Cellular Inflammation and Phospholipids with Dr. John Kim

This week on The Less Stressed Life Podcast, I am joined by Dr. John Kim who is a functional medicine pharmacist. In this episode, Dr. Kim tells us his story of having a heart attack at the age 33, the recovery process, and how it changed his life for the better. We talk about mold toxicity, parasites, Lyme, dysbiosis, histamine response, fungal infections, brain fog, chronic inflammation and more! I also ask Dr. Kim what his advice is for women when their men do not believe that they have a chronic illness.

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

• What is cellular inflammation?
• What are signs/symptoms that you are dealing with cellular inflammation?
• Foundations are key!
• Why is detoxing slowly important?
• How phospholipids help the cell membrane
• Why is correct supplement timing important?
• What is the cell membrane response?
• Why doesn't Dr. Kim like oat milk?

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ABOUT GUEST:
Dr. John Kim (Pharm.D., FAARFM) is a highly regarded functional medicine pharmacist who has emerged as a leading voice in the fields of health, wellness, and preventative medicine. With an unwavering commitment to uncovering the root causes of chronic illness, Dr. Kim empowers his clients to take control of their own health journeys, embodying the belief that "The Doctor of the Future is You."
Dr. Kim's personal health journey has been instrumental in shaping his professional outlook. In 2015, he suffered a severe heart attack, which served as a wake-up call to delve deeper into the root causes of chronic illnesses. Through extensive investigation, he discovered hidden stealth infections, including mold toxins, that had precipitated his heart attack. After two years of dedicated treatment, he successfully eradicated these infections, reclaiming his vitality and becoming a living testament to the transformative power of addressing root causes naturally.
Currently, Dr. Kim owns and operates Robinson Wellness Pharmacy, situated in Mendham, New Jersey, along with his own wellness practice, Dr. Kim Wellness. These establishments serve as vital hubs for the provision of holistic healthcare solutions, catering to individuals seeking to optimize their hormonal balance, address immune dysfunction, and restore gut health.

WHERE TO FIND:
Website: https://drkimwellness.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dr.john.pharmd/ 

WHERE TO FIND CHRISTA:
Website: https://www.christabiegler.com/
Instagram: @anti.inflammatory.nutritionist
Podcast Instagram: @lessstressedlife
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@lessstressedlife
Leave a review, submit a questions for the podcast or take one of my quizzes here: https://www.christabiegler.com/links

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TRANSCRIPT:

[00:00:00] Dr. John Kim: You have to address the actual damage to the cell membrane. When you're dealing with this type of chronic infections and top biotoxins, what happens is that it causes a rift within the cell membrane. It's basically damage. 

[00:00:11] Christa Biegler: Stress is the inflammation that robs us of life, energy, and happiness. Our typical solutions for gut health and hormone balance have let a lot of us down. We're over medicated and underserved. At The Less Stressed Life, we're a community of health savvy women exploring solutions outside of our traditional Western medicine toolbox and training to raise the bar and change our stories.

[00:00:38] Christa Biegler: Each week, our hope is that you leave our sessions inspired to learn, grow, and share these stories to raise the bar in your life and home.

[00:00:56] Christa Biegler: Today on the less stressed life, I have a Dr. John Kim, and I'm going to read his longer bio in a moment, but on Instagram, his bio is root cause medicine expert team, anti oat milks. We'll get to that. And I love vegan Karen's. I just enjoy that a little bit. So Dr. John Kim is a functional medicine pharmacist and a graduate of Rutgers university.

[00:01:19] Christa Biegler: And he pursued training through the American Academy of Anti Aging Medicine. Driven by a personal health journey, he is dedicated to uncovering the root causes of chronic illnesses. Today, he owns and operates Robinson Wellness Pharmacy and his own wellness practice, Dr. Kim Wellness in New Jersey. He also lectures nationally as an advocate for medical freedom, championing Individuals rights to make informed decisions about their health care.

[00:01:42] Christa Biegler: Welcome to the show. Dr. Kim. 

[00:01:44] Dr. John Kim: Thank you so much. podcast. 

[00:01:46] Christa Biegler: Thank you. All right. So I follow you on Instagram. That's how this arrangement happened. That happens sometimes. And at the age of 33, six years ago, you had a heart attack. So tell us about that and how it changed the trajectory of your life. 

[00:02:02] Dr. John Kim: Yeah, I mean, 

[00:02:02] Dr. John Kim: is a one matter that a lot of people don't realize how some of the biotoxin issues can be a big impact on the cardiovascular function, and that could actually throw the entirety of the cellular inflammation that might be going through.

[00:02:16] Dr. John Kim: And even though that we end up having to talk about functional medicine all the time, we really have a very minimal understanding of what kind of impact that biotoxin can cause. So long story short, when I was 33 years old exactly. June 4th of 2015. I have it as a anniversary marking for me, and I just was just having to deal with this particular heartburn, which I thought was a heartburn and, you know, I just got back from a wedding for my friend in L. A. Came back. I was a little tired, but nothing so much that I would just like, it's the time changing plus the fact that I was partying all the time at that during the wedding. So I thought that was the biggest issue. And it turned out to be a heartburn, which I thought it was then having to have a sharp shooting pain down to my left arm.

[00:03:07] Dr. John Kim: And Long story short, instead of going to the ER like fool, I end up having to go to an urgent care center and they did the EKG and they found out that I was just dealing with this particular angina and a heart attack and they had to have the actual physician come in. They called the ambulance.

[00:03:27] Dr. John Kim: I was brought into the ER. And even during that whole period, it was just a pain, nothing more. I didn't have any shortness of breath or sweating, just a common symptoms dealing with heart attack. I didn't have any. So when I was got to the ER, even the cardiologists didn't even believe me, nor did the ER physician.

[00:03:47] Dr. John Kim: And when they did echocardiogram, they found out that my left ventricle wasn't pumping correctly. And so whatever diagnosis they thought it was going to be a pericarditis was dealing with something else. So I ended up having to put in a cath lab. They did end up putting a stent put in, and I had an 85 percent blockage in my lower anterior descending artery, which is called a widowmaker.

