Leptin, a recently discovered hormone, regulates body weight by suppressing food intake and/or increasing energy expenditure.

Leptin is a very powerful and influential hormone produced by fat cells.

Science has discovered that leptin is the most powerful metabolic regulator that tells your brain whether you should be hungry, eat and make more fat.

Basically, leptin is the way that your fat stores speak to your brain to let your brain know how much energy is available and, very importantly, what to do with it.

In a perfect world, as you gain weight, you secrete more leptin from your fat cells. This in turn tells your brain you have enough stored fat so it reduces your appetite sending messages to help you burn fat.

But there is a problem!

Unfortunately many people have something called "leptin resistance". This means that no matter how much leptin you create from your fat cells, the brain doesn't see it.  This leads to a cascade of your brain thinking you are starving ======> you burn less calories ====>your appetite goes into overdrive and finally every bit of food you eat gets stored on your belly!

Until you address leptin resistance, you're not going to lose weight!

Optimal Leptin Levels

Your goal is to keep your leptins below 12, however, not too low. Researchers have discovered that leptins too far to the low side has been associated with dementia or Alzheimer's.

A leptin above 12 is not considered healthy.

Leptin levels can now be measured with a simple blood test. Levels above 12 are linked to weight gain, accelerated aging, increased risk of infertility, diabetes and heart attack.  In addition, high leptin levels are associated with belly fat and numerous cancers

Leptin rises if you don't sleep well, and if you have any kind of perceived stress.

Thyroid Connection

If you are having difficulty losing weight, I recommend you get your leptin checked. Remember you want it under 12.  From a thyroid perspective, if your leptin is above 12 you will commonly see low T3 (the most metabolically active thyroid hormone) and elevated reverse T3. This is not good for those trying to lose weight. The thyroid medication Synthroid (Levothyroxine) is aT4 medication and should be used with some level of caution when high leptin levels are seen. The take away from this thyroid connection is the fact that reverse T3 means T4 is not being effectively converted into the metabolic workhorse hormone, T3.

The Solution:

You become leptin resistant by eating the typical American diet full of sugar, refined grains, and processed foods. The solution is to eat a diet that emphasizes good fats and avoids blood sugar spikes. Basically a diet that emphasize healthy fats, lean meats and vegetables, and restricts sugar and grains.

For a full thyroid/leptin work-up, I recommend a practitioner knowledgeable in functional medicine.

Ronald Grisanti D.C., D.A.B.C.O., D.A.C.B.N., M.S.
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References:

Kozlowska, Rosolowska-Huszcz. Leptin, thyrotropin, and thyroid hormones in obese/overweight women before and after two levels of energy deficit.Endocrine. 2004 Jul;24(2):147-53.

Hsieh CJ1, Wang PW, Wang ST, Liu RT, Tung SC, Chien WY, Lu YC, Chen JF, Chen CH, Kuo MC.Serum leptin concentrations of patients with sequential thyroid function changes. Clin Endocrinol (Oxf). 2002 Jul;57(1):29-34

Ríos, Cisternas, Arrese, Barja. Is Alzheimer's disease related to metabolic syndrome? A Wnt signaling conundrum.Prog Neurobiol. 2014 Jul

The information on this website is not intended to replace a one-on-one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice. It is intended as a sharing of knowledge and information from the research and experience of Dr. Grisanti and his functional medicine community. Dr. Grisanti encourages you to make your own health care decisions based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health care professional. Visit www.FunctionalMedicineUniversity.com for more information on our training in functional medicine.

After consulting with hundreds of patients, I am seeing a scary pattern that I want to bring to your attention.

The concern is the combination of rock bottom intracellular magnesium “and” low vitamin D levels.

It is important to know that if you have a low vitamin D level in spite of taking it, a magnesium deficiency can be one of the reasons you can't correct it.

Magnesium levels in the first quintile (lower 20% of reference range) or below that, could make you a victim of a fatal heart attack.

​The following represents the quintile ranking. You want to see your intracellular magnesium in the 5th quintile.








The Vitamin D-Magnesium Connection
In addition to increasing your intracellular magnesium levels to the 5th quintile, I recommend working on increasing your vitamin D levels to 75 nmol/L or more.

Don't accept a level of less than 50 nmol/L. It is simply insufficient to support good health. The most current medical literature has shown that 5000IU per day is safe. You can even go as high as 10,000 IU.

