A: This program is based on dramatic new medical information -- information that for the first time provides a clear picture of how the body works.

It is called functional medicine and is not a fad. It is based on understanding all the systems of the body and the underlying causes of disease and weight problems.

(Two of the major underlying causes of weight gain are inflammation and toxicity.

You’ll learn about these problems -- and how to correct them -- when you follow The UltraSimple Diet.)

Another thing that makes this different is that I am a practicing physician, and I’ve been doing this for more than 20 years.

I’ve treated thousands of patients.

I’ve taken information from the scientific literature and combined it with my own experience as a practicing physician, as the medical director at Canyon Ranch, where I worked for nearly 10 years, and as the founder and medical director of The UltraWellness Center.

I have distilled what I have learned into the first and only comprehensive approach to dealing with the underling causes of obesity and impaired metabolism.

The UltraSimple Diet is a quick start into a new way of life.

That way of life is called UltraMetabolism, and UltraMetabolism is not a diet.

It’s a way of understanding how your body works and using that information to create a lifestyle program that is specific to you and works over the long run.

It will help you lose weight quickly -- but it’s not about a quick-fix program.

Instead, it’s about understanding the underlying causes of obesity and disease and fixing those problems.

Problems with the wrong information getting to our genes, problems with inflammation, problems with mitochondria, problems with detoxification, problems with hormonal imbalance: These things are all at the root of disease.

Simply put, new revolution in health care is coming around the bend.

I’m trying to help you get access to it now -- without waiting another 5 to 20 years for it to show up in your doctor’s office.

A: As someone who is extraordinarily busy myself, I can tell you that there is a way.

Your life depends on it. But it takes planning.

Most of us don’t think about food, but it’s one of those things we really have to think about.

You see, if you don’t think about it, you’ll find yourself in a situation where you’re stuck -- in an airport, in a car, in the mall -- where you don’t have any healthy food and you are hungry.

So what do you do?

Like most hunters and gatherers, you go hunt for something to eat -- and it’s usually going to be something terrible.

Here’s the solution.

I encourage you to plan.

It may mean having an emergency pack in your car or office. For example, I always have whole-food snack bars and a bag of nuts in my drawer at work.

It may mean making time on the weekend to shop for the food you need for the week.

It may mean planning your meals.

I pack my lunch quickly the night before; bring leftovers; or think ahead to where I will be and how I will get good-quality whole food.

It doesn’t take me much time, but it makes a huge difference over the course of my day in balancing my energy and metabolism.

I think all of us need to examine our lives.

What do you want?

Do you want to feel good and have more energy?

Or do you want to deal with chronic symptoms persistently interfering with your quality of life?

Just like you can’t expect to ignore your bank account and have your bankbook be balanced at the end of the month, your body needs attention, care, and strategic investment of time and planning.

A: I travel a lot, but I’ve found a way to avoid food emergencies by always carrying food with me.

When I travel on a plane, I have a bag of almonds, protein bars, or some fruit with me.

In a restaurant, I can usually find something on the menu, like salad, fish, or chicken, and an extra side of vegetables.

I might even be a bit of a pest and say, “Please, can you grill the fish for me?” or “Give me extra vegetables on the side” or “Don’t bother giving me the French fries” or “I’ll skip the breadbasket at the beginning of the meal.”

These things are fairly simple to do and just take a little extra planning and attentiveness.

Most people can do this.

YOU can do this!

If you put your mind to it, you can find good-quality, whole foods on a restaurant menu.

Pick the foods that work for your body rather than those that make you feel horrible at the end of the day.

Just think about how you want to feel. Do you want to feel well, or do you want to feel badly?

The choice is yours.

A: The answer is ‘yes,’ and it doesn’t take that long.

It may take a couple of days, just as it does when you’re withdrawing from alcohol, nicotine, or caffeine.

We are often addicted to the same foods to which we are allergic.

But if you get the allergenic or trigger foods out of your diet, you will not crave them anymore.

It may take a little detective work -- eliminating certain foods, then adding back the potentially allergenic foods -- or some testing, but addressing food allergies is a powerful way to stop cravings.