[00:04:08] Dr. John Kim: And especially for patient, young patient like myself at that point in time, you don't have any compensatory circulation that's been formed around the blockage and you're more likely to die from an actual heart attack compared to an older person. So that was very surprising from the doctor standpoint.

[00:04:26] Dr. John Kim: Second is that my troponin level was less than one, basically showing that there was minimal or actually no damage And the third was I was walking around with a heart. Issue for two days and having to come into the E. R. on scale. So it was basically something that was a mystery from the doctor's standpoint.

[00:04:46] Dr. John Kim: And then the second point that I also made was that because I didn't have any classical signs of a heart attack, they would have just sent me home. With that issue and then told me to, at least they were going to have me talk to my cardiologist and then screening it. So it's really a eye opening moment in terms of just experiencing that.

[00:05:08] Dr. John Kim: Secondly, experiencing God's provision and grace and having to experience it and having to change the overall trajectory into what I'm doing nowadays. It's completely different. So the conclusion was, why did this occur? Right? So I ended up having to come home after the stem putting in and having to sit in a ICU in a cardiovascular unit for 4 days, wondering what would happen.

[00:05:32] Dr. John Kim: How could have, not seen this from the get go. And even to staying home for two weeks just to recover after that was also mind boggling as well because I keep on having to stare at a wall and I'm like, what am I going to do? Do I need to quit my job and walk away? Is it something stress related?

[00:05:50] Dr. John Kim: So I'm very fortunate enough to have a lot of resources and a lot of the top functional medicine doctors around the area. And one of my physicians that I work with. On a daily basis, she was questioning whether I was dealing with some kind of a vector borne illness or some type of toxicity going on. So we got the blood draw done, and then after four weeks later, that's when I was tested positive for Bartonella, along with high levels of mold, aspergillus antibodies.

[00:06:21] Dr. John Kim: along with Epstein Barr and parasites. So that was a, not a definitive diagnosis, but basically it was a hidden biotoxin issues, which led to having to deal with a preconceived heart condition. So that was it. And then it took me about two years to clear the infection. It's already been almost seven years on Bartonella free, which is.

[00:06:44] Dr. John Kim: A lot of people are not able to achieve. Secondly I have a better understanding in terms of cellular information and what goes on really impacting people's lives, especially when you're dealing with biotoxins. And then we're going to be talking about more toxicity, but that's something that I am an expert in and what I experienced and what I teach patients.

[00:07:02] Dr. John Kim: And then how to take care of themselves as such is something that's really been an eye opening moment. And this was how certain little things like that end up having to change the trajectory and what I do. To take care of my clients. 

[00:07:17] Christa Biegler: Yeah. Well, you're not the 1st 1 is I had a conversation with a mystery heart attacks.

[00:07:22] Christa Biegler: You know, because you're a young, healthy person. And I did have a functional cardiologist here at 1 time, who also talked quite a bit about biotoxins being a risk factor for cardiovascular disease. That said, if you had all of these infections. biotoxins and parasites. I'd love to know if you were ignoring other symptoms that you were dealing with long before these heart symptoms.

[00:07:45] Dr. John Kim: Oh, absolutely. I mean, I was working constantly. I had severe GI issues. used to suffer from halitosis, so having severe bad breath. And looking back, that's a sign of a mold toxicity going on. Right. And that is something that I never ended up having to realize. I thought it was just the issue dealing with dysbiosis much.

[00:08:06] Dr. John Kim: Bigger than this biosis, you have dysbiosis causing inflammation in the gut leading into having lipoprotein saccharides being released into the lumen and to the blood vessels. And then you have a cycle of all these inflammatory cytokine activity, which can also cause the oxidation of the lipids, right?

[00:08:26] Dr. John Kim: So in connection with cardiovascular issues, you have to talk about GI function, which is not talked about readily. When you have a leaky gut, not just about the GI problem, it also has you having to cause a systematic inflammation along with the cellular inflammation that goes on. And so you have a very leaky gut.

[00:08:50] Dr. John Kim: Everything in terms of your cell membrane and all along that line. So you have to address those things very carefully. 

[00:08:58] Christa Biegler: Well, I think we'll spend a bit of time talking about that because this is an area that hasn't been talked about as much as it needs to yet. And this is why a lot of people are on a lot of supplements maybe and don't see changes.

[00:09:09] Christa Biegler: One of the big reasons potentially, but to the point of you being a man. Having all of these things, and then it kind of culminating into pretty severe symptoms. I'm coming kind of straight out of talking to some of my clients today. And in this particular group, there's a lot of people dealing with known mold issues, finding it in their homes.

[00:09:31] Christa Biegler: And long story short, a couple of the women were lamenting. About their husbands not being on board with some of these things. And so before we dive into some of the science, I'd love for you to talk about how you feel about that. What is your advice to women? Dealing with that kind of dissonance at home when they know and can see that there is an issue.

[00:09:53] Dr. John Kim: And that's the biggest challenge that I have as well and consulting my clients, I sometimes actually have the husband sit down during the lab interpretation session, and then really showing them how is actually impacting the wife. But also one thing that I really have to address, for some reason, I don't know what it is with guys.

[00:10:13] Dr. John Kim: When the wife is saying that, she's like, they don't really believe it. But then when you end up at the mention that it can impact your kids. Potential fertility issues and cognitive problems and all these things, then they end up like, Oh, okay, then we need to address it. So I just don't, I don't know where the disconnect comes in and really upsetting when I'm getting on these calls and just like, You won't believe your wife is sick.

[00:10:36] Dr. John Kim: But then when you're never to mention that your kid's going to be sick or sicker as it goes, and then your light bulb opening, I'm like, Oh, we have to address that. 

[00:10:44] Christa Biegler: Yeah, I suppose it's because they live in the same household and the man doesn't see the same symptoms. Right. And so they don't maybe think it's connected.

[00:10:51] Christa Biegler: I can only make guesses. 

