COVER -> RECOMMENDED DAILY REQUIREMENT
AN UN-NERVING MEDICAL TRAVESTY - "Lost his nerve"
"Frazzled Nerves"
"Un-Nerving"
"A Lot of Nerve"
"Getting on your nerves".
Our nerves perform one of our most important bodily functions. Everything else fails to respond accurately if the nervous system is impaired. Worldwide, nerve disorders are the most commonly inherited disorders. Though nerve disorders are not hereditary, its been found that human and other animal species are affected relatively equal.
Most of these disorders stem from a breakdown in the myelin sheath, which forms the outer protective layer of nerve cells - acting much like an insulator does over the individual wires of an electrical cord - to keep the multitude of sensory and muscle messages in our bodies relayed to their intended points of destination. Mixed messages cause pain, crippling spasms to muscles, fatigue, depression and loss of mental, visual and hearing functions and capacities. A very large percentage of what we consider "sick."
Peripheral Nerve Disorders: disorders of any of the nerves outside the central nervous system. Causes and treatments - unknown.
Examples, inherited and otherwise, would be
- multiple sclerosis (MS),
- amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's disease),
- progressive muscular atrophy,
- progressive bulbar palsy,
- primary lateral sclerosis,
- progressive pseudobulbar palsy,
- Charcot-Marie-Tooth syndrome(CMT),
- Bell's Palsy,
- Parkinson's Disease.
The body is constantly breaking the myelin down, while constantly also in the process of rebuilding. Most peripheral nerve disorders involve the lack of or improper "reconstruction" of myelin; especially where the nerves branch out near their ends. Each disorder affects a different part of the nervous system and a different set of muscles, so in each disorder a different part of the body is most affected. These disorders are more common in men than in women. Symptoms usually start when people are in their 50s; although, some can start in early childhood.
Beginning of the End?
My wife, who enjoys any kind of massage, always made me stop at her feet. "They're too sensitive!"Pressing the issue would make her legs jerk spasmodically. "Damn it! I told you not to touch them!"
About four years ago it really hit home, when I saw her grimacing as she put on her boots for work. "What's the matter honey?"
"It's my toes, they've been really hurting lately and I've been stumbling." And then she started to cry. "I'm gonna end up like my mother, I just know I'm gonna end up like my damn mother!"
I knew what she was talking about, I had just never wanted to face it; I had always dismissed it as an aberration, "Nah, her mom was probably an isolated thing, her siblings and her are all so healthy".
CMT (Charcot-Marie-Tooth Syndrome): a peripheral nerve disorder that causes an improper rebuilding of the myelin nerve sheath in the feet,ankles and (less commonly) hands, resulting in severe pain and muscle atrophy. It has no apparent affect on longevity or mental function - once you get past the pain and crippling. My mother-in-law had been struck by CMT at the classic age of 35 and, back then, the standard treatment was to remove the person's toes, sometimes even half the foot, just to reduce the pain. My wife was 35 at the time she started to notice symptoms. My mother-in-law had all of her toes removed at age 40.
Finally goaded into action by worry about my wife, our life and our two young daughters, I went into research mode but I kept hitting a dead-end. There are national and international organizations for CMT; however, they seem to only be concerned with advising on foot braces and funding research into gene-typing, the different variations of this affliction or nerve transplant studies. That and advising various sensation-deadening drugs, sold by the same companies that fund their research.
So I decided to call my father, the "Dr.Science" guy of our family, a voracious reader of anything related to medical science. Immediately, "Dr.Science" came back with a suggestion:
"Methylcobalimin. The American and European medical communities are giving it almost no attention, but researchers in Asia and a few other places are giving it a lot of attention. I've been taking it for the last few years, since I am a vegetarian and a senior citizen."Dad thinks he'll live to be 100; just so long as he isn't taken to see a doctor.
Methylcobalamin: the biologically necessary form of vitamin B-12; produced by the liver in small amounts from the commonly available cyanocobalimin. Cyanocobalmin is found in few vegatables; mainly appearing in yeast, eggs and meats. There are no known side effects and there is no known toxicity level so supplements are very common. Many people take several thousand times the Recommended Daily Requirement (RDR).
Unfortunately, in my opinion, many of our medical problems appear to be a matter of the body not converting what is eaten into what is NEEDED. This has been missed for decades, due to....
Flawed Testing
The Summer 1998 issue of Healthwatch reported a fascinating new research finding."Over 60% of CFIDS (chronic fatique syndrome) and FM (fibromyalgia) patients cerebral spinal fluids contained subnormal (low) levels of vitamin B12. On the other hand, vitamin B12 levels in the blood did not significantly deviate from normal ranges."
Further research has verified a medical travesty: standard blood tests for B-12 only check for the ingested cyanocoblamin floating in the blood, which is by no means a measure of whether the nerves are getting enough of the methylcobalamin that they actually NEED!
