Arthritis sufferers get relief with Boswellia in 7 days

An enriched extract of the ‘Indian Frankincense’ herb Boswellia serrata has been proven to reduce the symptoms of osteoarthritis. Research published today in BioMed Central’s open access journal Arthritis Research & Therapy has shown that patients taking the herbal remedy showed significant improvement in as little as seven days.

Osteoarthritis is the most common form of arthritis; it commonly affects weight-bearing joints such as the knees and hips, along with the hands, wrists, feet and spine. The symptoms include pain, stiffness and limited movement. This randomised, double-blinded, placebo-controlled trial of 70 patients will be of great interest to sufferers, especially those who don’t get adequate relief from existing treatments.

The study was led by Siba Raychaudhuri, a faculty member of the University of California, Davis, in the United States. According to Raychaudhuri, “The high incidence of adverse affects associated with currently available medications has created great interest in the search for an effective and safe alternative treatment”. The extract the authors used was enriched with 30% AKBA (3-O-acetyl-11-keto-beta-boswellic acid), which is thought to be the most active ingredient in the plant. Raychaudhuri said, “AKBA has anti-inflammatory properties, and we have shown that B. serrata enriched with AKBA can be an effective treatment for osteoarthritis of the knee”. This is a proprietary product developed by Laila Nutraceuticals.

B. serrata has been used for thousands of years in the Indian system of traditional medicine known as ‘Ayurveda’. This study is the first to prove that an enriched extract of the plant can be used as a successful treatment.

The same authors have previously tested the safety of their remedy in animal experiments. They say that, “In this study, the compound was shown to have no major adverse effects in our osteoarthritis patients. It is safe for human consumption and even for long-term use”.

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Article adapted by MD Only from original press release.
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Contact: Graeme Baldwin
BioMed Central 

 

References

1. A double blind, randomized, placebo controlled study of the efficacy and safety of 5-Loxin(R) for treatment of osteoarthritis of the knee Krishanu Sengupta, Krishnaraju V Alluri, Andey Rama Sathis, Simanchala Mishra, Trimurtulu Golakoti, Kadainti VS Sarma, Dipak Dey and Siba P Raychaudhuri Arthritis Research & Therapy (in press)

2. Arthritis Research & Therapy is an international, peer-reviewed online and print journal, publishing original research, reviews, commentaries and reports. Studies relate to the rationale and treatment of arthritis, autoimmune disease and diseases of bone and cartilage. The journal is edited by Prof Peter E Lipsky (USA) and Prof Sir Ravinder N Maini (UK) and has an Impact Factor of 4.04.

3. BioMed Central (http://www.biomedcentral.com/) is an independent online publishing house committed to providing immediate access without charge to the peer-reviewed biological and medical research it publishes. This commitment is based on the view that open access to research is essential to the rapid and efficient communication of science.

Exercise Reduces Muscle and Joint Pain 25%

People who exercise regularly experience 25% less muscle and joint pain in their old age than people who are less active. Research published in Arthritis Research & Therapy reveals that people who regularly participate in brisk aerobic exercise, such as running, experience less pain than non-runners even though they are more likely to suffer from pain from injuries.

Bonnie Bruce and colleagues from Stanford University, USA, compared the level of pain in a group of runners and a group of community-based individuals who acted as controls. Participants were followed for 14 years, and were on average in their mid-sixties when the study started. Each year, they completed a questionnaire about their health status, exercise habits and history of injuries. In total, the study included 866 subjects: 492 Runners’ Association members and 374 controls.

Bruce et al.’s results show that the greater majority of physically active participants did, on average, between 355 and 2,119 minutes of exercise per week over the course of the study, while controls exercised significantly less. After adjusting for confounding factors such as gender, age, weight and health status the results show that pain increased in both groups over time. But members of the Runners’ Association experienced 25% less musculoskeletal pain than controls. This reduction persisted throughout the study period, until the subjects reached an age of 62 to 76 years.

