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Kent Holtorf, MD is the medical director of the Holtorf Medical Group (www.HoltorfMed.com) and the founder and medical director of the non-profit National Academy of Hypothyroidism (NAH) (www.NAHypothyroidism.org), which is dedicated to the dissemination of new information to doctors and patients on the diagnosis and treatment of hypothyroidism. He is... Read More
Nathalie Niddam is a Holistic Nutritionist, a Human Potential and Epigenetic Coach and the host of the Biohacking Superhuman Performance Podcast. And - she is passionate about peptides. Ever since she first heard about peptides at a Biohacking Conference she has been deeply immersed in educating herself about them in... Read More
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Kent Holtorf, MD
All right. This is Dr. Kent Holtorf with another episode of the Peptide Summit. Today, we are graced with the presence of Nathalie Niddam, really remarkable person, and she has a huge internet, Facebook following, and she’ll be talking about peptides for bio hackers and really talking about real life experiences, and her knowledge base is huge. She has a podcast and I’ll give you her bio, but Nathalie, thanks so much for being on.
Nathalie Niddam
Thank you so much for having me. I’m honored to be here. It’s a pleasure.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Well, thank you.
Nathalie Niddam
It’s great to meet you, finally. I’ve heard so much about you, so-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Don’t believe it. Same here, and you’re just doing great work, and the knowledge base is huge, and just your experience and hearing back from real people is great, so a little bit about Nathalie. An amazing superwoman. She’s a self proclaimed science geek with a passion for human health. She’s a certified holistic nutritionist, Apeiron Academy Epigenetic Coach, and we’ve had a number of people from Apeiron on, and is a member of the first graduating class of Bulletproof Training Institute. In her teens, she fought with ongoing health and digestive issues, as she learned many years later to tap into her body’s own healing and repair mechanisms, and now wants to share her knowledge to help others take control of their health. Her unique method blends an array of human performance fields like neuroscience, personalized nutrition, nutraceuticals, bio hacking, peptide therapies, ancestral health and resilience training. She works with an international roster of clients one on one, guiding each one to tap into their own unique genetic code to personalize supplements, nutrition and lifestyle, in order to deliver results that last for a lifetime, which is really key. Just bring it all together, and very few people, especially very few doctors, are able to do that. She’s host of the Biohacking Superhuman Performance podcast, which I suggest you check out, and she runs a large and growing health optimization community on Facebook, and she gets like 50 requests to join her Facebook a day, so my god.
Nathalie Niddam
I did for a while. Facebook took care of that.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Then this whole censorship, they knocked her down for a while. I wonder if the Kardashians get that many requests.
Nathalie Niddam
Well, yes. I’m sure they do. I think they get anymore, but anyway, I just changed the name of the group and everything got better, so-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, so it’s that whole, it’s driving me crazy with the censorship. I think the word bio hacking now is foreboding, and so Facebook, it was called Optimizing Human Performance. She lives in Toronto, and Canada’s … I don’t know who’s getting worse, US or Toronto, with all this stuff.
Nathalie Niddam
Contest rate.
Kent Holtorf, MD
With her husband and Mini labradoodle, Cole, so thank you so much for being on. I’m very excited for this interview, because you’ve been out there in the trenches and hearing back from people, and what works, what doesn’t, what their complaints are and how everything works, and other things that work with peptide. It’s not just take a peptide and live forever type thing. How did you start all this? Tell me about how it all began.
Nathalie Niddam
I guess how it all began was, growing up as a kid, I always wanted to be a doctor, and so I went to college, I studied human physiology, and it’s funny, I think I had some health issues at the time. That threw me of course a little bit, and I spent most of my career as a salesperson in the advertising world as an adult, but I was always a fitness instructor. I always had a hand in health somehow, and until one day I woke up, I was like you know what? Nobody’s paying me enough to do this. I missed science. I missed the whole … I was always fascinated by the human body, this miracle machine that we all own, even the most broken body, when you think about it. There’s so much going on in there every minute of every hour of every second, right? All these processes. Anyway, so I went back to school. I became a holistic nutritionist, and then I became … You become a nutritionist and you’re like awesome. Now I know everything I need to know. Of course, nothing could be further from the truth. You really start learning the minute you leave school. Then I became a Bulletproof coach. Then I really got fascinated by epigenetics, and then I went to a conference and I heard about peptides, and as they say, the rest is history. There’s no turning back.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, and I think, really, it’s trying to find the standard, whatever degree doesn’t make them. It’s what you learn after, and I think that’s a problem with so may physicians. They’re still practicing what they learned in medical school residency, and there’s so much to know, and the more you know, the more you know you don’t know, and we found we sent a patient back better that’ll say doctors treat for 10 years, and they go back to them. You think they’re going to be happy. They’re usually mad, and the less a doctor knows the more adamant they’re right that whatever you’re doing is just crazy, because they’ve made up their mind. Don’t confuse with the facts, so it’s continually learning, and I think there’s also a key to happiness, having a passion I think makes a big difference, and the fact that you’re just helping so many people, because we need more people like you, because you’ve got the doctors and we’re usually very geeky, and we can’t talk to patients very well and explain anything.
Nathalie Niddam
I don’t think that’s the case for you, actually.
Kent Holtorf, MD
I take it as a compliment. People go, “You don’t seem like a doctor to me.” I’m like, “Thank you. I’ll take it,” especially my younger days, a little crazy. I think that’s great, and so how did peptides, when did those come into your world?
Nathalie Niddam
They came in a few years ago now. I went to a conference. I sat in on a talk, and when you go to conferences, I don’t know about you, and especially some of the conferences I go to. Some of the ones I go to, I don’t leave the conference room. I sit there and eat up the whole thing, and then there’s the other conferences where you basically spend your whole time in the exhibition hall, because you’re … Especially some of these bio hacking ones, because all the cool stuff is out there, right? You want to know what’s new, and this one conference, and I think I went to four talks, and the one talk I went to was on peptides, and I literally sat there, I think my jaw was on the floor. It was like get out. How is this possible that this exists and I’ve never heard of it? At the time, I still believe that I had shiny object syndrome and I was like no, no, no, no. I don’t need another thing. I don’t need another course. My husband keeps telling me, “You know everything you need to know, Nat. You don’t need anything else,” and I have now redefined my shiny object syndrome as the fact that I’m just a lifelong learner. Just need new stuff all the time.
Anyway, I came home and I came, and do you know what it was? I think I heard a podcast, and it may have been a podcast with Jean-Francois Tremblay, the owner of CanLab, who I think you know, and I was like all right. That’s it.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Sponsored the summit, so …
Nathalie Niddam
Right? And he’s in Quebec, I’m in Ontario. He’s French, I speak French. I thought I’m just going to call this guy up and pick his brain, and there was no turning back after that. After that, I just-
Kent Holtorf, MD
He loves to talk, so that’s good.
Nathalie Niddam
Yes. He’s the best, so we started talking, and then I met a guy here who is a bit of a cowboy. He put me on this crazy peptide protocol that worked really well for about a month, until my immune system decided it wasn’t having certain peptides, and it’s interesting, because that experience has really shaped the way that I guide people when I help them with peptides, because one thing I’ve learned about peptides is you can’t assume that the body is necessarily ready to receive.
