Bridging the Gap

The greatest benefit we can obtain from nutritional supplements is to “fill-in the gaps” in a person’s diet. All of us, no matter how well we eat, have nutritional gaps. Nutritional supplementation fills in these gaps. 

            The best place to start is with the person’s diet. What people put into their mouths daily is extremely important. One of my favorite pastimes at the grocery store is to people watch. I look at the person, and then look at the food in their basket, and see if there is any correlation between the two. It shouldn’t come as a big surprise that the people who eat the healthiest, look the healthiest. Now this is a gross over-simplification, but it still amazes me how much you can glean from looking at what people eat.

            Because of this, making sure that patients are eating a “clean” diet is important. As anyone who reads this blog knows, I always recommend the ketogenic diet. Once we’ve established a healthy diet, then we can start to make some nutritional supplement recommendations. A good example of this would be someone with a toxic liver. 

            In the case of a toxic liver, ingested food is not being optimized. Regardless of diet (keto, low carb, etc.), if the liver is toxic, the benefits of eating healthy are compromised. This is where I’d suggest adding in supplementation (vitamins, herbs, homeopathy). The goal would be to help the liver detoxify, so that the benefits of a healthy diet can be realized. Hence, supplementation “fills in the gaps” that diet alone cannot fix.