Show notes
Keeping your liver clean is yet another way to boost your cognitive longevity and enhance the likelihood that your brain stays sharp as long as possible. Though many people pay little attention to the liver and have scant knowledge of what it does, this vital organ performs many critical roles in enabling the body to continue functioning. Most significantly, it rids the bloodstream of harmful toxins.
“Your liver is vitally important,” explains Dr. Lisa Broyles. “It removes toxins and chemicals that are dangerous for us from our blood and gets rid of them.”
Dr. Broyles, a certified functional medicine doctor who is specially trained in preventing and reversing cognitive decline, says that people should pay attention to the liver and take steps to detoxify the organ if it is struggling to perform its many functions. Among those functions, besides detoxifying the blood stream, are producing and regulating the level of cholesterol, regulating sex hormones, storing sugar when the body needs it, tending to the body’s immune health, and guarding against blood clotting.
When the liver is having difficulty in its effort to remove bodily toxins, it can lead to such problems as migraine headaches, autoimmune disease, cancer, lupus, and arthritis.
The liver must be clean, Dr. Broyles says, if it is to effectively do its job.
“I do think that every six months, ideally, everyone should do a liver and gallbladder flush, and followed by some colon hydrotherapy, both before and after,” she recommends. Dr. Broyles says that a number of companies offer liver cleansing approaches and kits.
She talks about three phases of liver detoxification - oxidation, conjugation (making toxins more water soluble so they excrete into the intestines and leave the body), and transportation where toxins are broken down (to assure a healthy gallbladder).
The food you eat and the medicines and vitamins you take can all enhance — or in some cases hinder — the the way the three phases clean the liver of its toxins. For instance, Tylenol can shut down the process of liver conjugation, according to Dr. Broyles. She points out that genetic make-up also plays a role in liver detoxification; each person is different and testing can help determine the right steps to take in cleaning the liver.
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Dr. Lisa Broyles, MD, is trained in the Bredesen Protocol, a personalized program to prevent and reverse cognitive decline. It is estimated that nearly 50 million currently living Americans will die of Alzheimer’s disease if effective prevention and reversal are not implemented–almost 100 times more than have died of COVID-19. Mainstream medicine would have you believe that it can’t be prevented, is untreatable, and progressive, with most patients not surviving beyond three to eleven years post-diagnosis.
But we are learning that the disease is a pathology of multiple causes that is preventable and even reversible in the early stages through the kind of holistic and individualized approach prescribed by the Bredesen Protocol.
A certified functional medicine doctor with an interest in holistic/integrative medicine, Dr. Broyles is transforming medical care in rural North Carolina. Addressing the underlying causes of disease rather than simply treating symptoms, Dr. Broyles uses a systems-oriented, holistic approach that engages both patient and practitioner in a therapeutic partnership. The result has been a palpable rise in health IQ and wellness in the community she serves.
“People are hungry for this kind of patient/physician collaborative care. They want to take charge of their well-being. They want to feel empowered. Too often, though, the insurance system in America limits choices for physicians and patients alike. Functional medicine represents a fundamental paradigm shift from symptom suppression to an integrative body/mind approach to optimal health,” said Dr. Broyles.
Hoping to help more people than her limited practice can accommodate, Dr. Broyles is reaching out to her community through the Cutting-Edge Health podcast and other platforms.
Having graduated from the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University and completed her three-year residency at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Dr. Broyles is currently a family practitioner in Saluda, North Carolina.
For the past several years, she served patients at urgent care and occupational medicine centers in South Carolina and Tennessee. Prior to this, she was medical director for the East Tennessee Spine and Nerve Center in Chattanooga and the Johnson City Tennessee Downtown Clinic. Dr. Broyles graduated from Brody school of medicine at East Carolina University in Greenville North Carolina and obtained her functional medicine certification from Functional Medicine university in Greer South Carolina.
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Special thanks to Alan, Maria, Louis, and Nicole on the Cutting Edge Health team!