Episode 130
130: From Pharma to Photobiomodulation: Sarah Turner’s Journey Into Light-Based Healing
📺 Watch & Subscribe on YouTube
"We are liquid crystal, the fourth phase of water, and that water acts as a conduit for communication," says Sarah Turner, who joins the Quantum Biology Collective podcast to explain how light therapy and structured water could revolutionize our approach to neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson's. A former pharmaceutical researcher turned neuroscientist and biohacker, Sarah shares her journey from traditional drug development to exploring the frontiers of quantum biology and photobiomodulation.
In this eye-opening discussion, Sarah reveals how her work on asthma inhalers led her to discover the profound impact of grounding on drug efficacy, challenging the conventional pharmaceutical paradigm. She explains why we should view the body as an electrical system and how light therapy can "charge the battery" of our brains. Sarah also delves into the intricate relationship between light, water, and cellular health, offering insights into why simply drinking more water isn't enough for true hydration.
Tune in to today's episode to learn why Sarah believes that optimizing our light environment could be the key to preventing and managing neurodegenerative diseases, and why she advocates for a holistic approach to health that includes "good water, good light, and good friends."
5 Key Takeaways
1. Optimize your light environment to support brain health. Get regular exposure to natural sunlight, especially morning and evening red light. Consider using a red light therapy device that contours to the head for targeted brain benefits.
2. Focus on gut health to improve brain function. The gut-brain connection is crucial, so prioritize a healthy diet, manage stress, and consider red light therapy on the abdomen to support the gut microbiome.
3. Stay well-hydrated, but understand that hydration goes beyond just drinking water. Proper light exposure helps structure the water in your cells for optimal function. Combine good hydration with light therapy for best results.
4. Take a holistic approach to health. Optimize your light exposure, nutrition, sleep, relationships, and overall environment rather than relying solely on supplements or interventions for specific conditions.
5. If dealing with neurological issues like Parkinson's, consider red light therapy with 40 Hz pulsing for 10 minutes daily. Track your progress using symptom questionnaires and wearable device data to assess improvements over time.
Memorable Quotes
"We respond in a myriad of ways to the different wavelengths of light from the sun. And so red light therapy is taking a portion of the sun's wavelengths of light, and it's the portion that's usually found at sunrise and sunset because of the angle of the sun at the sky at that point."
"From my point of view, I'm interested in structured water. Water absorbs above 900 nanometers, so that's relatively a longer wavelength of light than most devices. Most devices don't want the light to be absorbed by the water. They want it on the mitochondria. But for my device, I wanted to have these longer wavelengths too, because I want to target water."
"We just need to really understand the importance of light in biology and also in our science because it is something that I feel like has been so far removed from it. But as soon as you start to gain that concept and even do little simple experiments, be outdoors, kind of be your N equals one, I think it becomes more real and tangible."
Connect with Sarah
Website: https://www.cerathrive.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CERASystem
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cerathrive/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebelscientist/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@CeraThrive
Rebel Scientist Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/rebel-scientist/id1544369238
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@cerathrive
X/Twitter: https://x.com/cerathrive
Resources Mentioned
Vielight - https://www.vielight.com/
Oura Ring - https://ouraring.com/
Fitbit - https://www.fitbit.com/
"The Fourth Phase of Water: Beyond Solid, Liquid, and Vapor" by Gerald Pollack - https://amzn.to/3F3fiBQ
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Transcript
Sarah Turner, welcome back to the QVC podcast.
Meredith Oke:It's a pleasure to see you again. I'm excited to
Meredith Oke:dive into neuroscience with you.
Sarah Turner:Thank you. It's always a pleasure to chat to you
Sarah Turner:and be on your show.
Meredith Oke:Super fun. So for those of us who just joined us,
Meredith Oke:we are doing this live with an, with an audience.
Meredith Oke:Members of the QVC Pro community are here
Meredith Oke:listening to my interview with Sarah and then
Meredith Oke:they will all be invited to do a Q and A. So this
Meredith Oke:is a slightly different format than usual. So,
Meredith Oke:Sarah, let's start off. You've been on the
Meredith Oke:podcast before and we did kind of a deep dive
Meredith Oke:into your background. So I really recommend
Meredith Oke:people go listen to that episode. It was really
Meredith Oke:good, but I would like to go over it again just a
Meredith Oke:little bit. Your background in neuroscience, your
Meredith Oke:training in red light therapy, your deep dive
Meredith Oke:into Parkinson's research, how did it all happen?
Meredith Oke:And how did you end up in this weird area of
Meredith Oke:health instead of working for a pharmaceutical
Meredith Oke:company?
Sarah Turner:Well, funny enough, I did start out at the
Sarah Turner:pharmaceutical company. So my, my background is I
Sarah Turner:was a scientific researcher at pharmaceutical
Sarah Turner:companies for, for the first 10 years of my
Sarah Turner:career. And I spent six years with
Sarah Turner:GlaxoSmithKline, one of the biggest, well,
Sarah Turner:biggest worldwide, but certainly the biggest in
Sarah Turner:the uk. And I was looking at researching not
Sarah Turner:actually drugs, but more drug delivery devices.
Sarah Turner:So I was involved in asthma delivery and more
Sarah Turner:specifically, I was on a task force. You know, if
Sarah Turner:there's issues that came up, a task force was
Sarah Turner:sent in to resolve the issue quickly. And one of
Sarah Turner:the main issues that they were looking at at some
Sarah Turner:point was why do these asthma. The new. They had
Sarah Turner:new asthma inhaler devices. Why were they not
Sarah Turner:working as they were expected? Because they knew
Sarah Turner:the drug was good, but for some reason, when they
Sarah Turner:put it out in these, they were like a spherical
Sarah Turner:plastic inhaler, a bit of a change from their
Sarah Turner:usual ones. And what we found very rapidly was
Sarah Turner:it's because the plastic causes a static charge.
Sarah Turner:And so if the, if the artificial lung, because
Sarah Turner:that's what we were testing, we don't test in
Sarah Turner:humans in these labs, you know, everything's
Sarah Turner:tested, you know, in a kind of a simulation. But
Sarah Turner:if that wasn't grounded because these plastic
Sarah Turner:devices actually made a static charge, then you
Sarah Turner:got a different deposition of the drug in the
Sarah Turner:lung. And so I did a lot of experiments where I
Sarah Turner:was grounded, where I was not grounded, where I
Sarah Turner:wore like rubber welly boots, where I wore like
Sarah Turner:special. An outfit that had silver in it. So that
Sarah Turner:we knew I was grounded. I attached myself to,
Sarah Turner:like the bed. Oh, it's the fairies. That's like a
Sarah Turner:fairy chime. But what I found was it makes a big
Sarah Turner:difference whether actually you're grounded on
Sarah Turner:not whether where the drug will deposit in the
Sarah Turner:lung. And to me, this was kind of a bit of a
Sarah Turner:revelation because it was nothing to do with
Sarah Turner:actually the inhaler or the drug delivery. It was
Sarah Turner:purely the state of where you're delivering that
Sarah Turner:drug. Right. In that case, it was into the. We
Sarah Turner:call them stacks, into the kind of simulation of
Sarah Turner:a lung. But in reality, the implication is that
Sarah Turner:if the person isn't grounded or hasn't touched
Sarah Turner:the ground, that the drug is going to. The drug
Sarah Turner:is to deposit in a different place in the body.
Sarah Turner:And so really the solution for the problem is
Sarah Turner:just to make sure everybody is grounded before
Sarah Turner:they start taking these drugs, because
Sarah Turner:potentially you would need less drugs or maybe
Sarah Turner:even no drug at all if that was kind of the
Sarah Turner:problem with the lung function in the first
Sarah Turner:place. So that is really fascinating why I left.
Sarah Turner:One of many reasons. But I think that was
Sarah Turner:probably like the straw that broke the camel's
Sarah Turner:back from why I left the pharmaceuticals. Because
Sarah Turner:really, the solution is not necessarily
Sarah Turner:necessarily then in the pharmaceutical. It's
Sarah Turner:really in the environment of the person. And
Sarah Turner:that's something that is so easy to modify. You
Sarah Turner:know, something as simple as standing out on the
Sarah Turner:ground for 10 minutes could have sold that
Sarah Turner:solution of this. This strange drug deposition in
Sarah Turner:the lung.
Meredith Oke:Isn't that incredible? And it's so interesting to
Meredith Oke:me how, you know, living as we all exist in the
Meredith Oke:quantum field, you never know what, where. What
Meredith Oke:thread is going to lead us to that next insight.
Meredith Oke:So you were trying to figure out why the drug
Meredith Oke:delivery system didn't work, and you ended up
Meredith Oke:uncovering the science of grounding and how
Meredith Oke:important it is to humans, which is a completely
Meredith Oke:different paradigm than what the pharmaceutical
Meredith Oke:company was operating in.
