Mold & Microbiome: How They Shape Your Health

Jocelyn Strand, ND

I’m so happy to be here. Dr. Shippy. Thank you.

Ann Shippy, MD

Well, I know you have your own personal story with mold. I think it’s so helpful to have people hear the story and that you can get to the other side and navigate through the world again.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

It’s so true. I mean, it’s been for sure. I feel like molds played a very strong role in my personal journey, health Journey. It’s part of the reason that I landed where I did in terms of my career as well. They’re all sort of intermingled. As is always the case. But I had a mold exposure in our home that we were living in the construction around like 1980 when everything was super airtight. I moved in with my now husband and he had a house that could handle one person just fine. But when I moved in and started cooking every meal and there were more showers being taken and all of that, a lot of that moisture in the house was going into the attic and the softs weren’t properly installed. The moisture was going into the attic and then running down behind our bedroom wall, which we didn’t realize until it came through. I had all of these . It was so confusing because I had of course, these bizarre symptoms. I really wasn’t educated at that point. In mold toxicity. This was maybe 12 or 13 years ago now. Yes. I had itching was my main like histamine of course. But it was mostly from my waist down. I would get inflamed in my legs were so inflamed and itchy that I would scratch until I bled at night. It had that prickling, that sort of passive mnemonic for mold like the prickling and insomnia, where it would just feel like electrical prickling all over my body to the point where I was laying on the couch at night crying because I didn’t know what was happening in my body. Then it showed up literally, like within, I would say, an hour of installing an air exchanger in that house. I felt like a different person. My itching results. Although I’m sensitive to it. Yes, I tend to like clear it relatively quickly. Then I kind of went about my life, and we didn’t do a proper remediation at first but we went about like.

Ann Shippy, MD

Hardly on the map at that time what a proper remediation is. 

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Had to still look at the map.

Ann Shippy, MD

Enough. Yes. Yes, exactly.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

I went along with my life and then I had a patient, a pediatric patient, and she had a mold exposure. She had tick borne illnesses. I didn’t know that at the time that I first met her. All I knew she had just, I mean, a slew of type one hypersensitivity. Allergy mediated responses to food. She would have an asthmatic response after she ate. It was unpredictable and it was life threatening. She was hospitalized with an I.V. Steroids and just tiny little three year old kind of failure to thrive picture. I ran testing on her microbiome and would at that time and I asked them, what do you use for pediatric dysbiosis? She said, well, tried biocide and it’s a liquid. I was able to do just a drop twice a day. This is a long story, but to make a long story short is that I watched her transform in a matter of weeks with the Biocide liquid. I didn’t know at that time that she had I kind of hit the nail on the head by accident. For tick borne illnesses and mold and dysbiosis for her at all at the same time, with that product. I just watched her change from that sort of failure to thrive to pink and she didn’t have any more respiratory in that amount of time. She hadn’t had any more respiratory events. She’s had a few triggered. Now she’s 13 or 14 years old or something. But then, of course, it’s those moments that we all have in practice where we go, Whoa, I’m on to something. I watched that happen for her. I tried it on myself. This is after I’d had my mold exposure. Of course, I didn’t titrate for myself. I went straight to the maximum dosing. I didn’t know what binders were. I just like great guns. I had a whole body mold recurrence when I did that. It only lasted for less than a week. But I thought, what is happening? It was just a remarkable experience to watch it unfold.

Ann Shippy, MD

Sometimes when we exacerbate things pretty seriously, we know we’re on the right track. We just need to modify. The approach. Like I look at those things as being a win, because anytime you can move the needle positively or negatively that there’s some clues there.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes, exactly. I mean, great clues. I think over time, I’ve gone from the sort of like darn the torpedoes to like, how do we really support? I was well supported in my detoxification of my mycotoxins and dysbiosis at that point. I didn’t. I was working very deeply with my microbial imbalances, dysbiosis and most likely biofilms as well. That were mycotoxins that were housed in biofilms. I just went after it. If I’d known at the time to support maybe this included iron and some binders and slowed down a little bit, I would have suffered the same way. But sometimes I go for the hard lessons in life, at least to myself and not to patients. I learned through.

Ann Shippy, MD

A lot of times that our bodies are our best teachers.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes, exactly. I tend to try everything on myself and I don’t know, I think like my family, my poor kids. They get to have their fevers. They get to be sick for a little while. They get to anyway, It was really amazing for me to watch that disappear. That sort of the ongoing illness disappear and then rise again, knowing. That’s what really what helped me understand what biofilms are and how those microorganisms can be housed in our bodies, whether it’s in the sinuses or ears.

