The Science of Supplements: What Works, What's Hype, and What Could Actually Harm You | Dr. Mahtab Jafari

Creatine, melatonin, peptides, protein powders, green powders, probiotics, multivitamins, and much more: A pharmaceutical scientist breaks down the evidence and busts the myths. Dr. Mahtab Jafari https://mahtabjafari.com/ is a Professor of Pharmaceutical Sciences and Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at the University of California, Irvine, and the Founding Director of the UC Irvine Center for Healthspan Sciences. She is the author of the award-winning book, The Truth About Dietary Supplements: An Evidence- Based Guide to a Safer Medicine Cabinet https://www.amazon.com/Truth-About-Dietary-Supplements-Evidence-Based/dp/1950043339. In this episode we talk about: Product quality, safety, and regulation The most important thing to do before starting dietary supplements Vitamins B, C, and D (and the multivitamin debate) The research on amino acids and peptides The truth behind sleep supplements The efficacy of herbs, botanicals, and green powders Heavy metal risk factors Supplements for brain health and muscle growth Probiotics and gut health Get the 10% with Dan Harris app here https://app.danharris.com/membership Sign up for Dan's free newsletter here http://www.danharris.com/ Follow Dan on social: Instagram https://bit.ly/3tGigG5, TikTok https://bit.ly/3FOA84J Subscribe to our YouTube Channel https://bit.ly/3FybRzD Join Dan and Emmy Award-winning journalist Allison Gilbert at 92NY on May 17th for a live conversation about how mindfulness can deepen connection and combat loneliness, available in person and via streaming. Register here. https://www.92ny.org/event/dan-harris-with-allison-gilbert Join Dan, Sebene Selassie, and Jeff Warren for Meditation Party, a 3-day immersive retreat at the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, NY, October 16–18. Grab your in-person spot here https://www.eomega.org/workshops/meditation-party, or sign up to livestream here https://www.eomega.org/workshops/meditation-party-livestream! This episode is sponsored by: BetterHelp: Find support and have someone with you in therapy. Sign up and get 10% off at BetterHelp.com/happier https://betterhelp.com/happier. Fast Growing Trees: Get 20% off your first purchase when using the code HAPPIER at checkout, fastgrowingtrees.com http://fastgrowingtrees.com/. Warby Parker: Buy one prescription pair and get 20% off any additional prescription pairs at warbyparker.com/happier http://warbyparker.com/happier. To advertise on the show, contact [email protected] or visit https://advertising.libsyn.com/10HappierwithDanHarris

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:04Dan Harris?

  This is the 10% Happier Podcast. I'm Dan Harris.

• 0:18Dan Harris?

  Hello, everybody. Today, we're talking about one of the most confusing and controversial areas of wellness and fitness, and that is supplements. Should you be taking them? Which ones should you be taking? How do you know? How do you separate fact from fiction in the midst of this multi-billion dollar, almost entirely unregulated business where people are making all sorts of wild health claims? So what to do about all this? We brought in a ringer, an expert, Dr. Mahtab Jafari. She's a professor at the University of California, Irvine, and she's also written a book called The Truth About Dietary Supplements: An Evidence-Based Guide to a Safer Medicine Cabinet. Real quick, as many of you know,

• 0:59Dan Harris?

  one of the major use cases for supplements is, of course, sleep, which is why we are this week over on the 10% app adding a ton of new sleep content. We've just added 10 new sleep meditations. We're also going to be doing a live session tomorrow where our Teacher of the Month, Cara Lai, is going to talk about how to use meditation for sleep. And alongside all of this, we'll be doing some sleep-centric content here on the pod. Sleep, as you know, is the apex predator of healthy habits. Nothing works without it. By the way, if you sign up for the app, which you can do over at danharris.com, you will also get this podcast without any ads. So head on over to danharris.com.

• 1:41Dan Harris?

  Okay, enough out of me. We're going to get started with Dr. Mahtab Jafari right after this. If you care about supporting independent media, and if you care about being a node of sanity in an insane world, there are a few quick, easy, and free ways that you can support me and my team, which I would be really grateful for. One way to do it is to sign up for my newsletter, which comes out on Monday mornings. It's a little dose of sanity in your inbox at the beginning of a busy week. The second way to do it is to Follow and subscribe to the show wherever you're listening or watching right now. That really helps. Three, share your favorite episode with a friend. This is a great and low stakes way to connect with somebody in your orbit. And not for nothing, it also helps us grow.

• 2:24Dan Harris?

  And all of these things take about 30 seconds and they really do help. You will be supporting me and my team and our mission. And I, as I said, would be immensely grateful. You can find everything we do at danharris.com. It's all right there. Thank you. I mean that seriously. We'll be right back with more show. If you care about supporting independent media and if you care about being a node of sanity and an insane world, there are a few quick, easy and free ways that you can support me and my team, which I would be really grateful for. One way to do it is to sign up for my newsletter, which comes out on Monday mornings. It's a little dose of sanity in your inbox at the beginning of a busy week. The second way to do it is to follow and subscribe to the show wherever you're listening

• 3:09Dan Harris?

  or watching right now. That really helps. Three, share your favorite episode with a friend. This is a great and low stakes way to connect with somebody in your orbit. And not for nothing, it also helps us grow. And all of these things take about 30 seconds and they really do help. You will be supporting me and my team and our mission. And I, as I said, would be immensely grateful. You can find everything we do at danharris.com. It's all right there. Thank you. I mean that seriously. We'll be right back with more show. Dr. Mahtab Jafari, welcome to the show.

• 3:42Speaker 01

  Thank you and thank you for having me.

• 3:44Dan Harris?

  It's a pleasure. I'm so eager to talk about this because I have so many questions and I've been so confused about this stuff for a long time. Let me start though by getting some background information on you. How did you get interested in this? My understanding is it has its roots in your childhood and perhaps even with your grandmother.

• 4:03Speaker 01

  Yes, it does. So I've been doing biomedical research for the past thirty years in various capacities, but mainly in academia. But growing up in Iran, every time I had a minor illness, a stomach pain or anything, my grandmother would give me some herbs from her own garden, not from a bottle. I usually felt better after getting those remedies from her. So that's how it all started, because she also had a garden and she grew her own herbs and fruits and vegetables. But then when I became a professor and I started my own lab

• 4:43Speaker 01

  and my research, I delved a little bit, obviously, deeper into it because I was a skeptic with some of the remedies that my grandmother used to give me. And the more I studied plants and botanicals, the more I realized how powerful they are. But as far as the research and my work on dietary supplement goes, it really started with questions that I get from people. The questions usually start by, you know, my neighbor or my friend recommended this supplement. What do you think? This has been going on for two or three decades now, and I finally decided to write that book to really create awareness and talk to people

• 5:25Speaker 01

  about the safe use of dietary supplements. So my work predominantly, my research at University of California in Irvine now focuses on safe use of dietary supplements, testing botanical extracts and dietary supplements in my lab, really creating this awareness, again, on the safe use of dietary supplements.

