lives. Accuracy. Now the next. Remember, the dominoes are starting to fall. So the next test we’d have everybody do on top of their celebrities is another easy to do at home. You’re going to collect some urine and you’re going to pour it on some special strips, and you’re going to let them dry. So it’s called a dry urine test. And that makes it very inexpensive and easy to ship. So these things are designed for the person to put their power in the hands of the people. So so now your urine, we’re going to look at that next domino. We’re going to look at the dysbiosis. And we can see what it’s measurement called indication. And you know what doctors used to do this 60 years ago when I was a kid. When you went into the doctor’s office, they would always collect a urine sample. Why? Because they had their own little lab in the back, and they could do things and tell you something and and get it all over with at one time. No. Oh, you got to go to the VA over here and get your your samples taken in. It’s just they used to do it. And indicator was one of the markers that told them if you had a dysbiosis and depending on the, the the way the person shows up, they could even do a good diagnosis for leaky gut, even from that one cheap test. Pardon me, but it’s very inexpensive. No, as long as you’re collecting urine, you know you’re going to measure some other things too, like that. You base the urinary bile acid sulphates, which are a marker for liver congestion. And it’s really fascinating that you can get those from a simple urine collection. And with the same year collection, we’re also going to look at what we call oxidative stress. And it’s called ADHD. The long form is eight hydroxy deoxy quantising if you really want to know. But with DG you know, is is what we call it. And it’s a measure of oxidative stress, which is which is a killer. You hear about free radicals and, all this damage that the environment’s doing to us, especially if you smoke or something like that, but even just normal air these days, I know Australia’s a very big country, a lot of open space, but it’s still on the same planet as San Francisco. And these, those places that are polluting the hell out of the place.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:36:55] And most of us live in, most of us live in big cities, the vast majority live in.

Reed Davis [00:36:59] Us automobiles and things. And so, you know, they’ve measured some of these toxins on the top of Mount Everest. And here, United States. The highest mountain is Mount Rainier in Washington state. My son has climbed it twice and peak both times. And, and there’s toxins in the snow up there, so you can’t get away from this stuff. And one of the major, ways that it affects is, is through oxidation. It increases free radicals. And so you’ve heard pro oxidation and it’s actually normal. There’s a normal amount and there’s antioxidants and antioxidants are very common in foods. And then there’s other phytonutrients that could be very important. But the idea is that, with this, you’re a simple celebrities and urine test. We just covered the off a lot of here’s the word healing opportunities. Healing opportunities. These are not medical diagnosis. We’re not stepping on anyone’s toes or, peeing in their backyard one bit. We need to leave the diagnosis to those that are licensed to do so. We’re just looking for healing opportunities, which is way for us to work with Mr. Jones and Mrs. Smith or whoever on. Here’s what’s really wrong. Here are some improvements you can make by looking at the data. And oh, by the way. It’s going to correlate perfectly with how you feel. To explain why you feel so rotten. And then there’s others. So. So again. And now you’re seeing how the again the dominoes fall. And we also do talk about blood. Now we do have we’d like to get a blood draw too. Don’t don’t get me wrong, but this next test is simply a finger stick. So you you shake your hand, and you get the little kit, and you get a little card out on your desk. Here. You can do it right in front of me. And I take my finger, and I’ll just just turn it red like that. See how it’s just turning bright red with. And then you poke it. They give you a little poker doesn’t really hurt. And it starts just beginning. You get a drip that blood out onto the blotter, and the next thing you know, you’re wiping it clean, and you put a little Band-Aid on it. Now you’ve just collected enough blood to run the next series of tests, which includes resigning and diming oxidase and, histamine. So Dao for short diamine oxidase. So you look at this zone, you learn, and it tells you if you’re. A breakdown, and the dominoes have fallen so far as to actually create leaky gut. Remember the, the saliva test here? Lots of stress, sex hormone problems. You know. Secret treasure is low. Or it could be high. And each one would tell you that it’s not normal. And then you get the display bosses showing up on the urine test. You got the liver dysfunction and the oxidative stress. Not to mention, now with the fingerstick, you’re looking at leaky gut and the histamine diming oxidase. Look at a ratio there. You can actually start visualising the condition of the villi. The microvilli and the spaces between the villa are called crypts. Very very important to have all that be top notch in the way it was designed it, you know. And let’s get some credit to the designer. You know, I believe the innate intelligence of the body’s. What we want to. Coach up. Coach up the innate innate intelligence of the body. We’re not trying to cure anything. The body is itself or doesn’t. But if it does, it’s because you’re you’re supporting and nurturing these functions. You’ve identified healing opportunities, not medical diagnosis.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:40:58] And nice. Kind of nice.

