Dr. Costantini’s discovery is big news. Unfortunately it has been lost in the maelstrom of political noise and Russiaphobia and has been ignored by the mainstream media, meaning your doctor may not have heard about it. Plus, Dr. Costantini has purposefully avoided initiating a promotional campaign to tout his successes or patent his discovery, choosing instead to send his findings to medical journals and conferences for examination, making him something of anomaly in the mainstream medical circles.
Recently a considerable improvement of motor and non-motor symptoms in patients affected by PD was observed with intramuscular daily doses of 100–200 mg of thiamine.
In this report we describe the results obtained from three patients with newly diagnosed PD. We have decided to treat the patients with high doses of thiamine in order to clarify the potential effect of vitamin B1 alone in the initial therapy of the disease.
Thanks for providing this reference. It provides support for the viewpoint that in some cases, PD is associated with a nutritional deprivation. Unfortunately, this viewpoint is in the minority and the scientists who want to pursue this line of thought must get by with skimpy support. In this case, they were able to muster only a study of 3 patients for 3 months, not a blind study since the vitamin was provided intravenously.
The same research group hasrwecently reported a followup study: 50 patients, time unclear, perhaps a couple of years for some participants: Long-Term Treatment with High-Dose Thiamine in Parkinson Disease: An Open-Label Pilot Study. (ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/265.... Likely not blind, as before. Again they get encouraging clinical results regarding symptomatic benefits.
This is an excellent question, and I will duck trying answer it, because it seems that the best answer is "It depends". I went to WebMd and found an excellent presentation on B vitamins: webmd.com/vitamins-and-supp....
The gist is (1) our needs vary rather widely, and (2) how and when you ingest it influences how efficiently and even if it gets to where you need it. The scientists who conducted the study, which is the topic of this post, are using a 100 mg twice weekly injection and call that "High-Dose Thiamine".
This medical stuff is so complex that it drives me crazy. I think that I'll stick to simple subjects like math, physics, and meteorology!
Really good news from my husband. Dr Constantini has confirmed he’s definitely improved in all aspects in last 2 months. Do you know how long his oldest patients have been ie have they been treated for 5 yrs and have they remained stable ? So impressed!!
Hopefully there is something miraculous about Thiamine injection. That might be prescribed for my dear wife hopefully (16 years with MS) to see if it would get her back on her feet. As for the articles, I am a very good reader and I foound an apparent contradiction. At one point the author wrote that fish is a best source of thiamine and in another sentence they wrote that eating raw fish (oriental dining style) contributed to thiamine deficiency. I found that to be illogical and off putting didn't you?
Buzz and Laglag, there is NO contradiction with regard to fish. A little bit of internet prowling yields the following insight:
"Are there interactions with foods?
Seafood
Raw freshwater fish and shellfish contain chemicals that destroy thiamine. Eating a lot of raw fish or shellfish can contribute to thiamine deficiency. However, cooked fish and seafood are OK. They don't have any effect on thiamine, since cooking destroys the chemicals that harm thiamine."
The study was based on three patients and then over hyped as a possible cure. I don't think Russiaphobia has anything to do with it. I think we are just weary of seeing these early stage case reports touted as cures in the media.
I await results of a bigger trial and a diagram which says more than, " Thiamine might act here. "
I agree, but don't you think most of us are desperate for a cure now & can't wait for the lengthy trials or don't want to wait so we're grabbing at every straw we can?
I understand your desperation. I too long for a cure so that I can have the man I married back. We all find our way through this maze in different ways but I don't think everything should be accepted at face value especially when it involves high dose injections of substances.
I still need more evidence that it is safe and cost effective before getting too excited
B-100 complex pills contain 100 mg, but wiki says above 5 mg can start to have reduced absorption, so there could be something to it. They give it alcoholics to "stops the shakes". Well maybe that's not exactly right. They give it to alcoholics because they are known to be low in it and that being low in it impairs the brain. Note of caution: it's needed by yeast in fermentation and if PD-cells are bypassing the oxygen pathway like the Warburg theory of cancer then PD patients may get a boost to the PD-cells. But boosting the fermentation pathway may assist it in spreading. I have a similar concern with Mannitol. But these concerns are overkill. If something helps then giving in to theoretical fears is sometimes simply over-thinking.
I do not understand all the science. Way over my head. I took 100 mg of thiamine yesterday afternoon and had a worsening of my symptoms that went on into the evening hours. Enough experience for me.
Hi. I've been taking B1 shots for a few months now (100mg IM, twice a week). It seems to help, but nothing miraculous. I also take several supplements and vitamins everyday (too many to list), as well as carbidopa-levadopa 100/25 (1/2 a tablet, three times a day) and mucuna puriens (1 tsp. 3-4 times a day as needed.)
The thing that helps me the most, though, is exercise. PD stinks.
Wishing you all a flexible, smooth, tremor-free day!
Avoid using in the absence of vitamin B6 and nicotinamide, as life-threatening brain damage may occur.
"Generally, the minimal starting dose used in the treatment of several neurodegenerative diseases is a 100 mg injection twice a week or 4 grams each day taken by mouth. If in time these doses were eccessive for that patient, it would happen that, after an initial improvement, he would start noticing a certain effectiveness of the therapy and then the recurrence of the symptoms previously regressed… You can also observe palpitations, tachycardia, increased anxiety, irritability, insomnia. In this case, we can suspend the therapy for a few days and agree with the prescriber about the reduction strength of the drug taken (my phone number: +39 3385682926, my email address: carapetata@libero.it, my professional study number: +39 0761304260) We usually halve the dose.
Over the past 5 years, we have also treated at higher doses approximately 2000 patients, of which 1500 suffering from Parkinson’s disease. We have never observed the slightest betrayal of the common laboratory tests or no clinical signs of suffering. We detected two cases of urticaria, two of generalized itching. In one case we had to stop the treatment because it was causing vomiting at each administration."
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PD stinks.
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