• 5:49Dan Harris?

  Okay. So I'm going to ask you a bunch of the questions that your friends and family members and neighbors have been asking you for decades.

• 5:55Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 5:56Dan Harris?

  But before I get into that, because I have a million questions about peptides and vitamins and all these other things, let's just talk about the overall landscape. Eleanor Vasiliou, who's producing this episode, gave me some research coming into this that kind of blew my mind. According to PubMed, The global dietary supplement market is estimated to be valued between 150 billion and 275 billion dollars a year, I believe. Those estimates are a couple of years old, so it may be bigger than that now. What's your sense about the size of this market and why is it getting bigger and more popular all the time?

• 6:34Speaker 01

  I think that these numbers are accurate. When I give public talks on dietary supplement, I usually have a slide that presents data on the market, on the number of dietary supplements. And the estimate for 2025, 2026 used to be like 50 or 60 billion, but it's way more than that. It's very close to the number that you just said. The question is why? Because as you mentioned, this is an unregulated market. So the question is why people reach for dietary supplements? And of course, the answer is multifactorial. I like to say that the social media and the marketing practices play a huge role.

• 7:17Speaker 01

  People like to have agency when it comes to their healthcare and they feel like by reaching out to dietary supplement, they are taking proactive steps to help themselves. So that's like the psychological aspect of taking supplements. Everybody wants to be healthy. Everybody wants to improve their wellness, their health. If you don't have training to really understand the science, it's sometimes hard to differentiate science and pseudoscience when it comes to marketing practices. So I wish I had a one-line answer to your question, but it's really multifactorial, why this industry is exploding.

• 7:59Dan Harris?

  You don't need to have one-line answers for anything here. You can be as nuanced as you want. I just want to give you permission that... So when you say it's unregulated, does that mean that if I decide to have Dan Harris's protein powder tomorrow, I can make any health claims I want? And also, is anybody going to test my product?

• 8:20Speaker 01

  Dietary supplements are considered as food now. So if Dan Harris wants to come up with his own, let's say, protein supplement, you can do that. FDA is not going to regulate. When I talk about regulation, meaning that FDA uses different guidelines when it comes to dietary supplements compared to pharmaceuticals. So a dietary supplement does not need to be approved by FDA before it reaches the market. So you can create your own supplement and you can put it on the market. And FDA requires that you practice good manufacturing practices and also make sure that you don't use ingredients that are dangerous to public.

• 9:03Speaker 01

  And really, the burden of proof when it comes to the quality of dietary supplement is on people, is on consumers, is on us. FDA gets involved when a dietary supplement has reports of side effects. So you can go on MedWatch. It's a program that FDA offers and you can type in a side effect that you're experiencing with a side effect. And when those complaints become like, let's say, when they are at the, I don't know the exact number, so I don't want to say anything wrong. But when those complaints increase on this website, then FDA starts looking into that company in particular

• 9:47Speaker 01

  to see why this is happening. And as far as the claim goes, FDA requires dietary supplements to have a statement. I'm sure you've seen that. It says, "This statement has not been approved by FDA." So you can make any health claim that you want, as long as you have that statement. I don't want to say always because you can make outrageous claims. But let's say that you want to say, "This supplement is going to help you sleep better. It's going to improve the quality of your sleep." Then you just have to put that statement, that this statement has not been approved or reviewed by FDA. And that's pretty much it. That's all the regulations we have right now.

• 10:28Dan Harris?

  Okay, Dr. Jafari, please excuse my French. But this system that you're describing sounds fucking insane. Given the size of this market, given the sheer number of people who are relying on these products, the fact that the level of regulation is so low and in some cases nonexistent, it just seems howlingly irresponsible.

• 10:52Speaker 01

  It is. I agree with you. It is really an insane situation. As an educator and researcher, what makes it even harder is the public perception. A survey was conducted not too long ago, asking Americans, "How do you feel about your supplements? Do you think they are safe? Do you think they were FDA-approved?" And almost half of the people thought that, yes, there is some sort of regulation for these supplements before they hit the market. More than half said that if this supplement is harmful, it should not be on the shelves of stores. So, yes, we definitely have a long way to go when it comes to regulation.

• 11:35Speaker 01

  And this is what I constantly talk about in my lectures and in my public presentations, that we need to have better regulation for dietary supplements.

• 11:45Dan Harris?

  You said that there's some burden on the supplier not to put harmful ingredients into these powders and potions that they're peddling. But I understand that actually adulteration and contamination are real problems.

• 12:03Speaker 01

  Yes. So, the burden of proof when it comes to the safety and the quality of supplements is on us. So you and I, as consumers, we have to do our own homework and we need to make sure that the supplement that we are taking has good quality. On the manufacturer's side, they have to follow good manufacturing practices. I mean, this is something that FDA requires. But as I said, FDA is not going to, for instance, verify the dietary supplement before it hits the market. And you're absolutely right. There has been cases of adulteration. Contaminations and these issues persist. And in my mind, it is going to continue to persist until we have better regulation.

• 12:46Speaker 01

  Having said that, the good news is that there are some responsible dietary supplement companies out there who practice transparency when it comes to where they get their ingredients. And there are third-party organizations such as NSF, USP, who come in and test those dietary supplements and give the company a stamp, a USP stamp or an NSF stamp, to say that, yes, we have tested their products and it is safe. But not every dietary supplement company goes through that process because it's extremely expensive, time-consuming. But the minimum is to study the company as a consumer and see if they are transparent

• 13:31Speaker 01

  from where they get the raw material and how they are manufacturing that supplement.

• 13:38Dan Harris?

  So I think what you're saying is if I'm tempted to buy a supplement, I'm in a store, I'm looking at a rack of supplements or an influencer I follow is recommending a supplement, I should check the label to see if it's USP or NSF certified. And if it's not, I should think twice.

