Welcome! This blog contains research & information on lifestyle, nutrition and health for those with MS, as well as continuing information on the understanding of the endothelium and heart-brain connection. This blog is informative only--all medical decisions should be discussed with your own physicians.

The posts are searchable---simply type in your topic of interest in the search box at the top left.

Almost all of MS research is initiated and funded by pharmaceutical companies. This maintains the EAE mouse model and the auto-immune paradigm of MS, and continues the 20 billion dollar a year MS treatment industry. But as we learn more about slowed blood flow, gray matter atrophy, and environmental links to MS progression and disability--all things the current drugs do not address--we're discovering more about how to help those with MS.

To learn how this journey began, read my first post from August, 2009. Be well! Joan

Showing posts with label liver. Show all posts
Showing posts with label liver. Show all posts

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Glutathione and loving your liver




September 25, 2011 at 2:02pm

Dr. David Perlmutter has pioneered glutathione treatment and believes it can be helpful in neurological diseases, including MS and Parkinson's Disease.  And it has helped many.

Glutathione is a super antioxidant, but taken orally, it doesn't really do well.  The digestive tract breaks it down before it can become available in the rest of the body.  It's great as an IV infusion,  but this isn't readily available to many.  So, I thought I would explain a bit about glutathione, and how we can increase the production in our own bodies.  The truth is, the best way to increase glutathione is not to ingest it or use an IV, it's to let your body make it itself.

Glutathione is naturally created by a healthy liver.  
When Jeff was diagnosed with MS, one of his strange blood results was that his liver enzymes, AST and ALT, were 10 times higher than normal. He was slightly jaundiced and his eyes were a bit yellow.   It looked like he had liver disease, and his neurologist assumed he drank too much alcohol, but Jeff didn't drink.  So I did some research, and learned that high liver enzymes happened in those w/MS---even before taking any drugs.

Multiple Sclerosis Linked to Abnormal Liver Test Results- 

To make the link, the researchers used data from the Sylvia Lawry Centre for MS Research in Germany, the largest database of MS clinical trial information in the world. In all, medical information from 813 people with MS enrolled in various clinical trials from North America, Australia and Europe was analyzed. The study was funded by the MS Society of Canada. 

Over a two-year period, there was an over three-fold increased risk of a person with MS having an elevated liver test result compared to expectations. An elevated test result indicates that liver enzymes have leaked out of their cells. This leakage into the blood stream may be an indicator of liver cell damage.