There are certain peptides you get a lot more latitude with, but many cases, particularly when people are very unbalanced, I don’t know what you’ve found, but I personally, and maybe, because I’m not a doctor, I’m a little more cautious. I like to give myself a little bit of time to level out the playing field as it were. Give them the time to level out the playing field from an immune system perspective before we start to introduce the other working peptides as it were.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, and I think what you found is actually very true, and even with myself, so when I was … We talked a little bit off air. Is when I was sick I was reacting to almost every peptide. Big red marks, because I was just so much of this Th2, Th17 allergic response, was just ready to go. Then as I got better I’m like hey, I can take that peptide, and so we find that, and some are more prone to it, like CJC Ipamorelin.
Nathalie Niddam
Yes. That’s the one I get calls from people in the car going, “Holy crap, what’s going on? Why am I so itchy?”
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, and the nice thing is sometimes it goes away, and like where I found a lot of mine did, but I feel like Follistatin, I still want to take that for lean muscle and stuff, which is it’s expensive and hard to find, but I still can’t do that one. I was at one time or another allergic or reacted to most everything, but then as I got better, then I wasn’t, so I think that’s very true. It sounds like you … Did you start with the immune peptides?
Nathalie Niddam
Yes, so my tendency is to start with Thymosin Alpha 1, just because, and you learn a lot also, from the people that you interview, right? So learning about Thymosin Alpha 1, how it’s even antiinflammatory, and even with people who don’t seem to have inflammation. I think we all do, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah.
Nathalie Niddam
We all have a degree of inflammation, and I’ll use things like molecular hydrogen, I think are amazing for just to balance things out, just for oxidative stress, and it’s not over antiinflammatory or antioxidant, but it just seems to be almost adaptogenic, and so you have these tools like the Thymosin Alpha 1 and the molecular hydrogens that are balancing effects. They’re not boosting or suppressing anything. They’re just allowing you to create a foundation to build from, and then it’s not even just compounds. One of the things I find in the group that I run, and I swear they must sit there going, “She’s only got … This woman sounds like a broken record,” but I keep telling them, until you’re sleeping, until we’ve helped you improve your diet, until, and I don’t care what you do. I’m fully agnostic when it comes to diet. I don’t care if you’re keto, or carnivore, or paleo, or whatever. I’m not as friendly to vegan, but whatever. I don’t care what it is, but until you’ve found that diet that works for your body and where you are today, and you’re sleeping and you’re managing your stress, and you’ve dealt with major stress problems, putting peptides into a body that’s in inflamed crazy state, with a few exceptions, it’s a little bit like sending a contractor into a burning house to fix your kitchen. It’s not going to happen.
Kent Holtorf, MD
I like that. I get so much crap from [inaudible 00:12:39] because I’m do as I say, not as I do, and Skittles for breakfast, Starburst. I exercise religiously, I don’t care rain or shine, every four months for eight minutes. I don’t care. It’s not going to get in my way, so I’m very lenient. I don’t want to be hypocritical and talk much about exercise or diet, but it really does make sense. It makes a big difference.
Nathalie Niddam
I think it does, and frankly, for me, because of what I do and my background, and do you know what? Truthfully, for me to even take on a client, it’s a mutual interview, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
It’s true. You can’t care more-
Nathalie Niddam
Are we a good fit?
Kent Holtorf, MD
About the client than they care about themselves.
Nathalie Niddam
And I used to. I used to lay awake-
Kent Holtorf, MD
It’ll kill you.
Nathalie Niddam
And not sleep, and somebody once said to me, finally, I had a friend who said to me, “Nat, if you’re working harder than your client there’s a problem.”
Kent Holtorf, MD
Or, I don’t know, you probably get this a lot too, so like at whatever, a cocktail party or something. People come like, “I’m so sick. I’ve got this and this and this,” and I’m like, “Well, you want to do this, this and this,” and, “My doctor said I don’t have that.” I’m like, “Okay. Well, how’s that working for you?” Why are you asking me? And you know they’re not going to do anything. I used to give people lab slips and all this, and they would almost never do it.
Nathalie Niddam
Well, and you’re also not doing anybody a favor, including yourself, because you’re not getting the full picture from them, they’re not getting the full picture from you, and we were talking about this earlier. I’m a little bit kidding. Peptides like Thymosin Alpha 1, BPC-157, there are certain peptides that you can use before you’ve done a lot of the hard work, because it helps people to feel better sometimes, and if we can get someone feeling better, they have a bit more energy, they’re better able to take on the work of fixing their diet and their lifestyle, and that kind of stuff, so definitely with it to a certain point. There’s a point where you can bring the peptides in just to help. Give someone a bit of a lift, so they can do the hard work, but-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Because you know a lot of people, they’re working their butt off and trying to lose weight, and then nothing works. They go screw it, forget it, but with immune modulation you just look at, as you get older and your thymus involutes, and that’s when you start getting all the chronic illness, because it modulates your immune system. Low Th1, Treg and high Th2, Th17, so increased autoimmunity, degenerative diseases, inflammation, so just doing that. Even the CDC says that 80% of the people over 50 years old have at least one chronic illness due to the involution of the thymus, so it’s like why not give people thymic peptides? Thymosin Alpha 1, Thymosin Beta-
Nathalie Niddam
Yes. They put fluoride in the water. You would think they would put Thymosin Alpha 1 in the water at this point.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, so Thymosin Alpha 1 is approved in 30 countries for everything, from cancer, chronic infections, and it’s a very good Th1 booster, which is that good immunity, that as you get older or your sick [inaudible 00:16:18] chronic infection, and then a simple way to think about it, so Th1 boosts this. Thymosin Beta 4 is the most prevalent in the body. It does both, more of a balancing, and then BPC-157. It’s not a thymic peptide, but it lowers that Th2. Now, there’s Thymulin, which I like a lot, it’s probably the most antiinflammatory, and then we have the TB4-FRAG, which is TB4, just four amino acids, which has basically the majority of the immune modulating and healing, and it’s about 10 times as potent as TB4 full chain, based on weight, and it’s totally orally available.
Nathalie Niddam
That’s really interesting, because Thymosin Beta 4, that has those seven FRAGs, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
There’s a bunch of FRAGs, and they all do different things. One part stimulates mast cells. What you don’t want, now if you give TB4, normally, it’s great for mast cells for most people, because it moderates the immune system, and all the mast cell guys, mast cell gurus, mast cell masterminds, they’re stuck on direct mast cell inhibition.
Kent Holtorf, MD
I’m like look up stream, look up stream, and in modulate you get such a better response, but for some people that one segment actually can override the other, so that the TB4-FRAG takes that out. Now, there’s another segment that grows hair, okay? And the fragment that we have does not, because it doesn’t contain that, but we also have a TB4 hair FRAG coming out, so-
Nathalie Niddam
You do? That’s exciting, and then there’s the one for musculoskeletal healing that’s very powerful, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, and so the fragment that we have has the healing and the [inaudible 00:18:10] effects.
Nathalie Niddam
I need to try that.
Kent Holtorf, MD
It’s more antifibrotic actually, than the full length, but it’s hard to compare, because it’s if you go by weight it’s 10 times as potent, so-
Nathalie Niddam
You don’t need as much, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes.
Nathalie Niddam
TB4 itself is, what? 43 amino acids. It’s a pretty big peptide.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, and so it keeps the price way down too.
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, amazing. Cool.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, and we have it coming out for pets too, so people will buy it for their pets before they buy it for themselves.
Nathalie Niddam
Let’s give it to Rover, see how he does.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, your Goldendoodle. Is he down there, laying next to you?
