August 28, 2019
Learn how to detoxify NATURALLY with Dr. Michele Burklund, Puriya’s Chief Science Officer.
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Right below, you will find the transcript of this video.
Transcript:
(00:00) – Hey, everyone, Dr. Michele Burklund here. I’m the Chief Science Officer here at Puriya and part of my role is to help educate you on different topics and this week I was thinking about what we should talk about and I was looking over different topics and what I found was that the term detoxification is so watered down and it can mean so many different things. And what I found is some internet sites stated outrageous claims, other websites said this didn’t work, other websites said yes, this did work and it could be very confusing. So one thing I wanted to do today is talk about basic detoxification and the body’s natural elimination pathways, and then talk about trials so we can clear up all the facts and fiction and claims so you can understand what detoxification is and how you can actually do it naturally.
(01:00) – So I think actually one of the best things you can do each day is to break a sweat for the body and for the mind but first we’re gonna go into a little detail about the elimination pathways. So the main elimination pathways in your body is where you have your lymphatic system, your kidneys, your liver, your colon, the blood and your skin. So we’re gonna focus a little more on the skin today and also discuss some things about sweat as well. So first up, I think any detoxification is incredibly important to support all the different systems so your liver, your kidneys, everything as well, I think that’s incredibly important. And your liver and your kidneys do a lot of the work. I mean, your daily exposures of what you come into contact with, different drugs or medications you’re taking, so many different things. So liver does an amazing job so does the kidney and so does your body in general but sometimes it actually needs a little more help because of all the exposures that we come into contact with today, there are so many different things that sometimes the body can get overburdened.
(02:10) – So what I actually want to talk about mainly today is the toxins that get stored in your body mainly in your fat cells and we’re also gonna touch on how a specific type of sweating can help remove different things inside your fat cells. So before we get started I’ll wait for more people to join and I also want to remind all of you to sign up for our newsletter, I believe there’s a link on our Facebook page on the top because we go into actually a lot more detail on liver support, kidney support, different techniques for your lymphatic system, skin brushing and also different ways that you can help eliminate these exposures as well because one thing is we wanna improve detoxification, and then the other part is if we are having these exposures we want to remove them. And as you know sweat, on its most basic level, is to simply cool-down the body but I’m excited to talk a little bit more and we’re jumping some clinical trials as to how it can actually help with detoxification.
(03:21) – So just some basics: When you go for your daily life, from the time you get up in the morning until you end your day, you can come into contact with so many different chemicals from just chlorine in the shower, make up, a lot of make-up has a lot of chemicals in it, lipstick a lot of them still have lead in them, there is aspartame in soda, there’s formaldehyde in new carpets, there’s BPA still in different types of plastics. So, so many different things we could go on and the goal is your body does an amazing job detoxifying them but sometimes it might need a little help. And our ebook really goes into detail as to what you can replace some of these toxins with and how you can get them out of your daily living, so I highly recommend that as a base to start. And let me pull up this trial here ’cause we’re gonna be talking about some trials here to really separate the facts from fiction. And I wanna talk about fat storage and toxins, so there’s actually a clinical trial that was published in 2017, at the University of Kentucky, that really took a look at adipose tissue and fats and how the body stores and accumulate toxin. And a lot of chemicals are lipophilic, meaning that they’re fat-loving, they are attracted to fat and that’s how they’re stored. And interestingly, this study found that these kind of exposures could actually contribute to different health conditions like obesity and diabetes.
(04:52) – I feel like this is an area where there’s so much information and so many new studies that we don’t quite know what these exposures can do to our body long term, what the maximum level of exposures, what’s the safe level of exposure, but the overall goal is to reduce the exposure. Talking about exposure one more time I’ll discuss an article published from the Environmental Working Group that found 232 different industrial compounds and pollutants in umbilical cords of infants… In umbilical cords blood of infants, meaning that exposure these days it’s all around us and we’re all around so many different things, especially starting in infants, so it’s important to be aware of them, and to remove them and support the body’s natural systems.
