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The Brain, the Thyroid, and Fire Alarms: Understanding and Optimizing Metabolism

The Brain, the Thyroid, and Fire Alarms: Understanding and Optimizing Metabolism

Are you ready to understand and optimize your metabolism? Schedule your free 20-minute discovery call with our New Patient Coordinator to see how you can become a patient at MaxWell Clinic and start your healing journey today.


Do you feel like your metabolism is out of whack?

With hypothyroidism, you often have to deal with fatigue that doesn’t seem to go away after a good night’s sleep. You may also experience hair thinning, daily headaches, or sugar cravings. These are all symptoms of an underactive thyroid, and they can make your life miserable. But did you know you can improve these issues by optimizing your metabolism?

Watch the video to learn the connection between your body, your brain and your thyroid.

You’ll have some clear direction on how you can start taking back control over your health and live life feeling like yourself again.

In this blog post, we will delve into the fascinating subject of metabolism and explore how the brain and thyroid work together to regulate it. Understanding this connection is crucial for optimizing our health and well-being. So, let’s explore this intricate relationship and its implications.

The Anatomy: The Hypothalamus, Pituitary Gland, and Thyroid

The brain, specifically the hypothalamus, plays a vital role in receiving information about the body’s metabolic state. It gauges the speed of metabolism and makes decisions accordingly. Based on this information, the brain sends signals to the pituitary gland, located below it, to release hormones. One such hormone is the thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH), responsible for thyroid function.

T4 and T3: The Inactive and Active Forms of Thyroid Hormones

The thyroid, a small gland located in the neck, responds to the TSH and produces two primary hormones: thyroxine (T4) and triiodothyronine (T3). T4 constitutes about 90% of the hormones produced, while T3 makes up the remaining 10%. It is important to note that T4 is an inactive form, while T3 is the active hormone responsible for regulating metabolism.

To better understand this process, let’s use an analogy. Imagine the brain as the headquarters of a company, receiving feedback from the “car dealers” (body) about the production rate (metabolism). Based on this feedback, the brain communicates with the pituitary gland, which acts as a mediator. The pituitary gland releases TSH, serving as a means of communication between headquarters and the production floor (thyroid). If the brain senses a sluggish metabolism, it signals the thyroid to produce more T4, which should eventually convert to T3, effectively speeding up metabolism.

The Role of Reverse T3: The Brake Pedal for Metabolism

However, there is a crucial element we haven’t discussed yet: reverse T3 (rT3). Reverse T3 acts as the brake pedal in our analogy, slowing down metabolism. When there is inflammation, starvation, or other factors triggering the body’s stress response, reverse T3 levels increase, inhibiting metabolism. Think of it as a fire alarm indicating that something is wrong.

Differentiating True Hypothyroidism from Elevated Reverse T3

Now, let’s address a common misconception about thyroid health. Often, patients complain of symptoms associated with an underactive thyroid, such as low body temperature, thinning hair, fatigue, and weight gain. However, if their TSH and T4 levels fall within the normal range, conventional healthcare providers typically conclude that the thyroid is functioning fine. This can be misleading.

In integrative and functional medicine, practitioners understand that thyroid health goes beyond TSH and T4 levels. They acknowledge the impact of reverse T3 and the overall metabolic state. By not considering reverse T3 and only focusing on TSH and T4, conventional medicine misses crucial information about the metabolism.

When it comes to treating thyroid-related issues, it is important to differentiate between true hypothyroidism and elevated reverse T3 levels. True hypothyroidism involves an elevated TSH and low T4, indicating an underactive thyroid. This condition can result from various factors, including nutritional deficiencies (e.g., iodine, selenium), autoimmune disorders, and chronic inflammation or stress.

The Impact of Inflammation and Stress on Reverse T3

Elevated reverse T3 levels, on the other hand, indicate that the body is conserving energy due to inflammation or stress. It does not necessarily mean the thyroid is dysfunctional. Treating true hypothyroidism and elevated reverse T3 requires different approaches. Therefore, it is crucial to work with healthcare providers who consider the broader picture and seek to address the root causes of metabolic imbalances.