Ann Shippy, MD

Some defining just so our listeners know what we’re talking about. Let’s just define microbiome first, and then let’s do biofilm.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Perfect. The microbiome is we have these are bacteria, it can be gram-negative gram positive bacteria, fungal elements and yeast and also viruses, even parasites can be part of our microbiome. These are all microorganisms that coexist with us. The main reservoir is in the gastrointestinal tract. Then we have the second largest reservoirs in then oral cavity, but we have them everywhere skin, vaginal tract, the prostate as the microbiome.

Ann Shippy, MD

Even the bladder we know I think you’re her title track does not sterile aquifer.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes or the pulmonary microbiome right we didn’t even we had no idea about that. We know that’s got a very strong link to how we respond to the exposure to viral respiratory, viral illnesses.

Ann Shippy, MD

We can’t exist without them like we would die without them. There they are, Lifeline.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

There are beneficios and the ratio is very important. When we have a healthy microbiome, it really protects us in a number of ways. It modifies and educates our immune system so that it’s competent when we come across something that’s a pathogen. But on the reverse side, it also establishes tolerance. If you don’t get hyper, you’re less likely to become hyper reactive to something in the environment, whether it’s an allergy or just reactivity. It’s that balance between inflammation, the gas and the brakes is how I think of it. When we have a healthy microbiome, it establishes health in our immune system and the way that it interacts. We’ll talk more about that today I think, in our conversation. Lately. many other ways too, that we could go into hydration and nutrient absorption and nutrient synthesis and energy production, all of those things that are really essential when we have an essential part of a healthy microbiome. If that gets disrupted, it can be something sort of mystifying and slow. Maybe your energy level is not as good, or you wake up with headaches or you do have a little bit of joint aching and over time and it gradually happens over time or it can be very dramatic. I think of an acute infection as really microbial dysbiosis. But it’s a very powerful dysbiosis. If we get an acute infection. Sort of how I think about the bugs on the body.

Ann Shippy, MD

Yes, that’s great. Then biofilm.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Biofilm is an interesting one and is definitely something that I learned once I was in practice. I didn’t hear anything about it in medical school. 

Ann Shippy, MD

It’s more so more of those of us that are actually delving in and looking to see what’s going on in the research that are even aware that it’s an important piece.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

It’s so important. Especially when we’re working with complex illnesses like mold illness. Biofilms are generated by almost every microorganism. I call it like an invisibility cloak. It’s a protective mechanism for them. They can hunker down and hide behind a biofilm. They can have beneficial microorganisms, but they can also house pathological or harmful organisms. If you don’t address a biofilm, then antimicrobials you take or antibiotics are less likely to have a good effect and they can receive. In kind of easy terms, it would be to think about, well, the first thing is the easiest biofilm to identify is that fuzzy teeth feeling. So fuzzy to go to a plaque as a biofilm. Every time I say that, I think like I mean, our toothbrush bristles have biofilms on them. Hopefully they’re beneficial microorganisms, but there are pathogens that.

Ann Shippy, MD

If you’ve got rid of canals or cavitation, that may not be the case.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Periodontal disease is the most common inflammatory illness globally, which is really interesting. Half the population has some inflammation in their gums or their periodontal area, and those bugs produce all sorts of bad, bad things that down in the periodontal pocket or the biofilms are placed. The reason that we can see it so easily on the teeth is that it’s a non shedding surface so the biofilms can hang out there, our teeth aren’t constantly shedding the surface and so they they can establish a house there like where we have biofilms in the gut or on the skin. We’re consistently shedding our epithelium and so we can definitely get biofilms there. But it’s not quite as dramatic or easy to identify. To identify. 

Ann Shippy, MD

The sinuses tend to be another one that it’s easier to identify.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes, exactly. Sinuses and ear infections in kids. That’s another one where I mean, kids who need repeated antibiotics, that’s usually due to a biofilm and a number of different microorganisms that are master biofilm producers. They just stay there. You take the antibiotic for a little bit better and then slowly they regenerate. Not even that slowly they regenerate from behind the biofilm. All I mean, if you’d asked me or if you told me when I was in medical school that I was going to specialize in microorganisms and the microbiome, I would have been like, “No, no.”

Ann Shippy, MD

Who is not your favorite class? I need you here. I’m living it, right? 

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Right now, I know way more about bugs than I ever thought I would. But it’s such a powerful access for us as clinicians for offering healing to our patients and for us to educate ourselves on. It’s a relatively straightforward support, not for everyone, but for most people. It’s pretty straightforward to tweak and support the microbiome so that it’s healthy.

