Chef AJ Live! | Interview with Gold Medal Olympian, Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn

I'm your host chef AJ and this is the show where I introduce you to amazing people like you who are doing great things in the world that I think you should know about today's guest really does not need an introduction but in case this is the first time you're watching me I will tell you who he is he's not only the star of the wonderful documentary Forks Over knives but he's just a superstar in every role especially the plant-based world he's the author of prevent and rehearse heart disease he's one of the nicest kindest just just I just love him so much I don't know what to say it's just getting nervous just even introducing him and his name is dr. Caldwell Esselstyn jr. thank you so much for being here I really appreciate it dr. Esselstyn AJ thank you well dr. Esselstyn I don't know if you remember this but eight years ago you gave me this and it's my favorite necklace it's a gold-plated leaf of kale why not it's amazing and I wore my kale shirt for you so dr. Esselstyn whenever we have a doctor on the show we get lots of questions that people send in we probably won't get to all of them we'll get to as many as we can but believe it or not dr. Esselstyn so number one question wasn't even about cardiovascular disease what people really want to know and they don't hear you talk about this a lot is what did it feel like being in the Olympics and winning a gold medal that must have been a great moment in your life well that was that was a few years ago 1956 and though there are some some memories that stand out quite obviously that is something that I'll always treasure at least of the friendship and the bonding of the eight other members of that crew who sadly as the the years have taken their toll on us we used to have a southern annual get-together and that began to dwindle as people tell often right now the earth there are three of us who are left and you're probably wondering you know what did the other five what did they possibly what did they die from if they were so healthy in 1956 over the years what what took their toll and at the front of the boat are number two men simply really died of the in an in addition that is he wasn't able to know he was no longer able to take sufficient nutrient to keep his health where it should be and he began to get repeated infections the number three man sadly died of liver cancer the number four man died of brain cancer the number five man actually died of pancreatic cancer I was growing number six number seven was rusty whales and he died of a heart attack and number eight died of bladder cancer so there are three of us left our captain Tommy Chong our coxswain go back clean and yours truly now there were there were a few really rather exciting moments on the way to to qualifying and that is we had to qualify to represent the United States we had to win up in Lake Onondaga which is in Syracuse New York and it was interesting we had absolutely wonderful coach by the name of Jim Rassman and who all the horsemen really treasured Jim he was he was quite special and up at Syracuse while we were practicing for the for the Olympic Trials we were out one day on the water the coach and the crew and lo and behold the other coaches who were not on the water decided that Yale had drawn a pathway that they felt was too easy in the round-robin so without Jim Rassman our coach being there the coaches they got together and they changed the the way the round-robin was decided so when we got back in off the water a reporter ran ran up to Jim Rassman and said coach harassment do you realize that while you're out on the water the other coaches changed the order of your race from what had previously been decided and Jim smiled and said well we just came up here to beat all these crews and I don't really care much in what order we do it that he would he was really quite like the gym one final moment at the me and the in the Olympics when we remind up at the start in the final there was Sweden Canada United States and Australia and this great big Australia number five man who was a nice guy just at the start it is our practice to pet what we call past the shake there's a coxswain shakes the hand of eight eight turns around and shakes the hand of seven seven turns around and so forth and he saw us doing this and this is just before the race starts and he yells over I say dawn haven't you met Charlie yet mocking our ritual well it was wonderful because it all gave us all a great pinch of adrenalin sent us off and the name of us I think to squeeze out the victory do you have that footage like can you watch a replay over do you own the footage that if you want to know but well back in 1956 there we have a wonderful recording of there were three Australian announcers who were stationed in state boats throughout the course so after one that had it for 600 meters he'd say and now I'm turning it over to Ray Jablonski and then ray Jablonski would take it for another 700 meters and then he turned it over and that's really quite exciting but yes somebody somehow captured about the last just for the last several years somebody now I don't know how they have found this but they did find the last about the last 250 meters of the race which was the one that counts yeah did you always want to be in the Olympics and be an athlete like I have I know somebody that was nominated for an Academy Award and you know she said it was a surprise to be nominated that when she went into work everyday to do the film she wasn't thinking about the potential of an Oscar when you were competing like what are you thinking like I could win a medal was that even on your mind or are you just trying to get through the race when I no when I got to when I was at Yale I and my freshman year at Derby day was supposed to be a great fun occasion because that's where their COO races were held and I wasn't my freshman year I was not out for rowing at all I just didn't go and there was very little about it but as I was standing on the bank in my straw hat and watching all my the people around me with beer can with the water pistols that were filled with beer I saw these crews