My guest today is Nicole Rincon. Nicole is a
board certified physician assistant graduating
from UC San Diego with honors in biology and
special focus on microbiology and genetics. Nicole
continued her healthcare education at Western
University of Health Sciences, where she graduated
on the Dean's List with a master's degree in
physician assistant studies. in 2007. Nicole
is MAPS, Medical Academia of Pediatric Special
Needs, attendee, and has extensive experience
with pediatric special needs, integrative and
functional medicine. Currently, Nicole works
at the Rasignol Medical Center, which includes
Dr. Dan Rasignol and former guest Dr. Richard
Fry. The Razignol Medical Center strives to identify
what may be causing abnormal functioning of cells
in persons with autism and other disorders using
biomarkers that are objective, testable, and
treatable. Through functional medicine intervention,
Nicole saw a dramatic change in her family when
addressing basic metabolic needs, gut health.
and environmental changes. Her goal is to empower
and educate her patients to actualize their ideal
selves through medicine and natural remedies.
Through Nicole's work at the Rasenal Medical
Center and her experience, she has vast information
and knowledge about non -traditional treatments.
For that reason, We plan on having several episodes
to discuss Nicole's findings and share incredible
insights to the public. And now my conversation
with Nicole Rincon. Nicole, let's start with
your education and professional history and then
the path into autism specifically. Perfect, thanks,
Ryan. I just want to thank you first, Ryan, before
we even get started. I really appreciate you
having me on the podcast, and I appreciate you
reaching out. This is an honor to be here and
to speak with you, and I'm really looking forward
to it. So my experience, so I have an interesting
story. So I'm a physician assistant. I've been
practicing medicine for 17 years now, I believe,
and let's see, 2007, yeah, 17 years. You know
as a child just to even go way back further than
that, you know, I was a pretty academic child
I was very good in math. I actually got a scholarship
to college in math so very very left brain there
and I Went to UC San Diego and I loved biology.
I love to study science. I got a bachelor's degree
in biology pretty good grades. I ended up going
to P .A. school at Western University in Pomona.
I was the youngest P .A. in my graduating class
because I just I'm intense. I just blasted through
the program and I was on the dean's list. So
I've always enjoyed academics and being in that
world. I, you know, in the meantime, I got my
P .A. degree. I met my husband and P .A. school.
We ended up moving to San Diego and I ended up
getting into the wellness field pretty early
on so I was doing a lot of Just wellness coaching
as far as vitamins supplements Dietary changes
was primarily the focus so healthy healthy diet
and Then basically after a few years we decided
we're gonna try and get pregnant So my husband
and I tried and tried and after a few years You
know, we'd went to the doctor and tried a few
of the medications didn't work went to a fertility
specialist and they ended up putting me on some
follicle stimulating hormone and We had the first
time we tried I didn't get pregnant Second time
we tried I got pregnant which was wonderful.
And then I had a miscarriage like ten weeks later
And it was very, you know, this period was super
stressful for my husband and I. And we decided
one more time, we're gonna try one more time.
So I ended up getting pregnant on the third time,
third and last. And they found out it was triplets,
which was, you know, super scary, but super amazing.
And we ended up, you know, I seen the pregnancy
through. So I had some ups and downs with that.
I had bed rest. That I had to start I think at
10 weeks But we made it to 34 weeks gave birth
to the kids the kids were I said two boys and
a girl they're now 12 years old and They were
developing normally hitting all their milestones.
I was on cloud 9. My life was great I had my
husband and my home and my three kids and my
job and And then at about 18 months, I noticed
my one stuff my one son started with a tremor
interestingly in the morning and he was starting
to stutter a little and I thought that's interesting
so we we took him to the doctor and he said well
maybe he has autism I don't know they send us
to the regional center we were getting worked
up and then about but it wasn't too severe and
we didn't know what to think of it so about six
months later when at the two -year mark um in
the summertime my son my other son and my daughter
um severely regressed. My son mostly regressed.
My daughter, at the same time, started having
seizures. So here I have these healthy triplets.
At two years old, they regressed, especially
my son that regressed at two. He started smearing
feces all over the wall, absolutely no eye contact.
He had at least 50 words, two -word sentences,
lost all speech. Just spinning in the corner
of the room, I couldn't get him back. And my
daughter, like I said, she started having seizures.
And so we were just I was just devastated at
this time. And I really I really got I really
got hit hard. I had some depression, you know,
temporarily. I mean, I couldn't get out of bed.
I had to take a little leave of absence from
work. And then I did what most parents do at
that time are a lot of parents with kids on the
spectrum. And I just. dove into the research.
I said, I'm tired of feeling sorry for myself.
There's something going on. I went to the doctor.
They said, well, your son, we don't know, but
he's stimming now, so let's put him on Risperidone.
It's the only FDA approved drug. I'm like, but
what's wrong with him? Why is this happening?
Well, we don't know. It's autism. It's a psychological
disorder. And, you know, I'm just me being me,
I just didn't accept it. So I said, no, OK. So
I went into the research and I stayed up till
2 a .m. every morning and just looking at studies,
looking at studies. What can I do? And so I he
was diagnosed. They gave him a diagnosis of apraxia.
So I went on to Google apraxia on PubMed and
basically I read a study. I think it was a double
blind placebo controlled study about Fish oil
and vitamin E and the combination helping apraxia
and it was a pretty big study for the time So
I thought okay, let's try it. So I gave my son
who was still severely Gone at that point for
me. I gave him this fish oil omega -3 Vitamin
E and within I swear it was like a week. He calmed
down. He stops. He stopped spinning and he actually
started making eye contact with me again and
this I mean it was only within a week and I thought
holy cow like we are on to something and I felt
this huge rush of energy and like okay okay we
can do this like okay so we're gonna keep the
vitamin E and I just you know keep the fish oil
and I I kept going down this rabbit hole we added
things I added I found a trial on N acetylcysteine
and I buy the I bought the exact brand at the
dose that they had recommended because I'm a
PA like I'm gonna do this clinically And I go
down the B12, the methyl B12, and I go down the
multivitamin with the B vitamins. And so I start
adding on these substacks myself, and I was seeing
improvement. Now, it wasn't miraculous. My son
still didn't have speech. But I realized that
maybe there was a fungal component. And so I
started treating them with grapefruit seed extract
at the time, which is what I had. And I noticed
that their repetitive behaviors went down. And
so I thought, okay, I need help. This is great.
I'm on the right track. And so I ended up going
to the Medical Academy of Pediatric Special Needs
Conference. And so it's a conference that trains
clinicians how to treat children with autism.
and neurodevelopmental disorders. And I was so
bold. I walked right into the conference. It
was my first time there. And I'm like, who is
the guy in charge? Who's the man? Who's the director?
And they're like, oh, that's Dr. Rossignol. I
said, great. Where is he? Does anybody know who
he is? I don't even know what it looks like.
And they're like, he's over there. So I just
stomp up to him on the lunch break. I'm like,
hey, I'm Nicole Rincon. I'm a physician assistant.
I'd like to work with you. Can you hire me? And
he says he looked at me and kind of laughed.