“Exercise was associated with a substantial and significant reduction in pain even [...] despite the fact that fractures, a significant predictor of pain, were slightly more common among runners,” conclude the authors.

More research is needed to investigate the mechanisms that might underlie the effect of exercise on musculoskeletal pain in old age.

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Article adapted by MD Only Weblog from original press release.
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Aerobic Exercise And Its Impact On Musculoskeletal Pain In Older Adults: A 14-Year Prospective, Longitudinal Study
Bonnie Bruce, James F. Fries, Deborah P. Lubeck
Arthritis Research & Therapy 2005, 7:R1263-R1270 (19 September 2005)

Juliette Savin
press@biomedcentral.com
44-207-631-9931
BioMed Central
http://www.biomedcentral.com

Arthritis Research & Therapy (http://arthritis-research.com/) is published by BioMed Central (http://www.biomedcentral.com), an independent online publishing house committed to providing open access to peer-reviewed biological and medical research. This commitment is based on the view that immediate free access to research and the ability to freely archive and reuse published information is essential to the rapid and efficient communication of science.

Taking Painkillers, NSAID Increase the Risk for Heart Attack

Painkillers-new and old-increase the risk for heart attack

 Cardiovascular side effects aren’t limited to the use of the newer painkillers called COX-2 inhibitors-a category that includes Celebrex and the recently discontinued Vioxx and Bextra. Old standbys, like ibuprofen and aspirin, aren’t entirely blameless, reports the October 2006 issue of the Harvard Heart Letter. The cardiovascular risks associated with traditional NSAIDs are small, but worth being aware of.

Ibuprofen, aspirin, and COX-2s all belong to the class of medicines called nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs). Most of them boost blood pressure and can counteract the effect of some blood-pressure drugs. They can also impair blood vessels’ ability to relax and may stimulate the growth of smooth muscle cells inside arteries. All these changes can contribute to the artery-clogging process known as atherosclerosis.

Researchers have determined that use of a COX-2 inhibitor increases the chances of having a heart attack. Vioxx, which was taken off the market because of possible heart complications, may lead to or worsen heart failure-but so can traditional NSAIDs. In general, cardiovascular side effects are most likely to happen in people with existing heart disease or those at high risk for it. 

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Article adapted by MD Only Weblog from original press release.
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Source: Harvard Health Publications
Contact: hhpmedia@hms.harvard.edu
Web site: http://www.health.harvard.edu

Omega 3 Fatty Acid Anti-inflammatory Effects Linked To Lowering Of Prostaglandin

Omega 3 fatty acids in dietary fish oil are reported to have anti-inflammatory and anti-thrombogenic and anti-arrhythmic effects in humans, but the biochemical basis for these beneficial health effects is not well understood. Now a University of Michigan biochemist reports that fish oil significantly diminishes the production and effectiveness of various prostaglandins, naturally occurring hormone-like substances that can accentuate inflammation and thrombosis.

Dr. William L. Smith described his findings on April 4 at Experimental Biology 2006 in San Francisco. His presentation was part of the scientific program of the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB).

Dietary fish oil causes its prostaglandin-lowering effects through three different mechanisms, says Dr. Smith.

First, the much fewer prostaglandins are made from omega 3 fatty acids as compared to the other class of fatty acids in the body, the omega 6 family of fatty acids that originate in the diet from leafy vegetables and other plant sources.

Second, the omega 3 fatty acids compete with omega 6 fatty acids for the same binding site on the COX 1 enzyme that converts the omega 6 fatty acids to prostaglandin (which is why the COX 1 enzyme and its COX 2 cousin are the targets of anti-inflammatory drugs like ibuprofen). The more omega 3 fatty acids present to block the binding sites, the fewer omega 6 fatty acids are able to be converted to prostaglandin.

Third, although omega 3 fatty acids also are converted to prostaglandins, the prostaglandins formed from omega 3 are generally 2 to 50 times less active than those formed from the omega 6 fatty acids from dietary plants.