rowing down there I said what the hell am i doing up here on the bank I really would love to try to get down there and get into one of those boats rather than up here but beer and a squirt gun this is crazy and my roommate was out and he was a freshman oarsmen and he was a great supporter of this so my sophomore year I went out for rowing unfortunately it turns out pretty well so once you went in a little pickle man where do you go from there because they didn't put you where you go from there is you've got a whole food plant-based nutrition but back then dr. Esselstyn they weren't putting you guys on weenie boxes you know what I think this would this would be amazing if somehow we could get your picture on every bag of kale so Smith now AJ now AJ yeah cuz when I think of when I think of greens I think of you dr. Esselstyn well that is just a wonderful story you nut must you imagine your parents were probably alive during that time right and I was oh yeah I don't know I remember going back to home I so I was we didn't have Jets remember then I had 55 straight hours when you reply from we flew from Melbourne to Fiji and then there was a layover and then there was Fiji to Hawaii and then Hawaii to Los Angeles and then Los Angeles to what was then Idlewild that was before Kennedy and lo and behold 5:00 in the morning I arrived at Idlewild and there was my dad he must have been so proud when you finish the race do you know right away that you were the winner or do you have to wait for them yeah we knew that I would say about three or four seconds beforehand our car our from did a beautiful job of that race because we were very close and Australia had was favored to beat us so about the first remember this is a 2000 meter race and we were not gonna for about the first 500 meters and then our sneaky little costume said I want to power 10 now power 10 is when you really hit it so hard that you you really want to gain and something on the other crew but you know you can't withstand that pace for the whole way so he gave us a power 10 and you know you never look out of the boat but the coxswain goes and he said that was great you gave me a man well actually we didn't give him a man on the other boat without power tang we gave him two men but hehe Accor said you gave me a man and he let us rest for a minute so to speak he said I want another power tent well the same thing happened again and then as we got near the end just before we went up into our sprint he he was yelling to as he said you're gonna win it was it was it exhilarating what did it feel like and what did it feel like when they put the medal on you and where where do you keep your medal well the men was very cagey about this because she was afraid little to get you know easy to get lost because my kids as they were growing up I always had permission to take it to school and show it to their classmates which they demanded and so it's now in a case in a piece of lucite hanging on the wall at home nice that's great would you say that was one of the greatest moments of your life nope no question but really what really does teach you is the importance of persistence I mean my father used to say about rowing but he said I never heard of this too where were they when they worked work nine months out of the year to turn an abnormal motion into a reflex action that's me that is so cool dr. Esselstyn thank you for sharing about that because people really wanted to know what that was like and live vicariously through you so many wonderful comments about how you've saved people's lives just through your even people that don't see you as patients through your just through reading your book prevent reverse heart disease I can't tell you how many people have read that book and have gotten well but like you say that requires persistence too well and also if you're going to be doing be asking an Orangeman to do this you've got to think of the dignity of simplicity I'm good I like that I'd like to have patients understand in terms that they can get their arms around I'd like to have them understand the science because it's really if you're going to get people to make a lifestyle change you have to show people respect and the only way that I know to show a patient or the public respect is to give them more time and that's why we are presently with our seminar that we have it is a single day six hour seminar usually about between 15 and 18 people who all have cardiovascular disease and they're really anxious to know about how it is that they acquired this disease and precisely how they can be empowered as the locus of control to halt and reverse their disease and I think that you cannot do that if you think you're gonna do this in a 12 or 15 minute offices it without the spouse so we always insist that the spouse or significant other be present and that people recognize that in these in this six hour single day session they're really going to learn all about how they created their illness and how we're going to as I mentioned empower them as the locus of control of the halt and reverse their disease it's so cool that you have this program and anybody could come if they wanted to it's very reasonably priced I mean just the fact that somebody could spend an entire day with you and and that's like amazing we had switch because we had it used to be in person we had people coming from throughout Canada throughout the United States and overseas however that was a personal at the Cleveland Clinic wellness should not all been changed now because of the virus and we have we've been doing it now virtually that's that's even better than for some people that may be clinically and they couldn't they don't have to fly to Cleveland they don't have to get a hotel yeah they just hook up that's fantastic you're a very kind person and very patient I remember one of the first times I heard you speak was about eight or nine years ago at White Memorial Hospital in Los Angeles and you gave your beautiful presentation like you often give with the slides prevent reverse heart disease very clear on what you said I think and at the end of the lecture there was a QA and literally the first question from a guy was what about olive oil where you