In this episode of the Health Optimization Medicine Podcast, Dr. Scott Sherr, Dr. Ted Achacoso, Dr. Allen Bookatz, Dr. Jup Kuipers, and Jodi Duval explore:
- Why might depression and anxiety begin with dysfunction in the gut rather than the brain alone?
- How do gut microbes, short-chain fatty acids, and the Cell Danger Response influence serotonin production, neuroinflammation, and mood?
- Why isn't taking a probiotic enough, and what clinical sequence does Health Optimization Medicine recommend before introducing beneficial bacteria?
- How can leaky gut, lipopolysaccharides (LPS), and neuroinflammation redirect tryptophan away from serotonin production and contribute to depression?
- How does Health Optimization Medicine use metabolomics, amino acid testing, and precision nutrition to restore the gut-brain axis and support long-term mental health?
What We Discuss:
00:00 - You Can't Heal the Mind If the Gut Is Screaming Danger
01:29 - The Rise of Mood Disorders and the Probiotic Craze
03:04 - The ER Reality: Cell Panic vs. Organ Pathology
05:28 - The Tripartite Axis: Enteric Microbiota, Gut, and Brain
06:12 - Shifting the Frame: Disease-Centered vs. Health Optimization
13:10 - The IDO Shunt and Serotonin Hijack
20:11 - The Solution: Why Throwing Probiotics at Inflamed Soil Fails
21:25 - The 3-Phase Clinical Protocol: Clear, Rebuild, Seed and Feed
22:44 - Actionable Monday Routine: Immediate Gut Barrier Support Blueprint
25:04 - The Critic's Hat: Probiotics vs. Standard Psychiatric Care
26:51 - Summary and Three Standalone Takeaways
30:07 - Ultimate Principle: Defining True Health Optimization
31:42 - Outro and HOMeHOPe Curriculum Details
Full Transcript:
Dr. Ted Achacoso (00:00): If your gut is in a state of chronic defense, your brain cannot experience peace. Over 90% of your body's serotonin is manufactured by enterochromaffin cells in the gut, heavily managed by your microbiota. When gut microbes sense an unsafe environment, whether from chemical toxins, poor nutrition, or chronic sympathetic stress, they trigger a local cell danger response, disrupting neurotransmitter synthesis and sending inflammatory alarms directly to the brain.
Conventional psychiatry tries to treat this exclusively in the skull by forcing synaptic serotonin with drugs. It is a profound mismatch. You cannot heal the mind if the gut is screaming danger.
Dr. Scott Sherr (00:46): Welcome, everybody, back to the Health Optimization Medicine Podcast. Your clinical team here today is Jodi Duval, naturopathic doctor from Australia; Dr. Allen Bookatz, chief of emergency medicine in LA; Dr. Jup Kuipers, general practitioner from the Netherlands—I don't think that's how you say that—but our founder, Dr. Ted Achacoso, currently in Washington, DC; and myself, Dr. Scott Sherr. I'm an internist just outside of Boulder, Colorado.
Today, your clinical team is going after one question: Can a daily probiotic cure depression by rebalancing your gut ecosystem? In the next 25 minutes, plus or minus, you will get the cellular mechanism, the clinical protocol, and the one thing most practitioners get wrong about it. Let's go. Jodi, it's on you. Why don't you start here?
Jodi Duval (01:29): We need to frame this question with some precision. We are currently witnessing an extraordinary rise in mood disorders. I think everyone is noticing it in clinic. We have seen it come through the doors much faster, I feel, in the last five years—anxiety, clinical depression, worldwide.
The answer from the conventional psychiatry point of view has remained unchanged for decades. We manipulate monoamine neurotransmitters at the synapse using selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs. This is where we've been focusing for the majority of the time.
Yet the clinical outcomes are disappointing. There's a high relapse rate. There are severe side effects. Meanwhile, the public is starting to realize that there are other things they need to be looking at. The power of the gut-brain axis is really coming through on social media and TikTok, and obviously the research is coming through as well.
