Ice bucket challenge????

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gmattson
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Ice bucket challenge????

Post by gmattson »

Wondering how Bill will react to this post. To a lay person who doesn't take ANY Pharma products, I also would like to see some of the money being raised be used to find ways, other than with more drugs, to combat the growing health problem in our world.
==========================
If you’ve been paying any attention to the news or the Internet recently, you know what the “Ice Bucket Challenge” is.
It’s great that so many people have been motivated to try and help find a cure for ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease.
My concern is that most of that funding will go to finding a pharmaceutical drug that will attempt to treat the disease.
It’s sad, because we already have natural remedies that can greatly reduce your risk of ALS without having to take a dangerous drug. I’ll tell you more about those in a minute, but one thing we could do right now to stop ALS is to stop statin drug prescriptions.

Did you know that there’s a connection between this cholesterol-lowering category of drugs and ALS?
First, a World Health Organization drug monitoring group in Sweden started getting a flood of reports that statins – HMG-CoA reductase inhibitors – were associated with a “disproportionally high reporting of upper motor neurone lesions.” The kind one gets with ALS.1
But no one paid attention to the reports.
Mainstream medicine even ignored the evidence from researchers at the University of California, San Diego.
They did a “Statin Effects Study” that also looked into reports of the horrible effects of statin drugs. They found that ALL 10 people they looked at had ALS-like symptoms when taking their statin drugs, and ALL of them had the symptoms go away when they stopped taking the drug.2
(I’ll be talking to you more about how to protect your heart from mainstream medicine tomorrow.)
But let me get back to this Ice Bucket Challenge thing. There are other completely natural ways to help your body reduce the risk of ALS that you can use starting right now:
1) Vitamin B12 is a good example. We’ve known about its benefits for ALS patients for years. When you give people with ALS high doses of methylcobalamin, the most absorbable form of vitamin B12, they can move around much better and with less pain. They get a huge increase in muscle action potential amplitudes (CMAPs).3 That’s the measure they use to find how well and ALS sufferer can move around.
A normal does of B12 won’t do the trick though. In the study, people who got .5 mg a day showed no improvement in movement. You need much more.
Liver, red meat, clams and other shellfish are the best natural sources. That’s because B12 is only produced in the gut of animals. You can’t get it from plants. They don’t need B12 so they don’t store it. But animals do.
You can also supplement, but be aware that as you get older you may have difficulty absorbing vitamin B12. So use the most absorbable form which is methylcobalamin. It’s the active form of B12 that’s ready for your body to use. In addition, it’s the only form that can cross the blood brain barrier, so you can get it where you need it most. For brain protection, take at least 2,000 mcg per day.
2) The second thing to do is make sure you get enough omega-3s. I talk to you about these healthy fats often, and this is why. The mountain of evidence showing how omega-3s improve your health and protect you is staggering.
A new study out of Harvard I found when I was doing research on this – which hasn’t even been printed yet – looked at over 1 million people and their risk for ALS. It shows that high intake of omega-3 fatty acids can reduce the risk of ALS by 40-60%.4 Show me a drug that does that.
A good source of omega-3s is to eat more small oily fish like sardines or herring. Sardines are at the bottom of the ocean’s food chain. They only feed on plankton so they don’t build up heavy metals and other contaminants in their flesh like larger fish do.
To really ramp up your levels of omega-3, I recommend supplementing with a combination of squid and kill oils. In one study, people taking krill oil had their omega-3s skyrocket by 178%.5 And squid oil has more DHA, the brain-protective omega-3, than any other source on earth. In fact, some squid oils can contain over 65% DHA.6
Make sure you get more than 3 grams of omega-3 a day for complete brain protection.
To Your Good Health,

Al Sears, MD
1. Edwards I, Star K, Kiuru A. "Statins, neuromuscular degenerative disease and an amyotrophic lateral sclerosis-like syndrome: an analysis of individual case safety reports from vigibase." Drug Saf. 2007;30(6):515-25.
2. Golomb B, Kwon E, Koperski S, Evans M. "Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis-like conditions in possible association with cholesterol-lowering drugs: an analysis of patient reports to the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) Statin Effects Study." Drug Saf. 2009;32(8):649-61.
3. Kaji R, Kodama M, Imamura A, Hashida T, Kohara N, Ishizu M, Inui K, Kimura J. "Effect of ultrahigh-dose methylcobalamin on compound muscle action potentials in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: a double-blind controlled study." Muscle Nerve. 1998;21(12):1775-8.
4. Fitzgerald K, O'Reilly E, Falcone G, McCullough M, Park Y, Kolonel L, Ascherio A. "Dietary ω-3 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acid Intake and Risk for Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis." JAMA Neurol. 2014 Jul 14. Epub ahead of print.
5. Maki K, Reeves M, Farmer M, Griinari M, Berge K, Vik H, Hubacher R, Rains T. "Krill oil supplementation increases plasma concentrations of EPA and DHA in overweight and obese men and women." Nutr Res. 2009;29(9):609-15.
6. Hwang L, Liang J. “Fractionation of urea-pretreated squid visceral oil ethyl esters.” Journal of the American Oil Chemists‘ Society 2001;Volume 78, Issue 5, pp 473-476.
GEM
"Do or do not. there is no try!"
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Bill Glasheen
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Re: Ice bucket challenge????