• 13:58Speaker 01

  Well, you should think twice, but there are other ways to check for quality. For instance, Consumer Lab, I highly recommend people using Consumer Lab. It's another third-party organization that look at the quality of supplements. So let's say the supplement that you are taking doesn't have that stamp because many supplements don't. Smaller companies usually cannot afford going through that process. So the minimum is to make sure that when you go on consumelab.com and put in the name of the supplement and company, you're not under what I call troubled problem or red list, meaning that the supplement has had issues with quality.

• 14:40Speaker 01

  And another way to check the company is to go on fda.gov and see if FDA has issued any warning letters, any injunction letters, or any type of warning to that company when it comes to the quality of their supplements. So again, you and I as consumers have to do our homework to make sure that the supplement is safe and has good quality.

• 15:06Dan Harris?

  Boy, uh, that doesn't seem like the smart system, but we can stipulate that. All right, so let's get a little bit deeper on the types of supplements that are out there. I'm going to list what I think are the various types, but please revise and extend my list if I've screwed up. But I think we're talking about things like vitamins, minerals, herbs and botanicals, proteins, probiotics and enzymes, and now everybody's talking about peptides. Is that a reasonably exhaustive list?

• 15:40Speaker 01

  That's a very good list.

• 15:41Dan Harris?

  So let's go through these. What are, and this is, this is going to be an embarrassingly basic question, so I apologize upfront, but what are vitamins?

• 15:50Speaker 01

  Vitamins are nutrients that we find in various foods, fruits and vegetables and dairy products and meat products that we consume that are essential for our health and homeostasis, meaning that we need to have them to survive and to have a good health. And some of them serve as cofactors, meaning that they are very, very important when it comes to physiological pathways and what makes us be healthy. And some of them contribute to the health of various organs in our bodies, such as our bones, our muscle, our brain. This is a very broad definition of what a vitamin is.

• 16:33Speaker 01

  And if we talk about specific examples, I'll be happy to tell you what that vitamin does exactly.

• 16:39Dan Harris?

  Yeah, I do want to get into specific examples, so thank you for the invitation. Let's start with vitamin B. I've been taking it for years, starting back when I became a vegetarian slash sometimes vegan. I'm not that now, but I still take it. Should I and other people be taking vitamin B? And if so, how do we know whether we should be taking it?

• 17:02Speaker 01

  So like with other vitamins, the first question that you have to ask yourself is, do I need them? And how do I need B supplements? And when you say vitamin B, there are different types of vitamin B. But the ones that people usually reach for, I mean, the most commonly used one is B12. So the first thing you have to do is to see if you are B12 deficient. As you mentioned, unless you are a vegan or a vegetarian, most of us are not B12 deficient because we get enough vitamin B from meat and from other food products that we consume. But let's say you do a blood test and you're vitamin B12 deficient. Then the chances are that you need to take that supplement.

• 17:47Speaker 01

  And there are also, of course, it's not just the deficiency in your blood with a blood test, but there are some other diseases that require B12 for B supplementations. And that is different types of anemia and other diseases. So again, the first question is, do I need to take it? And in your case, when you were a vegetarian, vegan, the chances of needing to take B12 was pretty high.

• 18:16Dan Harris?

  Right, so what you're saying now is that next time I go to the doctor, I should closely examine my blood test results. And if there is no B deficiency, I may want to talk to my doctor about no longer taking this supplement.

• 18:32Speaker 01

  Yes, absolutely. It's a very simple test. It's not that expensive because sometimes people tell me that, well, I can't afford it. And then my immediate answer is that, well, I promise you that the cost of the blood test is cheaper than what you're paying for the supplement on an annual basis. So it is a very simple blood test and you can find out if you're B12 deficient or not. And then supplement, if you're deficient, then yes, you should definitely supplement.

• 19:02Dan Harris?

  Just to reset for people, we're working our way through, I'm gonna politely, I hope, ask Dr. Jafari to help us walk through various types of supplements and separate fact from fiction. But I do want to digress from that slightly to pursue this question of blood tests. A key question for listeners is like, how do I know if I need any kind of supplement? So when we go to our doctor, what kind of tests should we be asking for generally?

• 19:31Speaker 01

  We should definitely ask for a comprehensive and a general assessment of vitamins. And it's very easy to test for vitamin D, B12, iron, magnesium, and things like that. So that is like the basic. And I think this is something that should happen every year. So once a year, we should check for these vitamins. But sometimes we may need to go one step further because, for instance, you may be supplementing with vitamin D and you're on a high dose of vitamin D and you're still deficient. So this is when you should also

• 20:11Speaker 01

  consider doing a genetic test to make sure that you don't have a gene variation that can cause vitamin D deficiency, even if you're taking high doses of vitamin D. And that genetic test, look at your predisposition or your genetic variance for vitamin D receptor gene. And that will tell you if you may need higher doses of vitamin D and what the underlying problem is. And I use vitamin D as an example. And there are other genetic tests that can be done for other vitamins. But the basic and to begin with, when it comes to deficiencies and recognizing them is to do a blood test.

• 20:55Dan Harris?

  And should the blood test be looking at? Just our, whether we have vitamin deficiencies, or should it be testing things like our overall nutritional status, liver function, electrolytes, things like that?

• 21:11Speaker 01

  I'm so glad you brought it up. So I was referring to just testing for vitamins, but anybody who wants to start taking dietary supplements, they have to have a baseline liver function test, a baseline kidney function test, and also electrolytes, as you mentioned. Many of these supplements use liver for metabolism. So if we have liver dysfunction, they can be very harmful. And kidney function is another one that is very, very important that we have a baseline kidney function. Because again, these supplements use kidneys to either be reabsorbed, excreted, or ending up in our urine.

• 21:53Speaker 01

  So baseline liver and baseline kidney function tests are very, very important. And especially in older adults, we recently published a paper looking at the case reports and the incidence of side effects and interactions with dietary supplements in older adults. And definitely in older adults, as we age, our kidney function and liver function kind of deteriorates. I don't want to sound very negative here, but it is part of the aging process. So we definitely need to have a baseline.

• 22:26Dan Harris?

  So just to put a very fine point on this, next time we go to our doctors, if we're interested in supplementation, what exactly should we be asking for in terms of our blood test? And how much is this likely to cost us?

• 22:39Speaker 01

  The good news is that most insurance companies cover these tests. So it is part of the annual checkup, and we don't have to pay for them. The most basic is to make sure that we have a complete metabolic panel that includes the liver function and kidney function. We want to make sure that we have a complete blood panel, the CBC, they call it. And then part of the annual checkup is always checking for electrolytes, the kidney function, the liver function. It is a very comprehensive blood test that is included when we do the annual check. And as I said, insurance companies pay for it.

