Category: Functional Medicine

Adrenal fatigue, COVID-19, Functional Medicine, update

COVID-19 booster case study: Alleviation of fatigue

If you have received your COVID-19 booster vaccine you may have experienced one or more of the following side effects:

  • pain and swelling at the injection site
  • muscle pain
  • headache
  • fever
  • chills
  • nausea
  • fatigue

Generally, these side effects last two to three days, but for one of my patients, the fatigue became unbearable to the point where it was impacting his daily functioning.  The patient received the injection during the day and by bedtime, the fatigue began to set in.  Since he was approaching the weekend, the patient figured he would  rest up over the weekend and that he would feel better by Monday. Unfortunately, the fatigue never let up. He did go to work on Monday but struggled to be productive.  Usually, the patient is boisterous and has a collaborative spirit, but on this day, he was very reserved and to himself.  Since the patient was feeling worse Tuesday morning, he took a sick day and reached out to his PCP who acknowledged that fatigue is common in COVID-19 booster vaccine recipients, but did not offer any supportive options, other than to rest. After 11 days with no improvement in energy level (energy level was 2/10), this patient, ‘John’, sought  me out for natural supportive options.

When one has fatigue, the usual suspects are low functioning thyroid and/or anemia. Upon doing a history and physical intake, it was noted that John has a history of hypothyroidism which is being well managed with Synthroid and his most recent blood work ( 2 weeks prior) showed a TSH at 1.5 mIU/L (milli-international units per liter).  Normal TSH levels are between 0.5 and 5.0 mIU/L So, I could rule out thyroid being an issue. In addition, his most recent CBC(complete blood count), showed a red blood count and hemoglobin level within the normal range and thus I could rule out anemia contributing to fatigue.

When these usual suspects ruled out, I turned my attention to the adrenal glands when the patient noted that he becomes dizzy upon standing up and that this dizziness started after receiving the COVID-19 booster vaccine. What does dizziness have to do with the adrenals?

In brief, the adrenal glands sit above the kidneys and play a role in secreting hormones and neurotransmitters  that help the body adapt to stress, and impact  blood pressure and sugar cravings. When the adrenal glands are over taxed and can’t buffer the stress, fatigue can come about.  Dizziness can also  occur for many reasons: heart, inner ear issues.  Another cause is low blood pressure that results when standing up. The technical term for this is orthostatic hypotension.   The patient has a history of low blood pressure (110/80)  when lying down.  What do you think should happen to blood pressure when one stands up? It should go up, at least by 5-10 points. This is a normal response to the fact that when one stands up, blood initially pools in your legs and since less blood is going to your head, in order for the body to maintain proper blood flow to the rest of the body, the blood pressure has to go up, and what organ or shall I say, gland is responsible for increasing blood pressure when standing up?….  It is the adrenal glands.

For John, I measured his blood pressure when he was lying down. It was 105/79. I had him stand up and after two minutes, I measured his blood pressure and this time it was 95/74.  His blood pressure dropped 10 points ! So, this was a clue that his adrenal glands were not functioning well.  It is important to note that John did not have a pathological issue with his adrenal glands. In western medicine, there is a condition called Addison’s disease. This is a pathological condition called adrenal insufficiency where the adrenal glands are not putting out hormones and neurotransmitters to regulate energy levels, blood pressure and sugar cravings.  What John had was a dysfunction with his adrenal glands.  If his adrenal gland hormones were measured, it probably wouldn’t a show a reduction in these hormones.  John was in a grey zone where his fatigue was not a pathological thryoid, adrenal or anemia issue, but he was experiencing fatigue that suggested his adrenal glands were over taxed.  The blood pressure evaluation that I did on John in two positions is an example of  a functional health evaluation. Functional health is about assessing how well a body system is working.

Based on the functional health assessment, I made natural recommendations to support John’s adrenal glands  functioning: riboflavin and patothenic acid and vitamin c.  Within two days of starting these supplement recommendations, John’s energy began to improve daily ,and when his blood pressure started to increase from a lying down to standing position, this equated with John’s energy returning back to normal 10/10.

If you are experiencing fatigue after the COVID-19 booster vaccine and you think it is related to adrenal fatigue,  check out my adrenal fatigue protocol. These are the exact nutrients that helped John get his energy back.

asthma, Functional Medicine, update

What is Functional Medicine ?

In a nutshell, functional medicine is an approach to health promotion by strengthening weakened body systems using diet, dietary supplements and/or lifestyle changes. Instead of solely treating signs and symptoms, functional medicine attempts to identify the root causes of these symptoms. This is accomplished first by identifying weakened body systems and understanding the pathophysiology as well as the nutrient deficiencies, type of diet and lifestyle that resulted in these weakened body systems.  Based on this knowledge, specific nutrients, diet and lifestyle recommendations can then be made to strengthen these weakened body systems.  In line with this approach to health promotion, functional medicine results in a more personalized form of medicine instead of a one size  fits all approach as often seen in western medicine.

To illustrate the personalization of functional medicine and identifying the root cause of chronic diseases, we can examine the functional medicine approach to asthma. Person A is an 18-year-old college male student who has been recently diagnosed with exercise -induced asthma.  His diet is high in animal products and sodium and deficient in fruits and vegetables.   Person B is also an 18-year old-college male student, but his asthma is worse due to stress and IBS-diarrhea.  From a western medicine perspective, the cause of asthma  is bronchoconstriction and the treatment of choice would be a bronchodilator. However, a functional medicine approach would yield a  different assessment and treatment recommendations.

For person A, his diet suggests that it is high in omega 6 fatty acids, and sodium and low in antioxidants, all of which can impair proper lung function, and contribute to exercise -induced asthma. Consequently, a functional medicine recommendation for person A would be to increase his omega 3 fatty acid and antioxidant supplementation while decreasing consumption of sodium rich foods.

In contrast, for person B,  stress is impacting the autonomic nervous system which may manifest in asthma and diarrhea. In addition, a person’s B diarrhea contributes to magnesium deficiency which can compound the asthma  as magnesium has a natural bronchodilator effect. Consequently, a functional medicine recommendation for Person B would be to engage in mind-body exercises to strengthen the autonomic nervous system and take a magnesium supplement to address the possible magnesium deficiency.

In summary, by taking a holistic approach to  identify the root cause of a chronic diseases, functional medicine results in a patient centered and health promoting form of health care.