The biochemical basis of other benefits of dietary fish oil – for example, omega 3 fatty acids’ impact on neuronal development and visual acuity — are probably due to effects on biochemical pathways regulating nerve transmission. Understanding the different pathways through which omega 3 works to convert prostaglandin helps explain why the plant-based omega 6 fatty acids don’t simply provide the same benefits. Because of omega 3 fatty acids’ known benefits to health, especially cardiovascular health, Dr. Smith’s advice is simple: eat more fish.

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Article adapted by MD Only Weblog from original press release.
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Contact: Sarah Goodwin
Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology

Diet rich in fatty acids could thwart diabetes onset

Omega-3 fatty acids have long been touted for their heart-healthy and brain-boosting benefits. Consider cod liver oil, fortified infant formula and enriched eggs.Now a study of nearly 1,800 children at risk for type 1 diabetes has found that increased consumption of dietary omega-3 fatty acids appears to reduce the risk of the body attacking its own insulin-producing cells, a precursor to this form of the disease, report researchers at the University of Colorado and the University of Florida.

The findings appear in the Sept. 26 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.

In the past few decades, there has been a dramatic rise in the incidence of type 1 diabetes, both in the United States and in Europe — a jump that coincides with changes in food manufacturing that have led to a decline in omega-3 fatty acids in the diet and an increase in the content of omega-6 fatty acids, said Dr. Michael Clare-Salzler, a professor and the Stetson chair in experimental pathology at the University of Florida College of Medicine.

“The foods we are eating now are qualitatively much different than those produced on a 1900s-era farm,” Clare-Salzler said. “When animals are commercially raised today, they are often fed grains rich in omega-6 fatty acids, fatty acids that can promote inflammation. In the old days, animals received a much more balanced intake of omega-3 and omega 6-fatty acids.”

The amount of omega-3 fatty acids found in food today has dropped 28-fold from 100 years ago, Clare-Salzler said. In contrast to the omega-6 variety, omega-3 fatty acids have potent anti-inflammatory effects.

“Animal studies have shown inflammation in the insulin-producing cells of the pancreas is an early event that leads to type 1 diabetes,” said Clare-Salzler, who also directs UF’s Center for Immunology and Transplantation. “From these studies in mice, it appears if you thwart inflammation you can prevent the disease from occurring. The human parallel in this study indicates that higher dietary intake of anti-inflammatory omega-3 fatty acids reduces the risk of developing an immune response to the insulin-producing cells.”

Scientists set out to study whether increased intake of omega-3 fatty acids would be associated with prevention of or delay in the emergence of autoantibodies in the blood that signal the immune system’s attack on insulin-producing cells. Children enrolled in the Denver-based Diabetes Autoimmunity Study in the Young, or DAISY, were all at increased risk for type 1 diabetes and were evaluated until they were, on average, 6 years old.

Their parents were asked annually to report what they ate, including how often they consumed canned tuna, dark-meat fish such as salmon, other fish, shrimp, lobster and scallops, and also what kind of fat was used in cooking. Blood samples also were taken to test study participants for the presence of autoantibodies, and Nancy J. Szabo, director of the Analytical Toxicology Core Laboratory at UF’s College of Veterinary Medicine, evaluated the fatty acid composition of red blood cell membranes isolated from blood samples taken from a subset of 244 children.

“Kids who had higher intakes of omega-3 fatty acids had a significant reduction in the risk of development of autoantibodies,” Clare-Salzler said, adding that the risk of developing the autoantibodies also went down as the concentration of omega-3 fatty acids rose in the red blood cells.

All fatty acids help bolster the structure and function of cell membranes, but omega-3 fatty acids strongly support the production of anti-inflammatory molecules than can quell an immune attack on insulin-producing cells, Clare-Salzler said.

The study’s lead author was Jill M. Norris, a professor of preventive medicine and biometrics at the University of Colorado at Denver’s School of Medicine. Funding came from the National Institutes of Health and the University of Colorado’s Diabetes Endocrine Research Center.