Reed Davis [00:41:02] We’ll take it. It’s yours now.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:41:04] No, no. I love the. I love the turn of phrase healing opportunity and interesting the whole leaky gut story because, of course, nutritionist naturopaths particularly have been talking about this for 40 or 50 years, but it’s only only since Xinyi Lin and what is now referred to as intestinal permeability. Yeah. It’s been accepted as. Yeah, I actually that does go on in the body. I, I love these accessible. I love this pinprick test and this urine test. And I do remember when my doctor used to do that. Something that I hear a lot when I, when I see patients was, you know, they’d come in with chronic, you know, degenerative diseases and when you’d go into the DoD. Oh no, my dad is perfect. No, I don’t know that any worry about that. It’s perfect. There’s an issue that a lot of people and practitioners included don’t understand. And that is the difference between a food allergy and a food sensitivity. Can you talk to us about food sensitivity, that difference and how we would determine food sensitivities?

Reed Davis [00:42:12] I’d hope to be able to clarify that. Allergies you already know about, because you’ve had them most of your life. They’re kind of inborn errors and like dogs, for instance. And I’ll tell you a quick story. Cats. So I had a cat for 15 years. Love my cat. Cat would all over the house and place, you know, bedroom. Everything. Just. Just love my cat. But when it died. I noticed that the sores in my nose that had been crushed had been there for over ten. I couldn’t remember when they started, so these little saws in my nose then went away and I thought, that damn cut, you know, like it’s because of the the reaction I had as an allergy. Now people are allergic to tomatoes or strawberries or whatever the heck they usually know about it because the the action is to is true. We talked earlier about Secretary IGA was ig e, which is the immediate more of a histamine type response. And you should know you start sneezing, your eyes are watering, your skin’s turning red, you know, whatever it is. Now. So these sensitivities are different. They’re more subtle and they take longer for the symptom. Appear to appear. So you could eat that food on Tuesday, and a symptom may not show up until Thursday or even Friday. So now how do you put that together? You just all of a sudden on Friday, you feel like crap, your joints are aching, your whatever it might be, digestive problems, headaches, sleepiness. Tired. It just doesn’t matter. Foggy thinking is huge in this. So we measure two different ways for food sensitivities. One is IgG. We talked about IGA. We mentioned it, which is mentioned IG is one, but it’s not as good as what we call the mediator release test. Right now. It’s not available in Australia which is very unfortunate. We have to build a lab down there. But the testing we do to make it clear is so important because everybody has some sensitivities. I’ll give you another quick story. I talked about the cat and my nose and things. So very early on, or well over 20 years ago, lady came in her office. I tell a story often, so if you’ve seen my podcast, you might know this one, but I get a zillion of them. But I love this one because this lady came in the office run and she was on about her eighth visit for chiropractic and acupuncture. We had a multi multiple disciplinary office. I was a greeter and and the hammer of the place and the lab guy. So I always was triaging. And so I’m walking this lady back to the her treatment room and I could tell she’s very sad. And I say hey first name, what’s what’s going on today. Oh really? I’m just so frustrated. This weight that I’m carrying is £40 and you know me, I’m ready to say some happy and encouraging. Oh, no. Wasn’t going to happen that day. She she said, I’m so discouraged by this weight. And it’s £40 and I can’t get rid of it because I’m on this medication for the hives. Big red blotchy patches all over her skin, all over her body, which would happen for no apparent reason. And the only solution she’d been offered was medication that made her gain weight. She been on it for two years and it was £40 plus. And it’s not funny, you know, but the poor poorly. I’m so I’m understanding. Yeah. Okay. You know and and she goes in, you know read I went to the doctor the other day to, to get a check-up and I told him how frustrated I was with the £40. And she said he told her, lady, you can be fat or you can have the hives. Take your pick.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:46:13] Wow.

