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Austria’s Mayr & More clinic is famous for its gut restoration therapy. It reopened in April after a complete overhaul


into the complex nature of our digestion and its links with body and mind were the American doctor Byron Robinson, who wrote The Abdominal and Pelvic Brain in 1907 and British medic Johannis Langley, who invented the term the enteric nervous system (ENS) around the same period. The ENS, otherwise known as ‘the


second brain’, is so called because our gut contains around half a billion nerve endings, which is more than in the spinal cord. It also manufactures around 50 per cent of the feel-good hormones serotonin and dopamine in our bodies. The ENS is 9m long and runs from


the oesophagus to the anal canal, not only controlling digestion but exerting a powerful eff ect on hunger and appetite hormones like ghrelin and CCK, as well as our immunity and mood.


HOW IT WORKS As there’s no offi cial defi nition for gut therapy, treatment protocols are open to interpretation. The FX Mayr cure, devised in 1901 by Dr Franz Xaver Mayr is a renowned protocol in Austria focusing on digestion (see SB07/3 p92). Guests follow a restricted calorie, low starch regime (in


Spa Business 2 2014 ©Cybertrek 2014


The more light scientists shed on how essential gut health is to overall mental and physical wellbeing, the more the public start to take notice


some cases, drinking only tea or water), chew each food morsel dozens of times, take Epsom salts as a bowel cleanse and receive regular abdominal massages and a range of other prescribed therapies. Launched more recently, the gut restora-


tion regime at Grayshott Spa in south England, also off ers a restricted calorie protocol (no sugar, grains or dairy) with two semi-fast days per week. The regime is based on the 5:2 intermittent fasting rule where you consume 500 calories on two days a week and eat what you want for the other fi ve (although Grayshott still likes to keep calories in check). Guests also take probiotics and cultured foods and have abdominal massages and other treatments to further aid their digestive systems.


TRAINING In Austria, the Mayr cure can only be delivered by doctors who’ve trained for at least three postgraduate years in the FX Mayr technique. The regime at Grayshott has been


devised and is delivered by a team of qualifi ed resident nutritional therapists. However, just as there’s no offi cial


defi nition for gut therapy, there’s no, one designated training programme for practitioners and facilities wishing to off er this type of treatment.


WHY OFFER IT? The more light scientists are shedding on how essential gut health is to overall physical and mental wellbeing, the more the general public is starting to take notice. Recent documentaries such as the BBC’s Guts: The Strange and Mysterious World of the Human Stomach in the UK, presented by qualifi ed doctor and author of The Fast Diet, Michael Mosley, have served to popularise this knowledge in the public domain. If the theory is sound, and improving digestion can help clear up other ailments, then such a programme could potentially attract a wide range of clients.


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