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Series Code: UP
Program Code: UP190130A
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00:01 The following program presents principles designed
00:02 to promote good health and is not intended to take 00:05 the place of personalized professional care. 00:07 The opinions and ideas expressed 00:09 are those of the speaker. 00:10 Viewers are encouraged to draw their own conclusions 00:13 about the information presented. 00:16 It's a sad truth, 00:17 but not all diseases can be cured. 00:19 And sometimes the best treatment 00:21 may be to try and maximize one's quality of life 00:24 for a time by slowing down the disease. 00:27 Finding hope in situations like this can be difficult, 00:29 but stay tuned, 00:30 and we'll share some hope with you today, 00:32 here on the Ultimate Prescription. 00:55 Thank you for joining us here 00:56 on the Ultimate Prescription today. 00:58 I'm your host Nick Evenson here with Dr. James Marcum, 01:02 Cardiologist and Speaker Director 01:04 at Heartwise Ministries. 01:05 Yes. 01:07 Dr. Marcum, you know, 01:08 sometimes diseases can't be cured. 01:10 And in those times I think you're very good 01:12 at giving hope to your patients. 01:14 Well, you know, 01:15 it's one thing that's learned is the belief systems 01:19 are a key part of disease. 01:22 And, you know, everyone wants to slow down disease, 01:25 everyone You've heard so much about disease... reversal. 01:28 But I have a lot of patients that come to me 01:31 from everywhere now that have advanced disease. 01:34 I think of a gentleman 01:36 I take care of that at Wall Street,... 01:38 he'd already He's in his late 30s, 01:40 already had his bypass surgery, 01:42 couldn't go 10 feet without having chest pain 01:45 moving up into his jaw 01:47 was already on six or seven medications. 01:51 And he comes to the office 01:53 wanting to know what he can do to help his heart. 01:55 Yeah. 01:56 Well, some of my colleagues, you know, 01:58 the most common manifestation of heart disease 02:01 is coronary artery disease 02:03 that's blockages in the arteries 02:04 that feed the heart muscle. 02:06 And that's what this gentleman from Wall Street was occurring. 02:09 Why did he have it? 02:11 He had bad genes. 02:13 And he was actually storing fat 02:15 in his arteries at an early age. 02:17 Our bodies are made to metabolize fat 02:20 in different ways based on our genetics, 02:23 but if you take in more than 02:24 10 to 15% of your calories in fat, 02:27 which he was doing in his younger age, 02:30 it's stored somewhere, 02:31 you know, some people were taking in up to 30 to 40% 02:34 of their calories in fat. 02:36 And if we get it from saturated fat, 02:38 animal fat, depending on our genes, 02:40 it could be stored, 02:41 and actually everyone in his family 02:43 had genetic heart disease. 02:45 And unfortunately, he was a smoker as well. 02:47 So it's quite a few whammies 02:49 and he started having surgeries and bypasses when he was young. 02:52 It didn't really fix the problem. 02:53 Right. 02:54 Lots of disease, lots of problems, 02:56 and then the arteries were too small, 02:57 too diseased to do anything with procedures. 03:00 His medicines were already maximized. 03:03 So he wanted to know things that he could do. 03:05 And a lot of the doctors he'd been to says, 03:08 "No, it's impossible to reverse any type of disease genetics." 03:12 Okay? 03:13 But we've been learning more and more about this. 03:16 And my interest in this really spurred 03:19 from about a little bit over a decade. 03:22 A friend of mine, Caldwell Esselstyn, 03:25 he wrote this book Reversing Heart Disease. 03:27 Okay. 03:28 And in this book, 03:30 he talks about reversing heart disease, 03:32 how he did it with nutrition. 03:35 And he took a cohort of patients, Nick, 03:38 and he put them on plant-based diet 03:41 and certain numbers 03:42 that weren't able to halt disease, 03:44 some were able to reverse disease. 03:46 Yeah. 03:47 And that was over a decade ago. 03:49 Right. 03:50 So I was very interested in this. 03:51 So I go up to the Cleveland Clinic, 03:53 talk to him about it. 03:54 And this is the only thing he's doing. 03:56 He's putting them on real strict diets, 03:57 plant-based diets, and studying them. 03:59 And he found out 04:01 and he published articles on this about, 04:02 "Yes, it is possible to reverse disease." 04:05 So I shared this with my patient 04:07 from Wall Street. 04:09 I said, "Listen, you know, it's possible not everybody, 04:12 some genetics are too strong. 04:14 But you know, let's do everything 04:15 we can to reverse disease." 04:17 And we start talking about the different stressors. 04:20 So I had him quit smoking cigarettes, okay? 04:23 Then he went to a plant-based diet. 04:26 And then I convinced him that greens, 04:27 nitrates make arteries bigger, make the endothelial healthier, 04:31 you know, and then I talked him about the fats, 04:33 and he was eating lots of fats, 04:35 you know, he loved cheese, he loved bacon, 04:38 he loved those type of things. 