Sarah Turner:It's a completely different paradigm. And
Sarah Turner:actually, with credit to Glaxo, they did actually
Sarah Turner:start to initiate some very interesting studies
Sarah Turner:into all kinds of like bipolar drug deposition in
Sarah Turner:the lung, different kinds of plastics, different
Sarah Turner:kinds of effects. I mean, ultimately they're just
Sarah Turner:looking for a plastic that doesn't cause the
Sarah Turner:effects. You know, they're not ultimately looking
Sarah Turner:for solutions for people to dissipate the effect
Sarah Turner:in themselves. You know, which is. Which is
Sarah Turner:really what is available to everybody. I mean,
Sarah Turner:they are still a business. But it was a very
Sarah Turner:interesting insight for me about how charge in
Sarah Turner:the body specifically can have a very dramatic
Sarah Turner:effect. And you know, we were talking about
Sarah Turner:inhaled products, but you can apply that to
Sarah Turner:anything that's inhaled. You know, we're inhaling
Sarah Turner:fine particles and things in our environments all
Sarah Turner:the time. You know, whether that's for the good
Sarah Turner:or for the bad. The way that our bodies respond
Sarah Turner:to our environment very much depends on the
Sarah Turner:charge in our bodies. So, you know, in order to
Sarah Turner:maximize the efficacy of all the systems in the
Sarah Turner:body, something very simple like grounding and
Sarah Turner:kind of. We know this now. There's been a lot of
Sarah Turner:books written about earthing and grounding, but
Sarah Turner:this is a very real demonstration of that. So,
Sarah Turner:yes, that was very interesting for me. And then I
Sarah Turner:left the pharmaceutical industry and I actually
Sarah Turner:pursued nutritional medicine because for me, that
Sarah Turner:was the next step. It's like, okay, how can we
Sarah Turner:best prepare the body? We can do grounding, but
Sarah Turner:maybe we can also change ourselves from the
Sarah Turner:inside with nutrition. But actually, that didn't
Sarah Turner:go far enough because for a lot of times, you
Sarah Turner:know, your mindset is. Your mind state is so
Sarah Turner:intrinsically linked that you can change your
Sarah Turner:nutrition and not have an effect. So I went on to
Sarah Turner:study clinical neuroscience, and that was really
Sarah Turner:where I started to learn more about the brain and
Sarah Turner:brain function and then start to look at ways to
Sarah Turner:modify brain function. You know, my focus changed
Sarah Turner:from that point. I moved to the States. I got
Sarah Turner:involved in the whole biohacking movement. I did
Sarah Turner:Jack Cruz Cruise. I studied various people. I
Sarah Turner:went and interviewed May Wan Ho. So. So that was
Sarah Turner:the point really, I suppose, about 15 years ago
Sarah Turner:when I moved to the States, that I got mostly
Sarah Turner:involved in looking very seriously at the brain
Sarah Turner:and brain function and ways that we could modify
Sarah Turner:that with an alternative medicine slant.
Meredith Oke:Right. And what were some of the insights that
Meredith Oke:you had that were different from traditional
Meredith Oke:neuroscience?
Sarah Turner:Yes, well, of course, I think probably your group
Sarah Turner:probably knows this very well, but most
Sarah Turner:traditional courses is in biology and
Sarah Turner:neuroscience are not teaching biophysics, you
Sarah Turner:know, so. So at this point, I had three science
Sarah Turner:degrees because I had already got a biology
Sarah Turner:science degree. I went and got my nutritional
Sarah Turner:medicine degree, and then I had a clinical
Sarah Turner:neuroscience master's degree. At no point did
Sarah Turner:anybody ever mention how biology interacts with
Sarah Turner:light, how potentially water changes its
Sarah Turner:structure when you have an interaction with
Sarah Turner:light. Nobody was really talking a lot, even
Sarah Turner:about circadian biology. So we was. I was still
Sarah Turner:much taught the kind of lock and key, kind of
Sarah Turner:more biochemical view of the brain, even with all
Sarah Turner:of that education. So it wasn't really. Until I
Sarah Turner:really started getting into the work of, like I
Sarah Turner:say, Dr. May Wan Ho, Dr. Jack Cruz, you know, all
Sarah Turner:of the people who went then and all of the people
Sarah Turner:who went before, because obviously there was lots
Sarah Turner:of people talking about light, for example, a
Sarah Turner:long time before then. But they were, they were
Sarah Turner:the ones who really got me to understand it in a
Sarah Turner:scientific way. So yes, it was, it's a total
Sarah Turner:turnaround from any of my academic training. I
Sarah Turner:can just say from my academic training. At least
Sarah Turner:now I have the background to understand how the
Sarah Turner:brain works, that I can apply these new
Sarah Turner:learnings. Because really they were all new
Sarah Turner:learnings. All of the quantum biology piece was
Sarah Turner:new learnings for sure. Right.
Meredith Oke:And I'm, I'm so interested in that because I
Meredith Oke:think it's actually a really, really good
Meredith Oke:combination to have a very strong foundation in
Meredith Oke:the traditional model. So that way when you layer
Meredith Oke:on the biophysics piece, the quantum piece, you
Meredith Oke:can fill in the missing pieces, of which there
Meredith Oke:are many. But you can also speak to people who
Meredith Oke:are still living and working out of the old
Meredith Oke:paradigm and be a bridge. The flip side of that
Meredith Oke:is that, and this goes for so many people in this
Meredith Oke:community, I don't want to say out on your own,
Meredith Oke:right, but you're charting a new path. Like we're
Meredith Oke:all sort of contributing to the creation of an
Meredith Oke:alternative to what is currently the mainstream
Meredith Oke:structure. So what did that look like for you?
Meredith Oke:How did you find your way? How did you find your
Meredith Oke:people? How did you support yourself?
Sarah Turner:Well, actually when I came to the States, I came
Sarah Turner:with a company. I was looking at some very way
Sarah Turner:out there science focusing on consciousness
Sarah Turner:interface devices.
Meredith Oke:Love it. What's that about?
Sarah Turner:Very, very interesting because there was some
Sarah Turner:research that was carried out at Stanford
Sarah Turner:actually where they were looking at the ability
Sarah Turner:to influence seemingly random events with the
Sarah Turner:power of the mind. So you know, the experiments,
Sarah Turner:the original experiments they called the pet. It
Sarah Turner:was actually Princeton, not Stanford. The
Sarah Turner:original experiments were called the PEAR studies
Sarah Turner:where they were using like a, a wall with
Sarah Turner:different color ping pong balls and looking to
Sarah Turner:see whether even though it should be a random
Sarah Turner:distribution, could you maybe focus on one color
Sarah Turner:and therefore somehow your own focused intention
Sarah Turner:was influencing the result. And other people have
Sarah Turner:done interesting experiments. William Tiller also
Sarah Turner:did some interesting experiments looking at
Sarah Turner:whether you could potentially affect the ph of a
Sarah Turner:liquid. All kinds of very interesting things. Can
Sarah Turner:you influence, you know, I know that there are
Sarah Turner:now different devices which have different random
Sarah Turner:colors. Can you predict the next color that comes
Sarah Turner:from a. In effect, it's like a random event
Sarah Turner:generator, Random event generator or pseudo
Sarah Turner:random event generator that's inside Some kind of
Sarah Turner:technology that mainly is what people use
Sarah Turner:nowadays rather than these kind of big like ping
Sarah Turner:pong balls on a wall. But it's the same concept
Sarah Turner:and it was a very interesting time because there
Sarah Turner:were, there are a lot of people looking at this.
Sarah Turner:It seems quite wacky and woo woo. But actually
Sarah Turner:when you meet the people who are doing the
Sarah Turner:research, they are, they're not at all. They're
Sarah Turner:actually very serious scientifically minded
Sarah Turner:people. It's just, you know, our measuring
Sarah Turner:mechanisms, you know, we, we don't have a good
Sarah Turner:way for kind of measuring what that could be. And
Sarah Turner:I think it comes down to either the science that
Sarah Turner:we're using to measure is wrong, which is the,
Sarah Turner:you know, that could be the case, or you know,
Sarah Turner:we're looking at a different kind of effect, you
Sarah Turner:know, maybe some kind of strange effect where,
Sarah Turner:you know, there's something going on with the
Sarah Turner:observation. But it's, it was a difficult place
Sarah Turner:to be for a long time because like you say,
Sarah Turner:there's so much resistance. And so, you know,
Sarah Turner:you're kind of labeled as fringe at best and kind
Sarah Turner:of wacky woo woo at worst. So you kind of have to
Sarah Turner:take that on the chin. And actually as I started
Sarah Turner:to move through that process and really kind of
Sarah Turner:get an understanding of it, I got introduced to
Sarah Turner:the concept of structured water by interviewing
Sarah Turner:Professor Jerry Pollock, who of course wrote the
Sarah Turner:book Fourth Phase Water. And this is something
Sarah Turner:that I could really get into because although
Sarah Turner:it's kind of still on the fringe if you think
Sarah Turner:about people talking about ordered water,
Sarah Turner:particularly in the brain, but it is something
Sarah Turner:where you can actually measure the effect. And
Sarah Turner:photobiomodulation has long history of research
Sarah Turner:and it works, you know, and it was through doing
Sarah Turner:that and looking at structured water and then
Sarah Turner:applying it to the brain, I got involved on some
Sarah Turner:like, as you mentioned before, Parkinson's
Sarah Turner:trials, I could see a real tangible, measurable
Sarah Turner:effect. So I made the jump to that because
Sarah Turner:although I still love that kind of woo woo world,
Sarah Turner:it's a difficult place to kind of base yourself
Sarah Turner:permanently because we, perhaps we're not using
Sarah Turner:the right science to record those observations.