Nathalie Niddam
No. She’s locked up.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Okay. Do you see a particular type of patient? Or what’s your bailiwick, or your-
Nathalie Niddam
My clients, because I don’t call them patients. Not being a medical doctor, I don’t use the P word ever. In my world, I’m really working with people mostly who are looking to optimize their performance. They want to find that edge. They want to be … I don’t typically work with people who have serious illness going on. At that level, I’m referring them out to other practitioners, to get themselves to an even keel, but bottom line anybody that comes to you, you’re dealing with digestive, I’ll deal with people, obviously, with digestive issues, musculoskeletal issues, sleep issues. What else? Basic immune stuff going on, so none of the very serious things, but basically what I’m doing is I’m taking them, if their baseline is here and they’re down there, we’re getting them back to baseline, and then from there the fun begins. We start to move up the ladder [inaudible 00:20:12] and really a lot of people are coming to me also, I don’t love the term antiaging. I will use [crosstalk 00:20:19] longevity, but bottom line is what we all want, whether we articulate it or not, we want to be kicking ass, until the day we’re not, right? Just don’t, I just never, and I just had this conversation with someone. The last thing any of us want is to be incapable and dependent for the last X number years of our lives, so-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes. A nursing home with Alzheimer’s. Forget it.
Nathalie Niddam
I think a lot of it we can influence, if not 100%, of course, there’s things we don’t know and things that … And it’s in decades, right? By the time we get started, I have 50 odd years behind me of whatever I’ve done. Well, not, because for at least the last 15 I’ve been virtually perfect. Kidding, right? We can do so much to turn back the clock on this stuff.
Kent Holtorf, MD
I think it’s totally true, and we see it with Alzheimer’s patients, Parkinson’s patients. We get ALS patients coming and they’re jogging, and you send them back to the neurologist. They’re diagnosed with three different neurologists and they go, “I must have misdiagnosed this.” Do they every say, “Wow, what did you do?” It’s interesting, and we have the ability. I’m surprised that peoples’ unwillingness, let’s say they have Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s or ALS, like no, I’m fine. My doctor says I can’t do anything, and-
Nathalie Niddam
Well, they put their faith in their doctors. I have a friend who died of ALS last year, and I talk to him about peptide. Not that I would have run the protocol, because that’s above my pay grade, but I know people who work with ALS patients with peptides, and he said, “Well, my doctor’s so smart. He’s the top expert in his field. I’m going to talk to him about it,” and I’m like … His doctor had him in a clinical trial for a drug that we knew didn’t work.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, or we had a person that said, “No, I want to wait,” till this one particular clinical trial comes out. We’re offering him exosomes and peptides, and this clinical trial was on exosomes, and we’re like you can get those now, but I think it’s about making a decision. They’re so scared to make the wrong decision they make no decision and just go, “My doctor says that.”
Nathalie Niddam
Well, they put their trust in someone, right? And they do the best they can, and it’s not like, we don’t have, nobody has a cure and a guaranteed treatment, but I think that, for me, and it’s such a personal decision, but I know for me, if I had an illness that was that definitively degenerative and terminal, there’d be no stone I would leave unturned.
Kent Holtorf, MD
I agree.
Nathalie Niddam
Then I’m that bio hacker person, right? And what does bio hacker mean? To me, a bio hacker is someone who is so open to what are all the things I could be doing? And I will pull from all the disciplines. As we were talking about earlier, conventional medicine has its place. We’re very lucky to live when we and where we meet. I had a pre meet at 28 weeks. Neither of us would be here today, if it wasn’t for conventional-
Kent Holtorf, MD
I was born at six months, yes. I was supposed to be retarded or not live, so-
Nathalie Niddam
Yes, him too. Meanwhile, look at you, and he’s Mr. Rockstar over there, so-
Kent Holtorf, MD
I’ve been called the politically incorrect R word, so …
Nathalie Niddam
Don’t think so. Anyway, so I think that there’s so much more available to people now, but it takes a person with the right open mind, and also coming across someone like you. Like a practitioner who has the experience and is willing to walk that road with them, because that’s what we’re doing with … That’s what I do with my clients, that’s what you’re doing with your patients. We’re accompanying them on a journey and-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Another weird response to me is they have a terminal illness, they’ve been given a death sentence by their doctor, and then you tell them here are some things and here’s, you can talk to these people who went to the treatment, whatever, and like, well, no. It’s not covered by insurance. I’m like okay. I remember when I had horrible Lyme [inaudible 00:24:59] just hit by a freight train, just felt so bad. It doesn’t matter how much money you have. It’s like you can’t do anything, so I’m pretty much an atheist, but I said God, I know it’s a woman, because she hates me, and I said just take everything. Take everything. Just get me better. She held up her side of the bargain. I got divorced. Someone who hired Gloria Allred and I was left with less than nothing, and I’m better, so …
Nathalie Niddam
You’re better and you can make more. That’s the cool thing about money.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes. It doesn’t matter how much money you have when you’re sick. It’s worthless.
Nathalie Niddam
Yes, but people can only do what they can where they’re at. We have to meet people where they’re at and help them the best we can.
Kent Holtorf, MD
That’s very true, and I’m very ADD and want things fast, and do tons of things at the same time. A lot of people, that’s not their style, but you’ve got to go along with it.
Nathalie Niddam
Respect.
Kent Holtorf, MD
You don’t want 20 things.
Nathalie Niddam
Respect and zen, yes.
Kent Holtorf, MD
It’s true, and so how do often, or do peptides fit in your picture for your patients?
Nathalie Niddam
Look, it depends on the client and it depends on, to our discussion, it depends on their goals and where they’re at, but I would say that I will introduce peptides at any given point depending on what their journey is. If I’m dealing with digestive issues, I’m going to offer peptides up. They’re just too powerful not to.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Do you have some favorite combinations, or?
Nathalie Niddam
Yes. I would say for basic stuff, BPC-157 and KPV are these two peptides that seem to … KPV just puts out the fire, if you will, so then BPC can come in and do its things. Those are probably my favorites, but I will always use the Thymosin Alpha 1 at some point in there. When it comes to things like musculoskeletal healing, which a lot of people are dealing with, whether it’s from their workouts or sore knee, or even with arthritis, again, the BPC-157, that triad, the BPC-157, the Thymosin Beta 4, CJC Ipamorelin, that little family, that repair stack, I think we call it, people call it the wolverine stack.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, they work great together.
Nathalie Niddam
It’s just magic, right? And you put someone on BPC-157, Thymosin Beta 4, you throw in a little bit of that CJC Ipamorelin, whether you’re dealing with, you’re trying to help them with an elbow or their gut or anything else, you know that three weeks later they’re coming back to you and they go, “Yes, my stomach’s feeling better, but I’ve had this back problem for the longest time and it doesn’t hurt anymore. Is that even possible?” You’re like, “Yeah.” I didn’t want to say anything, but yeah, that’s possible.
Kent Holtorf, MD
It’s interesting, so we’ll give BPC-157. It’s funny, we’re at a conference and the head of the conference was, just yelled at my girlfriend not to do something or whatever, and then, as soon as she was limping, here, take some of these. She goes, “What is it?” And then she comes back the next day, she’s not limping and she goes, “Thank you so much. You can do whatever you want.” It’s funny, so it’s people that don’t even believe in it.
Nathalie Niddam
My husband, who is a bit of a suffering husband, he deals with my craziness and all the … I’ve got him mouth taping right now. He literally is sitting there going, “Oh my god, I can’t believe you’re doing this to me.” He doesn’t believe in any of this stuff, but he is an athlete, so he swims with the Masters Club, he plays hockey. He had this knee injury, and finally, he now couldn’t push off the wall properly when he was doing his flip turns in the pool and he said, “Okay. I’ll try that stuff,” and so I was like, “Okay. Are you sure?” And he’s like, “Yes. Just give it to me”. All I used with him was BPC-157. That’s all I did, and three days later, three days after we started, and this actually still shocking to me, but I hit him with a higher dose, and so three days in he goes for a swim. He comes back that night, and I’m not asking. I’m not asking, and he’s like, “I’m not sure, but I think that maybe my knee felt a little better in the water today.” I’m like, “Yeah, that’s interesting, but let’s wait a little longer.”
