Dr. Kathy Van Zeyl, ND - The Running Naturopath

19/06/2024

🥵 HEATWAVE SURVIVAL 🥵

Hey friends. Been thinking of you. It’s a bajillion degrees outside. For many of us, this is a pretty darn rough time.

Heat is a trigger for:
- Ehlers Danlos Syndrome (EDS) 🦓 🤕
- Dysautonomia & POTS 🩸🫀
- Mast Cell Activation Syndrome (MCAS) 🤧 🦠 🫁

🦓 EDS factors - It loosens our already fragile & unstable connective tissues, making injuries more common, balance issues, and more pain.

🩸POTS factors - Heat causes dehydration, blood pooling in the legs, tissue swelling, tachycardia, fatigue and brain fog in people with dysautonomia. That > 100bpm heart rate on my Garmin is me just sitting at my desk and trying to exist. Hearts have to work harder when blood can’t get where it needs to go.

🦠 Mast Cells release histamine, prostaglandins, cytokines, heparin and other inflammatory/immune mediators. Heat can be a trigger for many, so watch for heat rashes, hives, increased allergies and immune responses.

All this stuff makes a heat wave more of a “survive” instead of “thrive” situation for both myself and my patients who have the “trifecta” (EDS, POTS & MCAS). But here’s a short list of things I do:

💦 fluids - tons!!! 2.5-3L/day, caution with diuretics (coffee, black tea, alcohol) and add a pinch of salt to drinking water to help hold the fluids where you need them!
🧂 Electrolytes - I have ‘em all!!! Range in sodium concentration goes from Salt Stick Fast chews (50mg per tab) to Vitassium (250mg per cap) to Liquid IV (500mg per dose) to Organika Extra Stength (1000mg per dose - on par w LMNT but cheaper!!!!)
🧊 Ice socks 🧦 (by Natracare) and cold water foot soaks (I keep it under my desk while I’m on with virtual patients) can help prevent leg swelling & brain fog. If you can’t put your feet up, stick them in something cold! 🥶 (I add frozen water bottles to the foot soak through the day to keep it cold)

Also purchased a cooling vest for my old man baby doggo Buggsly 🐕 and a neck fan pour moi (by Galecki) to keep cool when I don’t have a choice.

Limiting outdoor exposure to verrrrry small bouts, and keeping myself hydrated and cool by whatever means possible.

Stay hydrated, cooled & salted my peeps!!! 🐥

08/02/2024

Clinician-associated trauma: 👩‍⚕️ 😣 🤦‍♀️

It’s a real thing. Many of my EDS patients have experienced this for decades, searching for someone who knows what’s going on while having their symptoms dismissed, ignored, or downplayed while they go untreated. This is so frequent that a number of docs working with the Ehlers Danlos Society got together and published a paper on it. So if you feel this, you are not alone!! 💙🤗💙

Although I appreciate that EDS is still a poorly understood condition and many doctors don’t know how to recognize the signs, diagnose or treat it... the outright dismissal and undermining of patients is associated with poor health outcomes, increased prevalence of cPTSD and degrades a patient’s trust in the healthcare system. Which is especially not good in times of emergencies!🚨

This should not happen. Your concerns are valid. I truly believe that doctors and healthcare practitioners go into this field to help patients. Many of them may not know what we’re talking about when we say we have chronic pain and that our joints are unstable & slipping out of place, even though we *look* fine. I hope in future more practitioners will stop, listen and think before they speak... because often there are concrete answers (i.e. EDS) to explain this phenomenon.

As someone who both lives with and treats hEDS, I know there is so much we can do to help hypermobile patients who are struggling just to get through their day. So although I’m in a mini-vent mode (I’m seeing so many patients this week who’ve experienced this!), I will always be here with open ears, an inquisitive mind, and will work my tail off to help you through this. There are some absolutely brilliant practitioners out there and I’ve spent years amassing a referral team of trusted partners. If your practitioner makes you feel worse than you did before you went in (i.e. gaslit), just hang in there and trust that there are other medically-trained professionals who can and want to help!

