Latest / Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor / Wisdom Wednesdays - Not all fat is created equal - and there's a new villain on the scene

Transcript

Wisdom Wednesdays - Not all fat is created equal - and there's a new villain on the scene · Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor

• 0:09
  Speaker 1: Everyone, Welcome to another edition of Wisdom Wednesdays. And today
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: is a very special day because it is the fifth
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: birthday of the podcast. I could not believe it. I
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: actually thought I'd been doing it for about three years
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: and I just checked and it's actually five years, which
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: is crazy. So thank you to you, my listeners, because
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: you're the guys that keep me doing this by listening
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: in every week. And it would be great, a great
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: birthday present for the podcast if you wouldn't mind jumping
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: on to your favorite podcast player, whether it's Spotify, Apple Podcasts,
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: or whatever and leaving a review, because reviews actually really
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: really helped the podcast to get up the charts, and
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: that helps for a whole heap of reasons that I'm
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: not really going to go into right now, but let's
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: on with the podcast. This week, we are going to
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: talk about something that I think is both fascinating and
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: super important for anybody that's interested in our long term health. Now,
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: we all know that carrying too much body fat can
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: be bad for your health, but we all know that
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: obesity is linked to a whole host of chronic diseases.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: But here's the kicker. Not all fat is created equal,
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: where fat is stored in your body has a massive
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: impact on how dangerous it is. And you may already
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: know about some stuff such as visceral fat, which is
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: the fat that is underneath your stomach muscles and around
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: your organ You may know that that is a bad
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: or really bad fat. But even more interestingly, recent research
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: has shown that fat that builds up inside your muscles,
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: called intermuscular fat or imat, might be a very significant
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: play in the development of insulin resistance, type two diabetes,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: chronic kidney disease, and other metabolic diseases, and even physical
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: decline as we age. So let's break that all down. Firstly,
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: let's do a quick recap on visceral fat, which has
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: been the usual suspect for many, many years. And as
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: I said, it's the stuff you can't pinch. It's underneath
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: your stomach muscles, it's around your organs, inside your abdominal cavity,
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: and it's long been known to be a major risk
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: factor for metabolic disease. And unlike the fact that you
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: can pinch under your skin, which is known as subcutaneous fat,
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: visceral fat is more metabolically active and more dangerous. It's
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: actually been called an endocrine organ because it produces its
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: own hormones called arapokins. It also releases inflammatory substances, and
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: it floods the liver with fatty acids which to interfere
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: with blood sugar control and your cholesterol levels. And it's
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: linked long linked with insulin resistance taptoo, diabetes, heart disease,
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: and even dementia. The good news is that visceral fat
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: tends to respond well to lifestyle changes. Things like regular exercise,
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: better sleep, and cutting back on shit food all help
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: to reduce it. But more recently, researchers have turned their
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: attention to this other type of fat that may be
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: even sneakier because it's hiding in places we don't normally look,
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: which is inside our muscles. Now here's where the research
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: gets a bit nuanced. You might have heard the term
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: before intra muscular fat and immediately thought, m that's gotta
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: be bad, But it's not always bad. It turns out
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: that there are two million types of fat that show
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: up in muscle. One is intra mile cellular lipets or ims.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: These are tiny droplets of fat inside your muscle sells themselves.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: And then the other one is intermuscular at a post
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: tissue or IMAT. That's larger fat sales that are between
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: the muscle fibers and the fascia that holds those fibers together. Now,
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: the first one, the imcl those little droplets of fat
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: inside the muscle sales. That's actually normally. In fact, it's
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: been known for quite a few years that athletes often
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: have higher levels of this type of fat, and it's
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: because they burn it as a fuel source during exercise.
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: So with that regular training, the body adapts by folk
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: storing it close to the muscle so that it's easily
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: accessible fuel for muscles that are contracting and need energy.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: And that's pretty cool, and this is known as the
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: athletes paradox. Fit. People can have more intramuscular fat in
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: inside their muscle sales, but they are still very insulin sensitive.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: They don't have diabetes, and it's because they use that