[00:10:53] Dr. John Kim: I know it's crazy. And I've had already three clients where the wife is severely sick and then the husband wasn't believing it. So I actually asked them to have their husband get on a call and they're very defensive as well, which is also a problem. And that, you know, it's not impacting me.

[00:11:12] Dr. John Kim: So what's the point? So it's very selfish in terms of what the guys are doing. And as a guy, it's very shameful in terms of what they're, where their overall mindset is. 

[00:11:23] Christa Biegler: But as a man, do you think that sometimes men stereotypically are not very good at self awareness of symptoms? Just pointing to your language.

[00:11:31] Dr. John Kim: They suck at it. 

[00:11:32] Christa Biegler: Okay. Just check it in here. 

[00:11:34] Dr. John Kim: Yeah. 

[00:11:35] Dr. John Kim: They really suck at that. And then another thing is that they don't take care of themselves. And what they end up having to realize at the end of it all is trying to do a quick fix. At least females, or at least female clients that I have, they're very mindful in terms of what's really happening.

[00:11:52] Dr. John Kim: They're willing to put in the work in. They're willing to work on their issues including trauma, and then doing as much they can to adjust over root cause issues. For guys, very hard to convey that. And then I've had one client he was a lot of cutting corners on the diet, let's just say, and the wife emailed me saying that, oh, the husband is not, you know, keep on having to eat gluten when you told him not to.

[00:12:21] Dr. John Kim: So, like, it's just. I think they 

[00:12:23] Dr. John Kim: love to, 

[00:12:24] Christa Biegler: I think people love to poke at each other. 

[00:12:26] Dr. John Kim: Oh, yeah, I'm quite sure. But it's just, it's really it's sad. It's not like they're mentally making this stuff up. I mean, unless you're a hypochondriac is a different discussion, but it's just like, when you are noticing that your wife is going to different doctors and having to deal with this chronic issues all the time.

[00:12:45] Dr. John Kim: Having severe reactions to certain chemicals in the house and such. There's something going on. It's not like they're making this stuff up. And you know, if they have a monetary issues or money issues and budget wise, I get it. There are ways to, take care of that as well. There are financing available to take care of it.

[00:13:04] Dr. John Kim: But the first thing is Your spouse has to be well in order for the house to be well, right? That's a whole lot of discussion that has to be done, but I don't know what guys really crazy. 

[00:13:16] Christa Biegler: Yeah. 

[00:13:17] Christa Biegler: I mean, and I see a lot of kids and women, and so maybe the body structure is smaller. I think women may be genetically more predisposed to some of this, but with kids, especially you see a lot of skin issues and to your point about cellular damage, and you're talking about gut health, maybe needs to be in good shape for cardiovascular health for cell for inflammation cell. I see this with skin stuff all the time that the phospholipid membrane has compromised because of inflammation. And then of course, nutrients aren't getting in and out of the cell. And then you see dry skin, but you also see a lot of other things.

[00:13:46] Christa Biegler: I always say like it breaks everything. Right? Like these biotoxins, some of these more intense toxins can kind of break everything. 

[00:13:52] Christa Biegler: Let's talk about the signs and symptoms of a really very simply like, yep, I found all my answers on testing, but I want to make sure we come back to that later after we talk about some cell membrane things. 

[00:14:03] Dr. John Kim: I mean, symptoms dealing with cellular inflammation could be many, but one of the things that could be very common is gut and as well as cognitive function.

[00:14:13] Dr. John Kim: If you constantly deal with brain fog, right, there's major cellular inflammation going there, but also neural inflammation. And if you actually run a red blood cell fatty acid analysis, for instance. Through Kennedy Krieger, you could actually check how much of an inflammation is actually really happening within the actual cell membrane, as well as the deficiency of these different types of fatty acid breakdown, especially, lacking plasminogen, true discussion. And you could test for those and mark that out. So when you talk about like Dr. Robert Navier, for instance, talked about cell danger response and talk about the metabolomics metabolomics, I can say that word sometimes.

[00:14:55] Dr. John Kim: But in, in dealing with that's all epigenetic issues, right? That's actually from the biotoxins to the environmental toxins in dealing with genetic. And then you're dealing with nutritional micronutrient deficiencies. To deal with nervous system that's completely fired up and completely shot sometimes.

[00:15:12] Dr. John Kim: And then now you have a GI issue. If you're already having GI problem, that's just the first sign. And then now you end up having to see everything being dispersed. From skin issues to having to deal with chronic allergies or histamine response. Or mast cell activation issues. Brain fog, right?

[00:15:32] Dr. John Kim: Had trouble recalling certain things. Around, maybe you may have a sensitive to sun issue as well. If you have a mold issue, for instance, you might be sensitive to the sun. So I call it the vampire syndrome, right? As well as chronic fungal infections around the body. If you have a toe infections with fungal issues, that's a systemic infection that's already going on.

[00:15:53] Dr. John Kim: Now it's actually manifesting on your skin itself. A mental health problem as well. Depression. I mentioned about brain fog, headache issues, vertigo. Pain issues, neuropathy, it could be insomnia, tremors kidney infections, chronic UTI problem, right? Irritable bladder. That's very common with women and men.

[00:16:16] Dr. John Kim: If guys are dealing with chronic prostatitis issues, that's some form of mold toxins getting involved, especially aflatoxin. That could be a problem. Chronic viral infections. We have herpes infection that's actually happening chronically, right? You can't control the medication. Then there's some system.

[00:16:34] Dr. John Kim: Yeah, that's also in a worse scenario could be susceptible into cancer, lower immune response. You could run functional labs, you could look at CDC along with liver panels to really see what kind of impact that they're already dealing with, right? You have, when you have a elevated ALT, that's a sign of a chronic inflammation.

[00:16:54] Dr. John Kim: As well as dealing with some type of toxin issues, right? It's not just about the elevated liver. Why is it happening? 

[00:17:01] Christa Biegler: Yeah. 