Another major addiction / craving trigger is sugar and refined carbohydrates.

Sugar addiction is a major epidemic.

I’m subject to it like everybody else, and I know when I get out of balance.

When I don’t sleep enough and I’m tired, I’ll go for that sugar to give me a quick boost.

Then I get into a vicious cycle.

But once you stop, you won’t crave it any longer.

You’ll see sugar and think:

“Oh, that’s not going to make me feel good” or “I’m not even attracted to eating it.”

It’s important to understand that sugar and food addiction is not necessarily your fault -- there are biological reasons for it.

Cravings and food addiction are often caused by sugar imbalances, stress, and food allergies.

So address these factors systematically and directly by following the steps that I outline in The UltraSimple Diet and UltraMetabolism.

You’ll find that your addiction will go away -- often in just days.

A: That’s a very good question.

I believe that you will have more pleasure eating delicious, whole, real food than eating any junk food.

You will not only feel better and enjoy food more, but your metabolism will improve and you’ll have relief from many chronic symptoms. You may also avoid the common diseases of aging.

Your pleasure in food will increase, not decrease.

Here’s an example.

Today for lunch I had some stuffed grape leaves, marinated mushrooms, delicious Greek olives, and sliced duck breast from the local deli.

I wasn’t suffering, and I felt good. I had energy all afternoon.

So it depends on what food you love in life. If you love Coca-Cola, Ring Dings, and deep-fried hamburgers, then yes, you’re probably going to have to give those up.

You can’t continue to put junk in and expect to feel good and have lifelong health.

On the other hand, you can enjoy what I call the 90 / 10 Rule.

(Some people like to call it the 80 / 20 rule!)

If you pay attention to eating high-quality, whole, real foods 90 percent of the time, then you can have that ice-cream cone or dessert or even a Cinnabon the other 10 percent.

But when you make those choices, I encourage you to pay attention to how you feel afterward -- because you may not want to do it again.

So recognize that it’s not lifelong deprivation, but a matter of moderation, balance, understanding how your body works, and learning how to work with it.

If you do that, you won’t have a problem.

It is important to be careful at the beginning of the program. The biggest hurdle is the initial 2 to 3 days of detoxification and changing your metabolism.

After that, your body will seek its natural balance and rhythm.

A: Well, absolutely! This program works for everybody, whether you’re 7 or 70.

The key is that it works with the basic rules of biology.

It works with the underlying causes of disease and obesity, so it is absolutely for everybody.

The real question is, Are there any special considerations that need to be made? This is really connected to the next question and answer.

A: As you get older, certain changes happen in your body.

For example, you do lose muscle more easily.

If you’re 25 and you don’t exercise for a month and want to run 5 miles, you can do it. But if you’re 55 and you don’t exercise for a month and try to run 5 miles, you’re going to have a harder time.

There is a natural decline as we age: however, that is almost entirely preventable if we take care of ourselves.

As you age, you need to invest more time and energy in your health because you tend to lose muscle very easily and have more trouble controlling blood sugar and insulin, thyroid hormone, and other hormones.

However, with simple, daily deposits into your health bank account, you can easily prevent the common decline seen with aging.

So, yes you can absolutely do this at any age.

And yes, it is a little harder as you get older.

You may have to do a little more work, build more muscle, eat a bit more carefully, get more rest, and deal with stress more effectively, but those things can sustain you and keep you vigorous and active long into your 80s, 90s, and beyond.

A: Yes, your supplements may affect your medications. You should review your supplement intake with a nutritionally educated physician or nutritionist.

More concerning to me is how medications can affect your nutritional state.

For example, acid-blocking drugs can interfere with your ability to absorb vitamin B12. And certain drugs may interfere with other nutrients.

Food, nutrients, and herbs can absolutely interact.

But for the most part, taking a multivitamin, fish oil, and calcium-magnesium supplement has no danger to it and causes no adverse interactions.

Beware of interactions, look at your medications, maybe do a little homework, and talk to your physician. But for the most part, the basic nutritional supplementation is extremely safe.

A: It seems unbelievable, but it’s true.

