Vitamin B1 (thiamine) megadosing can massively reduce fatigue, in many cases reversing it entirely.
(π§΅1/20)
This study was a small pilot study conducted about a decade ago.
Anywhere from 600-1500 mg of B1 was used, depending on the weight of the patient.
The results were stunning.
10/12 patients had a complete reversal of fatigue.
The other two saw reductions by 50% and 66%.
(2/20)
What was stunning about this study was that these people did not have thiamine (B1) deficiency,
yet they responded to thiamine megadoses as if they were.
This is likely because measuring the amount of B1 or its active metabolite, TPP, is not sufficient to tell if someone gets enough of it into their cells, where it exerts its effects.
(3/20)
They suggest that certain genetic abnormalities of the thiamine (B1) transporters can be an issue.
Even if thiamine is normal in the blood, that doesn't mean it gets into cells where it helps.
Megadosing circumvents this.
(4/20)
Another study showed similar benefits in stroke patients at 600 mg per day.
Keep in mind this is >100X the normal amount you'd get in your diet.
These people showed fatigue reductions by ~75%.
(5/20)
Once again, there was no overt thiamine deficiency, at least as it is classically defined.
It's vital to not judge blood tests at face value.
You need to understand what its measuring in the big picture.
(6/20)
Thiamine (B1) megadosing (600-1500 mg/day) cuts fatigue nearly in half.
Here it was in patients with MS, 75% of whom often struggle with fatigue.
Thiamine megadosing also improves fatigue (& pain) in fibromyalgia.
Fatigue down 56.4%.
Pain down 63.3%.
(9/20)
Once again, improvement with these massive thiamine doses did not depend on underlying deficiency.
Some patients did not report any improvement until the dose was upped to around 1500 mg per day!
(10/20)
Most of these are small studies or case reports, but more recent studies continue to show thiamine's prowess.
For example, a 2020 paper in people with IBD showed thiamine doses, anywhere from 600-1800 mg of thiamine HCl, had huge benefits for fatigue.
G1 here had B1 the first 4 weeks, then nothing, then placebo weeks 8-12
G2 had placebo the first 4, then nothing, then B1 weeks 8-12
You can see that when either group had thiamine, it resulted in huge benefits.
(11/20)
Another recent study showed lower doses of thiamine can help with fatigue as well.
However, at these lower doses (300 mg), people needed to take it for 6+ months in order to see a benefit.
This can be fast tracked with higher doses.
(12/20)
In fact, thiamine can mimic & outperform many of the benefits of exercise.
Here, a huge dose of TTFD, a form of B1 lowered:
β₯ Lactate - a driver of muscle fatigue and a sign of inefficient metabolism
β₯ Ammonia - a toxic byproduct of protein metabolism
People taking thiamine had similar performance in bicycle exercise as people literally training for it without thiamine.
(13/20)
Vitamin B1 (Thiamine) is so important because it helps churn out energy in cells.
Enzymes like:
β’ Pyruvate dehydrogenase β central in carb metabolism
β’ Ξ±-KG dehydrogenase β Krebs cycle (all nutrients)
β’ Transketolase β antioxidant + detox power
β’ BCKDC β breaks down BCAAs for energy
all require the activated form of vitamin B1 (TPP).
(14/20)
Thiamine most notably is important for GLUCOSE metabolism.
One of the most vital steps in the metabolism of glucose is the conversion of a molecule called pyruvate into acetyl-coA.
This conversion is needed to get the most energy (30-32 ATP vs 2-7 without) out of glucose.
If your mitochondria are only harvesting a fraction of their energy from the food you eat, of course you will feel low energy.
(15/20)
Thiamine (B1) dependent metabolic reactions are also vital for maintaining a good NAD+/NADH ratio, which is vitally important for allowing cells to continue to burn energy.
A new landmark study has shown that eating meat is actually protective against cancer.
(π§΅1/7)
This study was published last month in the journal of Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism.
There has been a lot of noise around the idea that animal protein can increase cancer and death risk, as one highly publicized studies from the 2014 suggested.
(2/7)
They used data from the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES III).
This dataset has people track their food, and also ensures its accuracy by administering 24 hour dietary recall surveys.
Unlike the previous 2014 study, they used the multivariate Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) method, which uses multiple 24 hour dietary recalls to better estimate the USUAL intake of people.
Previously, only single 24 hour dietary recalls were used, which is considerably less reliable since it's only measuring one day.
Thus, this study is considered to be the most statistically rigorous to date.
To understand nicotine's effects, we must understand a molecule called NAD+.
NAD+ essentially acts as energy currency - its "occupied" form is NADH.
The more NAD+ you have relative to NADH, the better your cells are at translating food energy into usable cellular energy, and the more food energy you are capable of turning into usable energy.
NAD+ is also important for activating certain enzymes involved in various protective processes, like antioxidant defenses and DNA repair.
In other words, it's a pretty big deal when it comes to health and aging.
NAD+ levels decline, as well as its relative ratio to NADH, in aging and disease.