And he's like, well. Do you have a license to
practice in California? I said, yeah. He said,
okay. Yeah, okay. Yeah, send me your resume.
Sure. And then like that was it. The interview
process was over. And so he hired me, you know,
and obviously we communicated more, but I started
working for him like two weeks after that. I
ended up putting in my resignation and my old
job. I quit. So I was all in. I was going to
do autism research, autism treatments, help my
kids, help other kids. It's been great. So that
kind of starts my story at Rossignol Medical
Center. That was eight years ago. And so Yeah,
from there, you know, I, Dr. Rosignol's helped
me with my own kids. We've done, I mean, all
the things, well, not all, but almost all the
things I've recommended to my patients. We've
tried, we are in this, you know, I'm a mother.
Both of my boys had a moderate to severe diagnosis
of autism at this point. Now that they're 12,
my son is, one son, the severe son, ironically,
has lost his diagnosis. And then my other son
is very mild. And we still have issues. We have
some OCD and still some repetitive and social
stuff going on. But they're now in general education
in seventh grade. They're getting A's and B's.
There are no behavioral issues. I'm very proud
of them. And I'm very blessed. I'm very grateful.
And frankly, I'm proud of myself because my husband
has been so wonderful too. I mean, he supported
me through this whole process. And so it was
really a team effort to really and, you know,
to really dedicate our lives to change the trajectory
of our kids' future. So the reason I'm here,
the short of it is, for my long -winded intro,
is that I really, I feel grateful, I feel inspired,
and I really want to help other families to know
that there are things we can treat, that this
is not just a psychological disorder, that they
were... Necess born with that. There's nothing
you can do. You know, I don't believe that I
think there's a lot of hope I think there's a
lot of changes. I think that certain things We
may not be able to change and you can't necessarily
project the trajectory of every child but there's
so much you can do and so I'm just here to give
parents hope and Hopefully, you know talk more
with you about various treatments that you they
can do things they can look at things they can
talk to their doctor about that really Can like
I said change their future in in a positive way
because the brains only get so long to grow and
obviously the brain is there's neuroplasticity
it can change at any age even at old age, but
You know, there are critical windows that really
helps them early. There's critical windows It
really helps, you know, it says it makes it easier
children typically respond better the younger
they are so yes or not to wait If you're if you're
if you're on the fence about it, you know just
try something, you know, just start something,
you know, and, you know, obviously get help.
And I do want to disclaimer too, that what I'm
about to tell you and in future podcasts is not,
is not to be taken as direct medical advice.
So please talk to your doctor about any of these
interventions. I'm not your personal clinician.
So yeah, please, please understand. It's not
to be implemented directly from me, but there
are suggestions that you maybe you can look at.
Yeah. For the listener, PubMed, Nicole references
an excellent resource for everything that really
in medicine. I've talked about PubMed quite a
bit, so maybe the listener is aware of it. Tell
me about how you discovered the Omega. So again,
if you look at PubMed, there's actually, out
of supplements, it's one of the most studied
supplements with double -blind placebo -controlled
trials in autism. So there's a decent amount
of literature. I can't remember the amount of
studies. We're currently writing a paper on supplements
and placebo -controlled. controlled substances,
we're doing a review paper, Dr. Ross and I, so
I'm trying to, I think it was maybe 12, but I'm
guest, I'm eating here. So, you know, the most
studied supplements they have, I believe currently
for placebo controlled trials are omegas, melatonin,
and vitamin D, I believe. But there's a lot of
randomized controlled trials for different supplements
as well. But yeah, I just did a PubMed search
and looked and saw you know, what could be helpful?
And there was an article, I could pull it up
for our next podcast, but it specifically addresses
apraxia and autism with omega threes. Okay. Well,
I'm so curious about that is I've, I've, I was
taught I was, I've learned that omega and these
things like EPA, DHA, or they're like fiber optic
cables to transfer electrons and electrons are
so critical for our biology. And I think maybe
confusing and underrated, or at least a lot of
people don't know about them. What is known about
regression? So that's a big topic. And I could
probably talk for about a half an hour on it.
But there's varying literature. Dr. Fry and Me
is the second author and also Dr. Rosgenahl wrote
a study published actually earlier this year,
correlating mitochondrial dysfunction with regression.
So they find that especially mitochondrial respiration
has been associated with it in certain kids.
There's also some trials that show that there's
regression found with seizures in kids and with
epileptiform discharges. Seizures are, again,
another topic, but a lot of kids have comorbid
seizure disorder with autism. Then there's also
a subset of kids that don't actually have seizure
disorder, but they have epileptiform discharges.
They're typically seen at night when the child
is sleeping. for every kid you want to get a
24 -hour EEG or an overnight EEG and Even if
you're not seeing seizures, you can often see
these spikes in Various areas of the brain that
aren't normal. I mean, they're not physiologic.
They're not supposed to be there and so These
can correlate with actually autism behaviors
and functioning and they're found and actually
we're writing another paper on this that this
may be associated with Agroaggression as well.
So seizures epileptiform discharges possibly
correlating now, that could have a mitochondrial
dysfunction component to it. So they may all
be related. And so, and there's also some, some
talk about, you know, parents with, you know,
vaccinations, there's a lot of literature that's
very mixed on the topic. So what they found is
that, at least from the studies I've found is
that febrile regression specifically. So if a
child has a fever, that can be associated with
regression after post -vaccination. But like
I said, the literature, there's a lot of studies
with MMR, specifically in the thimerosal adjuvant,
kind of the mercury component of it. And there's
a lot of literature that says it's not associated
with autism or regression. Anecdotally, I mean,
I hear a lot of patients or not a lot. I would
say there's a subset of patients that's that
say that and they come to me and they said, yeah,
they have their second year vaccines or their
18 month. And then a few days later, they lost
speech. So it's hard to know what to make of
that. I think that the literature is mixed and
I think you and I've talked privately about this
is that I think there may be a component. for
vaccinations. I'm just going to say it because
it's the controversial topic. But I think, you
know, I mean, I hate putting it out there, but
also, I mean, I think there may be a component
to vaccinations and autism, especially with the
aluminum adjuvant that's recently been added.
There are a lot of studies that correlate autism
with metal toxicity. And so there's a study that
was published in 2014, and it was looking at
environmental trends, looking at Well, we know
the incidence of autism has risen exponentially
since the 90s, basically late 80s, mid 90s. So
the author looked at what toxicants, what environmental
exposures are we having that have been increasing
commensurate with the rate of increasing autism?
