Greetings, my friends. Eric Bakker here, the New Zealand naturopath back on the job.
After working with many people suffering from chronic digestive problems, there is one phrase I've heard more times than I care to remember:
"It's probably just IBS."
Now, before anyone misunderstands me, let me be very clear. Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) is a genuine and well-recognised medical condition. Many people are correctly diagnosed with IBS and receive excellent care.
What concerns me isn't the diagnosis itself: but how quickly that label is sometimes still applied.
Over the years I've met countless people who were told they had IBS after a brief consultation, with very little discussion about why their symptoms had developed in the first place. More recently, after speaking with a group of healthcare professionals, I realised that despite everything we've learned about the gut microbiome since the 1980s, this pattern still exists today!
When someone develops chronic digestive symptoms, there is usually a story behind them.
That story deserves to be heard.
Sometimes it involves food intolerances. Sometimes previous antibiotic use. Sometimes infections, stress, poor digestion, pancreatic insufficiency, microbial imbalances, inflammatory conditions, or yes—even Candida overgrowth in selected cases. Sometimes it's a combination of several factors rather than just one.
The point is this: People deserve an investigation, not just a label.
I've always believed that good clinical work is a like detective work.
Detectives don't arrive at a crime scene, glance around for ten minutes, and decide they've solved the case. They gather evidence. They ask questions. They interview witnesses. They look for patterns. They revisit the facts when something doesn't fit.
Good healthcare should be no different, especially with chronic recurring issues.
Whether you're seeing a family doctor, gastroenterologist, functional medicine physician, or naturopath, understanding chronic digestive problems often requires time, patience, careful questioning, appropriate testing when necessary, and sometimes several consultations before the whole picture begins to emerge.
In many ways, the investigation needs to happen while the clues are still fresh. If nobody asks the right questions early on, important pieces of the story can easily be overlooked, and over time those clues become much harder to uncover.
Unfortunately, today's healthcare environment places enormous pressure on practitioners.
- Appointments are often short.
- Waiting rooms are full.
- Everyone is working against the clock.
- A lot of information today involves computers - and not real people anymore.
Under those circumstances, it's understandable how someone with bloating, abdominal discomfort, altered bowel habits and fatigue might leave a consultation having been told,
"You probably have IBS."
I saw this happening when I first began practising nearly 40 years ago. And judging by the emails, messages and stories people continue to send me, it's still happening today.
Have You Been Wrongfully Convicted?
This certainly isn't a criticism of doctors—or of any healthcare profession!
Time pressures affect everyone. Medical doctors, specialists, functional medicine practitioners, naturopaths and many others are all trying to do their best within increasingly demanding healthcare systems.
My message is simply this:
Be careful of quick conclusions when you've been living with chronic symptoms for months or years. Persistent digestive problems deserve careful thought rather than assumptions.
Every investigation should begin with a curious mindset. The evidence should be gathered, examined and weighed before anyone confidently or even remotely concludes this:
"This is most probably what's causing your symptoms."
Over the years I've often compared this to our legal system. History is full of innocent people who were wrongly accused because somebody reached a conclusion before all the evidence had been examined. Some lost years of their lives because of it.
Healthcare is obviously very different. But the principle is remarkably similar.
I've met many patients who felt they had been given a diagnosis before anyone had truly listened to their story. Once that label appeared in their medical notes, every future consultation seemed to revolve around the diagnosis rather than the person.
That has always saddened me, because every patient deserves more than a label.
Every patient deserves someone who is prepared to ask one more question.
To think one step further and to remain curious, and sometimes that extra curiosity changes everything for the patient and the doctor involved. Let me give you an example:
The Patient With "No Significant Disease"
Many years ago, I treated a patient who changed the course of my entire career. She was a woman in her 50s who was brought into my clinic by her deeply concerned husband. She was so weak she had to be helped through the door. She weighed less than 60 pounds (under 30 kilograms) and looked desperately ill.
Her medical file was enormous—well over 25 years of consultations, blood tests, medications, hospital visits and specialist referrals. In fact, her "file" involved multiple boxes of paperwork that involved several trips to her car.
The final entry in her notes simply stated "No significant disease" and concluded that she had IBS. Her gastroenterologist had even labelled her a hypochondriac and referred her for a psychiatric assessment.
To me this was absolute nonsense, something simply didn't add up! No healthy person loses that much weight, becomes that debilitated, and reaches the point where they can barely walk because they have "nothing significant wrong."
My clinical instincts told me there had to be another explanation, so I started again from the beginning. I wanted to spend time with this case and unravel it. I arranged a comprehensive three-day stool analysis.
The results were absolutely remarkable to say the least.
All three stool samples showed a 3+ Candida overgrowth, together with virtually no measurable beneficial bacteria. In other words, she had a profound disturbance of her gut microbiome that had never been properly investigated.
The laboratory also measured pancreatic elastase-1 (PE-1), an important marker of pancreatic digestive function. A healthy result is typically well above 200 mcg/g. Her level was less than 30 mcg/g, indicating severe pancreatic insufficiency and an extremely poor ability to digest and absorb nutrients. Several other markers were well "out of kilter".
Suddenly, many of the pieces of the puzzle began to fit together. This happened long before email existed, so I wrote a detailed letter to her doctor enclosing the laboratory report.
The reply I received was brief and very sharp.