Kent Holtorf, MD
Good. Yes.
Nathalie Niddam
The next morning he went to play hockey, and he came home and he was like, “Holy crap Nat, my knee doesn’t hurt. I haven’t been able to push off like that in forever.” I’m like, “Yes, I know.” I was even surprised at how fast he responded, so not everybody’s going to respond that quickly, but he to me is the asset test for all this stuff, because he doesn’t expect anything.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes. There’s certainly no placebo effect, nocebo if anything, where-
Nathalie Niddam
Absolutely.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Expecting it not to work, or for sleep. What do you like to do for sleep?
Nathalie Niddam
For sleep, again, people ask for sleep all the time. I would say that CJC Ipamorelin, if people can tolerate it, is a really nice thing, but the truth, and DSIP, again, it’s a very complicated peptide. It’s not straight up. Epitalon is another one, because it helps to reset circadian rhythm, but this is the bottom line for sleep. If people aren’t doing the work behind sleep, if they’re not paying attention to their sleep hygiene, if they’re not wearing the blue blockers before bed, getting off the screens, stop eating a couple of hours before you go to bed, for the love of God. Just stop putting things in your mouth-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, and I think the blue blockers-
Nathalie Niddam
Whole thing-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Wifi at night.
Nathalie Niddam
Yes. Any of that stuff. I love, I’ve got this thing called the Perfect Sleep Pad on my bed, that cools my mattress. That was magic for me, when I got that thing, so I find with sleep and peptides it’s very hit and miss, because fundamentally, if we’re not taking care of the house here, I don’t know that peptides do that much.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, but I love the combination of delta sleep inducing peptide, Epitalon and either CJC Ipamorelin, growth hormone, AOD, and it can be magic for some people, but it’s not a sleep med where you take it and you sleep. It takes a couple weeks, and then really, if you look at the Epitalon, actually, KPV, the delta sleep, they’re reducing inflammation in the hypothalamus, and that’s where it’s like …
Kent Holtorf, MD
With inflammation hypothalamus, like with the Lyme patient stuff, it’s just you can’t shut
anything down, and the [inaudible 00:32:08] where they find like if you just put a phone in the middle of rats for nine days they get lesions in the hippocampus, in their brain. And it just activates the heck out of it, so they can never get to sleep, and that combination can be a godsend I think.
Nathalie Niddam
Yes. Well, just getting people to turn their phones off at night is a thing, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, and get that away, put it on airplane mode, get it away, blue blockers, and then turning off the wifi. I’ve had people that don’t even believe it. I said, “Just try it.” This one guy came back and he goes, “I didn’t believe it, and then I forgot to do it one night. I didn’t sleep. I’m like oh my god,” but I think EMS are a much bigger problem.
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah. I do think some people are more sensitive to wifi than others.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Very much.
Nathalie Niddam
It doesn’t, but definitely. Look, but again, with the sleep, people have to be willing to go at it, because it’s multifactorial. That is one thing you cannot throw a peptide at it and think it’s going to work.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes. Although-
Nathalie Niddam
You could get lucky, but-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, I find, because I’ll stay up two days to finish a project or whatever. I’ve been at it my whole life, because I’ve had Lyme my whole life and I didn’t sleep anyways, and what I found really helps from, where you just get that brain mush where you can’t do anything and you’re just irritable, is basically the Cerebrolysin, which you can’t get with CerebroPep, 5 amino 1 MQ, Dihexa, Selank. The brain peptides and the mitochondrial peptides, MOTS-c.
Nathalie Niddam
MOTS-c, yeah.
Kent Holtorf, MD
They keep your brain working, where otherwise they’re mush, and I know it’s the … I don’t sleep for two days, it’s like okay, I know. I feel like I’m aging, but at least I can keep my brain, because everyone’s yelling at me you’ve got to get this done. It’s a month late. Supposed to be on a talk and they text me, “Ready to go on?” I’m like, “What do you mean?”
Nathalie Niddam
What, now?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, but I’ve learned that I can do that. I’m not saying it’s a good thing to do, but it really helps.
Nathalie Niddam
Well, even DSIP in some ways mitigates the effects of lack of sleep, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
It does. It lowers that inflammation, so much-
Nathalie Niddam
Exactly.
Kent Holtorf, MD
And then it will also reduce insulin resistance, so all those reduce hypothalamic inflammation, which is the cause of so many problems. Insulin resistance, chronic pain, insomnia. We did a review article [inaudible 00:34:56] chronic fatigue syndrome and fibromyalgia, and we found that they’re very similar. The only difference between fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome, really, the same illness, but the fibromyalgia patients had more inflammation of the hypothalamus, whereas the chronic fatigue syndrome patient, more inflammation in the pituitary, which makes the pain centers there, but they all had low hormones, low thyroid, even though they’re-
Nathalie Niddam
Low growth hormone, right? Which was why the CJC Ipamorelin would be so magical for these guys. Just assuming that it’ll respond to the stimulus.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Right, and that’s the thing, so some people it doesn’t, but then you give the other stuff and now CJC Ipamorelin works.
Nathalie Niddam
Yes. Nice.
Kent Holtorf, MD
So big thing is gut, and then musculoskeletal. Do you treat the neurodegenerative diseases, things like that?
Nathalie Niddam
Not typically, no. I’ll support them, but that’s not my zone of genius particularly, so I will work with a practitioner on that stuff, because there’s so much of the lifestyle and the diet and the … There’s so much of the other stuff has to be taken care of. I did work with a Parkinson’s patient a few years ago, but that was before I even knew about peptides, but even then, just with molecular hydrogen, it’s amazing what we were able to do.
Kent Holtorf, MD
What has been your feedback on that?
Nathalie Niddam
Molecular hydrogen?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes.
Nathalie Niddam
I’ve got to tell you I’m pretty amazed at that stuff. I had a guy last year, I had two clients last year that had really bad arthritis in their feet, which was weird. I’d never had people with bad arthritis in their feet. Well, actually, I had three. Three people with arthritis in their foot or their ankle, and the first two I started with molecular hydrogen, and both of them experienced an incredible reduction in pain. One of them was willing to do the BPC-157 and he just about fell over, and he was using your product. He was using the oral. He wouldn’t touch a needle, so we had him do the oral and it fixed his gut. It fixed so many things, and then the third one, she came to me out of my group and she was looking for peptides, so we did molecular hydrogen, BPC, Thymosin Beta 4, CJC Ipamorelin, and you know what? I didn’t hear from her for about a month, and then I get an email from her and I was like, “Oh no.”
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, you don’t know, is it good or bad?
Nathalie Niddam
She was a new person. She was like, “I feel 20 years younger. I haven’t had energy like this and I’m … ” And she was gushing. I’m sleeping and I forget that my foot even has arthritis. I can walk. She was, and I was sitting there going, “Yes, I know,” but I didn’t-
Kent Holtorf, MD
That’s a thing you heard so much. Yes, I know.
Nathalie Niddam
Even then, and so I find with, molecular hydrogen is one of those products I feel is supportive with the peptides. It just helps the-
Kent Holtorf, MD
It’s the ultimate antioxidant, right?