[00:17:02] Dr. John Kim: So these

[00:17:06] Dr. John Kim: are things that could be impacting as well as infertility is a big one, especially for women these days. And guys and then I think there's a 1 point that guys end up having to have trouble understanding is erectile dysfunction. There's a reason why the mask micro vasculature of your penile tissue is not able to produce correctly.

[00:17:23] Dr. John Kim: Oh, you have inflammation going on. 

[00:17:26] Christa Biegler: I also think hypersensitivity to things when there's all this cellular damage happening, because if there's cellular damage happening, you're not to your point, getting nutrients broken down, getting them into the cell. And then if that's not happening, how does any other process work?

[00:17:40] Christa Biegler: Drainage and detoxification certainly doesn't work at all, right? It's way behind. And then you have these big infections coming in. So you tend to feel hypersensitive. Just kind of crappy overreacting to things, supplements, overreacting to foods, all of these things. I think that is a huge one. You were talking about nervous system.

[00:17:55] Christa Biegler: I'm just kind of describing it maybe a little different way. I feel like it's all kind of in the same overall bucket. 

[00:18:01] Dr. John Kim: When you are dealing with mass activation and some of these patients that we see they are super sensitive. You have to take it very slowly. I do this particular analogy called a, you know, Wrapped up a ball of string or even a rubber band.

[00:18:15] Dr. John Kim: You can't take everything apart all at once. You have to do it very slowly. It's like peeling an onion, for instance. So, that, it takes a lot of patience. It takes a lot of trial. And then you have to have the right functional labs to see what's really happening, and then really triaging the issue.

[00:18:33] Dr. John Kim: And that's the most important part and one of the things that I always end up having to work with clients is that they have to work on the foundational care in terms of how they're sleeping, how they're eating, what kind of water they're drinking, are they pooping daily? We have clients who are not able to poop for two weeks, three weeks sometimes, right?

[00:18:53] Dr. John Kim: So you have to address that. Are they sweating properly? Are they able to exercise? Are they able to go outside and walk around? Right. How is their family life? Do you have enough support going on? Do you have chronic stress from work? Is there family issues? You have an abusive relationship, right? These are things that could be minimal, you might be believing, but it's not.

[00:19:12] Dr. John Kim: It's actually impacting heavily within the cellular inflammation as well, including support system with family members, spiritual health. All that encompassing that I end up having to put as a 10th point of foundational care that we really work on focusing on that for first 6 to 8 weeks while we're actually working on the drains pathway and the detoxing properly.

[00:19:34] Dr. John Kim: And then we're going to be having to work on some of the colonizing issues. And then we have to really triage what are the issues that we're seeing is a mass like issues is a dealing with pain problem, including brain fog that needs to be addressed. And then you have to also look at the GI function as well.

[00:19:48] Christa Biegler: Yeah, let's talk a little bit more about the cellular inflammation and I liken this to being kind of like a dried up soil where the seeds can't get inside. Not like a nice, moist soil where the seeds can get inside. And so I tend to focus on fossil membrane support when I'm picking up that this is a bit of an issue when you're looking at cellular inflammation.

[00:20:09] Christa Biegler: I know you're working on opening up drainage detox pathways, but is there anything you're doing specifically to aid and nourishing the cell to get nutrients inside? 

[00:20:17] Dr. John Kim: You have to address the actual damage of the cell membrane when you're dealing with this type of chronic infections and top biotoxins.

[00:20:23] Dr. John Kim: What happens is that it causes a rift within the cell membrane. So basically damage. So you have to address in terms of why actually is happening. Well, you have a phospholipid deficiency that's going on. And as well as not just phospholipid, you're also dealing with fatty acid deficiency, right? So when you have lacking in omega 6 and omega 3 and proper balance of that, which can also cause leaky cell membrane, as well as when you are dealing with chronic stress response going on.

[00:20:51] Dr. John Kim: Well, your phospholipid reserve is going to be less and less as well. And third, if your diet is horrible, let's just say you're a vegan and having to have lacking in the overall phospholipid intake that you really need from animal fat, including then you're going to be having some issues as well. So it's all about the encompassing whole aspect of what's really happening within that aspect of it.

[00:21:14] Dr. John Kim: And when you are dealing with some of these symptoms that I just mentioned before, especially brain fog. You have major neural inflammation going on cell membrane that's been heavily damaged that we have to fortify you with oral phospholipids, especially liposomal phospholipids. And I recommend a brand called BodyBio which actually does the first thing that I took after my heart attack.

[00:21:36] Dr. John Kim: Long story short, I had gotten the Kennedy Krieger testing. We sent the lab results to BodyBio and the founder, Patricia Kane, ended up having to analyze my blood work. Then she ended up having to give me the overall breakdown. It doesn't how much of a possible that I need to take on a daily basis.

[00:21:52] Dr. John Kim: And all that. So, I know she retired, but bless her. That was one of the key components that really helped out in terms of getting my cellular information down. And then I also did IV phospholipids. So that's another thing that I did, which is very hard to come by. 

[00:22:06] Christa Biegler: Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:22:08] Dr. John Kim: But that's what I did to reverse my issues.

[00:22:10] Christa Biegler: Yeah, that's really cool that was sent over to her and that she was able to provide insight for your case. I use their fossil lipids all the time and I also think that they're totally life changing, but I don't think that this is super common or talked about as much as it could be. 

[00:22:25] Dr. John Kim: No, it's not. And it's.

[00:22:27] Dr. John Kim: A sad part that a lot of clinicians and practitioners are not looking at the cell membrane, right? And this is the same point that I always end up having to make. We're doing way too much, right? Throwing all random supplements because we went to some didactic lecture saying that any clinician that's going to be on stage will say, Hey, this, these things work.

[00:22:48] Dr. John Kim: Or if you end up having to go to supplement company seminar, of course they're going to say it's going to work, right? So that's when you end up having to pick up new tools and tricks and trying to use it on your clients. But really have to understand Is it the correct timing of adding those supplements in, and is it going to really push the needle in terms of what we are trying to achieve?

[00:23:09] Christa Biegler: Yeah. 

