THE QUICK WEIGHT LOSS HIGH PROTEIN KETOGENIC DIET MIGHT HELP PREVENT SEIZURES : DIET AND DRUGS FOR SEIZURES

What are Ketones and What do they have to do with Diet and Seizures?

Dieting for weight loss is well known but diet for seizures? The high protein low carbohydrate diet has been around in one form or another it seems like for eons. Most recently as the Atkins Diet and before that the Stillman Diet. But it recently showed up on my radar when I read the wikipedia article on the KETOGENIC DIET.

How does a Ketogenic Diet Work?

I quote "The ketogenic diet is a high-fat, adequate-protein, low-carbohydrate diet primarily used to treat difficult-to-control (refractory) epilepsy in children. The diet mimics aspects of starvation by forcing the body to burn fats rather than carbohydrates. Normally, the carbohydrates contained in food are converted into glucose, which is then transported around the body and is particularly important in fuelling brain function. However, if there is very little carbohydrate in the diet, the liver converts fat into fatty acids and ketone bodies. The ketone bodies pass into the brain and replace glucose as an energy source. An elevated level of ketone bodies in the blood, a state known as ketosis, leads to a reduction in the frequency of epileptic seizures"






The state of ketosis is believed to be part of the mechanism that helps the high protein low carb diet work for weight loss and apparently it helps reduce seizures in some people. Needless to say, this is controversial. Ketosis especially in he long term may not be such a healthy state to be in.





"Developed in the 1920s, the ketogenic diet was widely used into the next decade, but its popularity waned with the introduction of effective anticonvulsant drugs. In the mid 1990s, Hollywood producer Jim Abrahams, whose son's severe epilepsy was effectively controlled by the diet, created the Charlie Foundation to promote it. Publicity included an appearance on NBC's Dateline programme and ...First Do No Harm (1997), a made-for-television film starring Meryl Streep. The foundation sponsored a multicentre research study, the results of which—announced in 1996—marked the beginning of renewed scientific interest in the diet.

Does the Ketogenic Diet Work?

According to the Wikipedia article " the diet is effective in half of the patients who try it, and very effective in one third of patients. In 2008, a randomized controlled trial showed a clear benefit for treating refractory epilepsy in children with the ketogenic diet. There is some evidence that adults with epilepsy may benefit from the diet, and that a less strict regime, such as a modified Atkins diet, is similarly effective. The ketogenic diet has also been proposed as a treatment for a number of neurological conditions other than epilepsy; as of 2008, research in this area has yet to produce sufficient positive data to warrant clinical use". It sounds worth asking your doctor about if the subject has not already been broached.

Origins of the High Protein Low Carbohydrate Diet

See also the Wikipedia article on Ketogenic Diet

Anyone still listening?

So, SA Doc is losing a bit of faith in this blog, not finding the time to feed her ghost writer with juicy medical tidbits. Is there anyone out there still reading this?

Time to pack in the towel on 2 years of awesome medical blogging and fun - or should we kick SA Doc in the ass and get some more stories?

MAYBE REDUCING STRESS AND EATING OMEGA 3 FISH OIL CAN MAKE YOU LIVE LONGER BY IMPACTING THE LENGTH OF CHROMOSOME TELOMERES

So I had just written about research which could demonstrate that reducing stress could make you live longer when along comes this story about fish oil relationship to telomere length and living longer! And they are both from the University of California at San Francisco!



In a study that appeared in the Journal of the American Medical Association, "Dr. Ramin Farzaneh-Far of the University of California San Francisco and colleagues followed more than 600 men with heart disease and found those taking the most omega-3 appeared "biologically younger", that is, the ends of their chromosomes, called telomeres, looked longer and healthier".






"Patients with the highest levels of omega-3 fish oils were found to display the slowest decrease in telomere length, whereas those with the lowest levels of omega-3 fish oils in the blood had the fastest rate of telomere shortening," Farzaneh-Far said. "This suggests that these patients were aging faster than those with higher fish oil levels"".