Sarah Turner:But photobiomodulation straddles both worlds
Sarah Turner:because we can go into the whole esoteric side of
Sarah Turner:light science, which is fascinating, but we can
Sarah Turner:also get very real, tangible clinical effects
Sarah Turner:that we can use right now to kind of provide
Sarah Turner:evidence and to make this mainstream. So really
Sarah Turner:that's why I'm kind of in my happy spot right now
Sarah Turner:in between this kind of really exciting esoteric
Sarah Turner:and fringe world of Light therapy, but also in a
Sarah Turner:very firm, hard, scientific world of
Sarah Turner:photobiomodulation, where we can actually show
Sarah Turner:clinical data.
Meredith Oke:I love this so much because, yes, I. And I get
Meredith Oke:that question a lot. Or that, you know, that
Meredith Oke:comes up a lot. And people like, oh, is this just
Meredith Oke:like some biohacking thing? I don't know, I'm
Meredith Oke:just gonna, like, you know, how many minutes in
Meredith Oke:front of the red light for this or that or
Meredith Oke:whatever.
Sarah Turner:Like.
Meredith Oke:Or is this more of a spiritual, you know, open
Meredith Oke:our consciousness to a new level and it's like,
Meredith Oke:well, it's both, you know, what. What door are
Meredith Oke:you coming in? So I love that, that you're
Meredith Oke:bridging that and, sorry, there's someone at my
Meredith Oke:door. And I do see light as the starting point to
Meredith Oke:go in any direction that you want to go. Light
Meredith Oke:incorporated with the structured water. So you
Meredith Oke:move. So you started in pharmaceuticals, then you
Meredith Oke:moved into consciousness, and now you're in
Meredith Oke:photobiomodulation. So, yes, this crowd is
Meredith Oke:obviously very on the call here today, is
Meredith Oke:obviously very familiar with photobiomodulation.
Meredith Oke:But for those who are tuning into this podcast,
Meredith Oke:who maybe have heard of red light therapy, they
Meredith Oke:know a little bit about it. Could you give your
Meredith Oke:description of what it is and why it's so
Meredith Oke:important?
Sarah Turner:Yeah, I mean, we can kind of go very granular or
Sarah Turner:we can go very surface level with
Sarah Turner:photobiomodulation. I mean, it is just a long
Sarah Turner:fancy word for light therapy, right? Photo being
Sarah Turner:light bio, you know, modifying something,
Sarah Turner:modifying biology with light really is. Is the
Sarah Turner:definition. And it's a new definition because
Sarah Turner:previous, a lot of the devices that we use were
Sarah Turner:laser, so they had to change the definition from
Sarah Turner:cold level laser therapy or low level laser
Sarah Turner:therapy to something more inclusive because
Sarah Turner:people now use different light sources. So
Sarah Turner:photobiomodulation was the term for better or for
Sarah Turner:worse. It's a bit of a mouthful, but to me, it's
Sarah Turner:just the concept of using light to change our
Sarah Turner:biology. And very simplistically, the sun is our
Sarah Turner:major power source. And it's something that for
Sarah Turner:literally thousands and thousands of years, it's
Sarah Turner:something that biology has evolved alongside the
Sarah Turner:sun. And that's really why biology is here at
Sarah Turner:all, is because of the sun. So we respond in a
Sarah Turner:myriad of ways to the different wavelengths of
Sarah Turner:light from the sun. And so red light therapy is
Sarah Turner:taking a portion of the sun's wavelengths of
Sarah Turner:light, and it's the portion that's usually found
Sarah Turner:at sunrise and sunset because of the angle of the
Sarah Turner:sun at the sky at that Point we get this longer
Sarah Turner:wave light because if we think about light as a,
Sarah Turner:as a spectrum going from shortwave to long wave,
Sarah Turner:red light is at the longer wave of the visible
Sarah Turner:range and a little bit further on. So we're
Sarah Turner:talking about longer wave visible light and
Sarah Turner:slightly longer than that. And this is like I
Sarah Turner:say, sunrise and sunset. This light will
Sarah Turner:penetrate our bodies because actually our bodies
Sarah Turner:are very transparent to near infrared light. And
Sarah Turner:then we have a whole cascade of biological
Sarah Turner:effects. Now probably we're just at the start of,
Sarah Turner:of working out exactly how this works with our
Sarah Turner:biology. Because if we discussed before, this is
Sarah Turner:a new science, people, you know, have not really
Sarah Turner:published a lot on the mechanisms of light
Sarah Turner:therapy because I think, you know, we, we haven't
Sarah Turner:historically applied the physics angle to
Sarah Turner:biology, but we do know it's received by the
Sarah Turner:mitochondria, which is where our body makes
Sarah Turner:energy. We do know that it increases ATP. We do
Sarah Turner:know that it affects reactive oxygen species. We
Sarah Turner:know there's a transient release of nitric oxide.
Sarah Turner:So those small things mean that we have energy
Sarah Turner:and blood flow. And for a lot of people, you
Sarah Turner:know, that's, that may be enough. I think
Sarah Turner:probably what's going on is far more complex and
Sarah Turner:intricate than that. You know, because we have
Sarah Turner:synaptogenesis, we have neurogenesis. There are
Sarah Turner:lots of different light receivers, not just the
Sarah Turner:mitochondria. I mean, I came into it via water.
Sarah Turner:So, you know, my. One of the things I've always
Sarah Turner:got running is how are we actually changing the
Sarah Turner:structure of water in our bodies? And what are
Sarah Turner:those implications? Huge and many. But we have
Sarah Turner:other, you know, anything with an aromatic ring
Sarah Turner:is going to oscillate to a certain extent to
Sarah Turner:certain wavelengths of light, and specifically
Sarah Turner:red light too. So our bodies are really
Sarah Turner:oscillating, vibrating with these different
Sarah Turner:wavelengths of light. We live indoor lifestyles
Sarah Turner:now. You know, there's not many people who are
Sarah Turner:outside all day and all night kind of getting
Sarah Turner:those wavelengths of light. So we're very
Sarah Turner:deficient, we're very deficient as a species in
Sarah Turner:long wave red light. If you start to put those
Sarah Turner:back, it's like any deficiency. As soon as you
Sarah Turner:start to put those, those wavelengths back, the
Sarah Turner:body starts to respond and sometimes in, in, you
Sarah Turner:know, very amazing ways, because your body's been
Sarah Turner:deficient in some, something you give it back,
Sarah Turner:the body starts working. So I think from a very
Sarah Turner:simplistic point of view, it's as simple as that.
Sarah Turner:I see it almost like a vitamin deficiency or any
Sarah Turner:other deficiency. As soon as you put that Back,
Sarah Turner:the body will then start working because, you
Sarah Turner:know, you now have the tools that the body needs
Sarah Turner:to function.
Meredith Oke:Yeah, that makes so much sense. And I think it's
Meredith Oke:such a good way to present it and to help people
Meredith Oke:to think about it. When I sort of, I'm out in the
Meredith Oke:world and, you know, this winter I've talked to
Meredith Oke:so many people who are like, oh, I had the flu
Meredith Oke:and it's been three weeks and I still don't feel
Meredith Oke:better. And I'm like, you should really go get an
Meredith Oke:infrared sauna. Right. There's a little place
Meredith Oke:near, near where I live where you can just pay
Meredith Oke:like $30 for half an hour and sit in there. And
Meredith Oke:they're like, what? And it's because, like, we
Meredith Oke:lack, we lack the language, we lack the, the
Meredith Oke:paradigm to think about light and so to talk
Meredith Oke:about it in. I'm like, it's like food, you know,
Meredith Oke:the difference between processed food and, and
Meredith Oke:real food. Same goes for light. But, you know,
Meredith Oke:it's the way our lives are structured. It's so
Meredith Oke:hard for many of us to get what we need from the
Meredith Oke:sun because we're just not outside enough. So,
Meredith Oke:so, and so now I want to get into the, into the
Meredith Oke:brain a little bit because there's a lot of,
Meredith Oke:there are a lot of red light therapy devices on
Meredith Oke:the market, you know, a lot of quality products
Meredith Oke:that will make a difference in your life, but
Meredith Oke:most of them are not specific to the brain. And
Meredith Oke:with your background in neuroscience and then the
Meredith Oke:new paradigm you've decided to focus on, on the
Meredith Oke:brain. So tell us from a, from a biophysics point
Meredith Oke:of view, from the quantum biologic perspective,
Meredith Oke:how you see the brain working and why it needs
Meredith Oke:red light.
