517 replies to this topic

[xxxxxxxx]

"The researchers were not able to detect effects of collagen on the functioning of the joint." -your link

 

[Danail Bulgaria]

If you believe, that something can help you, and if it is harmless, use it.

Some symptoms can be reduced even by the placebo effect. Especially if they are pain related.

The hit in the (near) future I think will be a lab grown cartilage, transplanted where it has to be.

[sthira]

When they do finally work out how to grow robust cartilage (rather than scar tissue posing as if...) inside your body this will be very big news indeed. You'll hear about it loudly and clearly. I think I read that in the US alone nearly a million (knee) scopes are performed every year? I know many dancers whose careers are wrecked by one wrong landing followed by ripped cartilage. If we could take collagen supplements to regrow the precious stuff then we'd all be doing just that. Placebo doesn't work when your leg is broken and you try to use it to propel the rest of your body up and out. Ha. Trust me.

Edited by sthira, 03 November 2015 - 09:44 PM.

[aconita]

Cartilage may be able to heal and to a certain extent to regenerate, given a favorable environment that include proper rehab, supplements/nutrients and medical care but outcomes are slow and uncertain.

 

There are several studies showing cartilage healing but the scarce reliability of the outcome leads the medical community to state that it is not officially possible to do yet, that doesn't mean it can't happen but rather that one can't be 100% sure it will (probably not even 60% for that matter).

 

Not a good reason to give up hope and to not try whatever may help.

 

Cartilage implants mat be a possibility but a very primitive way of fixing things, not the real future in my personal opinion.

 

Controlled grow factors release sounds smarter and more elegant to me.

[sthira]

Cartilage may be able to heal and to a certain extent to regenerate, given a favorable environment that include proper rehab, supplements/nutrients and medical care but outcomes are slow and uncertain.

There are several studies showing cartilage healing but the scarce reliability of the outcome leads the medical community to state that it is not officially possible to do yet, that doesn't mean it can't happen but rather that one can't be 100% sure it will (probably not even 60% for that matter).

Not a good reason to give up hope and to not try whatever may help.

Cartilage implants mat be a possibility but a very primitive way of fixing things, not the real future in my personal opinion.

Controlled grow factors release sounds smarter and more elegant to me.

I think you're mostly right. Some cartilage, particularly that cartilage that receives blood flow (the lucky "red zone") may indeed "regrow." And that regrowth may sometimes be reflected back in imaging like cat scans. But in my case (and everyone's different) the regrowth isn't nearly as strong, and I feel it, it's "less than", and so I'm told the minor regrowth may be scar tissue only. The body does its best, but scar tissue really isn't good enough for robust regeneration.

And I think there are psychological and neurological components to repair. Sometimes people get meniscus transplants, and yet pain remains, instabilities remain, weakness remains, and some report transplants are even worse than doing nothing. This is why repairing cartilage remains a medical challenge.

I agree with you that a more elegant solution to regrowing damaged cartilage may happen partly through controlled growth factors (timed proteins, as Meowmixe said earlier). But I think for now the future seems to point toward some sort of combo of scaffolds seeded with proteins, and then reinserted. Those injured will have scans of both knees sent to a mold shop. But I wonder about the 3D modeling of the scaffold. My understanding (wrt to knee meniscus repair efforts) is they mold a scaffold of your intact, healthy knee (say the left is injured, the right is in tact -- they copy the right side, create a scaffold based on those dimensions, then seed it, and it's implanted). But aren't the left side of the body and the right side of the body naturally uneven? I mean, no one is perfectly symmetrical, so I guess just copying the good side is "good enough..."?

[aconita]

Surgical interventions are always a bet, I have seen too many arthroscopes worsening the overall condition.

 

In my opinion a surgical intervention has always to be the last choice when everything else failed or quality of life is so degraded it can't be much worse.

 

Implanting new cartilage is surely enough better than cutting a knee off and replacing it with an artificial one...but if the conditions are not as bad I will hold on and try something else before, by the way I heard of fractured meniscus healed amazingly well by traditional Chinese medicine (acupuncture mainly but not only).

