Common allergy drug reduces obesity and diabetes in mice

[Celebration]

http://www.physorg.com/news167835602.html

Crack open the latest medical textbook to the chapter on type 2, or adult-onset, diabetes, and you'll be hard pressed to find the term "immunology" anywhere. This is because metabolic conditions and immunologic conditions are, with a few exceptions, distant cousins.

However, a group of papers appearing in Nature Medicine, two of which are from Harvard Medical School researchers, have linked type 2 diabetes with immunology in a way that might persuade leading researchers to start viewing them as siblings.

............snip.

As Shi and postdoctoral research fellow Jian Liu discovered, mast cells were far more abundant in fat tissue from obese and diabetic humans and mice than they were in normal weight fat tissue. This led to an obvious question: by regulating mast cells, could we then control the symptoms?

.............snip.....................

The mice were divided into four groups. The first was the control group; the second group was simply switched to a healthy diet; the third was given cromolyn or ketotifen fumarate; and the fourth was both given the drug and switched to a healthy diet.

While symptoms of the second group improved moderately, the third group demonstrated dramatic improvements in both body weight and diabetes. The fourth group exhibited nearly 100 percent recovery in all areas.

[hedgehog]

1. Hmmmm...simultaneous rise in obesity and autoimmune disorders,

couldn't possibly be a connection there, it's all a matter of will power!

[Jane Austin]

2. Wow - fascinating!

As someone who's had a catastophic weight gain - and who has allergies and asthma - I find this very interesting.

The NasalCrom™ I carry around with me, but forget to use, is Cromalyn Sulfate, and I understand it stops allergies at the cellular level.

[Jane Austin]

7. Oops. I misspoke.

It's Cromalyn Sodium, not Cromalyn Sulfate.

[drm604]

3. Fascinating.

Cromolyn is available as a generic, so this might (pending more research) be an inexpensive solution to many people's health problems.

[FatDave]

4. This sounds like an amazing breakthrough.

Especially as a fat-ass with allergies who gets every cold he comes within 200 feet of.

[Aragorn]

5. makes sense

although the researchers in the story sounds as if this was a new approach, the loss of insulin-producing cells in the pancreas has long been believed to be an auto-immune problem. Maybe this should have been tried a lot sooner though.

[supernova]

6. Is there a generic form of this available?

[blue neen]

8. I know of Zaditor eyedrops, but does it also come in a pill form?

The Zaditor eyedrops also now are available OTC as a generic.

[localroger]

9. Don't get too excited

Unfortunately, the mice that are used in diabetes studies are not broken in the same way human diabetics are, and many of the treatments that work in mice have turned out not to work in humans.

[Celebration]

10. Certainly agree with that

Although it is interesting that they decided to try it due to the number of mast cells in fat in humans.

[petersjo02]

11. Thanks so much for posting this!

My husband was diagnosed with diabetes last Thursday. I've just ordered some Zadador from Drugstore.com to take along with his diabetes pill. We'll see what happens.

[Celebration]

12. Hmmm, that's an eye drop I think.....

An herb that is a mast cell inhibitor is quercetin, which is found in grapefruit. It can't be taken with certain medications, though, because of some ingredient that makes them more potent.

Quercetin really helps my allergies. No wonder!

I guess that may be why "grapefruit diets" sometimes work--inhibiting mast cells.

I think there needs to be a lot more work on this.

[petersjo02]

16. Husband on Lipitor,

so no grapefruit. But thanks for the suggestion.

[undergroundpanther]

13. Inflammation

is caused by living in our ever more and more polluted world.Eating the contaminated foods ,air pollutants,toxic chemicals in the home etc.Seems all these toxins are percolating up from the bottom of the food chain to us, now..I think THAT is why obesity AND auto immune disorders are on the rise.

It is profitable to chemical companies pharmaceutical companies and health insurance.The planet is slowly being poisoned to death and humanity is feeling the effects of it as we as a species are getting closer to the limits of the collective body burden of toxins that frogs, fish and many other extinct creatures could not endure themselves without dying off.

http://healthandenergy.com/inflammation_can_be_harmful.htm
http://www.lef.org/news/LefDailyNews.htm?NewsID=3609

Diets do not work because diets are about calories ,If fat is a form of auto immune reaction than it is the chemical companies the poisoners,the montsano,dow,union carbide and bayer and companies like them who put profits over life itself,who ARE to blame.

http://www.healthandenvironment.org/articles/doc/6145

The source of the problem

There are over 70,000 chemicals commercially produced in the United States today. many of which were developed after World War II. The long-term, low dose effects of many of these chemicals have never been investigated. In fact, the term “low dose” is misleading, implying low concentrations are harmless. But many chemicals are harmful in very low doses, like the herbicide 2,4, 5-T which is harmful in parts-per-trillion. Unless generated by the body (formaldehyde, pentane), the body’s level for chemicals should be non-detectable, and not “low level”.

http://accessnewage.com/articles/health/chemical.htm

Environmental illness blog
http://heirsonline.wordpress.com/tag/environmental-illness/

Air pollution liked to diabetes
http://www.elements4health.com/air-pollution-linked-to-diabetes.html

[hedgehog]

15. +1

[D-Lee]

14. Go low carb for diabetes and obesity, works now

Please look at these books and read the comments:

Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution -- http://www.amazon.com/Dr-Bernsteins-Diabetes-Solution-Achieving/dp/0316167169/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1248666465&sr=8-1
much of the content can be read at www.diabetes-book.com (which has a great Forum!)

Blood Sugar 101 -- http://www.amazon.com/Blood-Sugar-101-About-Diabetes/dp/0964711613/ref=pd_sim_b_2
some of the same information is presented by the author at http://www.phlaunt.com/diabetes/ (diabetes info) and http://www.phlaunt.com/lowcarb/ (low carb info)

You will be ever so grateful if you do. Briefly, in diabetes, your body just cannot break down carbohydrates and stores them as fat -- so eat about 30 grams of carbohydrates a day, which means veggies, and eliminate almost all starches, grains and fruits -- you will then be able to reach your individual balance and reduce medications to a lower level than you could otherwise.

(For DUers, if you consider the high carb American Diabetes Association recommended diet, take a look at the corporate sponsors of the ADA ...)