Mental Health Starts at the Cellular Level

• Why does shifting from psychiatric diagnoses to a cellular and network-based view of the brain change how we approach mental health?
• How do mitochondrial function, inflammation, and energy production shape symptoms like brain fog, low mood, and cognitive decline?
• Why are neurotransmitter imbalances often downstream of deeper issues like micronutrient deficiencies, gut dysfunction, and chronic stress?
• How does the gut-brain-microbiome axis influence anxiety, depression, and overall brain function?
• Why must lifestyle factors like sleep, stress regulation, and environmental exposures be addressed alongside biochemical optimization for lasting mental health improvements?

What We Discuss:

00:00 Intro: Mental Health Through a New Lens
02:00 Addiction vs Mental Health Explained
04:30 Why the Brain Is a Cellular Network
07:00 Mitochondria: Energy + Environmental Sensors
09:30 Brain Inflammation & What Causes It
12:00 Dopamine, Motivation & Burnout
14:30 Clinical Markers: What Testing Reveals
17:00 Gut-Brain-Microbiome Axis Explained
20:00 Stress, Sleep & the “Spiral of Doom”
22:30 Why Serotonin Isn’t the Full Story
25:00 GABA, Anxiety & Nervous System Balance
27:30 Lifestyle vs Supplements: What Actually Works
29:30 Real Case Study: Reversing Mental Health Decline
31:30 Final Takeaway: Optimize the Cell First

Full Transcript:

Boomer Anderson: [00:00:00] Welcome back everybody. We have another episode of the Health Optimization Medicine podcast. We're currently in the top 25 guys of all life sciences podcasts in the United States,

Boomer Anderson: which is rocking and rolling. We've had episodes with David Perlmutter, and also of course these amazing conversational episodes where we give people, clinicians' perspectives on really how to optimize for health and using of course, our clinical framework in Health Optimization Medicine and Practice. But I wanna tell, well, I haven't told you guys what happened to me on Saturday. Can somebody guess what happened to me on Saturday?

Dr. Scott Sherr: You

Dr. Scott Sherr: got a haircut. 

Boomer Anderson: Oh, I that's so, that's, oh, thank you. Thank you for noticing. I really appreciate that.

Boomer Anderson: So for 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: You.

Jodi Duval: at the beach. 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: You bought, you, you bought a, a mentally challenged person food

Boomer Anderson: No, don't, don't, don't do that. Okay. So, um, so this

Boomer Anderson: is 

Dr. Scott Sherr: is that? Is that woke? That's 

Boomer Anderson: I, I typically, [00:01:00] I typically wake up at like five 30 in the morning, right? And so around six 30 it, it's starting to get nicer in Chicago. And so I'm like, I'm, I'm gonna go for a bike ride on Lake Shore because you can do those things. Um, but. That morning, I, I was walking back from the storage place 'cause I had to pick something up there, on the street. It's kind of bordering, not so great part of Chicago. there's a, a guy who's clearly just like off his racket, right? And I swear you guys are gonna smile at some point. 'cause otherwise this is just gonna be like me practicing standup.

Boomer Anderson: Uh. 

Dr. Scott Sherr: a comedy sketch. I feel like you're, you're, you're just, you're working on your material 

Boomer Anderson: yeah. Working on my material. Working on my material.

Boomer Anderson: So, typically you kind of ignore these people, right? They're tweaking out or whatever. And, this guy came over to me and he was just absolutely desperate. He is like, man, can you just, and I initially waved him away. He is like, no, no, no, I just want food. And so it was Saturday morning. I'm by myself and figuring, you know, why not? Right. Um, go and, and buy the guy food, but you can [00:02:00] clearly tell that there's something off about him. And I got like this guy's life story about how this happened, how he came to this point where he is on Chicago Avenue and downtown Chicago and you know, just sort of walking around and has like this, this issue. And so I guess the whole thing made me feel grateful. Um, for about, you know, my mental health in particular and, uh, essentially what this guy had been through is he made a couple of wrong decisions, uh, got started on the, the drugs way too early, and because he eventually. You know, you guys would tell me as sort of pharmacokinetics experts or pharmacogenetics experts more than me, that he was chasing the high and so started early in sort of dopaminergic drugs like cocaine, and then eventually found himself, um, taking meth, right? And so this guy, uh, uh, asked me to buy him a coffee and a bagel. We were at Starbucks. Guess what he ordered.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Uh,