 

As a doctor I know once said humans are not meant to be opened and closed up in order to be fixed, otherwise we would have been provided with zips. 

[Logic]

I must have been... 'lucky' with my knees coming right in 2 weeks with Gelatine, HGW, Coconut Oil,  Astragalus, Vit C, Olive leaf extract.
Maybe it was all placebo effect...  (Except for the OLE as I was not aware of its potential at the time.)  YMMV  
 
http://www.longecity...ndpost&p=711410
 
http://www.longecity...ndpost&p=558918
 
http://www.longecity...-pain-patients/
 
 
 
New, and supportive of the above, info:
...the present observations are the first to report that autocrine activation of IGF-1 gene expression in target tissues is a possible solution to these problems. We confirmed in human cartilage explants what has been observed in other tissues that pro-inflammatory cytokines silence IGF-1 production [32,33,36]. In the present case this was achieved with IL-1β, a major determinant of chondrocyte activation and cartilage destruction [3,4,34,59]. However, this is the first report that IGF-1 production can be maintained in the face of these otherwise completely suppressive signals.
The ability of RNI 249, alone and in combination with vincaria, to maintain IGF-1 levels despite the presence of IL-1β has the potential to not only limit cartilage destruction, as was confirmed here with blockade of GAG release, but also to evoke anabolic actions and repair the joint....
http://pubmedcentral...les/PMC1456997/

NB the in vivo studies referenced too

Edited by Logic, 05 November 2015 - 09:03 AM.

[Danail Bulgaria]

When they do finally work out how to grow robust cartilage (rather than scar tissue posing as if...) inside your body this will be very big news indeed. You'll hear about it loudly and clearly. I think I read that in the US alone nearly a million (knee) scopes are performed every year? I know many dancers whose careers are wrecked by one wrong landing followed by ripped cartilage. If we could take collagen supplements to regrow the precious stuff then we'd all be doing just that. Placebo doesn't work when your leg is broken and you try to use it to propel the rest of your body up and out. Ha. Trust me.

 

I think we are talking about damaged cartilages, not about broken legs. 

 

In God I trust Everybody else has to prove me his concept

 

Edited by seivtcho, 05 November 2015 - 09:19 AM.

[Danail Bulgaria]

....

 

Cartilage implants mat be a possibility but a very primitive way of fixing things, not the real future in my personal opinion.

 

.... 

 

It will be the biggest breakthrough in chronic cartilage damages. It will allow full rejuvenation to a previous healthy state of the joint. 

[Maxpower]

So, given what we have learned about Collegen not realy getting from the blood stream into the cartilage, does this mean Glucosomine, Chondroitin and Natural Eggshell Membrane are also likely not able to repair damaged cartilage ?

[aconita]

There is a stronger positive evidence for collagen to improve knee osteoarthritis than for glucosamine sulfate and chondroitin where there are both positive and no different from placebo evidences almost 50/50.

 

The fact that there is no blood supply should not lead to the conclusion that nothing can get there, it is not as simple, there are other ways for the body to deal with that, it is just that some parts are not meant to regenerate too fast or as fast as others and even if it may sound like a fault probably it is not, to assume we know better is not a smart attitude.

 

When a cartilage or a tendon needs repair the lack of blood supply plays indeed a negative role because things gets a bit more tricky but let not jump to the conclusion that nothing can be done to at least create a favorable environment.

 

Our body is way smarter than we think.

 

[sthira]

The fact that there is no blood supply should not lead to the conclusion that nothing can get there, it is not as simple, there are other ways for the body to deal with that, it is just that some parts are not meant to regenerate too fast or as fast as others and even if it may sound like a fault probably it is not, to assume we know better is not a smart attitude.

Interesting. Thank you for the information. What do you consider the other ways that nutrients may get into avascular cartilage sites if not by blood? Do you mean viscosupplementation injections? Or gene therapy?

