Mostly due to a thick head and probably price, I am currently using cyanocobalamin, 1.000ug/ml 1 ml ampules. I SI 1 ml every other day, I've only been doing that recently. Before I was taking 2ml every 4 days, since September.
Would I be better off with hydroxocobalamin?
Are there any concerns I should have with cyanocobalamin?
I've been through a bit of a low patch lately, sinusitis, a few Christmas drinks probably haven't helped, the jabs don't feel like they are working as well. Should I be taking more?
I just tried going online to try and order hydroxocobalamin, but got confused with German and Dutch sites and Google translate not working. Just grumpy I can't get this cheaply and easily in UK.
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Oneash
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Update. Having searched on cyanocobalamin through these pages. I've managed to sort myself out and ordered some hydroxocobalamin. I may do a Wizard and do some self testing on what works best for me and what quantity.
I Shouldn't have done that with the espresso martini and peach mule on Thursday night! 🍸 Oh it was a fun night out with the girls, at last! Boy did I suffer for it.... I just want to be normal again 😥
To do a wizard one would have to hypothesis that the body should never be without enough B12 to heal and that time is 4 -6 hours and then set the alarm to inject in the night. Otherwise you are simply going with the what works methodology.
Good news is you do not have to go through other hypothesis. Although 3 injections a day and injections every 4 hours from other hypotheses worked better than guessing.
Anything else with be the Oneash's way.
I thought about this and did come to understand you could do your own studying and find misconceptions/errors and come up with your own hypothesis and design a trial. That would be the methodology I use. I do not use willy nilly experimentation and don't know how. Hey, it might work that would be cool.
You could conclude you want to give one of my trials a trial. That would not be my methodology.
Excellent about doing the Wizard, we have to experiment because we are all different otherwise known as zebras or unicorns.
I do hope you are taking a multivitamin and mineral as we can be deficient in other vital amines. Note my words.
Unfortunately, we have to learn to live with this illness which is by PACING our Energy. So, if you are going for a Girlie Night out then do enjoy it but know that you are going to have a ‘crash’. We do need to have a life and when we do ‘normal’ things we can smile and say Yes that was totally worth it. Just allow yourself to recover.
I too have purchased cyanocobalamin because my German is not great 🤪. I am not long back from abroad and I spent a little bit of time visiting pharmacies. I bought presents back which was that variety too 😉.
Anyway, have a fab New Year and slowly does it. Here’s my joke : What do you call someone with P.A. who has had 10 peach mules - A wonky donkey. Okay, I won’t give up my day job.
To do a wizard one would have to hypothesis that the body should never be without enough B12 to heal and that time is 4 -6 hours and then set the alarm to inject in the night. Otherwise you are simply going with the what works methodology.
Good news is you do not have to go through other hypothesis. Although 3 injections a day and injections every 4 hours from other hypotheses worked better than guessing.
Anything else will be Narwhal10's way.
I thought about this and did come to understand you could do your own studying and find misconceptions/errors and come up with your own hypothesis and design a trial. That would be the methodology I use. I do not use willy nilly experimentation and don't know how. Hey, it might work that would be cool.
You could conclude you want to give one of my trials a trial. That would not be my methodology.
There are many Hypotheses and Theories, I personally love them. They are seen throughout Complex Mathematics and Medicine such as the Gate Control Theory of Pain which is the Nervous System.
I have Greek letters tattooed on my body because they are seen in both Maths & Anatomy especially the Nervous System’s Fibres. So, I’m a walking textbook. 🤣
I am familiar with hypothesis and enjoy them, others and my own. I also use my own to my advantage if they turn out to be valid.
I once had a hypothesis that when venting soil one vent or two vents at each end had no effect as there was no cause for the air to flow other than temperature differential.
This led to differential venting with one high vent and one low vent. This takes advantage of atmospheric pressure. Much like a chimney.
That is now the standard in the USA not by understanding but regulation.
I differentiate between theory and hypothesis as a theory is concerned with systems from my perspective.
I do a lot of brain storming/spitballing to arrive and my hypothesis. That work I do not include here. Dissimilar to the hunt and peck/find what works method.
