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This week on the podcast, Mikki speaks to Julianne Taylor, a registered nutritionist and PhD candidate, whose research is diving into one of the more complex and contested areas of nutrition science: the role of diet in managing rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Julianne recently led a scoping review that sheds much-needed light on the challenges—and the promise—of using elimination and reintroduction diets for people with RA.

In this conversation, we explore the broader aims of Julianne’s research programme and what drew her into this niche in the first place. We unpack the motivations behind her review, including the striking lack of standardised protocols, the limitations of popular food sensitivity tests, and the idiosyncratic ways people seem to react to foods.

Julianne shares her insights on why dietary interventions remain underutilised in conventional care, despite strong patient interest and some compelling mechanistic leads—ranging from fasting and gut permeability to mast cells and neuroimmune crosstalk. We also discuss the impact of placebo and nocebo responses, the confounding effect of ultra-processed food removal.

If you’ve ever wondered why diet and autoimmunity remain such a grey area—or what it will take to turn that grey into actionable science—this episode is for you.

Julianne experienced first-hand the difference diet makes; she experimented with the popular Zone diet in the 90’s, and within days experienced increased energy, improved mental focus, and excellent appetite control leading to weight loss without hunger. Further experiments led to trying the paleo diet in 2009, which eliminated auto-immune joint inflammation and menstrual issues.

As a result she changed careers, from a designer to a nutritionist, and went back to University to study nutrition at Massey. In 2015 Julianne completed a post graduate diploma in nutrition science.

Julianne has been researching the connection between diet and health since 1997, and applying what she has learned to her clients with great success. She has a special interest in how diet controls appetite regulation via control of ‘hunger’ hormones. Using these diet principals she has helped hundreds of people lose weight with ease.

The effect of diet in reducing auto-immune disease is also a topic close to her heart, and in her post graduate work she researched diet studies and Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and interviewed 10 people who had successfully used a paleo diet to reduce symptoms or go into remission. Julianne is an AIP-certified coach.

Julianne is currently doing her PhD research on the topic of dietary strategies for rheumatoid arthritis, which includes an intervention pilot study on the effect of the auto-immune protocol (AIP) diet on RA

Julianne’s current hobby is powerlifting. She represented New Zealand in Sweden in 2019 in the Masters 3, 52kg category, winning a bronze medal for bench

https://juliannetaylornutrition.com/

https://podcast.mikkiwilliden.com/96

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doLeFDn_Tr0&ab_channel=ArthritisNZ

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40181632/

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