[aconita]

As already posted this is one explanation:

 

"Cartilage does not contain blood vessels (avascular) or nerves (aneural). The chondrocytes are supplied by diffusion. The compression of the articular cartilage or flexion of the elastic cartilage generates the pumping action, which assists the diffusion to the chondrocytes. Compared to other connective tissues, cartilage has a very slow turnover and is not easy to repair."

 

https://en.wikipedia.../wiki/Cartilage

 

Obviously there is a way for nutrients to get in avascular parts of the body since even those parts do regenerate (turnover), maybe slowly but they do.

 

You don't have the same cartilages in your knees as when you where born, we don't need a double blind research to state that, I guess normal commonsense will suffice.

 

Apart from injuries the worn out cartilage is probably cause of genetics and/or nutrients and lifestyle, the turnover is not fast enough to compensate the everyday worn out from use.   

 

The question may be about how to speed up the mechanism in order to achieve a satisfactory regeneration when cartilages are worn out or damaged by an injury, my personal first choice would be to provide the best environment possible by supplements, nutrition and rehab, these hardly will cause any arm.

 

PRP, ozone and hyaluronic acid injections, traditional Chinese medicine, etc... may help too or in same cases be the solution.

 

Hyaluronic acid is long known but only very recently research focused on it, we don't know that much about all its possibilities yet, for example cross linked hyaluronic acid is used to fill wrinkles, sagging skin, receding gums and worn out joints.

 

Cross linking means folding it in such a way that a very very high molecular weight is achieved, that is desirable because other ways hyaluronase (the enzyme responsible for degrading HA) will wipe it out in a matter of few ours, actually if you inject normal HA in a wrinkle the effect subside in no time and it is totally worthless.

 

Cross linked HA may last as long as 1 year (it depends from the site of application and by the subject), good but still a pain in the neck because it is fairly expensive and every year or so needs a new shot, on top of that cross linked HA is not a "natural" form of HA and has its own downsides, it may be rare but can cause long term adverse reactions not really desirable.

 

Research is going on to inhibit hyaluronase instead, that implicate shooting normal HA and having it last (or even saving your own).

 

I am confident in the near future some interesting development may open new ways to deal with cartilage damages or losses.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[sthira]

Surgical interventions are always a bet, I have seen too many arthroscopes worsening the overall condition.

I guess we should ask -- worsens the overall condition compared to what? An arthroscopy is worse than leaving a flap of damaged cartilage? That dead tissue now gets trapped between bones and causes even more grief. Just leave it there and it'll heal with collagen supplements. Aw man.

Arthroscopies can definitely work to relieve pain and suffering. But the damaged area may never be the same again. There may be increased instability, effusion, weakness, and surgery may send you down a straighter road to future osteoarthritis. But so will doing nothing once you're injured.

I'm aware of a study indicating that knee scopes were no better than placebo. Yet millions of them are performed on injured people every year. And they change lives forever. But what are the options? Millions of people are suffering, yet there are no other options. And to me the case of the knee arthroscope seems similar to the case of rejuvenation medicine in general. That is, a huge, lucrative need for new technology is right here... And yet? Yet we're waiting for the very slow science that just keeps promising new solutions coming soon. Within five years.

What are the hang ups?

...by the way I heard of fractured meniscus healed amazingly well by traditional Chinese medicine (acupuncture mainly but not only).

Oh gosh, I so very much wanted acupuncture to work to regrow my damaged cartilage. I gave the alternatives to surgery -- rehab, PT, acupuncture, supplement galore, knee braces -- I gave these alternatives two years before finally submitting to the scope. Oh... What a mistake I made. So by the time I finally gave up and submitted to the 20-minute scope, my tear had both deepened, widened, worsened, blah bleh, "I told you so," the people said.

To say acupuncture is a cure to a split cartilage is really a cruel tease. If that worked -- like collagen supplements -- that's what all would be doing, and we'd be healing.