Taking the Next Steps: Optimizing Your Metabolism

So, what can you do to optimize your metabolism and overall health? Here are some key steps to consider:

  1. Prioritize sleep: Aim for around eight hours of quality sleep each night. Establish a regular sleep schedule and create a conducive sleep environment.
  2. Focus on nutrition: Consume a balanced, organic diet rich in essential nutrients. If necessary, consider supplementation to address nutrient deficiencies.
  3. Incorporate movement: Engage in regular physical activity to maintain a healthy metabolism. Remember to balance exercise with adequate rest and recovery.
  4. Manage stress: Take steps to reduce stress levels through practices such as meditation, prayer, and seeking support from friends, family, or community networks.
  5. Cultivate healthy relationships: Strong social connections positively impact health. Surround yourself with supportive individuals who contribute to your overall well-being.

Conclusion: Seeking Optimal Health

By implementing these strategies, you can positively influence your metabolic health and optimize overall well-being. If the information provided resonates with you, it is advisable to reach out to your healthcare provider or consider contacting the Maxwell Clinic for further guidance. Together, you can explore any potential underlying causes and develop a comprehensive plan to support your unique needs.

In conclusion, understanding the intricate relationship between the brain, thyroid, and metabolism is vital for achieving optimal health. By addressing factors such as sleep, nutrition, movement, stress management, and relationships, you can positively influence your metabolism and overall well-being. Remember, it is essential to work with healthcare providers who take a comprehensive approach and consider the broader context of your metabolic health.


Are you ready to take charge of your health? Schedule your free 20-minute discovery call with our New Patient Coordinator to see how you can become a patient at MaxWell Clinic and start your healing journey today.