04:40 And I had to convince him that, you know, 04:42 you cannot get away with this. 04:44 So he went on basically a no fat diet, 04:47 he might have had a few nuts a week, 04:49 but pretty much no fat diet. 04:51 Then we talked about movement 04:53 and modified movements as he couldn't go very fast, 04:56 but we had to do everything. 04:58 We talked about the rest, all these other things. 05:00 Then we talked about all the stress on the body. 05:03 And guess what? 05:04 He gradually began to walk more, 05:07 he started to grow some new blood vessels, 05:09 his arteries were able to dilate a little bit better, 05:12 even though it had lots of fat in it. 05:14 So he started to improve his symptoms. 05:16 And he started working on stress 05:18 from all of these different problems he was having. 05:21 So it is possible to reverse cardiovascular disease 05:25 to slow it down. 05:26 Now, a lot of the guys that have done 05:28 the research on this don't work 05:32 with the typical person that I do. 05:34 See you remember... How's that? 05:35 Because they work with just people 05:37 with they come to them highly motivated. 05:40 Okay, they get the ones that have a real problem 05:42 that they wanna... 05:43 They wanna do it. 05:45 I work with all comers. 05:46 Some people say, "No, I don't wanna do anything, 05:48 you know, I'd rather do this and die a little bit younger." 05:51 And that's okay. 05:52 Okay, but I tell them, 05:54 it's okay as long as you have Jesus in your life, 05:56 you know, because you wanna have some hope here, 05:58 and some people choose not to do that, 06:00 but a lot of people say, "No, I'm willing to do it." 06:02 And most people if we move one step at a time, 06:05 and you loving them take into the right step, 06:08 most people can do at least something 06:10 to improve their health. 06:12 And a lot of this, you know, a lot of, 06:14 some of my thinking changed dramatically 06:17 when we were able to sequence the human genome, 06:20 really, the DNA is in charge of everything, 06:23 what turns on and off the DNA? 06:25 And I think of the DNA as our hardware, 06:28 okay? 06:29 And all of the stuff, their lifestyle, 06:31 the stresses of life, that's the software, 06:34 we can have good software and bad software. 06:38 The bad software can mess up our core DNA, 06:41 damage it causing disease to occur sooner than 06:45 it might normally then we get the symptoms, 06:48 then we reach for modern medicine 06:49 to treat the symptoms, 06:51 but sometimes we never take time 06:53 to get at the cause. 06:55 And that's what disease reversal is all about. 06:58 Trying to get people back 06:59 at the cause of disease if we can, 07:02 using modern medicine when appropriately, 07:04 and letting them also know 07:06 that there's a God in heaven that gives hope for today 07:09 and hope forever. 07:10 It sounds like your Wall Street patient 07:12 was very motivated. 07:13 And you had some success treating him 07:15 with a holistic plan, not just nutrition, 07:18 not just exercise, or quitting certain habits. 07:21 Yeah. 07:22 But he was willing to do a holistic plan. 07:24 And we've progressed now 07:26 to the step that he's decided that the stress of the job 07:29 is not too good for him. 07:30 So he's gonna quit the job. 07:32 And I'm trying to focus now on belief systems, 07:35 you know, he's not from a spiritual base thing. 07:37 He doesn't think about God. 07:39 But the next step would be convincing him 07:41 and showing everyone likes evidence, Nick, 07:43 and we call this evidence that this can reverse it. 07:46 So now I'm gonna eventually introduce him 07:48 to how worship changes our epigenetics, 07:52 how this changes the way genes are expressed, 07:54 and eventually introduced him to biblical prescriptions 07:57 to slow down aging, 07:58 and perhaps reverse the disease he has. 08:01 Is everyone reversible? 08:02 No, they're not, okay? 08:04 I have some people that their genes 08:06 are just too strong to reverse, 08:08 but I've also noticed 08:09 that genetic activation changes in life. 08:13 It seems like men start to age dramatically 08:17 when their testosterone drops, okay? 08:19 About the mid 50s. 08:21 Women seem to start really aging faster about 10 years 08:24 after menopause. 08:26 And that's when the body starts to age, things start to happen. 08:30 And that's, you know, 08:31 but we wanna start anti-aging techniques 08:33 in our younger years. 08:35 You know, I want you to do it now. 08:36 So you don't have gene expressions 08:38 and symptoms at an early age. 08:40 But it's hard to get people to understand 08:43 that even though you look good on the outside, 08:45 there's things going on the inside 08:47 that are eventually gonna catch up with you. 08:49 Right. Yeah. 08:50 And it's hard to convince them 08:51 of that until they have a symptom. 08:54 So disease reversal is about you know, 08:56 turning things off as long as we can, 08:58 letting everyone know basically, 09:00 we all have bad genes, 09:02 ultimately, well, we all need a savior. 09:04 And we wanna work on the software 09:06 that doesn't turn on the hardware 09:08 before we need to have it turned on. 09:09 That's right. Does that make sense? 09:11 Yeah, absolutely. 