• 23:18Dan Harris?

  Are there things we should avoid in terms of testing? I believe you've expressed some skepticism about tests that analyze hair and DNA and things like that.

• 23:29Speaker 01

  So again, just like dietary supplements, these diagnostic tests or tests to assess for nutritional status are also very popular. When you go on social media and look at marketing practices, these tests are also very popular. I don't want to say all of them, but last time I checked, they were not FDA approved. So you mentioned hair analysis. So we just published a paper looking at the level of minerals in hair and compare it to blood sample. Because a lot of people think that it's non-invasive, I can just do a hair test and I can find out what mineral deficiencies I have.

• 24:13Speaker 01

  So we cannot say that a hair test analysis, when it comes to mineral, is the same thing as a blood test. Because a blood test shows what I'm experiencing right now or over the past week or two weeks or acutely. A hair test is going to show you what your deficiencies and excess are over a long term. Does it have a clinical value? Yes, because sometimes we did some professions, you're exposed to heavy metals and other environmental toxins. So they accumulate in our hair. And the hair test becomes valuable in those situations. But a hair mineral analysis cannot replace a comprehensive blood test.

• 25:02Dan Harris?

  Much more with Dr. Jafari right after this.

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• 26:08Dan Harris?

  Okay, one last question about testing. If we see that we've got some sort of deficiency based on the tests that you recommend, is the move to go to supplementation first or see if we can make up for the deficiency via our diet?

• 26:28Speaker 01

  So my first recommendation is diet. Because if we have a good diet and if our nutrition is balanced, the chances of needing supplements is very, very low. So really, the first place to start is to have a very honest evaluation of our nutritional intake, to see how our diet is. But sometimes, even with good nutrition, you may need supplementation. And that's when you go to take a dietary supplement. But these conversations should happen with your healthcare providers. So my recommendation to people is that when you go for the annual checkup, when you go to see your physician,

• 27:12Speaker 01

  take your supplements with you. For instance, if I am checking your nutritional status and I see that you are high in vitamin B12, I need to know what supplements you are taking and at what doses. That is a recommendation that I always have, is to take your supplements to your doctor's appointments to make sure that you have a conversation with them. And then if you are deficient in something, first place to start is diet.

• 27:43Dan Harris?

  Okay, this is very helpful. Thank you for bearing with me on the digression into testing. Let's go back to marching through the list of various types of supplements to get your take on them. We talked about B, vitamin B, specifically B12, which, as I mentioned, is something that I take. Something else that I take that I think is very common, although I'm now questioning whether I need it, is vitamin D. Many years ago, my doctor pointed out that my vitamin D levels were, in his words, "in the toilet." So I just started taking a little vitamin D every day. I've also, though, started to get a little bit more disciplined about getting outside. So perhaps I don't need vitamin D, and I don't even sure if the supplementation would help in the first place. So I said a lot there. What's your take on D?

• 28:29Speaker 01

  Vitamin D is an interesting vitamin, and a very interesting and sometimes controversial topic. Based on reports, 40% of adult Americans are vitamin D deficient. So maybe when you were deficient, you were in that group. So now the question is, how do we define deficiency? And if you go and use PubMed or Google "vitamin D deficiency," it looks like almost every health association has their own definition of deficiency. The number that I use is 20. So anything less than 20 is considered deficient, and it really requires supplementation. But

• 29:11Speaker 01

  then the question is, where you are, and at what stage of your life you are, at what age you have, and what are some other medical conditions that you have. So if you have somebody who has osteoporosis and you've had spontaneous bone fractures, the chances are that you probably need to pay attention to your bone health. And you may need more vitamin D, because we just don't get out as much as we should. We are not exposed to sun. The use of sunscreens and everything else really reduces organic production of vitamin D that we can have naturally. So that's when-

• 29:52Speaker 01

  Supplementation is important. And how to supplement really depends on your blood level. If you are less than twenty, you may have to start with two thousand units a day. If you are in the, let's say, forty to sixty, you may not need supplement, but you still have to check your, you know, vitamin D levels to make sure that they don't fall short. But the recommendation is one thousand units a day if you are not getting enough sun exposure.

• 30:23Speaker 01

  So I don't know if I answered your question.

• 30:26Dan Harris?

  Well, I think it comes back to test your levels, talk to your doctor. And if it's indicated, take it.

• 30:34Speaker 01

  Absolutely, yes.

• 30:36Dan Harris?

  And we'll probably end up repeating that as I march through this this list a lot, but people need to hear it. But let me just ask a few more questions on vitamins. Vitamin C, many people, including my wife, who's a doctor, will recommend taking some vitamin C. If you are starting to feel a little sick or you're worried that you've been exposed, what say you?

• 30:57Speaker 01

  Vitamin C is a very interesting vitamin because we have been studying vitamin C, believe it or not, for almost eighty years. And we have different types of studies, some suggesting that vitamin C is not going to do anything to your cold virus, decreasing the duration or the symptoms, and some studies suggest that it does. If you look at these studies collectively, I like to say that when you feel like you are about to get sick, taking vitamin C, not at very high doses, because I've seen people taking three or four grams, which I do not recommend, but taking maybe five hundred to one thousand milligram of vitamin C is going to probably be

• 31:42Speaker 01

  helpful to decrease the duration of your cold, maybe by one point five days. That's what the summary of these studies are, but it is really not going to help much. And we have wonderful sources of vitamin C in our diet, you know, oranges. Strawberries actually have more vitamin C than oranges and kiwis.

• 32:03Speaker 01

  If you feel like you're getting cold and sometimes, I mean, I don't want to be disrespectful to people who believe in vitamin C, but sometimes the placebo effect also works. So if you take vitamin C at lower levels, five hundred to one thousand milligram a day, it wouldn't help. But daily intake of vitamin C is not really recommended. They have done studies in travelers who have taken vitamin C, compared them to travelers who didn't take vitamin C to see which ones get more sick, and there was no statistically significant differences.

• 32:37Dan Harris?

  I don't know if they still sell this, but I remember in the airports, they would sell something called Airborne, which was, I think, a multivitamin. And you drop it in your drink and it dissolves and it tastes good. I used to take it, but it sounds like it may not be that useful.

• 32:53Speaker 01

  If you have a good diet, if you have a balanced, good diet, the chances of being helpful is not that high. But Airborne is still being sold. I don't know the ranking, but it's pretty high on the list of most popular and sold dietary supplements, especially during the flu season and cold season in winter. And Airborne is not just vitamin C, it also has some other vitamins. It has zinc and a few other.