Reed Davis [00:46:16] And I’m like, hey, no wonder you look so bad today. But then she says, and so read. I told him, oh, that was very depressing. And he said he’d be happy to write a prescription for anti-depressants.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:46:30] Yep.

Reed Davis [00:46:32] So when I finally was able to get a word in edgewise. I said, hey, first name. Why don’t you ever try to find out why you get the hives. And this light bulb went on and her head snapped around so hard I thought, you’re not going to need your chiropractic treatment today. I mean, really like what? What do you mean? I said, I’m not sure. We could probably find out why you get the hives if you’re willing to invest in grade testing. So that’s one story about food sensitivity testing where within nine days after she she ran a test, we got the results, explained what she needed to do. Within nine days, she was off her medication, calling her physician, Ron and saying, I’m off this medication. I found out why I get the hives. What a concept.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:47:23] What a concept. Water concept. Well, well, well, Reid, we don’t have a 1.5 trillion US dollar pharmaceutical industry without medical practitioners facilitating it. And that is a pretty good example of the multi multi drug treatment for what actually if you bothered to look at root cause you would take a lot of boxes, a lot more than you’d think. So what a great what a great story. How do we test. I mean okay so that’s what.

Reed Davis [00:47:55] That’s that one. And you can’t. So I told you I have a doctor who’s overseas. stuff in Australia in, in Sunshine Coast which is near you I think.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:48:06] Well it’s not far and I have a feeling I probably have interviewed that doctor. What’s his name? Do you remember?

Reed Davis [00:48:12] His name is Sandeep Gupta.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:48:13] I have and Sandeep has been a guest on my program. And I would encourage people to go back and have a listen to his wonderful podcast. I mean, I’ve been a holistic practitioner for 40 years, but I learned so much from him in my interview. I really yeah. So I thought that would be who you would be working with.

Reed Davis [00:48:32] He’s one of our medical directors, and I’ve known him for 15 years, and.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:48:35] He’s a he’s very.

Reed Davis [00:48:37] Good school and quite a gentleman and funny guy, too. You know, he’s also quite a musician when he comes to the house here. I have a music group. Oh, he’s he’s plays the bass and the and the bongos and stuff. He’s quite a guy. Yeah. And I kind of.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:48:53] Forget he’s very into. He’s very into, environmental, particularly mould, you know, mould issues and, and, you know. Yes. It’s very interesting. We’ll, we might even release rerelease that, that podcast in the same week. Sure. Do yours. Yeah.

Reed Davis [00:49:09] Doctor Gupta anyway. Fascinating guy. And he’ll, he’ll, you know, tell you what, the alternatives are in Australia. We again, we’re trying to get access to all the labs we run here in the States. In Australia we do a really good in Canada and United Kingdom, but you know, Australia, New Zealand just a little behind. But but still we’re working on it to get get access to this. So so that test now here’s the thing. Yes. That lady got rid of the hives she found in really. Cause which was her main complaint. Now, I had another woman who had migraine headaches, and she was in a dark room with a pillow over her head five days a week. Wow. Couldn’t work. Really couldn’t afford anything. And so. But she did invest in this one lab and found out she had some sensitivities and within three weeks never had another migraine. I’ll tell you another thing where this food sensitivity testing came in. And then I want to explain a very important principle. So one of our, my, my clients way back in the day was doing very well. And she asked if I work with children. I said, yeah, I’m a football coach. I’ve been coaching for 15 years. I’ve coached hundreds of kids and I’ve raised four. So she goes, okay, well my why, why, why? You know, oh, they want to send my kid home from school due to misbehaviour. If I don’t put them on drugs. So schools telling you put them on drugs or we’re kicking them out of school. Right. And I asked first. First I said she said they want to put them on Ritalin, which was the drug of choice back then for addicts. I said, well, do you think he has a Ritalin deficiency and a tongue in cheek? And I thought it was funny and she was funny one bit. She said, no, it’s not funny. She goes, I don’t want to put my kid on drugs. And I said, okay, you know who’s doing that? Is it a doctor at the school? She said, no, it’s the principal and the teacher. I’m actually prescribing medicine for a young. By the way, this kid’s nine, and they wanted to drug him. He’s nine. I think he’s probably been almost a normal boy. In my view. I’m sure I was much worse at nine years old. The needless.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:51:29] But but but the point being, you identify, you identify the food sensitive. How do you.

