How to strengthen your gut to improve your health

Most of us apparently don't know much about our gut health. 

Anew survey by MDVIP shows 85% of people failed a survey when it involves digestion. That same survey shows two-thirds of adults suffer from recurrent digestive issues, yet never talk to their doctor about it.

So we're sharing tips to bring awareness and hopefully help strengthen your digestive tract with a few lifestyle changes.

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Since the gut affects every organ in the body, it's important to understand what the gut entails. It involves the entire gastrointestinal system: stomach, intestines and colon. Its function is to digest and absorb nutrients from food and then excrete waste.

Doctors warn, problems with the gut can be catastrophic to your health.

"An unhealthy gut can increase your risk for things like heart attacks, strokes, diabetes, and even Alzheimer's," says Dr. Andrea Klements, who is the Chief Medical Officer for MDVIP. That stands for medical doctor, value, and prevention, a national network of 1,100 doctors in the U.S. who focus on personalized, preventative medicine. They now serve almost 400,000 patients and boast a success rate of 97% satisfaction among their patients.

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They're trying to raise awareness that the majority of our immune system is in our gut! When it's off, it can cause everything from abdominal pain to bloating, gas, diarrhea or constipation, brain fog, moodiness, and fatigue.

"We have good and bad bacteria, we've heard of the words gut microbiome, and so those good bacteria need to outweigh the bad to have a healthy gut," explains Dr. Klements.

She goes on to say that something as simple as food sensitivities can disrupt the gut, even food that is typically healthy, so she suggests food allergy testing, then eliminate foods your allergic or sensitive to. You may also want to consider eliminating other foods.

"Maybe taking out something bad like a processed food, sweets, or sugar can go a long way with making you feel better," suggests Dr. Klements.

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She also warns about a popular treatment that can destroy the gut.

"Antibiotics not only kill the bad bacteria that cause your infection, but kill that good bacteria in the gut. So it will make it unbalanced and cause some of those GI symptoms, but can also give you more long-term chronic inflammation, not just antibiotics but also foods; if you have a food sensitivity, something like that," says Dr. Klements.

As for prevention, most doctors now suggest you take a probiotic supplement while taking antibiotics, and many foods can help, as well.

"Probiotics are good bacteria, so if you eat more yogurt, fermented foods like sauerkraut, pickles, those will replenish and add more good bacteria. Then, there are prebiotic foods, which are foods that feed the good bacteria, and those are things like garlic, onions, asparagus, and oats," states Dr. Klements.

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Gut issues can and do affect lifestyles in many ways.

"In those under 45 (years old), 40% of people said that they avoid sex due to GI issues and 30% say it markedly affects their quality of life, so we need a lot more education! People don't need to suffer in silence, and if their doctor doesn't seem to be understanding, you need to find another doctor. We also found that most of the women in the survey said they felt dismissed by their doctor," says Dr. Klements.

She tells us that MDVIP is a cash-only type claim, but she says they work well with, and compliment, Medicare and commercial health insurance companies.

To find out just how much you know about your gut, you can take the gut IQ quiz: https://www.mdvip.com/about-mdvip/blog/gut-health-iq

  For more information about MDVIP, click here.