Know your egg labels! What exactly is the difference between cage-free and free-range eggs?

Well, honestly not much. These are just labeling terms that the food industry has been using to make their product seem superior to another. The best eggs you can buy are probably pasture raised eggs.

Eggs are a staple here in most people's homes today with approximately 250 eaten by the average American every year. The sad part for me is that I do not get to eat them that often. When I do, I have become a massive label reader. The problem is that labels are massively deceiving in what the say about how the chicken was raised.

This was a lesson that I had to relearn a few weeks ago. I have been buying organic “cage-free” and "free-range" eggs from whole foods for a couple of years, feeding them to Erin and the kids on a daily basis.  I knew that cage-free wasn't caged free, but I thought that free range was a great equivalent to pastured at a lower price point. 

Then I picked up some pasture...

This time of year I often I get asked what I use for sunscreen. When I tell patients that I don’t believe it's necessary, they look at me like I'm crazy.  Of course, the next obvious question is what about all the skin cancer and melanomas in the news.

I have to tread lightly on this subject because skin cancers are, in fact, on the rise. The question I have always had about this increase in the incident of skin cancer is why it has increased so much over the last 30+ years?

The sun isn’t putting out any more radiation, and there isn’t any proof that we aren’t getting any more radiation here on Earths surface. So why then the dramatic increase in skin cancers? Well, honestly it is most likely the massive increase in dietary sugars and decreases in fat over the past 35 years.

The logic is pretty simple when you increase sugar consumption you increase the number of chemicals in your body called advanced glycation end products (or, appropriately, AGEs for short). These AGE’s are likely...

Do You Have Blood Sugar Dysfunction? Take This Quiz

One of my early mentors told me something I thought was oversimplified at the time: "If you can't get your patients to drink enough water and balance their blood sugar, you can't get them well. Period."

I was fresh out of school, confident in my skills, and certain that my clinical expertise alone would be enough.

I was wrong. He was right.

In my practice, those two fundamentals—hydration and blood sugar balance—are the foundation of everything else. You can't build health on top of chronic dehydration and blood sugar chaos.

Most people have no idea their blood sugar is dysregulated. The symptoms don't look like "diabetes." They look like anxiety, brain fog, fatigue, mood swings, and cravings.

Here's a 63-question self-assessment to identify blood sugar dysfunction before it becomes a diagnosed metabolic disease.

Why Blood Sugar Matters

Blood sugar regulation affects every system in your body.

When glucose levels fluctuate wi...

I get asked all of the time are my green drinks healthy? This is becoming one of the more frustrating questions that I get asked in the office.

People falsely believe that these drinks are healthy. The theory sounds great, run a bunch of the things that we do not eat enough of through a juicer and is supposed to be healthy for us.

A concentrated version of the things we do not want to eat and we do not have to actually chew or work to eat our food. Plus, it fits perfectly into a little cup that you can take with you.

All this sounds great for our modern fast moving lives. Sadly, there are several problems with these highly concentrated drinks.

First, there are way too many ingredients in these drinks. They tend to concentrate the vitamins and minerals from the fruits and vegetables.

This concentration leads to a problem, you will usually have to juice or blend significantly more than you would ever sit down and eat in order to feel like you have eaten anything. Because of this you...

I often get asked if prescribed drugs can cause nutritional deficiencies, and the simple answer is yes.  It is widely known that drugs force physiology to do something that it is either incapable of doing or can't do for some other reason. 

This bullying of physiology is going to tax and strain other parts of your physiology which will imbalance your available nutrients.  Think of it like a robbing Peter to pay Paul balancing act. While it is sometimes necessary to take drugs to either save your life or balance things out in the short term, there is always some price to pay.

Now I am NOT telling you that you need to stop taking medication.  You need to consult the physician that prescribed the medication and be sure you do before starting a supplement regimen of these vitamins and minerals. 

However, I felt it was necessary to let you know the potential deficiencies these drug classes may cause along with the foods that may help increase those nutrients. 

