Defiant Health Radio with Dr. William Davis
Defiant Health Radio with Dr. William Davis
Why managing skin pH is crucial for skin health and appearance
I’ve been showing thousands of people how to restore this microbe lost by the majority of modern people, Lactobacillus reuteri. But, of all the spectacular improvements in health we can gain by managing our microbiomes, such as an increase in empathy and generosity, reduction in anxiety and depression, deeper sleep, increased libido, restored youthful musculature and strength, the females in my audience have repeatedly said something like, “Well, that’s all well and good, but I’m mostly interested in the skin benefits.” So I’ve spent a good deal of time, energy, and resources in exploring this question, including performing a small human clinical trial to better understand how and why restoration of L. reuteri, especially when combined with other non-microbial synergistic factors, can restore youthful healthy skin.
One issue that has emerged to the forefront in our quest to better under skin health and appearance is the issue of skin pH. We may not think about skin this way, but healthy skin is acidic. The pH of healthy skin in someone not plagued by eczema, acne, rosacea, psoriasis, or other skin conditions is typically around 4.5. Recall that neutral is 7.0 and the blood is mildly alkaline at a pH of 7.4. Unhealthy skin, in contrast, skin with various skin rashes, has a pH of around 5.5—given the logarithmic nature of the pH scale, unhealthy skin is therefore 10-fold less acidic than healthy skin, a huge difference. This difference in pH is a crucial determinant of what you skin looks and feels like, whether you will be prone to these sorts of skin rashes or whether you can enjoy smooth youthful skin. So let’s dive into that topic, the importance of managing skin pH.
_______________________________________________________________________________
For BiotiQuest probiotics including Sugar Shift, go here.
A 15% discount is available for Defiant Health podcast listeners by entering discount code UNDOC15 (case-sensitive) at checkout.*
_________________________________________________________________________________
Get your 15% Paleovalley discount on fermented grass-fed beef sticks, Bone Broth Collagen, low-carb snack bars and other high-quality organic foods here.*
For 12% off every order of grass-fed and pasture-raised meats from Wild Pastures, go here.
_____________________________________________________________________________
MyReuteri and Gut to Glow can be found here: oxiceutics.com
Books:
Super Gut: The 4-Week Plan to Reprogram Your Microbiome, Restore Health, and Lose Weight
I've been showing thousands of people how to restore this microbe lost by the majority of modern people, lactobacillus roteri. But of all the spectacular improvements in health we can gain by managing our microbiomes, such as an increase in empathy and generosity, reduction in anxiety and depression, deeper sleep, increased libido, restored youthful musculature and generosity, reduction in anxiety and depression, deeper sleep, increased libido, restored youthful musculature and strength. The females in my audience have repeatedly said something like well, that's all well and good, but I'm mostly interested in the skin benefits. So I spent a good deal of time, energy and resources in exploring this question, including performing a small human clinical trial to better understand how and why restoration of lactobacillus roteri, especially when combined with other non-microbial synergistic factors, can restore youthful, healthy skin.
Speaker 1:One issue that has emerged to the forefront in our quest to better understand skin health and appearance is the issue of skin pH. We may not think about skin this way, but healthy skin is acidic. The pH of healthy skin in someone not plagued by eczema, acne, rosacea, psoriasis or other skin conditions is typically around 4.5. Typically around 4.5. Recall that neutral is 7.0 and the blood is mildly alkaline at a pH of 7.4. Unhealthy skin, in contrast, skin with various rashes has a pH of around 5.5. Given the logarithmic nature of the pH scale, unhealthy skin is therefore tenfold less acidic than healthy skin at 4.5. A huge difference. This difference in pH is a crucial determinant of what your skin looks like and what it feels like, whether you'll be prone to these sorts of skin rashes or whether you can enjoy smooth, youthful skin. So let's dive into that topic the importance of managing skin pH and let me tell you about Define Health's sponsors Paleo Valley, our preferred provider for many excellent organic and grass-fed food products, and BiotiQuest, my number one choice for probiotics that are scientifically formulated, unlike most of the other commercial probiotic products available today. And I'd like to make you aware of a new source for our favorite microbe, lactobacillus roteri, and a skin formulation I designed that improves skin from the inside out.