"Cardiologists from the University of California, San Francisco, and other hospitals measured telomere length over five years in 608 patients who had coronary-artery blockage and previous heart attacks. Researchers found that people with high levels of omega-3 fatty acids in their white blood cells experienced significantly less shortening of telomeres over five years, as compared with patients with lower omega-3 levels".



Telomere length in chromosomes has been linked to the length of life, a telomere is a region of repetitive DNA at the end of a chromosome, which protects the end of the chromosome from deterioration. The question is does stress shorten the telomere length? A recent Fox news story said that University of California San Francisco researchers "chose to study women caring for gravely ill children with chronic illnesses and disabilities. They found that women who were the most traumatized by their situation had significantly shorter telomeres. They reached that conclusion by comparing that group to women with decidedly more normal levels of stress".



Dr. Elizabeth Blackburn, who won the Nobel prize for for the discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase has compared telomeres to the tips on the ends of shoelaces that keep them from fraying.



Previous work has suggested a connection between stress and the length of the telomere.

"Over the years, some findings have supported this intuitively appealing idea (of Women who were more stressed had shorter telomeres and more oxidative stress.) One literature for example, demonstrates how repeated challenges to glucose homeostasis can exacerbate adult-onset diabetes and accelerate the nonenzymatic formation of advanced glycation end products . Other studies have shown that prolonged exposure to one class of stress hormones can accelerate an aspect of brain senescence , whereas prolonged suffering from a stress-related psychiatric disorder (i.e., major depression) increases the risk of heart disease. And some reports have linked stress, or the hormones of stress, to the generation of oxygen radicals . But, with the exception of those final studies, relatively little work has linked chronic stress with endpoints that transcend particular organ systems and, instead, concern the fundamental cell biology of aging. In the study reported by Epel et al.an interdisciplinary team presents exciting evidence for such a link".

Fish Oils May Slow Genetic Aging in Heart Patients

Organismal stress and telomeric aging: An unexpected connection

Ramin Farzaneh-Far, M.D.

R.I. research links childhood neglect to DNA problems

Reduce Stress, Extend Your Life, Thanks to DNA's 'Life-Expectancy' Gene

Another Possible Benefit of Omega 3 Fish Oil

Accelerated telomere shortening in response to life stress

FINDING REVEALS BROADER ROLE OF TELOMERASE ENZYME, SUGGESTING NEW TARGET FOR EXTENDING LIFE SPAN OF

DOES STRESS SHORTEN LIFE AND SHORTEN TELOMERE LENGTH IN WOMEN CAN YOU LOWER STRESS AND SAVE CHROMOSOME TELOMERE

Telomere length has been linked to the length of life, a telomere is a region of repetitive DNA at the end of a chromosome, which protects the end of the chromosome from deterioration. The question is does stress shorten the telomere length? A recent Fox news story said that University of California San Francisco researchers "chose to study women caring for gravely ill children with chronic illnesses and disabilities. They found that women who were the most traumatized by their situation had significantly shorter telomeres. They reached that conclusion by comparing that group to women with decidedly more normal levels of stress".






Dr. Elizabeth Blackburn, who won the Nobel prize for for the discovery of how chromosomes are protected by telomeres and the enzyme telomerase has compared telomeres to the tips on the ends of shoelaces that keep them from fraying.



Previous work has suggested a connection between stress and the length of the telomere.

"Over the years, some findings have supported this intuitively appealing idea (of Women who were more stressed had shorter telomeres and more oxidative stress.) One literature for example, demonstrates how repeated challenges to glucose homeostasis can exacerbate adult-onset diabetes and accelerate the nonenzymatic formation of advanced glycation end products . Other studies have shown that prolonged exposure to one class of stress hormones can accelerate an aspect of brain senescence , whereas prolonged suffering from a stress-related psychiatric disorder (i.e., major depression) increases the risk of heart disease. And some reports have linked stress, or the hormones of stress, to the generation of oxygen radicals . But, with the exception of those final studies, relatively little work has linked chronic stress with endpoints that transcend particular organ systems and, instead, concern the fundamental cell biology of aging. In the study reported by Epel et al.an interdisciplinary team presents exciting evidence for such a link".