[Music] good evening
i’m cliff steiner one of the pas here at the maxwell clinic you may remember me from a couple weeks ago
when i did the group visit on community in health tonight i’m really excited because i’m
going to be talking about one of my favorite subjects which is metabolism and specifically talking
about how the brain the thyroid work together and then send messages out into the body
which leads to feedback back to the brain to let us know about our metabolism i think there is a lot of
confusion here and i know that when i’m taking care of patients one-on-one it’s
it’s always something that’s very enlightening so i’m looking forward to sharing that with you this evening
so a couple of housekeeping items um you’ll be on mute
during the during the group visit but if you have a question then type it in the
type your question into the q a box and then at the end then i will go over those and and i’ll
answer those for you if uh for some reason my internet goes down then please just hang out and i
will try to get it going i haven’t had any problems um in quite a while but you know that’s always when that when you
say you haven’t had a problem that’s always when a problem happens okay so tonight we’re going to talk
about the anatomy so we’re going to look at where these hormones are coming from in the brain how they’re interacting with
the thyroid what the thyroid does with those hormones and then how they go out into the body
we’re going to be talking about how it works and how it really works so we’ll look at a couple of different
a couple of different ways in which people will explain it and how there can be some pitfalls to look out for
and then what does this mean for you right this is not just an anatomy and physiology lesson but how can this
impact your health i think that’s that’s important that’s why we’re here tonight right
and then next steps for you being your maxwell because that’s the goal right the goal of maxwell care is to help you
reach your goals of optimal health so i want to make sure that before we end tonight
that i’ve answered that question how does this help you and what is your next step
so anatomy okay so the hypothalamus
is in the brain and this receives information so you see
that that’s indicated here by those two little uh minuses and arrows that are
sort of pointing towards pointing towards the hypothalamus so that the the brain receives
information on what the um what the body says is happening with metabolism so on
how fast or how slow it is the brain receives that and then the brain takes that
information and it makes a decision do i need my thyroid to speed up or do i need it to slow down
and then based on that information it sends a hormone to the pituitary gland
and then the pituitary gland which sits right underneath the brain it’s about the size of a pee releases a lot of
different hormones one of those is tsh which you’ve probably heard of before
especially when talking about the thyroid that’s thyroid stimulating hormone
so thyroid stimulating hormone goes from the pituitary gland down to the thyroid
where it then asks the thyroid to make t4 primarily and you can see here
i’ve got two octagons one says t4 one says t3 so it’s about 90 10 so about 90
t4 is going to be made in the thyroid and about 10 maybe 7 to 10 percent is
actually going to be t3 now that’s really really important because t4
is the inactive form of this hormone
t4 doesn’t actually cause anything to speed up or slow down sort of like a lego block
whereas t3 is like the gas pedal for our metabolism
so this is the active form of the hormone another way to think about this would be
like a factory so i sometimes think about never actually been on the floor of a
car factory but i assume this is how it goes uh if any of you have more experience um you can you can let me
know if this works or not so think of the brain as headquarters or corporate
and so based on the feedback that they’re getting from the car dealers
they they know whether we should speed up production or slow down production
and so then they send a signal to the pituitary gland which then sends out tsh
so i want you to think about tsh as being the communication between corporate
and the production floor where the cars are actually made so if your tsh is really high
then that’s like corporate yelling at the workers down on the floor hurry up you’ve got to make more cars we
need more vehicles so this would be the brain sensing
that metabolism is slow and we need to rev up production
so then in a perfect world the thyroid will then receive this tsh coming from
the brain and will say oh i need to work really hard so then it will make more t4
so then that t4 elevates and then hopefully t3 elevates
and then the metabolism is now sped up there’s more production now we have uh good hair growth and
we’re losing weight like we want to and we feel good and we wake up energized
right like that’s what we’re hoping for that’s what we’re hoping that a a eu thyroid or a balanced uh thyroid and a
balanced metabolism will give us so there’s something else though we
haven’t talked about you see that big rt3 right there in the middle of the screen
so that rt3 stands for reverse t3
so if t3 is the gas pedal
then i wonder what reverse t3 would be well it’s the brake pedal right it makes sense so if we start out with t4
right t4 like i said is the inactive form and then we want our body to make t3
so that we can speed up metabolism but if there’s something going on right
think about why you would push the brake in your own car normally we push the brake because there’s an accident ahead there’s a
warning there’s something going on that says we should slow down right
so if that happens in your body if it senses inflammation or it senses starvation or since there’s other things
