Intro

People have never been more curious about strengthening the immune system than they are right now. The COVID-19 pandemic has got us all thinking seriously about our health and what it means to have immune strength, now and in the future. To get the most out of this trying time, we need to be open to looking at our health in ways we haven’t before. My guest today on The Doctor’s Farmacy, Dr. Jeffrey Bland, is a pro at that, and for this reason and so many others he is considered the father of Functional Medicine. Dr. Bland has been an internationally recognized leader in the nutritional medicine field for over 35 years. He’s authored five books on nutritional medicine for the healthcare professional and six books on nutrition and health. With his wife, Susan, Dr. Bland founded The Institute for Functional Medicine in 1991, a nonprofit organization focused on educating healthcare practitioners on effective approaches to treating and preventing chronic disease by getting to the root cause. 

Dr. Bland has always been a major inspiration for me. I was thrilled to have a video-call with him to discuss new ways of looking at optimal health and immunity in the face of this pandemic. In trying to better understand COVID-19, Dr. Bland went back to the basics of the immune system. He breaks down the processes at work, explains what the now often-heard phrase “cytokine storm” means, and talks about using food as medicine to promote immuno-rejuvenation. That means we’re not just supporting the current state of our immune system, we’re reviving it from the ground up. We talk about this and so much more on this week’s valuable episode. 

Here are more of the details from our interview: 

• Acknowledging the psycho-physical effects of COVID-19 and the three zones of learning the disease offers (4:35)

• Dr. Bland’s article, Reflections on the COVID-19 Pandemic (8:17)

• The flexibility and adaptability of our immune system (12:21)

• Research from the HIV/AIDS epidemic showing dramatic effects of giving African women a simple multi-vitamin (16:35)

• Immuno-rejuvenation and why our focus should not be on supporting our immune system but rejuvenating it (19:31)

• How phytochemicals in plants impact human immune systems (24:03)

• Himalayan tartary buckwheat and its immunopotentiating compounds (28:06)

• How food influences the function of our immune system (40:30)

• My COVID-19 blog, A Functional Medicine Approach to COVID-19, and what we should be eating now to protect ourselves (48:31)

• Five significant changes Dr. Bland predicts in how we will see healthcare globally post-COVID-19 (50:59)

• The interrelatedness of our immune and nervous systems, and our control over the function of these systems (1:00:43)

• Find information on Dr. Bland online at jeffreybland.com, http://plminstitute.org/, and https://bigboldhealth.com/

• Follow Dr. Bland on Facebook @jeffreyblandphd, on Instagram @drjeffreybland, and on Twitter @jeffreyblandphd