Digestive Issues & Gut Health

Digestive Disorders, a Common Complaint

Digestive disorders affect an estimated 60 to 70 million Americans, according to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK). Conditions like irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO), leaky gut (intestinal permeability), and gut dysbiosis are among the most common (and most commonly dismissed) health complaints in conventional medicine. Symptoms range from bloating, constipation, and diarrhea to unexplained skin issues, seasonal allergies, and fatigue; often with no clear cause identified on standard lab work.

If you’ve been told your lab results look fine but you still don’t feel right, you’re not imagining things. Gut issues are notoriously hard to pin down, especially when the problem isn’t just one food or one trigger.

We run more comprehensive testing than most conventional providers, look at how your gut, immune system, and nervous system connect, and build a plan that meets you where you’re at.

What might be causing your gut issues?

So what’s going on in there? Here’s what we typically find:

Gut Dysbiosis

Your gut contains trillions of bacteria, and the balance matters. Too much of even a “good” bacteria can cause problems; and dysbiotic bacteria (the ones we really don’t want) can drive bloating, irregular bowel habits, and systemic inflammation when they get out of hand. Most people have some degree of imbalance, even without classic gut symptoms.

Leaky Gut (Intestinal Permeability)

When the gut lining breaks down, it allows particles into the bloodstream that shouldn’t be there, triggering an immune response throughout the body. This is often connected to food sensitivities, and it can show up in ways that don’t obviously look like a gut problem, like skin flares, joint pain, brain fog, and fatigue.

Food Sensitivities

These are different from food allergies. A food sensitivity is a delayed immune response where your body produces antibodies against certain foods, which drives ongoing inflammation. What makes this tricky is that the foods triggering your symptoms might be ones you consider healthy, and the reaction can develop over time even to foods you’ve eaten your whole life.

IBS, SIBO, and Related Conditions

IBS, SIBO, colitis, and Crohn’s are serious conditions, not catch-all diagnoses for “we don’t know what’s wrong.” The underlying drivers vary: bacterial imbalances, motility issues, immune dysfunction, and dietary factors all play a role. Most of them can improve significantly when we address what’s actually causing the breakdown, rather than just managing symptoms.

The Gut-Brain Connection

Your gut and brain are in constant communication through what’s called the gut-brain axis. Chiropractic adjustments can tap directly into that connection. The parasympathetic nervous system attaches to your visceral organs, which means spinal adjustments can help your gut and brain communicate more effectively. And here’s something most people don’t know: the majority of your neurotransmitters — serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine — are produced in the gut, not the brain. Which means gut health is also mental health.

Most people dealing with chronic gut issues have more than one of these factors at play. That’s why a one-size-fits-all approach rarely works, and why we look at the whole picture before recommending anything.

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How We Help Digestive Issues

Once we understand what’s driving your symptoms, here are the approaches we typically use:

• Functional Medicine Testing
  We run comprehensive blood panels, food sensitivity testing covering 240 foods, and — when gut issues are a primary complaint — a 3-day comprehensive stool analysis that maps your microbiome, inflammatory markers, yeast/candida, parasites, and more. The 3-day collection gives us roughly 80–90% accuracy vs. the single-day tests many practitioners use.
• Food Sensitivity Testing
  We test IgG antibodies (and IgA when mucosal symptoms point to it) across 240 foods. Results are color-coded by severity, and we use them alongside the anti-inflammatory diet to reduce the ongoing immune burden that’s preventing your gut from healing.
• Anti-Inflammatory Diet Protocol
  We don’t just hand you a sheet and send you home. We review your dietary log, walk through what’s realistic for where you’re starting from, and adjust month by month. The protocol eliminates gluten, dairy, soy, sugars, and processed foods while focusing on proteins, healthy fats, and vegetables. We build toward it in steps that make it stick.
• Targeted Supplement Support
  We use professional-grade supplements only, not pharmacy brands, not Amazon. The GI stool test identifies which natural agents will help inhibit the specific bacteria found in your results, so your protocol is built around your biology, not a generic protocol.
• Chiropractic Care
  Spinal adjustments influence the parasympathetic nervous system, which directly connects to your digestive organs. For patients dealing with gut symptoms, chiropractic care can be a meaningful part of the overall plan, especially when stress and nervous system dysregulation are contributing.
• Acupuncture
  Acupuncture protocols exist specifically for digestive issues, including constipation, bloating, and intestinal upset. The results often surprise patients who came in for something else.
• Virtual Visits
  Lab reviews, protocol check-ins, and dietary consultations can all be done remotely, no need to come in for every appointment.

Not sure where to start? Most patients use a combination of approaches. We’ll figure out what makes sense during your first appointment.

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What to Expect

Your First Appointment

An optional free 15-minute phone consultation is just a starting point; a general overview to see if we might be able to help and answer initial questions. It’s not where we get into your full health history.

The case initiation appointment is where the real work begins. That’s a full hour (sometimes closer to 90 minutes) where we go through your complete health history: symptoms, diet, lifestyle, stress, what you’ve already tried. From there, we order testing.

Testing Phase

For most gut-focused patients, we order all the testing upfront — blood work, food sensitivity panel, and the 3-day stool analysis — so we have a complete picture from day one. Then we walk through results in stages, rather than dumping everything on you at once.

The Base Plan (Months 1-3)

Before we launch a full GI protocol, we spend a few months stabilizing the system first. This means starting the anti-inflammatory diet, removing foods you’re sensitive to, and beginning foundational supplements that support the body before we do anything more intensive. Jumping straight into a full gut cleanse can cause more reactions than necessary, things like nausea, headaches, fatigue, and we’d rather avoid that.

The GI Protocol (Typically 3 Months)

Once you’re stabilized, we begin the GI protocol: roughly 10 days on specific supplements to cleanse the microbiome, followed by 4 days of heavy probiotic support — cycling back and forth for 2 to 3 months, then a full month of probiotics to finish. This isn’t something you stay on forever. It’s a defined block of time with a clear endpoint.

Important to know: We work with patients who are willing to put in the effort. This isn’t a quick fix. It’s about getting to the root cause so you can finally feel like yourself again.

Retesting and Results

We retest after the protocol to confirm progress. Symptoms often resolve before the labs fully normalize; which is encouraging, but we want to make sure the underlying imbalances are actually resolving, not just quieting down temporarily.

How long does healing take? It depends on consistency and the severity of what’s going on. Patients who follow the protocol closely tend to see symptom changes within the first few months. If there’s more going on — like hormonal issues layered on top — the full timeline will be longer. What we can tell you is that we’ve yet to run a GI test that came back completely clean on the first try. There’s almost always something. And there’s almost always something we can do about it.

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Patient Stories

“I haven’t felt this good in 30 or 40 years.”

One patient came in with a long history of gut issues and had been managing symptoms on her own for years. We ran her blood work, food sensitivity panel, and stool test, and put her on a base plan to stabilize things first. About two to three months in, after starting the full GI protocol, she texted: “Wow, I haven’t felt this good in 30 or 40 years.”

“I had no idea I even had bloating.”

Another patient came in for fatigue and hormonal issues. Gut health wasn’t even on her radar. When we asked about bloating and digestive symptoms at her intake, she said she was fine. But after starting on foundational supplements and cleaning up her diet, she came back and said, “Wow, I had no idea that I had all of this.” Her body had been so used to the inflammation that she’d stopped noticing it.