Let’s talk about an unsung hero: The vagus nerve. If you are feeling stressed, anxious, gurgly or fatigued, this powerful, hardworking nerve might just be able to help you exhale.

The vagus nerve carries signals between your brain, heart and digestive system. All of these systems are central to the parasympathetic nervous system, the state where we heal and recover. It is such a huge player in our health and yet many people have never heard of it! Vagus nerve damage can lead to issues from anxiety to impaired digestion and even fainting spells from low blood pressure. Vagus nerve stimulation can be used to address anything from gastroparesis to epilepsy and even more common ailments…like depression! Healthy vagal tone (the term for the activity of the vagus nerve) can make a world of difference in how you feel and function every day.

But first….what is vagal tone?

It’s the activity of the vagus nerve, which is the main nerve of the parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest) and counterbalances the sympathetic nervous system (fight or flight). See the graphic for a crash course on the main points. So many of us get stuck in the sympathetic state, that Vagal tone becomes especially critical. It influences the regulation of everything from heart rate to gut motility to inflammation to mood.

You can think of it as the key to letting stress roll off your back. 

The vagus nerve is the 10th cranial nerve; it wanders from the lowest part of the brain stem to all the organs, branching off with thousands of nerve fibers. The vagus nerve is the main part of the parasympathetic system, housing 75% of all the PNS nerve fibers in the body!

Here are just 5 ways vagal tone affects health:

Heart Health

The vagus nerve directly innervates the heart, influencing heart rate and blood pressure. Heart rate variability (HRV) is a direct measurement of vagal tone, with a higher HRV indicating better vagal tone. 

Metabolic Health

The vagus nerve communicates from the brain to the gut, liver, pancreas and then back again. It helps to regulate hunger, insulin, blood sugar, lipids, and inflammation. Studies have even linked vagal tone with diabetes, metabolic syndrome, and obesity. 

Mood

The vagus nerve is thought to affect mental health through mechanisms related to stress, the gut-brain axis, and inflammation. Vagal nerve stimulation has been researched in people struggling with depression. It acts like a highway between gut and brain where neurotranmitters like dopamine, serotonin, and norephinphrin (all produced in the gut) travel to affect mood, memory, pain, and so much more.

Digestion

Gut hormones and neurotransmitters trigger nerve endings in the vagus nerve to send signals back to the brain. In turn, the vagus nerve regulates gut motility, secretions, and more. This is what we call the gut-brain axis! The Vagus nerve initiates digestion after detecting nutrients in the gut.

Healthy Aging

Vagal tone may decrease with age, affecting everything from the heart to the gut to inflammation. Actively supporting robust vagal tone can not only make you feel younger—clearer, happier, more energetic—it can help you look younger, stay active, and increase your health span by maintaining vitality into your golden years!

In functional medicine, we are all about looking deeper for the root cause and using the least invasive approaches for the most effective results. Vagal tone is not considered a “cause” of disease, but we are learning more and more about how it affects nearly every aspect of health. Plus, there are simple and free ways to improve vagal tone!

When you increase your vagal tone, you send a signal of safety to all of your organs so they can function at their best. So how do we go about this?

Here are some science backed ways to tone the vagus nerve:

• Deep Breathing 

• Meditation 

• Yoga

• Singing

• Laughing

• Massage

• Exercise 

• Cold Water Plunge 

• Balanced Nutrition 

All of these work because the vagus nerve communicates in both directions—both to and from the brain. These practices send signals to the brain that increase activity of the vagus nerve. That means your gears are no longer stuck in “fight or flight” and you’re able to downshift into “rest and digest.” Ahh relief!

This rest and digest state is not only a reprieve from stress, it is a healing place phase. Have you heard of the inflammatory reflex? What is a safeguard and a healing process becomes painful if left unchecked. Inflammation in some form is at the root of our illnesses. But is it ineveitable?

