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Pain Relief
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D,L-PHENYLALANINE AND
VITAMIN C:
TWO
DRUG-FREE APPROACHES TO CHRONIC PAIN
There are an almost uncountable number
of brands of pain relievers on the medical market. Were
pain due to a drug deficiency, they might have more to offer.
I am not in favor of
pain except as a warning. Pain is often our wake-up call to action, when
our bodies need to get a message to and an effective response from our busy
brain. As protests on the Capitol Mall get the attention of lawmakers in
Washington
(sometimes, anyway), so does pain act as the squeaky wheel demanding
grease.
Putting in earplugs
does not fix a squeaky wheel. The best pain relief will help cure the
cause of pain. At the very least, we want the hurt to go away
temporarily without harmful side effects. So we have therapeutic value
and safety as benchmarks for pain relief.
Here are two
alternatives to pharmaceutical products: vitamin C and D,L-Phenylalanine.
VITAMIN C (Ascorbic Acid) ANALGESIA
At high intake
levels, Vitamin C is known to reduce inflammation and act to as a natural
antibiotic and antihistamine. These properties are surprising enough to many, but one of the biggest surprises ever occurred
during the 1970's in Scotland
at the Vale of Leven Hospital. There, Ewan
Cameron, M.D. was giving ten grams (10,000 milligrams) of vitamin C
intravenously each day to terminally ill cancer patients. The study was
about vitamin C and cancer, but the unexpected finding was in pain
relief.
In Great Britain at the time, it was
policy to provide terminal patients with any and all pain relief available,
including addictive narcotics such as heroin. The argument was simply
that if one were dying anyway, a drug's analgesic value outweighs any
drawbacks such as dependency. Dr. Cameron and Dr. Linus Pauling wrote in Cancer
and Vitamin C (1981; revised 1993):
“Cameron
and Baird reported (in 1973) that the first five ascorbate-treated patients
who had been receiving large doses of morphine or heroin to control pain were
taken off these drugs a few days after the treatment with vitamin C was
begun, because the vitamin C seemed to
diminish the pain to such an extent that the drug was not needed. Moreover,
none of these patients asked that the morphine or heroin be given to them-
they seemed not to experience any serious withdrawal signs or symptoms.”
(page xii)
Any vitamin that
approaches the pain relieving power of morphine or heroin must be considered
some kind of analgesic indeed. The fact that 13 out of 100 terminally
ill cancer patients given vitamin C were still alive and apparently free of
cancer after five years is some kind of miracle.
Although quite a lot
of vitamin C is needed for results, it is a remarkably safe and rather simple
therapy. Additional information will be found in Dr. Cameron's "Protocol
for the Use of Intravenous Vitamin C in the Treatment of Cancer," (click here to read it)
and in the many vitamin C articles posted at this website (and easily found
with a quick website search from the www.doctoryourself.com
mainpage.)
D- or
DL-PHENYLALANINE
Unlike
left-handed, essential L-Phenylalanine, the D- or "right-handed"
form of this common amino acid is not actually a nutrient but an amino acid
analgesic. It is non-prescription but is rather costly for an effective
dose. Practitioners using DLPA (Dextro-Levo-Phenyl-Alanine)
normally employ it for chronic pain that is unresponsive to other
measures. Arthritis or lower back pain would be examples. While no
substitute for medical or chiropractic care, DLPA may well be a most suitable
companion.
The dose of DLPA
needed may vary from person to person, and is generally determined by
starting with perhaps 1,000 mg daily for two weeks and then gradually
increasing to a level that provides relief. If 3,000 mg per day doesn't
work after a month's time, it probably will not work at all. About
two-thirds of those using it will report real improvement in this time.
If they don't, then stop. There is no point in wasting money.
For this stuff is not
cheap. Tablet potency is commonly around 300 to 500 mg, so a person might
well need to take quite a few each day. I used to think that DLPA was way too
pricey until I saw a few prescriptions where the pills cost several dollars
apiece (and this was over a decade ago, long before the even more expensive
"Viagra").
The good news is that
persons reporting pain relief will generally be able to LOWER their dose
gradually and will often be able to maintain pain-free status with less DLPA
than before. It is a bit unusual for an analgesic substance to work
BETTER over time and require LESS; the opposite is the rule. (Consider
morphine, for instance.) DLPA has a long duration of action yet the body
does not seem to build up a tolerance to it.
You will probably not
find just "D-phenylalanine" for sale, hence the focus here on
DLPA. It is the D-form that is active; you CANNOT therefore substitute
the levo- ("L") form that is so widely
found, at far lower cost, in foods and stores. The "L" form will
not work. If the bottle does not specifically state its contents as
"DL," you can be certain they are just trying to sell you the
useless "L" form.
