Today’s world can be a stressful one, even in a country where we have so many freedoms. What with the economy, job losses and general financial uncertainty, stress is definitely a factor in many people’s lives.

Stress can be caused by many stimuli, and in turn, can also cause physical ailments in our bodies. Many in the traditional medical model see these ailments as psychosomatic; in other words, they assume that they are created by the patient’s imagination. They are starting to talk about irritable bowel syndrome, but most will not even recognize leaky gut syndrome as a legitimate problem.

We look at things differently at AskDrKing, especially when it comes to managing certain disorders that there isn’t a known medical or drug-based treatment. This definitely applies to irritable bowel syndrome and leaky gut syndrome—we have great success with our patients that come to us with these diseases.

A Testimonial on Leaky Gut Syndrome from a client of Dr. Corey King.

In these cases, there can be multiple factors involved in activating the leaky gut syndrome, including food sensitivities, antibiotics, chemical exposure,

…but the main reason is stress.

Stress affects the gut lining by first activating the adrenal glands, also known as the “stress glands”. When the adrenal glands are overactive due to physical, emotional or chemical stressors, they release too much cortisol. Cortisol is not only toxic to the gut lining, the cortisol will also start eating away at it.

And when cortisol starts eating the gut lining, two things happen: one, microglial cells get activated and start attacking brain function; and two, it also makes the gut lining permeable. The permeability allows undigested food compounds to slip through the lining and get into the bloodstream, which causes an inflammatory reaction.

Part of managing the problem is calming down the cortisol, which requires the adrenal glands to be brought under control. This way there’s an appropriate level of cortisol being released, preventing the gut lining from being under attack.

Leaky gut syndrome can easily turn into a snowball effect is when those undigested food compounds or bacterium get into the bloodstream and the immune system reacts, it causes those microglial cells to become activated at the brain and start destroying neurons, which, in turn, affects the vagus nerve. The vagus nerve, also called Cranial Nerve X, comes out from where the cerebellum and brain stem are located. With the neurological degeneration and the brain not working as efficiently as it should, the vagus nerve slows down blood flow and neurological innervation to the gut.

This is how the vicious cycle performs

Food sensitivity or antibiotics destroy the good gut flora, added to the adrenal glands producing the cortisol causing the gut to be permeable and allow the food or antibiotic to be released into the bloodstream, it then affects the brain neurologically through the microglial cells, and now the brain loses control of gut function through the vagus nerve, and finally, the vagus nerve does not fire properly.

If the vagus nerve does not fire properly, two things happen: One, proper innervation will not get to the gut; and two, it won’t control the blood flow to the gut. If the blood doesn’t get to the gut, it won’t heal.

So what makes the Tustin Chronic Condition Center different?

“Firstly, there’s not a drug out there for it,” says Dr. King, owner of the Tustin Chronic Condition Center. “So the traditional medical community can’t give a patient anything for it. In fact, the medical model will not even acknowledge that there is any such thing as ‘leaky gut syndrome.’ In our experience, the traditional medical models are usually loathe to find out about or try and treat a problem that there’s no easy, drug-based solution for.”

How do you recognize leaky gut syndrome?

There are several symptoms, including bloating and/or flatulence after eating, stomach pains, bouts of constipation or diarrhea, or a person might even notice undigested food in their stool. However, not everyone experiences symptoms. There are ‘silent-symptoms’ and these are the patients that are typically diagnosed years later with Celiac/Crohn’s Disease. More to come on this in later blogs.

At the AskDrKing, we treat leaky gut syndrome in two ways. The first thing we do is put them on an anti-inflammatory diet, and the second course of action is to put them on a natural herbal supplement that starts patching up the gut lining. Taking that herbal supplement a few times a day allows their gut lining to start healing, and we also recommend the use probiotics to accentuate the anti-inflammatory diet and the supplements. Also, neurological rehabilitation on the region of the brain controlling the Vagus nerve is extremely important, which is why all of our patients are going through neurological rehabilitation.

We are very successful with our patients in managing their irritable bowel or leaky gut syndrome. We treat people by coaching them in what to eat and what to avoid in order for their gut to heal.

If you are concerned that you are experiencing irritable bowel syndrome or leaky gut syndrome, we can help. Please call Dr. King now on (714) 731-7680 or use our schedule a consultation form.

There is a distinct link between our digestive system and our brain function, and if people continue to ignore the problem, it can lead to neurological degeneration—in common terms: dementia.

How exactly does that work?

How can what you eat affect your brain?

We’ve illustrated it here in a flow chart, but let’s give you a more effective mental image of how this process works.