And the author postulated that it was the aluminum
adjuvants in the vaccines that have been increasing.
that correlated with the curve of autism. And
they also correlated glyphosate, which is Roundup,
and that's a brand name Roundup, but it's glyphosate
that they put into the foods. And specifically,
a lot of the seed oils, wrapping it back around
to your omega -3 fatty acids. So a lot of these
children, when they study them, They've found
that many kids on the spectrum are deficient
in omega -3s and specifically DHA that are found
in fish oil. And a lot of these kids have an
overburden of omega -6. So if you look at the
glyphosate, I bring it around because our diet
is mostly composed of these omega -6 fatty acids
and these seed oils, which may be inflammatory
in and of itself. But then when you combine glyphosate,
which is... a very potent antibiotic in its own
sense. So when you study the toxic effects of
glyphosate, you find that it actually selectively
reduces lactobacillus in the gut, and it increases
Clostridia species. And we see that exact profile
in a lot of children with autism. We see that
there's lack of bifidote, lack of lactobacillus,
and a lot of them have C. difficile, a lot of
them. And so this is a profile. that can be very
severe in these kids and then it skews propionic
acid and basically causes autistic behaviors
even in mouse models. This is how they induce
autism in mouse models is that they give them
propionic acid which is a Clostridium byproduct.
So we kind of can correlate that these gut changes
are increasing behavioral changes and that can
be correlated with the glyphosate. Now it's all
speculation and this is where you know but this
is where some of the literature is going and
people are looking at this. So anyway, the full
circle of regression is that there I think there's
multifactorial issues here. And I don't think
it does the service to the autism community and
the medical community at large to give a simple
answer to say, oh, it's it's the vaccines, or
it's roundup or it's You know, I mean when when
autism first came out they used to blame like
they called it refrigerator mothers You know,
it's like oh, it's the mother's fault. They weren't
loving enough with their children I mean, it's
it's really folly to blame one specific thing
when we can test it and see that there are metabolic
issues There are microbiome issues. There are
mitochondrial issues their inflammation issues
lack of key fatty acids and vitamins and minerals
and so Many of this is you know, fairly simply
corrected as well. So that's why I'm here With
you dialing in specific supplementations and
kind of correcting each one of those kind of
items that you mentioned, I think most of them
or a lot of them were tied to the GI, gastrointestinal.
So your history and your experience even gives
you insight and information on this specific
treatment. Yes. What is it like working at Rossignol
Medical Center? And how does it kind of set apart
from other interventions? That's a great question.
Yeah, I really love it. Again, I met Dr. Rossignol.
I'm working with him over the last eight years.
we consider ourselves kind of a functional medicine,
integrative medicine clinic. And what that means
is that instead of just treating a symptom or
looking at one part of the body, you know, like,
oh, you know, so for example, autism is typically
a, it's a DSM, it's a psych diagnosis, right?
So it's a psychological diagnosis. And so what
we know that just, if we were to just treat them
with, Psychologic meds, risperidone, you know,
anti -dopamine or pro -serotonin or whatever.
It really doesn't address any core symptoms in
the sense that these kids, yeah, may reduce behaviors
and maybe the scores will improve, but they're
not, their metabolic profile doesn't change.
They're not actually improving. their function
of their cells, the function of their metabolism,
the function of their mitochondria. So that's
where functional medicine comes into is how are
these things functioning in the body and how
can we optimize that? Because if you fix the
core problems with the immune system and all
these, like the microbiome, the mitochondria,
then the kids actually get better without having
to address the neurotransmitters because you're...
fixing the underlying root cause. So that's kind
of the premise of our practice. I love practicing
this way. It's very holistic in looking at all
the body systems and how, like you said, how
the gut or the diet interferes with the brain,
interferes with the mitochondria, interferes
with neurotransmitters. And so you get to really
play, you get to put on your scientific doctor
hat and really every visit is different when
I see each patient. Every visit is tailored.
When I see a patient, we don't have like a protocol,
like, oh, this is what we do and this is how
you do it. No, I mean, really it's tailored to
every kid's needs. What are the symptoms we're
seeing? Autism is a very heterogeneous disease.
It's very varied. It's very different in how
it presents for every child or adult. And so
we really have to target individual systems.
And so I can talk about that process, Ryan, if
you wanted to, a little more in depth. Yeah.
First, I just have a comment that like these
supplements that you're providing instead of,
and I'm glad that you brought up the psychological
drugs as an alternative because the supplements
are upstream of like what synthesizes proteins
that make the neurotransmitters. So instead of
blocking them or manipulating them, like the
synaptic level or the vesicle level or the uptake,
et cetera, you're helping them create the proteins
and these neuromodulators, neurotransmitters
in a more organic way, in a more functional way.
Yes. So for example, yes, absolutely. So for
example, I wanted to bring this up because I
think one of the biggest things that we can do
to help kids right now with autism is folate
and You know, there's many there's different
forms of folate but kids on this autism spectrum
typically have problems with methylation and
methylation is part of a folate cycle and and
It helps produce neurotransmitters specifically
and so Kids have if kids have weak you mentioned
in in talking previously with me, MTHFR deficits.
They say that most kids have at least 25 to 50
% deficits if you're on the autism spectrum.
I rarely see, and I do see them sometimes, but
I rarely see a kid that does not have an MTHFR
mutation with autism. So that means that they're
not methylated folate properly. And without this
folate methylation, they're not going to properly...
Produce appropriate neurotransmitters and also
detoxification like glutathione a lot of these
things that are really important for neurodevelopment
at a critical age and there's also something
called folate receptor antibodies that up to
80 percent 70 to 80 percent depending on the
trial you look at of kids on the autism spectrum
have positive folate receptor antibodies and
so what that means is that they're their bodies
blocking there's two different kinds of antibodies
but in either case their body is blocking folate
from getting into the brain, active folate from
getting into the brain. So what we find is that
most kids are have these antibodies and they're
responding positively. The trials are really
good as far as treating core symptoms of autism
when giving them high dose folate. And it's just
folinic acid. So it's not folic acid is synthetically
made, folinic acid is just the unmethylated portion
that the brain, the body can take up and then
cross the blood brain barrier to help treat what
we call cerebral folate deficiency. So maybe
a lot of the core symptoms of autism, at least
in part, are cerebral folate deficiency. So one
supplement at a high dose to treat that, and
also to treat the methylation. In different combinations,
is it methylated, is it not, how much do we give
of each? just that one simple supplement can
really change, like you said, the downstream
effect of how we make neurotransmitters, how
we detoxify our body. And so we're really treating
a root cause that will then in turn help the
mitochondria, help the neurotransmitters, help
the gut function, help your metabolism, help
all these immune function. So it's really awesome
to start at the root of the tree. Yeah. For my
understanding is this methylation process, it's
circular, and it's also dependent on methionine
and amino acid, a very special one. This is where
all protein synthesis and DNA sequencing, I should
say, start. It's like these two circular things
on a bicycle. I envision it as a bicycle whereby
if one's not running in this circular fashion,
then the other process is going to be off. Yes.
And the byproduct of the of on the downstream
of that bicycle, the bottom of that bicycle wheel,
if you look at the diagrams as often, like I
said, cysteine and the glutathione as well. Yeah.