[sthira]

PRP, ozone and hyaluronic acid injections, traditional Chinese medicine, etc... may help too or in same cases be the solution.

The issue with PRP injections (which sound good on paper, like that should work) is that it's hit or miss. The injected solutions don't stay at the injury site. They're not that smart. They drift away into body oblivion, and go with the flow. The blood flow. Same story with stem cell injections. Sounds great! Doesn't work :-( If stem cell injections stayed at the injury site, maybe they'd help to regrow avascular cartilage. So how to force stem cells or healing nutrients like PRP, HA, collagen, whatever to just sit still and do their damned jobs? My understanding is that's what scaffolds are designed to do.

I am confident in the near future some interesting development may open new ways to deal with cartilage damages or losses.

Thanks for your confidence. I've been going on that same confidence for four years now, almost five. Some hurt people endure their entire lives suffering and waiting. We're told to just live with it. And bad things happen when it becomes painful to move. You stop moving. And then you sometimes fall apart. Depression, hopelessness, loss of a career in my case... So staying in hopeful in the face of more and more promises becomes a real challenge. Imagine every step you take is in pain? Cherish your under appreciated cartilage, folks, that's what I'm saying.

[aconita]

As I stated it is a matter of how bad the quality of life is, too often surgical procedures are done when there is no real need and the outcomes are uncertain (but it is not the surgeon that has to live the rest of his life with an irremediably damaged joint because of the outcome of the procedure).

 

Of course if the issue is such that life quality is really bad and/or not providing with what it can be done will likely cause a worsening or even compromising the future positive out coming it will be commonsense to make a choice even if is not the most wished.

 

Not every case is the same, you can't just state things as general rules according to your particular experience.

 

My uncle (my mother's brother) for some reasons was very trusty in the capabilities of a surgeon specialized in knee prosthesis, my uncle was diabetic and WAY overweight, at a certain point of his life he had some knee cartilage issues (guess why) and promptly got both knees replaced: he lived in pain since his death.

 

He was such a believer that the constant pain didn't stop him to insist my mother to have a consult with his surgeon about a swelling knee, promptly the surgeon stated that my mother needed immediate knee replacement too, so bad was her knee cartilage according to his diagnosis.

 

My mother had no pain at all, only a swelling knee, I suggested her to wait and maybe see another doctor first, which she did.

 

The other doctor is a professor famous for his knowledge about knees, he syringed out fluid from her knee twice, the first time stating that knee didn't need any replacement at all, the second time after checking a new MRI stated the situation worsened so bad it was out of comprehension how my mother still managed to stay on her feet.

 

A few years are gone by since, my mother did nothing, no supplements, non drugs, no rehab, she is almost 80 and absolutely fine, she walks around, go shopping, etc...totally pain free (she doesn't drive never had a license).

 

Would a total knee replacement have been a smart choice?

 

I don't think so, even if the MRI showed supposedly very little knee cartilage left.

 

The take home message here is to be cautious before jumping on the surgical solution bandwagon, if life quality is OK don't do something you may regret for the rest of your life.

 

I guess nobody here is willing to ear my personal history of a due shoulder arthroscopy "because it is the only thing we really can do" of some 15 years ago, which of course I didn't do and didn't stop me from boxing and weightlifting heavy totally painless since (and still going strong).

 

Traditional Chinese medicine unfortunately is a bandwagon on which many jumped on in order to make easy money, it is VERY difficult to find a good traditional Chinese medicine doctor, most just did at best a 4 weekend course of acupuncture which is not what traditional Chinese medicine is about.

 

I am not claiming that TCM is able to regrow cartilages, I just say that there is evidence of fractured meniscus perfectly healed by TCM therapies, I don't know if it will work for everybody, for any cartilage issue or if performed by any TCM doctor (weird enough there are good and less good legitimate TCM doctors too like in western medicine ).