If you exercise smarter -- not longer -- your metabolism will improve.

And the way to exercise smarter is by doing interval training.

This is what athletes use to increase their performance.

But that extra edge is available not just to highly trained athletes -- it’s available to everybody.

It’s simply a matter of alternating high levels of exertion with lower levels of exertion. I describe how to do this in UltraMetabolism.

The goal is to increase the rate at which you burn calories, not just while you exercise but all day.

So, yes, you can exercise less and lose more weight.

(If you’re over 50 and haven’t been exercising or you smoke or have diabetes or high blood pressure, you should have a stress test from your doctor before you start.)

A: I recently wrote a chapter on dietary influences on health for The Textbook of Functional Medicine.

In that chapter, I cite 350 medical references.

I outline, step-by-step, how food is not only calories, but also information. I also discuss how food talks to our genes and turns on messages of health and weight loss.

Real, whole, high-quality food may help us to avoid the deep-rooted conditions that lead to disease.

This is firmly based on science.

I also have my own data from my medical practice.

I have documented the changes in my patients’ blood work; reduction of blood sugar and inflammation; and improvement in thyroid function, metabolism, and detoxification.

Much of the medical literature on nutrition has been ignored by conventional medicine.

But for the last 20 years, I have been studying this rich treasure trove of data on health and nutrition.

Nutrition gets second-rate status in the medical profession.

It’s ironic. This is the most important thing that determines health and disease, and yet there’s no medical specialty that addresses it.

There is a group of dedicated scientists and practitioners trying to change this.

I’m on the board of the Institute for Functional Medicine. It is a nonprofit organization created by Dr. Jeffrey Bland to educate physicians in a new model of medicine

Our goal is to educate 15,000 physicians by 2010 to understand how to take this revolutionary medical data and incorporate it into the practice of medicine now.

In addition, The Center for Mind-Body Medicine has an exceptional course designed to educate physicians about integrating nutrition into their practice called “Food as Medicine,” co-directed by my nutritionist, Kathie Swift. (www.cmbm.org).

Current scientific discoveries take 20 years to become incorporated into the practice of medicine.

This is the most exciting time in the history of medicine.

Unfortunately, our current healthcare system (which should be known as a disease-care system) is not able to incorporate these findings into its existing structure.

That is why I feel that it’s so important for me to work with other doctors, do research, talk to consumers, and write books to bring awareness to the public that this medical revolution is here, it is now, and it is available to us.

We don’t have to wait for the future.

A: While The UltraSimple Diet is a quick start into a healthy way of living, it’s not a quick fix -- despite the fact that you can lose up to 10 pounds in one week.

Instead, it is the beginning of a process of reprogramming your body for life.

It is a way for you to understand how your body works.

Once you learn how to work with your body rather than against it, you can maintain weight loss and good health.

You can always slip back into bad habits, increased stress, lack of exercise, and bad eating.

And you might slip back.

I find that the biggest trigger to fall away from caring for yourself is stress.

Most people can manage their biology better when they’re not stressed.

My recommendations for journaling, stress reduction, sleep, and breathing are powerful tools that you can use to keep yourself on track.

Most people don’t understand how to find the “pause button” or their “off switch” that shuts down their nervous system.

It’s chronically activated.

Most people stay up late, watch TV, answer emails, surf the net -- and then expect to roll over and fall asleep.

That’s not how our nervous system was designed.

We need to wind down, calm ourselves, and sleep adequately.

Not getting enough sleep is a significant cause of metabolic imbalances. Getting 7 to 8 hours of sleep per night is critical.

These are some of the things you can do to arrest the yo-yo dieting pattern that people fall into.

Look at The UltraSimple Diet as a way of getting your health and your life back on track.

UltraMetabolism is a way of life -- a lifestyle that can help you correct the underlying issues that plague most of us in this society.

That includes the 125 million Americans with chronic diseases like heart disease, diabetes, dementia, cancer, arthritis, osteoporosis, and so on.

Also, two-thirds of us are overweight and more than 30 percent are obese.

This is an epidemic. It’s a juggernaut that’s not going to stop until we take control.