Sarah Turner:Yeah, I think we, we, we have kind of lost sight
Sarah Turner:of ourselves a little bit as light beings, you
Sarah Turner:know, of, of really running online as a major
Sarah Turner:energy source. Again, it's something alien. It's
Sarah Turner:not something that we've been made aware of. And
Sarah Turner:maybe it's kind of even less obvious to us now
Sarah Turner:that we do lead these indoor lives. And maybe
Sarah Turner:we're not so conscious of, you know, the cycles
Sarah Turner:of light, the cycles of the sun. You know, a lot
Sarah Turner:of that has been taken away from us. You know, we
Sarah Turner:don't do our own farming. We, you know, we're
Sarah Turner:really very much kind of removed from this
Sarah Turner:understanding of, of how we respond to light. And
Sarah Turner:from a point of view of how the brain is working,
Sarah Turner:let's say the brain is covered in potential light
Sarah Turner:receivers. So the mitochondria, the water in our
Sarah Turner:brains, the flavins in our brains, the opsins in
Sarah Turner:our brains. So we're covered in light receivers.
Sarah Turner:And so from my point of view, it's how can we
Sarah Turner:optimize getting the this kind of beneficial
Sarah Turner:light onto the brain in a way that's going to
Sarah Turner:have a therapeutic effect? So from my research,
Sarah Turner:you know, I think we, we know that we get light
Sarah Turner:onto the brain. We do know that the skull is a
Sarah Turner:barrier because, you know, you've got quite a lot
Sarah Turner:of bone. You know, the brain is contained in the
Sarah Turner:skull. And although it's not dark in there, you
Sarah Turner:know, we are receiving and emitting light from
Sarah Turner:our brains. We do have to make sure that the
Sarah Turner:light goes in. And with light, the angle is very
Sarah Turner:important because if you have something that's
Sarah Turner:kind of square to you and you know the angle is
Sarah Turner:not right, the light is very bouncy. Light is
Sarah Turner:just going to bounce off different surfaces. So,
Sarah Turner:you know, if you see light coming off of, if you
Sarah Turner:see yourself shining up red when you're doing the
Sarah Turner:light therapy, a lot of that is light that's
Sarah Turner:coming off you. It's not actually going in. So in
Sarah Turner:order for light to actually get onto the surface
Sarah Turner:of the brain, we know that we have to have
Sarah Turner:something that fits flush to the head and is
Sarah Turner:contoured in the right way, that the angle is
Sarah Turner:just right. So there are a lot of light therapy
Sarah Turner:devices for the brain, and all of them are either
Sarah Turner:like a helmet or something that actually pushes
Sarah Turner:up close to the head. And the reason for that is
Sarah Turner:you really do have to get the right angle with
Sarah Turner:regards to the wavelength. You also need to have
Sarah Turner:near infrared, because red light is surface
Sarah Turner:level. So red light is going to get kind of get
Sarah Turner:the blood and it's going to get the skin and it's
Sarah Turner:going to do good work. But in order to get onto
Sarah Turner:the surface of the brain, you need near infrared.
Sarah Turner:So that's the longer wave I was talking about. So
Sarah Turner:from my point of view, I'm interested in
Sarah Turner:structured water. Water absorbs above 900
Sarah Turner:nanometers, so that that's relatively a longer
Sarah Turner:wavelength of light than most devices. Most
Sarah Turner:devices don't want the light to be absorbed by
Sarah Turner:the water. They want it on the mitochondria. But
Sarah Turner:for my device, I wanted to have these longer
Sarah Turner:wavelengths too, because I want to target water.
Sarah Turner:So you need to have a device that is at least 850
Sarah Turner:nanometers. Mine also does 940 and 1070 because
Sarah Turner:I'm targeting all kinds of different light
Sarah Turner:receivers in the brain. But the main thing is to
Sarah Turner:have something that's flush and then the other
Sarah Turner:thing is hair. We all have different kinds of
Sarah Turner:hair. And although I'm not saying that hair is
Sarah Turner:going to be directly a barrier, it will change
Sarah Turner:the absorption. You know, the darker your hair,
Sarah Turner:the more light it will absorb. The thicker your
Sarah Turner:hair, the more it will kind of reflect and bounce
Sarah Turner:the light. So from my point of view, I wanted to
Sarah Turner:give a consistent dose because I'm making a home
Sarah Turner:use device, you know, for many people to use. So
Sarah Turner:in order for me to be sure that I'm giving
Sarah Turner:everyone the same dose, my device just goes
Sarah Turner:through the front part of the forehead and also
Sarah Turner:you're there on the frontal cortex. You know,
Sarah Turner:this is a very important part of the brain. It's
Sarah Turner:decision making. And a lot of neural projections
Sarah Turner:end here in, in the prefrontal cortex. So if
Sarah Turner:we're thinking about how lights working in a
Sarah Turner:brain, and again, this is where we have to go a
Sarah Turner:little bit, we have to be a little imaginative
Sarah Turner:because we really don't have a lot of data on why
Sarah Turner:something like Parkinson's. It's really deep in
Sarah Turner:the brain, right. And you're shining light onto
Sarah Turner:the surface. Why is that responding so well?
Sarah Turner:Maybe it's because you have a global effect of
Sarah Turner:water. Maybe neurons are acting of waves guides,
Sarah Turner:maybe there's effective microtubules. Something
Sarah Turner:is going on. But if it, but whatever it is, it
Sarah Turner:does seem that this part of the brain responds
Sarah Turner:very well, even if you've got an issue with
Sarah Turner:something that's deeper in the brain. So from my
Sarah Turner:point of view, this is a great target, the
Sarah Turner:prefrontal cortex. There's no hair, there's no
Sarah Turner:barrier. You can actually get a reasonable amount
Sarah Turner:of light onto the surface of the brain. It's
Sarah Turner:still not easy. You're still getting a fraction
Sarah Turner:of the light. And that's why I also use a body
Sarah Turner:panel, because, because the effect of light is
Sarah Turner:systemic. So if you can shine light into another
Sarah Turner:part of the body, you're also going to have an
Sarah Turner:effect on the brain. You know, if you're shining
Sarah Turner:light into, onto the blood and the mitochondria,
Sarah Turner:picking it up, you know, that's still going to
Sarah Turner:end up in your brain. We're a huge interconnected
Sarah Turner:system, you know, you can't. So treat your body
Sarah Turner:holistically was also another one of my, another
Sarah Turner:one of my reasonings for doing a dual, a dual
Sarah Turner:system, a dual device system where you could
Sarah Turner:target different parts of the body and still have
Sarah Turner:a brain effect.
Meredith Oke:Right? Because to use Mei1ho's words. If we're
Meredith Oke:liquid crystal, then yes, everything is traveling
Meredith Oke:at the speed of light or faster all through our
Meredith Oke:body. You have the gut, which is communicating
Meredith Oke:with the brain. So light on the prefrontal cortex
Meredith Oke:and light on the gut. I wanted to talk a little
Meredith Oke:bit about these neurodegenerative diseases. So
Meredith Oke:Parkinson's. I feel like when I think about the
Meredith Oke:generation above me, my parents generation, the
Meredith Oke:parents of my friends, cancer and Parkinson's,
Meredith Oke:it's like I don't. It seems to me that almost
Meredith Oke:every family, someone has one of those two. So
Meredith Oke:talk to me about what Parkinson's is. I know that
Meredith Oke:you were involved in some studies using red light
Meredith Oke:therapy on people with Parkinson's and the big
Meredith Oke:lab using big lab machines. So you've now
Meredith Oke:developed a home use device. What is going on?
Meredith Oke:How is Parkinson's and early onset Alzheimer's
Meredith Oke:related to light? I know there's a lot of
Meredith Oke:research out showing that disrupted circadian
Meredith Oke:rhythms, having light in the bedroom while you're
Meredith Oke:sleeping has been linked to these. I think more
Meredith Oke:than linked. I think there's probably a causal
Meredith Oke:mechanism that's been shown by now, but so much
Meredith Oke:of the lead up to these diseases has been linked
Meredith Oke:to light. What is going on and how does adding in
Meredith Oke:photobiomodulation help to work with these
Meredith Oke:diseases?
Sarah Turner:Parkinson's People may know that Parkinson's is a
Sarah Turner:degeneration of the cistantia nigra. It's neurons
Sarah Turner:in a certain part of the brain, fairly deep in
Sarah Turner:the brain, and you have degeneration of the
Sarah Turner:neurons there. And even the word substantia
Sarah Turner:nigra. It's interesting because it implies black,
Sarah Turner:doesn't it? Nigra, you know, it's a word for
Sarah Turner:black. And we know that if there's a dark matter
Sarah Turner:in the body that we're probably thinking about
Sarah Turner:melanin and where, you know, that's why you have
Sarah Turner:these different. You have different kinds of
Sarah Turner:molecules that are doing different things in the
Sarah Turner:brain. It's very interesting that Parkinson's is.
