NAC capsules

[1953bullard]

Do they all smell really bad? Just ordered some. And what dosage do you all take? I’m taking 600 mg 2 times a day

[Xenos]

Hi,

I was taking 600 mg 3 times a day during like a year.

I stopped for now, after a negative report (inefficiency) was mention here.

[1953bullard in reply to Xenos]

You couldn’t tell that they helped?

[Xenos in reply to 1953bullard]

It did not do harm, that I'm pretty sure.

Maybe it helped - very hard to tell.

[MBAnderson in reply to Xenos]

Xenos,

Do you remember where you read that negative report and do you mean it said only a small amount was absorbed or that it didn't cross the BBB?

Everything I've read about says that it's a viable precursor to glutathione.

Marc

[Xenos in reply to MBAnderson]

Here it is :

healthunlocked.com/parkinso...

[MBAnderson in reply to Xenos]

I'm going to take a pass on this study.

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/289...

This study isn't worth a long reply, but it might, otherwise, cause some PWP to stop taking NAC which they shouldn't do.

It was an open label study of 5 people (3 controls) for 28 days, 3 of whom may have dropped out and it measured GSH in the occipital cortex.

It makes me wonder what is in the head of a person who fancies himself a scientist setting out to prove something and figures a good way to do it is to study 5 people.

To purport to measure benefit from a nutritional change in 28 days is questionable.

They reported adverse events in 3 of the 5 people on 6 g a day. (I don't believe 6 g/day causes adverse events in 60%.) When a bad reaction is serious enough to be reported is an adverse event, it sometimes means the person dropped out of the study. Shouldn't they have said explicitly? This may be a study of 2 people. (It takes a lot of chutzpah to publish a study of 2 people.)

Lastly, they measured GSH in the occipital cortex. I understand we want GSH throughout hour body, including our occipital cortex, but as to the importance of it affecting dopaminergic neurons that cause PD symptoms, why didn’t they measure it in the substantia nigra?

Simon Stott; Science of Parkinson’s, July, 2017

“Either way, the investigators saw beneficial effects from using NAC in subjects with Parkinson’s disease. Yes, the study was not blinded, but it is intriguing that the benefits were observed in brain imaging assessments as well as clinical scores – it is harder to suggest any placebo effect is occurring when brain imaging suggests improvements.”

Simon goes on,

“So glutathione treatment doesn’t work?

I would not interpret the results that way.

Firstly, none of these clinical studies have recruited enough participants for major conclusions to be made of their results, except that collectively they indicate that glutathione appears to be safe for use in folks with Parkinson’s disease.

In addition, they have all been rather short studies (conducted over a matter of weeks or months) which makes determining changes in UPDRS scores or simply disease progression rather difficult. Parkinson’s is a slow progressive condition. Therapies that slow or halt the disease require longer periods to demonstrate efficacy.”

scienceofparkinsons.com/201...

Science daily

“Compared to controls, the patients receiving NAC had improvements of 4-9 percent in dopamine transporter binding and also had improvements in their UPDRS score of about 13 percent.”

sciencedaily.com/releases/2...

GSH is vitally important beyond its level in the substantia nigra and all PWP are deficient and should do whatever they can to increase levels.

[Xenos in reply to MBAnderson]

Thanks Marc, each one of your points is valid.

I am in the process of finding the right dose of B1 and I do not want to interfere for now. But I will go back to NAC as soon as I'm done with B1 dosage.

[MBAnderson in reply to Xenos]

Xenos, that's a really good thing to do. I assume you're taking B-1 orally?

I stopped taking everything a month ago so I could do the same thing, but for the past week I've been worsening each day and theorize that I depleted my stores (which may a ridiculous theory,) but I don't know how else to account for slowly improving over the past year and then taking a turn for the worse.

Anyway, it scared the crap out of me, so I resumed with my whole regimen a few days ago. I had my 1st injection 8 days ago and my 3rd injection today.

If B-1 is going to noticeably helpful, it's going to have to show up as an improvement on top of whatever my regimen might or might not be doing.

Keep us posted how it works for you.

Marc

[Xenos in reply to MBAnderson]

Marc,

I too have IM injections of 100 mg Thiamine hcl. My wife being a nurse, it is easy to program those. The process of finding the right dosage proves difficult, at least for me. For now, I stopped everything except L-Dopa and mannitol during two weeks and then began again at one injection every fourth day.

Time will tell... maybe.

[park_bear]

NAC capsules should not smell bad. If NAC gets wet and starts to deteriorate it will smell bad.

[1953bullard in reply to park_bear]

Thanks, these smell horrendous

[Hidden in reply to 1953bullard]

Every NAC I have tried smelled like sulfur to varying degrees, but never strong unless it was old, but even then, not that strong of a smell and only if I smelled the open bottle, not so noticeable from the capsule itself. Nothing that would deter me from taking it.

Art

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

I guess I should qualify my use of NAC. I use it everyday with L-Citrulline malate to control my blood pressure. I used to use with Arginine for the same purpose, but

the arginine put my arginine / lysine ratio out of balance and left me overly susceptible to viral infections. I have been using the NAC for years for this purpose.

Art