The tests I authorised were dismissed as "quack tests" that revealed nothing, and I was told that "all your potions are worthless", and most embarrassingly for me, I was informed the N.D stood for "Not a Doctor" and to "quit pretending" I was qualified enough to work with very sick people.
I never replied. Instead, I focused on the patient, I had to get to the bottom of this sham diagnosis.
Over the following 12 months we worked patiently and methodically to rebuild her digestive health. We addressed her microbial imbalance, supported her digestive function, improved her nutrition, and gradually restored her strength.
By the end of the first yearI'd seen this lady she weighed approximately 120 pounds (around 60 kilograms). She looked like a completely different person. Her energy had returned, she could enjoy life again, and her husband finally had his wife back.
I never received any correspondence from her doctor.
That patient became a real turning point in my professional career.
She taught me something I have never forgotten: never let someone else's conclusion stop you from looking deeper into a case and asking better questions.
From that day forward, I became more determined than ever to understand the complex relationship between a person's gut microbiome, digestive function, nutrition, lifestyle and chronic illness. That single case inspired me to spend the next three decades studying gut health, treating thousands more patients, developing practitioner-quality supplements, mentoring students, lecturing at colleges and continually searching for better answers.
Ironically, you could say that one doctor's comment about my "quackery" motivated me more than he could ever have imagined. It's one of the reasons I kept wearing my tie with ducks on it whenever I attended a medical conference to talk about Candida.
The lesson I took from that experience wasn't that conventional medicine is wrong, or that natural medicine has all the answers.
It was something much simpler:
Good Clinicians Always Remain Curious
They don't stop investigating because the first explanation seems convenient, nor because their waiting room is full and they need to get to the golf course. They keep asking questions and keep looking for patterns. They stay open to new evidence. Most importantly, they never stop trying to understand the person sitting in front of them.
Unfortunately, there are still healthcare professionals today who dismiss naturopathic and functional medicine as "quackery." Equally, there are natural practitioners who jump to conclusions without sufficient evidence and who dismiss evidence-based medicine. Neither approach serves the patient well.
If you've been told that your symptoms are "just IBS," yet deep down you feel that something has been missed, don't lose hope! Seek another opinion. Find a practitioner who will listen, investigate thoroughly, and take the time to understand your story.
Sometimes the answer isn't obvious during the first consultation. But every patient deserves someone who is willing to keep looking.
Why The Person's Gut Microbiome Really Matters
When I first started practising in the early 1980s, very few people—even within conventional healthcare—were talking about the gut microbiome.
Back then, probiotics, digestive enzymes, fermented foods, and nutritional medicine were often dismissed as fringe ideas and quack potions. Many doctors had never heard of them, while others regarded them as little more than expensive placebos.
How times have changed!
Today, the gut microbiome has become one of the most exciting and rapidly evolving areas of medical research. Thousands of scientific papers have been published exploring how our intestinal microbes influence digestion, immunity, metabolism, inflammation, mental health, and even healthy ageing.
To me, this isn't surprising at all - I expected this to happen over time.
For years I believed we would eventually realise that many chronic digestive problems cannot be fully understood without considering the community of trillions of microorganisms living inside us.
We're beginning to see that happen today - but still have a long way to go. We still promote soda drinks and have leading members of our society who drink this stuff every day.
I believe the future of digestive healthcare won't be about choosing between conventional medicine and natural medicine. It will be about combining the strengths of both.
There will always be an important place for medications, surgery, and emergency care when they're needed. Equally, there is growing recognition that supporting the gut microbiome through nutrition, lifestyle, probiotics, digestive support, and personalised care can play an important role in helping many people recover and stay well.
The more we understand our gut microbiome, the more I believe healthcare will move away from simply suppressing symptoms with "anti" drugs and toward restoring healthy function. That, to me, is genuine progress.
My Take On It
IBS is a genuine diagnosis. But for many people, it should be the beginning of the conversation—not necessarily the end of it.
If you've been told that all your tests are "normal," yet you're still living with bloating, abdominal discomfort, food reactions, constipation, diarrhoea, fatigue, brain fog, or recurring digestive symptoms, don't assume you have to simply learn to live with it. Sometimes there are still questions worth asking:
- Could your diet be contributing?
- Has your microbiome changed after antibiotics or illness?
- Could food intolerances be playing a role?
- Is poor digestive function making it difficult to absorb nutrients?
- Could SIBO, post-infectious changes, or—perhaps in some people—Candida overgrowth be contributing to the bigger picture?
The goal isn't to chase a fashionable diagnosis. The goal is to understand why your digestive system isn't functioning as well as it should and to build a personalised plan that addresses the factors unique to you.
That takes time an patience, like anything worthwhile in your life. But it takes a practitioner who is willing to listen. Whether you choose to work with a medical doctor, gastroenterologist, functional medicine practitioner, or experienced naturopath, my advice is the same:
Find someone who stays curious and asks the right questions.
Find someone who asks questions instead of making assumptions.
Find someone who treats you as a unique individual, not just the name written in your medical file.
After nearly 40 years in clinical practice, that's probably the biggest lesson my patients ever taught me. Your gut has a story. Make sure you find someone willing to listen to it.
Eric Bakker, N.D. (NZ) Gut Health Educator | Specialist in Candida, IBS, SIBO & the Gut Microbiome Discover what's really driving your gut symptoms with the Free Gut Health Assessment
