01/03/2021
Every time we eat or drink or expose ourselves to chemicals and hormones, we are either feeding disease or fighting it! Isn’t that amazing?
We call the millions of microbes that inhabit our bodies including the gut flora collectively The Human Microbiome and it may surprise you that there is 10 x more bacterial cells than human cells!
Our Microbiome is generally playing a beneficial role in our bodies and helps us to metabolize and make some important vitamins. They help us to break down our food and produce energy from food, they help support your immune system, they produce anti-inflammatory compounds and keep the gut wall healthy and keep our immune system healthy.
We now know that changes in the composition of our microbiome correlate with many diseases. From Diabetes to Auto-immune diseases such as Rheumatoid Arthritis and Autoimmune Thyroid diseases we have now identified changes in the gut flora pre-disposing people to these conditions. The common thread in disease processes are a lack of bacterial diversity and a decrease in good bacteria.
So what are the factors that affect our Microbiome?
1.Diet – not enough plant foods, too much sugar and animal foods, preservatives, high fat intake and gluten.
2.Medications – antibiotics, pain killers such as Panadol, ant-acids such as Proton Pump Inhibitors, Chemotherapy drugs, Steroids
3.Infections – Parasites, pathogenic bacteria and viruses
4.Stress – acute and chronic stress, physical stress, surgery
5.Chemicals in the environment – sanitisers, pesticides, cleaning chemicals such as bleach.
What can you do to support your microbiota?
-Get enough sleep and exercise
-Avoid too much sugar
-Support your digestion
-Avoid chemicals such as preservatives, pesticides
-Eat lots of vegetables
-include natural probiotic rich foods in your diet
-supplement with probiotic
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