that we’re going to talk about then it’s going to slow down metabolism
and that’s going to increase reverse t3
so now we’ve talked about this pathway right from the hypothalamus receiving the information
then it computing that information sending a signal to the pituitary gland which then sends a signal to the thyroid
itself which makes t4 and hopefully that t4 is converted into
t3 but sometimes it can be converted into reverse t3 before we move on i want to give you one
more illustration i want you to think of an individual cell in your body
as a wood-burning stove and these wood-burning stoves they don’t burn wood right in our body we burn
sugar we burn carbohydrates or ketones right we could burn these different things now
if the wood stove begins to get too hot then we want to close the damper
if our cells get too hot or we could say get too inflamed
then we want to close the damper on the cell and you can think of reverse t3 as doing that so
reverse t3 actually cools down these individual cells
so that should make sense to a lot of people who’ve suffered with hypothyroidism right because if you’ve
got really high reverse t3 or if you have hypothyroid you know that your temperature is hard to control and it
tends to stay low so
what if you had a whole lot of t3 and that there’s a lot of inflammation in
the body and so it’s there’s a lot of heat right if there’s a lot of heat or a lot of inflammation we’re going to increase
reverse t3 so you can almost think of that increased reverse t3 as a fire alarm
this is letting us know something is wrong
okay so let’s talk about what you’ve heard about the thyroid so a lot of times
we’ll have patients who have been to see specialists or maybe primary care
and they went to the specialist or they went to their primary care clinician and they said
i feel like i’m hypothyroid my temperature is low my hair is
thinning i feel uh weak and fatigued and i’m gaining weight and i can’t do
anything about it even when i don’t eat and so the specialist or the primary care provider they’ll say okay let me
take a look at your thyroid and so they will look at tsh
and t4 and if those numbers come back within
the normal range then they’ll say you’re fine right
although i wish they wouldn’t say you’re fine i wish they would say your thyroid
is working correctly now see there’s a big difference there
because if your tsh is normal and if you your t4 is normal then it is
a true statement to say that your thyroid is working fine
now you may say well wait a minute cliff now i’ve been to a lot of integrative and holistic specialists i’ve been under
functional medicine care for a long time and i know that it doesn’t mean that your
thyroid’s fine just because tsh and t4 are normal
so what i want to do here is i want to help you sort of change that paradigm
because what i would say is that if your tsh and t4 is normal
your metabolism may not be normal but your thyroid is actually functioning
correctly right because there’s another step that has to happen here this is the step
that’s often missed in conventional medicine where they don’t look at reverse t3
or t3 see because they’re not seeing about the gas or the break
or the open uh the um the open damper or the closed damper of
the wood stove they’re not looking at where the rubber meets the road on your metabolism
now in integrative and holistic medicine you may have heard them you know say that
um yeah you’re right i looked at more labs and your thyroid’s not fine
but then it seems like there’s a contradiction right it seems like the conventional providers are saying different something
different than the integrative and holistic providers are saying and i want to say that it’s not so much
different right it’s not that we’re saying that one is saying the thought was fine and one is saying that thought was not fine
i think that one is just not looking the conventional medicine provider is not looking at your metabolism
and the integrative holistic or functional medicine clinician is just trying to to use the
same language that you are when they say that the thyroid does not function well even though the thyroid may be fine it’s
the metabolism that’s off this this may seem like not that big of a deal
but when it comes to treatment i think it’s a huge deal
because as a functional medicine clinician my goal is to seek out the root cause
i want to know why your metabolism is not functioning well i don’t want to just know that your t3
is low or that your reverse t3 is elevated i want to dig deeper than that
and if i’m if i say that there’s something wrong with the thyroid it may leave me stuck there
and that can lead to people giving medication maybe where it’s not needed
so that could be giving you um you know synthroid or even one of the natural
thyroid hormones like armor
and and that could it could lead to not digging deep enough to figure out what’s
actually wrong now it is true sometimes we may need to use medicine and that’s totally fine but we should
make sure that we’re not missing something first so at the bottom of this slide i say be
cautious with cytomel so if you’ve never heard of cytometer before it’s t3
sometimes what i’ve seen in patients that come to the maxwell clinic from from elsewhere
is that they will have had the full workup and the reverse t3 was elevated
so what the clinician did then was say i’m going to give you t3
because if i give you t3 if i give you the gas pedal if i give you gas we can overcome this reverse t3
that’s true you can do that and if i if you have elevated reverse t3
and i give you cytomel we will see that reverse t3 go down
but i want to warn you that that is a lot like seeing the fire alarm go off
and then instead of looking for the fire instead of trying to understand
why why is my body inflamed why is my reverse t3 elevated instead of figuring
