Photo credit: I took this photo at the Oconaluftee Indian Village in North Carolina in April this year — an outdoor living Cherokee history museum. It’s a reminder that there are many alternatives to using plastic dishes and containers in the kitchen.
* * * * *
Welcome to my podcast, Healing with Dr Helena, where I challenge the limiting way we currently view disease, and offer a new paradigm for vibrant health and true healing. If modern medicine isn’t providing you with enough answers, and you want to come alive and thrive, rather than merely survive, this podcast is for you.
It’s also for people who want to boost their brain to perform at their peak, avoid Alzheimer’s and other dementias, and live longer, stronger, healthier and happier.
Each episode comprises four parts:
- A Brain Booster
- A Health Headline
- An Exploration of What’s Missing from Modern Medicine
- A Whether Report where I answer your whether questions eg ‘I’d like to know whether you can really die of a broken heart?’
So here’s a glimpse of episode 9.
* * * * *
Today’s Brain Booster is: Purge yourself of plastic!
Why? And what do I mean by that?
Plastics have become ubiquitous in modern life. Over time, larger plastic items degrade into smaller particles — micro and nanoplastics (MNPs) — and these MNPs can infiltrate air, water, soil, food chains, and ultimately the human body. While the environmental impacts of microplastics are well-documented, human health consequences are only just beginning to be understood.
A 2024 study at the University of New Mexico found triple the amount of MNPs in the brains of people with dementia compared to the brains of people without.
At this stage, we don’t know if the plastics caused the dementia — or at least contributed to it — or if a person with dementia has an impaired blood brain barrier, which makes their brain more likely to absorb plastics after they already have the disease.
Either way, my suspicion is that plastics in the brain are not a good thing.
We can’t escape plastics entering our bodies altogether, but we can try to minimise our exposure in various ways. Here’s an acronym I created to help you remember how you can purge yourself of plastic. And the acronym is PLASTIC!
If you listen to my podcast regularly, you’ll soon discover that I like acronyms — as does your brain, because acronyms make things easier to remember.
- P stands for purify the tap water in your home.
- L stands for limit, if not eLiminate processed foods because so many of them are contaminated with high levels of plastics. For instance, chicken nuggets contain about 30 times more microplastics than unprocessed chicken breast. Where do all the plastics come from? Machinery, conveyer belts, workers’ clothing and packaging. As if you needed another reason to quit junk food.
- A stands for Avoid cosmetics that contain micro-beads, and check the ingredients on personal care products for polystyrene, polyethylene and polypropylene. Also Avoid microwaving or heating food in plastic containers because this can substantially increase microplastic release.
- S stands for Swap plastic cutting boards, utensils and cutlery for wooden or bamboo chopping boards and stainless steel cutlery.
- T stands for Tyre pressure maintenance. Keep your car tyres at the right pressure so they don’t wear down as quickly because tyres are a big source of microplastics in the air and oceans.
- I stands for Invest in a HEPA air purifier for your home to capture microplastics from the air.
- C stands for Choose Clothes made from natural materials like cotton, linen, silk, or wool. Cotton and wool shed fewer micro-fibres than synthetic materials during washing.
* * * * *
Today’s Health Headline is: There’s a spoonful of plastic in your brain!
According to a study published in Nature Medicine in December 2024, even in the absence of dementia, our brains contain a teaspoonful of plastic. Really? Let’s take a closer look at the study and the whole microplastics scene.
* * * * *
What’s missing from modern medicine is conclusive evidence for the specific harms of plastics, and definitive advice about what we can do once plastics have made their way into our body. It’s important to recognise what we don’t yet know because jumping to conclusions, and getting into a panic, could take us down an unhelpful path.
We don’t yet know how much plastic exposure is needed to cause harm, what types of plastics are the most harmful, what particle size matters most, and how long we need to be exposed to plastics for them to start wreaking havoc.
* * * * *
Today’s Whether Report tackles a tricky question: I’d like to know whether microplastics cause gut disorders like inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD), and whether eating specific foods like blueberries, blocks the absorption of microplastics or helps clear them out of our bodies?
This question is what prompted me to dedicate an entire episode to a discussion of microplastics.
Research shows a significant correlation between microplastics and inflammatory bowel diseases such as ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease, with faecal micro and nano-plastic concentrations being significantly higher in IBD patients compared to healthy individuals.
The good news to emerge from this is that we can excrete plastics.
The goal is to figure out how we can increase our excretion of plastics not just via our bowels, but also through urine and sweat.
* * * * *
Click here to watch the episode on my YouTube channel, or listen to Healing with Dr Helena on your preferred podcast platform. I’ll publish a new episode every Monday, and you’ll receive an email notification that morning. Please subscribe to my podcast or YouTube channel so that you don’t miss an episode, and send your whether questions to: podcast@drhelenapopovic.com
If you’re happy for me to play your voice on my podcast, you can provide an audio file. Otherwise, you can type your question for me to read out.
I very much look forward to answering your questions, and exploring how we can all build a smarter brain, stronger body and deeply fulfilling life.
Please forward this Health-e-Byte to anyone who might find my podcast useful or interesting.