[00:23:09] Dr. John Kim: Is this the point that I mentioned about, I'll give you perfect example, is use of glutathione. Everybody's trying to throw glutathione, right from the start. I get that is one of the powerful antioxidants that we have to utilize, and that when you're dealing with chronic infections and toxins, your glutathione levels can be low, but.

[00:23:28] Dr. John Kim: There's a reason why glutathione level is low. If you understand the entire cell danger response and how that comes into play, there's a reason why the body shuts down the entire methylation process as well as glutathione production because they want less oxidative stress going on as well as methylation process can be hijacked by pathogens.

[00:23:49] Dr. John Kim: to create more inflammation in the body, which we keep on having to not understand. So giving methylated B vitamins or glutathione, for instance, because we want to support the methylation or after that wrong process to use. And this is the reason why a lot of clinicians end up getting to into trouble.

[00:24:06] Dr. John Kim: And some of the clients end up having to be not tolerating the protocol. And they have to having to complain that, Oh, I'm getting sicker and sicker. And then the doctor is No, you need to keep on having to take that. That's a die off reaction. There's a reason why there's a die off reaction going on.

[00:24:19] Dr. John Kim: There's a reason why the patient's very symptomatic, even with the protocol, and we're getting worse. We need to stop, we need to really assess the issues, understand the entire pathophysiology and what's really happening, and then address the cell danger response, that is adding in the proper phospholipid therapy, and addressing the cell membrane inflammation, or allow the cell membranes to work well.

[00:24:43] Dr. John Kim: Because it, what happens during the cell danger response is that Mitochondria pumps out phosphorylcholine to lock the entire cell membrane down to prevent other things to go out or go in. That is a particular defense mechanism the mitochondria is doing. What are you doing adding all these vitamins and those are not going to be addressed?

[00:25:04] Dr. John Kim: When you have a sneak or a damaged cell membrane to begin with, you're not achieving anything, you're just causing more damage. 

[00:25:10] Christa Biegler: Yeah. 

[00:25:11] Dr. John Kim: This is a particular thing that I wish the clinicians in the department understand. And I think more and more information of this should be shared. 

[00:25:19] Christa Biegler: Yeah, when I have this conversation with clients and I described the dried up soil analogy, I say, maybe in 10 years, this will be really common.

[00:25:26] Christa Biegler: But right now, this is our conversation. I know you haven't heard this somewhere else, but this is what we're talking about. Okay, phospholipids, cell membrane structure. I was going to say, you called it vegan. I would also say, like. Overall under eating. One really big sore spot. My schtick is Hey, let's fix your food reactions without being unnecessarily restrictive under eating and poor digestion in general leads to a lot of downstream negative poorly nourished impacts low nutrient status as well.

[00:25:58] Christa Biegler: which is just an emphasis on your point of, Hey, if you're not eating these where we would get these fossil lipids somewhat in animal proteins, then you're kind of missing out big picture as well. So under eating is one of these big pieces, I think that goes along with that. And to your point, you know, we talk about all these foundational things.

[00:26:16] Christa Biegler: You're right. If we're not looking at sleep, if we're not looking at diet first, but under eating is such an issue because people are afraid to consume foods because in functional medicine, there's been this huge focus on restricting foods for too long, unfortunately. And bring this up because some fossil lipid sourcing is from soy and people are like, Oh, I can't have this soy.

[00:26:33] Dr. John Kim: Yeah, definitely correct in the malnourishing portion and they're not eating much. And another thing is the heavy emphasis on fasting. You know, there's proper ways of fasting and fasting could be very impactful, right? For, especially if you're dealing with gut inflammation, you could do a three quick three day fasting and.

[00:26:49] Dr. John Kim: Inflammation goes on patients feel better, but is it the right time to adding it as a point? 

[00:26:53] Christa Biegler: Yeah, then they just keep doing it, 

[00:26:55] Dr. John Kim: right? 

[00:26:55] Dr. John Kim: That's not, I mean, even including I'm not bashing prolon. I pull on as well for myself once a year, but is it a proper timing and adding prolon fast mimicking diet into the mix?

[00:27:06] Christa Biegler: Right? 

[00:27:06] Dr. John Kim: You may not be able to tolerate, especially when you're looking at the breakdown of the ingredients that's adding in. 

[00:27:12] Dr. John Kim: I'm having to found those 64 key ingredients for a longevity process. That's a great information to share, but is it working well for these type of chronic infection issues? 

[00:27:24] Christa Biegler: Not for my clients, it's not the right choice for my clients, but sometimes I get people who are coming away from a fasting protocols because they realize that there's still issues.

[00:27:33] Christa Biegler: The negative positive to fasting is that when you're reacting to a lot of things, or if you have biotoxins, you take out a bunch of foods that feed the biotoxins or. Might even have biotoxins in them and guess what? You feel better, but that becomes a problem when you take that out and then you just keep taking it out, taking out.

[00:27:48] Christa Biegler: And I just mentioned that because it's part of the whole big picture of cellular inflammation and getting these nutrients into the cell. And if you don't have nourished cells game over, it doesn't really matter. Like everything else is going to break down piece by piece. Speaking of nutrients, let's talk about why you hate oat milk.

[00:28:05] Dr. John Kim: You know, this was a 3rd time having to be on a podcast and then the host was asking about why not? 

[00:28:12] Christa Biegler: Hey, I don't love oat milk. It's fine. 

[00:28:13] Dr. John Kim: You know. 

[00:28:15] Dr. John Kim: I didn't realize the impact of what oatmeal can do for the body. I mean, when you're talking about, I'm not going to mention any brand names of the particular ones that are on the market, but if you look at the actual ingredient on the carton of the box itself, first, you're going to see water and then oats, but then following that, what's happening right now, you add that actually adding a canola oil and all the inflammatory seed oils into the mixture.

[00:28:40] Dr. John Kim: Why? Because you're replacing an actual animal based milk product and to allow that overall satisfaction of ingesting fat and especially to take care of the taste buds and the feeling of eating fat, they're adding in canola and other inflammatory oils, right? I don't care. And then there are cleaner brands.