that out we just knock it off the wall we say oh it’s probably not important let’s just take some t3 and make you
feel great and let’s push on that’s dangerous if reverse t3 is elevated because
there’s inflammation in the body or some infection or some other issue going on
then it is so important that we seek out that root cause and not just cover it up
so i think it’s important then if we’re going to say we’re not going to cover up reverse t3 with medicine but we’re not
going to lower it with medicine then we have to be thinking about what causes an elevated reverse t3
so mainly it’s two things inflammation and stress
and i would say that those things are very very similar i would differentiate them by saying
that inflammation is usually stress from within the body
so this is something that’s putting a stress on the system this could be from leaky gut this could
be from an illness like a bacterial infection a viral infection a fungal infection this could be from an
autoimmune disorder if you have thyroid antibodies that are actually
attacking the thyroid or it could be from a toxic load
toxic load could be you know you’re not able to to detox very well because of liver injury maybe
there’s an issue with your kidneys or maybe you just need to sweat or maybe something’s boring with all three but
those things all need to be looked at if we’re concerned about toxic load i want to back up for a second and talk about
autoimmune because i think that’s really really important so if you have these thyroid antibodies
that are attacking the thyroid then i want you to think about like what
that may look like in your laps so let’s say that we have an elevated tsh right
so remember that’s the brain yelling at the thyroid that’s corporate yelling at the production workers work
harder but then we don’t really see an elevated uh t4
right we don’t really see the product that should be coming from the thyroid so i think about that as you’ve got
these workers that are on the production line and they are making t4 and they’re doing exactly like what they’re supposed
to do and then they start getting stung by bees and we’ll call these bees
autoimmune disease or thyroid antibodies and they’re attacking the thyroid as
it’s trying to work and corporate doesn’t understand what’s going on and it’s yelling work harder
work harder so it’s telling the thyroid to work harder and at the same time these workers your thyroid are being
stung by bees that’s going to make it really really difficult to do their job
so what we want to do is we want to work on bringing those antibodies down we can
do that by lowering inflammation by targeting other antibodies sometimes food sometimes
environmental allergens bring those down so that the the body the thyroid tends
to let not the thyroid itself but the body tends to make less uh thyroid antibodies
okay so that those things are inflammation illness leaky gut autoimmune disorder toxic load then i
want you to think about stress so when we say stress i want you to think about inflammation from outside
the body things that are putting pressure on us so this could be emotional stress maybe
it’s relational maybe we’re struggling in our marriage maybe we’re having family issues maybe we’re fighting with
our neighbors or we’re having trouble finding community maybe it’s occupational you know maybe
we’re we’re struggling with our job or um you know maybe we’re in a pandemic
and we can’t work or or we have too much work to do or there’s too much pressure being put on us at work any of these
things that can cause emotional stress on us can elevate our reverse t3
or it could be mental stress right like i when i think of mental stress as opposed to emotional stress i think
about problem solving right think about being in school or think about um
you know maybe you are doing a new job but you’ve got a lot to learn you’ve just got a lot of rewiring of the brain
and new neurons that are being created new connections that are being connected that are being made that create a lot of
stress on the body so we have to make sure that when we’re in those times of our life that we’re
doing everything we can to support our bodies or it could be insomnia
sleep is extremely important and if we’re not sleeping well that’s going to
elevate reverse t3 all of these things whether it’s
inflammation or stress all of these things increase cortisol
levels that’s why i like to keep inflammation and stress so connected
because in the body they do the same things right if i have an illness if i’m
fighting um if i’m fighting kovid or i’m um
having struggles at my work right both of those things while they’re very different stressors they both are
going to increase cortisol they’re both going to create an inflammatory response within the body that we need to cope
with and one of the ways that we cope with that is by increasing
reverse t3 which slows down our metabolism
so let’s talk for a little bit about true hypothyroid
i think it’s so important to differentiate and i know you’ve heard me like hammer this sort of over and over
it’s so important to differentiate true hypothyroid from elevated reverse t3
because they are treated differently so with true hypothyroid usually you’re
going to have an elevated tsh and you’re going to have a low t4
so that means the brain is working the brain knows that we need to increase metabolism
and it’s sending a signal through the pituitary gland down into the thyroid via the tsh it’s sending a signal to say
work harder but the thyroid is not able to do it
so we have to think about what are some things that can cause this true hypothyroid
it could be nutrition so you could be missing specific nutrients
nutrients like iodine selenium there’s a lot of others you could be missing one
of these nutrients or a few of these nutrients which could be because of leaky gut it could be because of
