Everything You Need To Know About Your Poop | Gut Surgeon Explains

Dave Asprey (0:00)

What do you think of the new fiber maxing trend?

Karan Rajan (0:02)

If you're eating 30 grams of fiber from just chia seeds, you're not doing yourself a favor. Psyllium husk has a role, and it's good at bulking your poop. Psyllium husk does not have a prebiotic effect. It causes rapid fermentation and bloating, which is counterintuitive to gut health.

Dave Asprey (0:18)

I gained 20 pounds in one week of bloating. Literally my gut, like just systemic inflammation. It was horrifying.

Karan Rajan (0:24)

People always love to catch on to a trend and do it maximally.

So if you're not used to eating fiber, and then you fiber max, and then you get bloated, that's on you. You need to go slow. I wish people spoke instead about fiber maxing, because different fibers do different things and feed different bacteria.

Dave Asprey (0:44)

You're listening to The Human Upgrade with Dave Asprey.

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Be sure to use our link so they know we sent you. Today, how about we talk with a former NHS surgeon who's a number one bestselling author with 12 million followers because he's really good at taking science and health stuff and making it accessible and understandable. And I want to talk to him about that because, well, that's, you know, it's what we're all working to do. But more importantly, he's really into poop. And so I'm like, we got to, we got to talk about this. And none other than Dr. Karan Rajan, who just came out to the studio in Austin. Karan, welcome.

Karan Rajan (3:01)

Thank you so much for having me.

Dave Asprey (3:03)

Anyone just said you really into poop in an intro before?

Karan Rajan (3:06)

No, they haven't. And I take it as a compliment.

Dave Asprey (3:10)

So you have a bunch of different things that you're doing that examines in clinical studies, like what's going on in the gut, what got you into the gut in the first place? You're a surgeon, not a gut guy.

Karan Rajan (3:22)

Yeah, so I'm a gut surgeon. I'm a GI surgeon, so I've been dealing for most of my professional career with removing colon cancers, sorting out digestive diseases from benign inflammation to life-threatening emergencies. So I've always been fascinated by the guts, how it can go wrong, and how can we stop that downstream process with proactive preventative health measures.

Dave Asprey (3:47)

Do you use a squatty potty?

Karan Rajan (3:50)

I don't at the moment, but when I was younger, like I grew up in an Indian household, we had all of these different mechanisms for poop, better poops. So I do believe in them. If someone is trying to retrain their gut to be better and have ideal streamlined poop mechanics, they need a squatty potty.

Dave Asprey (4:09)

This is the first time in history on the show that someone has said streamlined poop mechanics. That is the funniest shit ever.