 

You are perfectly right about PRP, I had a quite interesting talk with a university hospital doctor who use it about that issue, it doesn't stay there long (not because of the blood flow that is not really there in an avascular structure but because once the growing factors are delivered that's it, one hit and go, not enough to make a dent) and to keep injecting it is not feasible in the long run, a controlled slow release system is under research but it is not easy since continuous growing factors release may mean...cancer!

 

HA is a whole different matter since the kind injected in joints is cross linked and will stay there for quite a while, but it seems to ease the pain and function of the joint only til is there, once gone the issue is still back to square one.

 

Scaffolds work nice in some structures but are not really feasible in others, in a load bearing joint like a knee scaffolding may be tricky for a couple of reasons that comes to mind: scaffolds are usually not able to bear loads by themselves and there is still the issue of the avascular structure that doesn't allow a fast growing on the scaffold.

 

What they do is to take some of your chondrocytes, place them in a culture that grows them enough to achieve a big enough piece of cartilage and implant that where it belongs, better than a total knee replacement for sure but it doesn't guarantee pain free and smooth functionality either, actually it is not even sure it stays there very long.

 

Of course I am sorry for your struggle and I fully understand your frustration but as an old doctor friend of mine once said " they do all sort of incredible things, new technologies, etc...but how come that when is your turn you just get a we are sorry, not much that can be done in your case?"  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

[ironfistx]

 

 

There are several studies showing cartilage healing

 

Lists?
 

[aconita]

Here some osteoarthritis related researches, not exhaustive or representative by any means but still interesting surprises like melatonin or acetyl carnitine, impact exercise or heat, traditional Chinese medicine, etc...a couple of collagen related researches included too (there are much more, of course, but if really interested searching in pubmed is something anybody can do by himself )    

 

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/26417696

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/25668399

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/25667638

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/25187798

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/25176272

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/24852756

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/20401752

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/22486722

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/15077933

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/24816289

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/24786526

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/25792904

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/24153020

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/18208600

http://www.ncbi.nlm....pubmed/20444013

 

 

[Danail Bulgaria]

From all what you say guys, I get the impression, that nothing from the therapies today works in weared off cartilage.

 

I wonder why. If the problem is the joint, then replacing the entire joint should stop the pains. Why people would have pain after a total joint replacement? One thing is certain - the metal artificial joint has no pain receptors.

 

Stem cells can make the cartilage outside the body, growing on the scafold in a lab. Then the ready cartilage should be possible to be transplanted in the joint. Do you think,that replacing the cartilage only, not the entire joint will solve the problem with the weared off cartilage?

[aconita]

In medicine there is nothing 100%, it is always a matter of percentages, some issues can be managed with better percentages of success than others, percentages of success do change for better as research progresses.

 

Regrowing joints' cartilages doesn't hold high percentages of success yet, that doesn't mean that nothing works but rather that it depends and that the outcomes are still uncertain.

 

Cartilage doesn't have nerves therefore should not be painful...but all the surroundings do have nerves and it does get painful enough when cartilage wears off, an artificial joint has no nerves but...it does get painful (even if definitely better than a wheelchair).

 

It is what is already a procedure but it is not as simple to achieve a satisfactory result.

 

The cause of chondrocytes dead is usually inflammation, if the cause is not removed the graft will be short lived.

 

The graft is not like your own cartilage even if it comes from a culture of your chondrocytes therefore doesn't behave as nicely.

 

Joints are very delicate structures, going inside to mess around is unlikely to be desirable.

 

The human body is not a machine, it is way more complicated than that and fixing it as it is done for machines is primitive and doesn't usually yields satisfactory results,....well... it all depends about what satisfactory is relatively to the alternatives too.  

[Danail Bulgaria]

Maybe the artifitial joints are the final solution when your joints are totally screwed.

 

And there are no pain receptors in them. Why they make you feel pain then? If you ask me, what hurts will appear to be the bone where the artifitial joint is attached to. If you are with weaker bones and overweight, then you may be hurting the bones where the joint is attached to. This may explain why your overweight father had pains even with the artifitial joint, and your slim mother didnt have pain even with severely weared off cartilage.