Sarah Turner:Seems to be this disease which is caused by this
Sarah Turner:particular dark neurons being degenerated. And we
Sarah Turner:kind of know from a quantum biology point of view
Sarah Turner:how important things like melanins are from a
Sarah Turner:conduction point of view, from an electrically
Sarah Turner:conductive view in the brain. Now, that's
Sarah Turner:obviously not the orthodox scientific take on it,
Sarah Turner:but if you kind of go back to thinking about the
Sarah Turner:body as being electric and it's just really about
Sarah Turner:redox potential and how electrons are moving in
Sarah Turner:our brain and how light is penetrating the brain.
Sarah Turner:I think it puts a very different slant on
Sarah Turner:Parkinson's and why that would respond so quickly
Sarah Turner:to light therapy. You know, you have a lack of
Sarah Turner:this pigment in the brain which is making the
Sarah Turner:brain more conductive. And then you start to
Sarah Turner:shine light therapy on which is in essence kind
Sarah Turner:of charging up the brain in a very real way, you
Sarah Turner:know, in a like adding electrons to the brain and
Sarah Turner:then you start to see these beneficial effects.
Sarah Turner:But, you know, from an orthodox point of view,
Sarah Turner:there is a degeneration of these neurons cause
Sarah Turner:unknown in orthodox sites. But, you know, of
Sarah Turner:course we live, we're leading lifestyles where
Sarah Turner:you have got things which are going to reduce
Sarah Turner:your redox. You know, people aren't grounding
Sarah Turner:outside, people are watching blue screens, we're
Sarah Turner:surrounded by different WI fi. There's a lot of
Sarah Turner:things happening in our environment which could
Sarah Turner:potentially lower the charge or the redox
Sarah Turner:potential we have in our body, which may in turn
Sarah Turner:lead to degenerative diseases. And you know,
Sarah Turner:there are various genes and things which are
Sarah Turner:linked to having certain weaknesses in certain
Sarah Turner:body systems. So, you know that Alzheimer's,
Sarah Turner:Parkinson's, all these neurodegeneration are also
Sarah Turner:linked to certain genetic predispositions. So I
Sarah Turner:think really it's just a combination of genetic
Sarah Turner:and potentially epigenetic predispositions
Sarah Turner:combined with lifestyle that puts you in a
Sarah Turner:position where you are not able for whatever
Sarah Turner:reason to charge your body and your brain. So
Sarah Turner:that's why, you know, if you start to think of
Sarah Turner:the body more from our point, you know, very
Sarah Turner:simple battery point of view, it's just a
Sarah Turner:depleted battery is the issue. And what you're
Sarah Turner:doing with light is you're just charging the
Sarah Turner:battery. I mean, I think, I think it really is as
Sarah Turner:simple as that. Obviously, if you really start to
Sarah Turner:look at the biochemistry, lots of interesting
Sarah Turner:things are going on. And, and Parkinson's is an
Sarah Turner:interesting one because it's gut health too. You
Sarah Turner:know, I think it's mainly recognized now that
Sarah Turner:Parkinson's starts in the gut because we have a
Sarah Turner:lot of nervous tissue in the gut. We have the
Sarah Turner:microbiome that lives in the gut. We have the
Sarah Turner:vagus connection there. You know, again, this is
Sarah Turner:hugely important from a point of view of that
Sarah Turner:systemic effect of what's going on. You know, if
Sarah Turner:you have leaky gut and you have inflammation
Sarah Turner:caused by metabolites going into your blood, then
Sarah Turner:you have neuroinflammation too. You know,
Sarah Turner:everything is systemic. You know, nothing is
Sarah Turner:contained in its own compartment. So this, all
Sarah Turner:kinds of things cause this Leaky gut again, maybe
Sarah Turner:bad food, maybe pesticides, maybe pollution, bad
Sarah Turner:habits, bad relationships. You know, if you're
Sarah Turner:constantly stressed, you know, you're potentially
Sarah Turner:changing the chemicals in your gut and causing
Sarah Turner:leaky gut. So everything is connected, I think,
Sarah Turner:you know, very simple. Eat well, sleep well, have
Sarah Turner:good relationships. You know, that's the kind of
Sarah Turner:thing we need to do. If we've got ourselves in a
Sarah Turner:position where we've already got the genetic
Sarah Turner:predisposition combined with a poor environment,
Sarah Turner:that's really what causes any kind of, not only
Sarah Turner:neurodegeneration, but probably any kind of
Sarah Turner:chronic disease. How it manifests is probably
Sarah Turner:just a bit of a mixture of, you know, the cards
Sarah Turner:you were dealt with initially.
Meredith Oke:Right. So it's interesting you say that. I was
Meredith Oke:involved in an exchange on Twitter recently and
Meredith Oke:someone was saying, we need to stop calling it
Meredith Oke:mental health and physical health. And someone
Meredith Oke:was like, what should we call it? And the guy was
Meredith Oke:like, health? How about just health? It's
Meredith Oke:everything. So I'm going to open it up to
Meredith Oke:questions from. We have a lot of curious, curious
Meredith Oke:cats on the call today. Who has a question for
Meredith Oke:Sarah? This is being recorded, so raise your hand
Meredith Oke:or just unmute yourself and jump right in. As I
Meredith Oke:was saying, these are our practitioner. This is
Meredith Oke:our practitioner community. Who's on here today?
Meredith Oke:Who wants to go first? Lynn. Lynn, just unmute
Meredith Oke:yourself and ask your question. You can't. Okay,
Meredith Oke:let me. Okay, so this is from Lynn. Lynn wants to
Meredith Oke:know about red light protocols specifically for
Meredith Oke:Parkinson's.
Sarah Turner:Yes. So at the moment, I do have a small cohort
Sarah Turner:of young onset Parkinson's, actually. And that's
Sarah Turner:just because it's just so happened that that's
Sarah Turner:the community of people that have come for some,
Sarah Turner:you know how it is, somebody gets a result from
Sarah Turner:an illness and then they recommend to friends and
Sarah Turner:then you have a little community. And what
Sarah Turner:they're finding mainly is the. I have a program
Sarah Turner:in my headband that also oscillates at 40 hertz,
Sarah Turner:because we know that as well as shining light
Sarah Turner:onto the brain to have an effect, you can also
Sarah Turner:pulse that light at certain frequencies. The
Sarah Turner:brain is pulsing at different frequencies all the
Sarah Turner:time in hugely complex ways. But the hertz
Sarah Turner:frequency, or number of times of oscillations a
Sarah Turner:second is, is the one that we usually measure
Sarah Turner:when we're doing something like QEEG, which is an
Sarah Turner:electroencephalogram. And 40 times a second seems
Sarah Turner:to be a sweet spot for kind of enabling the brain
Sarah Turner:to entrain to a frequency where you're more alert
Sarah Turner:and Attentive. So the protocol that we currently
Sarah Turner:have for managing Parkinson's symptoms, and I
Sarah Turner:want to be very clear that I'm not talking about
Sarah Turner:curing, preventing, treating or diagnosing
Sarah Turner:disease. I'm talking about symptom management. A
Sarah Turner:40 Hz pulsing frequency with light on a headband.
Sarah Turner:Also utilizing a body pad seems to be having the
Sarah Turner:best result. And it's just 10 minutes a day on my
Sarah Turner:device, which is about 50 milliwatts if you're
Sarah Turner:using a different product, maybe just kind of
Sarah Turner:titrate up or down depending on the power. But I
Sarah Turner:would say with that, it's fairly low power.
Sarah Turner:Actually, it's a fairly low power device. Oh, and
Sarah Turner:Lynn's also asking, what do I think about
Sarah Turner:Vielight? I think they're awesome. I think
Sarah Turner:they're a brilliant company that's doing some
Sarah Turner:great results, great research. Should I say Dr.
Sarah Turner:Lou Lim? I've seen him talk many times and he's
Sarah Turner:always at the frontier of things. So, yeah, I
Sarah Turner:think it's a good product.
Meredith Oke:And what's the difference? Violated. That's the
Meredith Oke:one that goes up your nose, or am I thinking of
Meredith Oke:something else?
Sarah Turner:V. Light violet. They have. Yes. They have one
Sarah Turner:that goes up the nose and then they have. It's
Sarah Turner:kind of like different little pods they have. And
Sarah Turner:they're specifically targeting the default mode
Sarah Turner:network. So theirs goes on the default mode
Sarah Turner:network here, which is a bit awkward if you've
Sarah Turner:got hair. But I think they must have worked a way
Sarah Turner:to kind of push it in there. And then they have
Sarah Turner:an intranasal. And their idea is you're getting
Sarah Turner:light onto the kind of the olfactory bulb at the
Sarah Turner:back. But they have, they, I think their devices,
Sarah Turner:they sell different ones. So they have an alpha
Sarah Turner:and a gamma. So one is doing pulsing it 10 times
Sarah Turner:a second, one's pulsing at 40, but I don't think
Sarah Turner:it's in the same device. Unless I'm wrong, they
Sarah Turner:might have come out with a combination device.