Speaker 1:Skin pH, that is, the level of acidity or alkalinity, is a major factor in determining what your skin looks like and its health. So recall that people with unhealthy skin, with acne, psoriasis, seborrhea, eczema and other health conditions tend to have less acidic skin, typically a pH above 5.5 and to the 6 range. Healthy skin, on the other hand, tends to be acidic 4.5, maybe as high as 5.5, and less prone to all those skin conditions. There's also evidence that a normal pH, an acidic pH, also encourages healthy appearing and youthful appearing skin, reducing long-term potential for wrinkles, dryness and thinning. So there's great advantage to having acidic skin. Now you can measure pH. You can get pH test strips. You'll have to wash your face and then apply some saline, first to the test strip and then to your skin, and see what the pH is after a few seconds. Many dermatologists also have a pH meter they can ask them to use to see what your pH is. Ideally, though, you track it over time if you're introducing something that changes pH.
Speaker 1:Now, the major player in determining what your skin pH is a fatty acid called butyric acid. Now, there are two sources of butyric acid. One is the skin itself, that is, the microbes in the skin and the gastrointestinal tract. So what goes on in your gastrointestinal tract can play a major role in what goes on in the skin. That's why people talk about a gut-skin axis. The gut, the contents of the gut, and its penetrability plays a role in the appearance and health of your skin. Now, one major player in the skin microbiome that produces butyrate is Staphylococcus epidermidis.
Speaker 1:You've heard of Staphylococcus aureus right, you've heard this is a major pathogen in hospitals and in abscesses and infections. So that's Staphylococcus aureus, a very dangerous pathogen. Although all of us have it in our bodies, it's present, ideally, at very low levels, including very low levels in the skin. But it can overpopulate and that contributes to both infections in other parts of the body as well as distortions of skin health, because Staphylococcus is unwelcome and is very dangerous in skin. And whenever you have those health conditions seborrhea, acne, psoriasis, rosacea, eczema Staphylococcus aureus becomes the dominant microbe.
Speaker 1:It's not quite clear whether it's causal, whether it initiates the process or whether it's just an accompaniment and makes it worse. But regardless, staphylococcus aureus, we do not want to become dominant in the skin. We want instead a cousin, another species of Staphylococcus, staphylococcus epidermidis, and I'm sorry about these names, but Staphylococcus epidermidis is, in ordinary circumstances, your friend. It's the dominant, it's meant to be the dominant microbe in healthy skin. So in people who don't have acne, eczema, psoriasis etc. Tend to have their skin dominated by Staphylococcus epidermidis and it helps suppress Staphylococcus aureus.
Speaker 1:Now, staphylococcus epidermidis is a producer of that butyrate or butyric acid. So we want it to produce butyric acid because it acidifies the skin. Staphylococcus aureus, the one we don't want is very susceptible to acid. That is, when the skin is acidic it helps suppress Staphylococcus a, and when the skin is acidic it encourages or allows Staphylococcus epidermidis to thrive, so that acidity of the skin is a major factor in maintaining your skin health, by maintaining the balance between Staphylococcus epidermidis over that of Staphylococcus aureus. Well, how do you encourage the proliferation of Staphylococcus epidermidis in the skin?