Post by Bill Glasheen »

Hello, George, and thanks for posting this.

This piece - while supplied with references - is a bit of a mess. I respect that this is a physician who wrote it. But I'm having problems with some telltale language, the understanding of basic physiology, and the analytic reasoning applied.

Let me start with full disclosure myself. I am plenty old. I'm not retired yet, but I'm getting close. That said, diet and exercise have afforded me the gift of excellent health. I have my issues with a knee joint lacking parts (from a 1974 football injury surgery) that's going arthritic, and I have allergies (cats, pollen, dust, and stupid people). So I take my share of ibuprofen when needed, and I regularly take both Zyrtec and Singulaire to manage the allergies. Other than that... my blood pressure was recently measured as 121/55, my cholesterol at 160 (with an excellent composition), and my fasting blood sugar is well below 100. Because of Nature and Nurture, I won't die of heart disease or stroke. I'm convinced that cancer will eventually get me since my dad died of it at 89 (prostate) and I worked as a chemist for 4 years. Mostly though I'm in good shape. I take no meds to manage my blood pressure, my cholesterol, my blood sugar, or anything else that many people my age need to take.

I also work for a Fortune 100 company that offers a Medicare Advantage product. That's the commercial alternative to government Medicare. CMS pays my company a fixed amount per person based on how sick they are (using models developed by my previous employer) and they hold a big chunk of change back for incentives. The incentives revolve around NCQA HEDIS health care guidelines for the treatment of patients with common medical conditions. If our members with chronic diseases (like diabetes, hyperlipidemia, hypertension, heart disease, etc.) get the care they need to manage their conditions, then we are handsomely rewarded. This means that - you guessed it - we get paid reward money when patients needing statins get their statins. The list of people needing this medicine is long. Oh... and statins have potential side effects, and there are many of them. Getting the right amount of the right medication is key. Physicians however must always remember - primum non nocere. First do no harm. If the treatment is worse than the illness, then don't give the treatment.

There *are* some moral hazards involved here. We'd like to think that most people are disciplined, and behave like Mr. Spock on the original Star Trek. The truth however is that many people behave like Homer Simpson. An entire field of research called Behavioral Economics is all about getting people to do the right thing when they know what they should do but don't do it. Everyone knows they should diet and exercise; few do it. Believe me, we try. My job is setting up experiments where we beg/plead/incentivize people to do the right behavior, and see if our intervention works. If we change the behavior of 2 percent of a vulnerable group, we call it a good day. I have to do carefully-designed randomized controlled trials to measure effects with statistical certainty.

So... We *try* to get people to do the right thing, but most people would rather not. They get their lifestyle-related chronic conditions (Type II diabetes, metabolic syndrome, heart disease, hyperlipidemia, etc.), and we get rewarded for making sure that said conditions are properly managed. But wait, there's more!! Give people insurance - including the subsidized Obamacare stuff - and they're *more* likely not to respond to life's risks. The law of unintended consequences apply.

It is what it is. I walk the talk, and try to teach others "the way". Better to light a candle than curse the darkness.

More...

- Bill
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Re: Ice bucket challenge????

Post by Bill Glasheen »

Al Sears wrote:If you’ve been paying any attention to the news or the Internet recently, you know what the “Ice Bucket Challenge” is.
It’s great that so many people have been motivated to try and help find a cure for ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease.
My concern is that most of that funding will go to finding a pharmaceutical drug that will attempt to treat the disease.
It’s sad, because we already have natural remedies that can greatly reduce your risk of ALS without having to take a dangerous drug.
Just because you say this doesn't make it true.

Nowhere in the article does Dr. Sears discuss the mechanism of ALS and/or what causes it. He just states something that we're to take as fact, and then goes on with his anti-Pharma, pro supplements agenda.