Sarah Turner:But again, it's their kind of way of adjusting of
Sarah Turner:kind of targeting systemic is that they use the
Sarah Turner:nose, I use the gut because I'm interested very
Sarah Turner:much in gut health. And I think if you can solve
Sarah Turner:your gut health, a lot of the times the brain
Sarah Turner:issues go away on their own. So I'm very much
Sarah Turner:into using the gut, they use the nose, they use
Sarah Turner:intranasal.
Meredith Oke:Fantastic. And Michelle has a question before we
Meredith Oke:hear from Michelle. So you talked about doing
Meredith Oke:case studies and collecting your research. You
Meredith Oke:talked about some of the other companies that are
Meredith Oke:doing the same thing. Is this body of research,
Meredith Oke:who's going to look at it? Do you foresee a
Meredith Oke:future where in the United States perhaps the FDA
Meredith Oke:will recognize these devices? Like what is,
Meredith Oke:what's the ideal pathway with this research?
Sarah Turner:So at the moment we're still in a paradigm where
Sarah Turner:in order to get medical device approval you have
Sarah Turner:to go through the fda. I have to say I think that
Sarah Turner:is crumbling. That kind of institution is
Sarah Turner:crumbling, especially with the kind of the new
Sarah Turner:political environment that you have here in the
Sarah Turner:States. It seems things are changing, however, at
Sarah Turner:the moment. To get a medical device approval,
Sarah Turner:yes, you need to go through the FDA and some
Sarah Turner:companies are getting, like Veet talked about,
Sarah Turner:Vielight. That's one example. They're looking to
Sarah Turner:get a medical device approval for long Covid and
Sarah Turner:I think they've already submitted the data for
Sarah Turner:that. So if they get that, then that's going to
Sarah Turner:be great because it means that then is then a
Sarah Turner:recognized disease state that light therapy is
Sarah Turner:used for and then that hopefully opens the doors
Sarah Turner:for everybody else who wants to, to get a medical
Sarah Turner:device approval. I know there are other companies
Sarah Turner:looking at autistic spectrum disorder. I have
Sarah Turner:some colleagues that are working on mild
Sarah Turner:cognitive. So that is kind of the ultimate goal.
Sarah Turner:I'm at the stage where I'm collecting data on
Sarah Turner:young onset Parkinson's and motor neurons
Sarah Turner:disease, which you call ALS here in the States.
Sarah Turner:And I am just doing documented case studies under
Sarah Turner:the guided supervision of Professor Paul Chazot
Sarah Turner:at Durham. But I'm a long way off from being able
Sarah Turner:to submit that for medical device approval. But
Sarah Turner:at the moment, I think there's enough market and
Sarah Turner:a kind of option for people to be in the wellness
Sarah Turner:market still, you know, we can, still, we can't
Sarah Turner:talk about curing Parkinson's, but we can talk
Sarah Turner:about helping people manage their symptoms and
Sarah Turner:maybe going from a baseline of where they're at
Sarah Turner:to better. And I think for now, maybe that is a
Sarah Turner:place where we need to be. Because like I say, I
Sarah Turner:think things are changing and people are starting
Sarah Turner:to recognize more alternative ways of looking at
Sarah Turner:science and alternative ways of validating these
Sarah Turner:technologies. I already know, you know, people
Sarah Turner:are starting to look at different research groups
Sarah Turner:based in the Bahamas or maybe in Europe, where
Sarah Turner:we're kind of having the same level of scrutiny
Sarah Turner:on the data, but maybe not so much the
Sarah Turner:bureaucracy, red tape and outside interests that
Sarah Turner:influence some of these big bodies like the fda.
Meredith Oke:Yes, I agree. I think we're heading into a new
Meredith Oke:era. I'm so excited to see what happens. And yes,
Meredith Oke:that would be Ideal, keep the rigor, lose the
Meredith Oke:bureaucracy. That should be our mantra. All
Meredith Oke:right, Michelle, did you want to unmute yourself
Meredith Oke:and ask a question? Yeah, sure, I've got a couple
Meredith Oke:of questions.
Sarah Turner:The first one was just, I'm just curious on sort
Sarah Turner:of what measurements and.
Meredith Oke:Outcomes you're looking at other than symptoms.
Meredith Oke:Are you using QEG or any other.
Sarah Turner:Yeah, methodologies, just to see the effect of
Sarah Turner:your, of your red light. So I have a very small
Sarah Turner:amount of people where I'm doing QEG because it's
Sarah Turner:quite expensive and really I'm only doing that
Sarah Turner:where I've got access to the university. So I
Sarah Turner:have a few, I have a couple of case studies going
Sarah Turner:on at Durham where I have access to qeg. Some of
Sarah Turner:the people that I'm working with because I've
Sarah Turner:been in biohacking have things like aura rings.
Sarah Turner:And although, you know, it's still not recognized
Sarah Turner:as proper clinical data, it is valid data to look
Sarah Turner:at taking someone from where they're at to like
Sarah Turner:increased heart rate variability or deep sleep
Sarah Turner:scores or things like that. So I do use metrics,
Sarah Turner:not just aura, anything. I have a platform that
Sarah Turner:allows me to bring in anything anyone's got,
Sarah Turner:whether that's Apple, Garmin, Fitbit, Whoop,
Sarah Turner:whatever, whatever they're using. So I use those
Sarah Turner:kinds of metrics. I also use very basic
Sarah Turner:questionnaires because a lot of the people who
Sarah Turner:are at the moment buying my product are people
Sarah Turner:maybe a slightly older demographic who are quite
Sarah Turner:happy with self assessment questionnaires. So I
Sarah Turner:have one called my MOP Measure Yourself Outcome
Sarah Turner:Questionnaire. And that is very simple. It's just
Sarah Turner:what is your main symptom? On a scale of 1 to 6,
Sarah Turner:what does it prevent you doing? On a scale of 1
Sarah Turner:to 6, what is your general wellness? And then you
Sarah Turner:just repeat that every month. And I find that
Sarah Turner:hugely helpful for a lot of people because once
Sarah Turner:when you start getting ill, start getting better,
Sarah Turner:if you've been ill, you don't want to remember
Sarah Turner:being ill. So for a lot of people it's good to
Sarah Turner:say, okay, well, you know, when you first came,
Sarah Turner:you said that your brain fog was six maximum.
Sarah Turner:You're now saying it's one. Oh yeah, I forgot. I
Sarah Turner:used to be like that, you know. So for me, when
Sarah Turner:I'm just starting out, I'm not doing. This is not
Sarah Turner:clinical data that's going to be accepted by the
Sarah Turner:fda. But in order to kind of get something like
Sarah Turner:a. My mock form is a tool, you know, it is a
Sarah Turner:registered tool. I could use it if I wanted. To,
Sarah Turner:to publish the data. So I'm not using anything
Sarah Turner:that's wildly subjective, but at the same time
Sarah Turner:I'm just being. I'm very simple. I'm trying to
Sarah Turner:make things as easy as possible for people.
Meredith Oke:Yeah, that's great.
Sarah Turner:Thank you. The other question I had was whether
Sarah Turner:you had any experience combining your devices
Sarah Turner:with methylene blue? Because I've seen some
Sarah Turner:research around that with neurodegeneration.
Sarah Turner:Yeah, I, I do. I have done a lot of self studies
Sarah Turner:with methylene blue and I have a couple of. Well,
Sarah Turner:I have a guy in my group with motor neurons
Sarah Turner:disease who is, is very keen to kind of try out
Sarah Turner:these protocols with me. So he's been doing a
Sarah Turner:methylene blue protocol alongside the light
Sarah Turner:therapy and we're tracking his progress and he
Sarah Turner:thinks that he is getting an increased result.
Sarah Turner:I'm always, I'm a little bit hesitant just
Sarah Turner:because, you know, methylene blue has been used
Sarah Turner:historically as an anti, parasitic and an
Sarah Turner:antimicrobial. And I really, really have not been
Sarah Turner:able to get to the bottom of what is the exact
Sarah Turner:effect on chronic methylene blue use and the gut
Sarah Turner:microbiome. I don't know, maybe somebody here, I
Sarah Turner:would love to know.
Meredith Oke:Do you want to, just for the audience, just say a
Meredith Oke:little bit more about methylene blue, Sarah or
Meredith Oke:Michelle, sort of what it is and why it has been
Meredith Oke:become such a hot topic. As I speak this past
Meredith Oke:week, methylene blue blew up again on the
Meredith Oke:Internet because.
Sarah Turner:Did it?
Meredith Oke:Yes. Robert F. Kennedy. Someone shot a video on
Meredith Oke:their phone of him putting it in his water on Air
Meredith Oke:Force One or something. So now everyone's taken
Meredith Oke:over the Internet.