UF and University of Colorado researchers are continuing to explore links between diabetes and diet. Clare-Salzler and Peter Chase from the University of Colorado’s Barbara Davis Center for Childhood Diabetes are leading a National Institutes of Health-funded multicenter pilot trial, the Nutritional Intervention to Prevent Type 1 Diabetes, or NIP, to examine whether babies who receive dietary supplementation with the omega-3 fatty acid docosohexaenoic acid, or DHA, show fewer signs of inflammation. An expanded version of the trial will then determine whether DHA protects infants and children from the development of autoantibodies that lead to diabetes in comparison with babies who receive standard formula or diets with a much lower level of the omega-3 fatty acid.

If the trial confirms the hypothesis that dietary supplementation with DHA in infancy blocks early inflammatory events key to diabetes development, then, the authors write in JAMA, “dietary supplementation with omega-3 fatty acids could become a mainstay for early intervention to safely prevent the development of type 1 diabetes.”

“The compounds that are made from the omega-3s are natural, the body’s own protective mechanisms for overt inflammation,” said Dr. Charles Serhan, director of the Center for Experimental Therapeutics and Reperfusion Injury at Harvard Medical School. “What these results say is that you may now be able to add back through the diet these essential omega-3 fatty acids, and then they will be utilized by the body to generate its own set of protective molecules that help to instruct the immune cells in the local environment not to attack the insulin-producing islets cells in the pancreas … these are very powerful and potentially very important results.”

Source: Melanie Fridl Ross, ufcardiac@aol.com 

University of Florida Health Science Center
1600 S.W. Archer Rd., Rm. C3-025
Gainesville, FL 32610
United States
http://www.health.ufl.edu

Eating red meat may increase rheumatoid arthritis risk

Consuming high levels of red meat study says is an independent risk factor in the development of inflammatory arthritis

A chronic inflammatory disease of the immune system, rheumatoid arthritis (RA) has been linked to a combination of genetic and environmental factors. Aspects of lifestyle may explain as much as 40 percent of the risk. Cigarette smoking has consistently been found to play a role in RA’s development. The role of nutritional factors is less certain. Studies have suggested the protective benefits of eating fish, the dangers of drinking coffee, and a reduction in disease risk for women who enjoy alcohol in moderation. Such associations, however, are still wide open to debate and further research.Recently, a team of British researchers found that a diet lacking in fruit, especially varieties high in vitamin C, increases the risk of inflammatory arthritis, a common early sign of RA, as much as three-fold. Building on this compelling finding, they set out to investigate the association of other dietary habits with the onset of RA. Their results, published in the December 2004 issue of Arthritis & Rheumatism (http://www.interscience.wiley.com/journal/arthritis), indicate a high level of red meat consumption as an independent risk factor for inflammatory arthritis.

Led by Professors Alan Silman and Deborah Symmons at the University of Manchester, the team drew its subjects from a large, established research sample–over 25,000 men and women between the ages of 45 and 75 enrolled in the European Prospective Investigation of Cancer in Norfolk, England. Within this population, 88 new patients with inflammatory arthritis, affecting at least two major joints, were identified.

Nearly 40 percent of these patients satisfied the American College of Rheumatology criteria for RA at baseline. The patients were then matched, for age, sex, and body mass index, with 176 controls. At the study’s onset, each participant completed a detailed 7-day food diary, with advance instruction on measuring food portions to help them be as specific as possible in recording their intake. Each participant also supplied information on his or her past and present status as a smoker.

Patients were more likely to have been former smokers; only 35 percent of the patients had never smoked compared with 85 percent of the controls. In terms of dietary factors, patients and controls were similar in most areas, including intake of total calories, fat grams, and vitamin D, as well as coffee, tea, and alcohol consumption. Patients had a lower intake of vitamin C, although the association of this factor with disease risk was not as strong as it was in the team’s previous study. The most striking difference between the two groups was directly related to red meat consumption. After adjusting for smoking and other possible dietary confounders, patients with the highest level of red meat consumption had a two-fold risk for the development of RA. Patients who consumed high levels of red meat combined with other meat products showed similar high risk levels. Interestingly, a higher level of protein intake from all dietary sources was also associated with an increased disease risk, while higher levels of dietary fats, including saturated fat, did not have an impact.