So so you're you're getting this and there's
more it's more complicated than this. But just
for simplicity sake, you're interfering with
the the neurotransmitter the methionine portion
of it and you're also really impairing the glutathione
component component of it, which is the body's
master antioxidant, it's it's the master You
know grabber of toxins if you will and these
kids typically are low in glutathione and likely,
you know as a result of They typically have a
cysteine deficiency as well So I will often give
some N -acetylcysteine or some kind of sulfur
support. But in essence, if you optimize these
few cycles, if you optimize the folic acid cycle,
you optimize the Krebs cycle, which is the citric
acid cycle, optimize the electron transport chain
for mitochondrial functioning. I mean, once you
kind of look at these core things that are really
driving the cell for energy production and health
and protection, then things just get better.
And again, every kid is varied. And we do know
that there are also some DNA changes that we
have seen, particularly with mitochondrial DNA.
So there are a lot of mitochondrial DNA. Increased
copy number variants basically some duplicates
and there's things that we've seen that are that
can change But it doesn't it's not it's kind
of a subset of autism and I don't think that
it certainly represents the majority Yeah, so
so there are there are multiple things to look
at what I'm what I'm hearing and learning about
The approach here is you're starting at the very
upstream process the very start of the process
that if this is abnormal, all of these downstream
processes are going to be off. And this explains
why there are so many autism and XYZ, autism
and dyspraxia, autism and allergies, eczema,
the GI problems. This is all getting to the bottom
of what people need to know. We need to go upstream
and not at this downstream levels. It's not helping.
Absolutely. And yeah, one study I believe, I
mean, I think it was from the CDC or some kind
of a health NIH maybe guideline was saying that
the average child diagnosed with autism has four
core morbidities on average, in addition to the
autism diagnosis, functional constipation and
ADHD and, you know, yeah, allergic rhinitis and
eczema, whatever, you know, so yeah, there's,
it's not just a neurologic disorder. And we see
that. I think that's why a lot of research now
is coming out about the risk of developing Alzheimer's
and Parkinson's because all of these downstream
or these upstream processes that's responsible
for cell development and the nervous system development
is already kind of off. So they're more susceptible
to those aging problems. Yes. Yeah, I mean, I
have a family history of Parkinson's, and then
I have my children with autism. I have a sibling
with Guillain -Barre. And so I'm looking around,
I'm like, there's probably some underlying related
thing, even though they're different presentations.
And, you know, it's very odd because in previous
to this, we didn't have any history of this,
like, you know, previous to my parents' generation.
You know, it's not like this was a thing in my
family for Seven generations, you know, yeah,
so it's just odd that we're kind of looking at
this and I think in my family's case I think
a lot of it the cornerstone is mitochondrial
dysfunction And I think that's why you know,
my kids regressed there were several things going
on at the time when my kids regressed that I
can kind of point to but I you know, I don't
know if you want me to share my family story,
but just personally I know that My kids had a
copper dominance and we see this a lot in autism.
So There's a very skewed increased copper to
low zinc ratio and they're supposed to be at
a fairly similar ratio in neurotypical individuals.
So copper dominance is one of the number one
findings that they find with metallopathies in
kids on the spectrum. So my kid's hair was red.
I mean, looking back, my daughter and my son,
I mean, they were redheads. I mean, copper redheads.
And I remember thinking about, my husband and
I would talk about this, oh, why are they red?
Oh, isn't that cute? Because my husband's Hispanic.
black hair. I'm, you know, I'm, you know, Italian
and I have brown hair. And so we're like, well,
look at how cute our kids are redheaded. And
now looking back, you know, um, they were probably
severely copper dominant because when I started
testing them, they were really zinc deficient.
Um, and so that probably set the tone. Um, you
know, and then, you know, at the time as well,
we had, um, just to wrap this around, we actually,
I thought it was interesting that my kids all
regressed at the same time. And I thought, well,
there has to be something environmental. And
I was young, and I wasn't in the space yet. And
I didn't realize we had a water leak in my bathroom
downstairs. And we kind of let it sit there for
a while. The back of the bathtub wall was getting
a little squishy. And we thought, oh, OK, OK,
let's bring somebody out. And we brought out
a plumber, and they opened up the whole wall.
And I'm sure that there was just a ton of black
mold back there, because it was right around
that time when we opened up the wall and we didn't
properly remediate it. We didn't wall anything
off or move out while they're doing it. And it
was around that time that our kids got really
sick. And I thought, oh, I bet it was a huge
dose of mold exposure on top of everything else
that was going on. And it was part of it too.
And I noticed, like I was telling you, they had
a big fungal overgrowth at that point that I
had to kind of treat. And so once we... Properly
remediated it symptoms did get a little better
But it wasn't actually ironically. It wasn't
really Till we moved out of that home two years
later that my son started speaking again now
I Don't know if it was moving out of the home
or all of the interventions because we were doing
a lot of that time With Roz ignore that really
brought his speech back But there's yeah, there's
a lot to look at and there's a lot environmentally
You know, I think I think a lot of these things
play play a part. Yeah. Things like Alzheimer's
was 1910 whenever I hit medical literature, autism,
1943 for Canter. Like we're writing all of these
things just appeared, which is very interesting.
What is it like working alongside Rasenal and
Richard Fry and how that accelerates your ability
to learn? Yeah, it's amazing. I mean these guys
are really smart and I'm always trying to pry
information from them. They're ironically, for
as much as prolific as they are writing papers,
they're kind of short -winded with conversations.
And you know, I'm like the chatter in the group.
I'm always trying to pry info from them. But
yeah, they're very intelligent. And like I said,
when it comes to explaining mitochondrial function
and things, I mean, and cell biology, you know,
these are the guys to talk to. I mean, I have
a basic understanding of the function, but I'm
more, you know, I do all of the research, well,
not all of it, but I do a lot of the research.
So I'm the one that's kind of scouring the trials,
reading them. aggregating the data for them,
presenting it to them, and they usually do the
write -ups and kind of the finishing touches.
Learned something new every day. I mean, I'm
doing you know autism research and I literally
my husband gets tired of hearing about it because
I'm just like You know, there's so much out there
to learn so it's it's a it's a fantastic opportunity.
I I do part -time Research for Roscoe Medical
Center and then I see patients part -time as
well. Yeah as a PA having that insight to the
research is very It's different. A lot of PAs,
to my understanding, you don't see a lot of PAs
on papers in like Nature or Neurobiology of Disease
and all of these wonderful journals. Yeah. Well,
PAs, you know, their structure, I mean, their
function in the modern medical world is really
to be a clinician, is to see patients to help
ease, I think, some of the healthcare burden
that we have. You know, there's not... you know,
the number of clinicians or physicians is going
down. So, I mean, I think their primary role
is to see patients. And I think a lot of PAs
are very well -intentioned. I mean, I love my
colleagues. I've went to school with some really
good hearted people. I find that they're very
down to earth. And they really just want to help
people. I'm a little bit different. You know,
I've just I've always been kind of a nerd at
heart. And I just I really like the study of
science. And so and I just find it fascinating
in addition to my like personal interest because
of my family. But you know, I think most like
I said, I think most PAs are well intentioned.
They just don't go through the training maybe
because of lack of time. And I think it's mostly
because employers don't encourage this. You know,
the modern medical model is not following this
functional medicine model. And I think that we
because we are, you know, We're just a niche
private practice. You know, we're not part of
Kaiser or some of these other, you know, Blue
Cross or these other conglomerates. We're just
here to practice medicine the way we want to.
