JUST OUT! Dr Lenny Da Costa’s comprehensive guide to functional medicine, lifestyle changes, chronic diseases and how to heal yourself with the right nutrition. A must read!
By Pankajbala R Patel
Here is an important book to read regardless of whether you are a sick patient or a doctor…it is a book for everyone who is seeking good health, begin by understanding how the body works!
`Is Your Doctor Keeping You Sick’ by Dr Lenny Da Colsta, Notion Press, softcover, Rs499
THAT’S the title of Dr Lenny Da Costa’s debut book, one of a kind in India, which all of us should read if we are interested in understanding why sickness? No, of course not, your doctor is not keeping you sick! It is more likely that we are responsible for keeping ourselves sick individually and collectively…mainstream doctors though treat body parties and not patients! That’s the criticism going out and many patients will agree. Today’s mainstream healthcare system is run and controlled by pharmaceutical drugs and the hot-shot pharmaceutical companies and corporations which make big pay-offs to doctors, politicians, all kinds of people – to keep them sick for a host of sickening vested interests.
But this is to say Dr Lenny Da Costa debut book is a very important book to read if you value your good health and would like to understand how body beautiful works and how it can reward you as well as punish you. It’s a comprehensive guide on how our body works and how functional medicine and the appropriate lifestyle changes can defeat today’s story of chronic diseases and how they turn you into a permanent patient waiting patiently or impatiently for doomsday or so to speak.
Understand, says the good doctor, first of all it is the food that we are eating which is making us sick – our food is our medicine as well as our poison! Quit eating wheat products, high glycemic refined cereals like rice, the food industry’s slew of junk foods – also dairy products – and chances are you can say goodbye to high blood pressure, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, cancer, etc. Live long and happy!
Dr Lenny Da Costga is a consultant geriatrician, preventive cardiologist and anti-ageing functional medicine specialist; after his MBBS he studied geriatric medicine and did fellowships in clinical metal toxicology, anti-ageing, functional medicine and preventive cardiology. He is a speaker at many international conferences from Istanbul to Melbourne and over the last 18 years he has treated more than 25,000 patients suffering from IHD, CAD, diabetes Mellitus, cancer, autoimmune conditions and other chronic, degenerative disorders. He has clinics both in Goa, Mumbai, Pune and New Delhi. Curiously enough his observations is that very often mainstream doctors do not do the right investigations that are available because “modern medicine does not know how to handle the results.”
The good doctor observes in an amusing and unusual “Note To The Reader”: “What prompted me initially to go from just writing prescriptions that our guidelines so elaborately forced us to do, and to check on options available other than the guidelines in the realm of modern medicine, led me to a different world of data and research. And I discovered a whole lot of work being done that successfully treated a patient as a patient rather than a condition. The end objection was not a number, but better health despite not getting the number. That’s what your patent wants. In this era of the internet where everyone consuls Dr Google and becomes a quasi-doctor, our time has shrunk; and when we don’t answer questions, we are leaving doubt and stress in our patients’ minds. The time has come when the patient needs time to understand what you are doing and needs you to treat him as a whole rather than a number on a report, a finding on an investigation, or a symptom that needs to be treated. The patient is demanding this of us.” Well, bless him for saying it. Modern medicine leaves a lot to be desired and is surely stuck in a rut today
SLOW DOWN
IN his Foreword Dr Alok Chopra, MD, observes that there’s enough in the book to educate us about how to slow down the aging process and practically reverse it…if we learn about neuroplasticity, nutritechnology and nutrigenomics, “that proper nutrition and detoxification can heal any chronic illness.” Then there are functional medicine treatments which are detox procedures simple, non-invasive, safe. For example there is chelation therapy (whereby heavy metals and rogue minerals in the body which lead to unhealthy oxidation may be reduced and removed); ozone therapy, hyperbaric oxygen, coffee enemas, near infrared saunas, nutritional and healing IV therapies, yoga, pranayama and meditation. This is to name just a few!
In today’s world we are faced with a “tsunami of chronic illnesses despite the miracles of technology.” Read the book to connect the dots yourself between how we age and how aging is a punishment of chronic diseases courtesy our own ignorance and inability to discipline ourselves. In short, doing the right things at the right time to reap the rewards right up to the end of time or something like that.