Dr. Scott Sherr: cafe, cafe Mocha Frappuccino 

Boomer Anderson: Very cool. [00:03:00] Very, actually, actually like

Boomer Anderson: Almost spot on, right? And so, not only did I offer the guys breakfast, but he orders the most expensivething in Starbucks. So, anyway, so that was my $15 later. Um, but it did make me appreciate mental health. Right, because this guy is now in a position he doesn't want to be there.

Boomer Anderson: But his state is such that he has to do this to get back to feeling normal. So anyway, today we're talking about mental health optimization and if that sort of preamble doesn't make the final cut of this episode, that's okay. 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: actually what in that indicates is that, we always classify addiction as a mental health disease. No. Addiction is addiction, right? It's a different kind of disease altogether. It involves mental

Dr. Ted Achacoso: health, but it is in a class of its own because one can be addicted to activities and one can be addicted to in enlightened circles you're addicted to thinking, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: So, uh,

Dr. Scott Sherr: health maybe, or health.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: So, yeah, you can be addicted to health or you can be addicted to being alive, right? So, [00:04:00] all of these things are forms of addiction. it's just that there are definitions of, of addiction, right? It is like when you cannot function anymore. That's why they're functional alcoholics, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: For example. But that's all. Actually when you look at all those things, it's like if you just take out the brain in the process and just take a look at the cell itself, then we could actually have a better way of taking a look at mental health, right? Because the brain contains neurons, and the neurons actually are cells in themselves that have fundamental structure.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: They have cells, they have mitochondria, they have, they have nucleus mitochondria, cytoplasm, you know, uh, cell membranes and Endoplasmic Reticulum and so on and so forth. And, um. You know, when, when standard psychiatry with diagnosed disease, you know what we're looking at? It's like, no. How are these cellular networks inside your brain, actually communicating miscommunicating?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Are they threatened? Are they not? Are you know, are they inflamed? Are they [00:05:00] proliferating? You know, for brain fog for example, do they have enough production of energy and so on?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: So that's the way we look at this in terms of health optimization medicine, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Let's forget about the actual diagnosis,

Dr. Ted Achacoso: That's in there. And let's take a look at what the cells and the cellular network is actually doing. After all the neurons are just specialized cells, just, I say, but yes, it contains everything, uh, everything else, but it just actually specialized into the neuron, right? So when we're looking at this, so when we are shifting everything to the to the cellular level, right? We take a look at first the most visible to us is, you know, when patients or clients complain of brain fog, immediately we look at the thyroid.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: No. Instead of just looking at, well, you know is a brain actually producing energy, [00:06:00] to do so. Right. But that's only half of the story, right? So, so when we know that the body uses 20% even the brain uses 20% of the brain's energy, right? But it's, and that's, and, and that's just, you know, uh, even if you're not thinking about things that are beneficial to humanity and to the rest of the world, plotting a murder, for example, would require a lot more energy.

Boomer Anderson: but, but, 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: anyway, we all always know that that mitochondria will, will actually produce the energy, right? However, that's only have to start. The mitochondria are sensors. You know, they will sense.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Uh, you know, what's, what's going on outside? And they will cry if it's in danger,

Dr. Ted Achacoso: if you are taking like meth and this other substances that places the cell in overdrive, the cell senses all of this, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: And it will actually cause the, the brain to inflame. And so we have [00:07:00] actually markers for brain inflammation that we can see in a clinical metabolomics testing,

Dr. Ted Achacoso: right? 

Dr. Scott Sherr: we do.

Boomer Anderson: I know. Yep.

Boomer Anderson: Kyurenic 

Boomer Anderson: Acid, 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Yeah, he knows.