But most PAs are controlled by protocols. They're,
you know, if you have, you know, if you have
a, you know, headache, then we're gonna do this
or that. And then we're gonna give them this
med. And we're not really, they're not looking
at, well, why do they have a headache? Is it
a histamine intolerance? Is it a food allergy?
Is there something else? You know, like, what
are we? What's the trigger? And that's just not
how PA school is taught. And I think it's really
just this disease, drug, disease, drug, disease,
drug. And, you know, and a lot of these things
are very topical. And some of these things are
effective. I mean, we prescribe meds. We do.
And I think that there is a place for medications.
I'm grateful I'm a PA. But really, what is the
medication doing and why and how could it be
treating a core symptom? Or, you know, how can
we assist in the functioning of this person while
we're treating the core symptoms? Because sometimes,
you know, it'll take, I mean, it took took my
kid like almost 10 years to lose his diagnosis
and eight years. So, I mean, what can we do in
the meantime to help him function while we're
help detoxing his body and helping his, you know,
his metabolism and things like that. So there's
a place for that. But yes, the medical model
teaches in a way that does not know how to approach
autism. And I think that when we were specifically,
you know, when I'm here telling everybody, like
there is a way to approach autism that is very
medical and that is also very critical thinking
and that it is it is not just a psychological
diagnosis. And we can see this in the body of
literature that is vast. And so I think it takes,
you know, a lot of curiosity and time and employers
like Dr. Rosignol and Dr. Fry that are willing
to, you know, pay me to do research because,
you know, I have a family. I have to make money.
But I want to do this research. I want to do
the hard work. I want to I want to figure it
out. You know, and so it's a nice to have people
that are out there supporting this community
that are like, yes, let's all pull in together.
We'll all figure this out. We're in this for
the for the betterment of humanity, for the betterment
of our kids, because I I believe that, you know,
we all have, you know, a God given right to health.
I think that, you know, I think I believe this
like I don't think that. That we should be sick
and that and that you know our water or food
or these systems You know should be just putting
band -aids on things. You know, I I want to see
everybody well, and I'm gonna do whatever I can
to that to that end Yeah, yeah, I'm not a big
fan of the medical paradigm with that prescription
first approach and not finding root cause like
Like your practice and Residential Medical Center.
Yeah It's just the way it ought to be. And you
said two things there that really captured me
because I say this quite a bit, but it's not
relevant. But you said critical thinking and
curiosity. That's the master combo. If you really
want to learn. Well, this is the scientific method.
I mean, this is this is what science used to
be. This is what I love about science, you know,
because I'm very like analytically minded and
so I like math I like science and I but I like
the curiosity of I like the thought experiments
of well what if it's this what if it's this driving
this and not driving that okay what are the studies
about that oh okay somebody's done that maybe
we should do a study on this or you know it's
really that curiosity combined with just um where
are we at who whose shoulders what Giants shoulders
can we stand on to really elevate our level of
knowledge and of course apply that in a in a
way that is meaningful that the people are meaningfully
gaining skills and gaining health and gaining
longevity and expanding the edges expanding the
like you say expanding the edges yeah let's keep
expanding those edges you know and i i love science
i think it's I think it's fabulous. I couldn't
imagine me. I was so bored in high school. Oh,
history was such a drag for me. I was like, I
don't, this is not my thing. And my son is the
same way. He just hates it. And I'm like, you
know, honey, we got to do it. I get it. You know,
and he struggles in school because he's very
science focused too. So it's, um, it's just an
analytic mind. Um, it's, and it's, it's a beautiful
thing when you can apply it towards something
meaningful. Like I think you're doing, I'm doing,
let's spread the word. Let's, let's do, you know,
let's talk about it. Let's talk about what is
happening. You've definitely taught me to take
a step back whenever I see a physician assistant
to maybe not all of them are prescription first
approaches. And you even said that they're often
that's the protocol that they have to follow,
which is, you know, it's. I mean, that's that's
unfortunately the world that we're in. I mean,
if I don't follow certain protocols in a primary
care practice, you know, I can be I can be sued,
or I can be brought to the medical board for
negligence. Oh, you didn't prescribe this statin
for this person with high cholesterol. And it's
like, well, you can tell them, I think this,
I think that. Perhaps they have mitochondrial
dysfunction symptoms, and I don't think it's
appropriate, and all these things. Because statins
implicate ubiquinol in mitochondria. Exactly.
People should know that. Exactly. If I were to
put somebody on a statin, I'd probably throw
in ubiquinol in there. But if you're severely
deficient and you're having problems with the
electron transport chain in general and your
cells, then yeah, it might really affect you.
You might get some severe muscle cramps or fatigue
or things that... Yeah. It's not really... It's
just not talked about there's just protocols
that that fit this model And there's not a lot,
unfortunately, of critical thinking, especially
when most PAs have to see, you know, five, six
patients an hour. I mean, it's kind of out of
control. You walk in there and it's unfortunately,
in my experience, because I've been doing this
17 years, it's been getting worse. You know,
you used to be able to kind of take your time
and you could bill for a few things. But now
everything's like maximize the billing, hurry,
you've got five minutes to be in there and you've
got a chart and this and that. And now the kind
of the standard of care is to have a medical
assistant follow you around and chart for you
because you need to be able to see more patients
to be more profitable. And so it's just this
rat race. And most clinicians I know are really
tired. They're really burned out. Like I said,
I think they have the good intentions, but the
system that they're operating in now is... It's
very difficult to be heart -first to really care
because they don't have enough time their hands
are tied what they can do There's too much peer
pressure And and there's not enough knowledge.
I mean, no one knows any I mean most clinicians
pediatricians today still say well, there's just
there's not enough evidence about autism There's
not enough evidence. You know, we don't have
any We don't we don't have any clinical trials
and you know, we just don't know what it is and
it's just Unfortunately, that's just ignorance.
It's not true. And I don't blame them because
they're so busy. I mean, this is why it's nice
to have a niche. This is why it has a specialty.
We are a pediatric special needs. I mean, we
do treat ADHD and OCD and PANS, PANDAS, other
kind of comorbidities, but it's primarily autism
in the practice. And I will note, too, that another
great thing that we do that I like what we do
is that we look at the mothers, too. So I do
preconception care as well. A lot of the stuff
is like, well, we've found that the moms have
a lot of these issues to begin with. And so we'll
do an evaluation if a mom's really going to get
pregnant again. What happened? What did you do
during your pregnancy? Okay, let's not do that
again. And how can we optimize your metabolic
health now? She probably needs extra methylfolate.
That's a great thing. Vitamin D, we probably
should put her on some extra. We have kind of
a whole protocol or just kind of general guidelines,
but we'll look at these things that we often
look at with kids in the spectrum and we find
that they're frequently abnormal. Thyroid is
a very common one too. Yeah, tyrosine. Thyroid
hormone. Yeah, but the synthesizing from tyrosine
is an aromatic amino acid and it requires 200
to 400 nanometer light to activate. I'm glad
you mentioned the mother because the environment
of the pregnant mother has changed so much over
the last 50 to 100 years. Yeah. It's just like,
okay. We need to be aware of that. Yeah. Yeah.
