Peter D'Adamo: Exemplars

Been very busy with the redesign of the NAP website. Part of the problem is that I am Perl/PP/Unix centered and the NAP software and server are ASP Microsoft .NET. No matter, I enjoy learning this kind of stuff.

Generated quite a bit of new content. NAP needed simple FDA compliant explanations for the GenoType Diet formulas, and I wanted to release some additional information on the GenoType profiles that had been prepared for the book but not used. So I combined both jobs these into six monographs:

• The Hunter
• The Gatherer
• The Teacher
• The Explorer
• The Warrior
• The Nomad

Enjoy.

As I've been tinkering with this new blog software, I've become acutely aware of the importance of skins and themes. For the uninitiated, a theme (the more 'proper' wording) or skin (what everyone calls them) are a set of variables that a programmer often adds into a program that allows people to change the appearance of the program in ways that make it more personalized. For example this blog uses a variation of a skin called 'Nautica', which give it a rather pleasing blue palette. To get a better idea, you can browse the various skins for the blogging program Wordpress.

As I went along I began to see the GenoType characterizations as skins of a sort. If blood groups, secretor status an whatnot are the body, then the GenoTypes would be the choice of wardrobe.

For example, look at this graphic:

If we compare the basic type A characterizations and diet, we would see that type A has problems from a mostly tolerant immune system, a greater risk of heart and artery problems, and a greater risk of cancer. Reasonable enough, since that is what the research literature suggests. Type A's have less p53 tumor suppressor activity and their arteries are more prone to inflammation.

However, under simple blood type association, there is really no prioritization of this information.

If we look at the GT3 Teacher program we would see that the diet is skewed more towards cancer protection. It is in the GT3 Teacher that the p53 tumor suppression susceptibility winds up. GT5 Warrior on the other hand, seems to carry the arterial risk; probably because of the two, they are the more thrifty type. Thus if you GenoType as a blood group A Teacher, you will be wearing the 'cancer prevention skin.'

Technically if you are type A you could wear several skins, however if you GenoType as a Teacher, the Teacher skin will be the most therapeutic for you. Same with type O: You might need the 'metabolic syndrome' skin (GT2 Gatherer) more than the 'catabolic inflammatory' skin (GT1 Hunter).

Ditto for the B's and AB's.

Hopefully this will help folks see how values can change when one migrates from the BTD values to the GTD system. Somewhere in the allowable GenoTypes for people with type A blood, there will be that old BTD avoid, however, if it is not in your new GenoType values (or if it flipped to being actually beneficial!) it is because its BTD avoid status was less relevant than the benefits it provides under your new GTD skin.

A long time ago I preceptored with a naturopath who was fond of having his handouts typeset by a local printer. He was an older style ‘nature-cure’ type healer, and his handouts contained some very far out stuff. When I asked him why he went to the great expense of having a printer typeset his advice, he replied that ‘when people see something in print, especially a format that they know is not homemade, they take it more seriously.’

Twenty years later we now would appear to know better. The easy availability of laser printers and desktop publishing software can make any would-be Hemingway look the part. Of course there is a price to pay for the ubiquity of it all. Nice-looking documents have become the very essence of banality and reader confidence further eroded by the inclusion of misspellings, bad punctuation and terrible font choices.

Many readers will remember that absolute reverence by which one beheld the evening news in our childhood. Walter Cronkite and The Huntley–Brinkley Report not only acted the part of impartial newscasters; they looked it as well.

Having just seen the most recent Democratic debate on ABC-TV, I am even more convinced that the end is near for what might be called ‘filtered broadcasting.’ Instead of any sort of important discussion about issues which are of paramount importance to this country (and indeed the world) we were treated to a long inquisition about whether wearing an porcelain American flag pin is a sign of patriotism in a two hour long Calvary of he-said, she-said.

In the arts we have recently seen the emergence of a new kind of artist. The conventional record labels, having seen their profits eroded by downloading and lack of consumer interest, can only play by the numbers and hope for another Britney Spears or similar mega-mediocrity. The industry crowns artless (but safe and cute) adolescents “American Idols” when in fact they have demonstrated no skills beyond what one would expect from a decent karaoke bar singer.

Composers and musicians who actually do have something to say have opted instead to release material direct to the public, often with a payment-optional policy. Although this would appear to be financial suicide, surprisingly, many of these ventures have been economically successful.

Three decades ago Steward Brand said ‘information wants to be free.’ Brand’s WELL (Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link) was a precursor of the Internet, the greatest source of unfiltered information in human history.

When information is free, people get to choose what they want to hear and read about. When it is filtered, news organizations, corporations, professional societies and political parties choose it for them.

Years ago doctors would never think of explaining their premises and motives. To whom? The village blacksmith? What does he know of chemistry? Now consumers can harness the power of the Internet to research their health issues to any depth they desire. Yet most doctors still function in filter mode, thinking that the deck is still stacked in their favor.

It's not.

Doctors have to learn about everything. A patient has to just learn about what is wrong with himself. You would be surprised by the speed in which a motivated patient can become a virtual expert in their condition.

In my vision of the future we will all become our own ‘aggregators,’ selecting information sources from an abundance of highly specific and single purpose ‘channels.’ Once aggregated into our lives, all these channels will fuse into a Multiverse of realities shared between like-minded individuals.