We have to do it on a personal level and we have to do it on a political level. These are things that require persistent efforts. If we work collectively as citizens we can make a difference.

A: Actually, studies show that eating healthy is not more expensive.

And when you’re paying for your pharmaceutical medications in the latter part of your life because you didn’t eat healthfully, you’re going to really be paying for it.

And your children will be paying for it too. There is no free ride.

There’s a hidden cost to every French fry from McDonald’s, to every Coca-Cola on the market -- but it’s not built into the price of these foods.

Instead, we’re paying it as a society, we’re paying it in our healthcare system (in our health insurance), and we are paying it in the goods and services we use for treating disease.

It is important to see that it’s not factored into the cost of foods we see on the label.

With that said, eating whole, real foods doesn’t have to be expensive.

Whole grains, beans, and vegetables are generally inexpensive, and you can buy them in bulk. In fact, they’re a bargain, if you take into account the amount of nutrients in those foods compared to processed and junk food.

Wal-Mart and Safeway are now getting into the whole-foods market to compete with Whole Foods Market, our local food co-ops, and Wild Oats. These stores have an abundance of whole foods.

It is important to look at all the choices you make and deliberately choose how to spend your health dollars.

Think about the cost of your lattes and your Diet Cokes and the convenience foods you buy here and there. The cost adds up, and these choices do not serve you.

By doing a little bit of preparation and cooking ahead, you can cook great food and save a lot of money.

A: Breakfast is probably your most important meal, because it sets you up for the entire day.

Why?

Because it sets up your metabolism for the entire day.

People who eat breakfast sustain long-term weight loss.

In a study of 3,000 people who sustained a weight loss of 70 pounds and kept it off for 6 or more years, all but 4 percent ate breakfast regularly. The other thing they had in common is that they exercised more than people who didn’t keep the weight off.

That was it -- eating breakfast and exercising!

It’s important to eat protein for breakfast, as in a protein shake, eggs, nuts, or dairy or soy yogurt.

This is critical for setting up your metabolism to work the rest of the day.

Even if you hard-boil some eggs the night before, put them in the fridge, and run out the door the next day with a bag of 2 hard-boiled eggs to eat on the road, it’s better than not eating anything.

Plan in advance and you can even have something quick and tasty, like a protein shake or an UltraShake.

A: The UltraSimple Diet helps control inflammation and toxicity, both of which are contributors to postmenopausal weight gain.

Moving on to UltraMetabolism, which is a hormonally balanced way of eating, will help you cope with changes that occur around menopause.

This way of life provides fiber, omega-3 fats, and low-glycemic-load foods, along with hormone-balancing phytonutrients. Reducing caffeine and alcohol will also help, because they promote menopausal symptoms and weight gain. Addressing stress is also critical.

Other recommendations of the program -- like flax seeds, broccoli and other fresh vegetables, soy foods, and wild fish -- all help control the symptoms of menopause, too.

I’ve been taking care of menopausal women for a long time.

And I only have to use something other than food, lifestyle changes, and herbs to help address menopausal symptoms in about 10 percent of my patients.

It is very important to understand that the principles I’ve outlined in The UltraSimple Diet and UltraMetabolism are designed for everyone -- including menopausal women -- because they were designed to support and enhance the body’s normal core functions.

A: As I described in Chapter 4 of The UltraSimple Diet, there are two types of food allergies -- acute and delayed.

Conventional allergists using desensitization allergy shots given over a period of years can often treat the acute allergies effectively. These are the IgE allergies to foods like peanuts or shellfish or environmental allergies.

The delayed allergies usually arise because of a leaky gut and are not permanent.

They can be reduced or eliminated by healing the leaky gut. This involves eliminating the allergenic foods for 90 days while eating a whole-foods, high-fiber diet and taking probiotics, vitamins and minerals, and omega-3 fats to heal the gut lining.

Some of these reactions may remain, but the trigger foods can often be eaten occasionally without much of a problem in many cases. However, they can become a problem when eaten on a regular basis.

A: The size of the meals depends on your size and your metabolic rate.

