Signs of an unhealthy gut

01/26/23 • 21 min

1 Listener

Our gut helps fight disease. It processes energy for us and boosts our mood. So, having a healthy gut is extremely important – but there’s still a lot we don’t know.

Gut biome tests are a new, exciting technology, but are they the be-all and end-all for dietary decision-making? And are there simpler ways — and tastier ways, perhaps — to tell what’s happening inside our bodies?

In today’s short episode of ZOE Science & Nutrition, Jonathan and Dr. Will ask: What are the signs of an unhealthy gut? And how can we improve our gut health?

Referenced in today’s episode:

The Bristol Stool Scale. https://www.bladderandbowel.org/bowel/bowel-resources/bristol-stool-form-scale/
ZOE’s Blue Poop Challenge: https://www.joinzoe.com/bluepoop
Blue poo: Impact of gut transit time on the gut microbiome using a novel marker published in Gut https://gut.bmj.com/content/70/9/1665

Download our FREE guide — Top 10 Tips to Live Healthier: https://zoe.com/freeguide

Follow ZOE on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zoe/

This podcast was produced by Fascinate Productions.

Our gut helps fight disease. It processes energy for us and boosts our mood. So, having a healthy gut is extremely important – but there’s still a lot we don’t know.

In today’s short episode of ZOE Science & Nutrition, Jonathan and Dr. Will ask: What are the signs of an unhealthy gut? And how can we improve our gut health?

Referenced in today’s episode:

The Bristol Stool Scale. https://www.bladderandbowel.org/bowel/bowel-resources/bristol-stool-form-scale/
ZOE’s Blue Poop Challenge: https://www.joinzoe.com/bluepoop
Blue poo: Impact of gut transit time on the gut microbiome using a novel marker published in Gut https://gut.bmj.com/content/70/9/1665

Download our FREE guide — Top 10 Tips to Live Healthier: https://zoe.com/freeguide

Follow ZOE on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zoe/

This podcast was produced by Fascinate Productions.

Previous Episode

How to improve blood sugar control with exercise

Blood sugar is one of the rare nutrition topics where everyone agrees: We should avoid big peaks and dips and aim for a steady curve.

Spikes cause inflammation, accelerate aging, and lead to type 2 diabetes. Crashes make us feel moody and tired, and crave foods we don’t need.

We can control our blood sugar through what and how we eat. But something else affects our blood sugar — physical activity.

Exercise has a profound effect on your blood sugar response. Together with your food choices, being physically active helps you keep your blood sugar level even.

In this episode of ZOE Science & Nutrition, Jonathan speaks with Javier Gonzalez and Sarah Berry to find out how exercise affects our blood sugar response — even when we’re fasting — and how much exercise we need to do to benefit.

Javier Gonzalez is an associate professor of human physiology at the University of Bath whose research focuses on the interaction between diet and exercise.
Sarah Berry is one of the world's leading experts on human nutrition. She has personally run over 20 randomized clinical trials looking at how humans respond to different fats.

Download our FREE guide — Top 10 Tips to Live Healthier: https://zoe.com/freeguide

Timecodes:

00:00 - Introduction

00:12 - Topic introduction

01:39 - Quickfire questions

02:55 - Is a 30-minute walk as good as 30-minute cardio?

03:39 - What is blood sugar and why should we care about it?

05:10 - Blood sugar control throughout the day

07:43 - Why is it important to know about blood sugar?

09:01 - Blood sugar control

12:25 - How exercise affects blood sugar

14:17 - The power of fidgeting

16:12 - Effects of higher intensity exercise

17:00 - Lower intensity exercise vs higher intensity exercise

18:41 - Intermittent fasting and blood sugar

24:43 - Personalization

26:35 - What types of exercises can you do to control blood sugar?

29:12 - Cardio vs resistance training

34:21 - Blood fats & exercise

42:15 - 3 tips on leveraging exercise to control blood sugar and blood fats

43:14 - Summary

44:25 - Goodbyes

44:37 - Outro

Episode transcripts are available here.

Follow Javier on Twitter: https://twitter.com/gonzalez_jt

Follow Sarah on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drsarahberry/

Follow ZOE on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zoe/

Have an idea for a podcast? Contact Fascinate Productions to bring it to life.

Next Episode

How to eat well on a budget

The cost of living has soared. Energy prices have doubled, and food costs have gone up enormously. As a result, the weekly shopping bill can be shocking.

For some, this is merely an inconvenience. But many others face the awful choice between heating their home and maintaining their usual diet. The consequence is that many of us are throwing cheaper ingredients into our shopping baskets to save money.

So does this mean that eating healthy is an indulgence that be dropped in favour of cheap ultra-processed food? Or is it still possible to eat healthily on a budget?

In today’s episode, Jonathan speaks to Dr. Rupy Aujla and Tim Spector to better understand how to eat healthier while spending less:

Dr. Rupy Aujla is a medical doctor who, since 2015, has been teaching people to cook their way to health. He’s the founder of The Doctor’s Kitchen and has recently turned his efforts to healthy cooking on a tight budget.
Tim Spector is a co-founder of ZOE and one of the world's top 100 most cited scientists.

Buy Rupy’s book here.

Download our FREE guide — Top 10 Tips to Live Healthier: https://zoe.com/freeguide

Timecodes:

00:00 - Introduction

00:10 - Topic introduction

02:12 - Quickfire questions with Rupy

03:33 - Quickfire questions with Tim

04:22 - What’s one swap you can make today if you’re trying to eat well, for less?

05:07 - What has Dr. Rupy been up to?

06:58 - Do you need to give up eating healthy foods when economizing?

08:23 - Options when you’re on a budget

09:31 - Batch cooking

16:00 - Is it expensive to have healthy and good quality foods?

17:54 - Recipe adherence

20:24 - Advice for people cooking on their own

23:53 - How long does food last?

25:24 - How nutritious are canned & frozen foods?

28:23 - About protein

38:31 - What’s the one food you should spend more money on?

41:34 - Summary

42:29 - Can you have a healthier diet as a consequence of being on a budget?

43:23 - Goodbyes

43:26 - Outro

Get Tim’s book here.

Episode transcripts are available here.

Find delicious recipes to cook here.

Follow Rupy on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/doctors_kitchen

Follow Tim on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tim.spector

Follow ZOE on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zoe/

Want to create your own podcast? Contact Fascinate Productions to bring it to life.

ZOE Science & Nutrition - Signs of an unhealthy gut

Transcript

[00:00:00] Jonathan Wolf: Hello, and welcome to Zoe Shorts, the bite-sized podcast where we discuss one topic around science and nutrition. I'm Jonathan. And I'm joined this week by Dr. Will Bulsiewicz, â ̈

[00:00:09] Dr. Will Bulsiewicz: Jonathan. Our guts help fight disease process energy and boost our mood. So a healthy gut is hugely important, but there's still a lot we don't know our understanding of the gut microbiomes in its early stages. â ̈

[00:00:17] Jonathan Wo