Reed Davis [00:51:36] Break it up? But I just tell you. Yeah, the end of the story. Within three weeks of putting them on a different diet and homework schedule and exercise and boost that up about three times. The principal of the school called me, tracked me down through the mother and said, boy, he’s a different kid. He pays attention. He’s not poking the other kids. He’s not, bursting in appropriately. He’s just a whole different boy, which I thought was wonderful. And I’m all happy. And then he goes, would you put him on? Unfortunately, he thought it was some magic pill. You know, it certainly is. So I just wanted to get you ask me about food sensitivities. There’s three quick ones about how important it is for some people, because the food sensitivity this is really important was a major healing opportunity. It was a major contributing factor to their downward spiral and what I call metabolic chaos. You can borrow this one too. I have one diagnosis. You’re in metabolic chaos, and that’s what it is. And it’s always multiple causes, right? We’re probably running out of time. But here’s the week. So so so multiple causal factors including foods. And sometime and sometimes those foods are really, really important now. So I test everyone for food sensitivities. But looking forwards I can’t tell who if I’m going to have that kind of sort of miraculous. Sure. Compensation, you know, so depending on the level of the sensitivities, may be a major contributor. Oh my God, get off them and you’re better. Or they could be a minor contributor. And you never know. So looking forward, can’t tell who’s going to help the most. Looking backwards and go. We were in a test. Right. So so that so that sensitive.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:53:27] How do you how do you specifically identify the food that they are sensitive to.

Reed Davis [00:53:32] It’s a blood test. So and that’s why we can’t do it in Australia just yet because the blood has to be delivered overnight to the lab. The lab has to have the blood, three big vials of it, which is why we can’t do infants. You know, we could go down to four years old, six years old and get enough blood.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:53:54] And then we get a quantitative, quantitative immune response to various food.

Reed Davis [00:53:59] It’s yes, it’s it’s immune system, but it’s not immunoglobulin based. It’s what’s called mediated release based. So we expose the blood to various antigens, food particles, if you will. Right now it’s at 176 different foods. Well, no one needs that many foods. You probably eat 30. I might eat around 30 or 40, but most people eat 14 or 18 different foods. It’s kind of rotten, really. You should eat much more variety. But anyway, so. So it’ll give you the bad foods and the good foods and you switch to the good foods. And, I’ve seen miracles occur, but I’ve seen where. Well, it wasn’t the foods or they contributed, you know, minor way or less important. So it’s other things, environmental pollutants, you know, household cleaning products, personal care products, new draperies, outgassing, your new car, you know, not to mention driving in, you know, there’s just so many different contributors to metabolic chaos.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [00:55:02] Reed, you’ve given us so much you’ve talked to. Out, catabolic. Anabolic. You’ve talked about healing opportunities, which I love that expression. You’ve also mentioned, metabolic chaos in so many conditions now, being seen as metabolic diseases, physical and mental. And the focus is really on mitochondrial function in all of the testing that you do. Is there a is there a test tool or parameters that give you a clue as to whether metabolic function, mitochondrial activity is not working as it should?