• 33:20Dan Harris?

  So I think what you're saying is it probably won't help as a preventative measure, but what if you're starting to feel the first tingles and aches of a cold, will zinc and vitamin C and maybe echinacea, will any of that help? You mean, you mentioned C might help a little bit, but what about those other supplements?

• 33:40Speaker 01

  There have also been studies published on these other supplements, and in my mind, the jury is still out. And there is a very minor, I would say, minor significance and minor trend towards these supplements helping to reduce the symptoms and maybe to reduce the viral load. But as I said, there are no good randomized clinical trials looking at them. And of course, the issue of clinical studies on dietary supplements is something that we can probably spend a few hours on.

• 34:15Dan Harris?

  Okay, one last vitamin question. I think a lot of people just reflexively and habitually take a multivitamin. I suspect your answer is just going to be run the test, talk to your doctor, but I just want to check if there's anything more to say.

• 34:31Speaker 01

  Multivitamins, as you mentioned, commonly used. I think last time I checked the statistics, almost 30% of US adults take a dietary supplement. And I think the number is probably higher than that. So with multivitamins, again, I want to go back to the basics. The first question is, do I need them? If I have a very good diet, the chances of needing it is pretty much zero. Because the amount of various vitamins that we get in a multivitamin is pretty low. So let's say you're D deficient, 40 units or 50 units of, or even 100 units of vitamin D in a multivitamin is really not going to be helpful.

• 35:10Speaker 01

  You have to supplement. So the amount of these vitamins in a multivitamin is important. But going back to studies, study after study shows that multivitamins are not going to improve our health. Two recent studies actually show that taking multivitamins increases mortality. So patients who have been taking these supplements, they had a higher risk for mortality. But I want to step back because this can become like a headline news that, oh, taking multivitamins is going to increase your mortality. But if you look at the populations who were enrolled in these studies, you have to ask yourself some very basic questions.

• 35:52Speaker 01

  So maybe people who are taking multivitamins are secure in general. Their baseline health is not optimized. And this is why they are taking vitamins. And this is a problem that we have with most dietary supplement studies is the study design and looking at the characteristics of the populations that they recruited and were included in these studies. For most dietary supplement studies, for instance, we don't have baseline vitamin levels. This has been a big critique of vitamin D studies, especially the ones that fail.

• 36:28Speaker 01

  Because the supporters of vitamin D supplementations would say that, wait a minute, you didn't check vitamin D levels and you put these people on four hundred or one thousand units of vitamin D and you didn't see any efficacy, let's say, in bone fracture, cardiovascular health, immune health. So you can't really make those conclusions. And this is really an ongoing debate when it comes to studies on dietary supplements. But going back to your multivitamin question, if you don't have a sound nutrition, if your diet is not good, you may consider taking a multivitamin. But then you need to have a conversation

• 37:09Speaker 01

  with your physician, because you have to look at that multivitamins and see how much of each vitamin you have in that supplement, and if you need more.

• 37:22Dan Harris?

  This is just fascinating and sobering. All right. So we talked about vitamins. What are minerals? I honestly don't know. Like, what is the difference between a vitamin and a mineral?

• 37:32Speaker 01

  So I give you some examples to just make it easier. So for instance, calcium is a mineral, magnesium is a mineral, and zinc is a mineral, copper is a mineral. So when you test, when you do a blood test, you can also check the levels of minerals in your blood. A very controversial topic when it comes to mineral is the use of calcium, for instance. So we all need calcium in our diet. And I know there are ranges based on the fact if you're a woman, or if you're a female or a male, I usually recommend to people, try to have at least fifteen hundred milligrams of calcium intake every day. So

• 38:14Speaker 01

  a lot of people reach for the supplements. A lot of people take calcium supplements because they think that the more is better when it comes to calcium. And that is absolutely not true. Going back to the baseline test that we talked about, for instance, somebody who has kidney problems, taking more calcium is really not going to be helpful, is actually going to harm them. Going to cause more kidney problems and it is also going to deposit more calcium in our blood vessels. And that is going to be a separate issue because we are going to increase the risk of developing coronary artery disease. So calcium is great. My recommendation is try to get as much calcium as we can from our diet.

• 39:00Speaker 01

  But if we still need to supplement, we have to be very careful.

• 39:04Dan Harris?

  Let me ask about another mineral. You mentioned it, magnesium. It's often recommended as a way to help us sleep. What's the truth about magnesium? Does it actually help us sleep?

• 39:15Speaker 01

  Magnesium is another interesting mineral. Data suggests that fifty percent of adult Americans are magnesium deficient. You may think that we came up with that statistics because we measured blood magnesium levels. Just like I mentioned, vitamin D levels, we measured magnesium levels in our blood and we were deficient. And that's really not the case. The magnesium that we get in our blood test only represents one percent of the total magnesium in our bodies. Sixty percent of the magnesium in our bodies are in our bones. You're not going to get the amount that we have in our bones in a blood test. So that fifty percent is based on intake.

• 39:56Speaker 01

  Because we have done epidemiological studies and we have observed that most of us do not have enough magnesium intake. And based on that, the intake inadequacy, we decided that, okay, we are magnesium deficient. So now going back to the uses of magnesium. There are some studies, for instance, suggesting in certain types of migraine, people who have migraine headaches, taking magnesium help them. When it comes to sleep, studies have not been conclusive. Some studies suggest that it may help and some studies suggest that it may not help. I would say that this recent study that was published actually in twenty twenty five.

• 40:39Speaker 01

  Look at is probably the best magnesium study. And I tell you why, although the sample size was quite small, I think they only look at. At sixty adults. The good thing about this study was that the supplement that they used was standardized. It was a form of magnesium formulation, magnesium thionate, which crosses the blood brain barrier and then it can end up in our brain. And in that study, they showed that magnesium actually improved sleep quality. And the reason that I like this study is that it wasn't just based on a questionnaire, because I can be very subjective and ask you, Dan, how did you sleep last night? And you said, oh, it was pretty good. So that's very subjective.

• 41:23Speaker 01

  But in this study, they also evaluated their sleep quality with an oral rate. So what they did was that these people, they were collecting data on the subjects in this study in a subjective and objective manner. And they showed that magnesium supplementation helped them improve the quality of their sleep. But this is a small study, very small duration. I believe the study was done over twenty one days. What does that mean? Long term, we don't know. What I recommend to people when they complain about insomnia and sleep disorders is again, go back to their physicians and have a very open and honest conversations with them.