literally had just spent like an hour telling him the truth but you never you never lose your cool you never get angry or frustrated like me I feel like I say the same thing all the time does that ever do you ever get tired of answering these questions because you you have 13 pages right now of questions I know you've answered well sometimes there could be a little repetition but repetition is the mother of skill so there's some times that people some people don't get it the first time or the second or the third but maybe the fourth time they do yeah yeah that's great well I really I feel like this is a such a delight to when I think when I was finishing my second career originally I had thought that when I retired I'll really concentrate on trying to do when went surfing and maybe learn how to play the piano well none of those happened I mean once our research began to take wings I was committed to this and it was just too exciting to think that the people this was something that people had to know about the fact that you can absolutely not not just heart disease but here simply through food alone you have an opportunity and maximize your health and eliminate chronic illness well windsurfing unfortunately is something you can't learn virtually but I know for a fact because dr. Gustavo Tolosa who was on the show the other day you can learn piano playing through zoom okay yeah and you you're so tall you have very long fingers I bet you'd be great well I can dream it's never too late dr. Esselstyn so we'll get into the questions and guys you know I apologize but we have to give priority or the ones that were sent in because the feed goes too quickly so please get on my mailing list so you can ask a question and keep them short if you can because I'm more likely to ask a short one than a long one so we'll start with a very short one from Cindy who says could you please ask dr. esselstyn's if greens need to be cooked in order to allow the nitric oxide production yeah I prefer the cooking because I think the lessons that I have heard and learned about are that when you cook it five to a half to six minutes you begin to break down the cell membranes so that when you start chewing you have much more exposure and to the phytonutrients and all the vital components of the greens that you're chewing you can do it you can do it raw if you're getting a pinch and they mid-afternoon in a mid-morning dose and you happen to have no microwave around or what have you yeah and you can chew them raw but make up for it the next time nice another question on greens from Karen she says she's taking cloak cloak pagode sorry I'm not a doctor cloak it er yeah for a script Oh genic stroke in 2011 with Eden Green six times a day as dr. Esselstyn suggests could there be a time where I would no longer need this medication would any of the testing available be a good idea I would leave the decision of whether or not to continue your medication to the doctor who was prescribed it and he he or she can chart your progress and if he or she feels that you're doing well very well was your advocacy Earth considered reducing it by perhaps half depending upon what your situation is and I think it's really a the wise thing to do is to really deal with the medication with a physician who is prescribed for you what we have found in our seminar since these patients all have cardiovascular disease and many of them are an absolute most of the usual cocktails that you see for cardiovascular disease but with all candor and all fairness not one of the drugs and none of the stents and none of the bypasses have one single solitary thing to do with the causation of the illness they're going to be simply used for symptoms usually and what I have found is that for the patients that come to our seminar we you know with over a thousand patients attending it be absolute chaos if I tried to run everybody's medication and all those patients have had their medication is prescribed by a hopefully a learning physician who understands the medication how to use them but what happens was when our patients leave the higher seminars and they get back home they see their physician and they suddenly there they are they lost weight their blood pressure has come down their diabetes is none more under control their cholesterol has come down so what happens the doctor says my goodness you're really doing better we're going to reduce these medications and I think that's in using that approach in the last 34 years I have yet to receive a single email or phone call from the physician who said dr. Esselstyn how dare you teach my patient the healthiest diet on the planet that's something thank you so as Steve says I'm a big fan I'm so excited that you're having dr. Esselstyn on it's a question on fruit he says I put blueberries strawberries and blackberries in my oatmeal every morning and they also eat them for dessert every night after dinner is it possible and eating too many of them I do the same thing so then the answer's no Davis says how long do you have to eat a handful of steam cream six times a day with all sonic vinegar well I'm gonna have to give you the science in this maybe I'll just make some sense we're we're all experts would agree with cardiovascular disease where this disease has its inception its onset its beginning is when we progressively injured that delicate inner most life jacket and guardian of our blood vessels called the endothelium and it is the endothelium that manufactures that truly magic molecule of gas nitric oxide and it is nitric oxide which is responsible for the salvation and the protection of all of our vasculature because of its remarkable functions for example nitric oxide will keep all the cellular elements within our bloodstream flowing smoothly like Teflon rather than velcro it keeps things from getting sticky number two nitric oxide is the strongest blood vessel dilator in the body when you climb stairs your arteries to your heart the arteries to your legs they widen they dilate that's nitric oxide number three nitric oxide will protect us all from developing blockages and of course unique protect us from developing any thickness stiffness of the artery wall and number four so here's