It's very unfortunate. I mean, there's a lot
of maternal studies that's saying that air pollution,
so 2 .5 parts per million air pollution exposure
increases your risk of autism during pregnancy.
Maternal SSRI use, antidepressant use, increases
the risk of autism. Like I said, hypothyroid,
PCOS, vitamin D deficiency, zinc deficiency.
There's a lot of things we can look at that correlate
with maternal health. And that's kind of why
just to kind of full circle about these vaccines,
for example, maybe being a part of it, but maybe
not being the whole part, is I've had several
families. I had a family that they had a child
with autism, the mother. you know, and then she
vaccinated him and she swore it was the vaccines,
which, you know, I believe her, you know, I mean,
I never tell patients no. And they tell me like,
this is what I think it is. I say, OK, let's
investigate that. I mean, that's not my I'm I
want to look at other things as well. But I,
you know, I believe people as it were. And so
we look at that and I say, OK, you know, we talk
about it. And she kind of disappears for a while.
I hadn't seen the kid. And then she comes back
a couple of years later and she's like, oh, I
had another kid. And we didn't vaccinate him
at all. Not one vaccine for this whole for this
child. And he has autism. And so she was really
upset because she swore that was the only thing.
And I think, you know, I kind of tried to convince
her, you know, that we, hey, let's do some maternal
testing as well. If you want to have another
child, you know, let's look at you. And I hate
to say that to mothers as a mother, like with
three kids. I don't, you know, I. Parents get
so upset and I'm not blaming the moms because
gosh I had my own my own time of blaming myself
And what did I do and I shouldn't have taken
that Tylenol or I shouldn't have done, you know
We have all these woulda shoulda coulda moments,
but it's it's the mother's love. These mothers
love their babies I I believe that and it's nobody's
fault and I think you know, we need to look at
everybody's health, you know maternal health
is very important And by the way, sorry to keep
expanding, but also paternal health is important.
So the age of the father, increasing age actually
increases the risk of autism as well. So father's
health matters too. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I
know I'm throwing a lot of truth bombs at you.
No, it's like you're preaching to the preacher
now. It's like, oh my goodness, I have an episode
on autism research and a proposal for research.
And it's just, I think it could do something.
And I don't know, there's a lot to the light
story and how humans use light because of that
electromagnetic field, both the sunlight and
artificial light. There's electrons and magnetism
attached to it and everything with mitochondria.
is the electron transport chain and it's a lot
of magnetism with the iron sulfur clusters and
that spinning fo head that's producing out the
ATP a lot of magnetism there and that's why like
iron is so important for hemoglobin it's it's
all magnetic yes but i mean that will it's it's
tough for people to comprehend that because they
don't they don't Care to know that well, I think
a lot of it and I can't speak for you But I know
that I'm very much in this world. And so I know
I think that some people with autism Not all
of course but have like a sixth sense So I've
always been really sensitive to fluorescent lights
and a lot of these LED lights and it really is
neurostimulating for me. I have a very hard time,
like in certain lighting situations. And, um,
and I also have, uh, I have had periods in my
life where I've had a hard time with EMF as well.
You know, there were points in my life where
I could tell I was next to a router and I turn
off my wifi every night and I, I, yeah. Oh yeah.
And I, I absolutely, I mean, I feel like at points,
not always, but I, I can feel these things and
I feel like my son can feel them as well. Like
my, my kids, um, They are very sensitive and
I'm very I'm very Aware of how important the
sunlight is This is why I'm like still kind of
tan because I make our kids go outside. I'm like
we're gonna go outside and they go now because
of the screens, but I make sure my kids are tan.
We get at least an hour to a sunlight a day.
It's very important to me and I think that it
is a baseline of health. I mean, in addition
to vitamin D that it's producing, there's a whole
cascade of anti -microbials and anti -inflammatories
that the sunlight, I mean, I think you're onto
something. We're meant to be in the sun. I mean,
we're not meant to be in a box and you know.
made of chemicals and fluorescent lights. And
so, yeah, I'd be interested to hear what you
have to say on a paper or looking that up. I
mean, I absolutely believe that there's a lot
of forces, of course, we know we can't see and
that are affecting us super directly. I mean,
that's not voodoo science. That's real science.
That's a lot of people don't know about the different
wavelengths in light. Like light has wavelengths
and how our human biology takes those wavelengths,
what they do with those wavelengths. And it's
missing. Something you mentioned earlier about
tailoring to each individual or client, patient,
child. Can you talk a little bit about the comprehensive
evaluation process? Yeah, and I will, absolutely.
And I have a whole other talk that I've given
a presentation on this through Taka, which is,
it's like takanow .org. But anyway, it's an hour
long and it talks about my comprehensive evaluation
of what it includes and it goes into in detail.
Obviously, we don't have an hour now, but it
is posted on my ex -profile under Nicole, at
Nicole Ranconpied. It's also posted on my website,
which is but to just start out, when I see a
patient, the first thing that I personally look
at is how is their detox functioning? Because
when you throw in a bunch of novel interventions
to these kids, a lot of times, unfortunately,
we see that there are a lot of toxicities, either
metals or molds or... pesticides or things, you
know, that, um, that was an issue. And so, um,
I first evaluate how is their, their constipation
or, you know, how is their bowel movements? Because
a lot of these kids are constipated and, and
I find that that's really a key factor. Um, you
know, so we will make sure, cause to back up
the four ways your body really eliminates actually
excretes toxins is, uh, feces. So bowel movements,
urine, um, sweat. and exhalation, so breathing.
And so we need to make sure these are being optimized.
If you're not urinating, drinking enough, not
urinating enough, you're gonna have a problem
with any kind of protocols that we implement,
because a lot of things that we're gonna be doing
are stimulating your body's response to improve.
And oftentimes, if the detox pathways aren't
optimal, then... the kids are not gonna have
a good response. They're gonna say, oh my gosh,
Nicole, you made me worse. And they're gonna
leave and they're not gonna be happy. And you
know, we just pushed them too hard too quick.
So basically making sure that they're having
at least one to two daily bowel movements. I
really like oxy powder. It's like an ozonated
magnesium to help stimulate the bowels in kids
that are constipated, which most of them are,
I find. Making sure they're drinking good quality
of water. and frequently. So I have, I'm a big
fan of reverse osmosis water. Uh, we have one
in our house. I think that they're a great alternative
to certainly, you know, not drinking tap water.
Yeah. What's the fluoride? but also, I mean,
you know, there's a website called, what is it?
I think it's EWS, but it evaluates, you know,
the water in your public water system, the chemicals.