Routinely eating burgers and steak, however, may only influence people with a predisposition for RA. “It may be that the high collagen content of meat leads to collagen sensitization and consequent production of anticollagen antibodies, most likely in a subgroup of susceptible individuals,” the authors note. “Meat consumption may be linked to either additives or even infectious agents, but, again, there is no evidence as to what might be important in relation to RA.”

“A high level of red meat consumption may represent a novel risk factor for inflammatory arthritis or may act as a marker for a group of persons with an increased risk from other lifestyle causes,” Dr. Pattison and colleagues conclude. “It is unclear whether the association is a causative one.”

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Article adapted by MD Only Weblog from original press release.
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Article: “Dietary Risk Factors for the Development of Inflammatory Polyarthritis: Evidence for a Role of High Level of Red Meat Consumption,” Dorothy J. Pattison, Deborah P.M. Symmons, Mark Lunt, Ailsa Welch, Robert Luben, Sheila A. Bingham, Kay-Tee Khaw, Nicholas E. Day, and Alan J. Silman, Arthritis & Rheumatism, December 2004; 50:12; pp. 3804-3812.

Contact: Amy Molnar
amolnar@wiley.com
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Cinnamon and Cloves Double Team Diabetes and Cardiovascular Disease

Cinnamon and cloves shown in studies to improve insulin function, lower risk factors for diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.

Two studies provide new evidence for the beneficial effects (and biochemical actions) of cinnamon as an anti-inflammatory agent and support earlier findings of its power as an anti-oxidant agent and an agent able to lower cholesterol, triglycerides, and glucose, and improve how well insulin functions.In a related study, extracts of cloves also were found to improve the function of insulin and to lower glucose, total cholesterol, LDL and triglycerides in people with type 2 diabetes. Earlier studies had shown these positive effects in laboratory studies; one study presented at Experimental Biology provides the first evidence of these beneficial effects in humans taking the equivalent of one to two cloves per day.

Earlier studies in the laboratory of one of the co-authors of all these papers, Dr. Richard A. Anderson, Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center, United States Department of Agriculture, had shown that the equivalent of a quarter to half a teaspoon of cinnamon given to humans twice a day decreased risk factors for diabetes and cardiovascular disease, including glucose, cholesterol and triglycerides, by 10 to 30 percent. These new studies showing cinnamon’s ability to block inflammation extend our understanding of the potential for the spice, says Dr. Anderson. As an anti-inflammatory agent, cinnamon may be useful in preventing or mitigating arthritis as well as cardiovascular disease. And as scientists increasingly understand the relationship between inflammation and insulin function in Alzheimer’s (causing some to refer to the neurodegenerative disease as “type 3 diabetes”), cinnamon’s ability to block inflammation and enhance insulin function may make it useful in combating that disease as well.

The cinnamon and clove studies were presented at Experimental Biology in San Francisco as part of the scientific program of the American Society for Nutrition, Inc. The three studies are:

• Dr. Heping Cao of the Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center and colleagues, including Dr. Anderson, investigated the biochemical basis for the insulin-like effects of cinnamon. Results showed that cinnamon, like insulin, increases the amount of three critically important proteins involved in the body’s insulin signaling, glucose transport, and inflammatory response. Dr. Cao says the study provides new biochemical evidence for the beneficial effects of cinnamon in potentiating insulin action and suggests anti-inflammatory properties for the antioxidants in cinnamon. Other researchers involved in the study are Dr. Marilyn M. Polansky of the USDA-ARS Beltsville (Maryland) Human Nutrition Research Center, and Dr. Perry J. Blackshear of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina.
• Dr. Stephanie Mae Lampke, University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), and colleagues, used fractionation and electrospray mass spectrometry to identify the chemical structure of active ingredients in cinnamon. She worked with UCSB’s James Pavolich and Donald Graves. This study provides information on how cinnamon works. Working with Dr. Lampe, Dr. Anderson, and Dr. Polansky (also involved in the paper above) were members of the USDA BHNRC. Research was supported in part by a grant from Cottage Hospital, Santa Barbara, to Dr. Graves.
• Dr. Alam Khan, Agricultural University, Peshawar, Pakistan, a former postdoctoral student and Fulbright Fellow in the Anderson laboratory, reports the first study of the effect of cloves on insulin function in humans. Thirty-six people with type 2 diabetes were divided into four groups, which then took capsules with either 0, 1, 2, or 3 grams of cloves for 30 days. There were no significance differences in responses among the three levels of cloves used – but there were markedly significant differences between those who took cloves and those who did not. At the end of the 30 days, individuals with diabetes who had been taking some level of clove supplementation showed a decrease in serum glucose from an average 225 to 150 mg/dL, triglycerides from an average 235 to 203 mg/dL, a decrease in serum total cholesterol from 273 to 239 mg/dL, and a decrease in LDL from 175 to 145 mg/dL. The individuals with diabetes who had not been taking clove capsules showed no differences. Serum HDL was not affected by consumption of cloves.

The people with diabetes who had been in the experimental group then were taken off clove supplementation and, after 10 days, their glucose, triglycerides, total cholesterol and LDL measured. Although these had begun to rise somewhat, all remained significantly lower than at the beginning of the study. Dr. Khan says the finding that intake of 1 to 3 grams of cloves per day lowered risk factors of diabetes without changing HDL concentration suggest strongly that cloves are beneficial for people with type 2 diabetes. Co-authors of the study in addition to Dr. Khan and Dr. Anderson are Dr. Syed Saceed Qadir, Agricultural University, Peshawar, Pakistan, and Dr. Khan Nawaz Khattak, HMC, Hayatabad, Peshawar, Pakistan. The research was supported by the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan.

The effect of cinnamon is a major research interest in Dr. Anderson’s laboratory, where human studies are now taking place looking at how this ingredient can improve insulin functioning in women with polycystic ovary syndrome (a disease of insulin sensitivity in which perturbed hormone levels cause difficulty in getting pregnant, among other problems), people with type 2 diabetes and the prediabetic metabolic syndrome; and people who are very obese (because Dr. Anderson believes that improving insulin function will lead to improvements in weight and lean body mass).

A post doctoral fellow in the Anderson laboratory also is beginning to investigate whether improving insulin functioning will decrease the chance of developing Alzheimer’s disease.

Two final bits of advice from Dr. Anderson: First, eating great quantities of cinnamon straight from the can is not a good idea. Table cinnamon is not water soluble, meaning it can build up in the body with unknown consequences. Second, the powered cinnamon has another limitation. Dr. Anderson’s personal 60-point decline in total cholesterol occurred only after he switched from sprinkling cinnamon on his breakfast cereal to taking it in a capsule. Saliva contains a chemical harmful to cinnamon.

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Article adapted by MD Only Weblog from original press release.
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Contact: Sarah Goodwin
ebpress@bellsouth.net
Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology

Today’s Diseases Linked To Fetal and Infant Toxcity

Researchers find that later-life diseases resulting from fetal and infant toxicity have common immune pattern

A Cornell researcher and his wife have conducted the first comprehensive review of later-life diseases that develop in people who were exposed to environmental toxins or drugs either in the womb or as infants. They have found that most of the diseases have two things in common: They involve an imbalanced immune system and exaggerated inflammatory reactions (at the cellular level).

In an invited, peer-reviewed article on developmental immunotoxicity (DIT), published in a recent issue of Current Medicinal Chemistry, Rodney Dietert, professor of immunotoxicology at Cornell’s College of Veterinary Medicine, and Janice Dietert of Performance Plus Consulting in Lansing, N.Y., found that almost all the chronic diseases that are associated with DIT share the same type of immunological damage.

The diseases linked to DIT include asthma, allergy, suppressed responses to vaccines, increased susceptibility to infections, childhood neurobehavioral conditions, autoimmunity, cancer, cerebral palsy, atherosclerosis, hypertension and male sterility.