With love,
Dr. Kathy 💙🦓💙

08/02/2024

Clinician-associated trauma.

It's a real thing. Many of my EDS patients have experienced this for decades, searching for someone who knows what's going on while having their symptoms dismissed, ignored, or downplayed while they go untreated. This is so frequent that a number of docs working with the Ehlers Danlos Society got together and published a paper on it. So if you feel this, you are not alone!!

Although I appreciate that EDS is still a poorly understood condition and many doctors don't know how to recognize the signs, diagnose or treat it... the outright dismissal and undermining of patients is associated with poor health outcomes, increased prevalence of cPTSD and degrades a patient's trust in the healthcare system.

This should not happen. Your concerns are valid. I truly believe that doctors and healthcare practitioners go into this field to help patients. Many of them may not know what we're talking about when we say we have chronic pain and that our joints are unstable & slipping out of place, even though we *look* fine. I hope in future more practitioners will stop, listen and think before they speak... because often there are concrete answers (i.e. EDS) to explain this phenomenon.

As someone who both lives with and treats hEDS, I know there is so much we can do to help hypermobile patients who are struggling just to get through their day. So although I'm in a mini-vent mode (I'm seeing so many patients this week who've experienced this!), I will always be here with open ears, an inquisitive mind, and will work my tail off to help you through this. There are some absolutely brilliant practitioners out there and I've spent years amassing a referral team of trusted partners. If your practitioner makes you feel worse than you did before you went in (i.e. gaslit), just hang in there and trust that there are other medically-trained professionals who can and want to help!

With love,
Dr. Kathy

Patients with hypermobile Ehlers Danlos Syndrome often experience psychological distress resulting from the perceived hostility and disinterest of the…

16/01/2024

💪 ❤️‍🩹 ✨ Bodies are strong. Bodies are resilient. Bodies can heal if you give them the right kind of love ✨❤️‍🩹💪

Ahoy there and happy 2024 to my fellow EDS zebras 🦓 , bendy peeps, sports fans (TBT for anybody who loves re-runs of Scrubs and just wants to call ppl “sports fans” like JD) and people who are otherwise tolerant of puns and medical ramblings 😉

So the short story is that last week I forgot to check myself before I wrecked myself 🤕.

Living in Ottawa where our weather is menopausal, Mother Nature threw down some ice 🧊 (we gotta be better to that gal! 🌱) and I got up close and personal with a slippery sidewalk.

Fortunately or not, I’ve never broken a bone ( ✊ 🪵) but I’ve got ligaments that really streeeetch until they can’t take it any more and just rip. So have been nursing a left-sided ( phew 😅) elbow & wrist sprain for the last week, and am praising whoever invented kin tape. That stuff has saved my hide countless times and holds my joints together when the muscles and soft tissues are still in recovery mode.

So a minute on why I love kin tape:
1) easy to use. You can put it just about anywhere and often do it on yourself 👍
2) gives stability to joints while they’re healing… also if they’re loose and struggling to find support (heyo hypermobile peeps!) 🦴
3) as opposed to a brace, it doesn’t reduce mobility and works alongside your muscles & tendons to control smooth motion 💪
4) supports the brain’s proprioceptive channel help with balance and joint position sense 🧠
5) apparently makes you look like you’re rehashing 90’s colour block fashion trends 💁‍♀️

So although I had a minor freak out on how long this may take to recover as I’ve been relying on rowing 🚣 for cardio & stress relief while I’m still kneehabbing and can’t run…. I’m back to the rower today with my trusty tape. A lot of rest. A few extra tissue supports. And a belief in my body’s ability to heal with the right kinda love ❤️

Many of my hypermobile/Ehlers Danlos patients get sad & frustrated knowing that we got a raw deal with weak collagen, and that we may break more easily than others 💔

I know it sucks. And it’s also a gift. More in caption…