the absolute key number four a safe and adequate amount of nitric oxide will protect us all from ever developing any blockages or plaque so literally everybody on the planet whether they're from London Berlin Chicago New York or Los Angeles if they have cardiovascular disease it is because by now in the preceding decades they have so sufficiently trashed injured compromised and turned their endothelial system into a train wreck they no longer have enough nitric oxide to protect themselves from making blockages in plaque however the good news is this it is not a malignancy and once you patience to stop ever ever ever again passing through there that's another morsel that is further going to destroy an already train-wrecked endothelium then the endothelium recovers makes enough nitric oxide so you can now halt disease progression and we often see significant examples of disease reversal now the reason the the greens got into this whole scene is the following when you are shoeing a green you are chewing a nitrate so when you chew the nitrate it is going to mix with the facultative anaerobic bacteria that reside in the crypts and grooves of your tongue those bacteria are going to reduce the nitrate that you're chewing to a nitrite and now when you swallow than I tried it is further reduced by your gastric acid to more nitric oxide so now literally if you do this six times a day that is to say along with your breakfast cereal mid-morning snack once with your lunch and sandwich that's three mid-afternoon for dinner time five and of course I adore it when you have that evening snack of kill what it is that you're doing is literally from dawn to dusk you are absolutely restoring you are restoring the very molecule the deficiency of which gave you this disease in the first place so it's pretty darned pretty darn exciting now there's a caveat to this and that is you cannot have or use toothpaste with fluoride or use public drinking water with fluoride or mouthwash because those will destroy the beneficial bacteria in your mouth and be careful about antacids because antacids will reduce the acidity in your stomach so you'll not have enough acid to reduce the nitrites to more nitric oxide thank you someone want Marilyn who's watching live said well she can't have vinegar but instead you can still eat the greens even without the vinegar it's so important right the reason for the vinegar is that the acetic acid in the vinegar restores the nitric oxide synthase which is the enzyme within the endothelial cell that is responsible for making nitric oxide you cjj the whole beauty of this is as we discovered the importance of nitric oxide remember this the nitric oxide that is remain that is made by your endothelial lining decreases progressively as you get over for instance on you by the time your age fifty beautifully healthy the amount of nitric oxide your endothelial cells produces fifty percent of what they did at age twenty-five and by the time you're over eighty it's 73 percent less now oh the beauty of the greens is the greens does not depend on your endothelial system this is almost it's almost like in the last ten to fifteen years another avenue of the body's production of nitric oxide has been revealed and examiner's dr. Esselstyn isn't important to eat the green six times a day I just I just don't need I mean I eat a lot of greens but I kind of eat like literally I think if you don't have heart disease no but if you do have heart disease I would say yes why because if you just do this I have a salad that supper that's nothing compared the amount of nitric oxide you get if you did this six times a day as I said from dawn to dusk you are restoring the very molecule the deficiency of which gave you this disease in the first place and and you're doing it with no hideous expense and no awful side-effects I love it thank you a lot of people have written it with very specific medical questions about getting off medications so I've been posting the link to your monthly event and it's suggesting that they contact that the number to register that I think you AG I think I addressed a bit of medication earlier but but but some of these are very specific medical things so I'm asking them to please contact you know through your website because you can't really give a whole consultation to one person here but this one is as interesting from Lily she says she's 60 and she's been thin active and fit her whole life and raised seven children had blood sugar issues for four years but the last couple years hasn't felt great in the last 24 hours she was told she has more than a 70% gnosis in her right carotid artery and she says she's been eating high nutrient plant-based for three years and doesn't know what her options are from here so you know does she'd be a good candidate for your program I think yeah I think it was yeah I mean you what you do first of all with somebody with that kind of a history and you sit down and you go over carefully what they're eating because first thing you started with it says you ever drink did you ever have a drop of oil suddenly or how often do you eat out well not then they reply usually it's not very often than you sayin let's try that again twice a week all right twice a week you read out well let's just do the math a little bit that would be a hundred and four days out of 365 that you're at one of those famous Los Angeles restaurants known for the arrest and reversal of heart disease no that doesn't happen so what you find out is literally almost every single menu on all restaurants has got oil so the first thing you do if you're going to go and eat out you look at the waiter the waitress in the eye and you say understand this I am deathly allergic to a drop of any oil so the way or the waitress goes over the menu with it they can't find a thing so do you smile and you say look I'd like to speak with the chef ah the chef comes out and he or she are just absolutely flattered and you're talking over and you say look I cannot have a drop of oil no animal protein no Oh dearie and no sugar chef smiles 23 minutes later outcomes beans and rice or it may be a baked potato with a wonderful vegetable it it is doable but remember this you never go out