Intestinal Repair Basics

For decades alternative practitioners have been talking about leaky gut syndrome. We didn’t understand everything there was to know about it but suspected that it was behind many immune and allergy problems. In the mid 1990’s some breakthrough research began to change the way we think about and approach the leaky gut syndrome. A. Fasano and his team were working on a cholera vaccine. There were very disappointed to find their trials stopped shortly after starting due to excessive diarrhea in many of the test subjects despite having the newly developed vaccine injection. It appeared that the cholera bacteria had more than one way to achieve its goals. Instead of throwing in the towel, they decided to try to find out why. They discovered that bacteria had the ability to activate an intestinal enzyme they later named zonulin. Zonulin has the ability to open the tight junctions between the intestinal mucosal cells causing leaky gut syndrome. This was an important finding because other agents could also affect the tight junction in this manner including gluten in many people.



The problem with leaky gut syndrome is that it isn’t one of those conditions that is self limiting. Self limiting means that over time it will correct itself. An example of a self limiting problem is a cut on your lip. Even if you need a stitch or two it tends to heal up very quickly without any special measures. Once the zonulin is activated and fragments of food or other particles find their way to the blood stream, they start an anti-body cascade that further increases zonulin production and activation. Some of these products will also find their way to your brain and attach to opiate receptors and therefore increase your cravings for the very foods that are causing you problems. How are you going to fix the leaky gut syndrome? The first step will be to discover and eliminate the foods that are causing you problems. Several labs have antibody panels for this. Currently we use Cyrex Labs. They have one profile (Array 2) that checks for zonulin and related gut permeability molecules. They also have Array 3 that checks for several different wheat components and Array 4 that looks at several foods that gluten sensitive people might also react to.

Supplements can be a big help. You will start with an increase in your probiotics. One or two capsules a day is OK for a healthy person but will probably be woefully inadequate for someone working to regain their health. You will probably be taking more like 6-10 a day but be sure to start with just one or two and work up. For a more complete discussion of probiotic basic concepts see Health Resources: Probiotic Basics.

NeuroScience has put their well-researched gut repair products into two kits, one for repair and one for maintenance. The feedback on the NeuroScience: NEI GI Repair Kit has been excellent.

We also get great feedback on Apex Energetics RepairVite. This is combination of herbs and L-glutamine (preferred source of energy for mucosal cells).