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Dr.

Frank Shallenberger’s

Vol. 7, No. 3 March 2008

Slam the Brakes on Aging


Imagine if the scientists of the future against degenerative diseases like arthritis,
were to discover a medical breakthrough diabetes, heart disease, and osteoporosis.
that could actually reverse the aging process. Well, imagine no more. Such a break-
Imagine if that breakthrough could through already exists. And I’ve used it with
reduce your biological age by as much as 10 great success on hundreds of my patients.
or 20 years. Sound hard to believe? Then let me tell
Imagine if it could give you greater you about one of those patients. That
energy, increased libido, and more strength patient is … me!
and stamina.
Meet Patient Frank S.
Imagine if it could improve your brain
function, lower your body fat, and improve If you were to look at the picture on
your mood and sleep. my driver’s license, you’d see a 60-ish face
And imagine if it could protect you looking back at you. And if you were to
look at the date of birth on that same dri-
ver’s license, you’d see that I was born 61
years ago.
In this Issue
But what if you were to look at my
Q Avoiding breast cancer might be medical chart instead? Well, in that case,
a lot easier than you thought .... p. 4
you wouldn’t know I was 61. In fact, you’d
Q Three reasons you don’t get probably think I was 20 years younger.
enough of this vitamin .............. p. 7 That’s not a boast or an exaggeration.
Here are some of the numbers you’d find
Q Diagnosed with hepatitis C?
on my chart:
Here’s what you have to
do now ........................................ p. 8 « My blood pressure is 110/60
Coming Next Month « My resting heart rate is 57
• Now that you know how to evaluate « My fasting blood sugar is 85
your energy levels, what does it take « My fasting insulin is under 5
to improve it? I'll show you easy
steps you can do at home. « My HDL cholesterol is 63
• Folic acid deficiency can cause every- « My LDL cholesterol is 103
thing from gingivitis to cancer. This « My triglycerides are 78
surprise cause is easy to avoid, but
most people don’t. « My body fat is 12%
« My functional strength is 98%, which
is only 2% less than the average 40 Is it due to a strenuous exercise regi-
year old. men? Nope. During the week, I do just a
« My energy production efficiency, the half hour of exercise per day. And it’s mod-
single most important measurement erate exercise.
of aging there is, is 133%. That’s 33% Is it because I take fistfuls of supple-
better than the average 44 year old! ments at every meal? Again, the answer is
« My lung capacity is 106%, which no. I take three different supplements a day
is 6% higher than the average and that’s it.
40 year old. Maybe it’s because I’ve had healthy
« My cardiac capacity is 135%, which habits my entire life? No again. As a young
is 35% higher than the average 40 adult, I smoked, drank, and popped pre-
year old. scription drugs like they were candy.
« My equilibrium (sense of balance) tests In fact, I spent a lot of times in my 30s
out like that of someone much younger. feeling just plain lousy. But then I discov-
ered an anti-aging secret so powerful that it
But more important than my “num-
revolutionized my health and the health of
bers” is what those numbers enable me to
my patients.
do. At an age when many are slowing down,
I’m busier than ever. I put in a full 8-hour And Today, I’m Going to Share
day seeing patients at the clinic. And in my That Secret With You…
spare time I do research, write books and
articles, do radio interviews, and teach If you watch professional sports, you
training seminars for doctors. know that most athletes peak sometime in
Plus … I have no trouble skiing down their early 30s. The really good ones can
difficult slopes in the Sierra mountains… stay at the top of their game until they turn
balancing on the top of a mast on my sail- 40. But most have already started to lose a
boat … keeping up with the 30-year-olds in step or two (or more) well before then.
my bicycle club … or making the 215-mile That’s because we all peak physically
drive to San Francisco to visit my grand- some time in our 30s. After that, we begin
daughter. to go downhill. We age. We notice aches and
In short, I do pretty much whatever I pains more often. Our muscles tighten up
want, without limiting myself. and our limbs, especially our legs, stiffen.
And we just can’t move like we used to.
Is this health and youthfulness due to
my “good genes?” Hardly. My family history Of course, if you’re not a professional
includes diabetes, heart disease, senility, and athlete, you may not notice the difference
neurological disorders. for a while. But we all begin to age in our
30s. The question is “why?” And how can
you stop it from happening?
Real Cures (ISSN 1062-4163) is published monthly by
The answer to these questions lies in
Soundview Publishing, LLC. Publisher: Wallis W. Wood; your cells. When you’re young, your cells
Editor: Frank Shallenberger, MD. Subscriptions $49 per produce a lot of energy. And they continue
year; foreign addresses add $13 U.S. per year. Send new
subscriptions or changes of address to our Business Office: to produce more and more energy until they
P.O. Box 467939, Atlanta, GA 31146-7939, 800-728-2288 or peak in your 30s.
770-399-5617. Real Cures is a newsletter containing gen-
eral comments on health, nutrition, and medicine. Readers After that, your cells start to produce
are advised to consult with their own physician before
implementing any health idea they read about, whether energy less efficiently. In fact, their efficien-
here or in any other publication. Copyright © 2008 by cy declines in a steady, predictable, and non-
Soundview Publishing, LLC. All rights reserved.
Unauthorized reproduction of this newsletter or its con-
debatable pattern for the rest of your life
tents by xerography, facsimile, or any other means is illegal. until you die.