Boomer Anderson: boom, mic drop

Jodi Duval: I didn't hear the question.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: So

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Scott, you were saying it's a ratio

Dr. Scott Sherr: Yes. The ratio, what's

Dr. Scott Sherr: interesting is that I have a, a patient of mine who, I didn't realize when I first started working with her that she was vaping all the time and it was her ratio of these particular metabolites that we can talk about, this ratio was significantly in a place where she had significant brain inflammation. And as a result, it was obvious to me that I was like, what's going on here? And then she's like, oh, did I, I didn't tell you that I'd been vaping, and did I? I was like, no, that would've been nice. No, that would've

Dr. Scott Sherr: been nice for you to tell me. So. 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: I, I have a patient, in fact who, said he quit. Right? he's, not taking cocaine anymore and all that stuff. And then I take a look at his clinical metabolomics test [00:08:00] results, right? He's like dopamine metabolite, which is what?

Boomer Anderson: Oh, I've seen these. Um, but I've seen this particular patient's

Boomer Anderson: test results before. Yeah.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: it's your, your homovanillic acid,

Dr. Ted Achacoso: right? Totally down to zero. So it's like the brain was just so flat out of dopamine that anything that you try to do to resuscitate it, is difficult

Dr. Ted Achacoso: And then I just, uh, basically looked at him and said, oh, I said, you started taking again and said, yeah, okay, so, so

Dr. Ted Achacoso: you can actually see these things even if, if your patients are, are lying to

Dr. Ted Achacoso: you.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Right. 

Dr. Scott Sherr: Ted, I have a question for you. I, I've been thinking about this. Um, you know, because so many thousands of mitochondria per cell, in our brains specifically, we have, it's the most in reproductive organs. And then there after that is the brain and the neurons and, and things. I was thinking about this when, when you're thinking about. Well, just thinking in general, like nuanced thinking versus black and white thinking. Would it be easier for the brain to think [00:09:00] in black and white and therefore if you don't have enough energy capacity, like you just think more in black and white versus somebody that has more energy capacity to the brain, they could think more in nuance, like thinking more in the gray or is that something that I'm just making up?

Dr. Scott Sherr: I was wondering, I.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: No, well, well, actually it depends on your sensor, right? If your sensor can see only black and white, then you know your brain will actually do patterns in black and white. Remember that, uh, this has already been proven in cats. Right. where if you don't train, but this is on a different level if you don't train, the part of the brain that's actually responsible for vision, that which is responsible for, for hearing, will actually take over.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Right. And this is a cruel experiment, but it was done by some Yale researchers. They closed the eyes of newborn kittens,

Dr. Ted Achacoso: right. And then they reopened it afterwards. So the, the kittens are blind after the critical window by which, the site was formed, right? And then after that, but they had very keen sense of hearing.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: So you could see then that there's no nature or nurture. argument, that's basically a very, very false argument. You [00:10:00] know, nature starts the blueprint and then nurture completes it, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: you put the kit into light, et cetera. It's the same thing with color, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: for example, essentially your, sensor is not seeing color, properly, right? then your brain is actually going to, to produce images that are actually of that kind of quality of color. Right. I remember as a child I had severe astigmatism and whenever I draw an electrical post, where I grew up, there were electrical posts that were on the street, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: And I would draw the post in a straight line and I would fuzz up the edges because it's how I saw

Dr. Ted Achacoso: them. Right? 

Boomer Anderson: did you draw electrical posts when you were younger?

Dr. Scott Sherr: of course drew stick figures that had electrical posts looking like kind of figures

Boomer Anderson: Okay, fair enough. 

Dr. Scott Sherr: But um, but I wasn't in the detail of looking at the fuzz on the outside, you know, so, 

Boomer Anderson: the fun is in the fuzz.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: So, um, so let's get back to the part of your question. Yeah, yeah. You know, it depends on what the, uh, what nurture completes, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: So what the external [00:11:00] viral 

Dr. Scott Sherr: so it's not necessarily a brain energy like I always thought like, well, if you don't have enough energy capacity, you know, your mitochondria having significant challenges either making or detoxing from the energy that we do make, that it would be like only being able to do the very important functions of keeping you alive in survival mostly.