So, it is leading to this massive rush toward over-the-counter probiotics because the research is showing great outcomes for a particular probiotic strain, giving some really good insight and results. But there's more to this picture. It really is not that simple, and it's not a quick fix for mental health. People really want it to be.
Dr. Allen, in your practice and experience, you must witness a lot of the acute breakdown of this gut-brain connection daily.
Dr. Allen Bookatz (03:10): Yeah. From the acute-care emergency medicine practice, more than I'd like to, Jodi. Someone comes in with depression or some type of psychiatric or behavioral health symptom—panic attacks, chest tightness, maybe they can barely speak at the time. We do the medical stuff, right? We run the workup. Their EKG is fine. Their labs are fine. We make sure they're not a danger to themselves or someone else. Then we give them something to chill them out, take the edge off, and send them home—something like a turkey sandwich.
Dr. Scott Sherr (03:42): Don't forget the turkey sandwich.
Dr. Allen Bookatz (03:42): The turkey sandwich. Some benzo. Maybe social services, hopefully. In fairness, that is the right call in that moment for what we're designed to do in the acute-care space, and I'm not arguing with that.
But what we're really not asking is: Why does this person keep coming back? Was there anything underlying their anxiety that needed to be addressed from a medical standpoint? I would frame it like this: If they're displaying some type of anxiety, are their cells anxious for some reason? Could we investigate that?
Dr. Scott Sherr (04:16): Do cells have feelings, Allen?
Dr. Allen Bookatz (04:17): Do cells? I think cells absolutely have feelings. Yeah.
Dr. Scott Sherr (04:22): And so, in various ways?
Dr. Allen Bookatz (04:23): Exactly. And I have feelings too, Scott.
Dr. Scott Sherr (04:27): I know you do. You're in California, after all.
Dr. Allen Bookatz (04:30): Yeah. I think what's interesting is that, in conventional medicine, we tend to park that question in psychiatry. The patient gets sent there, and then, all of a sudden, there are a lot of really helpful things like therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy, and maybe medications. That's fair, but it often just stops there.
I don't think anyone—and certainly nobody—is looking at what the gut is doing. Nobody's asking, “Could there be a severe gut microbial imbalance that's triggering some type of systemic nervous system activation? Is that sending inflammatory signals that are constantly running in the background, explaining why this person feels this way?”
If their cells are in distress and having anxiety and panic attacks, then the system is going to feel that way too. It's like we're treating the smoke, but there's still this fire burning.
Dr. Scott Sherr (05:18): Yeah, man. I know. Jup, how do you see this in your practice?
Dr. Jup Kuipers (05:22): Yeah, I totally agree with you there, Allen. That's exactly where the mismatch lies. Conventional medicine treats the brain and the gut as separate entities, specialized into distinct departments like psychiatry and gastroenterology. But biology doesn't work in silos. The gut and the brain are intimately, molecularly linked.
When we look at a patient struggling with mood issues, we have to ask a fundamentally different question. We shouldn't ask, “What psychiatric drug can we use to suppress these symptoms?” Instead, we have to ask, “Why is the gut-brain axis signaling danger, and how do we restore cellular safety to this ecosystem?”
What do you think about that, Ted?
Dr. Ted Achacoso (06:02): Well, this is the core of the HOMeHOPe clinical framework, right? We have to shift our frame of reference from disease to health optimization. This is where we must draw a sharp line between Health Optimization Medicine and Practice, or HOMeHOPe, and functional medicine, which usually leads practitioners to prescribe a complex stack of supplements to treat specific gut markers.
But root cause is not enough if the root question is still disease. Pathogenesis is the root cause of disease. Salutogenesis is the root cause of health.
Similarly, we must distinguish ourselves from preventive medicine. Prevention is the prevention of disease and is still disease-centered. Health optimization is health-centered. Just because you're not sick doesn't mean you're healthy. It only means you're not sick.