When a person has any kind of food sensitivity or infection, it creates inflammation in the gut. Infections can stem from bacterium, parasites, mold, yeast or other sources.

Gut inflammation creates what are called cytokines, or TH17. We like to call these the “Bad Guys”, because they cause the gut lining to become permeable, which results in a intestinal barrier dysfunction, more commonly called leaky gut syndrome.

Once the gut lining becomes leaky, the body becomes more predisposed to food sensitivities and infections, which starts the cycle all over again. As this happens, those Bad Guys get into the bloodstream through the leaky gut and start traveling through the circulatory system.

We all have a blood brain barrier that protects our brain from receiving large protein molecules from passing through, things like alcohol, medications and certain hormones.

But since there are these Bad Guys…

These aren’t supposed to be in the blood, they insinuate themselves through the blood brain barrier, and set off another chain of events.

These Bad Guys, or cytokines, activate the brain’s immune cells called microglials. Think of these microglials as a tightly wound, hyperactive dog like a Chihuahua. This Chihuahua happens to have a bazooka tied to his back, and every time he barks, that bazooka goes off. That bazooka is destroying healthy neurons, and there are ten Chihuahuas for every healthy neuron.

So the process works like this: your food sensitivity or infection inflames your gut, creating the Bad Guys who eventually cause leaky gut syndrome after constant stimulation of the food sensitivity causes a vicious cycle. Once they’ve done that, they’ve created their escape route, which takes the Bad Guys right up to the brain. They sneak past the blood brain barrier, and set the Chihuahuas off barking, each of whom release ten bazookas at a single, healthy brain immune cell. The next time you irritate that food sensitivity or infection, the whole process starts over again, killing more healthy brain cells.

Now, who doesn’t want to stop a Chihuahua barking, literally or figuratively?

In this case, we really want to muzzle these Chihuahas, as these imaginary little dogs are literally destroying your brain. Early signs of this process happening are brain fog, loss of mental clarity and short-term memory loss. And these memory problems will only get worse unless we stop the problem in the gut.

The way that we at the Tustin Chronic Condition Center attack this problem is to start with the gut; we look at the gut to determine whether or not the patient has any gut issues. We then proceed to deal with the blood sugar dysregulation issues, which must be addressed because blood sugar issues also affect the gut, which in turn affects the brain.

Are you ready to make the changes necessary to stop your body from destroying itself and start the process of improving your health? Then please contact Dr. Corey King by calling (714) 731-7680 or using our schedule a consultation form.

If you have watched the news in the last two weeks, you won’t have missed the discussion about the research from a Japanese study that was recently released. As you know from our previous blog, the number of cases of diabetes is increasing in America at an alarming rate.

As if that wasn’t unpleasant enough, other sources are now confirming what we at the AskDrKing have been pointing out for some time: diabetes can lead to dementia and even Alzheimer’s disease. As a matter of fact, Alzheimer’s disease is now being referred to as “Type III Diabetes”.

Most people understand that blood sugar levels are inextricably linked with diabetes, but they are not aware of how important blood sugar levels are to brain function. In fact, blood sugar imbalances are a cause of neurological degeneration, and that is what leads to dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.

Your organ systems work synergistically together; each part of our body has a function and task that affects other parts of the body: organs, bones, muscles, and so on. Everyone can attest to the wonder of the complexity of our bodies in their functioning. The food that we eat provides glucose (blood sugar), and eating a healthy, balanced diet produces stable blood sugar levels. That said, many Americans don’t eat a very balanced diet, evidenced by the upswing in diabetes, and an unbalanced diet will produce varied levels of blood sugar. And when the body’s blood sugar levels bounce up and down, it directly affects the adrenal glands, which then release cortisol, which is what keeps your blood sugar in ‘check’.

And like most things, cortisol is good in moderation.

But low cortisol results in hypoglycemia (low blood sugar), sleep disturbances and a lack of energy and chronic fatigue. Too much cortisol both eats away at the gut lining (causing problems we’ll cover in a later blog) and decreases the hippocampus’ ability to use acetylcholine, a neurotransmitter that the hippocampus depends on for proper function. In short, high cortisol levels destroy the hippocampus, which controls conscious recall of factual information and short-term memory.

And what do dementia and Alzheimer’s patients suffer from?

Short-term memory loss. This current research from Japan and other countries is showing that Alzheimer’s patients are insulin resistant. Insulin aids in the brain’s ability to store information, so those with insulin-resistant diabetes can expect to see a decline in their ability for recall.