Speaker 1:Well, avoid antibiotics as much as you can. Not easy to say sometimes, but if you're prescribing an antibiotic, always question its necessity. Obviously, if you're very sick, you may need an antibiotic, but if it's for, say, a cold, maybe a sore throat or some minor ailment, question the need for the antibiotic, because you cannot undo the effects of antibiotics and one of the effects is the undo, the balance in the skin microbiome. When you use topical products like moisturizers and other products, we of course avoid things like phthalates and parabens that are carcinogens, but look for the ingredient, glycerol or glycerin. These are very benign ingredients that have been around for many years but are only in a handful of skin products. But when you have products that have glycerin or glycerol, that feeds Staphylococcus epidermidis, that in turn converts that glycerin or glycerol, glycerin and glycerol, by the way, are interchangeable. One's a liquid, one's a powder. It's converted by Staphylococcus epidermidis into butyrate and therefore helps acidify the skin. If you have a favorite product, let's say a moisturizer, that does not have glycerol or glycerin, you can buy an inexpensive bottle of glycerol or glycerin and add a little bit, maybe a half teaspoon or so, to your product, mix it, of course, and then apply that. You'll stack the odds in favor of encouraging the proliferation of that healthy microbe, staphylococcus epidermidis.
Speaker 1:Now let's take a brief break to let me tell you about Defiant Health's sponsors, paleo Valley and BioDequest. When we come back, let's talk about the role the very important role of the gastrointestinal microbiome in producing butyrate and thereby determining the health and appearance of your skin. The Defiant Health Podcast is sponsored by Paleo Valley, makers of delicious grass-fed beef sticks, healthy snack bars and other products. We're very picky around here and insist that any product we consider contains no junk ingredients like carrageenan, carboxymethylcellulose, sucralose or added sugars and, of course, no gluten nor grains. One of the habits I urge everyone to get into is to include several servings of fermented foods every day in your diet, part of an effort to cultivate a healthy gastrointestinal microbiome. Unlike nearly all other meat sticks available, paleo Valley grass-fed beef, pork and chicken sticks are naturally fermented, meaning they contain probiotic bacterial species. Paleo Valley has also launched a number of interesting new products, including extra virgin olive oil, spice mixes, organic coffee, strawberry lemonade, super greens and essential electrolytes in a variety of flavors. And if you haven't already tried it, you've got to try their chocolate-flavored bone broth protein that makes delicious hot chocolate and brownies. See the recipes for the brownies in my drdavisinfinitehealthcom blog. Listeners to the Defiant Health podcast receive a 15% discount by going to paleovalleycom.
Speaker 1:Backward slash defiant health. And in case you haven't yet heard, biotiquest probiotics are my first choice for intelligently, purposefully crafted probiotics. I've had numerous conversations with BiotiQuest founders Martha Carlin and academic microbiologist Dr Raul Cano. They have formulated unique probiotic products that incorporate what are called collaborative or guild effects, that is, groups of microbes that collaborate with each other via sharing of specific metabolites, potentially providing synergistic benefits. They have designed their sugar shift probiotic to support healthy blood sugars. Simple slumber to support sleep. Ideal immunity to support a healthy immune response. Heart centered that supports several aspects of heart health. And antibiotic antidote designed to support recovery of the gastrointestinal microbiome after a course of antibiotics. The BioDequest probiotics are, I believe, among the most effective of all probiotic choices you have. Enter the discount code UNDOC15, all caps U-N-D-O-C-15, for a 15% discount. For Defiant Health listeners, and due to demand for reliable, convenient sources of lactobacillus roteri, our favorite microbe, I created two products my Roteri, that contains 20 billion counts of L-Roteri alone, and Gut to Glow that, in addition to L-Roteri, has added marine-sourced collagen peptides, hyaluronic acid and the carotenoid astaxanthin, all combined to stack the odds in favor of beneficial skin effects. Of course, you can take these products as is or you can use either as a starter to make L-Rotarite yogurt to generate even higher counts of microbes for bigger effects. I'll provide a link for these products below in the show notes.