On this forum and in the medicial field hypothesis are stated as facts simply because the hypothesis is derived from a test of some sort. This is pseudoscience. You can make a good living with pseudoscience. It's true if you can get enough people to follow your pseudoscience. See everyone needs the same amount of water no matter what. Derived from a study in the 50's guessing how much water including in food the average person ingests.
I have been me for a long time. I am used to people explaining to me what I discovered. I still get annoyed when people misrepresent what I actually do and attribute it to me.
The conclusions from B12 retention times are just hypothesis. The treatment protocols built on a false hypothesis perhaps.
Currently taking vitamin D, folic acid and magnesium, mostly daily. I also take "Gut Powered" immune defence, when my guts get annoying, but I realised it contains vitamin C, which uses up B12 I gather. It was only 1 peach mule that turned me into a wonky donkey. It was such a good night, then such a horrid next day. If I ever dared again, I know to take lots of extra shots. I was so hungover, I didn't dare wield a syringe until the afternoon.
A scientific answer to your question....Our bodies need two forms of cobalamin, methyl and adenosyl. Cyano requires four metabolic steps to break down into these forms. Hydroxo requires one step. Some people have no problem utilizing the four step process, others find the cyano not effective in alleviating symptoms. I used cyano for many years but as I aged it no longer worked for me. Our bodies are mysterious creatures.
Initially, the overall metabolism of B12 should be understood.
Ligand : An Ion or neutral molecule that bonds to a central metal atom or ion.
In our case, cyano, methyl, adenosyl or hydroxy would be the "ligands" bonded to cobalamin (the base B12 molecule).
MeCbl: Methylcobalamin
AdoCbl: Adenosylcobalamin
Cytosol : The liquid matrix inside the cell
Methyl Group : CH3 (one carbon atom bonded to three hydrogen atoms)
"All of the B12 forms are reduced to the core cobalamin molecule inside the cytosol and then converted to the 2 active forms of B12—MeCbl and AdCbl—irrespective of the form of B12 ingested. It is important to understand that the conversions to active B12 forms do not employ the methyl or adenosyl ligand from supplemental MeCbl or AdCbl, respectively. The methyl group is derived from other molecules—5-MTHF, SAM-e, or betaine—while the adenosyl group is synthesized inside cells.
As a result, the form of ingested B12 may influence how much cobalamin is produced inside cells but not how it is converted to MeCbl, AdCbl, or various active metabolites involved in methylation reactions. Genetics may affect the activity of enzymes involved in absorption, binding to B12 blood transport or intracellular proteins and/or B12 metabolism. However, no polymorphisms are analyzed through commercially available clinical tests that justify the use of any particular form(s) of B12."
from "Comparative Bioavailability and Utilization of Particular Forms of B12 Supplements With Potential to Mitigate B12-related Genetic Polymorphisms"
^ Look at figure (1)in this article to see the (simplified) process
But more detail is needed to understand what happens with Cyanocobalamin and whether it is comparatively more or less expensive from a metabolic perspective.
So first, some additional definitions:
Cobalamin is the base cobalamin molecule but what is meant by Cob(I)alamin, Cob(II)alamin, Cob(III)alamin?
These are the three "oxidation states" of cobalamin, : 1+, 2+ and 3+
CblC : An enzyme that “tailors” cob(III)alamins entering the cell to Cbl(II), the physiological precursor of the two B12-cofactors MeCbl and AdoCbl.
Which will help to understand the following section from an inorganic chemistry textbook:
"Depending on its B12-substrate, CblC employs its co-substrate glutathione (GSH) in two different ways for the production of Cbl(II) (Fig. 20): When presented with CNCbl, the enzyme catalyzes the reductive de-cyanation to Cbl(II),287 whereas binding of alkylcobalamins (such as MeCbl) initiates the nucleophilic substitution of the upper ligand by glutathione, furnishing Cbl(I)−, which undergoes subsequent oxidation to Cbl(II)."
from Bernhard Kräutler, in Comprehensive Inorganic Chemistry III (Third Edition), 2023
In somewhat plainer english, when cyanocobalamin arrives at the cell, it requires 1 stage, involving glutathione, to de-cyanate to cob(II)alamin, while methylcobalamin needs two steps, the first again involving glutathione, converting it to cob(I)alamin-, then another to be oxidised to cob(II)alamin.