[00:29:02] Dr. John Kim: I mean, one clean blend I could mention is Bulk, M A L K, but you still deal with And oh, in itself it contains phytic acid it can actually affect the nutrients being absorbed. Secondly, oats are, depending on how it's processed, is perfect environment for mycotoxins to be involved in that. And even they say it could be gluten free, but you're still dealing with residues of gluten itself, so it's not a full 100 percent gluten free.

[00:29:31] Dr. John Kim: And then you're dealing with spike blood sugar, because if we break down, oh, it turns it to maltose, which is basically sugar water. And you're ingesting that. Now you have a spike sugar level that's going on, right? If you actually have a very much a metabolic flexibility and you can control your blood sugar.

[00:29:48] Dr. John Kim: Great. But do we see that naturally in a patient who's dealing with chronic issues? 

[00:29:53] Dr. John Kim: Definitely not there. 

[00:29:55] Christa Biegler: That's a distant level of health. How many direct messages do you have to field every week about oat milk? Just curious. 

[00:30:01] Dr. John Kim: Not much anymore. I sometimes end up having to delete or just completely ignore it.

[00:30:07] Dr. John Kim: I do get a lot of the DMS about, you know, I'm dealing with auto immune issues. Can you list me all the supplements I need to take? I'm like, no, I don't even know who you are. 

[00:30:17] Christa Biegler: Right. Yeah. No, the funny there, that could be a different conversation for a different day. Funny life stories.

[00:30:22] Christa Biegler: You get an Instagram messages every once in a while. I'm like, I don't know how to unsee that, but back to oat milk. In the defense of the listener. While we're here hating on oat milk, I once upon a time used to drink a lot of oat milk and eat a lot of oatmeal and I felt like an ass. And I part of that was probably a little bit blood sugar related, like there, I think some blood sugar mold history there, right?

[00:30:46] Christa Biegler: So as you said, oats are just a significant grains are just a tricky harbor of mold. Sometimes I'm way more interested in environmental sources of mold than I am food sources of mold, to be honest. But when you have it, When you have a colony inside of you and you're eating a bunch of moldy foods, sometimes it doesn't feel good.

[00:31:02] Christa Biegler: Right? 

[00:31:02] Dr. John Kim: That's definitely not. 

[00:31:03] Dr. John Kim: And I see clients are like, I mean, I have 1 client. It was like, yeah, no, I went to a family event that they were serving pizza and then some snacks and all that line. And then, oh, my God, I feel so horrible. The following day. I'm like. Yeah, that's the reason why I told you not to eat it 

[00:31:18] Christa Biegler: and with dairy.

[00:31:19] Christa Biegler: Also, I think I cannot guarantee everyone will tolerate dairy perfectly, but I think that most people can tolerate dairy a lot better than we do, because once you deal with infections and dysbiosis and things like that, we tend to tolerate things better, at least in some cases, 

[00:31:33] Dr. John Kim: definitely.

[00:31:34] Dr. John Kim: That's going to come back. Right. But the biggest thing that we have to also realize is what's really happening within the gut and why you're actually having reactions to such, you're really, when I see patients, especially when they do their stool analysis and I utilize a gut zoomer for bioroom illness.

[00:31:51] Dr. John Kim: The biggest thing that pops up all the time is having fat in the stool or they actually lacking in phospholipids What's really happening there? Well, they're actually lacking in stomach acid. They're also low in lipase, right? So these are the two common liver gallbladder function as well So end up having to add in ox bile that I end up having to add in especially pancreatin.

[00:32:13] Dr. John Kim: There's another one also You're lacking so I also utilize tatka for body bile one of the key things I intend to add in To allow patients to ingest that properly. What's the whole point of me giving you a high dose of You know, body about a PC when you're not even able to tolerate that. And then I had a client he just started seeing me.

[00:32:33] Dr. John Kim: And one of the things that he was mentioning about is like, well, I'm just having all these valve smelling poop now after eating all these things. I was like, well, you have a issue dealing with stomach acid and all the other enzymes and lacking. So we're going to add those in as well. So those are key things.

[00:32:48] Dr. John Kim: Like we keep on having to push supplements. If the overall gut environment is not ready to absorb these things, it's not going to work. 

[00:32:57] Christa Biegler: Yeah. Going back to the beginning of your story, well, the story was concise enough. It sounds like you were very lucky. In my opinion, it sounds like someone did some testing and it actually found things that you were looking for.

[00:33:08] Christa Biegler: I would say I hang out in mild to moderate mold space and I like it there. That's fine. I pick up that other people are not going to pick up. But my point is that if your test came back significant, you got a little bit lucky because sometimes it doesn't always look significant or people are told that they don't really have much of a problem, depending on how testing is done.

[00:33:30] Christa Biegler: Different types of testing, et cetera. So what do you want to say about testing pros and cons there? It's imperfect, but you got pretty lucky. I feel like, 

[00:33:38] Dr. John Kim: yeah, you know, it's all God's grace and not boasting about it, but 1 thing is, you know, being that I'm in a medical profession, only a compounding pharmacy, having to work with some of the top, top functional medicine doctors around the tri state area.

[00:33:53] Dr. John Kim: It just gave me a lot more exposure and knowledge and asking the right questions. It was the biggest impact that I made in dealing with the issue that I found back in 2015 and that was a reason why, the correct testing was also utilized as well, especially if I decide to just do random blood tests using other lab companies.

[00:34:16] Dr. John Kim: Detection of Bartonella is going to be nothing, right? That's not, but we were able to utilize iGenX. Using a fish testing that was able to detect the Barton L infection already had. I don't particularly believe at that point in time, the urine mycotoxin testing was actually prevalent, but we were able to utilize the antibody and we found out that there was a heavy levels of aspergillus antibodies floating around that we were able to say, Hey, we are seeing a, some type of mold issue that's going on.