Dr. Scott Sherr: And that's mostly related to black and white thinking, right? Am I gonna live, or again, am I, am I gonna die? Am I gonna, you know, am I gonna procreate or am I not gonna procreate? Whatever it might be. and that's why, 

Dr. Scott Sherr: that's my sense of like, my maybe why we get so polarized with, 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: no, I think there's more sensor dependent, right? there's more sensitive dependent. when I was doing research on, on this many years ago, we found out that the brain actually just responds to particular features of an image, right? 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: it responds to vertical lines, horizontal lines, you know, this direction, that direction.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: In other words, this has a abstraction. Of what you're seeing, right? And that's a blueprint, of what you see.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: In fact, there's a, an old story about, when the Spanish came with their huge ships, et cetera, and or came to, a native island. And [00:12:00] they were trying to point to the ships, 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: The conquistador were trying to point to the ships, and the natives actually couldn't see it because they were so large and not in their, experience to see anything. So they couldn't see anything, but they could see, all of those dinghies that came from the ships because they were small enough and it was actually registered in the brain. But we digress. We are actually looking at

Dr. Ted Achacoso: the mitochondria producing energy and mitochondria actually sensing the assaults on it, and therefore causing inflammation. Right? And this inflammation is measured with Kynurenic acid. And you know, there a quick reversal of this type of thing can be done with what Vitamin

Jodi Duval: B 

Boomer Anderson: call on me Coach. Call me

Jodi Duval: Mm-hmm. 

Boomer Anderson: sorry. No, Jodi got it already. Jodi spoke

Boomer Anderson: Jodi. 

Boomer Anderson: spoke out a turn, but she got it right.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Never speaks outta turn. Jodi.

Boomer Anderson: No, that's okay.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Jodi, I was, what are your thoughts on this too? I just, I know. We see a lot of women [00:13:00] and men I know, but also with a lot of mental health issues, and I know that you're seeing a lot of people come through practice and, and looking at a lot of their ratios, looking at a lot of their vitamins and minerals.

Dr. Scott Sherr: I mean, what are some of the things that you see most often when you're looking at it from a health optimization perspective?

Jodi Duval: Hmm. Yeah. So organic acids, I see, um, most people I, I, I see. Other than, uh, my client who is, uh. Has Parkinson's and is on l-dopa majority is HVA and VMA are bottomed, you know, and it's, it's quite, uh, it matches their symptoms and I think it's really nice for them to see that when they're feeling so despondent and unmotivated and really low.

Jodi Duval: And so in, in, you know, they, they feel much better about seeing that there's a reason for something, uh, and what they're feeling. So I don't often see, you know, obviously I'm looking at the quinic and, and the cour, um. I'm not seeing as much B six deficiency these days, so I did a couple of years ago. Um, but I feel like there is a little bit more awareness [00:14:00] around and mo a lot of people are taking multi B supplements for, you know, M-T-H-F-R reasons, and, and so there, there's a little bit more support there, but now I'm seeing a little bit more on the oxidative.

Jodi Duval: And the inflammatory component and still not really getting to the, to the, um, all the details that we need to be balancing the mitochondrial, um, you know, energy and, and the cell. And then we've got exposomics that are coming in, I feel in much bigger amounts. And even not just awareness, but in the last few years.

Jodi Duval: So there you, you've got sort of these, uh, these balances, you know, like maybe vitamin deficiencies and we are correcting a little bit better, but then we've got. More issues associated with the environment and you know, trauma and stress, and then that puts a higher demand on the mitochondria and the energy as well.

Jodi Duval: You know, we're not sleeping as well. So I think as we always talk about at home, hope, there's always this balance. Like we can see it and focus on the testing because. Clients then go, ah, [00:15:00] I can see that now. Right. More tyrosine and generally that comes along with a thyroid, um, or a lowered thyroid output.

Jodi Duval: And so you're getting all these co-factors and they know that they've got the building blocks there, but if they still don't do the lifestyle, the stress, the gym work, the BDNF building and all these other things that we know that we should be doing, then they still don't get great outcomes.

Dr. Scott Sherr: They need to read books too, according 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: can't you just raise BDNF with like microdosing, LSD. 

