No system is perfect; they all have the vices associated with their virtues. The profit motive drives much of our medical system, but it can ignore things that show no profit possibilities. Also, much of our medical system is driven by life and death outcomes. So things that are just uncomfortable or inconvenient are frequently ignored. As I age I find that I need to provide more of my own medical care as my body’s changes are just not important enough to involve others.
This is my list of conditions where I am all or part self-medicating:
- Blood condition precursor to Chronic Myeloid Leukemia (CML)
- Osteoarthritis
- Supraventricular Tachycardia (SVT)
- Too much trouble finding the right word
- Premature Ventricular Contraction (PVC)
- Aggravation with politics
This is my list of solutions to those things (in the same order):
- Low Dose Naltrexone (LDN)
- Glycine (an amino acid)
- Taurine (an amino acid)
- Acetyl l-Carnitine (an amino acid)
Hawthorne Extract and D-Ribose- Lithium Orotate
Low Dose Naltrexone – In my 60’s I was diagnosed with a blood condition precursor to Chronic Myeloid Leukemia (CML)L. I was told “It will probably develop, but don’t worry. We can treat it.” Of course I worried; it was the first big medical thing that had happened to me since I was 5, when I had polio (when my parents worried). One of the places I took my worry was to a friend, an inventor specializing in medical things. He told me to take a look at LDN. I looked it up on line and found ldninfo.org. I read the whole site, printed out a dozen of the pages, and took them to our GP – who actually read them. His conclusion was the same as mine: “It doesn’t cost much and is unlikely to cause harm if it doesn’t work.” He wrote the prescription. A year or two later I no longer had the condition. The blood guy (a/k/a hematologist) said “Spontaneous remission.” I tried to tell him what I’d done but he wasn’t interested.
Naltrexone was developed to counteract opioids; it blocks their effects. The standard therapeutic dose is 50mg every 8 hours. The standard LDN dose is 4.5mg, once daily at bedtime.
A few years later my wife, Paula, was diagnosed with fibromyalgia; the initial prescription did little. So she began the effort to have her doctor prescribe LDN; it was a long effort, but she eventually succeeded. It somewhat worked: she describes it as 90% effective, and effective enough. A few years later it stopped working. The compounding pharmacist suggested trying one or more 0.5mg capsules with the 4.5gm capsule. One was enough, 5mg was her new dose.
I’ve kept taking and reading about LDN. A couple of years ago I found the LDN Research Trust, which is even more comprehensive than the LDNinfo site. It helps you find someone to write a prescription and pointed me to a company that makes LDN in pill form, which should be cheaper and more reliable.
Glycine – In my 50’s I was diagnosed with osteoarthritis and told to take naproxen; I did so for a year or so. And then decided that I didn’t want to take a daily pain killer. I though of a friend that I co-drove with at Daytona in the early days of IMSA; he was 70 at the time (ancient in my eyes then). We had little money so we shared a room. In the morning he worked every joint in his body, “to keep them working,” he said. He finally quit driving race cars because it was interfering with his tennis. Anyhow, I stopped taking naproxen and started daily exercise. I still had a little joint pain, but I’ve kept exercising, and learned to like it.
About 15 years ago I bumped into Steve Gibson’s efforts to fix his sleep. He was waking at 1am and staying awake until 3 or 4. I was nothing like that, but I thought I could sleep better. I tried his vitamin concoction and convinced myself that I was sleeping better. Probably not. But as his approach evolved, I kept up. Along the way I began adding powdered glycine to my drinking water. And the very minor joint pain I had went away. It makes the water taste a little sweet, and if I take too much I produce some really bad smells. But I’ve learned how much to add to my water to get my benefits without bothering others. For me, it’s about 1/2 teaspoon per liter of water.
Note on amino acids: Among other things, they are the building blocks of protein and they have received a lot of study. However, most of the studies are on fruit flies and rodents. So the results are only suggestive. My experience with glycine made me aware of the hypothesis that age can reduce the body’s ability to extract needed amino acids from proteins. So I became more willing to try amino acids. They are cheap, easily obtained, and unlikely to cause damage.
Taurine – One night in my 60’s I woke up with a racing heart; it was over 200. I woke up Paula, and she took me to a hospital emergency room. I was seen quickly, and they gave me a shot that stopped my heart temporarily (not a good thought!), and it was normal when it restarted. They told me I had SVT and I visited a cardiologist for the first time. She was impressive. She explained that it was a miswiring of my heart nerves and that it could happen again. She prescribed a pill to carry with me and to take if/when it occurred again and showed my how to do stomach crunches, which could stop an episode by itself. She said that if it happened too often there were other things that could be done, but I didn’t like them. So I lived with it, as many others do.
I first read about Taurine on Steve Gibson’s news site. In his article about Taurine, an amino acid, he commented that it tends to stabilize heart function. Well, my SVT could benefit from some stabilizing, I was having an episode every 2-3 months. I started taking a gram of Taurine twice a day, SVT frequency dropped to 3-4 months. I was diagnosed with sleep apnea and started using a CPAP machine, SVT frequency dropped to 4-5 months. I increased dosage to 2 grams twice a day, and it’s now been more than 3 years without an SVT episode. I tried 3 grams twice a day for a while but returned to 2 grams twice a day when standing quickly frequently caused dizziness from my blood pressure dropping too much. (This was also associated with my trying Hawthorne extract, below.)
Acetyl l-Carnitine HCI – I’ve been discussing Creatine with my son for several months. He and my grandson are taking it to improve athletic performance. I read some articles, but wasn’t convinced. (In my 80s I don’t care about improving my athletic performance.) Then I read an article in the Life Extension Magazine about it. What most intrigued me was the summary of Carnitine effects: “Carnitine intake boosted mental and physical energy levels, reduced mental and physical fatigue, enhanced cognitive and neurological function, and improved frailty scores.”
