Hydrogen Therapy Explained: Tyler LeBaron on the Science of Molecular Hydrogen

Katie: See, one of the problems in this new emerging space is a lot of new technologies. What happens is people come up with the technology and then they go try to find the research. That's not how works in this case. The research came out first in top publications like the Journal of Science, Nature. These are the top academic peer-reviewed showing therapeutic effects of hydrogen. Welcome back to Behind the Practice. I'm Katie Brinkley and today I'm sitting down with Tyler LeVarin. Tyler, thank you so much for joining me on today's episode. Yeah, thank you. It's my pleasure to be here. Yeah, you know, and it's been a lot of fun. We've had the opportunity to sit down and talk with a number of guests so far. And what you're doing, Tyler, is a little bit different than some of the other guests that I've had on the show. ⁓ for people that maybe haven't heard about you or H2 or Inhale Health, Tell us a little bit about what you do and inhale health. Yeah, so I'm with InhaleH2. It's our company for inhalation of hydrogen gas. And so many people have heard of hydrogen water before and molecular hydrogen. Turns out this has therapeutic properties and I've researched this for now about 16 years. I did my PhD in cardiovascular and subervascular diseases. That was my dissertation. It was in physiology. And we actually use hydrogen gas to look at how hydrogen gas could help with some of the neurological conditions and a number of other things that are going on. There's around 3000 publications so far on molecular hydrogen, around 200 human studies. And I'm just really grateful to have been part of this for so many years. And this year I have joined as a chief scientific officer of InhalH2 because we want to provide hydrogen the way that we use it in the clinical studies. How? How on earth did you get started into this very specific field? Yeah, so about 2009, I learned about what's known as alkaline ionized water. And I looked to see if there's any research on it. And there were some publications. But the mechanism was not very clear. How could this have any benefits? Because we know that alkaline water alone wouldn't have those benefits. But when you do electrolysis of water, you break down the water molecule to hydrogen gas and oxygen gas. And it turns out that there's a lot of research on hydrogen gas. that got me started on researching molecular hydrogen. So back in 2013, for my internship in biochemistry, that was my undergrad degree, I went to Japan, Nagoya University. And that's where they are researching molecular hydrogen. One of the labs are researching this. And I had the opportunity to go to Japan. research molecular hydrogen in ⁓ the very self signaling pathways and get to know other researchers and clinicians and be just be part of this entire movement. And as I continue doing that, and like I said later, I did my PhD research in this area. And it's been very exciting to see this, this growth in some of the major publications. on the benefits of the electro hygiene. There's a lot of hype and misunderstanding about that, but we're trying to help educate people about what it is. I'm so, man, you just teed me right up with this next question because I do feel like there's a lot that that's one of the biggest barriers for a lot of this new research, this new technology, these new ways of finding different ways of being healthy and feeling better. So when you first started talking about what it is that you're doing, How was it received? Now, initially, most people had never heard about hydrogen gas having therapeutic effects at all. Yeah. And so a lot of people were not only skeptical, but rather dismissive and even cynical. but I've stayed with it in academia. I was not promoting or selling any products. See, one of the problems in this new emerging space is a lot of new technologies. What happens is people come with the technology and then they go try to find the research. That's not how it works in this case. The research came out first in top publications like the Journal of Science, Nature. These are the top academic peer-reviewed showing therapeutic effects of hydrogen. And I was staying in my lane of academia and doing research. But still, people were confused. Sometimes people would think that ⁓ hydrogen gas had reference to, pH, like the hydrogen ion. Or they would get confused to say, doesn't water already have hydrogen? But of course that's different because a water molecule has oxygen and two hydrogens connected to it. But that's different than hydrogen gas. That's why you can't drink water for your oxygen needs. We still need to breathe there because you need oxygen gas, right? Not the auctions in water. And so actually it was challenging in those early days, but now with as many publications there are and even my own ⁓ research, I've been really grateful to have collaborative researches around the world. publishing on molecular hygiene from cell culture studies, preclinical studies, and actual chemo clinical studies that are independent, largely funded by government grants. Like when I did my PhD, we had a grant from the government to do this research. you know, like one of the studies, for example, was in stimulating heart transplants and adult pigs. And so we would use hydrogen gas, a precisely say 2 % hydrogen gas. to show how hydrogas have these anti-inflammatory and antioxidant-like effects, improve the function of mitochondria, and so on. Man, and if someone's just hearing about hydrogen therapy for the first time, what are they missing? So because hydrogen is kind of a lifestyle intervention in a lot of ways, it turns out that molecular hydrogen is already naturally produced by our gut flora. If you have a healthy gut flora and you have a healthy diet, you will naturally produce a lot of hydrogen gas. in fact, research has shown that Japanese centenarians, so those who are living over 100, they have higher breath hydrogen gas than younger people who end up not living that long. If you look at other ⁓ cognitive neurological conditions like Parkinson's, dementia, and so on, they have lower hydrogen producing bacteria in their intestines as well. So there's