Toxins that are known to cause developmental immune problems in fetuses and neonates, according to the Dieterts, include herbicides, pesticides, alcohol, heavy metals, maternal smoking, antibiotics, diesel exhaust, drugs of abuse and PCBs.

Antidotes to DIT, the researchers note, could come from a variety of sources, including herbal and fungal chemicals — from mushrooms to clover — which appear to have promise.

Two immune processes — T helper (Th) cell balances and dendritic cell maturation — are both compromised in ways that disrupt the regulation of inflammatory cell function, which leads to exaggerated inflammatory responses.

“Most therapeutic approaches have looked at specific disease outcomes from DIT, rather than focusing on the underlying immune dysfunction that creates the increased disease risk,” said Rodney Dietert, who also presented his findings March 28 at the annual Society of Toxicology meeting in Charlotte, N.C. “Instead, we looked at the common immune dysfunction that is related to a host of diseases.”

Knowing the most common immune dysfunction patterns from DIT allows researchers to consider more seriously those “medicinals with the capacity to restore inflammatory cell regulation, promote dendritic cell maturation and restore desirable Th balance that would be the most likely candidates to combat the problems resulting from DIT.”

Focusing on studies of herbal and fungal chemicals, the Dieterts scoured the literature and found that some of the chemicals appear to be particularly promising when taken at appropriate doses. These include: Astragalus; Echinacea (purple coneflower); sang-hwang shiitake, reishi, maitake and snake butter mushrooms, black seed, Asian ginseng, milk vetch root, wild yam, Sophoro root and Greek clover (all of these also go by various other names).

In their paper, the Dieterts also list a multitude of substances that have been found to have “an uncertain impact” on DIT as well as several found to exacerbate immune dysfunction (including marijuana).

“We hope that these findings of persistent immune dysfunction from gestational exposure will provide encouragement for additional research. Furthermore, that researchers will look at these categories of medicines that have the possibility of correcting inflammatory and immune balance problems resulting from DIT rather than focusing solely on individual disease symptoms,” Rodney Dietert said.

He noted that until recently toxin-testing guidelines predicted only risk in adults, but that the Environmental Protection Agency has announced it will issue new guidelines to take into account the increased immune sensitivity of fetuses and young children.

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Article adapted by MD Only Weblog from original press release.
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Contact: Sabina Lee
Cornell University News Service

Vitamin D Deficiency a Common Problem in Children and Adults

In a review article to appear in the July 19th issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Michael Holick, an internationally recognized expert in vitamin D, provides an overview of his pioneering work that expounds on the important role vitamin D plays in a wide variety of chronic health conditions, as well as suggesting strategies for the prevention and treatment of vitamin D deficiency.

Humans attain vitamin D from exposure to sunlight, diet and supplements. Vitamin D deficiency is common in children and adults. In utero and childhood, vitamin D deficiency may cause growth retardation, skeletal deformities and increase risk of hip fractures later in life. In adults, vitamin D deficiency may precipitate or exacerbate osteopenia, osteoporosis, muscle weakness, fractures, common cancers, autoimmune diseases, infectious diseases and cardiovascular diseases.

According to Holick, a professor of medicine, physiology, and biophysics, and director of the General Clinical Research Center at Boston University School of Medicine and Director of the Bone Healthcare Clinic at Boston Medical Center, it has been estimated that 1 billion people world-wide are vitamin D deficient or insufficient.

Without vitamin D only about 10-15 percent of dietary calcium and about 60 percent of phosphorus is absorbed by the body. This is directly related to bone mineral density which is responsible for osteoporosis and fractures, as well as muscle strength and falls in adults. In utero and childhood, calcium and vitamin D deficiency prevents the maximum deposition of calcium in the skeleton.