Our earlier criteria
for natural pain relievers included safety and healing value. The safety of
DLPA is very good indeed. It is non-addictive and virtually non-toxic.
Some estimates place its safety on a par with vitamin C or fructose. Still,
it is not to be used during pregnancy. Persons with phenylketonuria
(PKU) obviously should not take any extra phenylalanine. Persons with
high blood pressure should take DLPA after meals. Outside of these,
there are virtually no adverse effects.
Added value may come
from the fact that phenylalanine is converted by the body into phenylethylamine. Low levels of phenylethylamine
are correlated with clinical depression; if DLPA raises these levels there is
a real biochemical benefit. As a pain-killer, it seems to act by keeping
enzymes called enkephalinase and carboxypeptidase A from breaking down the body's own
morphine-like natural painkillers, the enkephalins
and the endorphins. This makes a lot of sense: if the body relieves its
own pain, a safe mechanism is probably at work. DLPA appears to assist
that mechanism.
Research has
indicated that migraine, joint pains, neuralgia and even postoperative pain
respond to DLPA, and it has been reported to reduce inflammation. DLPA
does not deaden normal sensation even when taken for a lengthy period. Prescribed
medication usually may still be taken with DLPA without interference. Consult
the Physician's Desk Reference ("PDR", found at any doctor's
office, pharmacy, or library) for information on any drug you may be taking
or considering.
The most dramatic
pain-relief case I have seen was when a friend of mine had a large number of
old dental fillings replaced within a short period of time. As a result, he
experienced ongoing and severe jaw pain that no pharmaceutical pain-killer
could touch, and the dentist tried them all. In desperation, my friend tried
DLPA, about 3,000 mg/day. He reported immediate improvement, and truly
profound relief shortly thereafter.
REFERENCES ON D,L-PHENYLALANINE:
1. Balagot, R.C., Ehrenpreis, S.,
Greenberg, J. and Hyodo, M., "D-Phenylalanine
in Human Chronic Pain," Degradation of Endogenous Opioids:
Its Relevance in Human Pathology and Therapy, S.
Ehrenpreis and Sicuteri,
eds. New York:
Raven Press, 1983
2. Balagot, R.C., Ehrenpreis, S.,
Kubota, K. and Greenberg, J., Advances in Pain Research and Therapy, Vol. 5, Bonica, Liebeskind and Albe-Fessard,
ed., pp 289-293, New York:
Raven Press, 1983
3. Beckman, H. et al,
"DL Phenylalanine in Depressed Patients: An Open Study," Journal of
Neural Transmission, 41:123-134, 1977
4. Budd, K. "Use
of D-Phenylalanine, an Enkephalinase Inhibitor, in
the Treatment of Intractable Pain," Advances in Pain Research and
Therapy, Vol. 5, Bonica,
Liebeskind and Albe-Fessard,
ed., pp 305-308, New York:
Raven Press, 1983
5. Ehrenpreis, S., Balagot, R.C., Comaty, J.E. and Myles, S.B. "Naloxone
Reversible Analgesia in Mice Produced by D-Phenylalanine and Hydrocinnamic Acid, Inhibitors of Carboxypeptidase
A," Advances in Pain Research and Therapy, Vol. 3, Bonica,
Liebeskind and Albe-Fessard,
ed., pp 479-488, New York: Raven Press, 1978
6. Ehrenpreis, S., Balagot, R.C.,
Myles, S., Advocate, C. and Comaty, J.E.
"Further Studies on the Analgesic Activity of D-Phenylalanine in Mice
and Humans," Proceedings of the International Narcotic Research
Club Convention, E. L. Way, ed., pp 379-382, 1979
7. Heller, B.
"Pharmacological and Clinical Effects of D-Phenylalanine in Depression
and Parkinson's Disease," in Modern Pharmacology-Toxicology, Noncatecolic Phenylethylamines,
Part 1, A.D. Mosnaim and M.E. Wolf, eds., pp
397-417, New York: Marcel Dekker, 1978
8. Sabelli, H.C. and Mosnaim, A.D.
"Phenylethylamine Hypothesis of Affective Behavior," American
Journal of Psychiatry, 131:695, 1974
Copyright 2007, 2004 and
prior years by Andrew Saul.
Andrew Saul is the author
of the books FIRE YOUR DOCTOR! How to be
Independently Healthy (reader reviews at http://www.doctoryourself.com/review.html
) and DOCTOR YOURSELF: Natural Healing that Works. (reviewed at http://www.doctoryourself.com/saulbooks.html
)
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