Boomer Anderson: And, and holy 

Jodi Duval: was gonna, I was gonna mention the psychedelics after this. 'cause a complete mental health talk is not complete without that.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Well, I think Ted had a line on this before on mental health and, and in the case of a certain type of deficiency, if I remember 

Boomer Anderson: Yeah. So one, one thing, uh, I wanna interject with here, 'cause you mentioned vitamin B six, Ted, and that kind of ties a little bit into how we relax, right? And, Dr. Sherr, her has talked a lot about parasympathetic nervous system. 

Jodi Duval: The Spiral of Doom 

Boomer Anderson: let, let's go, let's go a little bit into that spiral of doom and how it plays a role in GABA and what [00:16:00] we need to do there.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Yeah, I think was, I was thinking about this as you were talking too, Ted. I mean, we were, when I was in medical school, and I'm sure when you were in medical school too, um, probably at the, maybe actually a little bit after you were in school. The, the big, the, the big thing was that depression was a serotonin deficiency.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Yes, 

Dr. Scott Sherr: that had depression had low serotonin levels, but they've done a number of meta-analysis over the last couple years. There's no such thing as low serotonin levels in depressed people. It's not any lower than people 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Yeah. It's only from Cathinone abuse, man.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Well that's, that's a different story. Um, that can, can be for another day and another podcast. Um, but serotonin deficiency, it doesn't exist in the sense of it causing depression. I mean, at least probably in some rare occasions, but in general, not the case. Right? So when you artificially increase serotonin levels, you make people happier. Sometimes, but it does take a long time for that to happen, four or six weeks. But the studies are actually pretty clear that GABA deficiency is much more associated with depression, also anxiety and [00:17:00] insomnia than the serotonin. And so when you think about that, your thinking about, well, why are people still GABA deficient all the time?

Dr. Scott Sherr: Right? And that comes down to a lot of the work we do at at HOMeHOPe, which is optimizing micronutrients, the gut, cellular biology. But a big overlying piece of this, of course, 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Yeah. Remember it. used to be just, yeah, it used to be just a bipartite axis. Right? We called it the gut brain axis. Right. But we know it's actually a tripartite axis. It's a gut brain microbiota access. Is because the microbiota in HOMeHOPe we considered a microbiota as actually, um, a separate organ in itself.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: It produces some metabolites. it is metabolism and so on. And remember also that when you are supplying the precursors, Precursor amino acids to the brain, neurotransmitters the brain actually, these are huge, amino acids, right? The brain actually have active transporters for them. They're called large neutral amino acid transporters because they're actually large,

Dr. Ted Achacoso: so you, you could see here that [00:18:00] that's why the gut is called the second brain too, right? it produces I think 98% of the serotonin, that we use.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: And then the brain produces only 2%, but it produces it on its own, right? So, so you could see here that the effect of that tripartite axis actually on brain inflammation. Also the studies on exposomics, right? like your exposure to particular things like sunlight and so on, which is also tied to chronobiology then actually affects how your brain cells actually respond to different types of stimuli.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Right. So, when you're taking a look at all of this, when you are able to manipulate the levels in the cells such that they are at optimal levels between 21 and 30 years old, you could see then, then this actually, it's not just a ripple.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: This actually is a wave that actually activates the entire neural network of the brain. And that is just knowing that actually makes you think about [00:19:00] how fundamental it is to take a look at cellular health first before you actually put in a diagnosis.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Right.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: As I said, one of my favorite examples here is that you give a woman a contraceptive, right? And the contraceptive actually will sequester your vitamin B six. And the patient actually falls into depression within two days of taking the contraceptive, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: So you could see there how important vitamin B six is to the brain. So immediately you see all of these co-factors are really very very important to optimize brain function and actually optimize mental health right? And as I like to say, there can be no true mental health optimization without prior cell health optimization. Right.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Just add on that with the, the sympathetic side of things, which is interesting, right? Which is when somebody's in fight or flight all the time, they're churning out like just when your friend, the meth addict was taking meth all the time. It's like a, [00:20:00] a simulation of being in fight or flight all the time. You're just pumping out cortisol, norepinephrine, epinephrine, like his organic acid panel would've been very interesting to see. I'm sure. 