to eat to further destroy more endothelial cells that makes sense that makes sense and I love the visual of just thinking about the the kale or the greens just being the medicine you know for this it's pretty cool so Andrea says she's been vegan for 20 years whole food plant-based for 10 and since 2003 her cholesterol has consistently been under 150 she is at her slim ideal weight and her blood pressure is good but she says now that she's in menopause her cholesterol has gone up she's didn't decrease her intake of nuts and seeds and she wonders is there any kind of a link between menopause and somebody having increasing cholesterol and if so what can you do about it yeah I'm not I wouldn't it would be unfair of me to tell you that I'm sure Mary will that an established link I just think it's a chance to perhaps review again what it is you may be eating check it out carefully again see how or where you're the heating out and remember this and this is important let's suppose that I have a hundred people who are absolutely following our program to it to a tee there'll be some who will have a total cholesterol of 102 or there's 140 180 200 220 we all have a different thermostat for making cluster don't know it obviously good persons who are eating whole food plant-based nutrition it'll be likely less than otherwise but they're going to be still people who have a elevated cholesterol now and this is important if you are eating in a way that you are not causing any injury or harm to your endothelial lining remember to have heart disease you've got to have your bad LDL cholesterol migrate through a weakened injured endothelium and then it sets up housekeeping in this sub endothelial compartment where it begins to make what we call these reactive oxygen species and builds up plaque and blockages however let's suppose you've got a few extra molecules of cholesterol coursing through your bloodstream however you've been eating in the way that you have an absolute endothelial fortress I don't care if you've got a cholesterol 200 if you've got an endothelial fortress all right that's great you know decorous of someone you were talking about the Olympics you know I was thinking how it was a team venture you had all the guys in the boat you know doing the same thing working together towards the same goal and I was wondering if you ever feel like with the work you're doing you're literally the only one in the boat and you're rowing uphill because you're you so many of the things that right away every I agree with everything you say I'm I don't have heart disease but I eat your diet which is a whole food plant-based no oil I don't need sugar a flour salt and I eat very low-fat but so many people these days even plant-based doctors you know the whole nut debate that you need nuts or you're gonna drop dead but now they're actually saying that the heart that oil is good for heart disease and these are vegan cardiologists that are saying there's no proof and that it actually is good to eat oil for heart disease and that vegan Chino is good I mean does that make you want to pull your beautiful gray hair up no it's just what we have to go by here yeah is the science and I I wrote a paper last year that was published in the International Journal of disease reversal and prevention and the title of it was is oil healthy and in that paper I discussed the animal studies and the human studies clearly showing how the endothelial cells are injured by oil and also it's interesting I have yet to see a single peer-reviewed published study where patients were seriously ill with cardiovascular disease have been given in an oil filled diet and have their disease halt and to have striking examples of disease regression do you remember you're a little bit older than me do you remember growing up eating a lot of oil because I I remember crick my mom had Crisco growing up but I don't remember oil being like this major thing yeah yeah I can remember there was there was there was oil in our usually it was always in our salad dressing yeah yeah yeah okay so lawyer says 62 years old she struggled with weight for a long time and and be medicated for blood pressure at 30 because it was 150 over 90 but she said even after losing quite a bit of weight and exercising constantly she took max max I didn't listen approach for years not only takes max sides but the doctors want to add more medication and up the dose she's been eating whole slew plant-based SOS free for more than eight years lost over 40 pounds but her her systolic pressure remains high blood pressure was 160 over 60 and she swears that she's not eating at restaurants and that she's compliant but she can't get the upper number down is that a problem I'm I'm curious two things when she said she lost 40 pounds if she went from 280 to 240 we still got a ways to go I that's absolutely critical because if somebody can you know that she's 5 feet - she weighed 200 pounds and now she weighs 160 she'll be very proud of herself but rightfully so but that is going to cut it yet what about if we got down to what she weighed when she was 19 when she weighed 128 it's going to be pretty hard to have the hypertension there so I really think you'd have to be sure you pay attention to what actually is the weight now the other thing that we have found very helpful because so often cited vascular disease patients are carrying extra extra poundage and that extra poundage is really going to lead to diabetes it's going to lead to cancer and heart disease and it's going to lead to hypertension and may prolong and hyper hyper tension going to injure your kidney so really when we have patients who were 250 280 300 354 in fact 3 months ago I had a patient weighed over 500 pounds now the first thing we asked those patients to eliminate is anything made of flour so the pasta bread rolls and bagels are gone over it because that's lousy nutrition and calories now the other thing is we've brought something from the National Institutes of Aging about nine years ago and it's been very helpful and that is that for two days of the week these are this is especially helpful for patients who say they've lost weight but they've hit a plateau they can't seem to lose anymore two