Morning bluesfan,

We buy ours online from the US from places like iHerb or VitaCost. There may be others. They both deliver here and very fast too. I imagine our customs would be similar to yours.

Hi Lara
You're up early - or is it insomnia? I was just checking out the i-herb site and given MrsD's previous recommendations will probably go with that. Can't start until I've had the tests and figured out doses yet. The doc will probably want to start me on injections but not sure if that'll be possible because of the effect they have lowering potassium (crucial for Addison's management).
Not worried about supply - i herb seem to have a pretty good shipping service. Do you order a year's supply at once? I'll check into the NZ customs requirements before ordering. A couple of years ago I had to figure out how to get my DHEA supply into Oz for a holiday trip. Managed to do it all online - got the permit etc and when I walked thru the airport they weren't even interested - go figure. Have a good day.

I was up a couple of hours ago unfortunately. It wasn't insomnia today it was "cat". Very wet weather here and she kept me awake half the night. Oh well.

I learned about getting it from Brian who used to post here. He'd checked it all out with customs etc.. I look for specials and buy other things at the same time. I also take Inositol powder and some other things so I get them regularly and save on shipping that way.

You have a good day too.

p.s. $852 LOL I am sorry but it's laughable isn't it. Unreal.

$$$$

Following my original post last Thurs about trying to figure out the B12 enigma.

Tues. 9.30 am – wasn't expecting results too early because of the holiday. Receive text from my GP – I quote: “B12 is good and higher than in January.” That's it - no number, no suggestion for any further tests etc. I guess it's the first day back after a long weekend and she's bound to be swamped. But as MrsD has taught us it's the numbers that are relevant.

Somewhat reluctantly I turned to another option - get the results myself online. Not sure if this is something the US and elsewhere use regularly and take for granted but it's still relatively new here. I won't go into details here or the reasons why I resisted accessing it up til now. Some months ago, the medical practice I use, tried to get me to register and gave me a password – fortunately due to my general clutter and disorganisation I hadn't thrown out the scrap of paper with it on … and it still worked.

So here's the numbers – mine are in the International Standard – Those in brackets are the US equivalents to make it easier for those in the US to compare. I also put in a result from 5 years ago to show the decline.

Date: B12 Result:
'normal' range 140–650 pmol/L (200-900 pg/ml)
31/3/2010 437 (592)

20/1/2015 169 (228)

2/4/2015 211 (290)
Hope I haven't made any glitches with this and it makes sense to you. (sorry the spacings don't seem to come out as I type them)

I know MrsD and others stress that B12 ideally needs to be above 400 pg/ml (295 pmol/L) but how do I convince my GP of this?
I also found online, which she didn't mention in the text, is that my Folate is high: 50 nmol/L (range 7.0 – 45.0 nmol/L) (= US 22 ng/ml - range 2.7 -17.0 ng/ml).
I did text her back pointing this out but not sure if their text alert system is only one way and doesn't accept incoming texts.

I'm dreading having to try and explain this all over again to the endocrinologist and neurologist – that's if I now even get to see them. I did think over the weekend that even if they do continue to tell me that my B12 is fine I will still start supplementing with or without their agreement – it would just be reassuring to be able to get the tests that help pinpoint a possible cause.
Would appreciate anyone's input. Thanks for reading.

I don't think you can't convince your GP or any other doctor of this; it's probably not worth your time and you risk alienating your physician. I have a personal policy of mentioning info once to my GP in a very diplomatic way and asking them about their opinion on the topic. Then after that, I drop it. Unfortunately, clinical practice significantly lags behind the current medical literature.

If this were my situation and my doctors were dismissive of my lab test values, I would probably self supplement and maybe use some direct to consumer lab testing. The key is to do enough reading to understand how much to supplement, what forms of the vitamin to supplement, how long to wait to test your levels, and also know if you should be supplementing any other items that are co-factors (I love these topics and enjoy reading about them!!! In my prior job I worked with all kinds of drugs, vitamins and supplements ). Also, another thought is that you are taking in enough B12 from your food, but are not absorbing it due to the other things happening your body. I think supplementing and testing are a great way to figure that out. It's just difficult when you don't have a doctor on your side....

Another alternative (if you have the extra money) is to see a functional medicine doctor. I saw one who looked at my B12 values and immediately started me on supplements. My mainstream medical doctors thought nothing of those same low B12 values in my testing that were originally ordered by them.

For you and your doctors:

http://www.aafp.org/afp/2003/0301/p979.html

This is a link to a medical site written for doctors...it is dated
2003.

Dr. Snow's article in JAMA from 1999....
http://archinte.jamanetwork.com/arti...ticleid=485067

Thanks madisongrrl & MrsD
I've calmed down a little now and am trying to think laterally to come up with alternative tactics.
I would love to see a functional medicine doctor - however I don't think they even exist under our medical system. Same goes for independent/private lab tests. They probably are in the larger cities but I'm in a small rural town. Thanks for reminding me about co-factors - it had crossed my mind about getting tested for other possible deficiencies but B12 seemed the most likely and I had the earlier tests as a base to go by. Will keep it in mind.

For me it was interesting to see that my B12 had risen slightly between Jan and April - what I hadn't told my GP was that I had started eating liver pate about 3 weeks earlier as I knew that was a concentrated source of B12 - so maybe I am still absorbing some - just not enough.

MrsD the aafp article is excellent and I had taken just the diagnostic diagram to my GP but when I tried to show it to her she got that glazed look and dismissed it. You can lead a horse to water but ...
Thanks also for the link to Dr Snow's article - I had seen it earlier but forgot to bookmark it.
As an interesting connection - researching further this morning - I think the Schilling test may still be available here in NZ - so maybe - just maybe - there is one advantage to living in a country with a somewhat redundant medical system.
Thanks for the encouragement - it's helped me continue after a rough weekend.

I totally empathise with your difficulties. We found one great doctor who was more up to date with the B12 issues but she advised my daughter that she was going away on maternity leave and that the other doctors in the practice would not agree with her recommendations regarding supplementing B12. Needless to say she left, we then moved and now we're in a similar situation as you are.

As I see it there are a couple of different ways to go ahead and I'll post what I think is the logical way for us (daughter and self) in a similar situation ...

We will go ahead with the genetic testing out of the USA. Considering the relatively low price of under $100 USD, it is much less expensive than seeing a Psychiatrist for $350 for 45minutes which is where we may all end up if no one starts to take us seriously.

Once you have that information then you are ahead already. Then you need to interpret the data and you can find that information with help here I'm sure.

My seriously real problem with getting the genetic testing done overseas is that I'm very wary of the gathering of health and genetic data by other countries.

In the meantime we will keep supplementing with the B12. I'm not sure how many free blood tests you can get over there per year, but we can only get 3 for vitamin type levels per year so my daughter tells me.

We're looking for the same information as you are as you know, so I just wanted to tell you that you're not alone and it will all work out in the end, but in reality it needs to be sooner than later.

btw I think your medical practice needs to upgrade their security online.

take care.

A book that might interest you is The Wahls Protocol. Dr. Terry Wahls is a conventionally trained MD, who got MS and figured out how to improve her situation through diet and functional medicine. Chapter 10 is all about supplementation and target reference ranges. Even though I don't have MS, I enjoyed he book and learned a lot from it.