Boomer Anderson: We're, we will get it back in six weeks. 

Dr. Scott Sherr: Nice. Perfect. And then he's gonna be very compliant about his, his supplement regimen with you, I'm sure. But it, it's kind of the elephant in the room for a lot of people, which is that like you can sometimes give people supplements until, you know, the proverbial cows come home.

Dr. Scott Sherr: But if, if they don't have that sympathetic downregulation getting into that more parasympathetic mode, ain't nothing gonna change. I just used a double negative Ted. Sorry about that. Um, but that's what it comes down to. And, what I found over the years is that you can't just downregulate somebody's nervous system without giving them some cellular support too, though.

Dr. Scott Sherr: That's the thing is if you just give them some stuff to downregulate and calm down, they can crash on you if you're not careful.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Yeah, and there's this wrong notions like, oh, I'm taking this supplement from my brain. And you take a look, it's like, no, actually this is good for all of your cells. So the key there is actually to measure, right? 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: [00:21:00] measure your metabolite levels as Jodi was saying, you use clinical metabolomics to do that.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: You know, you optimize those values between 21 and 30 years old, because that's supposed to be the peak of brain function. But I don't know what the brain function now of 21 to 30 years olds with advent of social media. Right?

Dr. Scott Sherr: This is the problem. 

Boomer Anderson: I mean, it's first generation with a declining IQ right? 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Yes, yes. a very much reduced attention span, right? Because the brain is a highly trainable machine, right? It's like an LLM its like a large language model. it's what you train it with. You're train it with, with short, short things and it'll only have attention for short things, right? and now it's like that little funny things that come up are actually if you write the concepts down by hand, you know, you'll memorize them better. It's like, duh. You know, it's just like recruiters are re recruiting two networks in the brain to actually help you learn.

Dr. Scott Sherr: I think people are learning better in school now because they have to actually write out their exams in front of the teacher instead of having it on the computer as well. 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Yeah. And, but you know what, Scott, that

Dr. Ted Achacoso: was how we [00:22:00] did exams before.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Me too.

Dr. Scott Sherr: That's how I 

Boomer Anderson: me, me as well. 

Dr. Scott Sherr: yeah. Yeah, 

Jodi Duval: too. 

Boomer Anderson: All right, so who, who, all right, so we need to kind of wrap things up guys. We're coming up here on time. Mental health optimization from a HOMeHOPe perspective. wants to give us a little rundown here? What happened today?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: okay, so in mental health optimization from a health optimization medicine perspective is we set aside whatever the disease diagnosis is. Right. We take a look, we test the clinical metabolomics, take a look at the neurotransmitter levels. The neurotransmitter levels there, by the way, are actually correlated with your platelet neurotransmitters, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: And there's just a statistical correlation between them. And then from there you could take a look at what can be corrected, right? right away. And then when you correct those, you could see immediately that the brain stops fogging up, and then there's a lot of more mental energy.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: There's more, clarity and so on. And that is not even counting the fact that, you know, we're not talking about the disease yet. Right. [00:23:00] So, one of the roles of the practitioners is actually take a look, the brain is usually arrested in the Cell Danger Response of inflammation. Right? It will arrest there. And, but with the rise of kynurenic acid, you know, and you could see usually a lack of vitamin B six. But there's also a lot of other factors like the exposomics. Like for example, if the patient or client is taking drugs, that's an increased pressure, right? If they, they lack sleep and so on, that actually contributes to brain inflammation, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Because if you lack sleep, the brain cannot clear out its, uh, debris in the glymphatic system, that's a new lymphatic system that's just discovered in the brain. Discovered in 2012, right? And then, when you are taking a look at the brain, also, you have to take a look at what the tripartite axis is doing.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: The gut brain microbiome axis because that's actually been shown that what the microbiota are producing is actually related to anxiety and depression. And that's already been shown in the clinics episode. That's why they have been formulatingProbiotics for those particular [00:24:00] diagnosis, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: But for me, it's like, no, let's not do the diagnosis. Take a look at it from a cellular level and from the body as an ecosystem level, right? So let's do precision. Precision measurement. Right? Let's take a look at what we can return into those optimal values. And then we could see that all the other relief of the diseases is basically a beneficial side effect of just optimizing what the cell really needs, right?