It’s all here in this very easily read and understood book in which Dr Lenny Da Costa explains the nitty gritty of eating to be sick, the environment in which we live which is also sick because of air, water, soil pollutants. The sedentary lives we live, the sitting around we do, the constant straining of our “already strained electromagnetic energy fields our bodies require.” One gets the idea that our civilisation is in a mess and so are we…if we don’t know how to clean up our mess! Our foods are our medicines but we have turned them into our poisons.
KEY TO WELLNESS
FROM ageing and chronic disease to what we are eating to make us sick, hormone balancing (the key to slowing down aging), toxicities (toxic metals to toxic airwaves all hamper good health), a strong body, a sound mind being the key to wellness, functional oncology for fighting cancer (the statistic are alarming!), functional medicine to treat autoimmune disorders and finally how to reverse cardiodiabesity (the triad of obesity, diabetes and heart disease)…it’s all here in mesmerising detail over 10 chapters. Learn why our pancreas gets exhausted and goes kaput (“ageing, chronic stress, poor diet, certain medications, and compromised brain function”)!
Dr Lenny Da Costa’s book is unputdownable. Do you know why wheat and its products are so terrible? “The name gluten is derived from the Latin word for glue, which simply means hold together as it has adhesive properties to hold together substances like bread and cake. But it’s the same properties that help it to bind substances that interfere with its breakdown. This in turn affects its digestion which then affects the absorption of nutrients, including the nutrients from other foods consumed at the same time. This results in glued-together constipating lump in your gut. This lump further impedes the whole process of digestion which then results in the rise of symptoms like constipation and irritable bowel syndrome.”
POWERHOUSE READ
ALL this and much by way of nuggets of questions you might have wondered about but never find the answers to. This is a powerhouse read of a book chok-a-blok with information we need to know and come to terms with vis-à-vis obesity, diabetes, thyroid and cardiovascular diseases, cancer…it is a book for anyone just feeling sick, frustrated and desperately seeking better health parameters to live more harmoniously and happily.
I would say the medical fraternity should read Dr Lenny Da Costa’s book “Is Your Doctor Keeping You Sick?” and not just their patients! Every Goan should read this book including our politicians — Health Minister Vishwanath Rane and Chief Minister Pramod Sawant! Get it translated in Konkani and Marathi, Dr Lenny Da Costa!
Excerpted from “Is Your Doctor Keeping You Sick?” by Dr Lenny Da Costa…
Carbohydrate-Heavy Diet: the Reason for Today’s Chronic Health Issues
Today’s carb-heavy diet, driven by our use – or rather an overuse – of grains, has been the cause of the high amount of insulin resistance seen in our population today. High insulin in our blood is in itself a risk factor for heart disease. So, if this diet does cause excess insulin in our blood, which in turn may cause heart disease, how was this diet recommended to reduce the incidence of heart disease?
That’s not all. When carbohydrates re metabolize din our bodies, they form glucose, which provides the energy needed for our cells to function, but excess glucose is converted into triglycerides, which in turn are the ones that get converted into VLDL and LDL – the cholesterol markers we check for to see if our cholesterol levels are high So we now know that cholesterol rise, specifically triglycerides and LDL, is not from consuming proteins, i.e., meats, or high oils. It is from consuming grains like wheat, rice, bajra, jowar, and maize, which are frank carbohydrates.
This also leads to central obesity, i.e., fat around your belly region. A majority of the requirements for classifying one as suffering from a metabolic syndrome, which eventually leads to uncontrollable diabetes, come from eating a high-carb, low-fat diet. When modern medicine classified anything as a syndrome, I believe that it simply tells you that it does not know its cause or what to do with it. Thus, you will never see your doctor trying to reverse metabolic syndrome. Instead, he will give you pills for diabetes, for reducing your cholesterol, and for reducing your BP, when al he had to do was maybe advise you on a proper diet to get you back to good health.
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AN interesting study by Aude YW, et al, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, 2004, titled “The national cholesterol education program diet vs a diet lower in carbohydrates and higher in protein and monounsaturated fat.” Wherein 60 overweight individuals were randomized to a low-carb diet high in monounsaturated, or a low-fat diet based on the National Cholesterol Education Program (NCEP), had some very interesting results which I am sharing with you here.. Both groups were calorie restricted and the study went on for 12 weeks.