a connection here with hydrogen gas. Now that's just a correlation. Correlation is not equal causation. But when we look at the clinical studies and of course the animal studies, we see that providing more hydrogen gas, it does have these potential wellness benefits. And so this is something that people are potentially missing out on, is you're not getting the molecular hydrogen to your cells, because you want to optimize your mitochondrial function. And that's a big one that molecular hydrogen can do. And in fact, just as an aside, We published a groundbreaking article in Redox Biology. one of the top journals. with my colleagues, very happy to be part of this discovery, this lab. But we found that hydrogen gas specifically targets a protein in the mitochondria that causes a mild stress response in the mitochondria. And that in turn causes the mitochondria to respond and regenerate, rejuvenate, like make it stronger and more effective, so you have more energy production. Yeah. And so we want to be able to provide that to a human, clinically with hydrogen gas therapy. So in the research, like when I, as I said, when I did my PhD, we would use tanks of hydrogen gas. And we would do that because we will have to control the concentration for two reasons. One, it's flammable, but it's flammable if it's above our 4 % concentration. And number two, we have to make sure it's therapeutic. You have to actually get enough hydrogen gas. in your body in order for it to be therapeutic. So that's why we focused on using like tanks of hydrogen gas. A lot of clinical studies use tanks of hydrogen gas. So in the market right now where people are using hydrogen therapy for wellness devices, which is really quite popular. In fact, in Japan alone, ⁓ in Tokyo population, about 50 % of the population use hydrogen therapy or have used it from one town to the other. So it's really, ⁓ it's not just a fad, it's really there. Yeah. In order to get a hydrogen gas inhalation here, we have to make sure that you're getting a therapeutic dose and it's not going to be fumable. And that is the creation of this machine, Inhalase 2. This machine allows you to get a hydrogen gas at a therapeutic level, the way we use it in clinical studies, and assures non-fumability. And by doing this, you can actually get a precise concentration. You can just adjust it. It's so easy. just... change the knob to one, two, three or four percent hydrogen gas and depending on the condition or your goals or whatever, you can choose the concentration of hydrogen gas that you want and you don't have to worry about flammability or it not being therapeutic. You work in a space that blends science and wellness. And I feel like a lot of people right now, it's kind of button heads with a lot of, know, like, ⁓ well, there's the big pharma brands, there's all this. And you say, have the science to back this up, that this is exactly what we have that can help you feel better, live longer. So how do you, how have you been really bridging that? that gap of credibility. Yeah. And they absolutely shouldn't butt heads. If we really want to have a good wellness, we need to have it be science grounded. And I'm not talking about scientism or where it's just religion and this is the authority. Science is actually the opposite of that. Science doesn't care necessarily what someone's cherished beliefs are. It just wants to know what is the most plausible explanation. And so we have a goal of having optimal health and wellness that we need to have clinical research. to back that up. so that's my point is with our machine, I've been doing this for 16 years research. And after the research has shown what it has shown published in top journals, realizing that one of the major hurdles to more clinical research, as well as for the wellness community is actually administering this hydrogen gas in your own home or in a clinic without having to buy compressed tanks of gas that is you know, dangerous because they're just, it's compressed tanks, And difficult and cumbersome. We're able to develop this unit, this inhalase tube machine. So you can literally mimic exactly that. And now we can do a lot of more clinical research, which we already have a lot of clinical research underway. In fact, I just got back last November. I was an invited speaker at the Japanese, was asked to International Hygiene Symposia. And it was so wonderful meeting with all these top academics. These not just people speaking and trying to sell a product. This is ⁓ university level academics who are doing your basic clinical or cell culture research. This is an academic symposia. And we're able to present some groundbreaking research and articles there with our other colleagues. And I presented the concept of the fraction of inspired hydrogen so we can maintain our dosage and our concentrations and everything. And it was very well received and accepted because this really will help catapult the research in a big way. Well, and you're making it accessible with this, with your new device. So who is this for? Yeah, that's the idea because a lot of these machines on the market, even though they provide like a nasal cannula, for example, and again, the problem with the nasal cannula is that you are unsure what concentration you're actually getting. Because everybody is different, right? People have different sizes. There's a child, there's an NFL football player, right? They have different breathing dynamics. Some people are nose breathers, some people are mouth breathers, some people have congestion. So when they actually do the research, you can take somebody and some people are getting less than a 1 % hydrogen gas, so not therapeutic. And other people are getting more than 4 % inside their nasal passages, which becomes an extreme vulnerability risk. And there's documented cases where people have actually had an internal combustion in the airways and have had complex spatial fractures because it has ignited inside of them. Because the amount of energy required to ignite hydrogen gas is actually less energy than is required to get a static discharge. that static spark when you touch the doorknob or something, it's less energy to ignite hydrogen gas. And so it's very