—2—
Over time, your cells will lose enough um as markers for age and health. While all
efficiency that the loss begins to affect the of these are important markers, not one of
organs that these cells make up. At that them can predict how old — and how
point, the organs begin to decrease in func- healthy — you really are.
tion. The heart doesn’t work as well. The The reason is that while these factors
liver doesn’t work as well. The brain doesn’t get worse in some people who age, they don’t
work as well. And so on. get worse in everyone. For instance, blood
When those organs start to lose func- pressure isn’t a good predictor of age because
tion, you start to notice something. Your there are plenty of people over 60 with nor-
blood sugar isn’t quite what it used to be. mal blood pressure who are sick and frail.
Your cholesterol levels go up. Blood pressure So it’s not a good measurement for aging.
goes up. And your sexual function and your But your cells don’t lie. If they aren’t
ability to sleep decline. producing energy as effectively as they
As the years go by and the cells contin- should, you’re on the fast path to aging
ue to lose their efficiency, the organs start to and disease.
deteriorate. Eventually, they get to the point This is not just conjecture; it’s been
where their function is so compromised, dis- proven in several studies. In one study,
eases begin to set in. Diseases like diabetes, researchers took genetically similar mice
or osteoporosis, or heart disease. and divided them into two groups. They
After that, your body begins to grow then genetically altered the mitochondria
frail and weak. The organs degenerate (a cell’s furnace, which converts oxygen to
to the point that they’re basically falling energy) of one group so that their energy
apart. And if you don’t do something production was dramatically decreased.
about it, you spend your final years in a They left the other half of the group alone.
nursing home. So the only difference between these two
Most people think this cycle is natural groups of mice was energy production.
and inevitable. They think that as they age, The researchers then followed these
they are supposed to lose energy. In fact, at mice over the course of their lifetime. They
some point, people might go to their doctor, found that because the genetically altered
who says, “What do you expect, you’re X mice produced a lower amount of energy,
years old.” That’s because doctors believe they didn’t live as long.
this is how aging occurs. Even more importantly, the altered mice
But this is NOT how it works! developed more degenerative diseases at an
The truth is, you don’t lose energy earlier age. In fact, all of the genetically
because you age. You age because you modified mice developed the age-related
lose energy. problems that are so typical of older people.
They developed arthritis, diabetes, heart
That’s the secret to anti-aging! The disease, loss of hair, osteoporosis (with
aging process stems from one thing, and one spines bent over), and they were less active
thing only — decreased cellular energy. in their cages.
This makes sense because every cell That means the less energy you have,
needs energy to function. It’s so important, in the more likely you are to develop disease.
fact, that energy is the universal biomarker Any disease.
for aging. It’s the only marker that can
accurately tell you how your body is working. Another study has even stronger scien-
And it can tell you this 100% of the time. tific evidence of the importance of energy
and long life. The researchers in the study
Most doctors like to use your blood used muscle biopsies to test the energy lev-
pressure, cholesterol levels, lung capacity, els of a group of mice. Then they subjected
blood sugar and insulin levels, and equilibri-