[00:34:48] Dr. John Kim: And third Epstein Barr. And then parasitic issues and there are no perfect parasitic parasite testing available except for that one company called parasite testing. org where you could do a plus spot testing to see the type of parasites you're dealing with. But during that time, you have to look at some of the lab markers and that's the thing.

[00:35:08] Dr. John Kim: A lot of functional providers are lacking in knowledge and doesn't meeting functional labs. I have 1 client. I did just, she went through several doctors and I noticed that there were certain lab markers, especially her low factor level and high levels of those. I'm like, you're dealing with a parasite issues.

[00:35:24] Christa Biegler: Yeah, at least that if 

[00:35:26] Christa Biegler: not more, 

[00:35:26] Dr. John Kim: she went to 5 different functional and completely missed it. I'm not trying to bash on this. It's like, right. is lacking in the overall knowledge and not questioning why certain lab markers are elevated or low. That's the problem. That's the reason why patients aren't able to get the right answer they're looking for.

[00:35:44] Dr. John Kim: And that's way, that's the reason why I'm so fortunate. And by God's grace that I was able to find the answers right away and the treatment started within two months after having a heart attack.

[00:35:55] Christa Biegler: I want to emphasize that you said the urine mycotoxin was not positive, but the antibodies in your serum or in your blood.

[00:36:03] Dr. John Kim: Let me correct that. It was not popular. Utilizing it. I think that was available at that point in time in . And so we were using blood to check it. And even Dr. Schumacher, I mean, who's very forefront in terms of deal with mold toxicity and you have to look at some of the other lab markers as well, especially batch F and all those things.

[00:36:23] Dr. John Kim: But again, the training, the overall knowledge, the access to some of the informations. Especially getting connected with body bio at that point in time, able to find the co infections that we're dealing with, clearing it out, and having to have that what I call the cellular resiliency, right, that was able to build up, and have to get my life back, including all the key things I've noticed after dealing with all that, not having to deal with food allergies, My gut's clean, my skin completely cleared up.

[00:36:56] Dr. John Kim: I used to deal with cystic acne everywhere. So those are the biggest issue that was that was already taken care of. Just fixing the gut and the phospholipid issues. 

[00:37:06] Christa Biegler: Since you have a compounding pharmacy, what are some of the most common things that you are compounding in your pharmacy that patients aren't able to get in other places?

[00:37:16] Dr. John Kim: Low dose naltrexone. 

[00:37:18] Christa Biegler: Interesting. 

[00:37:18] Dr. John Kim: Low dose naltrexone is one of the key thing that's been really impacting thousands of patients these days. You may not be able to go to a most complex, well trained functional MD, but if you could get a source of low dose naltrexone and find a key dose for you, you could reverse a lot of issues to deal with.

[00:37:38] Dr. John Kim: Especially 

[00:37:39] Christa Biegler: I didn't realize that was so hard to get. 

[00:37:42] Dr. John Kim: It's not hard to get. It's the right doctors that are trained to prescribing low dose naltrexone. 

[00:37:48] Christa Biegler: Sure 

[00:37:49] Dr. John Kim: Everybody have this understanding that the low dose naltrexone dosing has to be around like four to 4. 5 milligrams.

[00:37:55] Dr. John Kim: That's not true at all. And having to understand that we have to give these clients this naltrexone in the evening is also false as well. There's a group called LDN trusts where they do have, it's a nonprofit organization. They pull all the studies, data, and as well as practitioners together.

[00:38:14] Dr. John Kim: To really dive in the science of Neltrap Zone and more and more every year we're learning new things, new tricks. Right. So even for us, when we're compounding low dose naltrexone, we always start giving capsules. No, we don't. We also give in to liquid drops or we give to a patient's trochies where you could do a melt away of no dose naltrexone.

[00:38:38] Dr. John Kim: You could even do nasal sprays to reverse some of the issues patient dealing with chronic neuroinflammation as well as dealing with anosmia after post COVID issues. Right. So those are a couple of ways that we could do thing is, unless we actually have all these experiences that we could share with other practitioners.

[00:38:57] Dr. John Kim: Well, that LDN Trust does it very well for getting all those practitioners together and share that information. 

[00:39:03] Christa Biegler: Yeah, that's cool. Is there any other ones? 

[00:39:05] Dr. John Kim: I compound a lot of prescription based anti parasite medications. 

[00:39:09] Christa Biegler: Oh, interesting. 

[00:39:10] Dr. John Kim: Instead, like you're just relying on a herbal based anti parasites, you could really hyperfocus on the type of the parasites you're dealing with, and then you could really make a short treatment of the parasites and then really help the clients.

[00:39:24] Dr. John Kim: You know, push that dollar needle that they're looking for. And the third thing we do a lot is by identical hormone replacement therapy. 

[00:39:30] Christa Biegler: I was wondering that going back to your story for one more thing, you had all this testing done after your cardiac event and you did say that they had found parasites, but we know that parasite testing is not very good.

[00:39:43] Christa Biegler: Was it actually other secondary markers in blood that were giving you indication of parasites or how did you know for sure? And did you trust this? Like, I don't know how you were into, how much you were into functional medicine if there was a little bit of a bridge or if someone kind of introduced you to some, or if you were already open to it before you had this cardiac 

[00:40:02] Christa Biegler: event.

[00:40:03] Dr. John Kim: Yeah, so I was always into functional medicine. So when I graduated from pharmacy school back in 2006. And right before I was graduating, I didn't feel that the actual pharmacy work that I was learning about and doing was the right way to do it. Because I saw this particular one client that was working in the ER as a ER pharmacist.

[00:40:27] Dr. John Kim: She ended up having to come in every single week. I was there for five weeks, every single week with uncontrolled blood pressure. And even optimizing, we thought it was optimized actual medication, didn't do anything except for the fact that this person actually was dealing with some huge issues, metabolic issues.

[00:40:44] Dr. John Kim: And we never addressed the overall dietary changes in lifestyle, right? We were so busy just getting the patients out the door. That we hit, we miss a lot of things and that's the particular reason why I got into a holistic functional medicine practice. And after graduate from pharmacy school, I went through a forum to get my fellowship in functional medicine training.