Speaker 1:Now let's talk about how you can put the gastrointestinal microbiome to work to produce butyrate or butyric acid that can go to the skin and cause or contribute to acidification of the skin. Now, by the way, by doing this, by encouraging the production of butyric acid in your gastrointestinal tract, not only do you get better skin health, you get better intestinal health, because butyrate is the primary nutrient for your intestinal cells and it nourishes the intestinal lining and helps heal in case you have any problems in your gastrointestinal tract, like ulcerative colitis or Crohn's disease or irritable bowel syndrome or just inflammation. That butyrate also enters the bloodstream and mediates a whole range of beneficial effects. Stream and mediates a whole range of beneficial effects Reduction of insulin resistance, making your body more sensitive to insulin and facilitating loss of abdominal fat. For instance, it helps reduce blood sugar, blood pressure. It triggers better sleep and vivid dreams. So not only is it good for skin, it's good for overall health. It's one of the most important things you can do, by the way, for overall health. Well, how do you tip the scales in favor of having a microbiome that produces lots and lots of butyrate?
Speaker 1:Well, fermented foods play a major role here. These are foods that are, I hope, by now, familiar to you Sauerkraut, fermented pickles, other fermented vegetables, kefirs, kefir yogurts not the stuff in the store, right, because that's just the fermentation process used in commercial yogurt. Making is too weak, too brief to really make a difference. It's the yogurts that you make, especially following my recipes, that put to put to use prolonged fermentation. Recall that microbes don't have sex. There's no male and female microbes, right, they just double themselves Asexual reproduction One microbe becomes two, two becomes four, and so on.
Speaker 1:So lactobacillus reuteri, for instance, a very important microbe if you've been following my conversations, you know we talk a lot about lactobacillus reuteri doubles about every three hours at human body temperature. So if we were to do like they do in commercial yogurt making only ferment it for six to twelve hours, it's only doubled a few times we don't have very high counts. We're instead going to let it double twelve times and that's how you get super, duper high counts. So when we counted the microbes in our yogurt, we have about 300 billion, that's billion, with a B per half cup or 120 milliliter serving. So it's very high counts and that's how you tip scales at having important effects. Larger effects, more microbes means larger effects. Larger effects, more microbes means larger effects.
Speaker 1:So fermented foods whether it's the yogurts we make or kefir that you buy at the store, or fermented veggies you make on your kitchen counter and if you don't know what I'm talking about, please refer to my Supergut book, refer to other websites that have these resources on how to ferment foods. They're widely available. You can also buy commercial starter cultures from a variety of companies who will provide you with a packet of microbes to get started, or you could use one of my products for starter culture, like the myroterite or the gut, to glow even, and it helps to have small servings of some fermented food several times a day. It doesn't have to be a large serving it could be a tablespoon of fermented sauerkraut, it could be a tablespoon of kimchi, it could be a couple of sips of kefir, a couple tablespoons, a quarter cup of one of our yogurts, but it's important to do this throughout the day, in small portion sizes. I think it helps to make it a habit to include a fermented food in every meal, every time you sit down to eat.
Speaker 1:Another very important source of butyrate is to get plenty of prebiotic fibers and, once again, if you don't know what I'm talking about, please refer to my Super Gut book, my blog, my WilliamDavisMDcom blog, where we discuss these things at great length and provide lists for you, including a breakdown of which foods contain how much prebiotic fibers. Now I'm going to use the term prebiotic fibers to be inclusive for all the things that act as fibers on the microbiome, that is, allow microbes to metabolize these fibers to butyrate and other fatty acids, but it's really a broad category. Some call it microbiota-accessible carbohydrates, polysaccharides and some other names, but I don't want to get bogged down in that. That's a biochemical debate. Just recognize these fibers are converted by the microbiome to butyrate and other fatty acids, the microbiome to butyrate and other fatty acids. So these are things like inulin or fructooligosaccharides and galactooligosaccharides and xylooligosaccharides. You don't have to remember all that. Just recognize the foods they come from Onions, garlic, shallots, leeks, dandelion greens, leeks, dandelion greens, legumes like kidney beans, red beans, white beans, black beans, peas, hummus, chickpeas, other root vegetables.
