With respect, I think you are simplifying what is a very complex condition.

I doubt that a single "magic bullet" treatment for a complex condition like PD will be useful.

Here I have been influenced by a talk at a scientific conference given by somebody from Cambridge with both medical qualifications and PhD who made this point.

I think Mr. Here-Now makes very pertinent points about inflammation being a key cause of PD. He mentions several factors which can cause inflammation and the anti-dotes, aspirin, magnesium, vit-C etc. which reduce it.

The great scientific minds have not yet come forth with a significant PD treatment outside of L-dopa and maybe DBS. Until then, you are on your own so taking inflammatories is well worth considering.

Also with all due respect, I don't understand why you insist on

1) the "magic bullet" thing, when what I am saying is that multiple "bullets" are needed (vitamins, minerals and trace elements, phytochemicals, allopathic medicines such as leodopa and selegiline, etc.);

2) and in compliance when I recognize multiple targets (oxidation, inflammation, alpha-synuclein, liver overload, elevated homocysteine, epigenetic factors, environmental toxicants, psychological aspects). Parkinson's "diseases" may be a multifactorial and multi-carential syndrome…

It is true that I am not a neurologist (I imagine that is what you mean by medical qualifications, although I think there are already enough of them and very few divulgers), but I am capable of reading what the best ones like Birkmayer, Karobath, Perlmutter, Fahn, or Jenner write. They do have the training and clinical experience on the most demanding level imaginable.

The "point" is perhaps that in my experience I see that patients with 5-10 years of treatment suffer the same in 2020 as they did in 1994. So I really care very little about the official world of Parkinson's anymore. There are many neurologists who are taking steps to change things - but really.

I am staying with Dr. Cicero Coimbra, a practicing neurologist and professor of Neurology in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Or with neurologist Dr. David Permutter, with his writings on glutathione and his recommendations in 2013 on vitamin D3. I am sure they have the same medical qualifications at least as their Cambridge lecturer.

A profound revolution is taking place in the all-too-quiet official world of Parkinson's (Dorsey 2018), thanks to brave neurologists like these. Judge for yourself:

Fullard and Duda in 2020:
A Review of the Relationship Between Vitamin D and Parkinson Disease Symptoms

Lv et al. in 2020:
The relationships of vitamin D, vitamin D receptor gene polymorphisms, and vitamin D supplementation with Parkinson’s disease

In my humble opinion, I don't believe that they are thinking about "magic bullets" or simplifying the terrible reality of Parkinson's in 2020 - not for everyone, but for the millions of sick people and their families around the world.

By the way, we still don't give patients taking levodopa the vitamins B6, B9 and B12 to control the neurotoxic homocysteine, as neurologist Ahlskog recommends in his books. We have been waiting 20 years for someone to make that decision.... Even a politician could do it.

Hey parkinsons here-now,

Thanks for your posts. They are illuminating.

I have some questions for you?

How is your book coming along?

In my line of work I come across many Parkinson's patients. What advice about foods and supplementation would you give specifically so that I may pass it on to them?

Do you regard Parkinson's as an autoimmune disease? And if so would your approach as such work for all autoimmune diseases?

Keep up the good work.

Atty

Hello, Atticus.

Thank you for your kind words.

I really don't have the knowledge to know if it's autoimmune or not. That topic, the role of the second brain, GABA, diabetes, liver, B-group vitamin deficiencies that so closely resemble each and every one of the Parkinsonian symptoms, adaptogens, plants and oriental mushrooms, are exciting. But I don't have enough time. I have located the sages I should read, but... I have looked for a patron in the Renaissance style, but no luck. : (

I focused on the initial shortcomings and those that are added with the treatments thanks to Marty Hinz, and then Manfred Karobath and others. It seems to be the beginning of the neurodegenerative cascade (like a domino effect): both the damage produced by the lack of nutrients and the defenselessness produced by that lack against iron, aluminum, paraquat, aspartame, glutamate, cortisol etc.

One of the problems that I find both in the official world and in the "complementary and alternative" world is that everything has become very complex, a real jungle.

If I had to choose three supplements just to give them to my father (unfortunately he passed away in 2012 after 18 years of wasting - when the necessary knowledge already existed, but we didn't know it)

- VITAMIN D in high doses (minimum, the 1200 IU per day of the Suzuki study in 2013, maximum, from 5000 to 10000 IU per day recommended by the neurologists Coimbra in their "protocol", Perlmutter in a 2013 article or Hiller in his 2018 study);

- VITAMIN B2 in doses of 30-30-30 (total daily 90 mg), according to the Coimbra study in 2003 They said it was because when they stopped eating meat, levodopa had more effect: 44-71% motor improvement in 6 months and 3 patients 100%? I would like to know the brand of levodopa that Coimbra used... And since 2003 no one has dared to continue the study...

- And finally, something else: in my case, I would choose strong doses of VITAMIN C (Fahn used 3 grams daily for a year in his 1992 study), which no one has dared to follow either... curious.

This third supplement could be alpha lipoic acid, resveratrol, intranasal glutathione or NAC (although with B2 and vitamin C it would be quite elevated), magnesium treonate, B12, ...

This is not only a legal issue, but also an ethical one: the doctor and the pharmacist should always be consulted to adjust everything to each patient.

If I had to make a choice with the food I would certainly choose a "Mediterranean" diet with some oriental additions such as green tea (matcha if possible), ginger, turmeric, curry, some Japanese, Tibetan or Chinese mushrooms, etc, such as reishi, shiitake, maitake, yamabushitake, etc. And among the 80-100 grams of essential daily proteins, I would always choose an egg yolk and some oily fish: small sardines, non farmed salmon, etc. Or the avocado only before starting the levodopa therapy (because of the tyramine).

Foods such as tomato, pepper, spinach, broccoli, turmeric with black pepper, ginger, cayenne pepper, red onion and crushed raw garlic, gazpacho, etc.

Medicinal plants such as milk thistle, Japanese ashitaba, centella asiatica (gotu kola), cat's claw, etc.

I focus on what we know works. Regardless of the causal explanation.

When Dr. Lind gave oranges and lemons to two of the sailors with scurvy on the deck of HMS Salisbury in 1747 he did not know why, but they were cured. More than 200 years later, in the mid-1990s of the last century, we realized that we could not synthesize ascorbic acid in our livers as most mammals could, because of a genetic defect that prevented the use of the enzyme that converted sugar into vitamin C (because of the great similarity, Dehydroascorbic acid can use glucose transporters to cross the blood-brain barrier. And possibly sugar-rich diets and diabetes make it difficult for vitamin C to protect neurons by competing with excess sugar in the diet to pass to the brain).

The book goes ahead, but not as fast as it could. Thank you.

P:S.: I hope I don't violate any community norms. You can visit my blog "Parkinson's here and now".

Hey Parkinson's Here-Now

Thanks for your detailed response. That's very kind. I will take on board your advice.

Do you think all mushrooms have neuro protective benefits?

Have you come across Black Cumin or Nigella Seeds in your research?

I have driven into Southern Spain from Gibralter so may have passed through your town.

Vamos Rafa Nadal!

Atty