Reed Davis [00:55:37] Well, one of them is, in the, mitochondrial DNA. So we look for oxidative stress. As I mentioned, there’s some other tests, but remember that we want to look at a whole I call it a constellation of healing opportunities. So because everyone’s already been to a functional medicine doctor and ran a test. And here’s the problem that they do, the that I see is that physicians are using what I call the sounds like method. So a person shows up and they have a cluster of symptoms or symptoms and they’ll go, well, that sounds like x, y, z. And then they’ll run that test like thyroid is a perfect example. If you have if you’re tired, fatigued, can’t lose weight, you’re maybe said you have a cold or numb extremities and you’re constipated. That sounds like thyroid. So the doctor might run a thyroid test and then, God forbid, define, low thyroid hormones and high. There is simply any hormones. They would go, oh, I found your problem with your hypothyroid pet myself on the back. I found your problem. Well, it’s never just one thing. And so whether it’s mitochondrial dysfunction or organ dysfunction, hormone imbalance, it doesn’t really matter what it is. If you’re not looking at a whole constellation of healing factors or, what we call contributors to metabolic chaos, then you’re, you’re going to be beating your head against the wall. You’re going to be going around and around again. So because with the sounds like method, you know, oh, it’s hypothyroidism. And sure enough, with certain medication the symptoms might abate a little bit the more energy. But then, you know, the person might then go back to the doctor, go, well, I have a little more energy. And I lost a couple pounds, but I got this other thing. I can’t put on muscle. My libido is still low and whatever. What does this sound like? It sounds like low testosterone. So you test? Yep. Here’s your. No, no. You’re treating two different. So that’s the diagnosis and treatment model. And the same thing will be applied to mitochondria. Any other function it’s always going to be multiple causal factors. This is why again we run multiple lives multiple healing opportunities. And here’s the thing. You won’t hear anyone else run. If I haven’t said it already. Multiple causal factors are having an effect on each other. They can’t be singly measured. And that’s coming from a guy who teaches a course in lab work. Like, I’m kind of known as a lab expert, and I’m telling you, there isn’t enough lives. We can’t measure some of these interactions singly. Therefore, you have to look at the whole pattern and connect the dots. You can’t just treat one dog or even two. You really have to look at what I said it originally was hormone immune digestion, detoxification, energy production, which would involve mitochondrial function and nervous systems. And so we look at it all together and you can add in oxidative stress. We also test for food sensitivities. We do a complete and thorough examination of the microbiome. You know and so there’s a lot of moving parts. But with a system that’s been it’s not perfect by any means. It keeps saying we’re still working on it, but it’s been working really well for people for over 20 years. I’ve been teaching it since 2008, and I have thousands of practitioners using that system of it’s really mindset. And I know I said earlier that a method ology methodology is a method steps like withdrawal labs, but it’s where you think about the ology part is the science of it, where you think about it. So a methodology is, what I’m here to say is something we think we’ve done a pretty good job on. And that idea of hidden, hidden stressors, hidden contributors to metabolic chaos, hidden and multiple healing opportunities, how they affect each other and then what to do about the diet, rest, exercise, stress reduction, supplementation. There’s no one magic pill for anything. I told you about the story of the little boy who who showed up as a new kid, and the principal. He was so different. The principal tracked me down and unfortunately said, would you put them on instead of understanding these higher, you know, well, better bedtimes, schedule a better exercise effect. Tripled his exercise. Yeah. People don’t know the boy should exercise every day until they’re beat. That’s how you maintain, a young man’s health, you know?

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:00:38] Yeah.

Reed Davis [01:00:39] Just slows the hell out of him. And they will be, I think, trouble. They’ll be sharp, they’ll sleep well, they’ll do their homework when they have to.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:00:48] They’ll be hungry.

Reed Davis [01:00:50] For proper food, better appetite and so on and so on. Yeah, you get it. So the institution is little in a way. I just simplified it. I may not have even answered it directly.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:01:01] Because no, no, but I like I like that answer. And and I think it’s interesting because what I’ve observed and I know many practitioners in the functional health integrative health space, and I know many practitioners who are prescription driven in a 10 to 15 minute appointment schedule. And I know, but the thing is.

Reed Davis [01:01:20] That that’s generous. The average appointment here in the States is nine minutes.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:01:24] Yeah, I was being generous. I think it’s probably not that it.

