Metabolic psychiatry
Metabolic psychiatry as a field is about to explode. There are multiple clinical trials ongoing across the world and I anticipate that the evidence base for metabolic interventions in psychiatry is going to be solidified by these trials.
We already have multiple case studies of significant improvements in mental health symptoms through the use of the ketogenic diet, and clinicians in different continents with positive outcomes for their patients - in many cases the ketogenic diet has improved symptoms of mental disorder where traditional treatments such as medications and psychotherapy had failed. This is not surprising, given that the ketogenic diet is an evidence based treatment for treatment-resistant epilepsy and we have ample clinical experience of its use for this purpose. Never mind the fact that we prescribe anti-epileptics for many conditions in psychiatry!
Something that allopathic medicine does not do well in my opinion, is tackling the root causes of chronic illness. There is overwhelming evidence now that mental disorders are caused by underlying metabolic issues. This includes mitochondrial dysfunction, deficits in brain energy metabolism, insulin resistance, oxidative stress, immune system activation and poor gut health. I talk about these mechanisms in more detail in my book, Metabolic Madness.
I would like anyone visiting this site to know that there is hope! Even if you have tried multiple prescribed medications and different modes of psychological therapy. Chances are they were not addressing the root cause of your illness - which likely has a basis in metabolic dysfunction. Unfortunately for many these medications can come with their own metabolic side-effects.
I am personally in contact with many people who have revolutionised their mental health through adopting metabolic interventions. Some of these people tried all of the medications available to psychiatrists and had even been hospitalised before. Yet it wasn't until they fixed their metabolic health, that their mental health improved and stayed well!
Watch this space as exciting things are happening in the world of metabolic psychiatry...
