High-dose vitamin B12 for at-home prevention and reversal of Alzheimer's disease and other diseases

Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients, May, 2006 by Joseph G. Hattersley

Introduction

It is interesting to consider what proportion of Alzheimer's dementia (AD) may result from under-nutrition, (1) especially when it seems that there may be an easy, low-cost, perfectly safe, nutritional way that may allow people to avoid a miserable illness that many people consider worse than death. Some people might say, "That's too good to be true!" In fact, an at-home nutritional program, using a lot of vitamin B12 may indeed prevent and virtually eliminate AD. An early launch of the treatment soon after first warning symptoms start could even turn off the process.

Confusion, difficulty concentrating, loss of memory, marked changes in personality that can lead to outbursts of violence, hallucinations, wandering away, and early death all characterize Alzheimer's dementia. An estimated 2.3 million Americans now have AD. Prevalence doubles every five years after the age of 60, increasing from one percent among those 60 to 64 up to 40% among those aged 85 years and older. Nursing home care costs about $47,000 per AD patient annually, and this figure is rising steadily, putting a huge burden on the health care system. The disease is also terrible for the patients' caregivers. In what experts are calling "a looming public health disaster," statistics suggest there will be between five and seven million Alzheimer's patients over the next ten years. (2)

Let's start with a little background. Mammals, including humans, are born with serum levels of vitamin B12 at about 2,000 pg/ml (picograms--i.e., trillionths of a gram, per milliliter). The level declines throughout human life owing to practices common in Western societies. (4) Below 550 to 600 pg/ml, deficiencies start to appear in the cerebrospinal fluid. (5,6) US clinical laboratories regard 200 pg/ml as the lower range of normal. That low limit was set with hematologic criteria. But neuropsychiatric criteria, which are much higher, have become more critical.

"Most cases of Alzheimer's dementia are actually missed B12 deficiency cases, because of the too-low normal range for B12," wrote John V. Dommisse, MD in 1991 in Medical Hypotheses. (3) Dommisse, who practices medicine in Tucson, Arizona, has confirmed (7,8,9) that Alzheimer's disease appears to result from too-low serum vitamin B12, and repletion of the vitamin succeeds despite other risk factors. Repleting B12, according to Dommisse, can reverse 75% of B12 deficiency dementias when the condition is discovered early enough. (10)

Other aspects of the therapy should be noted: The neurological and cerebral manifestations of B12 deficiency require dosages larger, (11) and extending over a longer time, (12) than to those needed to reverse hematologic effects. (13) B12 therapy appears to be perfectly safe; in other words, the risk of overdose is virtually nil. Patients of Dr. H.L. Newbold in New York City injected themselves three times daily with triple-strength doses of B12 (9,000 ug/micrograms/per day) indefinitely. Their serum B12 levels reached 200,000 pg/ml (100 times the normal level found in newborn babies and higher), but none had any significant side effects. (3)

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Other Conditions Benefit From B12 Replenishment

Besides Alzheimer's, B12 ("cobalamin"*) deficiency can also cause the following conditions. And when started early, replenishing B12 (i.e., restoring it to or near to levels found at birth) may often significantly improve these afflictions as well:

* Depression Often in mild form, depression can be one of the first clues foretelling dementia. (14-19) Chris Reading, BSc, DipAgSc, MBBS, FRANZCP, FACNEM (reading@tpg.com.au) of Australia concurs: "... in most cases of [not only mild but also] 'intractable depression,' a subtle B12, or other nutrient, or thyroid hormone, deficiency has been missed." (20,21) Psychotic depression has been particularly associated with B12 deficiency. (22) As I'll discuss later, success of B12 therapy against depression in its various forms is "probable."

* Paranoid psychoses This nutritional deficit has also been linked to paranoid psychoses, characterized by over-suspiciousness and delusions.

* Bipolar-1 disorder Bipolar-1 disorder (manic depressive), marked by alternating periods of elation and depression; and more commonly bipolar-2 (cyclothymic personality), marked by mood swings within normal limits. (24-26)

* Chronic fatigue syndrome (27-29)

* Weakened immunity Weakened immunity can occur, leading to susceptibility to recurrent infections and cancer, as well as increasing risk of cardiovascular disease, cancer, (30) and much more by a second pathway, hindering remethylation of the toxic sulfur amino acid homocysteine back into the nontoxic essential amino acid methionine. (31)

* Asthma Incomplete digestion of foods due to hypochlorhydria and low pepsin production (see below) can be involved in subsequent allergic response in asthma. (32)

* Disrupted sleep/wake rhythms (33,34)

* Environmental illness (35)

* Low stress tolerance (36)

* Osteoporosis (37)