--and I'm on a crappy wi-fi connection (high speed indeed) in the Hilton Lobby, but figured I'd throw out a few thoughts since I got here around 2PM.

I did manage to attend a few of the aftenoon breakout sessions on various types and issues in neuropathy. Not much happening in them--the ones on types of neuropathy (i.e., autoimmune, toxic) were led by physicians, and there really wasn't much of interest presented--in fact, most everything that was said/discussed is available right here, and/or on other sites listed in the "stickies". Of course, I did not get to see the physicians' presentations for other physicians, most of which took place Friday, but perusing some of the handouts from these was not particularly enlightening, except for some small treatment comparison studies on how benfontamine and alpha lipoic taken together orally was more effective at symptom reduction than taking either seperately (even that seem no big deal).

One thing that did annoy me a bit was a plenary led by Dr. Alan Berger from Jacksonville Shands on idiopathic neuorpathies. Dr. Berger did not come across with many specifics here, but certain opnions expressed I did question, such as his assertion that facial parastheses are unlikely to have a neuropathic cause--I did point out that facial symptoms are not uncommon in situations such as Sjogren's and celiac neuropathies. He also pressed on not taking too much B6--I felt compelled to clarify the anecdotal nature of a lot of the reports of B6 hypervitaminosis and that none of these have seemed to occur in those taking the P-5-P form--the fact that he was not familiar with that form was a bit off-putting (especially since the Metanx people were exhibiting in the vendors' hall).

But, my biggest peeve was the nature of the questions from the idiopathic patient audience. I had assumed that people coming to this Summit, and paying for it, would be committed to knowledge and self-empowerment, and would likely be relatively knowledgable about the condition, but the nature of questions and comments to a great extent belied this--a lot of them didn't even get to the level of Neuropathy 101 (i.e.--"What is an axon? They say I have axonal neuropathy. . ." "Can alcoholism cause neuropathy?" "Is Lyrica a good drug for neuropahy" and the like). Apparently, many of these people don't read here--or anywhere else. I found it hard to believe in an Internet era--and this was not a group of technophobes, lots of laptops and cellphones--that people were so UNDERinformed, not necessarily mis-informed. It made me even more determined to preach the self-empowerment mantra at my seminar tomorrow--a large number of patients are going to get a lecture on not taking charge of learning about the condition--a polite lecture, but it's going to be a lecture.

More on this tomorrow (when maybe I'll alo get to talk informally with the medical people who still remain).