This is a good place to start - a website at the National Institute of Health.

..... Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) Fact Sheet

This explains the disease (in lay terms), what is known, what causes it (unknown), the medications used to treat it, and the hope that lifestyle (including diet/supplements) can help manage it.
Al Sears wrote:one thing we could do right now to stop ALS is to stop statin drug prescriptions
No, no, no, no, no!!

The logic of his argument is so flawed that a person with basic analytic reasoning skills should be able to see it. Basically statins sometimes can produce ALS-like *symptoms*, but that doesn't mean that statins cause ALS. The fact that removing the medication makes the *symptoms* go away speaks for itself. ALS is a chronic condition with NO (zero, zilch, nada, zippo) cure. Period.

For the right population statins save lives. Dr. Sears' article is logically flawed and criminally negligent. He'd never get it published in a peer-reviewed journal.

Oh and one last thing.. In my biomedical engineering training at UVa, we had a neuromuscular junction research division. I took labs with the chief investigator.

..... Image
..... Yong I. Kim -- Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Neurology

This is really important stuff. Please give generously to the cause. Thank you in advance.

- Bill
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Seizan
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Re: Ice bucket challenge????

Post by Seizan »

My older brother Robert died from ALS two years ago. Some treatments gave temporary relief but there was nothing that halted or even delayed the inevitable progression of the disease.

There are leads -- but there is no cure. Yet.
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Bill Glasheen
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Re: Ice bucket challenge????

Post by Bill Glasheen »

I'm sorry for your loss, Seizan. I agree that there's progress.

Pharma bashing aside, Dr. Sears' concern is valid. We don't just want to manage the condition; we want to prevent it from taking hold in the first place. We know that there's a genetic component for a small subset of the ALS victims, but we don't yet know why the vast majority contract the illness. But we will some day very soon - with the help of our best and brightest researchers, and those who support them.

I'm delighted that so many people - including many of our Uechi Ryu brothers and sisters - are taking on this ice bucket challenge for research donations. I see so many of them posted on Facebook. Whatever it takes... Nobody said charity couldn't be fun. :-)

Bill
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Re: Ice bucket challenge????

Post by gmattson »

Pleased that you commented on my posts Bill. Obviously you are a great deal smarter than I am regarding health issues and I do appreciate that we both value a non-medicated approach to preventing illness. On the other hand, I see lots of wisdom in what the Dr Sears, MD say, because he understands that the Pharma industry makes trillions of dollars selling their wares of drugs and as a skeptical kind of person, I agree with him that there isn't any money in discovering cures that don't involve drugs!

So I am always pleased to hear someone like you promote non-drug ways of staying healthy and. . . to learn that your company, which I believe is funded by the pharma cartel, actually rewards their workers for not using drugs!

Very interesting. . . your company should be in charge of our health care system instead of Obama! :)
GEM
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Bill Glasheen
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Re: Ice bucket challenge????

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One must remember that pharmaceutical companies - for the most part - are publicly traded, and exist at the pleasure of their shareholders. A primary goal is to generate revenue. We in the west love capitalism because it gets things done efficiently. But efficiency at a task doesn't necessarily mean a task is worth doing.

One very good revenue-generating model is the razor blade. You give away the razor, and make money ad infinitum selling the razor blades. Treatment of common chronic conditions such as hypertension and Type II diabetes represent a great opportunity to have a reliable source of income. The revenue isn't quite the same for actually curing the condition.

Barry Marshall of UVa was ridiculed for suggesting that h pilori - a common bacterium - caused peptic ulcers. If an infection can be cured, then that means a patient no longer needs a lifetime supply of H2 antagonists (e.g. Zantac, Tagamet). Barry had to infect himself with the organism to get others' attention. For his work, he was awarded a Nobel Prize in medicine. But the paradigm shift in understanding wasn't without a bit of unnecessary pain and ridicule.

The problem with many of these chronic conditions like Type II diabetes is the average person isn't willing to do what it takes to delay or completely avoid the condition. Society through modern medicine and third party financing makes it easy for an individual to avoid the up-front discipline and allow others to foot the bill. If we *insist* that others suffer the consequences of their poor choices, then we're called heartless conservative bastahds. If we allow people to evolve to leeches, we're equally heartless. Behavioral economics teaches us that even when people *know* that their bad choices have consequences, many (not all) will still take the easy short-term path and suffer down the road. It takes the best and brightest among us to put a barrier in-between the Homer Simpsons of the world and their bad choices.
George Mattson wrote: your company, which I believe is funded by the pharma cartel
Actually it isn't. In fact my company's history involves a series of evolutionary steps which prevented it from being in a position to have a conflict of interest. It started out as a nursing home company, bought hospitals, and shed the nursing home business. Then it bought into managed care, and realized the left side of the business was trying to keep people out of the hospital while the right side of the business needed high occupancy to cover fixed costs. That led to a shedding of the hospital business, and further evolution into the managed care realm.