Sarah Turner:Again now this kind of taking off now with, you
Sarah Turner:know, you would never, I would never think that
Sarah Turner:we would be kind of being introduced to these
Sarah Turner:health topics in this way, but however it's
Sarah Turner:coming through, that's great. Methylene blue
Sarah Turner:actually historically is a dye. It's a dye that
Sarah Turner:was used actually, you know, in blue jeans. You
Sarah Turner:know, so it's a chemical. But the thing about
Sarah Turner:methylene blue is it's an electronic recycler. So
Sarah Turner:it's not only an electron donator, but it
Sarah Turner:actually removes excess electrons. So from the
Sarah Turner:point of view of having something that would work
Sarah Turner:well with red light therapy, it is a compound
Sarah Turner:that people have been using because, you know,
Sarah Turner:you can supply even more electrons into the
Sarah Turner:electron transport chain to enhance the effect,
Sarah Turner:or if you're kind of over producing electrons in
Sarah Turner:the form of reactive oxygen species, you can mop
Sarah Turner:some of them up. So a lot of people use Methylene
Sarah Turner:blue. You know, I've seen people use it in their
Sarah Turner:eyes lately. You know, people are using it in
Sarah Turner:quite outrageous ways. It, it has been used
Sarah Turner:historically in the US Military. You know, that's
Sarah Turner:why people talk about, you know, because you pee
Sarah Turner:blue afterwards. So I think, you know, it has a,
Sarah Turner:it has a very strange biological effect. And
Sarah Turner:actually that's how you can titrate the dose is
Sarah Turner:by seeing how blue your pee is and kind of
Sarah Turner:titrating back from that. But it was used, it was
Sarah Turner:used for malaria actually, to treat malaria
Sarah Turner:because it is anti parasitic because of this
Sarah Turner:effect on the electrons and it actually has an
Sarah Turner:effect on the outer coats of the, of the
Sarah Turner:parasites. So this is kind of where I'm, I have
Sarah Turner:tried it. I'm happy to try things on myself and
Sarah Turner:see how it works. I'm not always happy about
Sarah Turner:recommending it to other people unless I really
Sarah Turner:for sure know that it's totally safe. And I'm
Sarah Turner:not, I'm not 100% convinced about it right now
Sarah Turner:because I just need a little bit more information
Sarah Turner:on how it is actually interacting with the gut
Sarah Turner:microbiome. Because my whole thing is, you know,
Sarah Turner:that I want the body to be optimally functioning
Sarah Turner:and, you know, if you focus just on one thing,
Sarah Turner:like you focus on getting more electrons to the
Sarah Turner:brain to the detriment of your gut bacteria, that
Sarah Turner:doesn't sit well with me. But I'm very happy to
Sarah Turner:hear anybody else's input on this because it's
Sarah Turner:something that, as you say, it's, Everybody talks
Sarah Turner:about it and if you go to any biohacking event,
Sarah Turner:everyone's got a blue tongue and now they've got
Sarah Turner:blue eyes, you know, where they're actually
Sarah Turner:dropping it into the whites of their eyes.
Meredith Oke:All right.
Sarah Turner:I do. I have used it and I have used it and I did
Sarah Turner:think I, I got more energy for it. Do I use it
Sarah Turner:every day? No, I don't. Do I use it every, Do I
Sarah Turner:recommend it to other people? No, not unless they
Sarah Turner:really kind of know the risks and they want to do
Sarah Turner:a little protocol in it. And I have to say that
Sarah Turner:just from an N of one of a volunteer here who's
Sarah Turner:got motor neuron, he did find it helped with
Sarah Turner:brain fog.
Meredith Oke:Right? Yes. No, I've, I've heard good feedback on
Meredith Oke:it. I also haven't tried it. I know. I think
Meredith Oke:people think I try all the things. I'm, I'm
Meredith Oke:pretty low maintenance. I, I don't use that many
Meredith Oke:extra products, to be honest. Julie?
Sarah Turner:Yes, Hi. So my question Actually is this is.
Meredith Oke:Kind of good to follow on the methylene blue
Meredith Oke:topic because I'm thinking about.
Sarah Turner:Or could you talk about the difference.
Meredith Oke:Between a therapy for a particular disease.
Sarah Turner:State, such as Parkinson's versus that
Sarah Turner:deficiencies.
Meredith Oke:Or health issues that maybe led to that.
Sarah Turner:And I feel like methylene blue kind of falls into
Sarah Turner:that. Like could it be used therapeutically
Sarah Turner:versus.
Meredith Oke:Do you use it in a preventative sort of way?
Sarah Turner:Because the preventative piece just seems so much
Sarah Turner:more complex as far as what's leading to
Sarah Turner:different disease states. Yeah, I think a lot of
Sarah Turner:it is urgency and motivation. If you find
Sarah Turner:yourself already in a fairly progressed disease
Sarah Turner:state, maybe you may take a more calculated risk.
Sarah Turner:But I think it is just about calculating risk.
Sarah Turner:With any kind of drug, with any kind of non
Sarah Turner:natural intervention, there's going to be a side
Sarah Turner:effect somewhere down the line. There's always a
Sarah Turner:price to pay for a pharmaceutical or for a drug.
Sarah Turner:And methylene blue does sit a little bit within
Sarah Turner:that category. Whether it's your detox organs or
Sarah Turner:maybe potentially upsetting your bacteria
Sarah Turner:balance, there's always some price to pay. But
Sarah Turner:it's about taking a calculated risk because if
Sarah Turner:you're in a fairly progressed disease state, you
Sarah Turner:might find that that risk is worth it for the
Sarah Turner:potential gain. I think from a prevention point
Sarah Turner:of view it's very, you know, it's very simple.
Sarah Turner:It's just really optimize your environment. Well,
Sarah Turner:this is my advice. Maybe this isn't advice that
Sarah Turner:anybody would take, but optimize your light
Sarah Turner:environment, optimize your relationships,
Sarah Turner:optimize everything and you don't need to do to
Sarah Turner:anything. In addition to that, I, I think it may
Sarah Turner:be something where you would want to do something
Sarah Turner:Additionally, once you find yourself in that
Sarah Turner:state or whether you're like me and you're just
Sarah Turner:curious and you just want to find out, but it's
Sarah Turner:not something I would do long term without having
Sarah Turner:the necessity to do that. So again, I think it's
Sarah Turner:about risk management. I do have a predisposition
Sarah Turner:for neurodegeneration, so I am kind of always
Sarah Turner:trying to weigh up what is the potential risk to
Sarah Turner:this particular therapy versus the potential
Sarah Turner:advantage. But yes, you're right, prevention is
Sarah Turner:tricky. It's a hard sell for sure. And it's a
Sarah Turner:tricky one to know what you, what's the best
Sarah Turner:thing you can do to put yourself in a better
Sarah Turner:position in your later life.
Meredith Oke:All right, so Sarah, where can people find you
Meredith Oke:and where can they find.
Sarah Turner:The Sarah Thrive so people can find me. It's my
Sarah Turner:name's Sarah. But my company is also Sarah. So
Sarah Turner:I've. I've helpfully won this T shirt so that
Sarah Turner:people can see the different spelling. But my
Sarah Turner:name, my name's Sarah Turner and my company is
Sarah Turner:called Sarah Thrive. Spelled like the brain. C E
Sarah Turner:R A, like cerebral, like cerebellum. So I'm on
Sarah Turner:almost all socials with that handle, Sarah
Sarah Turner:Thrive. So you can LinkedIn whatever it is. It's
Sarah Turner:Sarah Thrive. The company is SarahThrive.com and
Sarah Turner:also Shaws. And anything, any kind of contact
Sarah Turner:info you find goes to me. So, you know, you're
Sarah Turner:more than welcome to email me. Otherwise it's
Sarah Turner:just sarathrive.com great.
Meredith Oke:And Jedidiah has questions.
Sarah Turner:Can you hear me?
Meredith Oke:Yep.
Sarah Turner:So in your experience, do Parkinson's patients
Sarah Turner:tend to be dehydrated and. Yeah, sorry, do they
Sarah Turner:tend to be dehydrated and, and do you tend. Do
Sarah Turner:they tend to be fast oxidizers? You're asking me
Sarah Turner:if they're dehydrated and fast oxidizers? I. I
Sarah Turner:don't know. I mean, I don't have a measure of
Sarah Turner:someone's hydration status. If people are coming
Sarah Turner:to me with Parkinson's, usually it's because
Sarah Turner:they've been diagnosed with it and so they're
Sarah Turner:just coming with a pre diagnosis. And most of the
Sarah Turner:time people don't know things like their status.
