thiamine deficiency book

Thiamine Deficiency Gaining Recognition: New Book

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In the 5 years since Dr. Lonsdale and I published our book: Thiamine Deficiency Disease, Dysautonomia, and High Calorie Malnutrition (and 50 years since Dr. Lonsdale first began working with thiamine) recognition of the role of thiamine in health and disease have increased steadily year over year. Sales of the book double each year. Admittedly, the numbers were low and remain low in comparison to other popular topics, but the increase in awareness is heartening. Unfortunately, much of this awareness has not reached the medical profession. We regularly see reports in the medical literature boasting recognition of ‘rare’ cases of thiamine deficiency diseases like beriberi and Wernicke’s. If only physicians knew how common these conditions were and that they are only rare because we are not looking. Insufficient thiamine is Hiding in Plain Sight.

A New Book

In 2020, a UK physician by the name of Jo Dixon published a new book on thiamine deficiency, a personal account of her declining health, her discovery of thiamine, and her efforts to get treatment and spread the word. The book, called The Missing Link in Dementia, A Memoir, documents her journey. Unfortunately, she neither mentions thiamine in the title, the description, or even in the text until halfway through. One would not know the book is about thiamine until one reads it or unless it is recommended, so I will recommend it here. This would be a great starter book for someone beginning their health journey.

She has a second book listed on Amazon, Swimming in Circles that I have not read, but I suspect it details thiamine deficiency in fish in other animal populations.

While I would have preferred her to mention thiamine deficiency in the title or introduction, I found the book quite telling of the lengths one has to go to uncover this deficiency, even as a physician. Her case, unfortunately, is highly typical of what we see in patients everywhere. She had longstanding bowel dysfunction, which limited her ability to eat and maintain nutritional status. She led a busy life as a physician and mother of four children, which put pressure on thiamine stability. Even so, she functioned quite well for a long time. It wasn’t until her health took a severe turn for the worse that thiamine deficiency was recognized. Like others who develop issues with thiamine, she was forced to diagnose herself. No other physician, and she saw many, could provide any answers to her declining health. She had to figure it out herself. She was also forced to treat herself. Fortunately for her, she convinced a physician friend to provide IV thiamine, a protocol that was not accepted by her hospital and one she could not readily provide to other patients when she identified their deficiencies.

All of this is typical. We believe that thiamine deficiency was solved and thus any cases that do appear must be rare (to a tee, most case reports include ‘rare’ in the title or introduction). In reality, they are only rare because we do not look for them. We believe falsely that thiamine deficiency emerges acutely, and while it does in some cases, mostly it sits in the background, quietly and insidiously destroying one’s health. We have cases of high functioning individuals whose health begins to decline and whose thiamine levels are tested as low and should merit treatment but ignored for years as not being pertinent. And those are the lucky ones. Most physicians refuse to test for thiamine.

Thiamine deficiency is easily treatable if recognized early. It becomes more complicated as the years pass, and it is impossible if we never bother to look.

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Thiamine Deficiency, Dysautonomia, and High Calorie Malnutrition

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This book by Lonsdale D, and Marrs C, is available on Amazon books. It is published by Elsevier. Written particularly for physicians who are practicing in the field of Integrative Medicine, it would be of interest to the educated public, particularly those affected by chronic disease.

Beriberi, the classical thiamine deficiency disease, long known to have been caused by consumption of white rice, is thought to have been abolished in developed cultures. It is actually widespread in America due to the colossal ingestion of sugar and is usually diagnosed as psychosomatic disease. Because the standard laboratory studies are negative or nonspecific, it is assumed that no organic disease is responsible.

Beginning with a review of the many symptoms of beriberi, it is described as the “great imitator” of a large number of disease conditions, each of which is thought to have its own etiology. It is relevant in all mitochondrial disease, because thiamine sits astride the vital initiation of energy synthesis. Thiamine deficiency interferes with carbohydrate, fat and protein metabolism, but is particularly important in the etiology of diabetes, types I and II and metabolic syndrome. It also has a place in the etiology of Alzheimer disease and may have an important part to play in cancer.

Evidence is provided to show that the relatively new science of epigenetics is crucial to the understanding of the part played by nutrition and lifestyle in genetic function. If the early symptoms of nutritional deficiency are treated symptomatically and high calorie malnutrition continues, the result is an array of chronic brain diseases. When thiamine deficiency was discovered as the cause of beriberi, the early investigators recognized that therapeutic doses of the vitamin involved the administration of 100-300 mg a day for months. The book reviewed here should be in the library of any Integrative Medicine physician.

Publisher Discount

The publisher is offering a 30% discount off of the list price and free shipping if the book is ordered from their site. Just click the link below enter the promotional code ATR30 at checkout.

Thiamine Deficiency Disease, Dysautonomia, and High Calorie Malnutrition

The discount does not apply to Amazon orders.

For a preview of the book, click the preview button under the right side bar image.

 

Just Released: Thiamine Deficiency Disease, Dysautonomia, and High Calorie Malnutrition

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Together with Dr. Lonsdale, I am proud to announce the release of our new book: Thiamine Deficiency Disease, Dysautonomia, and High Calorie Malnutrition.

If you have followed our blog, Hormones Matter, for any amount of time, you’ll know that we spend a lot time writing about mitochondrial distress. Mitochondria are the engines that fuel our cells and sit at the nexus of health and disease. Healthy mitochondria do much to stave off disease, allowing the body to survive all manner of modern stressors, from illness to toxicant exposures, and everything in between. Unhealthy mitochondria, on the other hand, can set into motion a series of reactions leading to complex, multisystem illnesses that modern medicine often has no earthly idea how to treat. This book is about those illnesses and the mitochondrial cascades that allow their existence.

We cover the chemistry of illness from the mitochondria upwards through the autonomic system, to the symptoms and back again. It is a chemistry that we seem to have forgotten in recent years, a chemistry we like to ignore when it contradicts our presumptions about pharmaceutical medicine and diet, and a chemistry that kicks us in the butt when we deny its importance. The chemistry is complicated on its surface, but a deeper dive reveals what Dr. Lonsdale refers to as ‘the exquisite simplicity‘ of health and disease. This book will teach you that chemistry and much more.

Why Thiamine? Why Now?

Thiamine takes center stage in this book, not because it is a magic vitamin that cures all, but because it sits atop the mitochondrial energy pathways. It is a gatekeeper of sorts, determining if or how other downstream mitochondrial functions proceed. For some inexplicable reason, amid all the research on the importance of other nutrients, we seem to have forgotten thiamine. Over and over again, we are presented with cases on Hormones Matter of overt thiamine deficiency, and yet, rarely do physicians consider it. More often than not, it is the patients or their caregivers that figure it out.

Why don’t we consider one of the most fundamental units of health? The short answer, if we are honest with ourselves, pharmacology and surgery are far sexier than nutrition. Unfortunately, however, disease processes do not develop because of drug deficiencies or a lack of surgical prowess. In the Western world, they develop in large part because of nutrient deficiencies within the context of high calorie malnutrition and in conjunction with other stressors. Understanding the chemistry that decides health or disease is critical to achieving health. A key component of that chemistry involves thiamine. This book details how to recognize, evaluate, treat, and understand thiamine deficiency. It is a complicated topic, but written for a broad audience.

Buy Now and Receive a Discount

For a limited time, the publisher is offering a 30% discount off of the list price and free shipping if the book is ordered from their site. Just click the link below enter the promotional code ATR30 at checkout.

Thiamine Deficiency Disease, Dysautonomia, and High Calorie Malnutrition

The discount does not apply to Amazon orders.

For a preview of the book, click the preview button under the right side bar image.