Brain Injuries and Gut Problems

KAYLE SANDBERG-LEWIS BCN-FELLOW, M.A., LMT

It’s hard to believe something like a bump on the head can have anything to do with gastrointestinal problems but, unfortunately, it is much more common than most people realize – including physicians.

It is now understood that brain injuries are not “events” that one shakes off but “processes” because once injured, even slightly, damaged neurons continue to degrade over time. The consequences of brain injuries may take days, weeks, even years, to become evident. To make matters worse, brains are easily injured.

The brain is an incredibly intricate network of nerve cells – neurons – that work because they do not touch. At least they are not supposed to. The distance between neighboring neurons – synapses - should be 20 – 40 nanometers. The thickness of a single sheet of typing paper is approximately 100,000 nanometers. The interior of the brain is built without much wiggle room. 

The brain is the consistency of a soft-boiled egg and is not snuggly fit in the skull, which is rock hard. Therefore, in a situation such as whiplash, the brain can be injured by slamming against the inside of the skull without the head being hit by anything from the outside.

When there is an accumulation of injuries, it is called chronic traumatic encephalopathy or CTE. In the past the same problem was called “punch drunk” or “boxer’s brain”. 

Most people, unless they have been hospitalized for a brain injury, do not think of themselves as brain injured. 

Before I start working with people, I ask them to put a piece of paper in a central location, such as on the refrigerator, and whenever an incident comes to mind, write it down along with an estimate of their age at the time. Did they fly off their bike, fall out of trees, head the ball in soccer? Were they thrown from a horse? Did they drink heavily in high school, college or young adulthood? Did they ever ‘get their bell rung’ in football or other sports? Did they ever black out? Faint? Broken noses equal brain injuries. How many car accidents, even low impact, have there been? [Damage to neurons occurs at speeds as low as 3 miles/hour.] Did they ever land abruptly on their rear end or back?

People often respond with “Rear end or back? That’s nowhere near the brain!” The truth is your central nervous system (CNS) is made up of the brain AND the spinal cord. A jolt to the butt will shake the brain.

I also ask people to list surgeries requiring general anesthetic, any known exposures to neurotoxins and any history of lack of oxygen such as near-drowning, suffocation or strangulation.

I suggest people ask trusted older family members to check for family stories of early childhood incidents such as falling down a flight of stairs or rolling off the changing table. Was there difficulty during labor or delivery?

Even with all this preparation, there are times when people will not remember an injury until their head or neck is touched.

So, what is the connection between brain injuries and gastrointestinal issues? The autonomic nervous system (ANS) [“fright/flight”] and enteric [“gut brain”] nervous system are tightly intertwined. When there is even minor damage anywhere in the CNS, the ANS and enteric system activate and signal for the release of stress hormones, many of which are proinflammatory. The ability to self-soothe through the vagus nerve suffers and people stay in a form of “red alert”. The vagus nerve or tenth cranial nerve is both a motor and sensory nerve, meaning it sends directives to organs from the brain AND lets the brain know how the organs are doing. It is primarily parasympathetic in nature, which means its focus is “rest and digest”. 

Impaired vagal motor activity makes it harder for food to squeeze through the digestive tract and defecation and valve control suffer. This all contributes to bacteria moving from where it belongs in the large intestine into the small intestine – a problem known as small intestinal bacterial overgrowth or SIBO.

After even a small injury to the brain, the brainstem may become “disorganized”, leading to alterations in the heart rate, visceral blood flow, digestive enzyme release and blood glucose. 

In studies involving mice, it was shown that the lining of the small intestine was damaged within three hours of a minor brain injury. [They judged it to be “minor” because the mouse did not stagger afterwards.] The damage did not stop there; it continued to worsen as time passed. Within three days of the injury, the cells forming the wall of the small intestine were no longer snuggly fit together, allowing the larger molecules than usual out into the bloodstream – leaky gut. After one week, actual ulcers had formed.

It is believed this leads to a breakdown of the blood brain barrier – creating a “leaky brain” – which can damage the inner parts of the brain, often resulting in further disruption of gut function and perhaps damaging our ability to “ignore” the normal activity in our guts – a problem called visceral hypersensitivity.

The inflammatory toxins traveling through the blood from the gut to the brain provide another injury to the microglia, the immune system of the brain. So, the brain is injured twice – from the initial impact and from the chemical irritation, causing permanent inflammation. Inflammatory processes in the brain make mental/emotional and neurodegenerative problems more likely. 

Our clinic is committed to working on the underlying causes of gastrointestinal problems. To address the neurological damage from brain injuries, we have had significant success with Low Energy Neurofeedback System (LENS), followed by other forms of neurofeedback and stress management.

Kayle Sandberg-Lewis holds a M.A. in Behavioral Medicine, the study of how what we do affects our well-being. She has over three decades experience in stress management and is board certified in neurofeedback, which she introduced to her practice in 1996. Kayle co-founded Hive Mind Medicine in 2019, where she currently offers neurofeedback to her clients. Telehealth consults are available.

Hive Mind Medicine blog posts are for educational purposes only and are not intended as medical advice. Please consult with your health care practitioner for personalized guidance. Click on the contact button below if you would like to schedule with one of our Hive Mind practitioners.