Ann Shippy, MD

Yes, Well, so let’s talk about how mycotoxins affect the microbiome.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Okay. This is kind of in depth. I went round and round about the best way to delineate this because and it’s all intermingled. We’ll talk about the mycotoxins themselves and the influence that they have. I have a few notes just so I don’t forget any of it. The first thing that happens when we get a mycotoxins exposure, we all get mycotoxins exposure all the time. Primarily unless we’re in an environment that has mold and our main source of mycotoxins is our food. That’s part of the reason mycotoxins but other anything that we get from the outside world, why our gut is so heavily policed by our immune system, we have lots of protective mechanisms. We have good health, strong, healthy mucosa there. When we get a mycotoxin exposure, it’s really the prolonged exposure that over time will cause dysbiosis, meaning that the beneficial microorganisms that do all of those wonderful things that we just talked about start to diminish over time. The pathogens start to reproduce instead. We lose our healthy balance  ratio and microorganisms that work were what’s called commensal or sort of just existed, coexisted in our bodies, start to become opportunistic instead and they start to reproduce. Primarily the worst players are gram-negative bacteria like Klebsiella. I mean, again, I never knew I’d be able to list make a list on a gram of different gram-negative bacteria, but.

Ann Shippy, MD

Klebsiella is one that when I do the stool testing on patients with the detailed PCR testing, that that is one that’s very commonly creating imbalances. That’s a good way to mention.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

It’s interesting too, they’re one of the main so they’re gram-negative. That means they produce lipopolysaccharide, which is very toxic. It is the most potent immune stimulant to the human body known right now. If you can imagine if that’s over or growing and being released a lot, that our immune system is going to be inflamed or overactive. That’s one thing. Klebsiella is also a major biofilm producer, so they’ll hole up and produce a lot of biofilms. Then I think of biofilms, they’re so sticky that they’re used to bioremediation, toxic waste sites. Of course they’re going to hold onto and house every toxin that floats by them as well. It is a source of ongoing source of toxicity as well, those biofilms. When we get those mycotoxins, the bad players start to rise, the small we lose the protective activity of the beneficial. We’ll start to see again that sort of it can be low grade and gradual where people start to feel disruption and it can show up in their gastrointestinal tract, but it may just show up as fatigue, inflammation not feeling or cognitive impairment.

Ann Shippy, MD

Yes, some of those symptoms that you were experiencing with your sleep and with that feeling all over your body, I think that’s probably impacted by these toxins as well.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

I’m sure. That’s just one way, one way that might go. Toxins affect the microbiome. They also they are antimicrobial and that’s part of their mechanism for activity is that they kill the beneficial. But they also with that production of those metabolites, they not only do they increase inflammation, but they are what’s called a pathogen associated molecular pattern. In there it’s a pump and that goes immediately to the liver for clearance. But that is very toxic to the liver. The liver, the cut for cells are the immune cells in the liver come in to get rid of or to destroy or dismantle the pants. That causes damage associated with molecular pattern. It becomes a feedforward cycle. Our hepatocytes are the cells responsible for detoxification can’t do. They get congested I guess is what I would say. Our liver gets congested where it can’t do its normal level of work. The reason this is important is because these are mycotoxins. God, it’s a weird, I think an unusual intersection of the microbiome and toxicity just mycotoxins it is both a microbial agent producing a toxin and it’s just part of our total toxic load are mycotoxins. It’s just interesting but it all becomes enmeshed.

Ann Shippy, MD

It’s a vicious cycle.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes, exactly. The other thing that happens when we get a prolonged exposure to mycotoxins, even a single exposure, is that it causes damage to the lining of the gastrointestinal tract itself. Damages the epithelium or the cells that line the gastrointestinal tract, and then we lose our ability to protect or keep out and sort of police the area as well. We know that as a leaky gut. Or intestinal permeability. But that’s another direct action where Mycotoxins will then affect the way that our our intestinal linings interacting with our existing microbiome, we’re looking at increased likelihood of reactivity to foods and to other pathogens in the body or microorganisms that wouldn’t typically be considered a pathogen or our body wouldn’t recognize. All of a sudden, it’s got a much larger fight on its hands. When we have a leaky gut.

Ann Shippy, MD

Yes, everything quits working as well as it should for all the things that the mucosal membranes are supposed to do for us. That’s again, that’s also summarized like how the microbiome helps us to deal with the mycotoxins.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes. When we have a healthy microbiome, we have a number of protective mechanisms in place. The first thing I think of is those beneficial, are responsible for beneficial microorganisms, are responsible for the production of anti-inflammatory mediators. Things like short, they’re called short chain fatty acids. I think most people know beta eight the best, but there’s AC, they’re acetate and propionate. There are a number of other short chain fatty acids and those have systemic anti-inflammatory effects. They also feed and have antioxidant effects in the colon and the gut itself. It’s a really essential part of us being able to have healthy colon function. It’s that over time it will reduce our total inflammatory load and I think we live in a culture where we think I’m just going to take an anti-inflammatory. But really these basic ways, foundational support offers us over timeThis is establishing a healthy lifestyle. Establishing a healthy body is how we stay in balance and have this long term reduction in inflammation rather than having to take I mean, I think some of those supplements are very beneficial anti-inflammatory supplements and it’s also important to support our ability to do it, to.