(05:50) – So separating fact from fiction: There is a lot of information on the internet that states sweating eliminates only a tiny percentage of toxins or it doesn’t support detoxification but you have to really break down these articles to extract the real facts. Because yes, of course sweating is not the body’s main form of detoxification, you have the kidneys, the liver, the lungs, all of these are powerful workers, but what we wanna talk about specifically is certain toxins that are stored in adipose tissue from chemical exposure. So it was interesting reading all these different things saying that sweating doesn’t work, sweating works, this and that and it’s confusing because it’s not the main source of detoxification but it can certainly help especially when you have stores of fat. And it’s the term detoxification so many people use that for too many different things from daily exposures or chemicals that are easily excreted from your body, to heavy metals, and all the claims in between. So I think it’s important to use those terms wisely as well. My goal in teaching you today is to discuss sweat and show the studies that show that certain types of sweating can help promote elimination of fat storage toxins like heavy metals and also common chemicals like BPA that you’re exposed to and help reduce these and decrease the burden, especially in your bloodstream.
(07:25) – So I found this during a study in the Journal of Alternative Therapies for Health and Medicine, stated that saunas can be very effective for certain cardiovascular problems as it means to enhance the mobilization and as a means to enhance the mobilization of fat and xenobiotics. And a great study that came out a little bit ago from Canada, let’s see if I can find it in here, about BPA exposure. And this one was quite interesting because this Canadian study looked at different ways of excretion of BPA. And it can be found in water bottles or different types of plastic. And they looked at 20 different people, and they actually found that a 16 of the participants to have BPA in their sweat. But what was more interesting in this is that some of these people didn’t have detected BPA levels in their blood or urine. So perhaps sweat could even be a better mechanism to release that specific toxin.
(08:33) – So I thought that was quite a powerful trial to state to really show that the body has all these great mechanisms, but we also need to enhance and support them as well. And a lot of people get confused because they think any type of sweat can help with detoxification. It can help with detoxification, exercise can let’s say, but not directly from sweat, so we’re getting to that. Sweating from exercise isn’t known to release toxins from the body. There hasn’t been any direct studies that have shown that but actually a trial published from China in 2016 showed that people who worked out on a regular basis, compared to those who didn’t, actually had lower level of different pollutants and heavy metals in their body.
(09:33) – So it wasn’t a direct correlation, but it was an indirect correlation. And we also know that exercise can improve detoxification, not necessarily through sweat but we have improved circulation, stimulation of the lymphatic system. So all these great things that actually stimulate the body on different levels to encourage the elimination of toxins. So taking that hot yoga class, it might not be the best way to eliminate toxins through sweat or it hasn’t been proven, but it certainly doesn’t mean that it doesn’t promote detoxification through other ways. So I thought that was interesting as well. Now we’re going to be talking a little bit about saunas. And so many of you probably go work out at the gym and it can become a ritual to go into the sauna, relax your muscles, work up a good sweat, and help relax. And we will actually talk about the different types of saunas and the different types of benefits from each one because you have a dry saunas, you have steam saunas, you have infrared saunas. And each one works a little bit differently on the body.
(10:50) – A very popular study done in 2012 from the Journal of Environmental and Public Health looks at infrared saunas and specifically focused on heavy metals on four different ones: Cadmium, arsenic, lead, and mercury. And actually found that sweating through infrared should be considered as a tool to remove these toxins. Let me pull that one up here. So it’s actually a quite powerful study that shows that removing these this way not only decreases the burden of putting them into your bloodstream and pushing them through your liver and your kidneys, but it also proves that sweating can be an effective tool when you’re trying to release heavy metals.
(11:37) – And in the medical school in one of my environmental medicine classes, I remember learning that rice actually has a huge amount of arsenic in it. And I thought that was so shocking because rice is such a staple in so many people’s diets. And I didn’t know that. I think a lot of people still don’t actually know that. So this way, this type of sweating through infrared, specifically where it goes deeper into your tissues, found that it was successful in helping to release arsenic through sweat. And I thought that was interesting, and also they found different heavy metals like mercury. And mercury exposure can be sneaky too, it’s not necessarily from just the fish or the tuna you eat, but it’s also found in fish supplements and fish oils and stuff. So it’s very important to find high quality sources of those supplements and we could go into an entirely different topic about finding high quality sources but mercury definitely can contribute to the toxic burden in your body, and is something to be aware of not only in the food you eat, but also in your supplements as well.