So, I mean, you can look and mine has a ton of
arsenic and it's got, you know, nitrates and
nitrites and... chromium way above the upper
limit and it's got even uranium. I mean this
is like stuff that we're drinking you know so
and you're showering with. Anyway so getting
an RO. I even put you know in all my shower heads
I always put at least a carbon filter over my
shower heads to kind of get rid of some of the
chlorine. And you know making sure that they're
they're getting enough sweat so they're exercising
ideally out in the sunlight And then they're
excellent the exhaling so part of that is the
exercise So, you know basically optimizing those
functions first before I do anything But then
typically I will get Some basic blood work and
I don't want to go into like every single test
because like I said, that's an hour long but
a lot of it is We can look at methylation like
MTHFR genes. I look at basic stuff like anemias,
iron levels, liver function, kidney function.
We're looking at amino plasma amino acids and
we're looking for mitochondrial markers. Sometimes
we'll get a lactic acid for that. We'll look
at alanine lysine ratio. You can get a CoQ10
level. We'll look at carnitine. You can look
at both acyl carnitines and total free carnitine.
Again, which is a whole nother discussion, but
carnitine levels are frequently low and easily
treated. We'll look at, you know, vitamin D,
some immune functions, some kids that are always
sick. I get an IgG subclass, IgA, which looks
at kind of gut immune function. Is it low? Is
it high? Do you have SIBO or lack of diversity?
So there's a ton we can do. Just even a blood
work that's typically covered by insurance, which
is really nice. Not always but usually and then
I'll get a I would I mentioned zinc zinc super
important to I love testing for RBC zinc and
magnesium for minerals And then we'll get a stool
analysis so a lot of these kids have fungal overgrowth
either in their upper intestine lower intestine
both a lot of gram -negative bacteria. So you
see a kid with a lot of inflammation. I'm thinking,
okay, probably gram -negative bacteria in the
colon that creates that LPS production, lipopolysaccharides.
So a lot of times we'll see kids with a lot of
Proteus mirabilis or Klebsiella or Citrobac,
these crazy really kind of toxic bacteria. So
we can treat that. We see in the stool analysis,
you can see if they're under producing digestive
enzymes or if they just have like frank inflammatory
bowel, like indicated of like Crohn's disease,
celiac disease, things like that, I see sometimes.
We'll do what's called a urine organic acid test,
where it looks for metabolites in the urine of
certain bacteria and of mitochondrial function
byproducts. And so this is oftentimes how you
can find C. diff, because Custardia difficile
won't culture necessarily on on a stool test
because it's it's an anaerobic bacteria and when
you're introducing it to stool it's an aerobic
environment so it won't grow in an aerobic culture
and you think oh they don't have it but they're
just not testing for it the right way so you
have to get an organic acid test to rule out
um c diff and you know then you treat that you
know so um like i said there's a lot of in that
organic acid test you could look for mold metabolites
if they have a ton of these fungal markers that
are maybe aspergillus markers fusarium markers
um you know candida markers and you go okay they're
I got some serious fungus on board. And then,
what else will I usually get? I'll usually try
and convince him to get an overnight EEG. That
one's a little hard, but because the parents,
the kids have to wear a cap and they have to
sleep on it. There are some outpatient services
that are really good. that can do it for the
kid and they can do it in the comfort of their
own home or at a hotel instead of going into
the hospital. Because looking for seizures is
important and treating seizures can actually
help the behaviors as well and the functioning
of the brain, decreasing inflammation certainly.
The other thing that I love that I always test
for on the blood is a folate receptor antibody
test like I mentioned earlier. That's a private
test you have to send to a private lab so insurance
won't cover it. But those are crucial. Like I
said, up to 80 % of kids have high folate receptor
antibodies, and they found that the higher the
levels, the more severe autism symptoms generally
are. And then also the better they respond to
leukovorin, which is the, it's just a prescription
folinic acid, high dose folate, essentially.
So higher the titers, more sick, but they also
respond better to leukovorin. So I've seen some
super huge gains with just that treatment alone.
Um, yeah, I mean, it's, it's, it's really good
stuff. Like as far as one, one, like kind of
a one size fits all. And, you know, as far as
parent rating scales and, and the, the double
blind placebo studies back this up. I mean, the,
the literature is across the board positive and
it's, um, it has very little side effects. I
mean, it's very well tolerated and anything you
don't need you urinate out. So it's, it's, it's
kind of, you know, it's kind of incredible. That's
my, that's been my, my kind of. one of my favorite
treatments because it just seems to be effective.
And what else do we measure? You know, we can
do other things. We can look more specifically
into mitochondrial dysfunction like a mito swab.
It looks at the... Electron transport chain kind
of complex functioning looks at like complex
one complex three citrate synthase But you know
a lot again when you see a new patient it really
you want to look at does this kid look like Mito
You know because if he has really low muscle
tone really poor growth You're thinking maybe
it's Mito dysfunction But if he's just sick all
the time we're thinking maybe you're immune or
maybe The parents are like, his stool is just
awful. And it's been awful. And like, we can't
seem to get it anywhere near awful, you know?
And so you kind of guide what we need to target
first, you know, because based on like, what
are their most severe symptomology and, you know,
and we take it stepwise, you know? Yeah. So you're
approaching this from a different perspective
from somebody like in a ABA or mental health
or a psychological assessment. type thing where
they don't really get answers. They just get
an answer of diagnosis. Yes or diagnosis. No.
And, you know, I mean, to be fair, I mean, you
know, I've talked to Dr. Fry about this not too
long ago, and he's like, you know, Nicole, you
know what the best treatment is? And it's like,
what? Okay, give me this truth bomb. He's like,
oh, it's the kitchen sink approach. So there
was a study that, you know, kids that basically
did all the interventions for the longest period
of time had the best recovery. So And I do believe
that as far as ABA, some parents say it's cruel
because the kids are, if they don't like it or
they're not high functioning and they're not
getting it, it can be very upsetting. And it's
probably not the right treatment if you're feeling
that way about it. But the studies do show that
it helps in general. It does help functioning.
I mean, the scores are there as far as controlled
trials that it can help. So what I tell parents
is just... Try everything. Do everything. Do
the exercise therapy, which can be shown to be
good. Do the probiotics. Do the ABA or the OT.
Put them in early school. Get them in socialization
groups. Do the floor time. Come see me. Let's
talk about your diet. We got to change your diet,
your water, your exercise. Let's try some meds
if we're not getting there. And so you just kind
of do this. Multi -factorial approach and then
you know if it's not fitting if something's not
fitting take it out and you know, but if you
know It seems to unfortunately or fortunately
be dependent a lot on Kind of the amount of effort
you put into it, you know if you're just like
eh, we tried a couple supplements It didn't do
anything or you know, like, you know, and you
know and then some kids that don't you know not
all kids make all the gains that other kids do
but um, and I understand I mean these parents
are really tired and they're they're very exhausted
and it's very financially consuming sometimes.
I think these things are an alternative though
that could give them hope and provide answers,
at least get them off of the standardized path
that is very inconsistent and provide them with
something else, a different alternative. And
I just can't get over, like we mentioned earlier
about going upstream and investigating all these
biological processes. This is so fascinating.