Dr. Scott Sherr: would just add to that. I mean, we can't, you know, have the conversation without thinking about the overt aspects that many people are talking about now. Trauma

Dr. Scott Sherr: and challenges with, with, with that aspect of severe illness and other kinds of things that can be very difficult. But 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Oh yes. Traumatic brain injury right TBI, which is

Dr. Ted Achacoso: very common. Uh, right. And again, most of those people are actually, stuck at a CDR one or

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Cell Danger Response one. 

Dr. Scott Sherr: Right.

Dr. Scott Sherr: That's

Dr. Scott Sherr: important. But I, I think in, in the end, as you said, true brain health optimization starts with health optimization [00:25:00] medicine

Dr. Scott Sherr: and practice cellular optimization

Dr. Scott Sherr: strategies. And then that's really what is shifting our patients and clients on a regular basis. I know that for sure.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: We begin with the fun fact let's end with one did you know that, you're actually operating a pneumatic drill? Right. if you're, operating a pneumatic drill or you haven't done, 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: the vibration of pneumatic drill when you're drilling into concrete is enough

Dr. Ted Achacoso: actually shake your pituitary.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Right? Your pituitary gland in there such that it appears like it is actually, in TBI traumatic brain injury, right? And then

Dr. Ted Achacoso: It will stop producing growth hormone. It will stop producing all these things its supposed to do for you, and then we diagnose them with an endocrine disease where actually it's been the brain trauma, right?

Dr. Ted Achacoso: it's like, oh, you know, I'm so glad I never have to operate on, pneumatic drill.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Oh, Ted, one. One. I think one other quick story would be good is to maybe finish off as in your patient with bipolar disorder and talking about that quickly, just as a final, because I think that's a great summation of what we do and how it works.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: I don't know. I don't have any [00:26:00] patient with bipolar, disorder.

Dr. Scott Sherr: Yes, you, they reverse the diagnosis and don't have it anymore. As I recall, right.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: Yes, yes. 

Dr. Ted Achacoso: I had a, actually a 19-year-old right, who was diagnosed with, bipolar disorder and was placed on Abilify, right? What happened was that of course with Abilify, you don't get interested in your hygiene. And then, essentially you get fat. Right. and so on.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: What happened there is that I, I took a look at these, hormones. I took a look at these, metabolome and so on, and, in three years, right? He was able to be be out of school, he was able to get back into second year college and then graduated and took his masters and then when we were talking in my clinic, they said, Dr. Ted, I want to, because he lost so much, weight, et cetera, I was like, how can I get rid of these skin folds and stuff? And they said, why? He said, because I'm appearing in a music video. And it's a wonderful story, right? I really, like to share, it's because the mother is a dear colleague of mine who then said, oh my god, this is a wonderful thing to learn.

Dr. Ted Achacoso: And, started to [00:27:00] learn how to do this.

Boomer Anderson: Beautiful. All right. We all need to be in a music video. Uh, should we round this one out, guys?

Jodi Duval: Yeah. Thanks. Sweet 

Boomer Anderson: All right, so thank you guys all for joining us here on another episode of the Health Optimization Medicine Podcast, Dr. Ted, Dr. Scott, Jodi, thank you. This has been a fantastic one on mental health and the role a HOMeHOPe practitioner plays. Everybody, have a wonderful day. Remember to choose health.

Jodi Duval: Woo, bye.

Find more from Health Optimization Medicine and Practice (HOMeHOPe):

Website: https://homehope.org/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/homehopeorg/
Virtual Symposium 2026: https://homehope.org/homehope-virtual-symposium-2026

Use PODCAST10 to get 10% OFF your purchase of the Clinical Metabolomics Module at https://homehope.org/products/clinical-metabolomics

Find more from Troscriptions:

Website: https://troscriptions.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/troscriptions/

Use POD10 to get 10% OFF your Troscriptions purchase at https://troscriptions.com/collections/our-products>