1879. Vitamin B12 & Metabolic Syndrome: What the Research Says

Join Dr. Martin in today's episode of The Doctor Is In Podcast.

 

TRANSCRIPT OF TODAY'S EPISODE

Announcer:  You're listening to The Doctor Is In Podcast, brought to you by MartinClinic.com. During the episode, the doctors share a lot of information. As awesome as the info may be, it is not intended to diagnose, cure, treat, or prevent any disease. It's strictly for informational purposes.

Dr. Martin:  Well, good morning, everyone. How are you? And once again, welcome to another live this morning. Nice to have you on.

We appreciate you guys very, very much. Thanks for coming on. We appreciate it more than you know. Okay, so I want to do a couple of studies this morning.

Okay. And this is interesting because I think I brought this to you. I know I have, I'm sure I have. But I saw it again yesterday and I said, you know what, I got a comment on this.

And it's important to look at this. Okay. Now, you know how much I love A1C. Okay.

I'm going to say, put your hand up if you know I love A1C. I was talking to somebody yesterday and I said, I learned so much from A1C. Okay. I probably, I don't know.

One of the guys that emphasizes this more than probably anyone else. Because it just tells you if you're above 5.4, you're on the Titanic. Don't fool yourself. You can get blood work.

Your doctor won't even question you if you want A1C. I mean, generally, it's, you can get it. It's easy test to get. Anytime you get a blood test, please get your A1C because it tells you a lot of things.

Now, I brought this to you in the past. So I'm just going to mention it again. Okay. This came out of a study a couple of years ago.

I was reviewing some notes and I said, you know what, brain degeneration. Okay. This was the study. Brain degeneration.

The brain starts shrinking at 5.5 A1C. Okay. Now, remember what A1C is. It's glycated hemoglobin.

It sounds complicated, but it's not. Sugar attaches itself to hemoglobin. What is hemoglobin? It is protein inside of your red blood cell.

It's a carrier of oxygen. And you can measure what sugar does to a red blood cell. Again, sugar is toxic. If you don't believe me, ask your red blood cells.

They'll tell you. They'll tell you because they actually glycate or age and kill the red blood cell. They hook onto the hemoglobin and you can measure it. It gives you a measurement of because red blood cells last you three to four months and they're always being replaced.

That's what your bone marrow does. Okay. And you're replacing your red blood cells. You need them.

Without red blood cells, you've got no oxygen. So sugar glycates A1C, glycates the red blood cell, and you can measure it. And doctors, we talked about this yesterday. Okay.

It's not prevention. It's detection. Okay. It's not prevention.

It's detection and treatment. That's medicine in a nutshell. They detect. Take blood tests, for example.

They look at the wrong things, in my opinion. They go look at cholesterol. That's their big baby. I mean, cholesterol, cholesterol, and A1C, they only flag it if it's high.

Oh, you're diabetic or pre. Now remember what Dr. Kraft said. I always laugh because I don't.

He didn't invent Kraft dinner, by the way. He was the father of diabetes. Probably nobody wrote and studied diabetes like Dr. Kraft.

And he was very realistic, very honest. And he said, listen, there's really no such thing as pre-diabetes. If you're pre, you're a diabetic. And again, here at the Martin Clinic, we talk about this all the time.

I've been talking about this for over 40 years. You're either on the Titanic or you're not. And I can tell you, and you can tell yourself, if you're on it, you're either on it, on the road, on the ship, to disaster by measuring your A1C, 5.4 and below. Otherwise, you and insulin, well, insulin and your cells don't get along.

It's called insulin resistance. And that road of insulin resistance leads to all chronic diseases, heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's. Autoimmune is very much involved there, combined with leaky gut. So brain degeneration, if you don't think that's not Titanic-like, brain degeneration starts above 5.4.

At 5.5, brain degeneration starts. Guys, remember now that Alzheimer's dementia is type 3 diabetes. The world's forgotten that, but let's not us forget it. And let's not us be deceived.

The worst deception is self-deception. I used to tell my patients that all the time. Don't fool yourself. Be honest with yourself.

Put your hand up. My name is Tony, and I'm a carbaholic. And when your A1C is above 5.4, you got a bad relationship with carbohydrates. I'm sorry, but that's just the way it is.

And people try and skirt around the issue of food by telling you moderation and telling you, no, that's all right. It's not going to hurt you. And we live in a different world, guys. We don't live in the time of my grandfather.

The world's changed. Our food is so toxic, generally, right? And we're carb-loaded. Sugars and things that turn to sugar in nanoseconds.

And then you add processed foods with bad oils. And we're in trouble. But that's all right. If we know about it, we can do something about it.