—3—
The Easiest Way To where the medical community gets its nutri-
Avoid Breast Cancer tional advice. But this advice could be the cause
of the dramatic surge in breast cancer we’ve
If you want to avoid breast cancer, your seen the past decade or so.
doctor might tell you that mammograms are You, like most of my savvy readers, may
your best bet. But mammograms can only tell know that high-glycemic carbohydrates create
you if a cancer has already formed. And by elevated levels of the hormone insulin. And ele-
then, it may be too late. vated insulin levels (anything over 10 mIU/L)
Fortunately, there’s an easy way to avoid dramatically increase your risk of cancer. This
the cancer. All you have to do is avoid high is why diabetics have an increased risk of
glycemic carbohydrates. breast cancer.
Your conventional doctor would never tell In a recent study, researchers found that
you that. After all, he thinks these carbohy- women with the highest one-third of insulin
drates are good for you. That’s what the govern- levels had almost three times the incidence of
ment’s food pyramid tells them. And that’s breast cancer.

the muscle tissue to nuclear magnetic The Ultimate Energy Test


resonant scanning. This is a very accurate
way to determine their energy production. Anytime someone tells me that they
As expected, because of the genetic differ- want to slow down aging and prevent dis-
ences between each mouse, there was a ease, I immediately give them a test I devel-
considerable variation in energy production oped in the late 1990s. I call it Bio-Energy
efficiency. Some of the mice produced Testing. This test is easy to perform. It’s
energy really well, and some of them not completely safe and non-invasive. And I
nearly as well. believe it’s the ultimate tool to determine
the actual status of your health.
Then, after they measured their energy
production, the researchers simply followed I discovered Bio-Energy Testing after
the mice over the course of their life. They seeing some interesting technology out of
all ate the same food, lived in the same NASA. Do you remember the movie “The
cages, etc. And the researchers recorded Right Stuff?” It was the story of the
how long they all lived. Mercury astronauts and their flight into
space. In that movie, there’s a scene where
Result: the mice with the highest
NASA doctors have the astronauts breathe
level of cellular energy production efficiency
into a tube. The tube leads to a machine
(in the highest quartile) lived 36% longer
that helps measure lung function.
than those in the lower quartile. Again,
this is proof positive that energy is That machine isn’t just the stuff of
absolutely vital to your longevity and movies. NASA actually uses that machine to
disease resistance. test lung function. And it’s the basic tech-
nology behind Bio-Energy Testing.
Obviously, most of us don’t want to
have a muscle biopsy to determine our ener- Before NASA came up with this
gy levels. It’s invasive, which always carries technology, the testing was very cumber-
a risk of infection, and it’s very painful. So some. People would have to breathe into
how can you find out your energy levels something like 40 different plastic bags.
with a high degree of accuracy without all But NASA created a Gas Exchange Analysis
the problems? Let me show you…. device that was about the size of a small
TV set.

—4—
Another recent study explains why. It factors that increase insulin levels include a
showed that elevated insulin levels cause the lack of physical activity, obesity, and a diet high
liver to decrease the production of sex-hormone in omega-6 oils. You’ll find these in corn oil, saf-
binding proteins. These proteins are regulatory
flower oil, whole grains, and so many fast and
proteins. They protect breast tissue from exces-
sive levels of estrogen, which stimulates breast processed foods.
cancer cells. By decreasing the levels of these High glycemic carbohydrates are not healthy
binding proteins, insulin causes breast tissue to foods, no matter who tells you they are. Make it
be exposed to abnormally elevated levels of a point to eat these foods only once in a while. In
estrogen.
fact, I tell my patients to treat them like choco-
But that’s not all. Insulin also stimulates
cancer cells directly. And eating high-glycemic late cake. A little chocolate cake every now and
carbs is the most influential factor on insulin then is OK. But you wouldn’t delude yourself
secretion. into thinking that eating chocolate cake as a
However, it’s not the only factor. Other regular part of your diet is a healthy choice.

