If one does a search on "multiple sclerosis mmp-9" the connection will be revealed.

I have the BEST presentation of this in a study in my Web Storage -

http://home.ix.netcom.com/~jdalton/Yongrev.pdf SEE FIGURE 2 page 505 and MS narrative

The Vit d3 connection and MMP-9s.

jackD

THE NGF thing is a bit more difficult to find.

jackD


***WARNING*** ***WARNING*** ***WARNING*** ***WARNING***

This site is for researchers ONLY!!!! Can cause mere mortals to go into shock!!!!

http://www.copewithcytokines.de/cope.cgi?key=NGF

Another little tidbit found there that clarifies a lot of things

Hi folks..I've read many of your posts about Vit D. I've had MS for over 20 years and am still learning from you all! My Vit D levels are low and yesterday my Primary Care Doc gave me rx for Vit D once a week.

My question is: Do any of you know why we with MS have low Vit D levels? What causes it?

Thanks!

I don't know what causes us to have lower levels of Vitamin D. Maybe someone who knows will come along soon and post about it.

What kind of Vitamin D did your doctor prescribe? If it's not D3 then it's pretty useless. Most doctors still prescribe D2 which, IMHO, is a total waste of money. D3 is available OTC and is relatively inexpensive.

Here is a link to a thread about Vitamin D: http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/thread140053.html

Thanks for resurrecting this thread on Vitamin D because it is timely for me.

My wife has low Vitamin D and suffers from malaise, body fatigue, heavy limbs, and that "just not right bad feeling." She is now on a weekly OTC Vitamin D supplement in addition to a prescribed Vitamin D monthly.

My labs from April show a Vitamin D, 25-Hydroxy (?) level of 27.3 with a standard range of 32.0 - 100.0. My doctor has asked that I start taking an OTC Vitamin D supplement of 1000 iu daily. All other labs are well in line for normal.

Is this the same thing you are all discussing? What happens with a low Vitamin D level any way?

Please read the link Kitty gave above to my Vit D thread.

The RX version of D is D2 and is not very useful. Doctors still prescribe it but it just doesn't work. YOu need D3 OTC which is the active form to see any improvements and results. The D2 is a historical hold over from the past when D3 was not discovered.
D2 comes from plants and is not used by the body much. Doctors are not keeping up on this fact, and only are good for testing these days.

The rule today is 1000IU D3 to raise you 10 pts. Your target should be 50-70ng/ml. So if you are in the 30's you need 2000IU daily of D3. Get tested in 3 mons and adjust accordingly.

You are wasting precious time using the RX D2.

My thread has the new research and medical videos on this subject. So to see what benefits you can expect..the video from Univ. Medical School of Calif San Diego, and has the answers to that.
One of the most obvious is that you won't catch so many viruses and colds/flu. The other benefits are neurological among other things.

I'd also recommend you get a B12 test, since you cannot feel your toes when you cut your nails. In the same way, doctors report "normal" for very low ranges... which is no longer accurate. You should have at least 400 in US for your results. Anything lower needs supplements.
Here is the Medical link for doctors--(many have not learned this yet) from 2003... to correctly treat low B12 patients:
http://www.aafp.org/afp/2003/0301/p979.html
Low B12 impacts the entire nervous system, causing CNS effects similar to MS and peripheral neuropathies. It is very common in the elderly.

Medical doctors in US report "normal" for low B12 and Vit D because the lab ranges on the reports are OLD and no longer acceptable. A person can have significant neurological damage from B12 readings in the 200 or below range (which appears as "normal" on reports still).

Results of recent research into the effects of Vitamin D and MS were released today here in Australia. Here's a short synopsis.

"We found that higher levels of vitamin D are associated with a reduced likelihood of a relapse in MS."

"The study demonstrates that for each 10nmol/l* increase in serum vitamin D dosage, there was up to a 12 per cent reduction in the likelihood of a relapse."

"Clinically, raising vitamin D levels by 50nmol/l could halve the hazard of a relapse."

"Essentially, the study showed that people are more likely to have a relapse if they had low vitamin D levels."

Read more: http://www.menzies.utas.edu.au/artic...ntView&id=1291

Thanks, Koala!

For the US readers here, we measure the D differently than in Australia. They use nmols there and we use ng/ml

Here is a link to the conversion tables for countries using different report concentrations:

http://jama.ama-assn.org/site/misc/auinst_si.xhtml

Thanks Koala and mrsD! This information is invaluable.

I felt the best & progressed slowest taking 2000iu 4x/day. Level was 120's.