Sarah Turner:Most, most people are just coming from what, what
Sarah Turner:the doctors told them, and presumably they're
Sarah Turner:just being measured based on things like tremor
Sarah Turner:and maybe mri. So I, I really don't know. I mean,
Sarah Turner:I, I think obviously hydration goes very closely
Sarah Turner:with the light piece that we're talking about,
Sarah Turner:because if you're very healthy and your proteins
Sarah Turner:are working properly in your brain, then they're
Sarah Turner:going to be hydrated proteins so that they fold
Sarah Turner:in the right way. Because a lot of
Sarah Turner:neurodegeneration comes from misfolding of
Sarah Turner:proteins, which, you know, is coming from the
Sarah Turner:fact that maybe the water surrounding them isn't
Sarah Turner:charged or charged effectively, that the proteins
Sarah Turner:can fold in the right way. So I would think that
Sarah Turner:neurodegeneration is definitely associated with
Sarah Turner:some kind of water issue. But no, I, I wouldn't
Sarah Turner:have that additional information, and I'm not
Sarah Turner:sure that even the people who have been diagnosed
Sarah Turner:have that information. What. What's your take on
Sarah Turner:it? Well, I'm speaking more personally, but yes,
Sarah Turner:it seems to me that, that there's a lot to do
Sarah Turner:with that. I know that this is a question. If you
Sarah Turner:know anything more about it. Melanin itself
Sarah Turner:requires dopamine to make melanin. And since we
Sarah Turner:don't create enough dopamine in the first place,
Sarah Turner:that creates a problem receiving the light and
Sarah Turner:creating the water. I also wondered about the
Sarah Turner:fast oxidation piece because when you were
Sarah Turner:talking about methylene blue and excess
Sarah Turner:electrons. I know for myself and for my family
Sarah Turner:line, it seems like people are fast oxidizers. In
Sarah Turner:other words, they're, they're more high strung
Sarah Turner:and high metabolism, fast metabolism, as opposed
Sarah Turner:to the people that, you know.
Meredith Oke:On the other, have the other metabolic.
Sarah Turner:Problems of the, you know, putting on weight and
Sarah Turner:being the low metabolizers. And I want to know if
Sarah Turner:you had any experience with that or, you know,
Sarah Turner:observed just people who you worked with? No, you
Sarah Turner:know, I don't. And I suppose the science is only
Sarah Turner:good as the data that's collected from people,
Sarah Turner:because if this data was being collected, then we
Sarah Turner:would be able to do an analysis and find out, you
Sarah Turner:know, look for those trends. But I think if in
Sarah Turner:all the research, the data, we're not collecting
Sarah Turner:those data points, then it's very difficult to
Sarah Turner:say, yeah, there does seem to be a trend for
Sarah Turner:these kinds of things. Maybe once, you know,
Sarah Turner:maybe, you know, the whole thing about AI is
Sarah Turner:getting huge now, but maybe once we start to go
Sarah Turner:back, we could retrospectively look, if any, if
Sarah Turner:any of this data was collected, then we could see
Sarah Turner:trends. But I mean, your own observation again,
Sarah Turner:is data in itself. So if that's something you're
Sarah Turner:observing yourself, I would suggest that, that,
Sarah Turner:that could definitely be your idea of the survey.
Sarah Turner:I mean, just asking those questions. I'd love to
Sarah Turner:be, I mean, the clinic that I go to for
Sarah Turner:Parkinson's is not going to let me interview my
Sarah Turner:fellow patients. And so I would love to create a
Sarah Turner:survey just to ask the group of Parkinson's
Sarah Turner:patients whether they have symptoms that would
Sarah Turner:say, yes, you're dehydrated or yes, you are fast
Sarah Turner:oxidizer, things like that. Another thing I'm
Sarah Turner:curious about is this whole thing of the, the arc
Sarah Turner:that you have instead of like I have a red light
Sarah Turner:panel and just use it on my brain and my,
Sarah Turner:actually my whole torso, front and back. But
Sarah Turner:you're saying that because of the skull, the
Sarah Turner:light doesn't come in at all angles. Is that
Sarah Turner:correct? Yes. I'm saying in order to actually get
Sarah Turner:light onto the surface of the brain, you probably
Sarah Turner:need to have a device that goes flush to your
Sarah Turner:head rather than a device that's kind of square
Sarah Turner:on. Yes. But you're, you're still getting the
Sarah Turner:light in through the body, you know, you're still
Sarah Turner:having the systemic effect. And, and certainly,
Sarah Turner:you know, if you're shining it onto the abdomen,
Sarah Turner:you're still getting that gut effect where
Sarah Turner:you're, you're going to get a brain effect. It's
Sarah Turner:just if you want to target the brain directly, I
Sarah Turner:really think that you need to have a device
Sarah Turner:that's contoured. Otherwise the light just can't
Sarah Turner:get through the skull. All right.
Meredith Oke:Good to know. Thank you. Thank you. And thank
Meredith Oke:you, Sarah. It's been so good. And I just wanted
Meredith Oke:to pick up on that, the dehydration piece. So for
Meredith Oke:our podcast audience, a little more general than
Meredith Oke:the pros we have in the room right now. Could you
Meredith Oke:just say a little bit? I mean, I think when most
Meredith Oke:people think dehydration, we think, oh, I didn't
Meredith Oke:drink enough water. No, of course we need to
Meredith Oke:drink a decent amount of high quality water. But
Meredith Oke:talk to me about cellular dehydration. And you
Meredith Oke:already mentioned the effect that that could have
Meredith Oke:on the brain in terms of protein folding. But how
Meredith Oke:does light help with hydration?
Sarah Turner:Yeah, I think it's an important topic. It's, it's
Sarah Turner:about how the body is utilizing the water. And,
Sarah Turner:and if we think about inside the body, we are a
Sarah Turner:huge percentage of water, and some of that is in
Sarah Turner:our cells and some of it is in our blood. And it
Sarah Turner:makes a difference of where that water is
Sarah Turner:situated. It also makes a difference of making
Sarah Turner:sure that all the proteins in our bodies are
Sarah Turner:surrounded by water. And we mentioned May Wan ho
Sarah Turner:earlier. You know, this is one of her principles,
Sarah Turner:that everything is being kind of conducted in
Sarah Turner:this way via the water in our bodies. Because,
Sarah Turner:you know, we have intracellular water, but we
Sarah Turner:also have all of this water surrounding all of
Sarah Turner:our proteins. And from the work of Jerry Pollock,
Sarah Turner:we know that you can change the structure or the
Sarah Turner:order of the water when you expose a hydrophilic
Sarah Turner:surface, which is basically means water loving.
Sarah Turner:But any kind of membrane or anything inside our
Sarah Turner:body, if you expose the water that's next to one
Sarah Turner:of those surfaces to light, we can actually
Sarah Turner:change the order or the structure of water. And
Sarah Turner:this is a hugely fascinating concept, and
Sarah Turner:probably we could talk for an hour about it on
Sarah Turner:its own, but it basically means that you can have
Sarah Turner:different visualization viscosities of water in
Sarah Turner:different areas of the bodies and also different
Sarah Turner:charges. So my point of view is like protein
Sarah Turner:folding. Proteins fold according to where the
Sarah Turner:relative charges are on the, on the surface
Sarah Turner:structure. So if you don't have those charges or
Sarah Turner:if they're weak charges because, you know, we
Sarah Turner:have dehydration or not enough in those areas.
Sarah Turner:And you can have suboptimal functioning of the
Sarah Turner:cell. Hydration is very important. But also
Sarah Turner:having water, you're right, you could drink a
Sarah Turner:gallon of water. It's not going to the right
Sarah Turner:places, or your detox organs are not working
Sarah Turner:properly. Just peeing it all out. You know,
Sarah Turner:you're not getting that effect. So it's about
Sarah Turner:again, thinking holistically about it. You drink
Sarah Turner:enough water, but you also need the light
Sarah Turner:exposure and the good food and the good
Sarah Turner:environment in order to make maximum use of that
Sarah Turner:water so that you are hydrated.
Meredith Oke:Right. Coming back to what you were saying
Meredith Oke:earlier about keeping the battery charged, Right.
Meredith Oke:We need to be well hydrated, and the light and
Meredith Oke:the water all work together to keep us in that.
Meredith Oke:In that healthy state. Sarah, thank you so much.
Meredith Oke:Any last thoughts or anything that's coming to
Meredith Oke:you that you'd like to share with our audience
Meredith Oke:about anything?
Sarah Turner:No, I do. I think we've covered everything and it
Sarah Turner:was lovely to speak to your group. I think we did
Sarah Turner:good to do a podcast where we got some
Sarah Turner:interaction, but I also think it's also about
Sarah Turner:keeping it simple. You know, we just need to
Sarah Turner:really understand the importance of light in
Sarah Turner:biology and also in our science because it is
Sarah Turner:something that I feel like has been. We're just
Sarah Turner:so far removed from it. But as soon as you start
Sarah Turner:to kind of gain that concept and even, you know,
Sarah Turner:do little simple experiments, be outdoors, kind
Sarah Turner:of be your N equals one, you know, I think it
Sarah Turner:becomes more real and tangible because sometimes
Sarah Turner:the science, you know, we can get a little bit
Sarah Turner:stuck in the weeds, but it's actually very
Sarah Turner:simple. You know, good water, good light, good
Sarah Turner:friends. Done. You know, love it.
Meredith Oke:Yes. Real water, real food, real light, real
Meredith Oke:people.
Sarah Turner:Yes. Yes.
Meredith Oke:Recipe for happiness. And health. And happiness.
Meredith Oke:Sarah appreciates seeing you. I know you're very
Meredith Oke:busy traveling the world, attending all these
Meredith Oke:conferences, so I'd love to do this again
Meredith Oke:sometime. And thanks for being back on the QVC
Meredith Oke:podcast.
Sarah Turner:Thank you. Thank you all. Bye. Bye.
