Who We Are
About Us
The Nutrition Matters Foundation (“Nutrimatters”) is an IRS-approved 501(c)(3) nonprofit public charity. Donations will typically be tax deductible in the US. The leaders, staff, and principal supporters of Nutrimatters are people who have walked the walk and talked the talk of improving our health by applying new nutrition science in our busy lives and careers. We’ve done what only a single-digit percentage of people have ever done: permanently reversed obesity and improved metabolic disease without medications or surgery.
Leadership and Perspective
We live in the Research Triangle of Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA. Our ages range from the 30s to the 70s, and we feel fantastic. We are not doctors, nutritionists, or scientists. Plenty of websites, videos, books, and journals exist for that kind of guidance. We respect, value, and use these sources without claiming superiority. We claim a different perspective based on our ability to discern reliable research and improved outcomes from objectively applying the new science without regard for making money, career advancement, or scientific rivalries. And while we're happy to introduce ourselves, none of us are interested in being social media celebrities, influencers, or online personalities. As a result, Nutrimatters may look and feel quite different than what you're used to, but that's OK since we're working for quite different outcomes.
Speaking of results, since the current system has only a single-digit success rate at a permanent reduction in obesity without medicines and surgery, we respectfully suggest that there is room for a different perspective. After all, it’s hard to think of another thriving trillion-dollar industry other than nutrition that fails to deliver on its promises well over 90% of the time.
Not being doctors, nutritionists, or scientists, we’re entirely objective at culling through science and research. These days, there are studies supporting every view, even those views that are clearly contradictory. Information can no longer be trusted simply because the sentence starts with “Studies show…”
Nutrimatters avoids the possibility that the years spent developing medical, nutritional, and scientific expertise created a bias toward the work so heavily invested in. Further, having no interest in social media monetization, we have no bias for click-bait ideas or algorithm-friendly trending topics. Our only focus is sharing the science that gets low-risk results while maintaining a satisfying and rewarding life (i.e., substitutions, yes; suffering, no), and what is achievable and affordable to as many people as possible.
Nutrimatters hasn’t invented or discovered anything. Our curriculum comes primarily from the work of extraordinary scientists published in top-tier peer-reviewed journals. Nutrimatters essentially curates and translates this new research so it can be understood and put to practical use by people fully engaged in the everyday joys and challenges of modern living. We call this Actionable Knowledge. Actionable Knowledge contain simplified insights direct from the new research tailored for everyday decision-making based on a new predictive model of how the body processes food. Further, we support Actionable Knowledge through action-based programs such as , , , and .
Foundational Principles
We are absolutely not focused on appearance. Such is the domain of temporary weight loss. This is not the place if you want to fit into that little black dress or tux for that special occasion. But if you want to feel great, you’re at the right place. How you feel is the domain of permanent weight loss and freedom from obesity and metabolic disease. The new science makes it clear that a body free of obesity and metabolic disease is not constantly hungry, does not overeat or easily puts on weight, is not chronically fatigued, moves effortlessly and does not become sedentary, and feels great almost all the time.
Obesity does not cause metabolic disease, it is a symptom of already-present metabolic disease. You can no more avoid metabolic disease through weight loss than you can avoid a cold by treating a runny nose with antihistamines. Once taught how their body really works, many people will be able to make changes and choices that avoid and reverse obesity and metabolic disease without medicines or surgery. But for now, the confusion is so fundamental that we’re not even using the best names to describe the condition. As you’ll learn from the Courses and Articles, based on the new science, obesity and metabolic disease might be better described as bioreactor dysfunction and dysbiosis (a.k.a. small intestine damage and an unhealthy microbiome).
Nutrimatters will share our sources and research that are the foundations of our Actionable Knowledge and our predictive model of the human body’s use of nutrition. The standard for our model is that it must predict when changes and choices are made based on our model you will reliably improve obesity and metabolic disease. We will reveal where we are confident and where we are not confident since the available science is sometimes not yet definitive. We fully expect to make frequent revisions as the pace of discovery in nutrition science is unprecedented.
Nutrimatters is likely to be more trustworthy than many current sources of nutrition information because we won’t sell supplements, promote particular diets, or monetize its knowledge and experiences through subscriptions, paywalls, advertising, or affiliate links. Our operations are funded exclusively by tax-deductible donations. We will not use donations from factory food producers, their enablers, or their proxies, or any source with an agenda counter to your best health based on the new science.
Our approach is not intended for those who have reached or exceeded the medical threshold of significant disease. Nor is it for extreme cases or outliers, and no model covers all possible combinations and permutations. We focus on teaching low-risk behavior change and improved decision-making, where most people will make decisions based on real improvements they can experience for themselves.