To optimize health, we must evaluate the tripartite enteric microbiota–gut–brain axis. It's not just the gut-brain axis anymore. It's the enteric microbiota, gut, and brain at the metabolomic level.
Therefore, the $64,000 clinical question of the day is: Why treat depression exclusively in the brain when the signal starts in your gut? Let us unpack the exact biochemical and cellular mechanisms behind this connection.
Jodi Duval (07:11): Dr. Ted, back to you in a minute. But when we talk about the gut-brain axis, most people think of it as just a really simple highway. I think it is nice to explain it that way to our clients and patients, but it is actually a highly complex, multilayered communication network.
As with everything in the body, it is very complex. It's all interlinked. It all is a matrix, as I say. So, how do gut microbes biochemically dictate brain state and mood? It blows my mind.
Jodi Duval (07:49): Literally.
Dr. Ted Achacoso (07:51): To understand this, Jodi, we must look at the gut microbiota through the lens of the term holobiontology, which simply means that the human is not an isolated organism but an entire ecosystem of cells and symbiotic microbes.
Within this ecosystem, gut microbes are active metabolic factories. They ferment dietary fibers into short-chain fatty acids, or SCFAs, such as acetate, propionate, and butyrate. These SCFAs are not just local fuel. They are potent epigenetic signaling molecules.
Butyrate, for instance, acts as a histone deacetylase inhibitor, crossing the blood-brain barrier to upregulate brain-derived neurotrophic factor, or BDNF, in the hippocampus, directly supporting synaptic plasticity and mood regulation.
Lots of jargon, but simply put, it means that there are molecules in the gut that drive the brain to influence your mood.
Dr. Jup Kuipers (08:48): And so, when microbial fermentation is disrupted, how does dysbiosis alter that signaling?
Dr. Ted Achacoso (08:58): When the gut microbiota shifts into a state of dysbiosis, right? Dysbiosis is really merely a shorthand for the word dysbacteriosis. This is due to xenobiotic exposure, and xenobiotics are things that have never been encountered by your body before in evolution, like your new drugs, glyphosate, or chronic psychological stress.
The protective mucosal barrier is compromised. Gram-negative bacterial outer membranes release lipopolysaccharide, or LPS—sometimes called “little pieces of s***”—into the local circulation. This is where we say you have a leaky gut.
LPS acts as a potent endotoxin, binding to Toll-like receptor 4, or TLR4, on immune cells. This triggers a localized acute cell danger response, stage one, or CDR1. In CDR1, the cells halt aerobic energy production, stiffen their membranes, and release extracellular ATP, or eATP, as a danger signal.
This local purinergic alarm activates the enteric nervous system and triggers the release of pro-inflammatory cytokines like interleukin-6 and tumor necrosis factor alpha.
Simply put, when your gut is shifted, the ecosystem has an overpopulation of some organisms and an underpopulation of others and doesn't maintain its ecological balance. You begin to have a leaky gut, and then all of these endotoxins are able to enter your bloodstream. Your gut will also go into CDR1, or cell danger response one.
Dr. Allen Bookatz (10:38): Let's bring what you just said, Ted, out of the gut and really understand what's happening in the skull—or, you know, in the brain—because that's where I think things get really interesting clinically.
Those cytokines you talked about, those inflammatory cytokines like IL-6 and TNF-alpha, don't just stay there. They don't stay local in the gut. They don't just circulate in the bloodstream. They actually get to the brain, and that's really scary.
They reach the brain, and there are these little organs that are technically, I guess, not part of the brain, but where the blood-brain barrier is actually quite permeable. They call them the circumventricular organs. They're a specialized grouping of brain structures, but once inside, they have direct access to the microglia.
I think of the microglia as the brain's own immune patrol. Normally, they're hanging out. They're quiet. They're in maintenance mode. The blood-brain barrier is like the Marines. They're tough. They don't really let anything in.
But when they pick up that there's now this systemic inflammatory signal playing out, they shift into this huge defense state. They start releasing their own inflammatory mediators, calling for backup and creating their own recruitment signals. That's when the brain chemistry starts to go really sideways.