For example, you’re currently on the ‘Peter D’Adamo Channel.’

This will not stop filtering. Evidence suggests that we all filter out information that we disagree with. In True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact Society, Farhad Manjoo cites an experiment in which smokers and non-smokers could vary the amount of interference in static filled recordings of speeches. When smokers heard a speech about smoking and cancer risk, they did not try to improve the clarity of the recording. But they did push the button to get a clearer version of the recording when a speech was playing that said that there was no link between smoking and cancer. In non-smokers the exact opposite was true.

Maybe I’m just a libertarian (or just an aging hippy) but I would opt for choosing my own filters --versus having information filtered for me—- especially when the filtering is being done by individuals and organizations that I do not trust and for which I have no respect.

One of the features that can be of most use when GenoTyping someone is actually one of the hardest to come by: Getting the ABO blood groups of your parents.

Its importance should come as no surprise, since epigenetic changes are largely influenced by the patterns of gene activation and silencing that occur as part of

• The heritable epigenetic component (you start off with the patterns of gene expression that your parents give you)
• The prenatal environment (there are two major bursts of methylation activity in the fetus: at about 8-12 weeks, then again in the last trimester)
• The immediate postnatal environment (these are mostly related to gene expression due to hormones such as growth factors)

In fact one of the studies that got me interested in the largely unrecognized effects of blood groups as a modulator of the epigenetic environment was a study that looked at childhood ear infections and blood groups. However, unlike most epidemiologic correlation type studies, this one looked at the blood group of the child’s mother.

Maternal blood group A gave a relative risk (RR) for intervention of 2.82. The noted occurrence of an attack of acute otitis media (AOM) before the first birthday gave a RR of 6.13. When these two factors were used together, the RR climbed steeply to 26.77.

Now to understand just how strong this association is we should look at exactly what a RR (relative risk) is. Basically it is just the odds (over 1) that something will occur over it being random. An RR of 2 (about the RR of elevated cholesterol causing a heart attack) means that people with elevated cholesterol are twice as likely to get a heart attack as people whose cholesterol levels are more desirable. Thus the study is saying that if you are a kid with an ear infection in the first year of life, and you mother is blood group A, you are 26 times more likely to have a recurrence.

Here is a chart I made which compares relative risks for several common problems and factors associated with that risk. Obviously, this is a very strong association.

Are the effects of having a blood group A mother and getting ear infections the result of some sort of fetal programming? We know that some studies have linked the ABO antigens to cellular differentiation (the process where developing cells move from general embryonic 'germ' types to cells with more specific functions, like a pancreatic or epidermis cell.)

ABH antigen expression was considered as suggestive evidence for the assumption that blood group antigens could serve as early immunomorphologic markers of endothelial differentiation of mesenchymal cells, thus specifying the location of future blood vessels. Extending the conceptual framework of blood group antigens' significance we consider them as being possibly involved in the process of fetal morphogenesis.

In epigenetic terms, we may wind up being more interested in your parent's blood types are that perhaps we need be with yours.

Every once in a while, amid the junk mail, bills and catalogs, I receive a letter which surpasses all prior. In a wonderfully sycophantic endeavor this gentleman writes to ask me for a complete set of my works so he can continue on his mission to educate the Indian public about healthy living. Apparently the gentleman does it free of charge.

Sir, your books are on their way.

Been spending time doing tweaks and adjustments to some of the pages both here on www.dadamo.com and also at the NAP site at www.4yourtype.com . The NAP site just needed a little freshening. There are some new features coming along very soon, so I just settled for a face lift. The site uses some javascript to rotate a few banner ads; a nice feature that is both useful and space efficient.

On my main site I've finally bit the bullet and begun to migrate all the blogs from the arcane and unsupported 'Greymatter' blogging software to a very nice package called 'B2evolution.' The difference between the two is astonishing. The new format, much like this blog, is a modern platform that supports moderated comments, allows bloggers to tag their entries, and organize blogs by category. Plus these new programs and much easier to style, so they just look better. B2evolution also supports multiple blogs, so administration looks to be a snap.

Here is a link that will take you to the new blogging platform, in this case Susan Graham's page. Other blogs are accessible from the tabs at the top. The 'Retired' blog features all the great blogs written by folks who are no longer active. Heidi Merritt's great 'On The Diet' column has been converted to the new format as well. Once this gets reorganized by categories, newbies to the diets will have a real resource.

If anyone out there is interesting in blogging, and is willing to commit to a regular blog for at least three months, just leave a comment with your email. I'll get back to you. If you are an retired blogger and want to reactivate your blog, I can do that for you as well. If you are a current active blogger, please contact me so I can arrange a walk-thru for you.

In general, with few exceptions, such as Suzanne, Paul, Debra, Melissa and a select few others, most blogging careers don't seem to pan out over the long run. I believe many folks start out thinking that they will have all this terrific information to share, but then discover that consistent blogging is not all that easy to do. We seem to feel that we have to write some 'major' type of entry and so the first few words never get onto the page. That certainly need not be the case. Many of my best blogs start off with the most trivial of observations and evolve as I continue to write. The trick is to just write what you feel.