days of the week and this is safe it is powerful it is effective and it has duration two days of the week Monday and Thursday so you don't interfere with the weekend it is a water only fasting water only fasting 7 a.m. Monday to 7 a.m. Tuesday 7 a.m. Thursday to 7 a.m. Friday water only and then you can relinquish that when you've when you've hit your goal nice thank you yeah that's new because I agree with you about the flour products they may not harm their arteries but they're very calorically dense yeah yeah thank you so kit says I haven't heard this before she said that in a question and answer at a plant strong conference you suggested eliminating all grains for two weeks for those folks with stubborn cholesterol to further optimize their levels then they can slowly add back grains to see which we're causing the problems which grains do your patients find as problematic and which don't cause the increased cholesterol or does it vary widely among your patients yeah I think it's interesting when you get somebody who's really really quite desperate this is something to try just for two weeks if you eliminate the grain but your energy foods will become while your potato but some people seem to have a quite a sensitivity to the grains and that isn't and I've often seen reductions of 30 or 40 points in just two weeks when I do this and then that seems logical when there's adding back the first one we'd like to have them eliminate as wheat wheat would seem to be the most likely culprit although not always and and your concern slowly back back and something like maybe then both barley rye buckwheat trial quinoa and so forth and to try to see and identify which if the grains is contributing this oh I want to go back I had one other answer to stay here patient who had a high blood pressure hypertension something that recently came to my attention about stubborn persistent hypertension those patients between eleven and twenty eight percent of them may have what we call hyper algo stir onanism and the only way to really checked for that accurately apparently is a 24-hour urine collection and measurement for hyperaldosteronism because this may unmask a number of people who have stubborn hypertension that's very interesting thank you and I know she's watching live so there you go for somebody with high lipoprotein a and optimal LDL do you recommend an eighty one milligram aspirin to prevent the risk of stroke that goes along with high lipoprotein a no because I think when you're eating a whole food plant-based nutrition your blood tends to be thinner anyway and you think about it LP small a has a reputation as an extra bit of cholesterol that can add to someone's risk but so about 20% of people presumably in this country have elevated LP small way and perhaps the same 20% in Okinawa 20% in rural China 20% and let's say Central Africa well wait a minute the 20% of those countries have epidemics of cardiovascular disease No then what happens well when you are eating low food plant-based nutrition you do not have enough of the building blocks even if you've got an elevated LP small a that's not gonna that alone by itself you know almost all these papers and concerns about helping small a are with the fact that it is an additional factor factor the patients who were already eating this terrible Western diet what are there certain numbers that we should strive for and does it matter whether or not we have heart disease or not or should everybody yell yeah I think that's great JJ because no I think I've often said and I'll say it today I never heard of a number they gave heart disease no number gives heart disease what gives heart disease is what is passing through your lips every day that has the capacity to injured your endothelial production of nitric oxide Laurel we gave the advice to about the 24 hour test asked if you could either say it more slowly or spell that test what if I can't smell it right okay well maybe just say it again Aldo al do mr. Owen isn't ste ro and is M or aldosterone is the molecule you want to get a 24-hour aldosterone urinary measurement nice thank you thank you so much so I'm gonna try to phrase it also guys try to write shorter because it's it's easier so call Colleen says she's been she follows the wave eating that we recommend vegan for 15 years and she's kept off 55 pounds for five years and now she's slim she's never been able to do that before but she has two daughters that are eating keto paleo and one of them actually lost 120 pounds doing that and now she says well I only eat saturated fat and they think the things like corn and legumes are unhealthy and will kill them because they're man-made and I don't know if you can answer this dr. Esselstyn but she says like how do you can you even engage in a conversation with somebody that really believes that saturated fat is good and keto is good and things like that is there anything you can say that it's gonna make a difference yeah that can often be a bit of a dead end on the other hand what you can do is try to show if they if they if you have if they have willing ear try to see if they can understand about here is a study of both Liu plant-based nutrition will you take something as bad as a blockage of the carotid artery blockage of the coronary arteries blockage of the arteries to your leg and you're able to show that when you eat whole food plant-based nutrition you can stop that progression and often you'll see striking examples of disease reversal once they understand that that has never been shown to occur with keto oh he sure anybody can lose weight on keto yeah Kenny nice calories but the key is is there has never to my knowledge ever ever ever been a study of patients seriously you was cardiovascular disease where you can put them on a keto diet and have them arrest and reverse their disease as we've been able to show and I was hopeful tonight based nutrition you had mentioned earlier about fluoride being dilatory as people are saying well what if your dentist says you have to have it do you just say no no sorry well yeah I'd have a talk with your dentist and no I'm what the data show this is this is a work of Nathan Brian who's been a pioneer in this from the University