"Vitamin B12 deficiency may be underestimated in the general population. High-risk groups for the deficiency syndrome include the elderly, patients taking ulcer medications over long periods, patients with acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), vegetarians, patients who have undergone stomach resection or small bowel resection, or both, and patients with dementia. The vitamin B12 deficiency syndrome is characterized by five stages, the fifth of which results in irreversible neuropsychiatric manifestations. Although the deficiency is easily treated, diagnosis is somewhat complicated by the shortcomings of the various tests. Current state-of-the-art testing uses serum cobalamin levels as a screening test and serum or urine homocysteine and methylmalonic acid determinations as confirmatory tests. Vitamin B12 deficiency is treatable with monthly injections, large doses of daily oral supplement tablets, or an intranasal gel, which is far better absorbed than comparable oral supplements." --- Swain R. An update of vitamin B12 metabolism and deficiency states. J Fam Pract 1995 Dec;41(6):595-600.
In the Dark -Which would you choose?
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The results: It took an average of 7.79 weeks for the group given the steroid drug to recover completely. In contrast, the group given the steroid drug and methylcobalamin took just 1.23 weeks to recover, and the group receiving the methylcobalamin by itself enjoyed complete recovery after just 5.1 days.
The facial nerve score was significantly more severe in the steroid group compared with the methylcobalamin groups, and improvement in symptoms was better in the methylcobalamin groups compared with the group treated with the steroid drug. 54.5 days in the dark or 5.1 days in the dark; which would YOU choose? Yet, few physician's prescribe this cheap vitamin supplement to their Bell's Palsy patients.
The results with all of the other nerve and peripheral nerve disorders was very encouraging; even in the conditions where the effect is more widespread and damaging, such as MS.
The Dissident's Drug Distributor vs. The Almighty Dollar
There is an American vitamin company that HAS been pushing methylcobalamin for the last seven or eight years: The Life Extension Foundation - LEF.org.They are one of the few "vitamin distributors" that carry it. The Life Extension Foundation was one of the major lobbists for legislation that would include cheap, natural, vitamin folic acid (also implicated in peripheral nerve disorders) to be included in food products, so that more people would get the Recommended Daily Amount minimum amount - even though it would ultimately cut into their sales of folic acid.
Folic acid being added to all bread products manufactured in the United States since 1998, is estimated to be sparing 10,000 children a year from being born with spina bifida or other "neural tube" disorders. The food, drug and medical industries fought against the folic acid legislation vigorously. Why? No money in it for them, just like methylcobalamin, IMHO.
"Since methylcobalamin is not a drug, there is little economic incentive to conduct expensive clinical studies on it, so it may be a long time before we know just how effective this unique form of vitamin B12 is in slowing the progression of common diseases like Parkinson's disease. Americans [NO, people everywhere! -- E.C.] need to know about this important natural therapy that could extend the healthy human life span. A search of the scientific literature reveals 334 published studies on methylcobalamin. However, it would not be an exaggeration to say that virtually no doctors know of it or are recommending it." (Healthwatch article)
Magic Bullets
Other simple vitamin and mineral supplements have had an enormous impact on human health and existence. Many readers won't remember seeing people who had goiter (an enlargement of the thyroid gland below the chin which looked like a large sack of fat) before iodine was routinely added to most table salt.Or the people who had mild rickets from vitamin D deficiency before it was added to dairy products - vitamin D is made by the human body --- if you get enough vitamin A and sunlight --- unfortunately, the human condition and lifestyle has changed.
Many of the 70+ generation are slightly more bent-looking, due to the rickets many suffered. At some point people figured out that cod liver oil would cure the rickets and miliions of people had to endure daily doses of cod liver oil as children. Our poor bodies can't evolve and change as rapidly as other conditions in our environment with which they have to contend.
Methylcobalamin may be another one of those "magic bullet" nutrients: badly needed by our bodies, dependant upon a metabolic system that, apparently, often fails.
Keeping Our Fingers Crossed
My wife has always been suspicious of vitamins. "I get everything I need from my diet.""I know, baby, but this is something where your body may not be CONVERTING something in your diet into what you NEED."
Then, after a few days, she switched to,"I think they are making me sleepy."
There is a little truth to that, but the research seems to indicate that they actually keep you up (slightly) by suppressing melatonin, which helps you sleep - you just need to take them in the morning. Eventually, I gave up in frustration, until, once again, she had a really bad "attack" of the foot pain.
I convinced her to try taking them again (but slipped an extra into her morning coffee, in case she got sneaky on me.)
Three and a half years later, my wife has no pain when she puts on her work boots and I can't remember the last time she stumbled over one of her feet. A few months back we danced our legs off at a wedding reception - no stumbles, trips or pains. And lately, she has become quite demanding ... for foot massages.
Afterword: Considering the number of individuals I know who are becoming vegetarians out of fear of BSE (bovine spongeform encepholopathy/ "Mad Cow" disease), or due to a number of other health and ethical concerns, this article may be more timely than it first appears. Please, read this article thoroughly, digest it (figuratively,) and think if there is a friend or relative of yours who might benefit from this information that is apparently escaping the attention of the mainstream media.
QUESTIONS? COMMENTS? Go ahead and email Ed.
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