Somebody had applied a blowtorch to his toes.
Trying to ignore the searing pain in his right foot propped against the accelerator, Pete gritted his teeth and focused on the heavy rush hour traffic.
The tingling in his toes had begun about a year ago, and he had had no idea what was causing it. He kept flexing his toes, thinking that it was a just a circulation problem. But it kept worsening. Finally, he mentioned it to one of his coworkers.
Randy shook his head. "I have no idea, but it sounds like you’ve got a circulation problem. You'd better get it looked into before you develop something really bad ... like gangrene, or something."
With those "comforting" words ringing in his ears, Pete finally went to the doctor who diagnosed it as "peripheral neuropathy", and checked his blood sugar levels.
Dr. Hammond explained that peripheral neuropathy was usually caused by nerve deterioration in the extremities, and began with a tingling sensation in the toes or fingers. The "wiring" in his body had become damaged, and was now transmitting sensations that weren't there.
"You're not diabetic, but you're glucose intolerant, and the higher than normal levels in your blood evidently have damaged your nerves."
Dr Hammond prescribed Neurontin®, a drug originally developed to control seizures, but had been discovered to work as a "pain manager" in the condition of Peripheral Neuropathy.
"It's not a cure," he said. "We have no idea how it works. But it'll reduce the pain and keep you functional"
Pete didn't like the words "it'll keep you functional." The phrase definitely had an ominous ring to it.
He took Neurontin® faithfully according to prescription, and for awhile it worked, but it wasn't too long before he began to see what Dr. Hammond was alluding too. The painful sensations increased, and it seemed like it was getting more difficult for the drug to handle them.
Then, one day, he forgot to take his medicine, and he vowed he would never do it again. Without the pain manager, the pain level ramped up several orders of magnitude, and Pete discovered that the full extent of his condition had been masked by the drug.
Neuropathy had taken over half of his foot.
Sledgehammers slammed against his feet. Hot blowtorches seared his toes. Hot rocks were jammedinside the soles of his feet. Once ... worst of all ... a white hot band saw tried to cut his foot half off.
Now he knew he was now entirely dependent on the Neurontin®. Without it, he couldn't endure the pain...
And he almost couldn't walk at all.
There's damage out there somewhere
So what do we mean by the term "peripheral neuropathy"?
The nervous system of the human body is broadly divided into the Central Nervous System (CNS) and the Peripheral Nervous System(PNS). The former consists of the brain and spinal chord, whereas the latter is divided into the Somatic and Autonomic Nervous Systems.
Peripheral neuropathy affects the PNS, and can result in nerve damage to the Somatic or Autonomic Systems. Translated, neuropathy can develop not only in the feet or hands, but in the nerves regulating the lungs, heart, digestive and sexual organs.
In other words, it can develop anywhere and have very serious and far reaching consequences to the body. It can take the form of:
--polyneuropathy (peripheral nerves throughout the body)
--autonomic neuropathy (the cardiovascular system, digestive tract, bladder, or genitals)
The painful sensations of polyneuropathy, burning, itching, "electric shock", or hammering, may develop in the feet and legs either gradually or suddenly. You may or may not get a warning before they appear.
Three strikes and you're out
Today, there are three classes of medication on the market that can treat the pain resulting from neuropathic nerve damage:
-- tricyclic antidepressants such as amiriptyline (Elavil®)
-- anticonvulsants such as gabapentine(Neurontin®) and pregabilin (Lyrica®)
--serotonin and norepenephrin reuptake inhibitors such as duloxeten (Cymbalta®)
Blocking uptake of neurotransmitters or blocking pathways in the spinal chord prevent pain signals from reaching the brain. Sodium and calcium channels may also be blocked to keep the brain from registering pain from "cross talking" neurons.
None of the medicines can be thought of as a "cure", and if the causes of neuropathy are not addressed, it will continue to progress.
That's why the "strange tingling" in Pete's toes advanced to the sensation of somebody cutting off his foot with a hot band saw.
So, if medical science has thrown three balls at us and none of them are a "cure", is that it? Are we stuck with merely "managing the pain" and hoping we don't end up down the line with a foot amputation?
Eight is more than enough
Pete's condition was probably caused by borderline diabetes, and is known as Diabetic Neuropathy. However, Peripheral Neuropathy has a variety of causes (For a more in-depth explanation, see the www.neuropathy.org website).
These are:
-- Immune Related, the most prominent of which is the Guillane-Barre syndrome in which the body's immune system attacks the peripheral nervous system. Weakness in the legs is usually a preliminary sign of this condition.