The low-carb group lost an average of 6.2 kg (13.6lb), while the low-fat group lot 3.4 kg (7.5 lb). The difference was statistically significant. The low-carb group lost 1.8 times as much weight. But the more interesting fact was that there were also several changes in biomarkers that are worth noting:
• Waist-to-hip ratio is a marker for abdominal fat. This marker improved slightly in the low-carb group, but not in the low-fat group.
• Total cholesterol improved in both groups.
• Triglycerides went down by 42 mg/dl in the low-carb group, compared to 15.3 mg/dl in the low-fat group.
• LDL particle size increased by 4.8 nm and the percentage of small, dense LDL decreased by 6.1% in the low-carb group, while there was no significant difference in the low-fat group. (It’s pertinent to note that it’s the small dense LDL that causes problems and is a risk factor for heart disease.)
Thus, overall, the low-carb group lost more weight and had much greater improvements in several important risk factors for cardiovascular disease.
There’s tons of evidence like this that a keto diet consisting of a low-carb, high-fat diet reduces weight and proves various disease markers, thus reducing the chance of chronic disease, and at times, reversing it altogether.
We need optimal levels to help disease reversal
So to remove or mitigate these risk factors, we need to have these markers at the levels mentioned below:
Homocysteine levels (<9 umol/l)
C-reactive protein (<0.8 mg/l)
Ferritin levels (<80 um/1 to 90 um/l)
Fibrinogen Levels (180-350 mg/dl)
Lipoprotein a levels (<30 mg/dl)
Insulin levels – fasting (<10 micro units/l)
The measures we need to revert the numbers and reverse the disease are simple and can be attained by modification of lifestyle and the right nutrition and supplements. These include:
- Daily exercise: A maximum of 20 minutes of HITT exercise 5 days a week in the morning on waking up ensures that high insulin levels, and thus, insulin resistance and high blood sugar levels, are lowered. It also plays a role in reducing blood pressure as constant high blood sugar and high insulin levels are known to cause high blood pressure. Many patients need to stop their blood pressure medications as their blood pressure starts plummeting post 90 days of starting a good HIIT exercise routine.
- The right nutrition: A high-fat, high-protein and low-carb diet helps shift the body to a fat burner and thus helps reduce insulin resistance and blood sugar. Add to this 12-hour to 14-hour fasting five times a week – eat your dinner at 7.30pm and breakfast at 9.30am and your diabetes and blood pressure reversal is almost complete. It also helps you lose weight.
- Proper hydration: One class of water every waking hour is what’s recommended to help your body hydrate as well as detoxify the body and help eliminate the toxic build-up seen in bodies these days due to toxic overload.
- Supplements: Various mineral and vitamin supplements are a must as most of them are not available to us in our regular food since our food late today has a huge toxic overload. We have discussed this earlier, and hence supplementing the minerals with the right salts very important as the challenge is always to ensure absorption of all these supplements.
- Stop smoking and reduce alcohol consumption. Stopping smoking alone reduces the exposure to heavy metal cadmium that is present in cigarette smoke. This reduces the oxidation levels within the arteries, reducing inflammation and thus, reducing plaque formation. It also reduces fibrinogen levels, which is another risk factor for heart disease.
- The right amount of sleep: You need to sleep around 10.30 pm to 11.00 pm each night and wake up around 6.00 am post a good seven-hour sleep. This is mandatory as the melatonin secretion starts around 11.30 pm up to around 3.00 am to 4.00 am. Melatonin releases stress as the cortisol levels come down and initiates the repair and restoring of functions within the body. This helps the body to repair and rejuvenate itself, releasing the stress and reducing inflammation. Research shows that sleeping late at night post-midnight, reduces this benefit and also increases insulin resistance.
Besides these measures, in the presence of chronic heart disease or diabetes, you need to do a complete detoxification using IV EDTA (discussed earlier in this book) under the guidance of a trained functional medicine expert and use FIR saunas to detoxify yourself from exposure to glyphosate, which we are exposed to daily through our food chain. The key to success, though, is maintaining all the lifestyle changes and ensuring you detoxify yourself regularly and keep calm and stress-free.