Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Lithium compound can reverse Alzheimer’s in mice: study

hms.harvard.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 108 posts

Re: Lithium compound can reverse Alzheimer’s in mice: study

#31

Post by valianteffort »

cypherpunks01 wrote: post #12
adamgordonbell wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People use it in much smaller dosages then it's usually prescribed to apparently beneficial effect. I believe its also in the water supply in certain places, so if it works for dementia there are natural experiments already running on this. https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/low-dose-lithium-a-new...

Yes, it's already thought that there's an association between naturally occurring lithium in drinking water and decreased suicide rates: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/the-british-journal-... I would think naturally occurring lithium in some people's water would give pretty good control conditions to do a wide study of this effect on Alzheimers as well?

The addition of flouride to tap water supply likely affects brain development. Let's not go adding lithium too.

These things are simple enough to advise the populace to use on their own. The government should never play nanny, ever.

Re: Lithium compound can reverse Alzheimer’s in mice: study

#34

Post by WillAdams »

A spring near where I grew up used to be considered a notable watersource, and was actively bottled and sold, with the marketing proclaiming the benefits of "Lithia Water" --- always wondered how trace minerals from wells and springs affects health, and how consistent the elemental content is from year-to-year.

Re: Lithium compound can reverse Alzheimer’s in mice: study

#35

Post by dboreham »

exmadscientist wrote: post #16
ninetyninenine wrote: post #8

Lithium is a strange drug. It also cures bipolar disorder and nobody knows why. It also fucks up the liver over time and basically people on lithium eventually have to make a choice between dying or being insane.

It's mostly the kidneys that get damaged, not so much the liver. It also has a massive amount of benign or merely annoying side effects. Lithium might even be the drug with the largest overall amount of side effects. It's certainly a weird one. High-dose lithium is extremely hard on your kidneys and may well lead to kidney failure in a decade or so. Medium-dose lithium is a lot more gentle but still requires monitori…

> Now, why the ion channels are the place to go

Personal theory: these things are like "global constants" for the brain's GPU. Somewhat similar to the temperature constant in an LLM. There is no real "explanation" for why they work, they just have an effect. Various chemicals have various effects, often depending on the patient (because other constants vary, training data varies...) and we pick the chemical we like the effect of most.

Re: Lithium compound can reverse Alzheimer’s in mice: study

#36

Post by zingababba »

modeless wrote: post #4

Lithium orotate is available over the counter. People could try it today. > Since lithium has not yet been shown to be safe or effective in protecting against neurodegeneration in humans, Yankner emphasizes that people should not take lithium compounds on their own I reject this kind of blind safetyism. A cursory search suggests that lithium orotate has been used for decades, and the article suggests that "profound e…

I've played with it on and off for years from 1mg up to 10mg a day. It's a drug I definitely 'feel' when I'm not saturated. I initially became interested in it due to this -> "Since vitamin B12 and folate also affect mood-associated parameters, the stimulation of the transport of these vitamins into brain cells by lithium may be cited as yet another mechanism of the anti-depressive, mood-elevating and anti-aggressive actions of lithium at nutritional dosage levels.” (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11838882/)

It does reach a point of diminishing returns for me and I become too sedated. I now take it irregularly.

Re: Lithium compound can reverse Alzheimer’s in mice: study

#37

Post by connicpu »

modeless wrote: post #4

Lithium orotate is available over the counter. People could try it today. > Since lithium has not yet been shown to be safe or effective in protecting against neurodegeneration in humans, Yankner emphasizes that people should not take lithium compounds on their own I reject this kind of blind safetyism. A cursory search suggests that lithium orotate has been used for decades, and the article suggests that "profound e…

My spouse was prescribed lithium by doctors and it messed up her thyroid, it's not a drug to be taken lightly.

Re: Lithium compound can reverse Alzheimer’s in mice: study

#38

Post by modeless »

tgv wrote: post #22
jsbisviewtiful wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I reject this kind of blind safetyism. You said you searched to learn more about lithium, but somehow missed that it's highly recommended to be administered by doctors due to side effects after long term use. Anything that damages your kidneys or thyroids can kill you, so calling it "blind safetyism" is silly.

Especially since mice are not really perfect models for humans. For starters: these mice were "12 to 24 months of age", whereas your typical Alzheimer patient is well over 30 times that. The article also links it to amyloid plaques, which is a contested hypothesis that may well have held back Alzheimer research for decades. To be fair, the article seems to look at more mechanisms, but that's well beyond my expertise.

12 to 24 months is old in mouse years. And the article offers a plausible explanation for both why plaques could cause the disease and why clearing them alone might not fix it without lithium supplementation.

Re: Lithium compound can reverse Alzheimer’s in mice: study

#39

Post by cubefox »

wonderwonder wrote: post #30
cubefox wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The alternative to a clinical trial would be that there continues to be much less certainty whether lithium orotate actually works and is safe. Which would result in less or more usage than optimal.

I will ask you the same question I asked OP "Would you be willing to die of Alzheimer's in order to serve as a placebo for the control group? What about your parents?" Since that is essentially what you are asking the people that would have ordered low dose lithium based on this article to do.

Well I was the OP. It might be a tragedy of the commons situation. For each individual it may be better to ignore trials and just self medicate, but on the whole this could lead to an overall worse outcome in the long run.

Re: Lithium compound can reverse Alzheimer’s in mice: study

#40

Post by renecito »

modeless wrote: post #4

Lithium orotate is available over the counter. People could try it today. > Since lithium has not yet been shown to be safe or effective in protecting against neurodegeneration in humans, Yankner emphasizes that people should not take lithium compounds on their own I reject this kind of blind safetyism. A cursory search suggests that lithium orotate has been used for decades, and the article suggests that "profound e…

yup, because this could not be a scam.

You are free to try it, it's over the counter, no one is oppressing you here, Darwin is your friend.

Post reply on HN