Ann Shippy, MD

Optimize things, not to just keep the bare minimum. We need to get to the root cause of the inflammation and exactly is to augment.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes, exactly. Not have a need for things like ibuprofen or other assets.

Ann Shippy, MD

Which are so hard on the microbiome. Intestinal lining like it like I really try to get my patients to only take those if it’s something super acute and it’s going to be a very short period of time. You really try to not to use them. It’s kind of shocking when we look at the usage worldwide, how many people are taking these medications and not realizing the impact on their bodies.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

The direct impact rate on the gut lining, like you said, is right where we’re talking about today is that, again, that barrier function that is essential in the gastrointestinal tract. I think I read an article it was a while ago now that said that a single dose of ibuprofen will cause damage to the lining of the gut. Of course, I always think it’s like our skin, if we get a scratch, it will heal itself. But still, you have a little bit of exposure at that point. Imagine over time, like you got to stop scratching the wound or Yes. That’s one way is that it helps us with, with short the production of short chain fatty acids and beneficial metabolites, it also modifies the mycotoxins. When we have beneficial microorganisms, when it mycotoxins, when we consume a mycotoxin, it will basically neutralize the toxicity of the mycotoxin. I didn’t know that until I read the literature. Fascinating. But the flipside is also true that if you have dysbiosis, it can be called a masked what is it called? Masked Mycotoxins is what it’s called where they’re not damaging. We see this too in detoxification. There’s a substance that we get exposure to, whether it’s a mycotoxin or another toxic substance. If we have dysbiosis, then we lose the protection of the short chain fatty acids. Then we’ll start to see this conversion into a more toxic, even more highly toxic substance than what we originally consumed, which is very problematic. We’re talking total toxic load. That’s also one way that the microbiome interacts with mycotoxins.

Ann Shippy, MD

I think you’ve done a great job of really making this intersection between Mycotoxins and the microbiome and how it all works together. When things are really balanced, it’s all like we just our bodies can deal with it. But then as the toxic exposures increase, it gets harder and harder for this symphony between our cells and the microbiome cells that really to keep things into balance.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

I think of it like even a workout that you can do you can your endurance is one thing I can do so much. But there’s a point at which your body can no longer lift the heavy weight and it’s a total energy expenditure and strength issue. The same thing happens in our physiology where we can’t at some point homeostasis or the ability to maintain balance is overcome by sort of the hits that we take. What I love, and I’m sure you’ve seen, is that oftentimes I would say to my patients it’s not we don’t have a three legged stool. We have like a seven legged stool. We can take so many hits. It’s so our bodies are so smart and so capable of regeneration and healing that sometimes you imagine if you have seven or eight legs and it takes you have to go down to two before the stool starts to fall. Sometimes it only takes one in restoring one and the body will be able to write itself around. I’ve watched that happen. It’s not to say that we can’t support all seven legs of the stool, but it’s to say that sometimes just restoring one’s one thing, like the health of the microbiome or getting inflammatory foods out of the diet or getting hydrated or getting it, removing stress or whatever it is for the individual will make a huge difference in their ability to to manage all of this. That being said, we still need to support the complete detoxification of mycotoxins as we can. We don’t want to be always like on that on that line.

Ann Shippy, MD

The tipping point. No. Yes. As far away from that as possible.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes, I feel good, but I don’t feel good. I feel good. I don’t feel that. That’s not where we want to be. 

Ann Shippy, MD

But yeah, to you want to do a little bit of explanation about the fungal issues that people can get into with, with mold exposures.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

I would love to talk about that It’s something that happened for me specifically as well, is that mold and yeasts and fungal elements, they have a very similar protein structure and people can get and I hope this is what you’re after. But yeah, is that people tend to get reactive to all of those things at the same time. Where someone an example for me would be a patient who didn’t have any issues with if they ate sugar or if they had an alcoholic beverage or that they would feel fine the next day. Someone, once they get a mold exposure and become hyperactive, it can become very reactive to yeast in all of its forms and get very inflamed from those things. Also their blood sugar will then feed things like Candida or other fungal elements. Candida or yeast, it’s a normal flora in the mouth and the gut. It’s one of the main produces of biofilm in the mouth actually, and in the gastrointestinal tract, especially people who’ve been on a difficult health journey and been on a lot of antibiotics. Yeast will naturally be overgrowing and can cause fungal overgrowth there. Any time that you run into a mold exposure, you can get more reactive to or even get a yeast infection from at that point because the body reacts in the same way to to all of it, even if it’s just naturally existing yeast, you can get really inflamed wherever that yeast is naturally existing because the body is coming in and trying to clear.

