Russ's Grab-Bag Of Assorted PT Forum Goodness

[TheRuss]

Hmmm, what ramifications will that have for the brain? I BARELY understand what I'm reading here, you're background is a lot stronger than mine here.

I'm a bit fuzzy on the details myself. What I'm really looking for from these antihistamines is the ability to withstand a histamine dump in my brain without getting what feels like a hangover for the next week or so. Getting drowsy just before bed is a bonus.

[Kintanon]

Hmm. Hopefully it will work out for you.

[TheRuss]

Tentatively speaking, it appears to work better than nothing. I'll try to save it for emergencies if I can.

Also, for anyone who's curious about whether I'm still on the bastardized Anabolic Diet thing: I am, and it's not so bastardized now (I've started carb loading). I've been playing with different ways of visualizing the body composition changes, but that's tough, because they haven't really been that dramatic. I feel generally a bit smaller, and that's about it (numbers are literally all over the board). This is to be expected when one can't exercise, I guess.

[honesty]

I gave the anabolic diet up in the end. I was having problems eating the vast amount of food needed to get the required calories, the amount I was eating was making me feeling really bloated, and very much like puking when exercising, and finally I was feeling quite tired all the time. Now I'm off it I'm feeling a lot better. I did loose body fat when on it though.

[TheRuss]

I gave the anabolic diet up in the end. I was having problems eating the vast amount of food needed to get the required calories, the amount I was eating was making me feeling really bloated, and very much like puking when exercising, and finally I was feeling quite tired all the time. Now I'm off it I'm feeling a lot better. I did loose body fat when on it though.

Never had a problem with volume (although to be fair, I did just eat 998g minus bone of pork shoulder blade steak in a sitting). What exactly were you trying to eat?

[Kintanon]

Have you thought about trying a Paleolithic diet? I've heard of many much good results from it.

[TheRuss]

Have you thought about trying a Paleolithic diet? I've heard of many much good results from it.

Jack Rusher has spoken very highly of it, but I don't think I'll have much success on any diet until and unless I have the option of exercise to go along with it. I'll see if I've got any reading material for it around.

And now, random stuff from the last month or two:

... The JAMA study looked into how well this is working out. Its authors searched PubMed for papers published in 2008 that described the results of a randomized clinical trial in one of three fields: cardiology, rheumatology, and gastroenterology. In many cases, the publications included information on the trial's registration. If they didn't, the authors of the paper were contacted and, if that failed, the details were plugged into a variety of national and international trial registration sites in an attempt to identify it.

Right away, they ran into problems. Of the 323 published trials that they identified, a full 89 (27 percent) hadn't been registered at all, as far as the authors could tell. Another 39 had been registered, but had a result, termed a primary outcome, that was too vague. "For example, 'blood pressure' is not a clearly specified outcome," the authors note. "Ideally, we sought an unambiguous definition (e.g., change in systolic pressure from baseline at 12 months)." Three of the trials were actually registered only after the study had been completed.

That left them with only about half of the initially identified studies to work with. But, even here, there were notable problems. In 46 cases, the trial was registered with a primary outcome that wasn't the same as the one described in the publication. So, for example, 15 of them published results that never mentioned the primary outcome that the trial was intended to study. In other cases, the intended primary outcome was demoted to a secondary result, or a planned secondary outcome became the primary focus of the eventual publication.

Looking at why these changes occurred, the researchers found that the shift generally happened because the results from the planned focus weren't statistically significant; the ones that replaced them were. So, there's still a publication bias towards positive results, but it's a matter of a change in emphasis within a publication....

-Ars Technica, referring to Mathieu et al., "Comparison of Registered and Published Primary Outcomes in Randomized Controlled Trials"

We conclude that even a minor grazing injury of the skull, in the absence of penetrating brain injury or concussion, can activate dural mast cells and elevate cortical histamine, a novel mechanism with potential contributions to neurotraumatic complications arising from a relatively minor or grazing head wound.

-Stokely and Orr, "Acute effects of calvarial damage on dural mast cells, pial vascular permeability, and cerebral cortical histamine levels in rats and mice."

PRIMARY OBJECTIVE: We assess the potential of a panel of serum biomarkers to identify chronic neuronal injury in amateur boxers as compared to healthy controls without any history of head trauma.

RESEARCH DESIGN: Observational case-control study.

METHODS AND PROCEDURES: A panel of serum biomarkers was measured by a novel biochip array technique on the Evidence Investigator. Serum samples were taken after a 2-month period of nonparticipation in boxing.

MAIN OUTCOMES AND RESULTS: Boxers had higher serum levels of neuron-specific enolase (NSE, median [range] 11 [2.3-41] ng/mL) than controls (4.8 [0.78-27] ng/mL, p = 0.014) but unchanged levels of the other brain damage biomarker candidates, S-100B, brain-derived neurotrophic factor and heart-type fatty acid binding protein.

CONCLUSIONS: The more than doubled median serum level of NSE in boxers after an extended resting period suggests that repetitive head trauma results in sustained release of this brain-specific protein to the peripheral circulation.

-Zetterberg et al., "Sustained release of neuron-specific enolase to serum in amateur boxers."

When protein, carbohydrate and lipid digestions are considered successively, it is clear that the enzymes involved adapt to any change in substrate intake. For instance, when the amount of starch intake increases, the specific activity of pancreatic amylase is stimulated. At the same time, augmenting the disaccharide level leads to an increase in specific disaccharidase activity, and the absorption rate of some simple hydrolytic products, such as fructose, increases. It thus appears that altering the amount of starch intake leads to a parallel change in the activity of all the enzymes involved in the sequential hydrolysis of the dietary carbohydrates. The second part of the paper discusses the physiological significance of this adaptation in terms of utility to the animal. Two situations are considered in which (i) the nutritional requirements are supplied by food or (ii) they are not supplied either because of a dietary or an enzyme deficiency. When the nutritional requirements, particularly that of protein, are met, adaptation is apparently not useful to the animal. Nevertheless, the role of this adaptation on the hydrolysis rate of different substrates can be supposed. When nutritional requirements are not met, some data show that enzyme adaptation may be advantageous to the animal.

-Corring, "The adaptation of digestive enzymes to the diet: its physiological significance."

[honesty]

Interesting article on vitamin D over on T Nation, probably worth a look...

[Robstafarian]

Seeing the new posts to this thread in my user CP reminded me that I never posted my big news here. In short, supplementation of creatine ethyl ester has cured my chronic fatigue. My intake is 1.5g daily (in capsule form), with 3g daily when I wake up early enough to have a morning dose. Today marks the beginning of my third week on this regimen, and my fatigue has never returned.

My sleep schedule has stabilized such that it only remains for me to go to bed at midnight instead of 3AM. I became so accustomed to being kept up late, and not going to bed until I felt dead, that it's been quite difficult to notice "I could sleep now" before 2AM.

Another notable observation is that my body is building a considerable amount of muscle, apparently due to the creatine supplementation. It is as though my body now has "muscle fuel" which has always been lacking, thus my muscle spasms and balance problems form something of an automatic exercise routine. Never before have I had abdominal muscles like I have now; going upstairs is surreal! I suppose we (my parents, my doctors, and I) should have realized decades ago that there was a systemic problem; the customary "work makes muscles stronger" paradigm has never applied to me nearly so much as "work makes fatigue."

[Kintanon]

Congrats on your progress Rob! Glad to hear it.

Russ: How are the anti-histamines working out? Are you still trying to keep them as emergency only options or have you decided to move to a regular dosing?