This recent study from Japan included over 1,000 men and women over the age of 60, and researchers found that people with diabetes were twice as likely as the other study participants to develop Alzheimer’s disease within 15 years, and almost twice as likely to develop dementia of any kind. And remember, as we said in our last blog, Type 2 Diabetes is completely reversible without medication.

Do you have diabetes? Would you like your symptoms to improve, or even disappear, and lessen your chance of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease? Do you have a loved one or family member that is starting to show signs of dementia? If so, then please call me, Dr. Corey King today on (714) 731-7680 to schedule a consultation.

The Center For Disease Control estimates that 25.8 million U.S. children and adults have diabetes, or about 8.3 percent of the population. Diagnosed cases compose 18.8 of that total, with undiagnosed cases accounting for 7 million. Type II Diabetes sufferers make up 90-95% of that number, and the condition can develop in people of any age. And although it’s generally advised that Type II Diabetes can be managed with exercise and a healthy diet, we at the Tustin Chronic Condition Center look more deeply than that.

Unfortunately, Type II Diabetes is usually brought upon the sufferer by the sufferer.

What do we mean by that?

Simply put, the body’s cells were bombarded by insulin for so long, they finally shut themselves down to allow insulin to come in to your body. Insulin brings glucose into your cells, allowing them to function optimally and provide the body with energy. If you’re experiencing severe fatigue, a lack of glucose getting to the cells is probably the problem.

Insulin-resistant diabetes is completely reversible, and don’t let your doctor tell you any different. Do not let them prescribe medication for you, as this will just make your condition worse.

Type II Diabetes can be managed with small changes to your diet and lifestyle—this means taking personal responsibility for your health. If you start our program, we need a commitment from you that you will help us help you by following our guidelines.

We run the same tests for Type II Diabetics as we do for Type I Diabetics. Why? Because we find many symptoms are affecting both types of diabetes cases. We also put Type II Diabetics on certain nutritional supplementation that allow the receptor sites to open back up and allow the insulin to come in, bringing in the glucose and energy back to your body. Then your body can start functioning normally again.

When your body is resistant to insulin, insulin still flows through your bloodstream, but instead of being used, it builds up and gets converted into lipids or triglycerides. High triglyceride counts translate to high cholesterol, which then causes the build up of plaque in your arteries, which moves you into high blood pressure and arterial sclerosis, which can cause heart attacks, strokes and heart disease—all for something that can be completely reversed without medication.

Does this sound like the solution you’re looking for?

Then you’ve found the right place, and we can help you with this reversal process.

Many Type II Diabetics also suffer from peripheral neuropathy, or in common language, the loss of feeling in your extremities, such as your hands, fingers, feet and toes. We have specific therapies to help rebuild the nerves and return the feeling to these areas. Typically what starts to happen is the feet going numb, and this numbness can lead to balance disorders and accidents like tripping or falling, which is dangerous at any age. All of this is due to the fact that metabolically, your body is very unhealthy—your blood circulation and your nerves are basically starting to die off!

In order to walk normally, your feet have to communicate with your brain, and when this numbness occurs, the brain only “hears” that communication as pain, usually in the form of tingling or “pins and needles” sensations, that can continue all day, and all night.

We combine the neurological and metabolic work with the therapies for the peripheral neuropathy so you’re not suffering from balance disorders and painful tingling and numbness in the hands and feet.

Did you know that if a diabetic receives a cut on the foot, the wounds don’t heal properly? This can lead to severe conditions such as gangrene, which can result in amputation of toes and even feet. We know that no one wants to have a foot amputated because of a condition that is totally reversible. We know that there are sufferers out there who are serious about regaining control of their life, and those are the potential patients we want to work with.

Fill out our form to schedule your complimentary consultation or call 714-731-7680 if you are interested in working with Dr. Corey King. A five-minute phone consultation will be scheduled with Dr. King before an office visit so that he can personally evaluate your situation and make sure that it’s the right fit for both doctor and patient. We look forward to helping you achieve your health goals—and change your life.

Are you still struggling with diabetes?

Are you tired of the doctors increasing your medications? Are you ready to get your condition under control? At the AskDrKing, we specialize in helping patients with diabetes. What do we do? We help people regain their life!

The information you are reading now can help you change your life—that is, IF you let it. I am the only person in the Tustin region using neurological and metabolic therapy in order to help patients with Type 1 and Type 2 Diabetes.

Are you reading this because you’re tired of the medical “merry-go-round”? Or you’re tired of not getting the results you want? Or maybe you’re trying to help a family member or friend who is suffering from diabetes?