Ann Shippy, MD

I would say, at least 90% of people have no idea that they have these fungal overgrowth situations. Like I think a lot of times, especially in women, they think, Oh, well, I don’t have a vaginal yeast infection, so I don’t have a problem. 

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes, 

Ann Shippy, MD

They don’t realize it.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Where do you see it on the  body?

Ann Shippy, MD

I think most of the time it’s in the digestive tract and then doing the testing like a note test or some of the stool fungal fungal tests, we can actually find it. But see what’s in there. It usually takes testing because it’s the symptoms are just kind of lost in with the other symptoms that people are having for mold exposure and other things.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

They all look so similar. I had this conversation with Brian Karr. Do you know Brian Karr? He’s the mold guy. He’s just an amazing wealth of knowledge. But I did a podcast with him on the same topic and “I don’t remember what I was going to say.” 

Ann Shippy, MD

That’s the topic on these low grade fungal infections that are.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

I don’t remember, I’m sorry.

Ann Shippy, MD

Don’t be. That’s okay. You’ll get it. Is there anything I think you’ve done a great job of laying the foundation of like, what the problem is, why it occurs, this intersection between the microbiome and mycotoxins. Is there anything else you want to do to lay a foundation before we get into solutions?

Jocelyn Strand, ND

I don’t think so. I think the piece for me that I think is really important is that sort of gut liver access piece with Mycotoxins. I think I feel like I’ve already talked about that a bit. But just to clarify a little bit more what we’re talking about there. If there’s dysbiosis that will increase are just that will increase our the load that the liver has to carry. I talked about Lipopolysaccharide a little bit, but I love to talk about that more that those gram-negative bacteria as a general rule are maybe commensal, but usually they’re opportunistic and can become pathogenic and some of them are just straight up pathogens or harmful and LPS. LPS are called endotoxemia. When we get a rise in our blood levels of LPS, it’s so toxic. If you get a cut and it’s infected with a gram-negative bacteria, that is what causes sepsis and septic shock. Lipopolysaccharide generates a huge inflammatory response in the body. You can imagine that if they’re, of course in the gut, all of the blood flow surrounding the gut, all of that goes directly to the liver and it is prioritized. First pass in the liver that LPS are. When we get that dysbiosis, it’s a really important aspect for supporting detoxification in general, but especially when we’re dealing with a lot of hypersensitivities and a heavy toxic load from a mold exposure as well. In the flipside is that the liver, when it releases bile acids, when it’s healthy, it keeps our microbiome in check. We have good bile acid function and release in the small intestine. It’s that bidirectional pathway. That’s what it acts. That’s the definition of an axis. That we need the healthy functioning of the liver, we need the healthy function of the microbiome. The two of them interact with one another and you can see the same thing happen with the conversion of toxins from the liver by bile, a by the microbiome. If you get dysbiosis, the increase in toxicity and the reabsorption of toxins that your liver is already trying to clear and is trying to overtake and recycle.

Ann Shippy, MD

Yes.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes. Making sure that you’re supporting the beneficial microorganisms. And one thing I forgot to mention, too, is that a lot of those beneficiaries will bind the mycotoxins in their cell wall. As they’re reproducing and dying off in your gut, they bind those mycotoxins and then we excrete them in the stool instead of them causing that inflammation. Just making sure that you’re maintaining a healthy microbiome on multiple levels is super important.

Ann Shippy, MD

Since they have little suitcases that they’re carrying with them to. To take out the trash. If they’re not there with the little suitcases, then the body is having to really recycle things a lot, lot more. It’s like massively increasing the toxic load.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

We want to especially today with the way building structures are the potential for exposure to mycotoxins, but also just total toxic load in general on the planet. I feel we need to support our bodies in every possible way. This is a pretty powerful way to do that is just to support that healthy microbiome. Then the use of binders I think I don’t know. I’m sure you’re fluent in the use of binders, but that was something that I was missing in my practice and I caused harm to my patients by doing a detoxification without adequate support. You lose their faith and you lose their trust and they don’t get to heal. If you just feel like when you do that stuff, you fast causing damage. Hopefully it’s not lasting damage, but it can cause problems with the kidneys or the liver or other organ systems as well. Making sure to support the body’s excretion while you’re doing that.

Ann Shippy, MD

It’s so lucky. When I got a yeast like symptoms from mold in 2009 and when I tried to take the Colistier, the only thing that was out there was one specific approach to take Colistier I mean, it actually made me sicker.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Oh, my gosh.