of Texas yeah great thank you barber says I on the dot and the bio for dr. Esselstyn it says he was the head of thyroid and parathyroid surgery she says that she was vegan for four years thanks to the s Wilson family but six years ago she had parathyroid surgery and was told to take calcium afterwards her latest bone density scan showed her osteopenia getting worse thought on a whole food plant-based diet she'd get enough calcium dude advice taking more calcium as a supplement well if the parathyroid surgery was done that number of years ago and usually there are four parathyroid glands and over eighty percent of the time when the surgery is done it is one single gland it is the culprit and you remove this overactive gland and that music brings the calcium back tomorrow now if the calcium has been normal remember there are a lot of people who don't have parodies who have osteopenia and osteoporosis and my preferred treatment for osteoporosis yes you should have adequate amounts of vitamin D yes there should be adequate amounts of serum calcium should be normal but the bones love stress now when I talk about stress I'm not talking about walking because what's stress is if you go and go to a gym and you happen to do squats or deadlifts there have been studies that clearly show that when the when you do that the entire skeleton right through the thorah commercial spine lumbosacral spine colbus hips femurs tibia tibia and so forth all those bones are involved when you're doing those weights on the other on the other hand for many women who perhaps cannot go to the gym and it's unhandy they can go over the internet and you can purchase a thing called a weighted vest a weighted vest well obviously the weight is on your shoulders which means it's really starting right at your upper spine all the way down through as your walk and you've seen a number of patients really get a striking resolution of their osteopenia when they start stressing the bones bones respond to stress Wow thank you Peggy says her husband is in the 70th percentile for left anterior descending artery and still suffers with erectile dysfunction high iron levels and sometimes high fasting blood glucose number sometimes 197 other times 112 can't he resolve these concerns do you think his IDI will reverse he's eating his steamed greens and he has been to TrueNorth he's eating whole food plant-based now a lot of this is a question of time for instance that not infrequently after I've done some counseling of a notification I would get a call 11 months later dr. Esselstyn is it mr. so-and-so sure enough good to hear your voice yeah I said really recently something has come up and I'm wondering if I don't owe you in the other check so yeah everybody's took some patients it may be several months on some page since it may be 12 much longer but the Greens certainly it what you're looking for with erectile dysfunction obviously there's plenty of nitric oxide and also a long enough time to hopefully reverse blockages if they are there because that the blockage and the deficiency of nitric oxide is the you know is the problem so if I hear you correctly if we eat a green leaf we may not need a blue kill that about correct Thank You AJ do you have time I mean are you still exercising a lot like I know you were riding your bike do you do you it that's just something that you that was always instilled in you right I just yeah just this this morning I was out for about 55 minutes just flat and some hills and you know I think it's nice to you try to get the your lungs and your heart and what I would call the the red zone you know taking up there because you've you've got to keep stressing yourself exercise has innumerable bonuses for sure glad you said that because a lot of people eat the diet and they do very well and they may even lose weight but I find that it's it's almost harder to get people to move their body than it is to eat plant-based or even in greens yeah well the bike is only part of it because at least three times a week I try to do some resistance work wait nothing nothing is there dramatic but but it really is so important that your your muscles respond to this kind of stimulation yeah you've been a lifelong exerciser that we haven't you dr. Esselstyn even before you were plant-based this is just something that you always did right yeah yeah so how did you get that instilled in you because I mean I didn't start exercising till I was 52 it wasn't exactly modeled for me that this is something we should do well I don't know I think it when you're growing and you saw sometimes what happened to the older rowers once they stopped rowing what was their last good of exercise they didn't look they didn't look so great that's amazing I wasn't going to announce this but since I'm talking to you and since you really understand how important exercise is this I don't know if you know this person but you know who Jack LaLanne was right oh yeah he sadly he died after heart surgery did not know I thought he died from pneumonia did not know that he did it was in the mind after heart surgery Wow you know he was put he was primarily he ate pretty well didn't he I mean from what I understand maybe know well enough I never saw the details of his plate but I said I suspect that he was he was I can't say after I cannot honestly say that I knew that he was my base I he was there I found him very very inspiring in fact my first my first book I I actually dedicated to him and I was supposed to meet him but then unfortunately he passed away but I wanted to let you first be knowing everybody here his wife Elaine LaLanne who's 94 years old and still exercises it's going to be a guest on this show on Wednesday what a natural yeah yes because it's amazing because I proud I was of her husband number he used to dive at 8 over 80 years old he would dive into the bay there and pull a tugboat or something but I do see a difference in the way you are aging compared to most people I know I live in a community of 55 and older and the people here are not as old as you and they don't look like units and what I'm trying to say is it's not just the eating I think the fact that you've been so active has made you aged so well well and