The minimum number of calories you need to sustain your body is called your basal metabolic rate. You can calculate it as follows: 10 × your weight in pounds (for example, 150 lb. × 10 = 1500 calories a day).

However, I recommend tuning into your body’s signals, needs, and natural appetite instead of counting calories.

Once you eliminate sugar and allergenic foods, your body’s appetite control systems will regain balance and you can then eat when you are hungry and stop when you feel gently satisfied.

There is no calorie counting on The UltraSimple Diet or when you are living the UltraMetabolism lifestyle.

A: Eat your meals according the schedule outlined in The UltraSimple Diet.

You don’t have to follow the times exactly, but make an effort to follow the general outline -- breakfast, mid-morning snack, lunch, mid-afternoon snack, and dinner.

You will feel more balanced, eat less, and lose more weight.

A: Basically, eating organic, whole foods; drinking clean water; having daily bowel movements; and sweating daily will go a long way toward keeping your detoxification system functioning well.

In addition, taking the essential supplements I recommend, along with a liver detox-supportive formula, can help your body get rid of toxins over the long term.

A wonderful way to get rid of stored petrochemical toxins and metals is by using an infrared sauna.

Of course, if you are very toxic, you will need the help of a physician trained in functional or environmental medicine.

A: Simply follow The UltraSimple Diet -- the fat will take care of itself!

The biggest causes of belly fat are sugar and other refined carbohydrates and stress. The program outlined in The UltraSimple Diet takes care of both.

A: First, I encourage you to seek out and find the best-quality supplements (see Section 7 for guidance) because you will be taking these daily for the rest of your life.

If you are taking a multivitamin or calcium product, be sure it conforms to the guidelines I outline in Section 7. You don’t want to be ingesting coloring agents or chemical preservatives in your supplements every day for the rest of your life.

If you are taking good-quality supplements regularly, then you can safely add the supplements in the enhanced program to your regimen for the week and for a few weeks afterward.

In fact, all of the things I recommend -- magnesium, vitamin C, probiotics, and liver detox-supportive herbs -- can all be taken safely over the long term if you find them helpful.

A: Your body is designed to eliminate toxins through the bowels. Imagine if you never flushed the toilet or took out the garbage. Your house would be very toxic, very soon!

Something similar happens to your body when you don’t have regular bowel movements.

Follow the guidelines in Chapter 5 of The UltraSimple Diet to deal with constipation. They work for nearly everyone.

A: My guess is that if you really don’t like vegetables, then you probably haven’t had them prepared in delicious ways. Overcooked, canned, or processed vegetables taste horrible.

It is also likely that your palate has gotten so used to fats and sugars that you will crave those substances and shun whole, real food.

But you will be surprised at how you can appreciate, enjoy, and savor the foods you never thought you would. Just try it!

A: If you want to do the program and don’t have time to cook vegetables and broth, there are substitutes.

I recommend a variety of frozen vegetables from Cascadian Farm and the low-sodium, organic vegetable broth from Pacific Foods.

A: Yes. Try the Kripalu Yoga Gentle or the Kripalu Yoga Dynamic videos. They are excellent, easy-to-follow classes led by highly skilled yoga teachers.

For useful yoga and relaxation programs for home, see http://www.kripalu.org/shop/shop/Video

A: My goal is to give people a powerful experience of good health that they can feel in just one week.

Remember, you spend a lifetime in behaviors that don’t support your health -- poor-quality food, junk food, caffeine, alcohol, stress, lack of exercise, and more.

So for just one week I encourage people to do ALL the things at once that can transform their health practically overnight.

Then what you choose to do will be up to you.

But you will know how bad you have felt all along (which most people think is “normal”) -- and how great you can really feel.

A: The foods chosen for this program are low-allergy, whole, organic, fresh foods with scientifically proven anti-inflammatory and detoxifying properties.

They are designed to provide the right information to your cells and to your genes to turn on messages of health and healing and turn off messages of sickness and disease.

Choosing the right foods provides healing medicine for your body.

A: Stevia is plant-based sweetener.

It can be used in moderation; however, I recommend avoiding any type of sweetener (artificial or otherwise) that can stimulate your cravings for sweets.