• 42:08Speaker 01

  Because often insomnia and sleep disorders could be because of some other illnesses and some other issues. So just reaching out for a supplement or even a medication to take care of our sleep is probably not recommended. And then it comes to insomnia, of course, you're talking about dietary supplements, but the science shows that cognitive behavioral therapy is probably the most robust intervention to improve our sleep. And meditation, and meditation.

• 42:39Dan Harris?

  And meditation, yes. We've had sleep experts on the show before, and it's been asserted quite powerfully and repeatedly that CBTI, cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia, is the biggest winner in this category. I will say, and some of my listeners know this, I'm happy to say I had insomnia for a decade and it turned out I had something called restless leg syndrome that actually has been effectively treated with a combination of iron supplementation and a few medications.

• 43:11Speaker 01

  Yes, I'm so glad you shared that example because if you probably saw a physician to get the diagnosis of restless leg syndrome.

• 43:21Dan Harris?

  Many.

• 43:21Speaker 01

  If you had not done that, you would be over medicating and over supplementing for your insomnia and it was not good, it was actually harmful.

• 43:33Speaker 01

  So now you have a diagnosis and you're treating the issue.

• 43:38Dan Harris?

  When it comes to sleep, melatonin, is there evidence that it can help?

• 43:44Speaker 01

  Yes, melatonin is a hormone that we all produce naturally. We all produce melatonin. Some of us secrete less melatonin, so we may need to supplement even just to improve our circadian rhythm on a day-to-day basis. But for the most part, we have a good production. Most people have a good amount of melatonin. So melatonin could be useful for occasional insomnia. For instance, your jet lag or you're traveling, one to three milligrams of melatonin is not going to be dangerous. A recent study really raised the alarm on the use of melatonin.

• 44:23Speaker 01

  It was actually published four or five months ago and they look at 130,000 people who were taking melatonin at least for one year and they reported that melatonin increased the risk for heart failure in those people. And I don't want to go through the details unless you want me to, but really the premise was that it was changing their blood pressure and heart rate and this is how these people ended up having higher risk of heart failure. This study was not published. It was an abstract that was presented at the American Heart Association Conference in November of 2025 and it hasn't been peer reviewed. So when people ask me questions about this study, I say that the study was presented

• 45:08Speaker 01

  at a conference, at a scientific conference. But to my knowledge, because I checked this last week, it hasn't been published yet. And when it's published, I'm sure that in the discussion. Or the critique section. We are going to find out what are some of the controversial issues that we have to consider about this study. Having said that, my general recommendation is not to take melatonin on a daily basis. If you feel like you have to take it to fall asleep, then on a daily basis, then again, you need to have a conversation with your physician. One problem with melatonin is also the quality of the supplements. Melatonin can be sedative.

• 45:53Speaker 01

  Dr. Cohen at Harvard published this study looking at melatonin gummies. And he reported that some of these gummies had 300% more melatonin than what they reported. That means that you can be really sedated in the morning, meaning that you shouldn't be driving and you should really worry. So melatonin can help people to fall asleep, but it's really not a sleep medication. It doesn't help you to stay asleep.

• 46:24Dan Harris?

  Much more with Dr. Jafari right after this.

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• 47:34Dan Harris?

  What category do omega-3 fatty acids fall into?

• 47:39Speaker 01

  Omega-3 fatty acids are a form of dietary supplements. So they are not vitamins, they are not minerals. As you said, they are fatty acids. And we have to get them from our diet. Omega-3s and omega-6s is not something that we can just walk around and produce. So we need to get them from our diet. And the good news is that there are different sources of omega-3s in our diet. This is another dietary supplement that there is an objective test to evaluate whether we are deficient or we have sufficient amount in our bodies. And that is the omega index. That's again another, actually, you don't even need a blood test.

• 48:21Speaker 01

  It is a finger stick test that you can measure your omega-3 levels and the ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 in your blood. And if your omega-3 index is less than 8%, most likely you need to supplement.

• 48:39Dan Harris?

  My psychiatrist recommended a large dose of omega-3s as a way to elevate my mood because I've been dealing with a bit of a recurrence of depression over the last couple of months. Any evidence for that recommendation?

• 48:58Speaker 01

  So when we look at all the scientific studies that have been published on omega-3s, and this is another, I want to go back to the quality of clinical studies because once again, we don't, sometimes don't know what the baseline of the participants are. They could be deficient in omega-3s or replete, and we wouldn't know because we never check for that index. But if you look at the scientific studies on omega-3s collectively, there are some small studies that suggest that omega-3s are useful for brain health, especially if you don't have enough in your diet. But the studies are not conclusive. What we know about omega-3s for sure is that if you have high levels of triglycerides...

• 49:43Speaker 01

  And you take omega threes and sometimes the prescription form, not even the dietary supplements, unless again, you look for a high quality supplement, it can decrease triglycerides. So that's why omega threes are very helpful for heart disease. Omega threes also have anti-inflammatory properties. Some data suggests that maybe this is why they are also useful for our, you know, brain health and cardiovascular function because they decrease inflammation.

• 50:17Dan Harris?

  I think we're now back at our theme. Some arguments for omega three. But get tested, see what your levels are, talk to your doctor.

• 50:25Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 50:25Dan Harris?

  I'm not sure we fully closed the loop on whether they can help with depression. Did you answer that part?

• 50:32Speaker 01

  What I shared was that there are studies, there are small studies suggesting that omega threes can help with depression and they can help with brain health in general. Some studies even suggest that they can delay dementia. But my conclusion was that these studies are, were not done long term. Because for instance, with dementia, you can test omega threes in four to six weeks or even three months and say that, okay, they had an impact on the symptoms of dementia. The study has to be long term, it has to go over years and maybe sometimes a decade. But, but I was saying is that the data and the results are not conclusive.

• 51:16Speaker 01

  When it comes to the impact of omega threes on depression, for instance. But again, my own little editorial point here is that if you did take the omega threes and you feel improvement, then that means that it is working for you. So I am not going to say, Dan, stop taking it because it doesn't work. And sometimes when I share this answer with the patients that I see or my friends, they say, wait a minute, this is a very wishy washy answer. You're telling me to take it, but then the data doesn't show that. I said, this is when the personalization come into effect. Because if a study shows that, for instance, vitamin D is not going to help with your fractures

• 52:01Speaker 01

  or decrease the risk of having fractures, and I didn't check the baseline level, but it's working for you, then it's working for you.