 

Everything is relative, ofcourse. Including the individual perception of pain.

 

There should be different reasons for destruction of the cartilage. If you ask me, the reason for wearing off the cartilage from the aging (while the time goes by) is as simple as wear and tear, that overwhelmed the body's abilities to recover. The overwhelming the recovery ability and the filing away of the cartilage is on the same way as the great canyon was made - not with a single blunt force, but with constant and continuous filing away little by little. If you have a normal aging, the new cartilage is the best slution. If you have arthritis, it is the solution after healing the inflammation.

 

Why do you think, that the graft will not be like our own cartilage?  It will be the same DNA - no attack against it from the natural defense systems. Cartilage as cartilage. It should work.

[aconita]

Cartilage is subject to wear off from use and turnover should keep things in balance as it does in all body parts, turnover is a very delicate process, too much is a tumor, too little is "aging".

 

Probably everybody experiences a thinning in the cartilages to a certain degree as grows old but not everybody ends up with osteoarthritis, that's because if everything works as it should wear will be counteracted by turnover.

 

Nutrients and lifestyle do play a role and we can manipulate those, other factors as of genetic nature are a bit more tricky to control and there are other causes for cartilage issues too as sport injuries, for example.

 

In my opinion when a surgical procedure takes place there are inevitably damages done to surrounding tissues, good surgeons will likely do less of them as arthroscopic procedures tends to but still damages are impossible to be completely avoided.

 

When performed in certain location of the body those issues may be of a more acceptable nature but in delicate structures like joints a surgical procedure is unlikely to be issue free.

 

Artificial reconstruction of body parts even if performed with autologous  tissues will never be as your own because shape and size will be different and impossible to reproduce exactly, place on top of that the damages done to the surrounding tissues and the outcome will be less than ideal at best.

 

As an example because of an accident I undergone a surgical intervention for bone augmenting before a double teeth implant, performed at the highest technological levels in a university hospital the intervention as been as successful as it can be, autolouous and bovine bone under a kevlar/titanium membrane provided the scaffolding for my own bone to regrow as it successfully did...but after the implants is it everything as before?

 

No, it isn't.

 

The bone did regrow but the shape is not the same, the bone arches are missing leading to surrounding gums to get a different shape, interdental papillas are missing even after plastic reconstruction and some gums scars are left.

 

In this case the outcome is still very satisfactory because I have my fully functional teeth back, there is no pain whatsoever and the issues are mainly of aesthetic nature (which in my case, luckily enough, are not noticeable).

 

Now this is just bone ready accessible (just under a few mm of gums, no muscles, no fascia, etc...) and not even near a joint...imagine implanting cartilage grown in a Petri dish inside a knee joint which is bearing forces 12 times the body weight while running (leave alone jumping), after all the damage done to surrounding tissues just to get there (twice)...in my opinion there is no way that joint will ever be like it should.

 

A smarter and more elegant way would be to regrow your own cartilage in site, that would overcome all the issues mentioned above and is what I see as the future of cartilage treatment, right now we are not probably ready to fix an extensive injury to the cartilage that way but for a slowly wear off there are things that can be done for sure, no 100% guarantee of successful outcomes yet but still worth the effort.

 

 

 

     

 

 

 

 

[motorcitykid]

I must have been... 'lucky' with my knees coming right in 2 weeks with Gelatine, HGW, Coconut Oil,  Astragalus, Vit C, Olive leaf extract.
Maybe it was all placebo effect...  (Except for the OLE as I was not aware of its potential at the time.)  YMMV  
 
http://www.longecity...ndpost&p=711410
 
http://www.longecity...ndpost&p=558918
 
http://www.longecity...-pain-patients/
 
 
 
