(gut Nerves)"the Second Brain" Incredibly Interesting Book Discussed On The Most-unlikely Show.

[tom]

Dr. Michael Gershon (Columbia U.) was on "The Colbert Report" last night (6/11/07). He wrote a book, "The Second Brain", a topic that I believe is involved in many celiac ailments.

Unfortunately, the good Dr. didn't get much time to be serious, but it's easily worth watching.

The show is repeated once more (today, 6/12/07), at 8:30p here but I think 9:30p for many of you. ("Check your local listings")

I think the interview starts about 20-22 minutes into the show. (But there is also a particularly hilarious part ~12-15 min in - oops maybe only 10m)

1) There is a massive bundle of nerves in the gut.

2) The field is quite new, but one thing the neurogastroenterology crowd says is that "most of the body's serotonin is in the gut, not the brain."

3) It's a whole new take on even a seemingly understood, relatively simple symptom like nausea. And the implications it can have on SO many of the neurological symptoms astounds me. I hope one of the local libraries has this book.

[DingoGirl]

I have heard about this.....most interesting. can't quite believe it was on Colbert..... Dr. Oz (also from Columbia) was on Oprah today (re-run, another show about poop etc.) and did mention that there are as many nerves (or something? not paying full attn.) in the gut as in brain or spine.......

[tom]

Aw hell I guess I missed Oprah today!

[rinne]

Interesting topic.

I haven't seen the Colbert show yet but have heard about this book.

My own theory is that the gut is the first brain and that the actual brain is for translating consciousness. My experience tells me that consciousness is only one aspect of how we experience reality.

[eleep]

I've heard Colbert on an NPR interview (I think?) talk about having struggled with depression, so I'm not entirely surprised that he's interested in neurological and health issues.

[Cat5]

My husband was telling me something about this which I half listened to at the time, but this ~might~ explain why when I used to be preparing certain foods (I am newly diagnosed Celiac 3 months ago), that just smelling and handling certain foods my stomach would start to swell up so bad that by the time supper rolled around I couldn't eat because I felt like I was going to explode inside if I put one mouthful of food in there.

My upper back would hurt so bad from the swelling of my stomach that I was Miserable! Now that our house is completely Gluten-Free I don't have that happen anymore and this leads me to believe that perhaps there is more to this "gut-brain" thing to be learned about.

Thanks for posting this, it reminded me that I should search this one out.

[ravenwoodglass]

Doctors are looking for the reason why so many people with gut problems also suffer from depression and other psychological problems. The answer IMHO is not that there is some magical link between them but the fact that celiac has a neurotoxic effect on the brain, if our country would get it's head out the pharmacopia and actully test everyone for celiac they might have the real answer instead of more reasons to throw meds at us.

As someone who suffered for many, many wasted years with a constant diagnosis of mental health issues causing my IBS and doctors contstantly throwing toxic meds at me I see things like this being rather dangerous for us. I believe it is going to lead even more doctors to try to 'antidepress' us to death with more pills rather than finding the real cause for a lot of us, what we are eating.

[frec]

Celiac disease not only causes neurological damage but can cause low neurotransmitter levels due to poor absorption. My naturopath put me on several supplements to improve my neurotransmitter levels and it is helping relieve my depression.