Finally, we are very serious about the disclaimer at the bottom of every page of . We are not a substitute for your medical provider. Their domain is when obesity and metabolic disease reach the clinical threshold. Our domain enables you to make changes and choices to avoid reaching that threshold. Learning more about the body and disease is not a substitute for engaging a medical provider to treat the body or disease.
Science AND Outcomes Driven
Scientists and researchers have realized that the human body in general, and nutrition in particular, are mind-bogglingly complex, right up there with quantum mechanics, particle physics, genetics, etc. These “pure” sciences have long used models that were known to be incomplete and even speculative at times, yet they were sufficiently robust to be reliably predictive. New science reveals we know far less about the human body and nutrition than we thought, and much of what we thought we knew is now subject to serious doubt. It’s kind of like that old saying: The more you know, the more you know the less you know. In response, Nutrimatters is joining others in bringing a predictive modeling approach to nutrition.
Our approach should not be measured solely by the certainty of every dimension of nutrition science but also by the reliability our model’s predictions. In other words, if you make the changes and choices indicated by the model, does the model reliably predict improvements in your health? Everything we offer is based on the latest known science, but the science is often incomplete. This predictive modeling approach is known in other areas of medicine, such as pharmaceuticals, where many drugs are used confidently with little science on how and why they work.
Further, nutrition is unique among other medical sciences in that, historically, its doctrine is not based primarily on randomized controlled trials (RCT), the gold standard of scientific research. RCTs are primarily done on people with a disease where one group is given the treatment, and the other group is not, and who got the treatment is unknown. Every treatment has a risk, but the risk is offset by the potential to improve disease consequences. But if you don’t have a disease, it’s unethical to put people at risk of treatment. Unfortunately, the early stages of obesity and metabolic disease are typically not considered diseases. Therefore, RCTs were generally not considered appropriate for nutrition research. Also, RCTs work best for diseases that present in a relatively short timeframe. Diseases that present over decades do not lend themselves well to study by RCT. Hence, RCTs are few and far between for the diseases of nutrition.
Therefore, almost all existing nutrition research has been based on population studies (what scientists call epidemiological studies), which observed the health effects, behaviors, and environments of large populations. Population studies have low reliability because it is almost impossible to control all effective variables in a large population of people.
A famous example is a series of population studies in the 1940s and 1950s that correlated higher meat consumption in countries with more heart disease. As a result, it was long considered a scientific fact that meat consumption caused heart disease. This was later disproved, although other reasons may remain to minimize or avoid meat. It turned out that the countries that ate more meat did so because they were wealthier, and they were wealthier because they were more industrialized. Being more industrialized meant these countries had more air pollution. Air pollution, not meat consumption, was later proven to be the primary cause of increased heart disease in these countries.
There are also N-of-1 studies and small-group studies that fall between population studies and RCTs in terms of reliability. These are controlled observation studies of one person (i.e., test population Number of 1 or N-of-1) or small groups of test subjects (what scientists call cohorts) who are observed and measured as variables are changed. Often, an N-of-1 study is the researcher making controlled treatments on themselves and observing and recording the results. Small group studies are typically very similar in approach, only having a few more people being tested. The main concern is statistical techniques that control for bias, anomalies, and errors, don’t work well with small numbers of test subjects.
Typically, N-of-1 and small cohort studies are not as good as RCTs but generally are better than population studies, especially if the researchers are alert to the risks of confirmation bias and the placebo effect. Where RCTs are unavailable, we use predictive modeling, N-of-1, and small group studies to connect the dots of the new science. Interestingly, obesity and metabolic disease are getting so widespread that RCTs are now becoming more common for nutrition but will likely always be limited due to the long presentation time of these diseases.
Further, we don't always know in strictly RCT-proven scientific terms why every facet of Actionable Knowledge and predictive modeling appears to have helped the people of Nutrimatters. We will remain vigilant as RCTs and other data become available to revise and update any new understandings that don't match our model. Finally, we very much embrace Dr. David Allison's mantra, "Don't mistake experience for science and data." Yes, we are sharing the experience of our journey of avoiding and reversing obesity and metabolic disease. But it's a journey that uses the latest science and data as its primary navigator. Nevertheless, we are not offering our experience as science and data, and it should not be taken as such. There is more discussion on this topic throughout the Courses and Articles.
Want to help?
Your nutrition story, favorite research, scientists and researchers you follow, education experience, nonprofit tips, feedback, and more are of great interest to us.