I’d just like to start by saying that the medical establishment is great in emergency care, great at saving lives, and great at doling out medications. The alternative model, where we work from, is great at making the body function the way it’s supposed to. There’s only a handful of us throughout the country that are using these specific therapies to help you get your life back.

Remember in our last blog we compared the body to a car, where the brain is the engine and the blood is the oil. If you do not keep your body functioning properly, your brain, or your “motor”, will break down. This is called neurological degeneration, and it’s what causes diseases like Alzheimer’s, Multiple Sclerosis (MS) and Parkinson’s.

What makes us different from your primary care physician? First of all, you’re probably going to them because you are hooked on the medication, and you’re reading this because you don’t want to be. Did you know that Type 1 Diabetes is an autoimmune condition? Has your primary care physician discussed this with you? We see it every day in our office. An autoimmune condition means that the body is attacking itself, and in Type 1 Diabetes, it means that your body has attacked and destroyed part of your pancreas.

And that’s not all…

Type 1 Diabetes will lead on to further autoimmune conditions such as Multiple Sclerosis, arthritis, Lupus, Celiac/Crohn’s Disease, and Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis. These are serious diseases, and if you don’t get your present autoimmune condition under control, then your body will start attacking further areas of your body, and you WILL develop other autoimmune disorders.

Why hasn’t your primary care physician told you these things? Simple: They can’t do anything about it until enough tissue has been destroyed. How much is “enough”? When it gets bad enough to be seen on blood tests—that is, if they are running the right lab tests—and then they’ll tell you that you have an additional disease. This is not to discredit the medical establishment, we are just recounting the common practice that goes on in the typical medical model across the United States in diabetes cases.

Do you want to wait until there’s that much tissue damage done, and you have another disease, before you get help? Or would you like to prevent that from happening? If you want to prevent it, keep reading.

Think of your diabetes as a fire in your fireplace at home; if you throw gasoline on it, the fire will not just flare up, it could potentially burn the whole house down. There are many different things you’re doing in your life today that can be considered to be like throwing gasoline on your diabetes “fire”: bacterium, parasites, mold, yeast, anemia, blood sugar dysregulation, liver dysfunction, gastrointestinal dysfunction, fatty acid absorbtion dysfunction. All of these things are food sensitivities, and they can act like gasoline on that fire. And if your physician is not checking you for these food sensitivities, then they can be missing a huge piece of the puzzle for getting you well, and actually making you predisposed for more autoimmune attacks.

Every patient with a chronic condition that walks in our door is suffering from some sort of neurological dysfunction and, as we said before, this degeneration can be the cause of diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Do you have friends or family members suffering from these diseases? Do you want to suffer from the same symptoms? That is what will happen if the symptoms of Type 1 Diabetes are not managed and controlled.

What we at the Tustin Chronic Condition Center do is proper testing; we test your immune panels as well as we test your adrenal glands, which not only regulate blood sugar (a major problem with diabetes) they also affect the thyroid gland. In fact, many patients that come to us with diabetes problems also have thyroid conditions. We also do tests for food sensitivities and parasites for the list of “gasoline” items mentioned above.

Let me stress:

Without the right pieces of the puzzle, there is no way you’ll get your life back. And if your doctors haven’t done these tests, then you need to get to someone like me who will do the right tests.

We also look at your condition from a lifestyle and dietary perspective, as there are probably many things you are doing on a daily basis that is making your condition worse, and we can usually make just a few tweaks to your lifestyle that will allow your body to heal.

Are you ready to get your Type 1 Diabetes under control?

Are you tired of taking medication and seeing your symptoms continue? Then please contact us immediately to schedule a consultation, (714) 731-7680.

Do you have Type 2 Diabetes? Next week’s blog will cover Type 2 Diabetes exclusively, so check back. Not willing to wait? Contact us now to schedule your first consultation: (714) 731-7680.

Do You Have Adrenal Gland Fatigue?

When I was speaking with a patient today, one of her first health concerns was the idea she was suffering from adrenal gland fatigue. She went on to tell me that she has been struggling with her symptoms for years, and doctors are not listening to her and only want to prescribe her anti-depression medications! “I am not depressed. I don’t like how I feel, but I am not a sad person that needs medication to help me feel better. I just want to feel better!”

First, you need to know what the adrenal glands are: they are your stress glands that respond to physical, chemical and emotional stressors.

When the adrenal glands are functioning properly, they help your body respond to stressors by releasing hormones that help to regulate sleep, digestion, metabolism, heart rate, and blood pressure.