Reed Davis [01:01:28] Takes 20 minutes to write the bill up, but, you know, the appointment was nine minutes.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:01:34] But but my point is that we have been programmed all of the all of those have been programmed to look for the one answer, but person’s come in. I’ve given you the symptoms. Doc, tell me what’s wrong with me. And and sometimes people feel like, hang on, this is a whole range of different things. And they almost some people feel disappointed. Many feel empowered. It’s a it’s part of the whole philosophy of how we’ve been trained to look at health care really is.

Reed Davis [01:02:04] Yes, you’re right. You know, people are often thankful for a diagnosis because at least someone gave them an answer. It can be the wrong diagnosis, but they feel great that they have one, especially when it’s what we call a skin diagnosis. Like fibromyalgia, you know, chronic, these things, it’s multiple symptoms, multiple causes. It’s happened over a long period of time. It’s it’s definitely the person who’s suffering has contributed to that. It’s not something they caught. You know it’s not a transferable disease. It’s it’s a degenerative stress related condition. And you can’t just label it and say, here’s your pills. You’ll never fix anybody that way.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:02:51] Listen, you’ve given us so much deal with the saliva, with the blood, the pinprick test, the urine dipstick test. I love all of that. You mentioned microbiome, and I’m assuming there isn’t a is there a dipstick test for stool sampling?

Reed Davis [01:03:04] No, it’s it’s, you know, with saliva and urine and even the fingerstick this requires stool collection. So it’s not as much fun as some of the other tests, but it’s pretty easy. You go like a puppy on. Paper and you put it in the right thing and you send it in. It’s really kind of easy and it’s done at home. So it’s very convenient and it’s not real expensive. The way we do microbiome testing involves the stool collection. And then again that goes it needs, will process it. I’ve been to where the process is. It’s very interesting. But I have to say that some of the most recent stool testing is I don’t think it’s as good as some of the old stool testing, because it’s all done by machine. No, but still very helpful. So in the old days, we would you would have a guy in the lab who would use a microscope and shine different lights and put stains, and they would personally sort of become experts at identifying things that didn’t belong there. Like bug parts, if you want arms and legs or whatever it might be, in certain cells, of course, some, some parasites, actually one single cell. So it’s very interesting that they don’t do a lot of microscopy anymore. Also still culturing to put, swabs of the stool in various petri dishes and put those into an incubator and see what kind of fuzz grows on it. That’s very important, at least in the old days. That’s what we did. Now it’s all done by PCR, you know, sort of like genetic testing to look for the genes of the animal critters or.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:04:44] Help.

Reed Davis [01:04:44] Me if you’re looking for and it’s you able to run a lot of labs very quickly on in that way, it’s when you take out the human equation, you get faster, turnaround time and things like that.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:04:59] But getting the getting the sample, I mean, we’re in Australia, you’re in America. There’s a certain, you can’t really do that, can you? Yeah. You can’t.

Reed Davis [01:05:09] That’s a question. Well, the real the real challenge is life blood. Because we need our blood through our food sensitivity testing, which I explain to be overnighted in. The lab is in Florida. Yeah, and if so, if you can’t get the live blood. And I’m talking about fresh, warm red blood, you know, and you don’t freeze it, you just got to get it overnight to the lab. And so anywhere and they have a lab a similar lab in in Poland, believe it or not. So our European friends can if they can get it overnight to the lab in Poland. So there’s only two labs in the world running that test. So for food sensitivities for those people, we do use the fingerstick. And it’s a different way of looking at things, but it could be very effective. You can identify foods that you need to get rid of and foods that might actually be pretty safe. So, so it just depends. And we’re working with labs in Australia now to get more access for my graduates. Because Australia’s got some funny rules.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:06:18] Yeah, yeah. Listen, you’ve given us so much and given us so much to think about, and you’ve put it in such a great and understandable why I can see you’ve been teaching. You’ve been teaching for all these years. You, you know, clearly good at what you’re doing. I want to say I wanted to ask one last question. And this is, you know, take a step back from your teaching, from your role as in functional medicine, because we are all individuals on a health journey through life in this modern world. What do you think the biggest challenge is for us as individuals on that journey?