For years, doctors used this machine Then we feed the information into a
to test lung function in emphysema computer program that calculates your
patients. They also used it to test the energy production efficiency, metabolic rate
lung function of high-performance athletes (how well you produce energy at rest),
and astronauts. whether you’re producing energy from fat or
But until I came along, no one had put glucose, how well your body turns energy
two and two together and figured out that it into muscle strength, and ultimately, your
could be used on regular folks to test their biological age.
energy production. Once we take these measurements,
When I figured this out and told people we compare them to what the energy scores
in the field, they said, “Of course!” It was so are for the average 30 year old, 40 year old,
obvious — but only after the fact. 50 year old, and so on. When I compared
those scores to the traditional bio-markers
Here’s How Bio-Energy people use, I found a strong correlation.
Testing Works Except that instead of having to measure
10 different bio-markers, I have to measure
You probably learned in school that only one!
people breathe in oxygen and breathe out That one marker is how efficiently
carbon dioxide. When you breathe in oxy- your cells produce energy.
gen, it floods your cells with oxygen. The
oxygen then enters the mitochondria, ener- How Energy Efficiency
gy is produced, and the resulting waste Declines With Age
product is carbon dioxide.
Bio-Energy Testing simply measures Young children make the oxygen-
how efficiently your mitochondria are able to-energy conversion the most efficiently.
to convert oxygen to energy, and how much And we all know how much energy they
carbon dioxide is created as a result. Using a have.
mouthpiece, we measure how well your body But as time goes on, various factors
makes this conversion at rest and while can interfere with this conversion. These
exercising. include infections, injuries, lack of sleep,

—5—
stress, poor dietary habits, smoking, drugs, SOD (superoxide dismutase), catylase, and
lack of exercise, too much exercise (which glutathione peroxidase.
is a form of self-inflicted injury), and These enzymes stop or quench free
exposure to toxins (such as heavy metals, radicals. But when they do, the enzymes
pesticides, herbicides, and other chemicals). become inactivated. That means they can’t
Doctors have taught for years that free quench another free radical until something
radical molecules cause aging. It’s true that reactivates them. That something is the
they do cause tissue destruction. As a result, antioxidant nutrients. These include vita-
they do play a major part in aging. But what mins C, and E, beta-carotene, lipoic acid,
causes all the free radicals? I told you earli- selenium, etc.
er that low energy production is what caus- However, this still doesn’t solve the
es you to age. And now I’m going to tell you problem. Since antioxidants reactivate
how. It has to do with free radical produc- antioxidant enzymes, then the studies should
tion. Lower energy levels cause your free show that taking antioxidants reduces free
radical levels to go up at an alarming rate. radicals and the damage they cause. But,
Here’s why: again, that’s not what they show.
Free radicals are a by-product of We now understand why. Like free
inefficient energy production by your radicals, the mitochondria produce antioxi-
mitochondria. When your mitochondria dant enzymes. But unlike free radicals,
work efficiently, they don’t produce very which increase as mitochondrial efficiency
many free radicals. But as they work less drops, antioxidant-enzyme production
efficiently, they start producing more decreases as the mitochondria become less
and more. efficient. Thus, decreased energy production
It’s very similar to a car engine. As the leads to a deadly combination — increased
car engine works less efficiently, you get free radical formation with decreased
more pollution coming from the exhaust. As antioxidant enzymes. As the mitochondria
the mitochondria become less efficient, you become less efficient, there are less and less
get more free radicals. Your cells also enzymes produced for the antioxidants to
become more susceptible to free radical reactivate. This combination lets free radi-
damage. And you age faster. cals destroy tissue, which leads to aging
If free radicals were the cause of aging and disease.
and energy loss, then lowering your free What’s more, taking antioxidants
radical levels would stop the aging process. won’t help the mitochondria produce more
That’s why doctors have told you to take enzymes. In fact, there’s only one thing that
so many antioxidants. We call antioxidants will — improving energy production. A
“free radical scavengers” because they recent article in the New England Journal
attack free radicals and remove them from of Medicine concluded that the biggest
your body. difference between a 25-year-old and a
The only problem is that antioxidants 75-year-old is in how efficiently their bodies
don’t stop the aging process. Now that may use oxygen to produce energy.
sound like heresy to you. But let me explain. And in next month’s issue, I’m going
There have been dozens of animal to show you the absolute best ways to get
studies testing this theory. But not one has your mitochondria to produce energy more
ever found that you can stop (or even slow) efficiently, revitalize your cells, resist dis-
aging by taking antioxidants. ease, and feel and function years younger
than you do today. What’s more, you can
That’s because antioxidants don’t do these treatments in the comfort of your
directly attack free radicals. Antioxidant own home. Don’t miss it! Q
enzymes do. Antioxidant enzymes include