• 52:11Dan Harris?

  I don't find that wishy-washy. I find that elasticity to be just wise.

• 52:16Speaker 01

  And you know, then something else that I like to add is that science is constantly evolving. So we may have had studies that were published 10, 20 years ago, and the conclusion of those studies are not really consistent with what we are studying now. So we have to remember that when we talk about scientific evidence, scientific evidence evolves, and you're doing a better job with the quality of the studies on dietary supplements. So hopefully, we will reach a point that I will have this interview, this dialogue with you and say, "The studies are great. The quality of the studies are great, but we are not there yet."

• 52:57Dan Harris?

  On the subject of depression, another supplement that was actually recommended to me by the same psychiatrist, I have not taken this, is St. John's Wort. What's your take on St. John's Wort?

• 53:09Speaker 01

  It comes from a plant, so it's a botanical extract. One of the ingredients that this botanical has, one of the hundreds of molecules that this botanical has, is very similar. The chemical structure of that molecule is very similar to SSRIs, selective serotonin reuptic inhibitors. So St. John's Wort does have antidepressant properties. But again, it has to be used under the supervision of a physician, because St. John's Wort uses the same liver metabolic pathways that some other drugs use, and it may interact with them. So you really need to be under the supervision of a physician.

• 53:54Speaker 01

  I do not recommend people just going to a store and buying St. John's Wort to improve their mood and improve their depression, because with the understanding that, "Oh, this is just safe. This is a dietary supplement. This is a natural product, and it's safe." There is nothing safe there, because it can interact with your other drugs and supplements.

• 54:17Dan Harris?

  So you mentioned that St. John's Wort is a botanical, and that actually is one of the categories I wanted to ask you about herbs and botanicals. And you mentioned early on in this conversation that your grandmother used to give you herbs and botanical remedies for various ailments when you were growing up. What is your current view on the efficacy of herbs and botanicals now?

• 54:42Speaker 01

  Humans have used herbal remedies and botanicals for thousands of years. In the context of traditional medical practices, when they use correctly and appropriately, we know that they work. Going back to my grandmother, for instance, if we had stomach pain, she would give us mint. She would grind up some mint, put them in hot water, and give us like a mint tea. Of course, she didn't know that by putting the mint in hot water, she's extracting it because you're extracting chemicals out of the mint plant when you do that, and it helped us. Another example that I use from my grandmother is in harsh, cold winters of Tehran.

• 55:25Speaker 01

  She used to give us like one teaspoon of cinnamon to keep us warm. And I really hated that because it was very bitter. Years later, it was about 10 years ago that we did a study in my lab with cinnamon, and we found out that cinnamon actually activates heat shock proteins. So what I thought it was voodoo by my grandmother is actually I was able to prove it in my lab, which was very interesting. So going back to herbs, they can be effective if they are used in the right context. Again, I want to go back to the quality of the dietary supplements, especially herbal products, because unless we know the source, we know the farm that they come from,

• 56:10Speaker 01

  we know the quality of the product, it is really hard to make any assessment about their safety. And one thing that I always talk about is staying away from these blends, proprietary blends, because you may buy herbal Remedy and they list, I don't know, sometimes ten or twenty different herbs. And there is no information on the dose, there is no information or where these herbs come from, where they cultivated from an organic farm, responsible agriculture practices, we don't know. I really want people to think twice when they take an herbal remedy that has many different ingredients.

• 56:53Dan Harris?

  Okay, well, that brings to mind AG1, which is an incredibly popular supplement. It's advertised all over social media. They've talked to me and my team about advertising on this show. We had a bunch of requests that I don't think went down well with them. And so they're not currently advertisers here. But so what's your take on AG1?

• 57:14Speaker 01

  My take on AG1 is pretty much what I just shared with you about other dietary supplements. I have not had a deep dive into this particular supplement. So I can't really share any scientific data. I don't know if they are out there. But my take is going back to the quality and making sure that the quality of the product is verified and it is trustworthy. And if you tell me some of the indications that people are recommending AG1, I can make comments on those two.

• 57:50Dan Harris?

  But I think the basic pitch is that it's just a ton of, it's like having a huge salad. And I don't know if that's a reasonable claim to make, but I think that's the pitch.

• 58:01Speaker 01

  This is a very interesting pitch that many companies where they sell these green powders. I think the big umbrella for these kinds of supplements is that, oh, use these green powders because we have poor diets, we don't have enough fruits and vegetables. And the green powder or AG1 can replace that. If you're not eating a salad, at least do that. My take on that is the same take that I have with everything else. Number one, these are highly processed. In order to get to the product, you have to go through some chemical processing. Even if you're freeze drying the herbs or the greens, that is considered processing. So they are highly processed.

• 58:46Speaker 01

  And then the other question is the other ingredients in these green powders, because they don't taste good. So unless you add sugar and other additives, it's not really pleasant to eat them. So I want to go back to the question of quality. And finally, do you think that we are going to get the benefits of the polyphenols that we get from, let's say, a salad compared to AG1? There's really no comparison, because a fresh salad that you make at home and you eat has polyphenols and antioxidants that are not processed. They come in your salad bowl and in your salad that you can compare. You can compare the efficacy and the health benefits

• 59:30Speaker 01

  of whole foods compared to something that is processed.

• 59:36Dan Harris?

  What about protein powders?

• 59:39Speaker 01

  So protein powders is another interesting topic, and I think we are becoming very obsessed with protein powders because we are realizing that we don't have enough protein intake. The average adult in US does not have enough protein intake. So now the question is, how am I going to supplement that? For me, the safest and easiest way is with food. So make sure that you have thirty to forty grams of protein intake with each meal. And I know there are various numbers out there, one point six to two point two grams per kilogram per day. But my recommendation, I try to simplify my recommendation. So I tell people that you're eating breakfast,

• 1:00:24Speaker 01

  look at your breakfast and see if there is any protein there. Look at your lunch, look at your dinner, your snacks. So try to consume enough protein with each meal, and if you can, with your snacks. Now going back to the protein powders, there have been studied. And we know that some of them have heavy metals, some of them are contaminated. So then again, the question is, how can I assure the quality of that protein powder? A very recent study, I'm trying to remember the funding agency. It was part of the Clean Label Project. And they looked at, I believe, one hundred thirty four different protein powders out there.