Nathalie Niddam
It’s an adaptogen, right? It doesn’t overdo it. It doesn’t. As a signaling molecule, it just seems to flip the right switches.
Kent Holtorf, MD
And is there a particular brand you like?
Nathalie Niddam
I support Alex Tarnava, who’s the Drink HRW guy, because I love the work that he does, and he’s the one that came up with the formula for the tablets that dissolve in the water.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, I haven’t tried. I use for colas, but yeah.
Nathalie Niddam
They’re all the same. They’re all coming out of the same factory.
Kent Holtorf, MD
The same thing?
Nathalie Niddam
The only thing is that Alex has, he’s developed a tablet that you drop into bathwater, so you can soak and you can absorb transdermally, and that’s a really cool product for people who have any kind of skin ailments or arthritis. That kind of stuff, and then the other thing that I use is, but this is for people who are willing to invest in hardware as it were, is I interviewed on my podcast George Wiseman, who developed the AquaCure machine, which is the Brown’s Gas machine, which is like molecular hydrogen. Only different, and that thing produces crazy results for people.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Wow. I’m going to have to check that out.
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, it’s these electron … When you put the anode and the cathode in the waters to make molecular hydrogen, if you don’t have a membrane between them it creates this fourth phase of water, which is not the fourth phase of water that [inaudible 00:39:49] talks about. This is a different one, and he describes it almost as a gel, and it’s this electron charged, this charged water, and so you can inhale the gas, you can drink the water, you can use it topically. I’ve seen some pretty cool stuff happen with that stuff, but it’s more of a commitment.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Do you like ozone?
Nathalie Niddam
I love ozone. I have a little ozone generator that I’m supposed to put in my sauna. Only it’s stuck in Florida, where I have not been able to get ever since.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, even I think it’s wrecked ozone. Ozone water. It’s the opposite on the spectrum of hydrogen, but it ends up doing the same thing.
Nathalie Niddam
They all balance out, right? I don’t typically use a lot of ozone in my practice. I’ve found that the molecular hydrogen, it’s just been with the peptides they all-
Kent Holtorf, MD
A lot easier too, yeah.
Nathalie Niddam
And people are more accepting of it. It’s easier for them to use it.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes. I totally agree. You probably get a lot of weight loss issues, and increased performance. What are some of your go to things?
Nathalie Niddam
On the weight loss front, it really depends again on, and I know that a lot of people will use the MOTS-c, they’ll use the 5 amino 1 MQ, stuff like that. I will sometimes also call in things like [inaudible 00:41:08] which is a derivative of [inaudible 00:41:12] more for people who have, and it’s really about what are the levers we need to push, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Do you get increase in myelocytes with that?
Nathalie Niddam
Very little, and at least-
Kent Holtorf, MD
PT-141, yeah, you’ve got to watch out.
Nathalie Niddam
You do, but I think it’s more when you live in a sunny climate. When you live in Canada, like me, unless it’s summer. If it’s the summertime, like last summer I did a run of [inaudible 00:41:43] just to play with it for a while. I had the best tan ever, and I have to be careful with [inaudible 00:41:49] because if I inject it I get a stain at the injection site, which took me a while to figure out, and by the time I figured it out I had a few spots on my belly, so I’ll use it intra nasally.
Kent Holtorf, MD
It’s good for younger people, if you have dark spots, and I get it. I’m ADD, so I’m like this isn’t working and I’m doing the cream, but also there’s the delay, and oh my god, I was the weirdest looking, I don’t know, from African, whatever. Everyone’s like, “What the heck?”
Nathalie Niddam
Well, if you don’t get somebody else giving you feedback, you can go over the line. You just walk around looking like you spent far too much time in the sun-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, then [inaudible 00:42:35] so I was blue, which I can talk about it, because I wrote a paper on [inaudible 00:42:44] silver hydrosol, which was great. I was doing liters at a time and you can’t turn blue. It basically flushes out. Another doctor convinced me to do this other product, which actually is the silver sol silver protein with suppository in the skin, and all of a sudden I was a smurf. It’s really considered irreversible, and then I took dapsone and I got methemoglobinemia, and then I was fluorescent blue, and I took-
Nathalie Niddam
You really are a bio hacker, aren’t you? These are the stories of the bio hacking community, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Oh, I’ve almost-
Nathalie Niddam
That happened.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, and it was like oh my god. It looked like I had makeup on, blue smurf makeup.
Nathalie Niddam
You’re like that X-Men character, the blue one.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, so it’s funny for a couple, like … And then, even after, till finally, it doesn’t chelate out, but I found a lot of things helped [inaudible 00:43:48] and a lot of things, that if I got a laser, like oh my god. It’s like a tattoo, because it was silver. You’d think I would be totally immune to any infection, at least skin infection, because it’s embedded with silver, but it’s pretty much gone now, but it’s, again, thought to be irreversible, so-
Nathalie Niddam
Wow. Well, you don’t look blue now. Anyway, but to answer your question, on the weight loss side, I use a very light hand with the peptides, because I really believe it comes down to balancing peoples’ hormones. That’s the other piece we haven’t even really talked about yet, but if checking in on those hormones to make sure that they’re balanced, and then again the sleep. It sounds so basic, but if you’re not sleeping, if you’re eating the wrong foods, if you’re not moving, if you’re not getting outside, you’re not seeing the light, you’re going to stay stuck. And so I don’t love to bring the big guns in, until we’ve done the work, but things like [inaudible 00:44:49] can be helpful for people, so that we take away that constant need to eat while we’re building the good habits. So that, when we can take it away, they now know exactly what they’re doing. We’ve balanced the blood sugar, we’ve gotten rid of the cravings, we’ve taught the habits and they’re ready to fly on their own.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, and we started as a thyroid clinic, because it helped so much, and so many people who are lower thyroid even have normal TSH, and we’ll check everyone’s base of metabolic rate and their, basically, see the relaxation phase of their [inaudible 00:45:26] which is shown by the British Medical Journal to be better tests, the blood test. We’ve actually been trying to develop this test for 15 years, which will show that the THS, I’ve written review articles, which are available on our nonprofit National Academy of Hypothyroidism, but when people say, “I have no metabolism. I’ve wrecked my metabolism,” and people, “Yes, sure. You’re eating dingdongs in the closet.” Is that we find they’re usually about 25% low, so in order just to stay even they have to basically restrict 500 calories a day, and if they don’t they’re going to gain basically-
Nathalie Niddam
It’s a race to the bottom, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah.
Nathalie Niddam
It just gets worse and worse and worse, and so-
Kent Holtorf, MD
It drops more, so we find T3, if you don’t supplement with thyroids, keep your metabolism up, that longterm weight loss is very difficult.
Nathalie Niddam
Absolutely. Yeah, because you just keep hitting these new lower set points, and that’s the thing I was going to say. I’m not going to give [inaudible 00:46:25] to someone who is already not eating enough, so it’s really understanding what it is that’s going on and what are the mechanisms that are working against the person? Before you can really help them, because the people who come to us for weight loss, you know this, the people who come to us for weight loss are not the people who can go run around the block and eat a little less, and lose five pounds in a week.
Kent Holtorf, MD
They’ve tried that. They’ve been on every diet.
Nathalie Niddam
They’ve hit that wall. There’s nothing. They just can’t. They have nowhere left to turn, so clearly moving more eating less is not their solution.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Calories in calories out is not true for a ton of people, to some degree.
Nathalie Niddam
Yes. Within reason, but I think it’s like everything else, right? Both are true. If you’re metabolically healthy, and you’re overeating and not burning enough, you’re going to put on weight, and if you stop overeating and you move more you’ll be fine, but most of the people-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes, you give someone a steroid, Prednisone. They’re eating the same, but they just gain weight.