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Three Reasons You Don’t
Get Enough Vitamin K
Most people don’t think about vitamin Olestra, it also won’t absorb these vitamins.
K when it comes to protecting their health. The result is multiple fat-soluble deficien-
But vitamin K is a vital nutrient. cies — and all of the health problems that
If you don’t have enough vitamin K in go with them.
your body, you substantially increase your (3) It’s not just drugs and man-made
risk of getting some serious diseases. These chemicals that cause vitamin K deficiencies.
include cancer (such as breast, colon, liver, The natural fat blocker chitosan also blocks
and stomach), atherosclerosis and heart dis- your body’s absorption of the vitamin.
ease (vitamin K prevents arteries from cal- Chitosan comes from chitin, which
cifying), and osteoporosis (it reduces calci- comes from mushrooms and many sea
um loss in your bones). creatures. It protects tissues and helps their
The problem is that it’s becoming easi- resistance to invaders. Many people take
er for people to develop a deficiency. That’s chitosan to lose weight or to lower their
because there are three common chemicals cholesterol. It works by inhibiting fat
that keep you from getting adequate absorption. So it may lead to vitamin K
amounts of vitamin K. deficiency.
(1) The most common chemical is fat- If you’re taking any of these products,
blocking drugs. Since vitamin K is a fat-sol- ask your doctor to check your vitamin K
uble vitamin, these medications interfere level. If it’s low, consider getting off the fat
with its absorption. And they cause a defi- blocking products. Also make sure you’re
ciency. Common fat-blocking drugs include eating vitamin K-rich foods, such as most
many of those used to lower cholesterol. vegetables, oils, eggs, and legumes. God
It also includes the new prescription made these foods. Be sure to eat them
weight-loss drug Orlistat (xenical). And instead of the new miracle foods created by
recently the FDA cleared Alli — another Madison Avenue. You might want to take a
nasty little diet drug that has the same effect. supplement as well. I suggest you take 15
mg a day of vitamin K2. Q
(2) The second chemical is the fat sub- References:
stitute Olestra. Olestra also goes by the
Chlebowski, R.T., et al. “Vitamin K in the treatment of cancer.”
name Olean. No matter what you call it, Cancer Treatment Review. 12:49-63, 1985.
Olestra is a wonderful example of how crazy Deuchi, K., et al. “Continuous and massive intake of chitosan
the world is getting. Olestra is an “artificial affects mineral and fat soluble vitamin status in rats fed on a
fat.” In other words, it is a non-food mole- high-fat diet.” Biosci Biotechnol Biochem, 59(7):1211-1216,
cule that contains no nutritive value at all. 1995.