• 1:01:08Speaker 01

  And they reported that forty seven percent of them had heavy metals. So now the question about these heavy metals is that. How much of heavy metals? Because if you look at Prop sixty five in California, they almost recommend nothing. And that was a big, big critique of that work is that it was over exaggerated. The amount of heavy metals in these protein powder. But to me, if I am a consumer. And I'm looking at the protein powder and there is a forty seven percent chance that this protein powder may have heavy metal, I will think twice. So I would again go back to my recommendation with protein powders.

• 1:01:49Speaker 01

  It is much safer to buy something that has the NSF stamp. Because NSF regulates sports and nutritional and dietary supplements that are used in sports. And protein powder, as you know, are heavily consumed among athletes. So I know that I'm starting to sound like a broken tape recorder, but go back to food. Consume your protein from whole foods and in your diet. And yes, every now and then we may need a protein shake, so I don't have anything against that. My sons consume them, but go for a good quality one.

• 1:02:30Dan Harris?

  Speaking of athletes, and I consider myself to be, you know, an amateur athlete and, you know, dedicated worker, outer, I lift weights, et cetera, et cetera. Something I hear a lot about in fitness circles, but have never tried myself, and I don't actually even know really what it is, so maybe you can educate me. Creatine, what's your take on creatine?

• 1:02:50Speaker 01

  Creatine is an emerging dietary supplement. A lot of people confuse it with a type of protein. They said, oh, right after workout, I have to take my creatine because this is going to be another protein I'm taking. It is not. Creatine is a dietary supplement. And again, here, going back to the science, we've had really interesting studies on creatine. So if you're going to the gym and you're lifting and you want to improve the quality and the quantity of your muscle, taking creatine can be helpful. So the recommendation is, you know, after your workout, try to take three to five grams of creatine.

• 1:03:32Speaker 01

  And if you have a good kidney function, it is pretty safe. Now, we have studies suggesting that creatine could also be good for cognition. It could be good for brain health. And there is a positive trend in these studies, but I think we need more. The best benefit with creatine when it comes to the impact on brain health was observed in post-menopausal women. But if you are an athlete and you're working out, taking creatine can be useful. Because I don't know how deep you want me to go into the mechanism of action of creatine, but it really helps the production of ATP in our muscle cells. And it also helps with the retention of water.

• 1:04:17Speaker 01

  So you may hear people saying that, I started taking creatine and I gained weight. Well, the first one to two kilo, extra kilogram or four, five pounds of extra weight is because of the water retention in your muscles. This is not really a way, unless you're also eating a lot of candies and, you know, sugary stuff when you exercise. And the last thing I want to say about creatine, because I just got this question actually yesterday, so it's really fresh on my mind, that the type is important. So creatine monohydrate is probably the one that you should consume because it's better absorbed.

• 1:04:56Dan Harris?

  Another supplement that people are talking about a lot these days, I think this is a category of supplements, I think, peptides. I'm hearing a ton about peptides, they're all over the internet. What are peptides and what's your take on them?

• 1:05:10Speaker 01

  If you have a good diet and you consume enough proteins, you probably don't need any extra amino acids and any extra peptides. There are a lot of claims suggesting that when you take peptides, you're going to have better elasticity in your skin, your hair, your nails. And I put peptides in the same category as I put collagen, that these studies have been very subjective. I mean, not very subjective, but semi-subjective because they use surveys and they look at your superficial skin, for instance, to say that if they work and if they don't work. And again, going back to the quality, if you are convinced that this

• 1:05:55Speaker 01

  peptide supplement is going to help you, at least go for the right quality. Make sure that the quality of the supplement is good. But the data is not very convincing.

• 1:06:05Dan Harris?

  Okay, last thing to ask you about, although there are a million other things I could ask you about, but we don't have infinite time. Probiotics, live microorganisms that allegedly aid digestion, so probiotics and enzymes. Any evidence for these?

• 1:06:21Speaker 01

  So probiotics are also very popular, and some people just take them on a daily basis. My recommendations on probiotics is that you have to work on your diet. If you want to have a good microbiota in our gut, probiotics are just going to offer a very temporary solution to a gut microbiota that needs to become healthy with our diet. So my recommendation is if you want to have a healthy gut microbiota, stay away from sugar, especially processed sugar or anything that has high amounts of sugar, and consume fruits and vegetables. That is how you have a healthy microbiota.

• 1:07:06Speaker 01

  Taking probiotics for very specific conditions could be helpful. For instance, if you are taking antibiotics, I highly recommend that you take a high-quality probiotics while you are taking that antibiotics. And I recommend that you start taking it on day one. And why do I recommend that? Because probiotics are going to offset the gastrointestinal side effects that, for instance, the antibiotic is going to cause. But taking probiotics on a daily basis, it's really not recommended. There are some specific diseases like ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease that may require taking probiotics. But again, that's a conversation you need to have

• 1:07:50Speaker 01

  with your physician to make sure that you are taking the right one. Because for people, for instance, who are immunocompromised for various reasons, because they are taking drugs to prevent organ rejection and things like that, probiotics can actually be quite harmful. Again, you have to look at the quality. They can cause infections. So I highly, highly recommend, again, the conversation with the healthcare providers to choose the right type of probiotics and the specific disease that you are taking probiotics for.

• 1:08:26Dan Harris?

  You have been very patient with my pesky questions. I really appreciate it. And I want to recommend that everybody check out Dr. Jafari's book. Again, it's called The Truth About Dietary Supplements: An Evidence-Based Guide to a Safer Medicine Cabinet. I will put a link in the show notes if you want to go buy it, which, again, I think would be a wise move if this is a subject you're interested in. But in closing, let me just say, Dr. Mahtab Jafari, thank you so much for taking so much time with me/us.

• 1:08:58Speaker 01

  Oh, thank you. Thank you for having me. And thank you for the great questions.

• 1:09:07Dan Harris?

  Thanks again to Dr. Jafari. Super interesting to talk to her. I've actually made some pretty significant changes since this conversation. Don't forget, it's Sleep Week over at the 10% Happier app. You can sign up at danharris.com. You'll get our truckload of new sleep meditations that we're adding this week. And if you sign up today, tomorrow, on Tuesday, we're going to do a live session with Cara Lai on how to boost your sleep with meditation. Finally, thank you to everybody who worked so hard to make this show. Our producers are Tara Anderson and Eleanor Vassili. Our recording and engineering is handled by the great folks over at Pod People. Lauren Smith is our managing producer. Marissa Schneiderman is our senior producer. DJ Cashmere is our executive producer.

• 1:09:51Dan Harris?

  And Nick Thorburn of the band Islands wrote our theme.

• 1:10:04Speaker 04

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