As long as vitamin D is a hot topic these days, it stumps me why they glossed over it so quickly.

Alzheimer's advances show need for better drugs

Easy. "Alzheimer's advances show need for better drugs".

Vitamin D isn't a drug, so there is little interest (and funds) for researching its role in Alzheimer.



Yeah like drugs for lowering cholesterol do such a good job of preventing heart disease...... . Cholesterol lowering drugs are the worse thing that happened to CHD. It took all the focus away from the actual treatment and causes and shifted it to the treatment of useless numbers.



How do they know that it's the exercise itself that is causing this lowering of risk. It could be the effect of better insulin sensitivity, or the kind of life-style that active people lead.




You'd think that would prompt them to focus more energy into this, rather than keep hoping for the next cholesterol lowering megabuster type of drug. Oh wait, Vitamin D is not a magic pill that will allow them to treat a number instead of an actual disease and make them all very very rich.

Same old, same old. Same uncritical look at epidemiological studies that say little and confuses cause and effect. Same desperate search for the next big drug. No wonder we aren't making any advances.

A drug that stimulates the production of vitamin D, exactly like when the sun hits our skin. Now that would make me millions.

don't forget the coconut oil

http://coconutketones.blogspot.com/

Tuesday, June 22, 2010

Steve's MRI - Two years later

Steve had an MRI at the end of April 2010. His previous MRI was nearly two years ago, just about the time we started using the coconut oil, in June 2008. I am very pleased to report that Steve's MRI was reported as "stable" compared to the previous study. In contrast, his MRI went from normal in 2004 to having significant atrophy by 2008. Normally with Alzheimer's disease, the brain would continue to atrophy over such a two year period. This is quite encouraging, to think that medium chain triglycerides might be responsible for heading off the process of brain atrophy.

I know correlation is not causation...

But when you see the curves of "using statin drugs" and "increased Alzheimer's" they are virtually identical. I see a pattern matching here, because if an older person says they have statin side effects like muscle pain, tiredness, and impaired memory, they will say, "So what, you're old."

And when the person get's Alzheimer's, they will say the same thing.

It has taken years for there to be enough distance for them to say that the incidence has gone up. And I'll lay on the blame on low-fat diets, too; except I know people can't stick to them.

Multiple Defects in Energy Metabolism in Alzheimer's disease.

There are many other papers commenting on the link between metabolic problems and Alzheimer's. This is just one recent example.

So if we have mutated dysfunctional mitochondria what strategies are most likely to lead to biogensis (the creation of new) healthy unmutated mitochondria?

Mitochondrial energetics and therapeutics.Analysis of the many ways that a shift from carbohydrate glycolytic metabolism to fatty acid and ketone oxidative metabolism may modulate metabolism, signal transduction pathways, and the epigenome gives us an appreciation of the ketogenic diet and the potential for bioenergetic therapeutics.

Diet-Induced Ketosis Improves Cognitive Performance]

So do we need Coconut Oil, MCT oil + low carb diet with some intermittent fasting or do we need more drugs?

You can bet where the money will be invested.

I've always thought that statins probably caused or aggravated alzheimers.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/release...90223221430.htm

Cholesterol-Reducing Drugs May Lessen Brain Function, Says Researcher
ScienceDaily (Feb. 26, 2009) — Research by an Iowa State University scientist suggests that cholesterol-reducing drugs known as statins may lessen brain function.

Yeon-Kyun Shin, a biophysics professor in the department of biochemistry, biophysics and molecular biology, says the results of his study show that drugs that inhibit the liver from making cholesterol may also keep the brain from making cholesterol, which is vital to efficient brain function.

"If you deprive cholesterol from the brain, then you directly affect the machinery that triggers the release of neurotransmitters," said Shin. "Neurotransmitters affect the data-processing and memory functions. In other words -- how smart you are and how well you remember things."

Shin's findings will be published in this month's edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Cholesterol is one of the building blocks of cells and is made in the liver. Low-density lipoprotein (LDL) -- often referred to as bad cholesterol -- is cholesterol in the bloodstream from the liver on the way to cells in the body. High-density lipoprotein (HDL) -- so-called good cholesterol -- is cholesterol being removed from cells. Too much LDL going to cells and not enough being removed can lead to cholesterol deposits and hardening of the cells.

"If you have too much cholesterol, your internal machinery is not going to be able to take away enough cholesterol from the cells," said Shin. "Then cells harden and you can get these deposits."

Cholesterol-reducing statin drugs are helpful because they keep the liver from synthesizing cholesterol so less of the substance is carried to the cells. This lowers LDL cholesterol.

It is the function of reducing the synthesis of cholesterol that Shin's study shows may also harm brain function.

"If you try to lower the cholesterol by taking medicine that is attacking the machinery of cholesterol synthesis in the liver, that medicine goes to the brain too. And then it reduces the synthesis of cholesterol which is necessary in the brain," said Shin.

In his experiments, Shin tested the activity of the neurotransmitter-release machinery from brain cells without cholesterol present and measured how well the machinery functioned. He then included cholesterol in the system and again measured the protein function. Cholesterol increased protein function by five times.

"Our study shows there is a direct link between cholesterol and the neurotransmitter release," said Shin. "And we know exactly the molecular mechanics of what happens in the cells. Cholesterol changes the shape of the protein to stimulate thinking and memory."

While reducing the cholesterol in the brain may make you have less memory and cognitive skills, more cholesterol in the blood does not make people smarter. Because cholesterol in the blood cannot get across the blood brain barrier, there is no connection to the amount of cholesterol a person eats and brain function.

Shin says that for many people taking cholesterol-lower statins can be very healthful and they should listen to their doctor when taking medication.