It's really fun. I'm here to tell you. I really
enjoy it. Because this is where it's at. This
is where the autistic phenotype starts. And all
of those co -morbids. And it's the future of
medicine. It really is. It's the way people want
to be treated, you know, like want to be medically
treated, you know, and it's the way that it's
appropriate. And it's certainly the way that
worked for my family. And, you know, we focus
on autism in our clinic, but, you know, yeah,
I mean, there's so many other metabolic diseases
that could be treated very similarly the way
we do this, you know. between, you know, diabetes
and like you said, Alzheimer's and, you know,
just a slew of thyroid disease and things like
that. You know, I mean, a lot of this goes back
to the functional medicine, the functioning of
the cells. Yeah. And how they all integrate with
the systems. And I'm so excited for the future.
I really think like all this literature, you
know, we mentioned earlier when we were talking
about, you know, on the media now being with
RFK jr. And he's bringing up that we need to
clean up the food and you know, and I'm so excited
to hear that because I've been saying that for
a decade. It was just like, you know, a lot of
this is is a disease of environmental toxicity,
unfortunately. And yes, there's finally movement
and people are talking about and people are looking
at their water and they're looking at their food
and they're, they're thinking about maybe taking
a few supplements to help optimize, you know,
whatever you know, maybe MTHFR deficits they
have or other genetics or just whatnot, just,
you know, whatever lifestyles that they're living
that that they need to help, you know, kind of
accommodate. So it's it's a really, really, really
cool time to be practicing medicine. Yeah. You
know, it's like I'm super excited about it. It's
becoming in people's radar. And it's obviously
a lot of our health trends are not trending in
a good direction. And people want to know why.
And yeah, there's a lot of hope coming around
the corner, I think. So with everything that
you know, and some of the things that you introduced
here, we'll do more episodes and talk more in
depth about some of these and even maybe introduce
some new items. So people know about this. People
needs to know about this. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah,
I mean like I said, there's you know, I I I have
my clinical practice and kind of see what works
and what doesn't and I also you know I really
focus on a lot of the research and I know the
Ross Rossignol and fry, you know, so we're trying
to blend How does this? how does this functionally
land on the patient? How is this actually working
out? How do we read some study on paper and then
actually implement this treatment and then how
are we seeing that this is working out? And then
sometimes I don't, sometimes I'm like, eh, I
didn't see that that correlated too much in my
own view or sometimes it's really great. So yeah,
it's an exciting time. I like that. that we're
looking at the literature and kind of making
it more scientific again, like we talked about,
you know. I mean, not everything is a trial.
Not everything has to be trialed. Sometimes you
just have to go for it. On the other hand, I
mean, sometimes you just have to base it on clinical
suspicion. The parent's like, you know what I
noticed, you know, when he eats garlic, he feels
better and okay, you know. And so you just, you
know, sometimes you just go for it, but based
on parent ratings. But yeah, it's... It's a very
cool model that I think we're gonna see a lot
more of it in the future I think a lot of people
are gonna be starting to practice medicine this
way and I think that You know and I'd like I
said, I think that a lot of practitioners want
this to I think that a lot of PAs and you know
to be biased But I think a lot of people are
gonna jump on board, you know, once it becomes
more mainstream. I think this is what Frank I
don't blame the doctors and PAs for the system,
right? good people and they just this is just
where the model they fit in and they have families
they have medical debt they're just they're trying
and you know i know i know there's there's some
bad stories and there are um but you know I see
a lot of them that are leading heart first. I
have some, most of my best friends are PAs and
they're just, man, Nicole, you know, they're
really trying and they're telling me about their
patients and they care. You know, they really
- Yeah, that's why I got them into healthcare.
Yes, yes, yeah. Like I very rarely see, oh, you
know, like some people are jaded in any career,
but you know, I think that things will turn around
and I think that most people will get on board.
Yeah. Sometimes the trial has already been proven
to us. We don't need a randomized controlled
trial through Mother Nature. Yeah. And everything
that you're testing, well, Mother Nature gave
us through evolution, many generations of evolution.
So just get it back to that. Yes. We're talking
about less, not more. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Thank
you for sharing today. We'll put together some
items for future episodes for sure. Okay. Well,
thanks, Ryan. Thanks for having me on. And again,
for viewers, like I said, I have a website and
I have my Twitter page and I am also still seeing
new patients for now at Rossignol Medical Center.
We're out of Orange County in California. So
let me know if you guys need any help. But I
look forward to making more podcasts. This is
fun. Uh, I put all your information in the show
notes and, um, definitely promote, um, the clinic
and your work for sure. Yeah, we got, we got
three trials coming out too. So be on the look,
I'm going to share those on my profile. So once
pretty quick and we got, yeah, we got two more.
So hopefully by the end of the year, I don't
know how it's kind of pushing it, but we'll hopefully
get them out. We'll see. Yeah. Maybe you can
give us some teasers from it. Um, Well, two of
them are review trials. So we're trying to do,
like I said, we're actually reviewing all medications
affiliated with autism that are randomized control
trials. And so what is the entire body of evidence?
So these pages are like 100 pages long paper.
So it's a lot, but just what are the medications
that help? what symptoms are they helping, which
don't help, which have the highest side effects,
which don't, you know. And we're doing the same
thing for another paper for supplements. So what
is the most, let's kind of know about these supplements.
And so just to give us as clinicians a map of
like, this is pretty decent quality evidence
and this is what you can try to use. Cause we
even get specific, a lot of the trials are specific
with dosing. So you can not just guess at where
to start. And then, you know, it'll also, you
know, give, like I said, the clinicians a start,
but also the patients too. If you're like, hey,
I was thinking about Omega and I, you know, I
read this trial and okay, you know, like this
looks good. And I don't encourage people to like
practice medicine, you know, without a doctor,
but I know what happens and I want to encourage
people to do something, you know, like, you know,
I don't want people to freeze, you know, some
of this stuff. Yeah, don't go buy random medications
in Mexico that, you know, or, you know, from
India that you don't know what you're implementing.
That's pretty dangerous. But you know, some of
these things are over the counter for a reason.
You know, officials pretty safe, you know. Yeah.
Most of the stuff you can buy is pretty safe.
You're giving them informed consent that way
they are fully informed to make a decision. Yes.
Yes. And yes, exactly. So, you know, I want I
want people to to feel empowered to not not feel
just feel hope. Like, well, let's try it, or
whatever. Know that there is evidence out there.
This is not snake oil. I mean, really, and it's
true. We're not profiting. We're just putting
this knowledge out there. When we publish trials,
they've always been open source, free. They're
not behind a paid wall. I work with good guys.
They believe in this stuff. There's a lot of
passion. Dr. Fry, whenever he was on, he was
just so interested in just sharing the information
and even teaching me and just coming on and spreading
all this knowledge. Well, thank you and looking
forward to the next ones. All right, Ryan. Thanks,
me too. If you are listening to the podcast or
listening to the episode, please feel free to
leave a review or ratings. In podcasting, review
and ratings are crucial and I very much appreciate
your feedback. You can contact me on X at RPS
47586 or click on the hop link so you can have
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you can email me info .fromthespectrumatgmail
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Spectrum Podcast.