[00:41:07] Dr. John Kim: It only gives you so much information and you build up from there. Just give me great foundation. I was only working with patients dealing with hormone dysfunction and gut. And then after dealing with my own problem. Now I got into the biotoxin issues and helping clients that way 

[00:41:23] Christa Biegler: for sure. Oh, and you were going to tell us how you found out you had parasites.

[00:41:27] Dr. John Kim: Oh, so sorry. Yeah. So I was dealing with severe food sensitivity issues and histamine response. So namely, if you have things like helmet for instance, you can actually have very high levels of mass activation going on. So sometimes in certain clients, when we utilize albendazole, for instance, for the three to seven day protocol, the mass I'll end up having to decrease drastically.

[00:41:51] Christa Biegler: How wonderful. 

[00:41:52] Dr. John Kim: Yeah. Followed by utilization of a linear, which is called not as up tonight, and you could do a one, two punch. You may need to do another cycle. 

[00:41:59] Christa Biegler: Pretty fast. Pretty fast. 

[00:42:01] Dr. John Kim: It's fast. And that's just doesn't end there. You do have to address more because parasites harbor more than line. So when you're dealing with mold toxins, for instance, you have to get the underlying causation of the mold first, then do a parasite tackling, then go after the other code infections.

[00:42:21] Dr. John Kim: That's basically the hierarchy you have to go through instead of actually, which I don't particularly agree with. Some of the practitioners have happened to just utilize parasite protocol right after that. Some clients cannot tolerate that right after. Because you're dealing with colonizing mold, you have a immune system that's already been in bad, causing imbalances and also the gut function that you have to address the overall inflammation first.

[00:42:45] Dr. John Kim: And this is the reason why adding in the phospholipid therapy from the get go, it makes so much sense. 

[00:42:51] Christa Biegler: For sure. Did you decide in your journey where you were exposed to mold? I think that's can be a loaded question, but did you just say, yes,

[00:42:59] Dr. John Kim: I know exactly where I got it from. 

[00:43:00] Christa Biegler: Yeah. Where'd you get it from?

[00:43:01] Dr. John Kim: My parents house. 

[00:43:02] Christa Biegler: Oh, yeah, cool. Yeah. Did they do anything 

[00:43:04] Christa Biegler: about it?

[00:43:05] Dr. John Kim: Nope. They're still living in a moldy environment. And well, especially when I go to the house, I could see. mold all over the ceiling. And I know exactly what type of mold it is. And it's hard to discuss that with a Asian immigrant family and how that is impactful.

[00:43:24] Dr. John Kim: And my parents are, it's really sad to discuss this, but they're the type of people that If you don't know, it's better, right? So it's hard discussion to make. And anytime I go to a house, I get allergy symptoms. And so I'd have to do some detox work afterwards, but yeah it's hard to discuss. 

[00:43:43] Christa Biegler: get that question sometimes from clients who say, what am I going to do when I go to my parents moldy house?

[00:43:48] Christa Biegler: And I was like, here's some ideas. I also have that problem when I go to my parents house. So you just give yourself some support, stay out of the certain affected areas, if you can, and you minimize your exposure as much as possible, I guess.

[00:44:02] Dr. John Kim: Yeah. And then yeah. And then the basement of my parents house, and then we had, I think when I was living there, at least three flooding that we actually had.

[00:44:12] Christa Biegler: They're super common 

[00:44:14] Dr. John Kim: and that was never treated properly. 

[00:44:17] Christa Biegler: I remember something flooded in the original house I grew up in until age 10, you know, so this was a distant memory. It just came up to me like not very long ago and I remember it was so fun cause I was probably like six years old and we got to stay in a hotel for a week.

[00:44:30] Christa Biegler: It was a blast. Right. And you think about it and there's so much. Poorly done flood exposure, unfortunately. And I talk about this pretty freely at this point because it's so flipping common. I'm just like, you're just better off if you're aware because you don't have to be like scared. It can be anywhere.

[00:44:45] Christa Biegler: And so you're better off if you know, so you can just address it and move on. Because , none of us are immune to being exposed at any time whatsoever. So I just talk about it. I'm sure that before I became much more aware of how much mold was impacting us, we were just like, Oh, it's just fungus.

[00:45:01] Christa Biegler: That won't go away. You know, like, I think we were really in functional medicine, really into fungal stuff, like maybe 15 years ago. And I think it probably was just, could have just been mold the whole time. Who knows, but. 

[00:45:11] Dr. John Kim: Yeah, that's correct. And then another thing that. Could be an issue. And this can be an impact for people who grew up in a moldy house to clear the mold issue that dealing with.

[00:45:22] Dr. John Kim: And then the next step they go through is trauma response to deal with the biotoxins, right? They're like, Oh my God, clean environment. Everything has to be clean. Everything has to be. Yeah. There's only so much you could do, right. And then I always mentioned is that you need to do maintenance work to support your cell membrane, support your detox pathway.

[00:45:40] Dr. John Kim: So because you're not going to be living in a perfect environment ever. 

[00:45:44] Christa Biegler: Yeah, I agree. Totally agree. I think you can always support yourself with nervous system, adrenal support, and a drainage detox support to emphasize what you said, Dr. John Kim, where can people find you online? 

[00:45:56] Dr. John Kim: Absolutely. You find me on Instagram dr dot, John dot PharmD.

[00:46:01] Dr. John Kim: I'm always active there. And as well as I have a website, Dr. Kim wellness.com. And if you want to do a consult, there's a link there for you to make a appointment and then discuss about the further issues that you might be dealing with. 

[00:46:12] Christa Biegler: Cool. Thanks so much for coming on today. 

[00:46:14] Dr. John Kim: Okay. Thank you so much.

[00:46:15] Dr. John Kim: Sharing and reviewing this podcast is the best way to help us succeed with our mission to help integrate the best of East and West and empower you to raise the bar on your health story. Just go to review this podcast. com forward slash less stressed life. That's review this podcast. com forward slash less stressed life.

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