Nathalie Niddam
They go up, yeah.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Turn on, so we do find a lot of people, what we’re finding, these people are not even insulin, but leptin resistance, so leptin goes up when you gain weight. Goes back to the brain, should go back to the brain and tell your brain hey, we’ve got enough stored energy. Let’s increase metabolism, increase your thyroid, lower your appetite, burn fat, but you find people with high leptin, just like people with high insulin resistance, the brain doesn’t see it. So your brain thinks your body’s starving, so it’s increasing your appetite, telling the body to store fat, lowers your thyroid, lowers your metabolism.
Nathalie Niddam
Communication problem.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Which is really the hypothalamic inflammation.
Nathalie Niddam
Again, yeah. That’s why using that TA1 so often works, because it brings down inflammation.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah. Inflammation is the killer. Let’s see, so where do peptides rank in your whole thing? I’m sure lifestyle is-
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah. They’re right up there. It’s like asking me to pick my favorite child. That’s an impossible question.
Kent Holtorf, MD
I can do that easily.
Nathalie Niddam
No, but I think what I’ll say about peptides is they’ve changed my practice. They’ve changed my ability to be effective with people, because they’re the tiebreaker. They’re the game changer. They’re the thing that, it’s like it was the missing key for so many different things, and certainly on musculoskeletal healing stuff. You can give people essential amino acids, you can give them bone broth and collagen and use all this stuff, but when you can bring a peptide onboard for some of those things. Like I’ve had a couple of people that I’ve helped, where I’ve had orthopedic surgeons be dumbfounded by-
Kent Holtorf, MD
They’ll never admit it.
Nathalie Niddam
Well, actually, in one case he’s like, “All right. Bring me the papers.” I don’t know what he did with it in the end, but-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah. Okay.
Nathalie Niddam
This is a woman who had a nonunion joint fracture in her wrist and was heading for surgery, and she actually was in my Bulletproof class and she had heard that I was doing something with this weird stuff called peptides, and so she called me up and I said, “Okay. Well,” and I gave her, again, it was a fairly aggressive protocol, because we didn’t have a lot of time. I think it took eight weeks, and she went for her next x-ray and she didn’t need surgery. She was like, “I … ” And she’s in the medical field herself, and she was like, “I can’t even believe this, that this is even possible,” and I’m like, “Me neither,” because I was like, “Okay. Well, we’ll try it out”. And then my brother recently had a full tear in his quad. His knee was a disaster. It was his fourth major joint. He had both shoulders and the other knee done, but in his case we used peptides, but we also used hormones. We optimized his hormones-
Kent Holtorf, MD
I think that they go together, totally.
Nathalie Niddam
His surgeon had told him he would not get full range back in his leg, and three months after his surgery he went back and the guy was, again, oh my god. How did that even happen? Emotion.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, and with Lyme I had the same thing. I was supposed to get both hips replaced, rotator cuff. Everything was just shredded, and this was years ago, but I went to the orthopedist upstairs and he goes, “Well, yeah. You need surgery,” and he’s limping, and then I ask him, “Well … ” He goes, “I had the same surgery.” I’m like, “Well, why are you limping?” He goes, “Well, my bone collapsed and I was in traction. I got nerve impingement,” and I’m like, “Are you recommending that?” I said, “What about PRP and stem cells or anything else?” No.they don’t work, and did it. Within a year, 80% better. After a couple of years, basically back to normal, that I was doing every six months, whatever. Stem cells, peptides. We used a lot, ozone-
Nathalie Niddam
I was going to say. Yeah, like AOD9604 with hyaluronic acid in a joint is, but that’s not work I can do. That’s work I can refer people out to. You need someone who’s-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, and stem cells exosomes are great, ozone, and it’s cheap, and so a lot of things work, but I’ve never had surgery, and I could not lift my arm up of that, and they don’t want to believe, but even you mentioned a game changer for your practice. When I had Lyme and I did three and a half years the highest dose IV antibiotic, seven at a time, three, four times a dose. Was never any better, and that’s why I went out looking for things. I went to Europe and found peptides, like oh my god. I was in heart failure and I couldn’t stand up straight, so I’m walking hunched over, and the cardiologist said you can maybe get 10% better in 10 years, and that’s like I can’t live like this. And then after I start taking them, after even a couple days, I felt a little change. I’m like something’s weird, and then I show up at his office a year later and it’s pretty much normal, and he’s like, “Wow, that’s interesting.” Doesn’t ask me what it was.
Nathalie Niddam
That radical remission thing, right? There’s a whole book, radical remission.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, a miracle, and that’s what doctors will say. They’ll say you’d rather believe it’s a miracle.
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, you’re an outlier. We can’t explain it. Yeah.
Kent Holtorf, MD
And so it’s really totally transformed our practice, because, like with Lyme disease, we have been treating a lot of that and we use, antibiotics have their place, but with Horowitz is awesome. Huge dose of antibiotics and that. Is we use them selectively, and we found if your immune system is so low, that Th1 is natural killer cell function, which monitors your body for infections and cancer, for cellular infections. Mine was zero, and where I was in the ICU with sepsis and the nurse outside, I hear her talk to the other one. “This is the guy with AIDS, but he keeps coming up negative for HIV,” and I’m like, because the doctors did not believe in Lyme, so I’m like fine. I don’t know what it is. Tell me what it is. It’s like no interest, but yeah, and so it doesn’t matter how many antibiotics, because antibiotics never kill everything. Your immune system has to take over, and so until you get your immune system up here the antibiotics will work, because it can knock it down here and your immune system take over.
Nathalie Niddam
I think what’s amazing about peptides and what we learn as we go is that, because they’re not ultimately foreign to the body, they aren’t … Unlike a drug that’s basically trying to do something for your body or to your body, and to your point there’s a place for antibiotics. Sometimes the bacterial or viral load is just too high. There’s just too much for the body to deal with, but what the peptide does, it enables the body to do what the body does, and what the body can do we have yet to be able to reproduce, so if you can play those levers appropriately, so that you’re using the antibiotics or whatever it is appropriately without crushing the body, and then bringing in something like a peptide that signals the body and reminds the body we know how to do this. I belong. I’m from here. They’re all in some way, shape or form native to the body. They all are extracted from naturally occurring compounds in our bodies, so what you’re really doing is just reawakening the body’s ability to do what it can do innately. I think that’s why we see such amazing things with peptides.
Kent Holtorf, MD
And they’re all, they don’t get, they’re not known for this, but they’re so antimicrobial. And like, for instance, BPC compared to Acyclovir for herpes viruses, outperformed it one one thousandth the dose.
Nathalie Niddam
Really?
Kent Holtorf, MD
KPV for fungus, bacteria, parasites, TB4 also has the indirect, because raising the immune system, but also directly shown to be very antiviral and antimicrobial overall, so they have a lot of other effects that we don’t even think of them about.
Nathalie Niddam
Right, or then you get like an LL-37, right? But that one you have to treat, LL-37 we have to give a lot of respect-
Kent Holtorf, MD
I hear you, so when I first did LL-37 there was no dosing. I could not find any study on dose. I’d call people, no one knows, so I just draw it up out of the syringe and I take it, and I go to work, and oh my god. I jump out of my skin, and then I had this guy was now my partner. Was going to go to peptides, but he was a drug rep at the time, and he’s like, “I’ve never seen anyone like this,” and I’m seeing patients and I’m just like, with a panic attack. I’m like, “How are you today?” I’m just taking all this GABAAR and all this stuff, so I took probably 50 times the dose, so we’re very careful with LL-37. We start that later. It can be a great addition.