For example, there's a particular enzyme that's been implicated in the neuroinflammation that arises with this process. It's called IDO, indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase.
Dr. Scott Sherr (12:08): Yeah, this is a really important point, Allen, because IDO activation is the critical biochemical junction. Can you explain a little bit how this actually works with serotonin production?
Dr. Allen Bookatz (12:18): Yeah, of course. The way I think of IDO is that it hijacks tryptophan. That's the amino acid your body uses to make serotonin and melatonin. It's the one that is often talked about during the Thanksgiving meal and why we get sleepy. That's actually not true, but it fits, at least for what we're describing here.
Think of it like this: If IDO fires up, tryptophan gets redirected down a different road called the kynurenine pathway. Two things happen, and neither is really great.
First, you lose all your raw materials for making serotonin and melatonin. Your mood is disrupted, you have terrible sleep, and if you talk to anyone in an inflamed state, that totally tracks.
Second, the kynurenine pathway produces another byproduct called quinolinic acid, and that is actually a genuine neurotoxin. It acts on the NMDA receptors, which are already excitatory, and it overactivates them. It's like it turns the volume knob up on the NMDA receptors, and then it directly starts damaging neurons.
So, when your clients or patients tell you, “I feel cognitive fatigue and brain fog,” that's actually where they come from.
What's interesting—and here's the part that really gets me—is that, in psychiatry, they see low serotonin and immediately say, “Oh, that's the issue,” and reach for an SSRI, thinking that's going to address the root cause of the depression.
I guess if that was how you understood how depression worked, then the logic fits. But we know differently. We know that low serotonin could be a reason for depression. But if serotonin is actually low because tryptophan—which is this currency here—is no longer available in the same way, the system is under threat. So it’s taking this basic building block and shunting it because of this gut-driven neuroinflammation. Then you’re not really fixing the problem.
You’re just kind of working around it. Their model in conventional psychiatry is not necessarily wrong based on their approach, but it’s just not complete.
Dr. Ted Achacoso (14:33): No, no. Conversely, when you take a look at a leaky gut, then you should examine for a leaky brain, right? That's what they say. When you sense that there's a leaky gut, examine right away whether there's a leaky brain because, usually, leaky gut equals leaky brain.
Jodi Duval (14:50): Allen, that's a really good explanation. I think it also exposes this limitation in what we look at when we see that pathogenic, drug-first model, which you would see a lot of.
In sharp contrast is the HOMeHOPe salutogenic framework, which really looks at how we can restore cellular safety to the gut so that, when we're looking at that tryptophan that's shunted to the kynurenine pathway, we can flow back to that really healthy serotonin synthesis.
We saw this mechanism recently supported by a landmark clinical trial. It was published on June 18, 2026, so very recently. It was titled “Efficacy of a Daily Probiotic in Relieving Depression and Anxiety in Older Adults.”
The researchers demonstrated that a daily probiotic, or a multistrain probiotic, administered over 12 weeks led to highly significant reductions in depression and anxiety scores. This correlated directly with a drop in circulating inflammatory markers and improved tryptophan-to-serotonin ratios, which is pretty cool.
We're looking at this as direct clinical evidence—obviously, within the limitations of studies, and we're all individuals—showing that rebalancing the gut ecosystem relieves neuroinflammation and supports brain health and, therefore, mood.
Obviously, it is a small clinical trial. That was a limitation. The probiotic strains are also very highly specific. So, when we're looking at generic, shelf-stable supplements, it may not be the same thing they were looking at in this particular study.
That's what we need to make sure we communicate specifically: Not just any multistrain probiotic off the shelf in a health food store or supermarket will be the same as what they were looking at here.
The science, I feel like—we've talked through all of this—is clear. This is what I love about HOMeHOPe: It all makes so much sense, but it has never been explored in this way from the context of the internal environment. Obviously, we can't just change from an external point of view, from this pathogenic disease-management state. It needs to come from internally.