Ann Shippy, MD

But I knew I just knew I needed binders, so that helped me to get up to speed on my own body before I started taking care of patients. I learned the hard way. But yeah. It was like that let me be able to see and practice and. All those things so can hold that space. But the binders are tricky because some people can get sicker from certain binders and it takes some courage to keep trying them. I’m the one doing the right doses and the right ones for your particular. I think it probably is somewhat dependent on the microbiome, what toxins are working together in the body and all of that. It can also change over time. There’s a little there’s ongoing trial and error to figure it out.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Interesting. Yes, that’s not something that I’m as tuned in with as I could be as that reactivity to binders. It’s in my head. A binder is something that’s going to make people feel better.

Ann Shippy, MD

It also it is because it’s helping the suitcases get checked out. But yeah, every once in a while and it’s so tricky. I’m always just cautious with it.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Do you use binders just one at a time then? 

Ann Shippy, MD

For most people, like sometimes I’ll get a feel. Okay, this is a robust person. We can just go for it then in the more sensitive, go a little slower.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

That’s so interesting. I mean we’ve had I’ve good success clinically having people use binders before they ever bring on any kind of anti-microbial or clearing even and drainage support as well. I think drainage can be super powerful. But again, it can aggravate if you don’t do it right. It takes being tuned in.

Ann Shippy, MD

Back to your stool analogy, it probably depends on each person’s legs of the stool. What’s really the out of balance the most. I think you get a lot of intuition though with each person after having. But let’s kind of give an overview. We talked a little bit about binders. What are some of the other things that you find are helpful with your patients?

Jocelyn Strand, ND

If we’re talking I love what you said about the individual and intuition, I feel like I think it’s really important for us to bring that into our patient population. I don’t know if you can hear my dog barking in the back. Okay. I got to put her away.

Ann Shippy, MD

 He wants to join the conversation.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes, apparently so. I think if it is someone very sensitive, safe hands or pandas or mold exposure, a chronic Lyme patient, and so often you’ll see all of many of those crossing over with one another. I mean, I think people with Lyme who are already inflamed are much more prone to be really aggravated by an exposure to mold than, say, someone who’s like you said, robust gut health. But with those, there are a couple of things that were game changers for me with those with that patient population. One was realizing that we can’t just drain the vital force like what drainage techniques and binders and all of that. We have to restore the vital force as well. What I used was by and I’m not being this isn’t like, this is just what I use. I’m not getting paid for this for talking about Pocono, but I use their drainage remedies pretty extensively. Then they have a couple of products NEU-regen, N, E, U, dash R. E. G. E. N. I’m pretty sure I’m saying it wrong because they’re strange names. But that was from a sort of Chinese medicine perspective as a Chi restorer. It brings vital force back to the patient. When I started combining the reinvigoration of a vital force with the drainage that allowed and a lot of my very complex patients to continue to push forward with therapeutics that would help restore their physiology, meaning getting those mycotoxins and the dysbiosis, whether it was gut dysbiosis or I also think of Lyme and Epstein-Barr and all of these other chronic illnesses as low grade illnesses as dysbiosis. To me it’s all become that it’s an imbalance in the body.

Ann Shippy, MD

A lot of times the healthy body can just nip it all in the butt. Like I think there are plenty of people that are carriers for Lyme that have no illness.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Exactly.

Ann Shippy, MD

Associated with it because our immune systems are keeping in check, just like we keep the chickenpox virus in check until our immune suppressed and then we get shingles.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes, that’s exactly how I think about it too. I live in Northern Minnesota, which is one of the highest endemic areas for Lyme and tick borne illnesses. It is something that I ended up having to find my way through. Our patients help kind of guide that path. But so I always started with binders first and drainage and then I would bring in antimicrobials and in that includes so I use Biocidin and then I work for Biocidin for full disclosure. We would clear the gut with the liquid first to help reestablish balance in the microbiome in the gastrointestinal tract. Once people are sort of good to go with their gastrointestinal tract, I would graduate to the liposomal form of the Biocidin which is more bioavailable. In the research that in vitro research it had better 74% better intracellular absorption. The liposome does so it would go directly from then from the mouth into the bloodstream. 

You don’t lose some of it when you go through the digestive process and the liver kind of clears parts of it. But it has to be very gradual if it isn’t robust person. We all buzz right through all of that and people feel better and it’s pretty easy to support them. But for people who are really sick, we might also bring in things like or I would bring in things like glutathione like liposomal glutathione, and other antioxidants, vitamin C, liposomal vitamin C, and I would say the drainage were sort of my foundation. Just depending on the individual and where they needed additional support, whether it was in sort of mechanical function of the digestion was often also needed suppor, hydrochloric acid, or bile acids, or pancreatic enzymes, that sort of thing as well. I don’t know, that was kind of vague.

Ann Shippy, MD

Yes, that was well, that’s okay. Let’s step through it. First was getting the vitals for lymphatic drainage, then binders. With the binders, what do you like?