So we don't bury our heads in the sand. At 5.5, A1C, the brain is shrinking. Oh, okay. Better to know it.

Okay? Better to know it. And I want to bring you another study here this morning, okay? And the study on B12 and kids, okay?

Because this is brand new. So let me bring it to you. Diagnosis and Treatment. This is published in the Frontiers of Nutrition, Nutrition and Metabolism.

Okay? Diagnosis and Treatment of Vitamin B12 Deficiency in Children. It's so common. B12.

Guys, that's a brain vitamin. B12 is a nerve vitamin. B12 is a metabolic vitamin. It's part, I believe, okay?

This is me. I'm a little weird. I'm different. I add things to metabolic syndrome.

Okay? So you guys know this because you listen to me and I talk about it. I add things. Okay?

Dr. Byrne, what have you added to the diagnosis of metabolic syndrome? Okay? Which is elevated blood glucose.

So we do the A1C because it's the most accurate. You can do HOMA, H-O-M-A-I-R. That's a metabolic test for insulin resistance. I like it.

The problem is it's just usually not routine. Doctors, unless you go to a non-traditional doctor, they're not doing that. They don't even know how to interpret it. They really don't know what it means to some extent because again, they're detection and treatment.

I want you to be into prevention. Okay? So you've got high triglycerides, low HDL, elevated A1C. Those are all tests that you can get done routinely.

You can look. You get a good picture. Right? And blood pressure could be elevated slightly.

A1C is elevated slightly. You're on the Titanic. And then I add, and I 100% in my mind at least, I'm right about this. I add three tests, maybe four, maybe five.

No, you don't have to do all of it, but let me tell you this. Okay? I add vitamin B12 to metabolic syndrome. If you're low, it's part of metabolic syndrome.

I add uric acid. And I looked at someone's blood test yesterday because he showed me a requisition and the doctor didn't put, they flagged the CBC and other things are marked it off. But I said, you should have marked off this one I was showing them. You should have marked off uric acid.

Well, he said, I don't have gout. Most people that have elevated uric acid don't have gout, but it's a biomarker. It's a biomarker. It's a very important biomarker.

Okay? Because if your uric acid is elevated, you know, they always talk about like purines and don't eat red meat, right? Hey, no, no, it's not that at all. It's you're consuming way too much fructose because uric acid tells you that.

So remember when I said, my name is Tony and I'm a carbaholic, me and fructose, high fructose corn syrup. And this is why I put it in the metabolic syndrome because we change the sugar. The world thought they were smart. Big food thought they were smart.

We're smarter than nature. We're smarter than God. What are we going to do? We're going to take a lab product, high fructose corn syrup.

Okay. And we're going to use that instead of sugar, ordinary sugar, instead of cane sugar, we're going to use high fructose corn syrup. And guys, it has been a complete disaster. And again, my audience knows this, the world out there, they don't pay attention to it.

Big food got away with it. I was screaming like John the Baptist in the 1980s when they invented this high fructose corn syrup. I remember actually one time, okay, because I got interviewed, go back with me a long time, okay. I got interviewed and I said, well, it's the Antichrist of sugars, you know, putting an emphasis on high fructose corn syrup and how bad it was.

And I said, you just wait and see. And I got a response from, I think it was the medical director of the high fructose corn syrup association, or I don't know what they called them, I can't remember. I actually got a letter from them. Dr.

Mert, you don't know what you're talking about. High fructose corn syrup, fructose is good for you. Corn is good for you. We take it from corn.

I don't care. You're wrong. Because that fructose goes right to your liver. It doesn't, you know what I mean?

It's like Monopoly. You don't pass goat. It goes right to the liver in a nanosecond, just like alcohol. And it's a corn syrup, liquid to the liver.

It packs the liver. That's why we see fatty liver in children. I never thought in my lifetime I would ever see anything like it. And I saw it in my office all the time.

Kids with fatty liver. And they were drinking high fructose corn syrup. They were eating high fructose corn syrup. Nobody told them.

Nobody told the parents. You weren't meant to drink juice. You weren't. You can eat fruit, but eat it.

You eat fructose and fruit, you eat it. No problemo. Okay, don't live on it. Okay, don't live on fruit.

You know me. But you can have it after the reset. You can have some fruit. Eat it.

Don't drink it. The number one drink in North America is orange juice, even a head of soda. And they go directly to your liver and pack up that liver. And they elevate triglycerides and they lower HDL.

Imagine. It's one of the biggest issues in heart disease. Not cholesterol. The fact that your cholesterol is actually low, HDL goes down.

It's those stinking fat balls, triglycerides. All that to say. As I was saying, you're a gasid. Now I've got to get to the other one.