Although it’s fat soluble, your body cannot Gundberg, C.M., et al. “Vitamin K status and bone health: an
analysis of methods for determination under carboxylated
absorb it. The intestines don’t have an osteocalcin.” J Clin Endocrinol Metab, 83:3258-3266, 1998.
enzyme capable of digesting it. And, since it
Merkel, R.L. “The use of menadione bisulfite and ascorbic acid
tastes like fat, you can enjoy your “fat” in the treatment of nausea and vomiting of pregnancy.” Am J
without gaining weight. The FDA approved Obstet Gynecol, 64:416-418, 1952.
it as a fat substitute in 1996 and is popular Prasad, K.N., et al. “Vitamin K3 (menadione) inhibits the
on Oreos, chips, and other junk “foods” that growth of mammalian tumor cells in culture.” Life Sciences,
29:1387-1392, 1981.
are supposed to make you thin.
Yoshida, T., K. Miyazawa, I. Kasuga, et al. “Apoptosis induction
The problem with Olestra is that it’s of vitamin K2 in lung carcinoma cell lines: the possibility of
able to absorb fat-soluble vitamins like vita- vitamin K2 therapy for lung cancer.” Int J Oncol., 2003
min K. Because your body can’t absorb Sep;23(3):627-32.

—7—
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Q. My husband just tested positive for (2) Take a good, high-quality multivita-
min/mineral every day, along with a good
hepatitis C. What do you know of that
can help or stop this? — Lee M., via e-mail omega-3 mixed fatty acids supplement.
(3) Check the tests I mentioned above
A. This is a great question. I’ll have to once a year and, if possible, also check the
answer it in full in a future issue. But let me Fibrospect test annually as well. If any of
give you some hope. Just because your hus- these tests indicate that the liver is starting
band has a positive hepatitis C test does not to become inflamed, then you may actually
mean he has the disease. have hepatitis C.
It means only that at some point in his If your husband has both a positive test
life, he was exposed to the virus. He may for hepatitis C and symptoms (listed earli-
have the disease. But it’s more likely that he er), a grade 2 or greater biopsy or Fibrospect
developed an immunity to it. It’s important score, or an elevation of the tests mentioned
to remember that 70% of those who have a above, then he actually has hepatitis C. In
positive hepatitis C test never actually that case, he will need to take action that
develop hepatitis. For them, being infected will halt any more liver inflammation from
with the hepatitis C virus is not a problem. developing before it becomes a concern. The
The word “hepatitis” means that the best way to do that is to follow the above
liver is inflamed. The only way your hus- advice as well as take the following:
band has the disease is if his liver is (1) Milk thistle extract, 400 mg two
inflamed. Inflammation causes pain, fatigue, times a day.
joint pains, or certain kinds of rashes. But it (2) Lipoic acid, 200 mg two times a day.
takes a liver biopsy or a series of blood tests (3) Selenium, 200 mcg two times a day.
(liver function tests, transferrin saturation, (4) Artichoke leaf extract, 400 mg three
C-reactive protein, sed rate, ferritin) to con- times a day.
firm the inflammation.
These can help keep inflammation
If the liver is inflamed, the liver function under control. I’ll have a lot more on hepati-
tests will be elevated over 100 IU/L, the iron tis C in future issues.
panel may show a transferrin saturation over
But, again, the likelihood of your
45%, and the C-reactive protein, sed rate, and
husband having the disease is pretty small.
ferritin will be elevated. Another excellent
I hope that gives you great encouragement
test for liver inflammation is a Fibrospect test.
— and steps to take to keep any potential
You can find information about this test at
problems under control. Whatever you do,
http://www.regence.com/trgmedpol/lab/lab47.
don’t take the drugs. These steps will be
html. If your husband has any of these indi-
all you need.
cations of hepatitis, then he has hepatitis C.
If not, then all he has is a positive hepatitis
C test.
The drug companies insist that anyone Got a Question?
with a positive hepatitis C test will have
problems with the virus and must take the Do you have a question for Dr.
drugs. But that’s not true. People that have Shallenberger? If so, please send it (typed
a positive test, but who don’t have hepatitis only) to him c/o Soundview Publications,
are lucky. All they have to do is the following: P.O. Box 467939, Atlanta, GA 31146-7939 or
feedback@RealCuresLetter.com. While he
(1) Avoid alcohol, except maybe one to won’t be able to respond personally, he’ll try
two times per month. In people infected with to answer as many questions as he can in
the hepatitis C virus even moderate drink- these pages.
ing may be enough to cause inflammation.

—8—

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