The Integrated Pharmacist

Welcome to another episode of the Integrated Pharmacist Podcast. This is my first in a new series based on disease states rather than a specific modality or product. My goal is look at the major health concerns through the lens of complementary and alternative medicine and find evidence to substantiate that approach to health. I'd like to begin with diabetes. Diabetes is essentially the body's inability to deal with sugar. Often, the targeted chemical in the body is insulin. Insulin is like the key that unlocks the sugar gate to each of our cells. When it isn't working properly, sugar builds up in our blood where it can cause complications throughout the body. For patients with Type 1 diabetes, their bodies don't make insulin. Most often, this is because their immune system developed a response to the pancreatic cells that produce insulin. In other words, their bodies attack their pancreas to the point that they cannot produce insulin on their own anymore....

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Integrated Pharmacist Podcast. First, I'd like to apologize for the brief hiatus. Between studying for board exams and moving across the country for residency, I haven't had the resources to produce an episode. But I am happy to be back at it. My current position as a pharmacy resident in functional medicine has sparked a number of potential topics. On the top of the list is a controversial supplement called Co-emzyme Q10 or CoQ10. CoQ10 is a special kind of molecule that assists in the processes of energy creation so that they happen more readily. If enzymes reduce the threshold of certain reactions, the coenzyme is like the key to unlock the enzyme door. We know this specific coenzyme is used heavily by mitochondria - that's the energy-producing factories inside all of our cells. In a process called the electron-transport-chain, CoQ10 helps our cells produce more energy from the food we eat. With ...

Greetings, listeners!  Welcome to another episode of the integrated pharmacist podcast.  Today I'd like to share with you one of my favorite herbal medications - the elderberry.  With the current COVID-19 pandemic causing socioeconomic upheaval, people are scrambling for some miracle product that will prevent themselves from getting the dreaded disease.  From disinfectants and face-masks to unproven medications, very little seems to be off the table at his point. Elderberry has taken some spotlight in all of this, because of its history of use in other viral infections.  Research suggests one of it's effects is similar to the human hormone interferon.  Interferon is a chemical that virus-infected cells release that helps prevent neighboring cells from getting infected.  The in-vitro trial I refer to demonstrates mostly late-stage activity against influenza virus infection as well as immune response activation to up-regulate specific cytokines dur...

***Disclaimer: This blog is not meant to be used as legal or medical advice.  It is written as my person perspective on how medical professionals could blend western medicine with other modalities*** A growing number of people are developing sensitivity to gluten without having celiac disease.  Is there something they can do to improve these negative symptoms?  This week on the Integrated Pharmacist Podcast, we're talking about Enzyme Therapy.  This approach to health recognizes that foods we eat can affect overall health.  Enzymes throughout the body can help certain chemical processes happen.  If the right ones are administered, food can potentially be digested even better.  This could lead to healthier guts and bodies.  We already practice this in western medicine.  We have medications that are concentrated pancreatic enzymes.  These are typically given to patients whose pancreas does not work optimally such as in cystic fibrosis ...

***Disclaimer: This blog is not meant to be used as legal or medical advice.  It is written as my person perspective on how medical professionals could blend western medicine with other modalities*** Greetings, and welcome to another episode of the Integrated Pharmacist Podcast.  Fad diets come and go.  So often, they're built on extreme limitations with the goal of dropping weight quickly or offering longer, more vibrant life.  These fad diets came into being during the 19th century when people drifted culturally away from ethnic and locally grown foods to diets based more on comfort and pleasure.  This new style of eating obviously had a negative effect on health and wellness, so new diet trends continue to spring up.  Extreme diets have included low-fat, low-carb, high fiber, and high protein.  There have been diets based on specific foods or food-groups like cabbage and grapefruit, restrictive diets, liquid diets, and much more. Of course, fad ...