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: fat efficiently, and the body's just very clever because it's going, hey,
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: you're doing lots of exercise, so I'm going to store
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: energy as close to possible to the muscles so that
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: you can have it straight on hand. Now, the second
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: type of fat that I'm at the intermuscular out of
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: post tissue. That's where you've start to see trouble. It,
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: as I've said, builds up between muscle fibers, and it's
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: a bit like marbling in a steak, right. It's not
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: used for fuel like IMCL. Instead, it tends to accumulate
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: in people who are sedentary, people who are overweight, and
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: people who have insulin resistance. Now, what's concerning about i'm
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: at is that it appears to interfere with muscle function.
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: So unlike the other one, which helps the muscle, this
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: imat actually impis the muscle. It increases inflammation, and it
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: drives insulin resistance. So not only does it empower how
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: your muscles work, but also impers your metabolism and increases
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: your risk of developing metabolic disease. And unlike visceral fat,
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: i'm at is often overlooked. You won't see it on
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: a scale or on BMI, and you won't even see
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: it in a DEXA scan. And if you're a regular
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: listener to this podcast, you'll know that I am a
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: big fan of a DEXA scan because not only do
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: they show your bunk density, they show you the amount
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: of muscle that you have. They also show the amount
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: of visceral fat that you have. It turns out that
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: i'm AT only turns up in MRI scans or CT scans,
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: and that's where researchers are now seeing a very clear
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: association between higher i'm AT levels and poorer blood sugar control,
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: even after accounting for other fat stores like belly fat.
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: And in one twenty twenty through three review, researchers noted
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: that intermuscular fat is strongly correlated with insulin resistance, and
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: even worse, it's appears that it interferes with how muscles
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: regenerate and function as we age, So it's not just
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: a metabolic issue, it's a physical one too. And then
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: think about this, This is just a nasty, vicious loop.
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: If it's impairing our insulin resistance and then it's interfering
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: with our muscles. Muscle is the biggest gluco sink. It's
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: the thing that stops you becoming insulin resistant when you're
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: using it. So if it's then interfering with our muscle functions,
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: then your insulin resistance gets worse and that has a
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: negative effect. Then you get more of this intermuscular fat
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: around a nasty, vicious cycle. So what's the takeaway. Well,
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: while there's been a long focus on visceral fat, and
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: rightly so, i'm at, it appears might be just as important,
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: especially for people with obesity, type two diabetes or scarcopania
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: that aids related muscle loss. And while it's a new
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: area of research, it does suggest that we shouldn't be
• 8:11
  Speaker 1: thinking about fat as a number on a scale. Where
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: the fat is stored and how your body is using
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: it really matters. Visceral fat drives liver dysfunction and inflammation,
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: imat interferes with muscle function and insulin sensitivity. Subcutaneous fat
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: the stuff you can pinch, it is the least harmful.
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: So what do we do with all of this? Well,
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: the good news is that the strategies for reducing visceral
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: fat actually work with i'm at as well. So the
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: first one is exercised and especially both in resistance training
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: and high intensity interval training. They help to reduce fat
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: infiltration in the muscle and improves muscle quality as well
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: as reduced visceral fat. And then a diet low in
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: you've guessed that it ultra processed foods, refined carbs, added sugars,
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: and crabby foods with things like a multifiers and flavor
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: enhancers and preservatives. They, if you reduce them, will reduce
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: your overall fat and keep insulin sensitivity in check. And
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: then it's about prioritizing sleep. Poor sleep is very strongly
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: linked to fat accumulation in both visceral areas in the
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: belly and in the muscles. And then it's about tracking
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: your muscle mass, not just fat mass. This is about
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: lifting heavy shit because strong, healthy muscle helps protect you
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: against these effects and a whole host of other chronic diseases. Remember,
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: it's not the fat that's the enemy. It's the dysfunctional
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: fat in the wrong places. Next time you hear somebody
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: saying just lose we it, remind them it's not just
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: about how much fat you have, it's where you carry it,
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: and that visceral fat and the intermuscular fat the i'm at.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: These are the twin drivers of metabolic dysfunction and many
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: lifestyle diseases. So that's it for this week, folks, catch
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: you next time.