This is one of those very hard, very personal topics that always brings out the passion in people, no matter what side you stand on.   The choice to vaccinate your child could be one of the most agonizing decisions you have to make in the first few years of your child’s life. 

If you choose to not vaccinate, you have to wonder if you're risking their lives to all the horrible diseases that those vaccinations might protect you from.  If you do vaccinate, your question then becomes what are the real potential consequences for injection your child with potentially damaging chemicals?

Honestly, for me it was an easy decision to not vaccinate.  One of the main reasons that we will talk about today is that vaccines do not create immunity. Immunity is defined as:

1. The state of being immune from or insusceptible to a particular disease.
2. The condition that permits either natural or acquired resistance to a disease.

Not to get to in depth here in the function of your immune system, but ...

There are so many things that stress and worry new parents. The feeding of their baby is one of the most common concerns that I get asked.  Specifically, what and when to start feeding baby solids?  Not to add more pressure to the new parent but this really is one of the more important decisions you can make for your child’s health and for your sanity over the next few years. 

The right food choices at this time can lead to a healthy gut microbiome and balanced blood sugar that will help curb the ups and downs of the toddler temper tantrums. The problem is that this really is one of those topics that you can get lost in because there are so many theories about what is right and why. When to start?

This one is pretty simple.  You should start at about 4 months but all children are a bit different.  The exact time is determined by the size and maturity of the child.  A physical sign they are ready to start eating/supplementing solid foods away from breast milk is when they stop pushing...

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been asked, “I am thinking about doing a vegetarian diet.  What do you think?”  I usually just shake my head and ask them why they are going to cut out the best source of essential fats, high-density nutrients, and complete proteins?

Honestly, I can see why some people would want to avoid animal proteins.  Whether it be for environmental or ethical reasons, the animal feeding operations can be pretty grotesque.    You can look at beef feedlots, chicken farms, and fish farms, and you'll find food operations that do horrible things to the environment and the foods that we eventually consume. 

However, I would propose that it would be a much better ethical and moral statement to vote with your wallet and purchase the healthier alternatives of pastured meats and sustainably caught fish. There are still vegetarian proponents who argue that even these sustainable pasture-based farms are doing irreparable damage to the environment.  I will point those pe...

I was recently asked this question, and I have to say it disturbed me a bit.  This rumor, urban myth or just plain bad press, pops up about the chiropractic adjustment every few years.  The simple answer is that chiropractic adjustments can not cause permanent damage, and it's significantly safer than most other forms of health care.  Over 20 million people receive either chiropractic and osteopathic manipulations, and the incidents of serious side effects are “very low.”

When talking to the general public, I will inevitably be asked how do you know you're not going to break a neck?  Well, I have studied martial arts for about half of my life, and there is no way that the chiropractic adjustment can break a neck, baring any major underlying pathology.

There are a few simple facts about the safety of chiropractic.  First, insurance companies spend a lot of money researching the danger of an event or activity.  If events and activities that carry more risk, much more must be spent on t...

Welcome to this Thursday version of my Wednesday Q & A, sorry I didn't get this up yesterday, but I felt this was an important question that I didn't want overshadowing by our great ADHD webinar last night.

I was shocked when I got this question from a patient not too long ago.  They showed me a letter they received from the Plano Independent School District, that stated:

“Dear Plano ISD parent, I want to make you aware of some additional immunizations that will be required for the 2014 school year The changes will amend 25 Texas Administrative Code, Chapter 97, Subchapter B, 97.61; 97.63-97.72.  Following are immunizations that will be affected:

Meningococcal Vaccine
One dose requirements for seventh – twelfth-grade entry
Varicella Vaccine
Two dose requirements for kindergarten – fifth and seventh – twelfth
grade entry
Tdap Vaccine (Tetanus and diphtheria toxoids and acellular pertussis)
Booster dose required for seventh grade
MMR Vaccine (Measles, Mumps, and Rubella)
Two dose require...