Dr. Chris Palmer: Diet & Nutrition for Mental Health

Huberman Lab

Scicomm Media

Science, Health & Fitness, Life Sciences

4.8 • 26.2K Ratings

🗓️ 21 November 2022

⏱️ 184 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

My guest this episode is Chris Palmer, M.D., a board-certified psychiatrist and assistant professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. He explains the important connection between nutrition, metabolism and mental health and his pioneering work using the ketogenic diet to successfully treat patients with various mental illnesses, including depression and schizophrenia. Dr. Palmer explains how the ketogenic diet is an evidenced-based treatment for epilepsy, mimics the fasted state and can offset the cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s. He describes the key roles of mitochondria in mental health, how certain conditions likely arise from mitochondrial dysfunction, and how low-carbohydrate diets increase mitochondrial turnover to improve mental health. He also explains how low-carbohydrate diets positively impact the gut microbiome and weight loss, important risk factors for mitochondrial health such as marijuana and alcohol, and the best way to increase circulating ketones depending on individual needs. We also cover how a ketogenic diet impacts mood, sleep, and fertility. Dr. Palmer’s work stands as a revolutionary approach to mental health and disease that, given the prevalence of mental health challenges, should be of interest to people of all backgrounds and ages. Thank you to our sponsors AG1 (Athletic Greens): https://athleticgreens.com/huberman Thesis: https://takethesis.com/huberman Eight Sleep: https://www.eightsleep.com/huberman ROKA: https://www.roka.com/huberman InsideTracker: https://www.insidetracker.com/huberman Supplements from Momentous https://www.livemomentous.com/huberman For the full show notes, visit hubermanlab.com Timestamps (00:00:00) Dr. Chris Palmer, Mental Health & Metabolic Disorders (00:03:25) Thesis, Eight Sleep, ROKA (00:07:18) Nutrition & Mental Health (00:20:43) Low-Carb Diets & Anti-Depression, Fasting, Ketosis (00:27:52) Schizophrenia, Depression & Ketogenic Diet (00:34:32) AG1 (Athletic Greens) (00:35:38) Psychiatric Mediations, Diet Adherence (00:42:35) Highly Processed Foods, Ketones & Mental Health Benefits (00:46:51) Ketogenic Diet & Epilepsy Treatment (00:56:10) Ketogenic Diet & Mitochondria Health (00:57:05) Nutrition & Benefits for Neurologic/Psychiatric Disorders (01:05:44) Mitochondrial Function & Mental Health (01:15:12) InsideTracker (01:16:23) Mitophagy, Mitochondrial Dysfunction, Aging & Diet (01:25:09) Neurons, Mitochondria & Blood Glucose (01:31:54) Obesity, Ketogenic Diet & Mitochondria (01:40:00) Mitochondrial Function: Inheritance, Risk Factors, Marijuana (01:46:34) Alcohol & Ketogenic Diet (01:55:21) Brain Imaging, Alzheimer’s Disease & Ketones (02:01:05) Exogenous (Liquid) Ketones vs. Ketogenic Diet (02:06:27) Neuronal Damage, Ketones & Glucose (02:10:16) Alzheimer’s Disease, Age-Related Cognitive Decline & Ketogenic Diet (02:23:45) Ketogenic Diet & Weight Loss (02:35:47) Ketogenic Diet & Fasting, Hypomania, Sleep (02:46:37) Low Carbohydrate Diets, Menstrual Cycles, Fertility (02:52:23) Obesity Epidemic, Semaglutide & GLP-1 Medications (03:01:01) Zero-Cost Support, YouTube Feedback, Spotify & Apple Reviews, Sponsors, Momentous Supplements, Neural Network Newsletter, Social Media Disclaimer Title Card Photo Credit: Mike Blabac

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Huberman Lab podcast where we discuss science and science-based tools for everyday life.
0:08.7	I'm Andrew Huberman and I'm a professor of neurobiology and
0:12.4	Ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine. Today my guest is Dr. Chris Palmer. Dr. Chris Palmer is a medical doctor specializing in psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.
0:22.2	He is the world expert in the relationship between metabolic disorders and psychiatric disorders.
0:27.5	He treats a variety of different conditions including psychosis including schizophrenia as well as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder obsessive compulsive disorder
0:37.8	anxiety disorders and depression among others. He is best known for understanding the relationship between how
0:44.5	metabolism and these various disorders of the mind interact and indeed today he describes not only his own
0:50.5	fascinating journey into the field of psychiatry but also his clinical and research experience using diet that is different forms of nutrition in order to treat various
1:01.1	psychiatric disorders. He describes some remarkable case studies of
1:05.5	individuals and groups of people who have achieved tremendous relief from the types of
1:10.3	psychiatric disorders that I just mentioned a few moments ago as well as new and emerging themes as to how
1:16.7	metabolism and the mind interact to control things like obesity.
1:20.9	Indeed, he raises the hypothesis that perhaps obesity in many cases is the consequence of a brain dysfunction as opposed to the
1:28.9	consequence of a metabolic dysfunction that then impacts the brain. During today's episode
1:33.5	he shares with us his overriding hypotheses about the critical roles that might a condrill function and
1:40.0	dysfunction play in mental health and mental illness and how various particular types of diets
1:45.9	ranging from the ketogenic diet to modified ketogenic diet and even just slight adjustments in carbohydrate intake can be used in order to
1:54.2	change mitochondrial function and
1:56.4	bring relief for various psychiatric illnesses. He also highlights the essential and important theme that various diet
2:04.0	interventions including the ketogenic diet were not first developed for sake of weight loss
2:08.8	but rather were developed as treatments for neurologic conditions such as epilepsy. Today he shares with us
2:14.4	how the foods that we eat alone and in combination and how fasting both intermittent fasting and more lengthy fasts
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