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Well I use the GI detox, so the Biocidin Botanicals i. So Biocidin in itself is the flagship product and it’s a broad spectrum, meaning activity against bacteria, yeast, fungal elements. It’s a formula and I think Dr. Fresco just happened upon the fact that it’s got 18 botanicals in it. It’s a very potent drop wise dosing and so what’s cool about that is that it’s very well tolerated in these very sensitive people because you can titrate with tiny doses, but also there’s no like heavy hit with oregano or it’s like each one is just the tiniest amount. It almost seems like homeopathic in itself.

Ann Shippy, MD

Which makes a lot of sense because oregano, it’s not going to be that particular for the good organisms versus the bad. You end up wiping out some of the good ones too. This approach to have small doses of synergistic.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes.

Ann Shippy, MD

In herbal plan makes a lot of sense to me.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

I love botanicals and part of the reason I love them as well, I love the earth. What I feel like it’s been put here for us as a gift to me. That’s how I feel about it, is that we’ve interacted with these plants for all of human history. Our body recognizes and knows how to work with them, but so do the microorganisms that we like on our bodies. We do have research showing that the beneficial is are not depleted by Biocidin.

Ann Shippy, MD

It’s so Important.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

It’s so exciting. It’s like it’s sometimes seems too good to be true. But when we. Got the results back, we were all like, “Oh, my gosh.” Some of the beneficial is actually went up, not statistically significant, but what we were about to prove was that it didn’t suppress beneficial microorganisms and it did not do that. Very cool. I find myself in this place of gratitude that I have this tool in my toolkit to work with the microbiome. But it also clears mycotoxins in some case studies that we have. Not just whether those are mycotoxins, what we don’t know is, was that housed in a biofilm or was it is it an ongoing exposure? Where how do we identify it? That’s a little bit more complex. But we do have before and after testing, showing clearance of mycotoxins with the use of the Biocidin liquid. One doctor used it in a nebulizer. I can’t recommend that because we haven’t studied it for safety.

Ann Shippy, MD

I just want to point out, like so many supplement companies out there don’t do their own research. That’s one of the reasons that I love Biocidin and I use it often in my clinic is because there’s data, there’s research to back it up.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

It’s so nice as a clinician to know that I can stand behind what we’re saying, the claims that we’re making and what and how we talk about the product and that we can. I mean, I’m a geek, like, what can we study next? I love it. This was a roundabout way of getting to the binder, which is also a formula. For that reason I think it has. It’s activated charcoal. Zeolite Clay citrus pectin, no, apple pectin, excuse me and humic and fulvic acid and aloe. Per reports, it’s much more well-tolerated by most people than some of the other single binders are, or binders that don’t have aloe. That aloe can help prevent the constipation that some people experience when they use a binder. That’s the binder that I’ve always used, it’s the one I work with. I think as clinicians like, it’s easy to get kind of in a rut. Probably I could look at some others, but that’s the one that I use and that I love. 

That binder, even when you open the drainage pathways with the drainage remedies, the homeopathic drainage remedies, you still want to be binding what’s being released from the liver, from the lymphatics through the kidneys, all of that. We want to be binding wherever we can to save them the trouble of having to reabsorb and reprocess those. That’s the binder I would start with the drainage and the binder and then bring in for for most people they could just go straight to the the anti-microbial and the binder. But for our very sensitive people, I would then very carefully titrate with the Biocidin liquid starting at one drop a day and working up slowly to maximum dosing which I think is on the label it’s seven drops twice a day. I would sometimes go up to 15, drops twice a day with my patients with really large patients, sometimes 20 drops twice a day. I would go to you for that.

Ann Shippy, MD

One of my favorite bio cited products is the throat spray. I totally just ignore with a max dosing on the bottle because I don’t I’ve never seen a downside to it and it’s so great for helping to fight up the respiratory infections and including the main one that we’ve been dealing with the last few years.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Yes we and that’s something we hear a lot of in our in terms of on our clinical line reports is that it’s saves the day.

Ann Shippy, MD

Yes it goes like multiple bottles go with me on every trip. I haven’t stopped traveling through this whole time. I’ve just been on the go and so I have extra for family and friends.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

I know always pack an extra ride because someone’s going to need. It. It’s like I got everything it took.

Ann Shippy, MD

I took four bottles with knowing there’s been an uptick again recently, I took four bottles with me and I ended up giving them all away. 

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Do you really? That’s hilarious. You’ve got great stories around travel and all of that. I really enjoyed when you came on our webinar and shared some of your experience has been it’s I’d love to pick your brain sooner. 