Nathalie Niddam
Well, it’s the cleanup crew, right? It’s like VIP. It’s the cleanup crew comes in at the end and finishes the job kind of thing.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes. It also boosts stem cell function, as does TB4. BPC will increase growth of receptors on cells, so you get even a better effect. Everything in medicine I think is a vicious cycle, and the nice thing with BPC too, it’s like you were saying, homeostatic. If your blood pressure’s low it raises it, if your blood pressure’s too high it lowers it. If you’re hypercoagulable it improves it. If you can’t quite, it improves it. We’re just starting a study on POTS in the peptides, so we’re trying-
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, it should be. Isn’t VIP also really great for POTS?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah. A lot of … I haven’t used too much VIP, because I can’t get over the fact that it raises Th2 immunity, which is-
Nathalie Niddam
Right. You have to be careful with it, yeah.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Plus, it’s a Shoemaker thing, who’s not my favorite. He’s brilliant, but … I have some bias there.
Nathalie Niddam
You’ve got to take the good from all the places, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
You do, and so I try to put that out of my mind, but I’m like … You probably just hear so many great stories. You’re probably just like yeah, yeah, yeah-
Nathalie Niddam
I think, in our business, we never get tired of the good stories, right? You can never get jaded, because there’s always going to be another amazing story around the corner that you didn’t expect, so I think that what I love about what I do is witnessing what is possible, and it’s a gift. Really, it’s a joy. I feel very grateful to be able to do what I do, and to be able to hold space for people while they do what they do, and just to be a part of this world. I just think it’s amazing-
Kent Holtorf, MD
I think that’s the attitude you have to have, and what kills me, that you can help 1,000 people and miracles, save all these lives, and one person, totally nuts, they give you a bad Yelp, I take it so personally. It’s always like, “That’s not what happened.”
Nathalie Niddam
That’s not fair.
Kent Holtorf, MD
And you can’t say anything, because you can’t mention anything, so those things drive me crazy, and the paperwork and the bureaucracy, and just basically censorship of information. Why is now Google the arbitrar of basically medical truth? Give me a total break on that, but that’s a whole other, I can’t get going on that.
Nathalie Niddam
We can do that a whole other discussion on that. I think the world is, there’s a lot of craziness going on right now. We just have to do the best that we can and people will find us.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yes. I think that’s a great attitude. Let’s talk real quick about bio regulators.
Nathalie Niddam
I love bio regulators. I think bio regulators are, and I don’t know that we know as much as we could about bio regulators just yet, but-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Can you define bio regulators, or tell everyone what you’re talking about?
Nathalie Niddam
Well, the way I think of bio regulators, honestly, is they, and these have really come out of the work of Dr. Khavinson in Russia, and it’s these tiny, in very many cases, some of the most powerful ones are three amino acids. Like Epitalon is, what? Three amino acids long, and they address a system or an organ. I haven’t particularly used them therapeutically myself, but the way I’ve used them is I will build stacks for clients who are at a point where they’re in a fairly homeostatic state. They’re in a pretty good place, and I’m like, look, for a couple of times a year we’re just going to do a little refresh on the house as it were, so we’re going to use Epitalon to reset our circadian rhythm. The invitation to people is pick a period of time whee you have some control over your life, so that you can allow your body to do that reboot, so you can get the rest that you need, so that, that circadian cycle can reset. The pineal gland gets that little renewal. You get normalization of melatonin, and people are like, well, and then it’s supposed to help with growth hormone and bone density, and blah-blah-blah. Well, that’s all the melatonin, because if your melatonin’s regulated, you’re sleeping better, your growth hormone’s going to come up, and if you’ve got more growth hormone onboard, well, your bone density is going to improve, and your sense of wellbeing and your-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Reduction in cancer and cardiovascular disease, and so-
Nathalie Niddam
Mortality, yeah.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Some nice studies on cardiovascular rates, over 65, fought it for 15 years, and they found that the cardiovascular function got better, especially when you combine it with thymosin, that it got better, rather than worse in the control group, and significantly less cancer, less mortality, morbidity, so it’s probably ultimate antiaging peptide.
Nathalie Niddam
It is, but then you add in the CardioGen for the heart, you add the liver. Whose liver couldn’t use a helping hand right now? You do the cycle of Livogen and PancraGen, and so you address the organ system, the Vesugen for the blood vessels, so-
Kent Holtorf, MD
I tried that. It’s hard to know if it does anything.
Nathalie Niddam
You’re not going to feel, so you know what’s really cool? I just recorded a podcast with the SVP of this, I don’t know if you’ve come across the Biostrap, which is … The Biostrap is, and I’m thinking I want to do a round of Vesugen when the thing comes out, so Biostrap is a health tracker. It’s a band that you wear and it’s got the sensor, it’s got the red light. It measures your sleep, it measures your SPO2, it measures your HRV. It does all this stuff, but the other metric that they can access with these sensors, because of how powerful they are, is they can look at arterial elasticity, your arterial stiffness and age, and so how interesting would it be to wear a Biostrap, look at that metric, and then do a round or two of Vesugen and see if it actually made any difference? Now, it’s not going to make a difference. I don’t know. This is literally I’m asking the question. I don’t know.
Kent Holtorf, MD
We had one, a device that did that, and then it broke and we couldn’t get anyone to fix it, but I loved it, because it really tells you where you are. We also were doing vascular ultrasounds, looking at all the blood vessels. Now, if you typically do them and send it to, basically, a standard radiography group and radiologist, they’re so used to just looking for big plaques and stuff, that they don’t say there’s a little intermedial thickness, thickening, because they just think that’s normal, but we did it in our office, we could pick that out for people, and it’s like look. You’ve got, this is early heart disease and cardiovascular disease, and great. We lost our tech and I can’t find another tech, but I love that stuff, and the arterial-
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, so I think there’s so much we can still learn from it, and I think Vesugen, I think it’s a real interesting peptide. Like my husband has got, recently developed Raynaud’s disease, so his fingers will turn white in the cold, which is not a good thing when you live where we live, and I’m like we’re getting our hands on some Vesugen. I’m really curious to see, and, of course, what’s interesting about the bio regulators is you can use them on that 20 day or 10 day cycle a couple times a year, but you can also use a much higher dose for a shorter time when you’re looking for more of a therapeutic benefit.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah. Now, you’re husband, are you sure he’s not infected? He needs some new modulators, because when I had Lyme, oh my god, I had Raynaud’s so bad. I couldn’t shake anyone’s hand. Now it’s gone, but-
Nathalie Niddam
Got to meet them where they are my friend.
Kent Holtorf, MD
He’s not going to do it. You’ve got to tell him not to take it. Then he’ll-
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, exactly. Don’t you ever touch that bottle.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, but we’re liking a number. We’ve been testing them out, like the Epitalon we love. We’re concerned about oral viability, if you take it orally, but Pinealon actually is good. The Vilon, which is basically, it’s only two amino acids. How does it do all this? And it’s a great immune modulator, and we found that actually in our thymus extract, where we actually isolated the TB4 FRAG, and it’s expensive to isolate something and concentrate it, but there’s Vilon in there, so that. We’re going to be doing that, and then out of pituitary extract and the Pinealon. We’re loving those and we’re seeing good effects. 10 years ago I was doing Cortigen injections. I don’t know how the bioavailability is, because it’s a 4 amino acid, but-
Nathalie Niddam
Yes, so I use the injectable ones right now. I did send some of the oral [CardioGen 01:07:28] to my parents, but I typically, but you know, going back to what you said about the smallest peptides and how they seem to be the most powerful, look at GHK, which is this, again, it’s three amino acids, and yet it seems to … It’s so little it seems to have a receptor in every tissue in the body, and be able to up regulate some kind of function or effect.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, and you know what’s interesting? With a lot of these small peptides they can’t find the receptor and one study I was looking at it seemed to be harmonic, so it vibrated and then stimulated. I’m thinking what do EMS do to that? You know?