concerning that people are using these other types of machines in that clinic when number one, you don't even know if they're getting a therapeutic dose. Number two, you're not able to control the concentration for different disease contexts or wellness contexts, whatever your goal is. And number three, you could be introducing a very vulnerable mixture that could potentially cause a lot of harm. And that violates all the safety codes and health codes and building codes and all the regulations. There's like 20 different regulations and it violates all of them. And so if something were to happen and you called the insurance company, like, Hey, you know, this happened to my clinic or there's this damage or whatever. They're to be like, wait, you did what? Why did you have that in there? Like you can't, you can't do that. Right. So this is ultimately why I helped to develop this machine so it can be, it available for the clinic and for the home user at a price that's affordable. Cause some of these machines are like. $15,000 to $30,000. And again, they're not provided at a therapeutic level all the time. They could be flammable and they're never a precise concentration. In this case, it's affordable and it's perfect for anybody who's into wellness and optimizing their cellular health. Well, I love the fact that you said it's great for clinicians and it's great for home use as well. let's say someone's like, wait a second. You've opened my eyes to this. This is something that I'm considering now. How do I find out if... you know, the clinician I'm going to even has this option. How do I know if hydrogen therapy is something I should consider? So let's talk about that a little bit. If someone listening right now, maybe they're not a clinician, but it's really open to their eyes so that this even being a possibility. First, I just want to say it's not FDA approved. And so if you're thinking, ⁓ I'm going to get this, can cure my cancer, whatever, probably don't buy the machine because we don't have that level of research or otherwise it would be FDA approved. Now there are a number of studies, like let's say on cancer, for example. ⁓ And even made analysis showing people with, you know, tumors and other conditions where it's actually, you know, shrunk them or they've gotten better or... And the great thing is there's no contraindication with chemotherapy or radiotherapy, unlike many other therapeutics or natural supplements or what have you. There's no concern right there, but you need to have a reformed consent. So that's my first thing is to get educated, right? Go to... Well, you can just go to inhaleh2.com. You can learn about the machine. But you can also just go to PubMed, right? That's the government's database of research. And you can type in hydrogen gas therapy or molecular hydrogen therapy, or just Google that. Ask your AI about molecular hydrogen. Okay? And you can learn about those benefits and see if it's something that if you and your financial needs can potentially want to try, you want to do. When it comes to hydrogen therapy in relation specifically, you do want to always make sure, this is not just me promoting our machine. This is... just logic, you want to make sure you're getting a therapeutic concentration regardless of your breathing pattern. And regardless of who's in your house, whoever's going to use it, regardless of your patient coming in, regardless of their body size and if they have like a nasal congestion, they're sick or something, right? You have to make sure you can control the concentration. Because again, in some studies, like an animal studies specifically, sometimes a 2 % is more effective than a 4%. So you want to be able to control the concentration. And number three, you have to make sure it's not flammable. You do not want to take that risk on. And right now the Inhalase 2 machine, which we filed a patent on this design is the only one that answers all of these questions. And this is why we want to make it available, not just to the researcher or the clinician, but to normal clinics, to the health and wellness enthusiasts, everybody. You should have an informed consent. You can make your own choice if you want to try this device or not. So looking into the future. where do you see hydrogen therapy fitting into mainstream healthcare? If the research continues to progress like it is so far, where you see actual translational effects from the animal studies to the clinical studies, then hydrogen has the potential to radically revolutionize healthcare. And I made the prediction back in 2015 that in 2027, that there would be a marked awareness of hydrogen. And we're starting to see that already. mean, Joe Rogan talking about it. You've got some top celebrities talking about it. Football, top football players. not going to mention all their names, but you have some really high level athletes, celebrities, and podcasters and influencers talking about this, as well as being published in some of the top academic journals. We have research collaborations with, you know, Harvard here in the USA and other universities around the world that are really growing. And I predict that if it continues at this pace, then by the year 2037, everybody. pretty much will have heard of hydrogen and will know that yeah, hydrogen has some benefits, right? Like we already know is naturally produced by our gut bacteria. And if you have a healthy microbiome, a healthy diet, you should produce hydrogen. But we see over and over again by supplying exogenous or additional hydrogen from the outside, you have more of these benefits. And we can see this clinically, like clinically relevant, meaningful results because of something safe. It's immediately you can apply. And there's no country indications with other types of therapies. This has been such a great conversation. Thank you so much for joining me on today's episode of Behind the Practice. Behind the Practice is produced by Next Step Social and Podcasting and hosted by Katie Brinkley and Sean Quintero. A special thank you to our guests today. This episode was recorded live at the Boston BioLive Functional Longevity Summit. A special thank you to the team that helped make this podcast happen.