09:12 So with this, 09:13 I'm starting, I decided, "Well, you know, 09:15 I've been doing this for a long time now." 09:18 It's time to put all the knowledge together, 09:20 both the place for modern medicine, 09:23 the place for lifestyle, 09:25 and all the things that I learned in visiting, 09:27 you know, like Caldwell Esselstyn, 09:29 T. Colin Campbell, 09:31 the people that work on the mind-body things, 09:34 it's time to put this all in a book. 09:36 So I'm working on probably my last book, 09:39 and it's gonna be called More Control Less Fear 09:44 Reversing Cardiovascular Disease 09:46 One Step at a Time. 09:49 So I'm working on that. 09:50 It's sort of gonna be my last book 09:52 that I think I write, 09:54 and it's gonna sort of bring all of this together 09:56 and we're gonna be able to give it to patients 09:58 that here it is, you know, 09:59 you don't have to cap 20 visits to the doctor. 10:02 Here, 20 visits all at one time, 10:04 take it and use this as a manual. 10:06 In it though I'm also gonna talk about 10:09 the spiritual side subtly. 10:11 And let them decide 10:12 where God would take them with all that. 10:14 Yeah. 10:15 So you're really trying to take the message 10:17 that a lot of us have grown up within the church, 10:19 and really share this with a broader audience, 10:21 your patients and folks at the hospital 10:23 that may otherwise not hear it. 10:25 Yeah. 10:26 So I want to ask, you know, prayer for this 10:27 'cause it does take a little time 10:29 and I haven't been able to cut down 10:30 on the normal practice. 10:32 So, you know, I work 60 hours a week and... 10:33 With the Chattanooga Heart Institute, 10:35 and there's so many people that need help acutely, 10:38 that need to sort through all this and one thing that's, 10:42 you know, after practicing for so many years, 10:45 you see just about everything. 10:47 Right. 10:48 And you sort of can help people move them 10:50 to where they need to go. 10:52 So they don't have a lot of fear. 10:53 A lot of people the fear of the disease 10:56 is sometimes the chemistry of fear 10:59 and worry is sometimes worse than having it many instances. 11:03 So there's an art to knowing, you know, 11:05 how to present things, you know, 11:07 I had a patient the other day that had an aneurysm. 11:10 Well, when you say the word aneurysm, 11:12 people get really scared. 11:13 Yeah. Okay. 11:14 But if you say a dilatation of a blood vessel, 11:17 that's a little nicer way. 11:18 And we'll keep an eye on that. 11:20 It's not to the stage where I think it's dangerous, 11:22 but it's a stage 11:23 where we need to keep an eye on it. 11:25 And now our technology, Nick, is so advanced, 11:29 that we find out a lot 11:30 of what I call incidental findings. 11:32 We find things that are wrong in the body, 11:35 but it's no consequence. 11:37 And sometimes we'll find a disease 11:39 that will sit quiet 11:40 and someone else will die from something else. 11:43 After doing this for so many years 11:45 the patients that I started with nearly 30 years ago now 11:49 are in their 90s now, 11:50 they don't usually die of heart disease, 11:52 even though they have it, they die of fall. 11:54 Right. 11:55 I'd say more people die of fall in the advanced ages 11:58 than anything else. 12:00 Their balance gets worse. 12:01 They try to do things they shouldn't do. 12:04 Their muscles and bones get weak, they fall down, 12:07 and they bonk their head, they break something. 12:09 And even though they have heart disease 12:11 or some other chronic condition, 12:13 that doesn't get them, the fall does. 12:15 And it seems like I can't convince people 12:17 of the dangers of falling down as much as these other things. 12:21 But, you know, 12:22 but it's very interesting as the body ages, 12:24 which part malfunctions first, and hopefully, 12:28 we have our viewers out there that this will help them 12:30 at least learn how to be more careful 12:32 if you're older about falling down. 12:35 Make sure you get up slower. 12:37 Make sure you have something to hold on to. 12:39 Don't be too proud. 12:40 Don't be doing dangerous thing 12:41 like my nine-year old that got up on the roof 12:43 to clean his gutters and fell off the roof 12:46 or going down stairs 12:47 where you probably should take the elevator. 12:50 You know, be smart about things, you know, 12:52 'cause sometimes less is more. 12:54 Yeah, well, we're gonna take a break in just a moment, 12:56 but before we do that, 12:57 I wanna go ahead and tell people 12:59 about a resource 13:00 that they can have for free today 13:01 and take with them everywhere that they go. 13:03 The Biblical Prescriptions app 13:05 is a new free download 13:07 from the Apple Store or the Google Play Store. 13:10 And it will remind you three times a day 13:12 at times that you can choose a scripture 13:15 and there's a worship routine that will take about 10 minutes 13:17 and you can go through that. 13:18 And it really helps you implement 13:20 and retain God's Word 13:21 and keep that right at the forefront of your mind 13:23 as you go throughout the day. 13:24 So check out HeartWiseMinistries.org 13:27 or go straight to the App Store 13:29 and you can download that for free. 13:30 So we're gonna be back with more 13:31 on the Ultimate Prescription in just a moment. |
Revised 2020-02-15