Dr. Scott Sherr (17:25): Pardon the interruption. This episode is brought to you by the fourth annual Health Optimization Medicine and Practice Conference, happening October 2 and 3 in Chicago, Illinois, at the Drake Hotel.
You are all cordially invited to something that's not a typical conference. This is truly a community, and you'll feel that the moment you walk in. This is not wellness aesthetics or disease management dressed up in optimization language. This is actual, rigorous, measurable, deeply human health optimization.
It's a small group. Only 150 seats are available, and we've already sold out a lot of these. It's going to be an intimate gathering. If you want your ticket, you need to get it soon.
We have a great lineup of speakers, including Dominic D'Agostino, JJ Virgin, Kiran Krishnan, Dr. Ted Achacoso, who's the founding pioneer of Health Optimization Medicine and Practice, myself, Dr. Scott Sherr, Lucia Aronica, an epigenetics researcher, Elizabeth Yurth, and many more.
If you're a medical practitioner, we'll have at least five CME credits for you. This is a room that's going to genuinely change how you practice and, I think, how we all live.
If you want a discount, we do have one, but it's only for a short period of time. Go to homehope.org and save 25% on your conference ticket by using code CONFERENCE25 at checkout. That's homehope.org, code CONFERENCE25 at checkout. Get it soon because we're selling out fast. I hope to see you there. Take care.
Jodi Duval (18:41): We know that a dysregulated gut drives a dysregulated brain. But what does a HOMeHOPe practitioner actually do clinically to correct this imbalance? What is the one-cent solution, Dr. Ted?
Dr. Ted Achacoso (18:56): Well, the solution must never be to throw a random probiotic at the patient, right? We do not prescribe lifestyle or supplements from a slogan. We prescribe precise lifestyle and supplements from precise cellular data.
First, we run an advanced clinical metabolomics test, like an organic acids test, or OAT, to measure markers of bacterial and yeast overgrowth, such as arabinitol, benzoate, and hippurate. You can also do a stool test. If these markers are elevated, we know there's active dysbiosis.
We also measure plasma amino acid profiles to assess tryptophan availability. As Dr. Allen mentioned, we can see the quinolinate-to-kynurenate ratio to quantify the degree of active neuroinflammatory shunting.
Dr. Allen Bookatz (19:52): Okay, Ted. It's great to talk about ratios and all, but we have the data now. We know what's elevated. We see what's depleted and where the pathways are being pushed. Dr. Jup, walk us through how you actually sequence this clinically. What do you do next?
Dr. Jup Kuipers (20:09): In clinical practice, the protocol we must follow is a strict, logical sequence to establish safety first. We cannot simply plant new bacterial seeds—probiotics—in inflamed, toxic soil.
We start with phase one: clear and unburden. We use targeted phytopharmaceuticals and bioactive compounds to selectively clear microbial and yeast overgrowth while introducing high-dose oral binding agents to capture circulating LPS—“little pieces of s***”—and their toxins, preventing them from crossing the intestinal barrier.
When phase one is complete, we move to phase two: rebuild the barrier. We support mucosal integrity using active amino acids like L-glutamine, along with zinc carnosine, to heal these tight junctions, effectively shutting down the translocation of endotoxins into systemic circulation.
Then we move to phase three: seed and feed. Only after the local inflammation is dampened do we introduce highly calibrated multistrain probiotics containing clinically validated strains like Lactobacillus helveticus or Bifidobacterium longum to actively downregulate purinergic danger signaling and support gut-brain axis communication.
We pair these with prebiotic fibers like inulin or fructooligosaccharides to feed the symbiotic networks. This structured approach ensures that the cells in the gut can transition from a defensive cell danger response to healthy aerobic energy production and salutogenesis.
Dr. Scott Sherr (21:44): This is a perfect sequence, Jup, and I really appreciate it because we want to give listeners a practical, immediate step to apply. Here is our “Do It on This Monday” protocol.
The next Monday coming up, whenever you're listening to this, if you're struggling with chronic stress, brain fog, or low mood, do not start with high-dose probiotics. Instead, start by establishing gut-barrier safety.