Vitamin D is a metabolic test. It'll tell you if you're on the Titanic or not. It's one of the tests that I add to metabolic syndrome. B12, it's one of the tests that I add to metabolic syndrome.

Why do I do that? Because it is a metabolic vitamin. It is a brain vitamin. Do you know that if you're under 400 in your blood test of B12, again, study, demyelination takes place.

What? What is that, Dr. Martin? Well, you know the nerves, they have a sheath.

It's called the myelin sheath. Sheath. Okay. Not sheath.

Sheath. Okay. Your nerve has a sheath on it. A protective coating.

If your B12 is below 400, which the vast majority of people, oh, Dr. Martin, my B12 is normal. And normal, no good. Because if you're under 400, your nerves are actually being damaged.

That's how significant B12 is. And doctors today, I hate to be negative. They don't even test it routinely. And they wouldn't know what number to look at if it slapped them in the face.

Completely ignorant on B12. Except if it's high. Then they go crazy. I don't know how many times doctors called me, Dr.

Martin, you're a patient. Who's my patient? Their B12 is high. I said good.

What? It's high. It got flagged in their bloodworm. I said, B12, here's a question for you, doc.

Is it fat soluble or water? I don't know. It's water soluble. You can't get toxic on B12.

I'm sorry, it doesn't happen. But it's very serious if you're low. Your nerves are damaged. Do you know it?

No. It's a slow process. And by the way, up here there in the brain, it's all neurons. You need B12.

And people are so ignorant here. Not you guys. Sorry. You know that.

I don't mean you, because not my audience. You guys got my honorary PhD in nutrition. You really do. Smartest audience anywhere.

I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry. Smartest audience anywhere. I boast about you guys. I talk to people every day.

They don't know what I'm talking about. They look at me like I've got two heads. But my audience knows what I'm talking about. The significance, and they're saying, okay, let me read here a little bit of the abstract.

B12 deficiency is a common, yet frequently, let me quote this study. Let me just get into you. Frontiers in nutrition. Vitamin B12 deficiency is a common, yet frequently under recognized nutritional disorder with important public health implications.

And then they go on to say why it's so prevalent today. Well, there's a lot of vegetarians. There's a lot of vegans. There's a lot of people that don't eat enough red meat.

There's a lot of people like that. And they're talking about it's not necessarily an easy vitamin of what I tell you guys all the time to absorb on the best of days. Okay? And they say, I like this, okay, in the article, because they say diagnosis requires integration of clinical features, okay?

Complete blood work and functional biomarkers. I really like that. Okay? They're saying, okay, the B12 test, yes.

The B12, yes. And most people are low. That's what they're saying. And kids even, they're low in B12.

And then they say, there's another test. And this is why I like this to homocysteine, okay? Which is an amino acid test. And it's very indicative.

If your homocysteine is high, your B12 is low. Okay? So if you can get your doctor to add the homocysteine test, it's very good. It's very good, the homocysteine test.

Okay? I like it. They could put it in metabolic syndrome, but they won't. Okay?

I put B12, though. I put B12. I put B12, vitamin D, because when you're low in vitamin D, and if you're low in vitamin D, almost guaranteed you're going to be low in B12. You'll be in the lower end.

You might be classified normal, but again, remember what I said. Remember what the studies show. Demyelination occurs at levels of B12 under 400. 200 and something is normal.

You've got to optimize it. Anywho, got the memo? That was why I love A1C. Okay?

But there's a lot of other reasons. It's not just A1C. We talked about that this morning. And the study on B12.

And children, imagine. Guys, we live in a crazy world. We really do. We really do.

But we're not discouraged. We're encouraged, because information allows you to make choices, the right choices. Right? That's why I love educating, because it allows you to be your own doctor.

Look, you need a doctor. I've got no problem with that. But be your own doctor. It's best you take charge of your own health.

That's what I'm trying to equip you with. Okay? Thank you for the support. Thank you for the feedback.

Thank you for being the best audience in the world. I think we're at 100,000 just about followers on Facebook, our private Facebook group. It's incredible. I don't know how many millions of downloads on the Doctors in Podcast.

It's amazing. But guys, how could I do that without you? It's impossible. This shows you how long I've been around.

Okay, guys, we love you dearly. Guess what tomorrow is. I'll be on the road, by the way. Okay?

So tomorrow, I won't be in studio here. I'm on the road. Okay? But we're going to do our live Q&A.

Okay? We'll do it tomorrow. Okay, guys. Love you.

Announcer:  You've reached the end of another Doctor Is In Podcast, with your hosts, Doctor Martin Junior and Senior. Be sure to catch our next episode and thanks for listening!