Speaker 1:You can even buy them as commercial powders. For instance, inulin is very popular. Put maybe a teaspoon in your coffee or other food, just like your fermented foods. Make it a habit to include some source of prebiotic fiber in every meal. It doesn't have to be tough. If you're going to have a three-egg omelet for breakfast, for instance, make sure you include some chopped onions, a tablespoon of black beans or other legumes. So make it easy on yourself. Keep them handy, keep them around in your refrigerator or in your pantry. Add a little bit to every dish and that will nourish the microbes in your gastrointestinal tract to produce butyrate. The other good thing here is that when you do this, not only do you cause those microbes to produce butyrate, but you also bloom those species so that they're able to produce even more butyrate.
Speaker 1:Now one fiber I don't want you to forget about is hyaluronic acid. Now, as you know, lots of ladies know about hyaluronic acid because they apply it topically as a hyaluronic acid serum. That, of course, does nothing to nourish the microbiome in your gastrointestinal tract. So the real magic of hyaluronic acid occurs when you take it orally and it acts as a fiber. Remember that Hyaluronic acid is one of those rare fibers sourced from animals or meant to be sourced from animals. So your great-grandmother would have gotten her hyaluronic acid by consuming the organ meats of animals.
Speaker 1:Well, most modern people have abandoned consumption of organ meats because we were told there's awful advice to cut saturated fat and cholesterol. So most of us do not include a serving of brain or tongue or stomach or intestines in our meals anymore. You can use an external source. Now there is hyaluronic acid in the gut to glow at the dose that works. Or if you don't have that, you can always buy. It's kind of a commodity. Product Quality is not that big a deal. You can buy a very fine hyaluronic acid powder and add the typical dose is 120 milligrams per day and that acts as a fiber that blooms species that produce butyrate, and you feed it more hyaluronic acid and those other fibers like inulin, fos and legumes, and you get those species to produce even more butyrate. So it becomes a wonderful way to boost the butyrate content of your skin, thereby acidifying it, discouraging proliferation of Staphylococcus aureus, encouraging the proliferation of Staphylococcus aureus, encouraging the proliferation of Staphylococcus epidermidis. That in turn produces even more butyrate. You can see this process feeds upon itself and you get bigger and bigger effects, and this is how you inch toward a pH in the skin of 4.5.
Speaker 1:Now here's a last trick I want to suggest to you that microbe we all talk about all the time, lactobacillus roteri. We make a yogurt out of it using once again that process of mine with prolonged fermentation 36 hours. That allows the microbe to double 12 times to get these really big counts of microbes in the hundreds of billions. But in the process we allow lactose the sugar in dairy right Many people are lactose intolerant to be converted to lactic acid. So there's almost no lactose left in the original yogurt, in the dairy, and people who are lactose intolerant almost never are almost never intolerant to the yogurt because there's almost no lactose remaining. Well, that lactic acid is acidic and if we test the pH of our lactobacillus roteri yogurt, it's around 3.5.
Speaker 1:Tenfold more acidic than healthy skin. A hundredfold more acidic than unhealthy skin. Well, think about applying that yogurt as a mask. So apply it to your skin, like on your face or problem areas of your skin, maybe on your hands or elsewhere. Leave it on for a couple, three minutes or so, then rinse it off thoroughly.
Speaker 1:The microbe itself does not take up residence. Lactobacillus roteri cannot take up residence for more than a few minutes, maybe a couple hours, in your skin. So that's not the reason it works. The reason it works is it's helping tip the scales in acidity to a much more acidic environment, and recall that it's acidity that Staphylococcus aureus doesn't like, but Staphylococcus epidermidis does. Epidermidis does so. Using the lactobacillus roteri as a mask in problem areas or on your face where you're concerned about wrinkle formation and dryness, helps acidify the skin and tip the balance in favor of the microbe we want that protects us Staphylococcus epidermidis. Okay, if you've learned something from this episode of the Fine Health Podcast, I invite you to subscribe to your favorite podcast directory. Post a review, post a comment, tell your friends, help us build this community of like-minded people all trying to build a community of self-management of health, not relying on the healthcare system. Thanks for listening.