Ann Shippy, MD

Okay, I’ll definitely follow up on all of that. That sounds awesome. Anything else you want to share about your tools in your toolbox to help people recover. To give hope. I just love the tools and the toolbox that I get from for Biocidin in other ways.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

It’s really great to hear. It definitely gives me a lot of purpose on the planet to bring this research and bring the clinical information forward and to do, to read and learn and then share all of that and report back. The one thing I would say that I sort of left out, I referred to the oral microbiome a little bit, but the oral microbiome. We have about 300 on average microorganisms that live in the mouth, which is significantly smaller than the number of microorganisms that live in the gut. But we swallow a liter of saliva a day, which is gross and interesting. It is where we have antimicrobial peptides and all that in our saliva. We have, it’s all designed that way. Our immune system is in our saliva as well. It’s all designed that way for a reason, but we have ten to eight. One billion microorganisms in a milliliter of saliva and we’re swallowing a liter a day. If someone’s having a difficult time getting, getting full healing, it’s really important to address the oral microbiome. One of the things I love about the liquid is that you’re also working in the oral microbiome when you use the Biocidin liquid, which is why I always use the liquid instead of the capsules in my own practice. I mean, we sell a lot of the capsules, but it’s for me, I feel like you’re missing one entire important niche. 

We swallow that if we don’t have good stomach acid, those microorganisms will go right through our stomach and establish themselves in the small intestine or in our gut. We want the good guys there. So you think of Candida again as one of the main microorganisms. Their Porphyromonas gingivalis is the gram-negative bacteria that lives in the mouth, produce it constantly producing lipopolysaccharide. There’s that bad guy again. But in my head I thought, Why is it so important? Why is P gingivalis or  Porphyromonas gingivalis related to things like Alzheimer’s disease and cardiovascular disease and cognitive dysfunction, all sorts of inflammation, including autism, joint pain or autoimmunity, when there’s such a small amount in the periodontal pocket compared to the gut. After doing the reading, it occurred to me that we don’t have the first pass through the liver. It all goes all of that translocation of the lipopolysaccharides in the periodontal pocket. There’s just the adjacent blood flow is so close it’s only a single cell layer that those toxins, basically endotoxins cross directly into the blood flow. It’s just another source of another therapeutic target. That’s true for any of the metabolites that are difficult for our body will go directly from the periodontal pocket into the bloodstream. If you have bleeding gums, you actually have transient septicemia, so you’ll have it transiently, you’ll have actual translocation or movement from of the pathogen itself into the bloodstream. The body clears it, but it’s just something to think about as a part of the whole digestive tract and microbial dysbiosis is to make sure and include the oral microbiome. You can do that with Biocidin liquid. There’s a toothpaste with Biocidin in it that can be used. We have a fresh new viscosity on it. We’ve gotten a lot of thumbs up on the news version. It’s just something to keep up to..

Ann Shippy, MD

Make somebody take care of your oral microbiome. Do the prevention so that you don’t get any of the gum disease or I think it also probably reduces the risk for cavities when you’ve got a healthy microbiome in the gut. 

Jocelyn Strand, ND

It definitely, there are microorganisms that are very closely related to cavity cavities in the mouth and there are oral probiotics and there are antimicrobials that you can work with to diminish those back clears in the mouth as well.

Ann Shippy, MD

This is neat. This is such a wonderful resource of information and giving more hope for recovery and healing. It’s just amazing to get to delve into this. I mean, it’s just a critical topic for all of us.  Like you’ve got to get your microbiome right to be able to have a healthy body.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

It’s thank you so much for having me. Just in terms of hope, I can share one story that I had a man who we are working with. He had Lyme disease, but he also found in the course of when we were working together, he pulled his dresser away from the wall and there was mold growing on the wall behind his dresser. He was on the main level and he had a crawlspace underneath it. When he open up the crawlspace space, it was just completely coated with mold, mold growth. He really wasn’t that was an obstacle to his healing. Once we identified it and worked with his mold toxicity, he went he got better with the other therapeutics before we were focusing on mold, when we were just focusing on Lyme disease. But as soon as we cleared the mold for him, he called me three weeks after we started the therapeutics. This was the NEU-regen that was so remarkable. There was another one of those moments in practice where he called me and he said, I’m 90% better. I mean, in three weeks it’s like why we’re here as practitioners is for those moments when we can watch a person’s journey. It really most people can get well with this support. 

Ann Shippy, MD

Absolutely 100% believe that when you get that important puzzle pieces for each individual that it’s like that third leg of the stool, the body just knows what to do.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Exactly. You but we’re far from each other.

Ann Shippy, MD

You have to figure out which conference we’re going to next.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

That’s right.

Ann Shippy, MD

Well, thank you so much for the wisdom, the experience, the heart that you bring. I know that you’re in a really good spot to help a lot of people.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Thanks so much, Dr. Shippy and all of the same things right back to you for bringing your wisdom forward and in your heart forward on all of this. Appreciate you.

Ann Shippy, MD

You sit here. Thanks so much.

Jocelyn Strand, ND

Thank you.