Giulia Enders Gut | The Inside Story of Our Body’s Most Under-rated Organ|Grace Gawler Book Recommendation

Giulia Enders has been fascinated with the human digestive system and how its function affects all aspects of our health. In this extract of her newly published book, Gut: The Inside Story of Our Body’s Most Under-rated Organ,she discusses the surprisingly complex end point of digestion.

Giulia Enders, a young passionate medical PhD student has been fascinated with the human digestive system and how its function affects all aspects of our health. In her newly published book, Gut: The Inside Story of Our Body’s Most Under-rated Organ, she discusses the surprisingly complex end point of digestion. Did you know that 80% of your immune system is located in your GUT? It is not rocket science to make the link between having a healthy gut and good health and wellbeing! Giulia Enders brings this complex subject to an almost lighthearted but powerful narrative that is engaging, entertaining and incredibly valuable for anyone interested in improving their wellbeing. 

Listen to interview on Radio National Giulia Enders with Natasha Mitchell:

gut the inside story
Giulia Enders Book

From my personal viewpoint; I have always been fascinated by the gut and it’s workings. I became even more fascinated when I surgically parted with 10 feet of intestine (both small and large intestine) in a series of surgeries over a 13 year period. Re-framing the experience as a learning opportunity; a result of a  medical misadventure rather than disease; I was thrown into the fast track of helping to convince my body that less was now going to be more!

How would or could my gut adapt to such huge changes and what did I have to do to help the process. My gut became an intense “in house” study for me so when I heard this terrific interview on Radio National last week – I just had to share it with all of you who want to look after your health -including your inner gut health.
Read an edited extract of Giulia Enders book’ ‘Gut: The Inside Story of Our Body’s Most Under-rated Organ’, published by Scribe. Select the link below to Radio National.

http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/lifematters/how-does-pooing-work-and-why-thats-an-important-question/6580500

About the author Giulia Enders: When she was seventeen, Giulia developed a sore on her leg that stubbornly refused to disappear.Soon other sores appeared on her body and despite the efforts of a range of doctors and medications, nothing seemed to help them heal. So she did some research. She read about other similar cases that had followed courses of antibiotics. She began to make a link between her skin’s condition and the health of her intestines. Her fascination with the gut and how its function affects all kinds of aspects of our health continued, so she started studying medicine and continued researching for her PhD.

The result is a MUST READ for anyone interested in improving their health. An international best-seller: Gut: the inside story of our body’s most under-rated organ just published in Australia.

Once you read this book, I think you will appreciate your own inside story and, maybe even make some health enhancing “gut-sense” lifestyle changes!

Until Next time…Wishing you Good Gut Health!

Grace

Introducing Health Intelligence Australia-A new Model of Healthcare Grace Gawler and Dr Bruce Whelan

On this week’s Navigating the Cancer Maze on Voice America radio, I presented an encore broadcast of a special interview with my colleague GP Dr Bruce Whelan: “Spinning Gold from Straw: How trauma transformed a Doctor’s Life and Practice”. This year, Dr Whelan and I have forged a very special medical partnership to help patients Navigate the Cancer Maze – Health Intelligence Australia.

On this week’s Navigating the Cancer Maze  on Voice America radio, I presented an encore broadcast of a special interview with my colleague GP Dr Bruce Whelan: “Spinning Gold from Straw: How trauma transformed a Doctor’s Life and Practice”. This year, Dr Whelan and I have forged a very special medical partnership to help patients Navigate the Cancer Maze – Health Intelligence Australia.
Last week a patient asked me what makes Dr. Bruce Whelan unique in terms of the type of medicine he practises? The answer came Health intelligence australiaeasily. In the past 10 years Bruce has become involved with and specialized in management of addictions, mental health and severe and chronic pain as well as general medicine. These are also all important aspects of cancer management. They are the areas of medicine that tend to be under-serviced by GPs due to time constraints or lack of training. But there is more that makes Dr Bruce Whelan uniquely suited to the new Health Intelligence Australia group.
Another area of Dr Bruce Whelan’s expertise is in the area of trauma. He knows a lot about trauma at a very personal level because in 2002 he was summoned to Bali from Sri Lanka, where he was working.  He was given the unspeakably grim task of identifying bodies after the bombing at the Sari Club in Bali. His task was made even worse when he spent two days unsuccessfully trying to find and identify the body of his son-in-law Shane – killed in the bombing along with a partner of his daughter’s friend. As luck had it the girls were going to be late getting to the Sari Club that night. But lucky as they were to escape; the trauma of the incident lived on and shaped their future.
When Bruce graduated  from the University of Queensland in 1967, like many of us, he had no idea what life had in store for him. As a doctor, Bruce Whelan had already seen lot of suffering, but the post-traumatic stress affect that the Bali incident produced, had long lasting effects. The product of uninvited change!  Bruce fought a battle he could not win; to have bodies quickly identified, stored appropriately and repatriated to Australia.

Dr Bruce Whelan
Dr Bruce Whelan

This intensified the trauma, grief and loss experienced by many. However, being a resourceful doctor, eventually he was able to spin gold from straw as they say, and today, 14 years later; the experience brings with it a man who is the wounded healer who serves his patients with a rare quality of directness and authenticity. He is someone who deeply understands trauma and depression in another human being.

There is no substitute for this type of life experience. This type of experience can’t be learned in any university except in the university of life!
It is recognized by psycho-oncologists that a diagnosis of cancer is also a traumatic event and many patients experience PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) that often remains undiagnosed and untreated throughout the course of the illness. Some patients have experienced trauma before diagnosis and it may not have been dealt with. Unrecognized trauma can play a complicated role in the ongoing management of illness. Major life traumas can  impact every treatment approach that a cancer patient will try during their recovery….. it can even affect patients who are survivors of the physical illness, but who did not have the opportunity to deal with the psychological impact of the illness at the time.  This often plays out as depression, memory loss or dissociative disorders.
To make an appointment for a consultation to see either myself or Dr Whelan, or for a team consultation,  please visit:
RESOURCES:   Check out the following resources to understand more about PTSD and the brain:The Biology of Trauma           http://www.natal.org.il/english/?CategoryID=232
Article Psychology Today:   The Anatomy of Post traumatic Stress Disorder
Listen to interviews with Dr Bruce Whelan on Voice America – at http://www.drbrucewhelan.com/about-dr-bruce/