(12:53) – So we also have dry saunas. And dry saunas are the typical sauna that you go into at the gym. Some of them have infrared, so it’s hard to say which one is available there, but typically it is the dry sauna. And I thought this was a great study to talk about. So the Journal of evidence-based Complementary and Alternative Medicine did a systemic review of different clinical effects of saunas and it took 40 different studies and looked at over 3,855 people. So it’s a quite extensive study where they looked over at different studies and they found many medicinal benefits in dry saunas for many different things from pain management, cardiovascular function, athletic performance, stress, mental health. And found this therapy to provide many beneficial health… Health effects in general.
(13:58) – So without getting too much into the science proposed by this study, they found that saunas did two things: That it enhanced immune pathways and most likely through hyperthermia, which we’ve actually discussed in a previous interview and it enhanced excretions of toxins through sweating. So both of those things had positive effects on the body through different ways of using that sauna. And a very interesting thing, just about sauna and sweat in general, is a lot of the studies found that it had an important psychological benefit as well, and it helped improve mood, reduce stress, and also helped engage you in that mind-body time with yourself. And so I thought that was great because when you go into an area like that, when you go into a sauna, you can’t really bring that much with you, maybe a book and it forces you to relax as well. So I thought that was great.
(14:57) – And for those of you who might not have saw my interview with leading immunologist Dr. Ralph Clead, he is an expert in hyperthermia treatments and he goes into a lot of detail about infrared therapy, and why he’s not really a fan of dry saunas for releasing sweat or stimulating the immune system. So if you wanna take it to another level and you’re really interested in hyperthermia or the effects of infrared, he definitely goes into more detail in our last interview. So here at Puriya, we believe in a complete holistic approach too. So sweating is a great way to release heavy metals especially arsenic, mercury, cadmium and it’s been shown to help with BPA as well. And it’s great for overall health, it’s great to get moving too and exercise is incredibly important for the immune system, for your stress, for your body in general. So we support all these ways of increasing your body to sweat. Finding a reason to break a sweat each day I think will not only help detoxify your body but also help your body and your immune system in general on a daily basis.
(16:15) – But here at Puriya, we wanna focus on all of the elimination pathways as well. And there’s a lot of foods that can help the chelating agents. So chelating helps grab different toxins or heavy metals from your blood and excrete it out of your body. And some very powerful ones can be garlic, chlorella, spirulina or cilantro. Some great ways to stimulate the lymphatic system, and that’s another great way to encourage natural detoxification, is through hot and cold hydrotherapy. One of my favorite things. And also, skin brushing, where we go into more detail in our e-book and it’s this light brushing, and you brush from the bottom up, so you’re brushing to help go to your heart and bring that lymphatic system to go into your bloodstream and be cleared from your body.
(17:08) – So just a lot of great ways to help improve that and help support that. Of course, I’m going to say drinking clean water. So drinking water, yes, drinking clean water, especially, is a great habit to get into on a daily basis and to help cleanse your body, clean it, hydrate it, especially if you’re sweating. And eliminating daily exposures. The overall goal’s to decrease that toxic burden in every way we can and simply changing your lifestyle habits just a little bit can also have profound effects. So we also have a list of kidney-friendly foods and liver-loving foods in the e-book as well. That goes into a lot of detail but the core is eating a lot of leafy greens, focusing on fruits and vegetables, especially dark colored ones rich in antioxidants, foods that have Glutathione in them like the Brassica family, and overall eating a clean diet.
(18:13) – So today I hope we separated some facts from fiction here, specifically infrared sauna sweating can help eliminate some chemicals from your body including different heavy metals and BPA. And it’s also important to support the entire body in that process as well. So I hope all of you have an amazing weekend and I will see you next week. I also wanna remind you that next week we have Dr. Priya Waller and she is going to be talking all about Ayurvedic medicine. So it’ll be a lot of fun to learn more about what type of dosha you are and help answer some questions on different foods to eat that are Ayurvedic and a lot of great tips. So have a great weekend and I will see you next week, take care.