Take five grams of L-glutamine powder in warm water twice daily, as an example, on an empty stomach to seal your gut's tight junctions, and eliminate heated, highly processed industrial seed oils from your diet to drop local membrane inflammation.
Only after two weeks of barrier support should you introduce a high-quality multistrain probiotic to seed your gut ecosystem. Remember, this is what Dr. Jup just mentioned. This immediate step physically unburdens your enteric membranes, signaling safety to the enteric nervous system and allowing your mitochondria to restore baseline energy production.
This is a key, step-by-step process that all of us can try, even without doing testing.
Dr. Ted Achacoso (22:45): The five grams, Scott, should be in one liter of water and sipped throughout the day. Don't gulp it in a single session. You take this only for about six weeks or so. And a warning: You may get irritable with glutamine because it can be an excitatory neurotransmitter.
Jodi Duval (23:11): I think a lot of people, especially with the parasite cleanses and all sorts that we've talked about in previous episodes with the social media run—if you're clearing too quickly and you haven't done your barrier, the little pieces of s*** are going to travel everywhere and cause absolute havoc. You've just got to think about that, people.
I love this clinical sequence. It is definitely something we all need to know about as clinicians, and we've seen it transform clinical outcomes hugely.
But in HOMeHOPe, we must always maintain the balance—this absolute intellectual honesty. We need to look at all sides. So, let us deliberately steelman the strongest case against our own protocol. What would a serious conventional critic say, Dr. Jup, about treating depression via the gut microbiome?
Dr. Jup Kuipers (24:12): I guess a serious conventional psychiatrist would probably argue that major depressive disorder is a highly complex, multifactorial neuropsychiatric disease with deep-seated genetic, neurostructural, and psychosocial underpinnings.
They would probably point out that, while the gut-brain axis is a fascinating area of research, large-scale clinical trials proving that probiotic therapy alone can successfully treat severe, treatment-resistant depression are still lacking.
They would also caution that relying on probiotics or dietary changes for a patient with active suicidal ideation or profound clinical depression is highly irresponsible, and that evidence-based pharmacotherapies like SSRIs and targeted psychotherapies remain the absolute proven standard of care.
What do you think, Ted?
Dr. Ted Achacoso (25:01): However, we are not evidence-based. We're evidence-informed medicine. We agree with the critique. We agree that severe, acute neuropsychiatric crises require immediate conventional medical and psychiatric intervention. HOMeHOPe is not acute sick care. We do not treat acute disease. We operate in the domain of health optimization.
If a patient is in an acute psychiatric emergency, send them to Dr. Bookatz. Now, conventional drugs are necessary to stabilize them. However, once stabilized, conventional medicine completely ignores the functional metabolic matrix of health, leaving the patient in a chronic state of cellular dysregulation.
Furthermore, we are not suggesting that probiotics are a monotherapy for psychiatric illness. We are demonstrating that you cannot optimize brain health if the gut ecosystem is actively in a cell danger response one state.
We refine our position: Precision probiotic therapy must function as a foundational biological chassis to signal safety, upon which all other psychiatric and psychological interventions can succeed. That's why we're called foundational medicine.
Jodi Duval (26:07): Let's sum it all up in a one, two, three—a take-home one, two, three. Three standalone takeaways that we can apply immediately. Dr. Jup, you're first.
Dr. Jup Kuipers (26:19): Takeaway one: Your gut is your primary neurotransmitter factory. Over 90% of your serotonin is produced in your gut under the direct supervision of your microbiota. If your gut microbiota is in dysbiosis, your brain serotonin production is fundamentally compromised, regardless of how many brain-targeted drugs you take.
Jodi Duval (26:39): I'm going to go with takeaway two. You must seal your gut barrier so the little pieces of s*** can't sneak in.
Never throw high-dose probiotics into an inflamed, leaky gut. We must look at unburdening the gut. Let's help the body out a little bit and support it, gut first, by clearing some of that overgrowth and burden, then sealing the tight junctions with L-glutamine, which is the primary fuel source.