It is sad to see that many physicians are still recommending 400IU per day. This is out-dated information. This level is only for preventing a disease called rickets.                          

Much higher levels of vitamin D are needed for prevention and healing diseases such as diabetes, coronary artery disease, osteoporosis, depression, recurrent infections, dental problems, etc.

So the take away is make sure you have your physician test your intracellular magnesium levels in conjunction with vitamin D levels.

By the way, I mean intracellular NOT serum magnesium. This is commonly ordered on a basic blood test.

The following are two good labs that offer the intracellular magnesium:

http://www.gdx.net/product/nutrient-toxic-elements-test-blood (Genova/Metametrix)

https://www.doctorsdata.com/red-blood-cell-rbc-elements (DoctorsData)

References:

Hanley DA, et al, Symposium: Vitamin D insufficiency: A significant risk factor for chronic diseases and potential disease-specific biomarkers of vitamin D sufficiency, J Nutr. 135:332-7, 2005

Vieth R, et al, Efficacy and safety of vitamin D3 intake exceeding the lowest observed adverse effect level, Am J Clin Nutr 73:288-94, 2003

Hollis BW, Circulating 25-hydroxy vitamin D levels indicative of vitamin D sufficiency: implications for establishing a new effective dietary intake recommendation for vitamin D, J Nutr 135:317-22, 2005

Chapuy MC, et al, Prevalence of vitamin D insufficiency in an adult normal population, Osteoporosis International 7:439-43, 1997

Thomas MK, et al, Hypovitaminosis D in medical in-patients, New Engl J Med, 338:777-83, 1998

Rude RK, et al, Skeletal and hormonal effects of magnesium deficiency, J Am Coll Nutr 28; 2:131-41, 2009

By: Ronald Grisanti D.C., D.A.B.C.O., D.A.C.B.N., M.S.

Compliments from Functional Medicine University

The information on this website is not intended to replace a one-on-one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice. It is intended as a sharing of knowledge and information from the research and experience of Dr. Grisanti and his functional medicine community. Dr. Grisanti encourages you to make your own health care decisions based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health care professional. Visit www.FunctionalMedicineUniversity.com for more information on our training in functional medicine. 

When it comes to life-threatening infections, antibiotics have been a GodSend, however for minor infections the following antibiotics are troublesome and are known to cause some nasty side effects.

The antibiotic family I am referring to are fluoroquinolones. You may also see it referred to as quinolones. The following make up the quinolones: Ciprofloxacin, Cipro, Ciloxan eye drops, Levofloxacin, Levaquin, Quixin, Moxifloxacin, Avelox, Vigamox eye drops, Norfloxacin, Noroxin, Ofloxacin, Ocuflox, Floxin, Floxin Otic, Floxacin, Trovafloxacin, Trovan and alatrofloxacin.

Side effects include sudden severe insomnia, hypnic jerks, tendon and cartilage tears, brain fog, weird sensations like bugs crawling on you, headaches, buzzing, pain, tinnitus (ear ringing), face-down fatigue, moving abdominal pain and every thyroid symptom possible.

For people with thyroid disease, these antibiotics are especially worrisome because the quinolone antibiotics are built with a fluoride backbone. It is important to note that fluoride is extremely toxic to your thyroid.

Combining quinolone antibiotics with Levothyroxine (a T4 drug) may lead to reduced absorption of thyroid medicine and cause changes in TSH.

From a functional medicine perspective, fluoride competes with iodine which is necessary to make T4.

I don't like fluoride, or fluorine, or anything related to fluoride coming anywhere near your thyroid gland.

Four medications have been pulled off the market, and the remaining drugs have a "Black Box" warning on them from the FDA.

If you are taking an antibiotic check with your pharmacist to see if it is in the fluoroquinolone family.

If so you would be wise to ask your physician for another type of antibiotic. Again this plays an even more significant role if you are suffering with thyroid disease.

Ronald Grisanti D.C., D.A.B.C.O., D.A.C.B.N., M.S.

Reference: 
Cohen, S. Thyroid Healthy. 2014

The information on this website is not intended to replace a one-on-one relationship with a qualified health care professional and is not intended as medical advice. It is intended as a sharing of knowledge and information from the research and experience of Dr. Grisanti and his functional medicine community. Dr. Grisanti encourages you to make your own health care decisions based upon your research and in partnership with a qualified health care professional. Visit www.FunctionalMedicineUniversity.com for more information on our training in functional medicine.