decreased absorption it could be because of issues with your genes or it could be
your diet also autoimmune which we touched on
already right i talked about how you’ve got these thyroid antibodies they’re attacking the thyroid they’re preventing
it from making the t4 that it so desires to make it could be from chronic stress or
inflammation as we’ve talked about and it can make you feel and present the
same as elevated reverse t3 so true hypothyroid can look just like
elevated reverse t3 so just because you have a low temperature it’s hard for you to lose
weight you’re ha you have thinning hair you have a lot of fatigue that doesn’t mean
that it’s true hypothyroid it could be elevated reverse t3 and because those things are treated so differently it’s
important that you have a provider like those of us at the maxwell clinic that are really digging deep to make sure
we know what’s driving these symptoms
so next steps so what are we going to do to make sure
that we can optimize metabolism so we talked a little bit about sleep
so the these are steps that i would like for you to do just to kind of step back
maybe this evening you know pull out pull out a piece of paper and just take an inventory
and are these things even right now even tonight that you can make a difference
that is going to help make sure your reverse t3 is low and that your t3 is elevated and get you
feeling your best so you want to make sure that you’re sleeping about eight hours a night some
of us need a little more some of us need a little less none of us need a lot less so if you’re
surviving on four to five hours of sleep a night that’s not good if you’re sleeping a lot
more than eight hours nine ten hours something’s going on there something is is uh is not right with your circadian
rhythm it’s not right with your thyroid and that really should be investigated
you want to make sure that this sleep is good sleep you want to make sure the room is dark you want to make sure it’s
quiet um you know even if you uh one of the things that i forgot to mention
that can elevate reverse t3 is working third shift just working third shift not
living within the um within the cycle of the rest of society can actually elevate
your reverse t3 so you want to try to go to sleep you know sometime between 9 10
11 something like that and sleep you know through the night hours
nutrition nutrition is very important i mentioned the two
two of the the nutrients uh selenium and iodine i believe it was uh and like i said there are a lot of
others so the best way to get this nutrition is going to be from organic
wholesome food and there are a lot of us that don’t have access to that food
or we have such a deficit that we need to use supplements if even for a short time to try and get those nutrient
levels up to drench our bodies in these life-giving nutrients that our thyroid
needs so if that’s the case i would encourage you to get that checked out i would encourage you to
um you know have some labs done and make sure that you do have the nutrients that you need
then movement you know it’s so interesting that movement the amount of movement that we
do when we move of course we’re heating our bodies up our cells are burning oxygen they’re burning burning
carbohydrates burning sugar and it’s a big part of what keeps a
thyroid stable so a big part of our metabolism is movement if we don’t need to burn energy
our bodies aren’t going to burn it so if we stay sedentary if we aren’t moving
then our reverse t3 is going to elevate our t3 is going to drop and our body is
going to conserve you know it’s interesting that there’s something else that raises reverse t3
that i forgot to mention and that is being a bear yes that’s right being a bear so
if you’re a bear and you hibernate then your reverse t3 elevates
and it makes sense right like if reverse t3 is going to slow down metabolism then wouldn’t it make sense
that if i was hibernating that my reverse t3 would elevate because i have no need to burn energy
well that’s the same sort of thing if we are sedentary if we don’t get up if we don’t go move around
then we also will increase our reverse t3
stress management stress management is so important i have been working with a patient over
the last few months who we first started out together and reverse t3 was pretty
high you know metabolism was not optimized and so we we uh we we got that we got
that worked out you know i mean the patient came up with a plan based on their labs based on the physical exam
uh that made a lot of sense patient was on board with it and they really improved over the three months
between labs and everything looked great well then i had the patient come back
and do some more labs three months later and reverse t3 was really high and i was like okay
what’s changed has your sleep changed no not really i’m still sleeping the
same amount uh how about nutrition no stay sane i mean still eating a really
healthy really clean diet still exercising still going to the gym three days a week still walking outside
uh walking her dog um but stress had gone up because she
had a job change so she was really anxious because this new boss was just really hard on her and
she had she had a new job and she wanted to do well and she was she was trying to hold a standard really high and it was
causing a significant amount of stress and and it showed in her reverse t3 so
we worked on stress management so you want to work on stress management from two two perspectives really
one is the amount of stress that you’re dealing with so what are the tasks that
are on your plate right because if we can lower the amount of tasks on your plate then we can lower stress
but often that’s not very easy to do most of us can’t quit our jobs move to the beach
you know that’s not going to happen right um most of us can’t change jobs or we