This sounded good. I ordered some and tried it, taking 1gm after breakfast and dinner. After a week I realized that I wasn’t unable to find the right word any more. This had been a growing problem for me, it was noticeable enough that Paula encouraged me to see a neurologist. I did, and after tests he said it was just aging – but to come back in a year for a comparison. So the Carnitine (a/k/a ALKAR) fixed a real problem for me, without my expecting it to do so! (BTW, this occurred about 10 months after I last saw my neurologist; when I saw him he accepted the effects on me and told me he would investigate it further for others’ potential benefit.)
Then I went skiing. In the past when someone lifted the ski lift’s safety bar too early I would have a pang of fear, and I would grab something. (I always sat on the outside so there was something to grab.) Now, no pang! I just said to myself “Oh, the bar is up already,” without any other reaction. Two days later we went to Newport, RI for dinner, to our favorite restaurant. The Newport Bridge is high, narrow, subject to winds, and you can see through the sides. Normally, I turn on the radio or a book to concentrate on as I drive white-knuckled across the bridge. This time, just minor fear! No white knuckles! Just high winds and a mostly comfortable drive across with hands relaxed. A little fear, but not important; I could do what I wanted! Two good, unanticipated effects of ALCAR – “unanticipated” to me indicates that I couldn’t have made up the effects. I’m taking 1gm after both breakfast and dinner.
Finally, I’m impressed with this article about it. It taught me that the acetyl form can pass the blood/brain barrier, making it most useful for me and that its half life is almost 36 hours. Other reading taught me that the HCL form indicates its a salt, and easier to dissolve.
After a couple of months the ALKAR wasn’t working as well. When I looked at what I was taking I realized that I had halved my dose. When I switched to 180 capsule bottles I inadvertently switched to 500 mg capsules; when I thought I was taking 2 grams I was taking one. So I first increased to 1.5 gm in the morning and 1 in the evening; my symptom, dizziness when I moved quickly, declined. After 10 days I increased my dose to 2 gm morning and evening. As I didn’t keep proper records, this is probably what I was taking when finding the good results.
Hawthorne Extract and D-Ribose – Premature Ventricular Contracton (PVC) is a partial contraction before an effective heart muscle contraction. By itself, it’s primarily a waste of energy and, if you have limited heart strength it can affect what you can do. Also, some people are aware of it occurring and are bothered by it. I’m lucky: I like to exercise and do so, so my heart is in good shape. And I don’t notice the PVC events.
When it was noticed before a cataract replacement procedure my cardiologist evaluated mine. My PVC episode occurred on 26% of my heart beats, based on a 24-hour sample. 10% is typically considered the check-it-out level, so I saw an electrocardiologist. He found that the PVC event locations are diffuse, so that ablation would have little effect. But since I exercise a lot and don’t notice the PVC’s I can ignore them.
The material below on PVCs is essentially obsolete for me. When I was at Dana Farber for a planned visit they detected a heart rate of 37 – too low! However, it’s uncertain whether their measure was confused by my PVCs or was real. Also, their EKG showed continued PVCs. I was only taking Hawthorne extract, but I also was experiencing brief (half-second) feelings of vertigo. So I’ve stopped the Hawthorne extract. Another Holter monitor (scheduled for 12/4) will tell me more. In the week after dropping the Hawthorne extract I’ve had no brief vertigo events.
That was good news, but I wanted to try to reduce the PVC frequency, so I read a bunch of opinions and some research. I found that three things were generally recommended: (1) Hawthorne extract; (2) D-Ribose, a building block of ATP; and, (3) l-Arginine, an amino acid. I cycled through them individually and in combination, evaluating their effectiveness for me with the number of extra minutes of exercise detected by my Fitbit. For me, this was least with 600 mg of Hawthorne extract twice a day plus 850 mg of D-Ribose twice a day. l-Arginine had the least effect on me. I choose a brand of Hawthorne extract that was standardized so I’d always take the same amount.
To the extent that I can measure the effects, I think that I have reduced the frequency of my PVC’s. But I won’t know until I see a cardiologist again, and it will probably be a year before I can be monitored again. Regardless, I’ll post here when I know more.
Since I wrote the above I looked at D-Ribose’s half life, about 15 min, so it just won’t last long enough to affect many PVC’s. It may have a good effect on declining heart function (link), but happily I’m not currently facing that. So I’m going to try discontinue taking it. As I still have some maybe I’ll take some on skiing days to see if it helps.
Lithium Orotate – I subscribe to and read the Life Extension Magazine every month. Overall, I’m not impressed with most vitamin research; the sample sizes are too small and they pay too little attention to confounding effects. But the LE Mag tries, and I accept many of their results. They mostly pass my lower bound “it can’t hurt, it might help, and it’s not expensive” test. One of their reported studies indicated that 1mg of Lithium Orotate daily might reduce the likelihood of dementia. So I began taking it, didn’t expect any changes and found none.
Over the next couple of years politics became more unpleasant, which bothered me. So I read more about Lithium Orotate and thought that increasing my dose to 5mg might reduce the bother. It tried it, and it did. So I now take 5mg of Lithium Orotate daily; I think of it as my political vitamin.
Recently I received a Ground Truths email from Eric Topol (I look forward to these as I find them well written and documented). This one was titled “Lithium and Its Potential Protection from Alzheimer’s Disease“. This article lived up to my high expectations and gave me another reason to take Lithium Orotate, although I’m long past the age when it has its greatest effect on Alzheimer’s.
Last edited 11/9/2025
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