Defiant Health Radio with Dr. William Davis

Everyone knows that sugar rots teeth and raises blood sugar. But there are additional phenomena that result from consumption of sugar that even your doctor is likely unaware of.  Understand how and why sugar impacts health in so many unexpected ways and  your efforts at regaining health, losing weight, and slowing the phenomena of aging will be more effective. Sugar Science: https://sugarscience.u...

Because most of us as modern people have lost the intestinal microbe, Lactobacillus reuteri, that is responsible for increasing release of the hormone, oxytocin, from the brain, are the phenomena of love, affection, and concern for other people less intense than they used to be in prior times? Was love and affection stronger, for instance, in the 19th century, the Middle Ages, or the Greek Empire?...

My new book, Super Gut: A 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight, will be released Feb 1, 2022. It is a book packed with new ACTIONABLE strategies that show you how to take back control over health. Among the issues I discuss: How replacing microbes lost from the human microbiome can yield extravagant health benefits such as deeper sleep, smoother skin, increased...

In this episode of Defiant Health, we consider something that we do not often consider: identifying the emotional stumbling blocks to success . Whether you are faltering in gaining control over weight loss, chronic pain, or other health or life struggle, JJ Flizanes discusses how the cause for your failure can be emotional, some factor in your past life that is keeping you from enjoying the succes...

Neurologist Dr. David Perlmutter, known to most Defiant Health listeners as The NY Times bestseller author of Grain Brain, as well as Brain Maker and Brain Wash, makes some surprising and enlightening observations about a blood marker called uric acid. Up until recently, uric acid was thought to be the factor that caused gout and kidney stones. But Dr. Perlmutter reports on emerging science that s...

Despite the widespread advice to consume more "healthy whole grains," a wide range of health problems, sometimes catastrophic, develop with their consumption. Humans made the mistake of incorporating the seeds of grasses ("grains") into their diet 10-12,000 years ago, not recognizing that they were trading health problems for near-term survival. Then modern agribusiness and gen...

Food intolerances are proving to be a rapidly growing problem: intolerances to nightshades, so-called FODMAPs, fructose, histamine-containing foods and others. But why? And does just eliminating the food solve the problem? We need to view food intolerances as a warning sign of the process that causes food intolerances in the first place: disruptions of bowel flora and especially small intestinal b...

Many people struggle with controlling their appetite, inevitably giving into temptation and impulse and thereby struggling with weight and multiple measures of health: higher blood sugars, higher blood pressure, higher triglycerides, fatty liver and others. You have the potential for spectacular control over appetite by adopting several natural, healthy, safe practices that allow you to make smart...

It has only recently become clear that the hormone oxytocin profoundly influences many features of aging: skin, muscle, bone, etc. Most modern people, however, have lost the intestinal microbe, Lactobacillus reuteri or L. reuteri ,  responsible for provoking release of oxytocin from the brain (hypothalamus). You can therefore restore this lost microbe that, in turn, causes oxytocin to be released...

The modern diet is woefully deficient in the protein collagen and, as a result, we experience increased potential for skin wrinkles, slower healing, arthritis in joints, even diseases of the aorta. You can correct this situation by including foods rich in collagen, knowing how to navigate collagen hydrolysates, and taking advantage of boosting oxytocin by restoring the intestinal microbe, Lactobac...

The American Heart Association and other agencies, dietitians, and doctors all urge us to cut our intake of fat and eat more "healthy whole grains," ignoring the fact that wheat and other grains provoke a panel of unhealthy metabolic changes that hugely increase risk for heart disease. Understand these phenomena, ban all wheat and grains from your life, and enormous changes develop acros...

Most people already know that the hormone oxytocin is the hormone of love and of uterine contraction during childbirth. But that is only the tip of the iceberg of what this hormone can do. Higher levels of oxytocin have been found to increase dermal collagen and thereby reduce skin wrinkles, restore youthful muscle and strength, preserve bone density, deepen sleep, reduce appetite and have other y...

Low-carb diets work. They are more effective at weight loss and reducing health conditions such as high blood sugar, high blood pressure, even fatty liver. Whether you call it ketogenic, carnivorous, Atkins' or other version of a low-carb diet, the majority of people experience substantial near-term health benefits.  But there are some issues to be aware of to prevent the long-term health det...

My guest in this episode of Defiant Health is co-founder of Paleovalley, Autumn Smith.  Autumn describes the emotional and physical struggles she had earlier in her life, finding the healthcare system useless for effective solutions. She and her husband learned about the power of diet and all her health problems are now just a memory. This inspired the couple to start Paleovalley. I’ve had a chanc...

Brenda Watson's name may already be familiar to you, having been featured on Dr. Oz, Good Morning America, and six PBS specials. She is also a prolific author of books such as The Road to Perfect Health and Fiber 35 Diet. But you may not know that she, along with her husband Stan, were the founders of Renew Life, for many years the largest probiotic company in the U.S. that they have since so...

Of the many effects of wheat consumption on the human body, it's the brain effects that stand out, effects that include: Appetite stimulation Depression, suicidal thoughts High blood sugar and insulin resistance Seizures Once you understand how and why the various components of common wheat products can be blamed for many modern health problems, you have the key to reclaiming many aspects of...

All throughout human history and up until approximately 100 years ago, iodine deficiency, goiters (enlarged thyroid glands), hypothyroidism, and death from thyroid failure was a common public health problem.  Ask your great grandmother (if you could) about goiters and she would likely have been able to share many horror stories about people who were disfigured by goiters and who died of thyroid fa...

People of the 21st century have lost empathy, as well as experiencing more social isolation, divorce, and suicide than prior decades--but why? Psychologists talk about lack of community, the dissolution of traditional families, over-reliance on technology, all of which are undoubtedly important contributors. But could there be a physical factor that could contribute to these social phenomena? And,...

CT heart scans to generate a coronary calcium score is, by a long stretch, the best and most precise way to gauge risk for heart disease, certainly far better than virtually useless cholesterol values.  Even though this technology dates back over 25 years, it is still plagued by misinformation, often used to twist people's arms into taking drugs like statins, and even used to exploit people b...

For the majority of people with type 2 diabetes or pre-diabetes, the condition is completely reversible within weeks to a few months--but you cannot achieve this with prescription drugs, the conventional "cut your fat and cholesterol and eat more whole grains" diet.  Instead, we 1) follow a diet that no longer raises blood sugar or insulin, then 2) address common nutrient deficiencies th...

It is estimated that we, as modern people, have lost about half of the microbial species occupying our gastrointestinal (GI) tracts compared to indigenous populations who hunt and gather. Exposure to antibiotics, glyphosate residues in food, other herbicides/pesticides, synthetic sweeteners like aspartame, emulsifying agents in ice cream or salad dressings--we swim in a sea of microbiome disruptin...

Watch TV morning news in years past and you would see authors on health and nutrition topics interviewed regularly. TV news exposés would likewise air reports on problems in healthcare such as excessive charges, aggressive hospital marketing tactics, fraudulent practices by doctors and the like. But in the last decade, there are virtually no such interviews or reports on any of the major TV networ...

Here is the very first episode of Defiant Health Radio with host Dr. William Davis, cardiologist and author of the New York Times bestselling Wheat Belly series. You may already know that modern healthcare does not yield health. Sure, plenty of prescription drugs and procedures are dispensed. But real health? Not even close.  In this episode of Defiant Health, I recount how and why I left my cardi...