Combination therapy with vitamin D3, progesterone, omega-3 fatty acids and glutamine reverses coma and improves clinical outcomes in patients with severe traumatic brain injuries: A case series

You can ask your doctors if anything here would help in stroke recovery. Doesn't know, then the correct and only answer is for them to contact researchers to get an answer.  Not doing anything, call the president and ask what the fuck is the responsibility of the stroke doctors. Delivering the status quo of stroke rehab means that the stroke president also needs to be fired.  Or you could look up these:

• progesterone (11)
• omega-3 (77)
• vitamin D3 (5)
• glutamine (2)

Combination therapy with vitamin D3, progesterone, omega-3 fatty acids and glutamine reverses coma and improves clinical outcomes in patients with severe traumatic brain injuries: A case series

How to cite this article:

Matthews LR, Danner OK, Ahmed YA, Dennis-Griggs DM, Frederick A, Clark C, Moore R, DuMornay W, Childs EW, Wilson KL. Combination therapy with vitamin d3, progesterone, omega 3-fatty acids and glutamine reverses coma and improves clinical outcomes in patients with severe traumatic brain injuries: A case series. International Journal of Case Reports and Images 2012;4(3):143–149.

Abstract

Introduction: Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a major public health problem and a leading cause of death and disability in the United States. Management of patients with TBI has changed very little over the last 20 years. Case Series: A case series of three patients with severe TBIs who were aggressively treated with vitamin D3, progesterone, omega 3-fatty acids, and enteral glutamine for six weeks, termed neuroceutical augmentation for traumatic brain injury (NATBI), with very favorable outcomes. Conclusion: A large clinical study trial using these four supplements (NATBI) together is warranted.

Keywords: Traumatic brain injury, Vitamin D3, Omega-3 fatty acids, Loveza, Progesterone, Cerebral edema, Glutamine

Introduction

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a major public health problem. According to CDC it affects over 1.7 million people annually in U.S. with 275,000 hospitalizations and 52,000 deaths. [1] The medical cost for treating TBI patients in the United States in 2010 was $76.5 billion and rising annually. [1] Primary causes for TBI include the following: motor vehicle crashes, falls, assaults and sports or recreation-related injuries (concussions). Finding the right treatment to reduce mortality rates and improve the clinical outcomes in TBI patients has been elusive. Management of patients with TBI has changed very little over the last 20 years. Advancements in the treatment of TBI requires great understanding of the biochemical mechanisms of the brain during a normal resting state as well as the metabolism after a severe traumatic event. Brain metabolism is markedly altered during TBI. After the initial insult to the brain, the brain's metabolism is altered and can increase up to 140% of its normal metabolism. Vitamin D (a steroid hormone) and omega-3 fatty acids (an essential fatty acid) are both very powerful anti-inflammatory agents that reduce cerebral edema and swelling. Glutamine becomes an essential amino acid during stress and produces the extra glucose (via the Cori cycle) that is used by the injured brain and the extra glucose used by the immune response system to fight off infection during stress. Progesterone (also a steroid hormone) is a neuroprotector of injured brain cells and potentiates the effect of vitamin D. These agents are all immune modulators which work synergistically to prevent secondary brain injury by limiting or decreasing inflammation; an increasing well-recognized cause of ongoing brain swelling after a primary injury. They are also neuroprotectors that makes the neurons more resistant to stress, ischemia, hypothermia, hyperthermia, hypoglycemia, hyperglycemia, hypotension, and hypertension. Immune modulation with nutritional supplements is a rapidly advancing field with a very promising future in treating TBI as well as other critically injured/ill patients. We present a case series of three patients with severe TBIs who were aggressively treated with vitamin D3, progesterone, omega-3 fatty acids and enteral glutamine for up to six weeks, termed neuroceutical augmentation for traumatic brain injury (NATBI), with very favorable outcomes. [2] [3] [4] [5] Patients in a coma with severe TBI (Glascow Coma Score <8) who were admitted to a Level I trauma center were evaluated in a prospective observational study. Patients were treated with a neuroceutical combination of vitamin D3, omega-3 fatty acids, progesterone, and glutamine initially via a nasogastric tube and later orally for six weeks. Primary outcomes were mortality rate and return to recovery which was defined as a Glascow Coma Score (GCS) of 10 or greater.NATBI protocol works on multiple levels and neuroprotective pathways in TBI patients by down regulating cytokine production, preventing oxidative stress (free radical oxygen formation), decreasing cerebral edema, and inflammation, thus limiting secondary brain injury in contradistinction to progesterone therapy alone (Protect III study). [3] [4] [5] In addition, our NATBI regimen is relatively inexpensive, safe, and very effective at reducing brain and systemic inflammation post-injury.