No, there is no funding from Pharma except *maybe* in the investment of reserves. (I frankly don't know...) These days they're in the business of buying up primary care and urgent care practices so they can keep people out of the ER and hospital with proper primary care. There's also been a considerable investment in home health and complex patient intervention. Another part of our business gives small economic incentives to keep biometric measures (e.g. blood pressure, cholesterol, BMI) in acceptable ranges, and offers discount memberships to local gyms.

The Obamacare debacle is the classic example of too many cooks and too many constituencies. Some would prefer universal care, ignoring the fact that said systems suffer from long waits for elective procedures. We're supposed to believe that Obamacare's structure is a nice "compromise." That's like saying cutting the baby in half and dividing it up between the arguing mothers will solve the child custody problem. Many don't understand the puritan ethic of living a good life and being responsible for the consequence of your choices. That's too... severe. Or so we're led to believe by those with misplaced social concerns.

Turn the page - hopefully sooner than later.

- Bill
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Re: Ice bucket challenge????

Post by saterraji »

Well Bill....

After reading your reply to George's post, I have to say it seems your reply pretty much reflects the demographics of your statistical group...period. Because the group George is posting to reflects "outside" this narrow demographic and results, will more than likely not fall into those whom you diligently research, it would appear this message will have more practical meaning and application. For one who's daily clinical investigation into the "practical side-effects" of not only statin drugs, but the wide-range of side-effects offered up by ALL synthetic pharmaceuticals, from a purely "bio-energetic" profile, reveals unending and complex negative consequences, all I can offer up is: " Stop Drinking the Kool-Aid" and the concurrent ideology that there is a "magic bullet" and it works!!

This is a deep issue and its healing must first begin with dispelling and deconstructing the myth of our current healthcare...(or should I say dis-ease management) system which is effectively breaking down our country, along with the "unending war" scenario offered up by the "military industrial complex" ramped up by our good old Texan prez. LBJ....When we all stop for a moment and look at the value and historical importance of "Self-Care"...the simple and profoundly effective natural therapies our ancestors used to remain healthy, beginning with the REAL food they grew and ate for themselves and their families....."food is the FIST MEDICINE", this will be the "defining moment" for a new respect for our country and our planet.
Learn to use the oriental micro-systems & heal.
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Re: Ice bucket challenge????

Post by Bill Glasheen »

First...

When looking for evidence, articles published in peer-reviewed journals trump expert opinion, and both trump personal opinion. If you quote me something from a peer-reviewed journal, we have a discussion. If not, we don't.

Here is a good place to start when talking about the value of statins. Be sure you click on all the tabs:
  • Overview
    .....
  • Evidence Statins are helpful
    .....
  • Risks and Side Effects of Statins
    .....
  • References
..... Statin Medications & Heart Disease

Second...

Clinical trials published in the peer-reviewed literature necessarily must involve *qualified* (e.g. sick) patients randomly selected from all walks of life. If not, the research isn't likely to be published. There is no special "demographic of your statistical group" in this matter.

Third...

Statins aren't for everyone. Here's a great article from Scientific American which discusses whether or not the list of people who take them should be expanded. Pharma and their investors would like it if lots of people needed them. No... The right medicine for the right patient in the right amount at the right time. This is why licensed physicians *only* can prescribe them.

..... The Stats on Statins: Should Healthy Adults Over 50 Take Them?

Fourth...
saterraji wrote:the wide-range of side-effects offered up by ALL synthetic pharmaceuticals
I have a problem with this statement.

All medicines have side effects; this isn't news. Medicines should be prescribed only when the potential good outweighs the potential harm. Primum non nocere. And there are no guarantees.

"Natural" (non-synthetic) pharmaceuticals have no advantage. If anything, you're more at risk because you can purchase and use many of them (herbs, etc.) without FDA approval and regulation. And there is no regulation of the purity and concentration of the active ingredients. Buyer and user beware.

And finally...

When it comes to doing what it takes to avoid needing statins in the first place, I walk the talk. See my recent biometric readings - required by my company every year - and weep. You are preaching to the choir. I also work for a company that advocates the halt of disease progression rather than treating lifestyle-related diseases.

- Bill
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