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, I get scared, but some of those like Tylon and thymogen definitely works. We’ve had a lot of that, in the thymic extract, and then the Pinealon we’re liking [inaudible 01:08:25] of course, is great. Yeah. Let’s see. What else? Yeah, so we’re going to be incorporating a lot of those, because I think it’s amazing that something that small, and they’re also resistant to digestion.
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, that’s very interesting, right? Because we find them as an oral product in the … You have to bring them in from Russia or wherever, because there’s nobody, other than you right now, that’s starting to work-
Kent Holtorf, MD
We’re making sure they absorb and all that stuff, but yeah, so-
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, but mostly we don’t find them typically in the oral form-
Kent Holtorf, MD
They’re very expensive orally.
Nathalie Niddam
Well, I think it’s because they have to use a higher dose, because you’re going to have some loss, right? Typically, so-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, but for 14 days, this VisuGen that I got, I was like damn.
Nathalie Niddam
Ouch. As you said, without health what’s money worth, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
I agree, but I wasn’t sure if it was working, so I’m going to check out that Biostrap.
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah. It’s the new Biostrap EVO, and so they haven’t launched that feature to the public yet. They’re going to be going into a testing phase with something called Heart Lab, and that’ll be the one that can report back on the peripheral arterial elasticity and age, but they’ve done a couple, even really interesting clinical studies, because they’re providing clinical grade data, so you’ve got hospitals that are using it. They have the kids’ hospital in LA, was able to use the Biostrap, and I think they found a new marker that’s for kids with sickle cell anemia, that is-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Does it do heart rate variability?
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, and when it reports heart rate variability you get 1,000 points on the graph, so it’s reporting, it’s measuring your heart rate variability all night long.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Is it for home use, where people-
Nathalie Niddam
I don’t have it. It’s plugged in upstairs. Literally, it looks like a Fitbit, but it doesn’t have a face or anything. It’s just a-
Kent Holtorf, MD
What’s the cost of it?
Nathalie Niddam
239 bucks. It’s crazy, because people say all these things are so expensive, and I’m like can you imagine that you’re wearing something on your wrist for $239 that’s reporting back to you what your blood oxygen saturation rate was all night long? It’s telling you-
Kent Holtorf, MD
You go to the hospital and get that-
Nathalie Niddam
Right. Resting heart rate all night long, and so you can figure out I’m not breathing really well these days. It’s almost like maybe I need to go get that checked out.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, checking sleep apnea. Yeah. It’s funny, so we’re getting a plasmapheresis machine and it’s funny, so I was traveling around getting plasmapheresis. Usually 3,500. I went to the hospital and I said how much is for one plasmapheresis? They go, “I don’t know, but you get 80% off.” I’m like, “That’s nice, but can I get the price?” She comes back and she says, “It’s $35,000.” I’m like, “So 80% off,” she goes, “No. That’s with the 80% off.”
Nathalie Niddam
Like thanks. I’m good.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, so just that’s our healthcare system. That’s another thing, don’t get me started with. We are the least free market healthcare system almost in the world, and everyone’s like socialize medicine. You don’t have the opportunity to negotiate the price of a med or … We’re insulated. We think we’re free market. It’s crazy, and you don’t even know the price until you’re done. You just get the bill.
Nathalie Niddam
Which is actually crazy, right? We don’t have that in … We’ve got our own problems here, but-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah, so I actually submitted healthcare reform and it was supposed to be published in the, what’s it? Major medical publication, the publication. Oh my god, I’m blanking out. Anyways, but then they pulled at the last minute. I could tell, and then I actually got it through some finagling to Paul Ryan. Not biggest fan, but he wrote back and I just signed a thing saying I won’t quote him or anything, but this was officially from him. He says, “Your plan’s very well thought out, but do you know how many people are slurping from the trough of healthcare? They will never go anywhere.”
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah. It’s unfortunate. It’s the politicization of healthcare is a sad thing, but it all comes down to the same thing, right?
Kent Holtorf, MD
Yeah. I think it’s individual responsibility and caring about your own healthcare.
Nathalie Niddam
And that’s where I think that the work that we do, I think that the work of helping people to upgrade their health, so that they don’t have to rely on healthcare, is the most important work we can be doing right now, and especially these days. Especially these days, and at the same time it’s about people being willing to take responsibility. It’s a little bit what you were talking about earlier. Unfortunately, we still have a mentality. We want to believe that we can just go to someone else and give them full responsibility for our health, and everything’s going to be okay, and the truth is that you are the master of your domain and you’ve got to take care of that house first. You have to own that-
Kent Holtorf, MD
Better for yourself and you’ve got to realize the medical system … I used to get very mad at doctors, but they’re also put in a system where there’s no incentive to do anything different. You look like Kaiser. Well, with the lowest 20% of non cost effective doctors, meaning doctors that are writing for labs, making diagnosis, using treatments, and so they get these doctors just to do nothing. And then, also, so for a doctor, if he … It’s better for them to say, “I don’t believe in that,” because they can go home and sleep. If they believe in something, but say, “I’m not going to treat it,” they’re a bad person, right?
Nathalie Niddam
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Kent Holtorf, MD
So it’s like with all these, chronic Lyme, chronic fatigue syndrome. Like psychologically I don’t believe in that, because they can’t do anything about it, so it’s much easier to think that way, but it’s a tough system. They’re miserable, but they don’t-
Nathalie Niddam
They’re working hard. Yeah, they’re working hard, so … Anyway, that’s why you do what you do. That’s why everybody [inaudible 01:15:22]
Kent Holtorf, MD
This was awesome. I think you’re just doing such an amazing job, and just really get it and understand what people need, and really how to get them better on their own terms, so you’re a good, you have so many different hats. Psychologist, and just know so much about so many things and how to help these people, and always obviously continually learning and that, so my hat goes off to you, and my praises.
Nathalie Niddam
And to you.
Kent Holtorf, MD
We need more people like you, so what’s the name of the Facebook group?
Nathalie Niddam
So the new name of the Facebook group is Optimizing Superhuman Performance, because just being human’s not enough, so that’s the Facebook group. So you can find me there or-
Kent Holtorf, MD
So you just search that? I know nothing about Facebook. I don’t-
Nathalie Niddam
No, you should, so it got to the point where you could no longer find the group, even with search, but now it’s Optimizing Superhuman Performance. You should be able to find it. If you can’t find the group, you can find me under my name on Instagram, which is just Nathalie Niddam, or I’ve got a website, natniddam.com. So I’ve had people now, because of the podcast, reaching out, because they couldn’t find the group, they’re coming into my website and sending me notes.
Kent Holtorf, MD
That’s scary. Yeah, so it’s N-I-D-D-A-M, just so everyone knows.
Nathalie Niddam
Yeah, N-I-D-D-A-M.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Well, awesome. Again, thank you so much. I learned a lot. I think this was great, and just keep doing what you’re doing.
Nathalie Niddam
Thank you, and thank you so much for having me. This was great. Thanks so much.
Kent Holtorf, MD
Thank you. Great.
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