Once cob(II)alamin, is formed, it must be further reduced to cob(I)alamin. Cob(I)alamin can either use a methyl group from 5-MTHF, SAM-e, or betaine, to become methylcobalamin, or, take adenosyl from ATP to become adenosylcobalamin.
So, from what I can see, Cyanocobalamin seems to take 1 LESS metabolic step to reach the active forms than does methylcobalamin or adenosylcobalamin.
An interesting side-note/discovery I had from this research, is that the sudden creation of large amounts of adenosylcobalamin may require large amounts of ATP, which ironically could result in sudden increased weakness/tiredness, especially following initial treatment where many cells are deficient and start to frantically generate adenosylcobalamin when they receive cobalamin.
This may explain why I experienced a sudden loss of muscle strength after my first large supplement dose (and even worse after the first injection, to the point where it was difficult to walk), as there was likely a sudden massive demand for ATP (the energy currency of cells), which would cause sudden onset muscle weakness - exactly what I experienced but no-one could explain. An even better reason to start creatine before B12 treatment and continue to help support creation of sufficient adenosylcobalamin....
Thank you for the detailed response to my post. I looked back to try to find my reference but it's been several years since I read it and, if I remember correctly, it was an article post, not a journal publication. I did find this article which explains the differences of the forms of cobalamin and their usage in the body. b12-vitamin.com/forms/
According to a NIH (US) publication... As a result, the form of ingested B12 may influence how much cobalamin is produced inside cells but not how it is converted to MeCbl, AdCbl, or various active metabolites involved in methylation reactions. Genetics may affect the activity of enzymes involved in absorption, binding to B12 blood transport or intracellular proteins and/or B12 metabolism. However, no polymorphisms are analyzed through commercially available clinical tests that justify the use of any particular form(s) of B12. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...
This same publication also states....Ingestion of CNCbl results in lower tissue retention of active vitamin B12 than the naturally occurring forms of B12, which may be particularly problematic in individuals with SNPs on B12 metabolic pathways. Researchers also have expressed concerns of potential cyanide accumulation in human tissues after long-term supplementation and/or intake from foods fortified with CNCbl. Thus, the CNCbl form of B12 seems to be an inferior choice despite its lower cost.
It seems like the only good way to determine what works for an individual is to try different forms to see how they affect our well-being. And I know from experience that our bodies change over time, especially as we move into the senior years. Good luck and good health to all of you.
The site you linked, b12-vitamin.com has some good information but you must consider the source, which is Jorg Schweikart. He is associated with Sunday Natural, a supplement company, who have a financial interest in promoting the benefit of taking the natural forms, methyl, hydroxo, or adenosyl, which they sell, as opposed to the much cheaper and widely available cyanocobalamin. Sunday Natural are a fine company and actually I regularly order from them but I would be pretty skeptical of any source with such a strong vested interest in promoting the narrative that the natural forms are "better" in some way.
I don't know all the affected SNP's offhand but I'm not seeing how, given the metabolic conversion processes, how particular forms would be better for particular SNP's, except that cyanocobalamin would seem to require 1 less conversion step.
I'm not convinced that the cyanide content of cyanocobalamin is at all significant compared to the background diet and exposure, which is covered in-depth by vegan health here (a site run by registered dietician Jack Norris):
There is also a good video on this issue from Layne Norton (@biolayne on YouTube).
In terms of tissue retention, some studies have reported higher absorption of cyanocobalamin than methylcobalamin and on balance seems not conclusive either way.
By all means, use what works best for you, but from what I understand of the biochemistry, it is not at all clear that any form is objectively superior to the others.
The normal detoxification process is described in the linked vegan health article:
"usually via the enzyme rhodanese which converts cyanide to thiocyanate by adding a sulfur molecule. Thiocyanate is then excreted in the urine. Although most rhodanese is found in the kidney (Aminlari, 2007), the World Health Organization reports that 80% of absorbed cyanide is metabolized to thiocyanate by rhodanese in the liver (WHO, 2004)."
Hydroxocobalamin is also extremely effective at clearing cyanide, thats why it's used as "Cyanokit", which is injected in gram dosages to cure cases of potentially lethal cyanide poisoning.
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