-- Diabetic, caused by excessive blood sugar. This can take the forms of either peripheral (damage to the extremities) or autonomic (damage to the central nervous system).
--Infectious, caused by HIV, Hepatitus or Lyme disease.
-- Drug and Nutrition Related. Excessive alcohol consumption can result in a deficiency in thiamine (Vitamin B1) that is essential to the health of the peripheral nervous system.
--Hereditary. Charcot-Marie-Tooth Disease is an example of hereditary neuropathy. Nerves in the legs are affected first, followed by those in the feet and ultimately to the hands and arms.
--Carpal Tunnel Syndrome. Neuropathy resulting from repetitive damage.
--Critical Illness Neuropathy can be brought on by attempts to combat cancer, such as chemotherapy.
--Idiopathic Neuropathy. A word for saying that nobody knows what causes it.
And nobody, it seems, knows how to cure it.
Two essentials your nerves desperately need.
But is there, in fact, no hope?
Neuropathy brought about by excessive alcohol consumption is thought to be caused by the reduction of Thiamine, or Vitamin B1, in the body. Thiamine has long been known to be vital to the healthy functioning of nerves and was linked to the disease Beriberi in 1937.
It has long been known that nerves respond to the presence, or absence of Vitamin B1, but only recently, Neuropathy has been shown to also be made worse by the absence of B12 which supports nerve cell sheathing and promotes and regenerates nerve cells.
Unfortunately, both vitamin B1 and B12 are water soluble complexes that are not retained long in the body. Thiamine is flushed out of the body in 4 - 5 hours, and less than 1/2 of 1% of Vitamin B12 consumed orally is retained. It is almost impossible to get enough of this Vitamin, and nerve cells are not protected well without it.
So, is there a possibility that with the proper intake of Vitamin B1 and B12, that damaged nerves can be healed?
There may be gain that kills the pain.
Pete was beginning to panic.
The Neurontin® dosage levels weren't cutting it. His doctor had told him to regulate his carbohydrate intake, but he was on the road, commuting 2 1/2 hours every day, and he had to hit the ground running when he reached his office.
Controlling his carbs? He might as well try to control the traffic he had to fight his way through every day to get to work.
And the neuropathy was rapidly taking over his feet. The numbness he felt when he took his medicine, and the pure pain that hit him when he missed a dosage, were enough to convince him of that.
Where was this headed? And, more importantly...
Was there any way to stop it? Was there any actual – cure -- out there? Somewhere?
From his Internet research, Pete learned that there was indeed some ongoing medical research into the role Vitamin B1 played in actually reversing neuropathy, but little was known.
But then he discovered something. Medical research was focused on water soluble Vitamin B1 and B12, vitamins that didn’t remain long enough in the body to do much good.
If somehow they could be retained by the body longer …
Hang around and something might happen.
Pete discovered there was a possibility that vitamin B1 and B12 could be retained in the body long enough to be therapeutic for nerve damage. It just had to be in an oil soluble form, rather than water soluble.
The term "like dissolves like" has been a maxim of Chemists since the dawn of Chemistry. It has long been known that chemicals can be divided into two classes: polar and non polar. The former are generally water soluble, and the latter are oil soluble.
Oil soluble materials are taken up by the body and retained longer than the polar, water soluble, chemicals.
A new form of vitamin B1, known as Benfotiamine, has been discovered to be retained in the body much longer than Thiamine, and Methalcobalamine, known as Methyl B12, is also retained longer and is effective for nerve repair.
Packaged together they may provide a real alternative for peripheral neuropathy sufferers, particularly those with Neuropathy symptoms in their hands and feet.
Something more
Pete needed something more than pain management. He needed something that would actually therapeutically work to "heal" his condition, but he couldn't find it in conventional medicine.
All available drugs did little more than to block or "manage" the pain, and as time went by and Pete's condition worsened, they were having steadily more difficulty doing that.
Vitamin therapies exist which offered promise...but Pete was reluctant to try them. He was locked into the notion that any "alternative" solution to a medical problem was somewhere in that hazy world of medical quackery...
And he didn’t fully realize that alternate therapies were relegated to “quackery” by an industry dependent on pharmaceutical companies whose business economy depends on increasing the public’s drug dependence....not true therapy.
But alternate solutions do work, and without the side effects conventional pharmaceuticals usually produce.
Vitamin therapies, based on oil soluble B complexes, are known to have a powerful role in healing damaged nerve cells without side effects, are based on sound medical principles …and provide bright hope for healing peripheral neuropathy.