Leslie R Matthews1, Omar K Danner1, Y A Ahmed2, Diane M Dennis-Griggs1, Alexis Frederick1, Clarence Clark1, Ronald Moore1, Wilson DuMornay1, Ed W Childs1, Kenneth L Wilson1

1Morehouse School of Medicine, Department of Surgery, 720 Westview Drive, SW, Atlanta, GA, USA. 2Department of Epidemiology, King Saud University, College of Pharmacy, Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudia of Arabia.

doi:10.5348/ijcri-2013-03-281-CS-2 Address correspondence to: Leslie Ray Matthews MD, FACS, 720 Westview Drive SW, Atlanta Georgia 30228 USA Phone: (404) 6162391 Fax: (404) 6161417 Email: lematthews@msm.edu Access full text article on other devices Access PDF of article on other devices

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Researchers to study effect of watermelon juice in reducing heart disease

Were these two earlier research efforts not enough to prove the benefits? This waste of resources is directly a result of NO fucking stroke strategy.  I eat a pound of watermelon a day whenever possible, can't find juice.

Watermelon Could Lower Blood Pressure April 2014 

Watermelon juice reverses hardening of the arteries Nov. 2011

 

 Researchers to study effect of watermelon juice in reducing heart disease

University of Alabama researchers soon will launch a study that looks at watermelon juice as a way to reduce heart disease.
Dr. Kristi Crowe-White and Dr. Amy Ellis, researchers in the College of Human Environmental Sciences' department of human nutrition and hospitality management, are recruiting subjects for a 10-week study to see how watermelon impacts blood vessel function.
The researchers believe that several natural ingredients in watermelon — lycopene, citrulline, arginine, glutamine and ascorbic acid — will act in synergy to decrease arterial stiffness and oxidative stress.
Arterial stiffness is an early independent risk factor for cardiovascular disease and cardiovascular events like heart attack and stroke. As people get older, the arteries get stiffer, more rigid and less able to dilate, Ellis said.

Oxidative stress also increases with age because the body is not able to compensate, and people's diet typically is lacking in needed antioxidants. Oxidative stress is one of the underlying causes of all chronic disease, so when the level is high, if a person has a genetic predisposition for a chronic disease, that's when the manifestation will occur, Crowe-White said.
"Our goal is to reduce the risks of these future cardiovascular events, but since we are both dietitians, we're interested in doing this through a food-first approach versus just another pill or medication," Ellis said. "If there are natural ingredients in this food that could be beneficial, why not try that first."
Study participants need to be postmenopausal African-American or European-American women ages 55 to 69 who do not smoke or have high blood pressure, diabetes, liver disease or kidney disease. The first four weeks will involve study participants drinking either 100 percent watermelon juice or a placebo twice a day.
At the end of the four weeks, there will be a two-week washout period where neither beverage is consumed. In the next four weeks, participants will drink the opposite of what they had in the beginning of the study. Vascular and blood measures will be assessed at the beginning and end of each four-week period. Participants are eligible for compensation up to $100.

Source:

University of Alabama

Chemical Test Quickly Finds Cognitive Damage in Stroke Patients

Knowing this really does no fucking good because there are NO stroke protocols to alleviate cognitive problems. At least not publicly available which is what our fucking failures of stroke associations should have available for us.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/chemical-test-quickly-finds-cognitive-damage-in-stroke-patients/?
A stroke happens when blood flow to the brain is interrupted and brain cells starve of oxygen. Aftereffects include muscle weakness and altered senses. In many cases, strokes also affect the way a patient thinks or processes information.
Quickly identifying the effects of a stroke helps doctors to tailor rehabilitation programs to the needs of a patient. Currently, structural neuroimaging and neuropsychological tests assess cognitive damage, but these take time and require the patient to be involved and compliant.
Now, a team led by Weizhong Wang and Xiaoying Bi from the Second Military Medical University in Shanghai has analysed metabolic changes following a stroke. The researchers were particularly interested in identifying changes related to post-stroke cognitive impairment. Bi explains that these changes may be ‘caused by inflammation, neurotoxicity or oxidative stress’ because of the stroke.
The team used paired ultra-high performance liquid chromatography and Q-TOF mass spectrometry to study serum samples from a control group, a post-stroke cognitively impaired group and a post-stroke non-cognitively impaired group of patients. Multivariate data analysis of the data set highlighted the different metabolic profiles of the groups and identified a wide range of metabolic changes.

To create a practical test, the team then used a regression model to pare down the metabolites to three that were simple to check for: glutamine—an amino acid; kynurenine—a metabolite of tryptophan; and lysoPC(18:2)—a lysophospholipid. These biomarkers can rapidly identify post-stroke cognitive impairment without actively involving the patient in the testing.
Peng Song, a specialist in neuro-analytical chemistry, from the Eastman Chemical Company in the US says the research signals the coming age of clinical metabolomics. ‘The finding paves the way for a better understanding of the molecular mechanisms and eventually, more effective treatment,’ he adds.
This article is reproduced with permission from Chemistry World. The article was first published on November 2, 2015.