New, and supportive of the above, info:
...the present observations are the first to report that autocrine activation of IGF-1 gene expression in target tissues is a possible solution to these problems. We confirmed in human cartilage explants what has been observed in other tissues that pro-inflammatory cytokines silence IGF-1 production [32,33,36]. In the present case this was achieved with IL-1β, a major determinant of chondrocyte activation and cartilage destruction [3,4,34,59]. However, this is the first report that IGF-1 production can be maintained in the face of these otherwise completely suppressive signals.
The ability of RNI 249, alone and in combination with vincaria, to maintain IGF-1 levels despite the presence of IL-1β has the potential to not only limit cartilage destruction, as was confirmed here with blockade of GAG release, but also to evoke anabolic actions and repair the joint....
http://pubmedcentral...les/PMC1456997/

NB the in vivo studies referenced too

 

I was taking hydrolized collagen, ev coconut oil, and Vit C, but it didn't seem to moderate my knee pain very much.

 

I used to take astagalus and olive leaf extract but this is going a few years back, and it wasn't for knee pain. I've discontinued using these two supplements but maybe I'll try adding them along with the collagen, coconut oil and vita C.

 

I'll tell you though, SAMe along with Biosil seemed to be as close to a magic bullet for knee pain as I could find. I'd say the pain decreased in the neighborhood of 90%.

 

[aconita]

That vincaria/maca study Logic provided looks very interesting, about maca we can do without any extraction, vincaria from uncaria is worth the effort, here is the patent:

 

https://www.google.c...tents/US6797286

 

I may be overcautious but chloroform/methanol is a quite toxic solvent, ethyl acetate looks much better and safer to me.

[sthira]

I'll tell you though, SAMe along with Biosil seemed to be as close to a magic bullet for knee pain as I could find. I'd say the pain decreased in the neighborhood of 90%.

Thanks for this idea -- I thought I'd tried every damned supplement or substance on the market, but I didn't know about SAM-E. I'm trying 400 mg of the Jarrow brand in the morning on an empty stomach in combo with the Jarrow B-complex.

What do you do?

Also, is your knee plagued by osteoarthritis? I don't have that (yet) but rather some torn white-zone cartilage. If it helps with inflammation, regrows some tissue, relieves depression, I'll be quite vocal here. Ha... FWIW, I'd dearly love to be proven wrong in my belief that avascular cartilage cannot be regrown..

[motorcitykid]

 

I'll tell you though, SAMe along with Biosil seemed to be as close to a magic bullet for knee pain as I could find. I'd say the pain decreased in the neighborhood of 90%.
 

Thanks for this idea -- I thought I'd tried every damned supplement or substance on the market, but I didn't know about SAM-E. I'm trying 400 mg of the Jarrow brand in the morning on an empty stomach in combo with the Jarrow B-complex.

What do you do?

Also, is your knee plagued by osteoarthritis? I don't have that (yet) but rather some torn white-zone cartilage. If it helps with inflammation, regrows some tissue, relieves depression, I'll be quite vocal here. Ha... FWIW, I'd dearly love to be proven wrong in my belief that avascular cartilage cannot be regrown..

 

 

No I don't have osteoarthritis, I sprint after weight training and sometimes my knees ache afterward. Sometimes they don't ache at all, and sometimes it's pretty bad.

 

SAM-e, Jarrow B-complex, 500mg of sublingual B-12(I usually just nibble off half a 1000mg tab) and Bio-sil is the combination that almost completely eliminated my knee pain, to the point where I forgot I ever had it.

 

With that said, I might discontinue taking SAM-e or try using it less frequently, even though it works like a charm.

 

The reason: Methionine restriction is associated with increased longevity, dosing with SAM-e might (even though SAM-e technically isn't methionine) be throwing a monkey wrench at my DNA or in whatever other mechanism methionine is indicated.  Taking SAM-e could potentially be derailing my plans to achieve the benefits of increased longevity, even if i restrict methionine in my diet.

 

However (this is getting off topic) if I take glycine(which blocks methionine absorption)with every meal that's high in methionine, maybe I could continue taking SAM-e three times a week. If I follow this plan, I could reduce my overall methionine intake and still benefit from the pain relief I get from SAM-e.

