I always have fun (and take notes) when my guest is pharmacist Jim LaValle, R.Ph.,C.C.N. author of Your Blood Never Lies: How to Read a Blood Test for a Longer, Healthier Life. He also wrote the best seller Cracking the Metabolic Code: 9 Keys to Optimal Health. Saturday, he will give us diet and life style tips for keeping our immune system in top shape during the colds and flu season. Perhaps even more importantly, he will review scientific studies showing that aged garlic extract (e.g. Kyolic) can help reverse atherosclerosis. Then we talk with weight loss expert Valerie Hall how we can enjoy the holidays without gaining weight. She will discuss the metabolic, mood and appetite factors that usually cause weight gain. She recommends Body Regime to support all three of those factors. Body Regime is offering free shipping and a free bottle with the purchase of 2 bottles. (800-407-3737)

Click here to find podcasts, show archives and how to listen nationwide.

At Thanksgiving, even with all the commotion and the enticing aroma of a feast to distract us, we probably all take a moment to give thanks. But, there are good reasons to make a point of being thankful every day or better yet, many times each day. The following was adapted from a recent newsletter from our friends at Guiltless Superfoods.

1. Gratitude improves physical health.
2. Grateful people sleep better.
3. Gratitude improves psychological health.
4. Gratitude opens the door to more relationships.
5. Gratitude enhances empathy and reduces aggression.
6. Gratitude improves self-esteem.
7. Gratitude increases mental strength.

I am grateful for your support of our Healthy by Nature mission.

Several fine functional (integrative, nutrition-oriented, etc.) physicians that I know have been unfairly targeted and investigated by the very mainstream Texas Medical Board (TMB). Because our HBN-type doctors do such a great job helping their patients, the typical result is just a reprimand for some sort of “record-keeping error” (every medical office has some if you dig). These poor doctors must spend tens of thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours protecting their licenses. The Sunset Commission is currently conducting a review of the TMB. We need to give them a piece of our mind. Please CLICK HERE to learn how to have input online and/or testify at a hearing and/or participate in a rally in Austin. The Kotsanis Institute (817-435-4405) is renting a bus that holds 60 people to go to the rally all day Friday the 9th of December. It will be leaving early on the 9th from their office in Grapevine. The cost is $29 per person and includes a box lunch in Austin. We need your help, Texans, because this opportunity only comes around every decade or so.

LISTEN to that show in the archives.

We discussed Richard Snyder, DO’s new book, Your Personal Prescription Checklist: How to Maximize Medication Safety and Efficacy in the Age of Personalized Medicine. It is a workbook to avoiding conflicts between medicines and between medicines and supplements. (He has another new book to add to his long list, What You Must Know About Liver Disease: A Practical Guide to Using Conventional and Complementary Treatments.) My first guest at the top of the show was Phillip Wilson who specializes in far infrared. We reviewed the benefits of that form of light (yes, light, not just heat) and introduced the convenient and affordable far infrared table lamp. Link here for details and great savings for listeners on both the lamp and sauna.

The Probiotic Cure. We now know that the microorganisms in our gut are a crucial part of our human instruction manual and that they control thousands of biological functions in our bodies. It is past time that we learned how to care for them because important varieties are disappearing and leaving illness behind.

Copyright 2016 Martie Whittekin, CCN