Reed Davis [01:06:50] Oh, it could be a lot of things. I think point of view is a big one. How you look at the world. Is it the cup half full or half empty? So I think the healthier people, seem to be the ones who have a good point of view and outlook. And they’re not as pessimistic. They’re optimistic. They’re they’re just, less challenged, facing their challenges. They take things on, we call it ready, willing and able. So if you’re ready, willing and able, that’s a good thing. If you’re not really ready yet and you’re, you know, so willing to change, you know, I don’t want to give up. I heard a lady tell me, as long as I don’t have to give up my bowl of ice cream before bedtime, I’ll do anything you ask me to do. And I said, well, that’s the one thing that’s probably going to make the biggest change in your life. Give up that bowl of ice cream for a bit so you got to be ready. So you need to to be able to make the investment and the time and maybe have some support around you. You got to be willing to maybe it’s not going to be as comfortable as you want is not you can’t come home every, day after work and eat a bag of chips. You know, you just there’s some discipline involved sometimes, and this or that ability. So ready, willing and able. And that could mean a lot of things. So get it ready, willing and able to. Make some, decisions. Do some things that are going to benefit you when you’re not going to see the results right away. That is the biggest challenge, I think, is, you know, if you have £40 to lose, that’s going to take a while. So try to lose.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:08:42] Five.

Reed Davis [01:08:43] And look at that as positive and good. And again the cup is half full. Well good. Now you only have £35 to lose. Or if that’s your goal lately for other people, it’s again, like I told you, the story about the hives and migraines and A.D.D. and the asthma. I’ve seen asthma go away in three weeks, and that’s a kid that was on an asthma inhaler. You know, it was embarrassed and didn’t want to. Reason I knew is because, you know, I told you, coach football, he didn’t want to come to practice because he was embarrassed to curious and halo around. And mom came to me and said, can let’s call him Billy. Can Billy still play on the game Saturday if he doesn’t practice during the week?

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:09:27] I said, no, you can’t.

Reed Davis [01:09:29] You can’t come and play on Saturday. You got to hang out with the rest of the kids and learn the plays and things that we’re doing. So anyway, so this kid and as within three weeks, you never had another asthma attack. So I’m telling you that some things are quick like that, but when it’s slow improvements that’s the body takes time to heal. That’s when you got to carry that mental attitude around with you. I think mine comes through, you know, I’m not agnostic. I, I have, a rock solid, belief. And it’s my ground I give every day. And I thank God for, you know, all the blessings. And then the rest of this seems to go okay. Or, you know, if it doesn’t, it’s still okay.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:10:14] Well, I mean, gratitude is a powerful thing. And I’m very grateful to you for joining us today and sharing your knowledge and wisdom with us. And we’ll have links to all that and on can order some of those tests myself. So thank you so much for joining.

Reed Davis [01:10:28] My pleasure. Run. It’s, it’s, any time kind of a thing if you get any inquiries and they and they want you to have me back. Tell me what you want to talk about. We can go into detail on some of these things that are actually pretty exciting. Any anytime I’ll.

Dr Ron Ehrlich [01:10:42] Take you up on I’ll take you up on that. Thank you. Well, we’ll have links to, reads the website, the functional diagnostic nutrition, program there. And, the people that he has, he has trained. And if you are interested in pursuing some of those tests, which I certainly am, I will be, visiting, with one of those doctors here in Australia. I think some of those tests, which are so simple and shed some interesting light on our health, are worth doing, worth benchmarking. I’d also encourage you to join our unstressed health community. There are so many wonderful benefits and resources there, and the advisory panel is growing by the day. We will be organising some, events, live Q&A and live events in the coming 6 to 12 months. So I would encourage you to join our community. I hope this finds you. Well, until next time. This is Doctor Ron Erlich. Hey. Well, this podcast provides general information and discussion about medicine, health, and related subjects. The content is not intended and should not be construed as medical advice, or as a substitute for care by a qualified medical practitioner. If you or any other person has a medical concern, he or she should consult with an appropriately qualified medical practitioner. Guests who speak in this podcast express their own opinions, experiences and conclusions.