Many people believe the nervous system and immune system function independently.  This simply isn’t true! It was discovered 20 years ago that a reflex involving the vagus nerve helps to reduce pro-inflammatory cytokines and resolve inflammation. So thought inflammation is an immune response, it can be triggered and managed by the nervous system…specifially the Vagus Nerve!

Since this discovery, clinical trials have successfully used vagal nerve stimulation in patients with rheumatoid arthritis and inflammatory bowel disease. 

 Does this make you want to go back and review that simple list of ways to simulate vagal tone? It does me. Let’s dive deeper on one of my favorites (second only to laughing!) Let’s look at food.

Nutrition for the Vagus Nerve?

Okay, there isn’t a specific “vagal nerve diet.” There is a whole host of foods to choose from Here’s a hint: it’s nothing you would find on a Vegas Buffet.  Really, anything that nourishes the gut will improve the gut-brain axis, and therby support our hero, the Vagus Nerve. Let’s discover a few.

Foods can increase vagal tone:

🥦 Fiber sends signals through the vagus nerve to the brain and back to slow gut movements and make us feel full. 

🥗 The Mediterranean Diet is associated with higher heart rate variability, which is a measure of vagal tone. The trick is to eat a wide variety of fresh foods.

🍗 Similarly, the Paleo diet includes fatty fish, nuts, seeds, organ meats and more traditional foods that deeply nourish and eliminate inflammatory foods that impair vagal tone.

🐟 Probiotics, omega-3 fatty acids, and B vitamins improve heart rate variability too.

🍳 Choline is especially nourishing for Vagal tone and is found in foods like eggs, sunflower seeds, beef, chicken, organ meats, red potatoes and quinoa.

🫐 Specific gut-health foods that may also improve vagal tone include antioxidant, mineral, and polyphenol rich foods like blueberries leafy greens, cruciferous veggies, and colorful root veggies.

Foods that IMPAIR Vagal tone:

🍩 Trans fat in processed foods have been associated with decreased vagal tone as well as weight gain, obesity, metabolic dysfunction and more.

 🍭high sugar diets throw off microbial balance in the gut and interfere with the gut brain axis while perpetuating cravings that make it hard to choose nourishing foods.

 Remember:

The vagus nerve regulates everything from heart health to metabolic health to immune function, and it is strongly influenced by what is going on in the gut! That means that anything you do (or eat) to affect gut health will probably also affect vagal tone. 

I love to nerd out on how everything in the body is connected. If you are trying to make sense of what is going on with your own health or how your symptoms relate, I can help. I alway suggest you experiment with quick easy ways to help yourself switch into the parasympathetic state: laugh, take time out, breathe deeply, connect with loved ones, meditate. But if you find it increasingly hard to unwind, if you suspect your stress is affecting sleep, digestion, moods, energy, your very quality of life! it may be time to look deeper.

Consider booking a free call if you are ready to launch on your own customized healing journey.

References

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Pavlov VA. The evolving obesity challenge: targeting the vagus nerve and the inflammatory reflex in the response. Pharmacol Ther. 2021;222:107794. [link]

Dai J, Lampert R, Wilson PW, Goldberg J, Ziegler TR, Vaccarino V. Mediterranean dietary pattern is associated with improved cardiac autonomic function among middle-aged men: a twin study. Circ Cardiovasc Qual Outcomes. 2010;3(4):366-373. [link]

Gerritsen RJS, Band GPH. Breath of Life: The Respiratory Vagal Stimulation Model of Contemplative Activity. Front Hum Neurosci. 2018;12:397. [link]

Lin LL, Chen YJ, Lin TY, Weng TC. Effects of Resistance Training Intensity on Heart Rate Variability at Rest and in Response to Orthostasis in Middle-Aged and Older Adults. Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2022;19(17):10579. [link]

Falvey A. Vagus nerve stimulation and inflammation: expanding the scope beyond cytokines. Bioelectron Med. 2022;8(1):19. [link]

Young HA, Benton D. Heart-rate variability: a biomarker to study the influence of nutrition on physiological and psychological health?. Behav Pharmacol. 2018;29(2 and 3-Spec Issue):140-151. [link]