054: Dr Ruth Tapsell – Devon’s Real Food GP
Dr Ruth Tapsell Ruth is a GP in North Devon in the southwest of England. Three years ago she came across Dr David Unwin who was using lower carbohydrate diets to achieve outstanding outcomes in his patients with Type 2 Diabetes. So having tried unsuccessfully over many years to help her patients using the mainstream approach, Ruth and her team decided to offer the lower carb approach instead. Since then, they have been seeing some remarkable outcomes with many patients putting their Type 2 Diabetes into remission, losing excess weight, coming off many of their medications and benefiting from a host of additional benefits, including resolution of sleep apnoea and IBS. The Covid-19 pandemic has brought into focus the alarmingly high prevalence of poor metabolic health. The tragic collision of these 2 pandemics motivated Ruth to spread the word to other health professionals that metabolic health can improve significantly within weeks, and that this may help to improve an individual's outcome from Covid-19. To reach out to health professionals across the UK and beyond, Ruth has been delivering a series of free, unsponsored educational webinars, with her co-host, Midlands-based practice nurse Gayle Gerry. Ruth and Gayle have welcomed a terrific selection of speakers from a range of medical specialities who feel similarly passionate about sharing this good practice with other health professionals. Hopefully, as the community of low carb practitioners continues to grow, this will lead to many more patients being offered this highly effective approach and becoming empowered to regain control of their metabolic health. Dr Ruth Tapsell acknowledges that her medical school education did not cover nutrition or sleep. Even with Diabetes and Endocrinology training, it didn’t make sense that her patients were eating carbohydrate-laden food and covering it with insulin. She thought that if eating a certain way causes diabetes then by changing the way we eat it, it might be possible to reverse Type 2 Diabetes or prevent it. She didn’t discover using therapeutic carbohydrate restriction as a way to manage type 2 diabetes until three years ago. It was her husband, also a GP, who came across an article from Dr David Unwin in a medical magazine. They have started using this approach in their general practice. Dr Ruth now runs local groups for patients and webinars for health care professionals to get the word out and educate others on the use of low carb / real food way to manage their health and wellbeing. Dr Ruth featured in an article in the Daily Mail highlighting the work she is doing in helping her patients halt and reverse Type 2 Diabetes.She talks about her general practice in being a low prescribing practice and the challenges of getting others within the NHS to get on board with these life changing practices. One of Dr Ruth’s dreams is that Hartland in Devon becomes a Blue Zone, where everyone lives to 120.We talk about raising teenagers and how difficult it is in school with the food on offer and with their peers.If you are looking for the show notes on Apple Podcast please click through to the episode web page as they are not showing on Apple at the moment. Dr Ruth's Top Tips If you are on any medication, speak to your doctor before starting on low carb or ketoDo it gently, cut out processed food - especially seed oils and sugarBe kind to yourself and keep an open mind Resources Mentioned The 8-Week Blood Sugar Diet: Lose weight fast and reprogramme your body:Lose weight and reprogramme your body - Dr Michael Mosleyhttps://amzn.to/3iDN2pU Daily Mail article