Before seeding that ecosystem with beneficial bacteria, we're supporting it and giving it some support. Dr. Sherr, you're up next.
Dr. Scott Sherr (27:20): Takeaway three: Balance your biochemistry, not your symptoms. Stop treating cognitive fatigue and mood issues with generic supplements or stimulants.
Use advanced clinical metabolomics to map your specific organic acid and amino acid imbalances, if you have them, allowing you to prescribe precise orthomolecular support to shift your cells from defense to salutogenesis.
Jodi Duval (27:46): Dr. Allen, you are our expert today. Did you know that?
Dr. Allen Bookatz (27:51): [Laughs] This feels good, trying this on for size.
Jodi Duval (27:57): I know. I'm going to let you try this uniform on today. So, let's bring this discussion home, shall we? How does rebalancing the gut ecosystem tie back to the foundational principle of Health Optimization Medicine and Practice?
Dr. Allen Bookatz (28:17): That's a big one. Let's see if I can do this one justice. Ultimately, it goes back to a question that we are not asking enough in modern medicine: What does healthy actually look like?
For most of the system, healthy means you do not have an illness. You're not sick. You don't have a diagnosis. Your labs are normal, meaning nothing was flagged. Nothing was outside the super-high or super-low ranges. So, you're fine—or at least that's what we're led to believe.
Not being sick matters, but normal is not the same as being optimized. That's an important distinction we don't really talk about in medical school. The absence of a problem is not the same as the presence of optimal functioning.
In HOMeHOPe, health is that second thing I just talked about. The cellular machinery is running the way it's supposed to—optimally—not just quietly enough to pass a panel or function at whatever level of survival is required.
A big part of that, as listeners are hearing, comes down to whether the cell feels safe. When a cell senses a threat—just like any of us would sense a threat—whether that's a toxin, infection, chronic stress, challenging relationship, traffic, who knows? I'm in Los Angeles here, right? It goes into what we call the cell danger response, or CDR.
You're going to hear us talking about this over and over again because it is key to everything we're discussing. The cell stops doing its normal day job, stiffens up, and shifts into defense mode. That is a brilliant, wonderful short-term survival move. We absolutely need it.
The problem is when the cell gets stuck there. We have tissues that are technically alive and passing every test, but they're locked in defense instead of doing the actual work. Everything else regarding repair, maintenance, and all of that is on hold.
Going back to what we talked about today, the gut microbiota is a good example of why this matters. It's not just this bag of germs that we try to manage, suppress, or supplement. It's this highly complex, co-evolved network that's been doing its job for a very long time.
When those cells are out of danger mode and working, the brain gets the signals it needs to feel safe, think clearly, and hold a steady, wonderful, positive mood that can maybe manage the traffic.
When we use metabolomics to find where that network is actually breaking down and then correct it, we're not just quieting a symptom. We're coaxing those cells back out of the cell danger response and bringing them into normal, optimal functioning. We're asking why the symptoms keep showing up in the first place. That's what we continually go back to.
That's really the whole shift: Health is not something we force. It's something the body settles back into once the cell stops bracing for a threat that may have passed a long, long time ago.
Dr. Scott Sherr (31:29): Well done. Well said, Allen. Thank you all, and thank you to the whole faculty for being here today. This is a perfect place to anchor our discussion.
If you're a practitioner listening—whether you're a physician, naturopath, pharmacist, or health coach—and you want to move beyond the limitations of pathogenic medicine and master this clinical approach that we have here at HOMeHOPe, you have to join us.
Go to homehope.org to explore our academy and enroll in one of our foundational principle metabolomics courses. There are multiple pathways. Once again, that's homehope.org. You can check us out every week. Please don't forget to like and subscribe below.
To all of you, we wish you a great day. Thank you for listening.
Jodi Duval (32:10): Thanks, everyone. Bye.
Dr. Allen Bookatz (32:12): Thank you.
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