5 Signs Your Adrenal Glands Are Not Functioning Properly

Patient X, let’s call her, Shania (I was in love with Shania Twain when I was younger ), went on to explain her symptoms to me:

1. Difficulty falling and stay asleep
2. Gaining weight around her hips and abdomen, despite low calorie diets and exercising several hours, 3-5 days a week
3. Craving salt, all of the time
4. Having joint pains recently, despite eating a Paloe type diet
5. Short term memory loss (recently, despite not having any head trauma)

Without running any specialized adrenal gland tests (I like the hormone test from www.dutchtest.com) , I told her it sounds as if her adrenal glands are having some trouble.

However, let’s test them and then figure out WHY they are not functioning properly.

Triggers That Can Stress Your Stress-Glands Out

After looking at Shania’s hormones (female and adrenal hormones), I was able to determine how to support her adrenal glands. However, I told Shania that we needed to calm down the triggers that caused her adrenal glands to malfunction.

After discussing her lifestyle, exercise routine, sleep patterns, and looking at other blood work, I discovered she has some of the common adrenal gland stressors I see in patients. Here are some of the big ones:

1. Lack of eating: A lot of women try to lose weight by cutting calories. When most people cut calories, they only eat a couple meals per day. This caused Shania’s blood sugar to drop, kicking her adrenal glands in the butt to work harder and to raise blood sugar.
2. Infections: I always run basic blood tests on my patients (67 markers in total, CLICK to download Dr. King’s Basic Blood Panel markers) before I look at anything else. Shania had two infections, a parasitic infection and a viral infection. Infections cause stress on the adrenal glands.
3. A lack of a normal sleep routine. Shania travels a lot with work; both, flying and driving. Multiple time zones each week were causing havoc on her adrenal glands, not to mention family life.
4. Hypothyroidism: this means her thyroid gland was not working up to par. In reality, I discovered that Shania not only had hypothyroidism, but that she was suffering from Hashimoto’s hypothyroidism (this is an autoimmune condition). When the thyroid gland is under-functioning, this puts more strain on your adrenal glands to tell the brain to release more thyroid hormone.
5. Food sensitivities! Yes, eating foods that your body has an allergy to/reacts to, can cause abnormal stress on the adrenal glands, forcing them to work harder in order to help your body’s immune system combat the “foreign invaders” that shouldn’t be there.

Ok, now that we discovered some of her triggers causing the adrenal gland insufficiency, what was the game plan to help get her better?

How to Improve Your Adrenal Glands

I had to teach Shania how to eat properly. Food sensitivity testing helped us narrow down what foods she was able to consume and which foods she must stay away from. Once we knew what she could and couldn’t consume, I set up an eating plan to help her stabilize her blood sugar throughout the day.

The one thing I needed to do, ASAP, with Shania was get rid of her infections. I started her on some natural products to accomplish this, while not destroying her good gut flora.

While I couldn’t tell Shania to quit her job (she was the sole bread winner for the family), we devised a plan to help her balance out the jet lag, time changes, and sleeping in hotel rooms several nights per week. I think her family appreciated this more than anyone.

Managing an autoimmune condition is difficult but here are a few steps we took to manage Shania’s Hashimoto’s Disease

• Healed her gut lining (I know, I didn’t discuss this as part of the problem, but for Shania it was)
• Supported her thyroid with natural thyroid support
• Detoxified her liver and gallbladder as those two organs play an important role in thyroid hormone utilization

But My Doctors Aren’t Talking to Me About This, What Do I Do?

I hear this A LOT! Luckily for you, you have made it to the end of the article, and I am about to tell you to…CALL ME! I specialize in working with patients like Shania and you, and I LOVE my work.

First things first, gather up your blood tests your doctors have been running on you. If you don’t have copies of them, call your doctor’s office and request them (they are yours by law, but you may have to sign some release forms). Now, see if your doctor ran the markers that I mentioned above. Again, (CLICK to download Dr. King’s Basic Blood Panel markers).

Just in case your doctor didn’t run those markers, don’t fret, I can get them run for you. I use a Co-op to order all my patients’ blood work through. The Co-op gives me the blood markers at a VERY reduced price. I run my blood work the same way patients do, even though I have a great PPO insurance plan, because the doctors never want to run the markers I ask them for.

If your doctor ran any specialized adrenal tests, I want to see those as well. The more pieces of information I can see, the better I can help you. Schedule a complimentary consultation to get started.

Once you are ready to schedule a time to speak with me, simply give me a call, (714) 731-7680. I like to speak to all new patients first, before we ever look at blood markers or any specialized testing. The call is complimentary and will last about 10-15 minutes. This is my way of seeing if I will be the right doctor for you.

OK…grab your phone and give me a ring! I look forward to speaking with you soon!