Exciting new way to slow aging & live longer….

Today's Post: Thursday, 10-15-2009

We’ve posted on many ways to slow aging and live longer.

Of those, staying away completely from tobacco smoke and doing regular vigorous exercise seem to be the most effective.

Now there is news of a different kind. You actually may be able to permanently slow your rate of aging, live longer, and have fewer chronic diseases in a completely new way.

(Of course, you can do all three things!)

Here’s the news & who I got it from.:

Last Friday, 10-9-2009, I got the Doctor’s House Call email from Dr Al Sears.
(You can subscribe free to his e-newsletter at www.alsearsmd.com .)

His title for his email that day was: “People with this Factor Live Past 100.”

There is an antioxidant called glutathione that has some extra and extremely useful healing and protective effects in addition to just being an antioxidant.

I’d read that it has curative effects on cognitive problems and helps prevent them in The Better Brain book by David Perlmutter, MD. He uses intravenous glutathione therapy to treat people with low blood levels of glutathione and who have cognitive problems and reports excellent results. He also has found that the supplement NAC, n-acetyl cysteine, causes glutathione release and that taking 500 to 1,000 mg a day is protective for the brain because of this glutathione release.

I’ve also read that glutathione helps your liver substantially in getting rid of toxins or rendering them harmless -- including excess caffeine and alcohol.

But as far as other positive effects I’d not yet read other information.

In his email last Friday, Dr Sears says that it’s been found that people with the highest levels of glutathione routinely live past 100.

It seems that its detoxifying effects and its healing effects in addition to its antioxidant effects apparently helps glutathione to prevent or slow down the development of many chronic diseases including arthritis, high blood pressure, heart disease, cancer, & type 2 diabetes.

So it seems that glutathione if present in high amounts in your system either sharply slows aging or improves your health as if it did or maybe both. Given the recent press about telomeres and aging, in fact, having high glutathione levels may be a way to prevent telomeres from shortening or even restore them. That actually tends to STOP aging.

There is even some supporting evidence for such anti-aging effects.

Dr Sears reports that researchers at the University of Louisville were able to cause the glutathione levels in mosquitoes to go up by 50 to 100 percent. Those mosquitoes then lived 30 to 38 % longer than mosquitoes usually do.

In addition, Dr Sears reports that other researchers at the Montreal General Hospital Research Institute in Canada then did virtually the same experiment with mice and got very similar results.

Dr Sears also reports that, in humans, Odense University in Denmark found that centenarians ages 100 – 105 had higher levels of glutathione than people aged 60 – 79. Further, the centenarians who were most active had the highest levels of glutathione.

In the same way that high levels of glutathione increase life spans, low levels make virtually all chronic degenerative diseases older people sometimes get more likely. Dr Sears lists these chronic degenerative diseases that tend to happen more often to people with low levels of glutathione.:

Heart Disease; Cataracts; Arthritis; Renal Failure; High Blood Pressure; Leukemia; Diabetes;
Hearing Loss; Cancer; Obstructive Lung Disease (COPD); & Macular Degeneration. Yikes !!

Dr Sears reports even more good news. Researchers at the University of Michigan found people with higher glutathione levels reported a greater sense of well being, getting sick less often, lower blood pressure, lower cholesterol & reduced body fat compared with people who had lower levels of glutathione.

(It may partially be that good health habits such as regular exercise increase both glutathione levels and create these beneficial effects in other ways. But the research Dr Sears reports also makes it clear that just increasing glutathione DOES create these effects directly as well.)

Eating many of the vegetables already known to have multiple health protecting effects also boosts glutathione too -- including horseradish, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, kale, & Brussels sprouts.

Taking NAC supplements, as Dr Perlmutter recommends, is one of the best and easiest ways to boost glutathione levels. Dr Sears apparently suggests 1500 to 2,000 mg a day to some of his patients. And both Dr Perlmutter & Dr Sears say that 500 to 1,000 mg a day boosts glutathione levels reliably.

Dr Sears also lists several other supplements that also will help boost your glutathione levels.

Each of the supplements he lists have other health benefits besides boosting glutathione which makes them doubly useful to take.

Here’s Dr Sears list and my comments.:

Alpha Lipoic Acid tends to normalize blood sugar levels and one researcher at UC Berkeley found that older people who took it regained some of their youthful energy and vitality.
(I take 200 mg a day; & some people with high blood sugar issues have had good results taking 600 mg a day.)

Melatonin can help overcome jet lag more quickly, helps older people sleep better, and seems to have some direct anti-cancer effects.

Most people who take melatonin though, tend to take far too much and often wake up groggy and a bit slow witted. For most people 3 mg a day is far too much. Since the most useful amount tends to be in the 0.1 (one tenth) to 0.5 mg (one half) range, what I did when I tried melatonin was to buy 1 mg tablets and take half a tablet before bed each night. (Dr Sears sells a melatonin spray that he finds is much faster acting when you want to fall asleep; but I don’t know how much the dose is.)

Taking Bilberry extract is like taking packages of predigested blueberries without the fiber and using a kind of blueberry that has been shown to also improve circulation to your eyes, preserve your ability to see, and improve your night vision. So in addition to its eye protection and sight improvement taking Bilberry extract also increases HDL and helps to prevent or reverse mental decline as just like eating blueberries does.

Grape Seed Extract has very similar effects to bilberry extract and also has been found to lower high blood pressure somewhat too.

Turmeric prevents cancer and apparently both prevents and may treat Alzheimer’s disease if in its early stages.

Dr Sears also reports that taking whey protein supplements boosts glutathione. (This may be because they are a good source of cysteine or NAC or both.) And whey protein is a good way to get lots of extra protein and its appetite satisfying effects with virtually no fat added.

Lastly, I’ve never seen them in stores, and unlike the other foods and supplements he recommends I don’t know that they have other separate health benefits, nor do I know his statement that they boost glutathione levels as much as he says is accurate.

But if you are sick or have a chronic condition or simply want to boost your glutathione levels right away, it might be worth finding them and trying direct glutathione supplements.

Dr Sears reports that taking 1 to 2 grams a day of supplements of glutathione itself actually delivers up to 80 percent of the glutathione to your body.

And, as I often do, he says for best results to do all of the above. Eat many of the vegetables often & take the supplements including glutathione itself daily.