Study finds exercise, sunlight treat Multiple Sclerosis

[MSUK]

A decade-long study into treating multiple sclerosis has found lifestyle changes can slow its progression and in some cases remove the symptoms.

Melbourne researchers found that a low saturated fat, plant-based diet, exercise, sunlight exposure and relaxation techniques can improve the health of sufferers.

Study leader Professor George Jelinek says those lifestyle approaches, along with drug treatment, can improve quality of life for those with MS by 20 per cent.

He says the finding is quite a breakthrough.... Read More - http://www.msrc.co.uk/index.cfm/fuseact ... ageid/1693

[cheerleader]

Here is the actual study, published in Neurological Sciences. These were participants in Dr. Jelinek's 5 day retreat who then went home and answered questionaires over an extended period, and had MSQOL and HRQOL evaluations.
http://www.springerlink.com/content/7534m81178534157/

[jam]

This may be more successful in rrms but it is a problem with ppms if u do not have the balance or energy. I have been to this retreat and did not find it helpful to me nor did the books he wrote. As he has rrms it is more centered around this. However u may be able to slow/halt disease progression if u are able to get in earlier enough.

Just my opinion.



Jam

[Rogan]

Here's another study confirming the above information.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/artic ... z2Sp2WFNIE

The study discusses sunlight's ability to unlock nitric oxide to widen the arteries.

"This implies it is UV radiation, not heat, which is responsible for the beneficial effects. The researchers believe sunlight unlocks nitric oxide stored in skin and widens arteries. Both effects lower blood pressure"

I wonder if it widens the viens too. This would be helpful with folks with CCSVI.

[CaveMan]

Couldn't find that particular study, but found these two Review/Opinion papers with same author outlining the process in a bit more detail, makes you wonder what other processes are mediated by sunlight and UV exposure:
http://eurheartj.oxfordjournals.org/con ... /1041.full
http://www.vitamindwiki.com/tiki-index. ... +June+2012

[cheerleader]

Thanks for that story, Rogan---
The connection of UV rays to nitric oxide production has been known for awhile. It makes sense when we look at the vascular connection to MS/CCSVI. I got interested in all of this with my endothelial studies. And yes, the NO affects the veins as well as arteries--but it's always the arteries that are studied. Here's a section from a note I wrote up on Facebook a couple of years ago.

Dr. Furchgott and the Discovery of Photorelaxation
I've been reading up on the effect of UV rays on the body, and I came back to the research of Nobel prize winning researcher, Dr. Robert F. Furchgott. He passed away in 2009, and his university keeps his web page online. Dr. Furchgott was a professor at SUNY Downstate in Brooklyn, NY---the same place where Dr. Sal Sclafani recently retired and where the first CCSVI conference was held in the US! Here's Dr. Furchgott's page--
http://www.downstate.edu/pharmacology/f ... hgott.html

Dr. Furchgott discovered the process of photorelaxation over 40 years ago. What he noted in the lab was that exposure to UV rays changed the endothelium, encouraging nitric oxide production and vasodilation of arteries. In 2009, before he passed, he stated the current working hypothesis--
"The present working hypothesis is that light photoactivates some material in the vascular smooth muscle, causing the release of some product which stimulates the guanylyl cyclase to produce cGMP. We are planning experiments to test this hypothesis. One possibility is that the vascular smooth muscle in vivo accumulates some "end pro" formed from the endothelium-derived nitric oxide, and that this product releases NO intracellularly when exposed to the proper wavelengths of light."

Photorelaxation and the Cardiovascular system
Research into the connection of blood pressure and cardiovascular disease in northern latitudes continues....and the connection appears to be that of nitric oxide and UV rays.
http://circres.ahajournals.org/cgi/cont ... 05/10/1031

Interestingly, mean systolic and diastolic pressures and the prevalence of hypertension vary throughout the world. Many data suggest a linear rise in blood pressure at increasing distances from the equator. Similarly, blood pressure is higher in winter than summer.3

sunshine/UV rays are good things, and need to be studied in more depth-
cheer

[Talisker]

A statistical study on subjective measurements. Yes eating well and using your body is good for you so why this study?

[Rogan]

Cheerleader,

Thanks for the links back to your older posts and the information on the research of Nobel Prize winning researcher, Dr. Robert F. Furchgott. I had read your posts on nitric oxide's relationship to vasodilatation but many times I have to read things twice for it to sink in.

This is a huge connection to me. And yes I know that correlation is not causation, but whenever I mention to folks with loved ones with MS that MS may be a vascular issue in their neck and brain they always come back and site the very strong statistical evidence that MS is a disease related to Vitamin D deficiencies and Northern Latitudes. Every time I don't really have a good answer to that correlation.

Perhaps the above statistical correlation is exactly true but it not just a Vitamin D problem but a lack of UV light that causes some folks go over that point of manageable partial vascular stenosis to becoming a sick person with MS.

Sunlight helps to open up your veins. MS may be a vascular disease. MS is more commonly found in sunlight deficient areas. Sounds plausible to me.

Oh, and thank you for that link to SUNY Downstate in Brooklyn, NY. I knew Dr. Sclafani had worked there but I had no idea of the breathed of practical deep useful research happening there. It sounds like a wonderful research institution. You have no idea how much I respect medical researchers.

[Talisker]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-e ... e-22433359

[cheerleader]

Cheerleader,

Thanks for the links back to your older posts and the information on the research of Nobel Prize winning researcher, Dr. Robert F. Furchgott. I had read your posts on nitric oxide's relationship to vasodilatation but many times I have to read things twice for it to sink in.

This is a huge connection to me. And yes I know that correlation is not causation, but whenever I mention to folks with loved ones with MS that MS may be a vascular issue in their neck and brain they always come back and site the very strong statistical evidence that MS is a disease related to Vitamin D deficiencies and Northern Latitudes. Every time I don't really have a good answer to that correlation.

You have no idea how much I respect medical researchers.

You and me, both, Rogan. It's these researchers, thinking outside the current paradigm, who are broadening our understanding of MS.

Here's a researcher who looked at UV rays and MS, using the EAE model. (Not my favorite model of the disease, but he learned some interesting things)--UV rays were able to suppress EAE, independent of vitamin D production.

For those who are interested and want to read more research, here's a fascinating paper on UV rays and MS by Dr. Hector DeLuca of the University of Wisconsin.
about the research: For more than 30 years, scientists have known that multiple sclerosis (MS) is much more common in higher latitudes than in the tropics. Because sunlight is more abundant near the equator, many researchers have wondered if the high levels of vitamin D engendered by sunlight could explain this unusual pattern of prevalence.

Vitamin D may reduce the symptoms of MS, says Hector DeLuca, Steenbock Research Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, but in a study published in PNAS this week, he and first author Bryan Becklund suggest that the ultraviolet portion of sunlight may play a bigger role than vitamin D in controlling MS.
Here's Dr. DeLuca and Dr. Beckland's full paper.
http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2010/ ... l.pdf+html