I am posting this information because as a patient with ataxia, I know how hopeless it feels at times and so even a glimmer of hope is better than none, BUT it is critical that people understand:
SOME PEOPLE TRIED VITAMIN B WITHOUT A DOCTOR AND GOT VERY SICK. DO NOT TRY ANYTHING BASED ON COMMENTS ON THE INTERNET. DO YOUR HOMEWORK AND THEN TALK TO YOUR DOCTOR IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN LEARNING MORE ABOUT THIS RESEARCH.
Now having said that I will provide some basic information. Vitamin B has long been known as an important aid to health. Vitamin B deficiency leads to Pellagra, and states require flour and other foods to be "fortified" with vitamin B to further public health. Recently vitamin B has regained attention as a potential therapeutic for other illnesses because scientists learned that niacin was closely linked to production of NAD+ which is a chemical that is critical to cellular health and a chemical our bodies make less and less of as we age. Unfortunately niacin, when taken in large doses, makes humans sick.
Recently, however, a new vitamin B was discovered called Niagen. So far the research in humans seems to indicate that Niagen is 1) more effective at boosting NAD+ in humans than other vitamin Bs 2) has other beneficial impacts on cellular processes that niacin does not have, and 3) does not seem to have the negative side effects associated with other vitamin Bs. But, what is most interesting to me is that vitamin B has been shown to treat 2 different types of ataxia in mice and is being studied in a third type of ataxia in human clinical trials.
In the first study I link below, mice with Ataxia Telangiactasia were treated using Nicotinamide Riboside(NR) or Niagen, and in the second study mice with Huntington's disease were treated using Nicotinamide (NAM) a similar but NOT identical vitamin B. For those that don't know Huntington's Disease is caused by a build up of bad proteins in the brain just like many ataxias so a chemical that treats HD MAY treat many ataxias. In fact the researchers in the second article had this to say at the conclusion:
"These findings are exciting
because for the first time, NAM treatment has been shown to be
effective in improving motor deficits in a model of HD, at doses that
are within a human clinical range. Our data therefore suggest that
NAM is a potential therapeutic for HD symptoms, and should be
strongly considered for clinical trials."
I spoke with the researchers involved in the study on HD, and they agreed Niagen (NR) would have been a better source for vitamin B than NAM, but at the time they were unaware of NR's relevance and there was no data on NR's ability to increase production of NAD+ or its effect on other cellular functions.
Sadly the history of translating mouse research to humans is not great so although these studies are "tantalizing", they are only animal studies, and it may be years before we get to see human trials and even then the outcome will be in doubt, but like I said some hope is better than none.
NAD+ Replenishment Improves Lifespan and Healthspan in Ataxia Telangiectasia Models via Mitophagy and DNA Repair
sciencedirect.com/science/a...
Nicotinamide improves motor deficits and upregulates PGC-1α and BDNF gene expression in a mouse model of Huntington's disease
sciencedirect.com/science/a...
Nicotinamide in Friedreich’s ataxia: useful or not?
Vitamin deficiencies? Reversible?