can’t you know we have children we’ve got to take care of our kids they’re not going to go away we have households to manage that’s not
going to go away so we can’t often we can’t always take things off our plate
so then we have to think about meditation we have to think about prayer we have to think about support systems
within our community we have to think of other ways to help us manage stress
so i would encourage you to think about that and when we get finished here tonight think about it on a scale of one
to ten where is your stress level right now and what can you do is there something
you can take off your plate is there some support that you can get is there more time that you can pray is
there more time that you can meditate because that’s going to make a huge difference in your metabolism
and then another thing is relationships relationships whether that be support
within your community whether it be from your spouse whether it be from your family or your
friends we need relationships we need relationships in the exact same way that
we need vitamin d we are going to be less healthy without community
so i would encourage you to think about ways that you can make sure you’re in healthy relationships
are you being supported are you getting what you need to reach optimal health
as i talked about in the the in our last group visit on community and health
these relationships within our community are absolutely critical
to reaching optimal health because we can’t do it on our own
so i would encourage you that if some of what i’ve talked about tonight has set off alarms in your own mind or
made you think of maybe maybe it’s labs that you need to get checked out or maybe
it’s um you know you need to re-look at your sleep cycle you need to rethink about the food that you’re eating you
need to consider where you can be doing more movement or getting rest from that movement
that’s also that’s an important point that i don’t want to skip over we have to be recovering well
from our movement so i can’t work out really hard an hour a day seven days a week right i’m going to break my body
down and my reverse t3 is going to elevate my metabolism is going to slow
so if some of what i’ve talked about tonight sets off alarms in your own mind that i would encourage you to send one
of your providers maybe it’s me send us a message let me know if there’s something that i
can do or if you know one of the other clinicians in the maxwell clinic whoever your clinician is reach out to them and
let them know what you’re thinking um and that’s that’s it
so hopefully that was helpful um i know it feels like it really flew by and i
know we covered a lot we talked about uh we talked about anatomy we talked about how it works in your body the
physiology of it and how you can make a difference in your own life
so um if you have any questions i would encourage you to type those in the q a
right now and i’ll give a little bit of time for that to happen
otherwise it has been wonderful being with you guys you know um these are these are a lot of fun and
um we hope that they’re helpful so your feedback is greatly appreciated
uh looks like i have a question so let’s take a look here
how is the thyroid connected to the gut so that’s a great question so i’m actually going to go back here to
one of these slides okay
so the gut let’s say that you’ve got leaky gut
or you have some type of you know infection or some type of inflammation that’s in the gut itself
then that inflammation is going to send a signal to the brain telling the brain hey we have
inflammation here so then that inflammation is going to cause the brain
to send out a lower amount of tsh or it could send a signal to the thyroid
telling the thyroid that hey we need to put out more t4 which would then be converted into reverse t3
slowing down metabolism so if we have good gut health
then that means reverse t3 is going to be lower reverse t3 lower is going to help us
feel better so this is one of the main things we look at when we’re looking to heal leaky
gut and you guys know who have been patients of the maxwell plant for a while you know that you know we do a
very comprehensive look when it comes to labs at what’s going on and if we find leaky gut and we start to heal that one
of the things we’ll usually recheck will be a reverse t3 because what we’re wanting to see is as we bring down
inflammation in the gut as we help heal leaky gut are we helping to optimize metabolism
and often we are so hopefully that answers your question
um if there are no other questions then i hope that you guys have a
wonderful night and have a great rest of your week [Music]

This blog provides general information and discussions about health and related subjects. The information and other content provided in this blog, website or in any linked materials are not intended and should not be considered, or used as a substitute for, medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. This blog does not constitute the practice of any medical, nursing or other professional health care advice, diagnosis or treatment. We cannot diagnose conditions, provide second opinions or make specific treatment recommendations through this blog or website.

If you or any other person has a medical concern, you should consult with your health care provider or seek other professional medical treatment immediately. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something that you have read on this blog, website or in any linked materials. If you are experiencing a medical emergency, please call 911 or call for emergency medical help on the nearest telephone immediately.

Cliff Syner, PA-C

Cliff Syner, PA-C, has a passion for helping others heal. While serving in the U.S. Army, he cared for trauma patients around the world as a special operations flight medic.