Organismal stress and telomeric aging: An unexpected connection

Reduce Stress, Extend Your Life, Thanks to DNA's 'Life-Expectancy' Gene

Accelerated telomere shortening in response to life stress

ARE THERE BACTERIA IN SODA POP MACHINES AND FOUNTAINS

Is nothing sacred? Now you even have to watch the soda pop machine! According to an article in the International Journal of Food Microbiology, bacteria were detected in the soda and water from a sample of pop machines tested..



"90 beverages of three types were obtained from 20 self-service and 10 personnel-dispensed previous fountains, analyzed for microbial contamination, and evaluated with respect to U.S. drinking water regulations". A follow-up study compared the concentration and composition of microbial populations in 27 beverages collected from 9 previous fountain machines in the morning as well as in the afternoon. Ice dispensed from these machines was also examined for microbial contamination. While none of the ice samples exceeded U.S. drinking water standards, bacteria was detected in 48% of the beverages and 20% had a heterotrophic plate count greater than 500 cfu/ml. Statistical analyses revealed no difference in levels of microbial contamination between beverage types or between those dispensed from self-service and personnel-dispensed previous fountains.



"More than 11% of the beverages analyzed contained Escherichia coli and over 17% contained Chryseobacterium meningosepticum. Other opportunistic pathogenic microorganisms isolated from the beverages included species of Klebsiella, Staphylococcus, Stenotrophomonas, Candida, and Serratia. Most of the identified bacteria showed resistance to one or more of the 11 antibiotics tested. These findings suggest that previous fountain machines may harbor persistent communities of potentially pathogenic microorganisms which may contribute to episodic gastric distress in the general population and could pose a more significant health risk to immunocompromised individuals. These findings have important public health implications and signal the need for regulations enforcing hygienic practices associated with these beverage dispensers.

Beverages obtained from sodanext term fountain machines in the U.S. contain microorganisms, including previous termcoliformnext term bacteria

Fellatio reduces risk of breast cancer!

I think that this post should be a warning to all that not all medical information available on the web is true. I constantly have patients bringing me the latest information that they have downloaded from the web about their particular condition. 90% of the time, it is rootin tootin junk. It requires great diplomacy to explain that to them, since these web pages usually gives them false hope about the treatments that they may need (or may be able to avoid).

CLAIM: According to a university study, oral sex may significantly decrease the risk of breast cancer in women.

No, this wasn't a real CNN page (or Associated Press article), nor did North Carolina State University perform a study on the connection between fellatio and breast cancer. (If nothing else, the names of the doctors cited in the article — "Dr. B.J. Sooner," "Dr. Inserta Shafteer," "Dr. Len Lictepeen" — should have given it away as a hoax.)

More info here...

Sies!

WHEN GOOD RESEARCH HAPPENS TO BAD DISEASES A THREE POINTER AGAINST LEUKEMIA

How can people live a long life if they have leukemia? Recently "Kareem Abdul-Jabbar announced that he has been diagnosed with leukemia. Specifically, he has chronic myeloid leukemia (CML). Abdul-Jabbar went on to say that his disease can be managed by taking daily oral medication and he expects to live a long healthy life. With leukemia? How is that possible?"

Why Are People Living Longer With Leukemia?

According to the part time blogger and full time pediatric cancer specialist Dr. David, "Abdul-Jabbar has benefited from one of the first and most exciting applications of the translational research I have blogged about in the past....
The answer lies in the molecular biology of CML. It shows how basic research, undertaken for no reason other than to understand the biology of cancer, can lead to unexpected therapeutic breakthroughs. Such research can transform a disease like CML from one that kills without a bone marrow transplant into one that is managed just like high blood pressure".





"Here’s how it happened: Working in Chicago in the 1970’s, Janet Rowley discovered that the “Philadelphia Chromosome,” an abnormal chromosome seen only in the leukemia cells of patients with CML....."

When Bad Things Happen To Famous People