keep and keeps me reading all the reading all the journals and staying on top of things yeah it must be fun being married to an energizer bunny who's also a gourmet cook absolutely oh yeah I've asked her to come on the show because she is one of the most requested but I no she doesn't want to but that's okay but she's amazing do you guys have time I mean now you can't really do anything like go to movies or shows but do you do you guys have time to have any fun or it's just my whole life I'm like is there anything you guys do like play games watch Netflix know I discovered that I just got her Netflix and so that that's gonna be pretty interesting what kind of things do you watch I'm I'm a little old fashioned I I love westerns that's funny that's funny that's great so if you had what do you want your legacy to be well I have really it's not about it yet I think the I think that one thing it's important that you never you never take anything for granted nothing you've got you know what's amazing about you people complain all the time how difficult it is to get their kids to eat healthy in general and vegetables in particular you have a slew of children and grandchildren and all the esselstyn's eat this way it really is a family affair right well how do you get that to happen it's because by the time let's start with our own kids our own for when they heard what I was involved with and then they started looking at my parents and parents and the whole Esselstyn tree above ourselves and boy that is not very attractive I'm him in everything there where there were strokes there were heart attacks there was cancers of the prostate cancer of the ovary cancer of the pancreas and it was it was a typical really a American family history and so that when our children saw this they said well okay we we can we can see that and then of course we have the ten grandchildren and it wasn't it it was just automatic by then they didn't it there was never any discussion that's just they got fed so there's no it just must be great the challah at your house there's no controversy cuz everybody's eating the same thing that's right that's right yeah if they made a movie of your life who do you think should be the star Gary Cooper he's not alive we gotta take somebody that's still alive that's hilarious you really do like westerns well dr. Esselstyn it is just always a pleasure and a joy talking to you and thank you for all that you and everybody in your family everybody in the it really is a family affair getting getting everyone healthy you all I don't think it's any secret but rip just broke his ankle I know that you know how I know that because he was supposed to be on the show tomorrow and he had to cancel so yes I do know yeah and it's all the angles of the ankle I brought into absolutely true again and he is now entering his fourth week so in another two weeks he'll be out of the cast and walking again so he's already I should say he has been swimming well that's great that's great well I know you've said this before and you're you're sort of well-known for it because it's actually a t-shirt but Nicky says what constitutes greens what constitutes greens all right you ready all right bok choy Swiss chard kale college collar named beet greens mustard being turned green snappy cabbage brussel sprouts broccoli cauliflower cilantro parsley spinach and arugula no asparagus and the top five are kale Swiss chard spinach arugula and beet greens nice what it does for your memory very good that's true nobody will ever accuse you of not not having a good memory of the five you listed I think arugula might be my favorite I agree yeah you know everybody asks us of every guess but and I'm sure you've answered this before and I think I could probably answer it for you but what is dr. Esselstyn eat every day I think I know but I'll let you answer it every day pretty much well I like an oat cereal was at roots that I mentioned in the morning with roasted banana and a raisin don't know and you for lunch and has the most engaging sandwich that you can imagine I mean it's always got some sprouts on it there's always some maybe some cilantro and some kale and maybe a slice of cucumber or on top of it based on some hummus and really we get so much in the way of phytonutrients for that and of course at dinner time my favorite of course was without that beans and rice right on topic because peppers there can be a cut-up there can be peas there can be corn there can be a whole host of vegetables and then maybe some some sauce on top of that and sometimes I'll even have a little avocado you really know how to live dangerously don't you dr. Esselstyn that's it that's amazing well thank you for the work that you do and continue to do and I just there's nobody to fill your shoes you and dr. Campbell are like to two of just you really guys you guys are such heroes and thank you so much for everything you do and taking the time to talk to me today I really do appreciate it AJ keep it up stay safe and thank you so much absolutely and thank you guys so much for watching I hope you'll come back tomorrow when we have a doubleheader at 10 a.m. which is an hour earlier than usual we have dr. David Katz who's gonna be discussing his new book how to eat you have any questions for dr. Katz dr. Esselstyn I'm gonna have what willing on to so what should I ask dr. Katz and dr. Willett asked her one note I come around come around to the fact that oil is dangerous okay oh that is actually yes doesn't I don't know if I can I've got to find a way to phrase it without if anybody wants to be updated last year yeah well you know what if I could phrase that I could say this is a question from dr. Esselstyn that way I can get myself off the hook maybe if I can use your name so thanks but we also have another episode tomorrow at 1:30 p.m. with dr. Columbus batiste and he is going to be talking about how kovat has uncovered America's dirty little secret so stay tuned and dr. Esselstyn all the best to you and n and your entire family wires

Channel: CHEF AJ

Views: 28,313

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Id: yxJjd3m5btc

Length: 57min 58sec (3478 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 13 2020