Studies have shown people living at higher latitudes (where the angle of the sun’s rays are unable to sufficiently produce adequate amounts of vitamin D in the skin) are more likely to develop and die of Hodgkin’s lymphoma, colon, pancreatic, prostate, ovarian, breast and other cancers. According to Holick, both prospective and retrospective epidemiologic studies have also shown an association between low levels of vitamin D and an increased risk for Type 1 diabetes, multiple sclerosis, Crohn’s disease, hypertension and cardiovascular disease.

Holick believes the current recommended Adequate Intakes for vitamin D need to be increased to 800 – 1000 IU vitaminD3/d. “However, one can not obtain these amounts from most dietary sources unless one is eating oily fish frequently,” says Holick. “Thus, sensible sun exposure (or UVB irradiation) and/or supplements are required to satisfy the body’s vitamin D requirement,” he adds.

Lastly Holick adds, “The goal of this paper is to make physicians aware of the medical problems associated with vitamin D deficiency. Physicians will then be able to impart this knowledge to their patients so they too will know how to recognize, treat and most importantly, maintain adequate levels of this important vitamin.”

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Reference: More information and complete text of the published article can be found at University of Boston..
Contact: Gina M. Digravio

Take Glycine to Prevent Arthrosis or Osteoporosis

Taking glycine prevents degenerative diseases such as arthrosis or osteoporosis, according to a doctoral thesis presented at the UGR. The research, which was carried out at the Cellular Metabolism Institute in Tenerife, studied the effect of the glycine supplement in the diet of a group of 600 volunteers affected by different diseases related to the mechanical structure of the organism.

Glycine is a non-essential amino acid used by the organism to synthesise proteins and is present in foods such as fish, meat or dairy products. The study, carried out at the Cellular Metabolism Institute in Tenerife and at the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology of the University of Granada by Doctor Patricia de Paz Lugo and supervised by Doctors Enrique Meléndez Hevia, David Meléndez Morales and José Antonio Lupiáñez Cara, established that the direct intake of this substance as a food additive helps to prevent arthrosis and other degenerative diseases, in addition to other diseases related to a weakness in the mechanical structure of the organism, including the difficulty of repairing physical injuries.

The work of De Paz Lugo was developed at the Cellular Metabolism Institute (CMI) in Tenerife, where researchers studied the effect of the glycine supplement on the diet of a group of 600 volunteers affected by different diseases related to the mechanical structure of the organism such as arthrosis, physical injuries or osteoporosis. The patients analysed were aged 4-85, and the average age was 45.

In all cases, there was a notable improvement in the symptomology. “Therefore –according to De Paz Lugo- we concluded that many degenerative diseases such as arthrosis can be treated as deficiency diseases due to the lack of glycine, since supplementing a diet with this amino acid leads to a notable improvement in symptomology without the need to take pain-killers”.

A very common disease

Arthrosis is the most common osteoarticulary problem in our society: more than 50% of the population suffer from it after the age of 65, and 80% of people over 75. It consists of a degeneration of the articulary cartilage which disappears until it leaves the subchondral bone exposed. Arthrosis has no cure at present and the most widely used treatments are pain-killers and NSAID (non-steroidal antiinflammatory drugs), which only relieve pain but do not repair the damage in the cartilage or influence the development of the disease.

The work carried out by the scientist from the CMI shows that collagen has a unique structure with a right-handed triple superhelix in which the glycine represents a third of its residues. Mathematical analysis of the metabolic route of the synthesis of the glycine, developed by the research group to which Patricia de Paz belongs, demonstrated that this amino acid should be considered an essential amino acid.

The doctoral thesis carried out at the CMI and the UGR has shown that the capacity of the metabolism to synthesise glycine is very limited. The conclusion of this study is that glycine, administered in daily doses of 10 grams divided into two doses of 5 grams one in the morning and one at night leads to a general improvement in these problems over a period of time which, in most cases, is between two weeks and four months.

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Reference: Dr. Patricia de Paz Lugo. Cellular Metabolism Institute, La Laguna (Tenerife) E-mail: patricia@metabolismo.ws

 Source: Dr. Patricia de Paz Lugo Universidad de Granada