 

 

[Logic]

SAM-e, Jarrow B-complex, 500mg of sublingual B-12(I usually just nibble off half a 1000mg tab) and Bio-sil is the combination that almost completely eliminated my knee pain, to the point where I forgot I ever had it.

 

With that said, I might discontinue taking SAM-e or try using it less frequently, even though it works like a charm.

 

The reason: Methionine restriction is associated with increased longevity, dosing with SAM-e might (even though SAM-e technically isn't methionine) be throwing a monkey wrench at my DNA or in whatever other mechanism methionine is indicated.  Taking SAM-e could potentially be derailing my plans to achieve the benefits of increased longevity, even if i restrict methionine in my diet.

 

However (this is getting off topic) if I take glycine(which blocks methionine absorption)with every meal that's high in methionine, maybe I could continue taking SAM-e three times a week. If I follow this plan, I could reduce my overall methionine intake and still benefit from the pain relief I get from SAM-e. 

 

You might look into Cissus as it is said to have the Sam-E effect.
https://cse.google.c...=0&gsc.q=cissus

 

http://www.ergo-log.com/joints.html

Edited by Logic, 12 November 2015 - 08:13 AM.

[motorcitykid]

 

SAM-e, Jarrow B-complex, 500mg of sublingual B-12(I usually just nibble off half a 1000mg tab) and Bio-sil is the combination that almost completely eliminated my knee pain, to the point where I forgot I ever had it.

 

With that said, I might discontinue taking SAM-e or try using it less frequently, even though it works like a charm.

 

The reason: Methionine restriction is associated with increased longevity, dosing with SAM-e might (even though SAM-e technically isn't methionine) be throwing a monkey wrench at my DNA or in whatever other mechanism methionine is indicated.  Taking SAM-e could potentially be derailing my plans to achieve the benefits of increased longevity, even if i restrict methionine in my diet.

 

However (this is getting off topic) if I take glycine(which blocks methionine absorption)with every meal that's high in methionine, maybe I could continue taking SAM-e three times a week. If I follow this plan, I could reduce my overall methionine intake and still benefit from the pain relief I get from SAM-e. 

 

You might look into Cissus as it is said to have the Sam-E effect.
https://cse.google.c...=0&gsc.q=cissus

 

http://www.ergo-log.com/joints.html

 

 

I think I'm going to try this..thanks Logic.

 

I'm surprised Paradise Herbs doesn't carry Cissus- I was hoping to get it from them.  Have you tried this?

 

[Logic]

I think I'm going to try this..thanks Logic.
 
I'm surprised Paradise Herbs doesn't carry Cissus- I was hoping to get it from them.  Have you tried this?

Nope.  Its not easy to get hold of in South Africa.  It was on my list, but the previous stack worked so...

Forgot to mention:  Take the Gelatin before sleep as it'l  give you the added effect of increasing your HGH spike as much as 8X and HGH is also known to be good for joints.

You also get an HGH spike from workouts IIRC...
 

http://www.ergo-log....gelatinegh.html

Edited by Logic, 13 November 2015 - 11:52 AM.

[motorcitykid]

 

I think I'm going to try this..thanks Logic.
 
I'm surprised Paradise Herbs doesn't carry Cissus- I was hoping to get it from them.  Have you tried this?

Nope.  Its not easy to get hold of in South Africa.  It was on my list, but the previous stack worked so...

Forgot to mention:  Take the Gelatin before sleep as it'l  give you the added effect of increasing your HGH spike as much as 8X and HGH is also known to be good for joints.

You also get an HGH spike from workouts IIRC...
 

http://www.ergo-log....gelatinegh.html

 

It seems you have to take a lot of gelatin to get the 8x spike. Could you tell me how much you take? Also, do you take it in its pure form(capsules) or do you eat the gelatin?

 

 

 

Edited by motorcitykid, 14 November 2015 - 02:04 AM.