QuoteSafety and efficacy of coenzyme Q(10) supplementation in early chronic Peyronie's disease: a double-blind, placebo-controlled randomized study.
Private Practice of Urology and Andrology, Tehran, Iran.
Abstract
No oral medication has proved to be clearly beneficial for Peyronie's disease (Peyronies Disease). We investigated the safety and efficacy of coenzyme Q(10) (CoQ(10)) supplementation in patients with early chronic Peyronies Disease. We conducted a randomized clinical trial of 186 patients with chronic early Peyronies Disease. Patients were randomly assigned to either 300 mg CoQ(10) daily (n=93) or similar regimen of placebo (n=93) for 24 weeks. Erectile function (EF), pain during erection, plaque volume, penile curvature and treatment satisfaction using patient versions of the Erectile Dysfunction Inventory of Treatment Satisfaction (EDITS) questionnaire were assessed at baseline and every 4 weeks during study period. EF was assessed using International Index of Erectile Function (IIEF-5), and pain was evaluated with a visual analog scale (VAS, 0-10). All patients also responded to a Global Assessment Question, 'Has the treatment you have been taking during this study improved your erections?' After 24 weeks, mean IIEF-5 score, mean VAS score and mean EDITS score improved significantly in patients receiving CoQ(10) (all P<0.01). Mean plaque size and mean penile curvature degree were decreased in the CoQ(10) group, whereas a slight increase was noted in the placebo group (both P=0.001). Mean index of IIEF-5 in 24-week treatment period was 17.8+/-2.7 in the CoQ(10) group and 8.8+/-1.5 in the placebo group (P=0.001). Of the patients in CoQ(10) group, 11 (13.6%) had disease progression vs 46 (56.1%) in placebo group (P=0.01). In patients with early chronic Peyronies Disease, CoQ(10) therapy leads plaque size and penile curvature reduction and improves EF.International Journal of Impotence Research advance online publication, 19 August 2010; doi:10.1038/ijir.2010.20.
I saw this CoEnyme Q10 study today. The results look promising, but there hasn't been much mention of Q10 before, so I'm a bit skeptical. Of course, it may well be that in the early stages of the condition a variety of treatments are at their most useful, and that Coenzyme Q10 is one of those. At any rate, it's worth further studies being carried out on CoQ10.
I was taking Co Q 10 on a regular basis before I even got Peyronies Disease. I still take it every day.
So, I wouldn't put too much hope in it being anything too beneficial for any of us.
GS
300 mg per day is a LOT of CoQ10. With the price of CoQ10 what it is, I doubt that very many people are taking anywhere near that much. 50mg is typical of what I see people taking. I am currently taking 100mg and as a result of this study will probably bump it up. Interestingly, my doctor just suggested that I bump it up as well. The results of the Iranian study could WELL have been dose dependent as dose dependency is typical with CoQ10. CoQ10 is typically poorly absorbed so that is another factor. But that study is VERY impressive. I am certainly going to take action as a result of it. - George
Well by golly! Some interesting stuff out there on the Internet about CoQ10.
Quote from: al-hikmah.org
Some evidence indicates that CoQ10 supplements may offer benefit for individuals taking medications that interfere with the body's production of CoQ10, or partially block its action. It has been suggested (but not proven) that these effects on CoQ10 may play a role in the known side effects of these treatments, and that taking CoQ10 supplements might help. The best evidence is for the cholesterol-lowering drugs in the statin family, such as lovastatin (Mevacor), simvastatin (Zocor), and pravastatin (Pravachol). For several other categories of drugs, the evidence that they interfere with CoQ10 is provocative but less than solid. These include oral diabetes drugs (especially glyburide, phenformin, and tolazamide), beta-blockers (specifically propranolol, metoprolol, and alprenolol), antipsychotic drugs in the phenothiazine family, tricyclic antidepressants, methyldopa, hydrochlorothiazide, clonidine, and hydralazine.
If the above is to be believed, one could perceive that CoQ10 which is essential to human metabolism can be blocked to some extent by a long list of prescription medications. How very interesting! Some of us around here have suspected that medications we were taking when we developed Peyronie's had at least some role in ending up with this disease. Could CoQ10 be a, if not the, missing link? Could the drugs we ARE TAKING and MUST TAKE to stay healthy be AGGRAVATING our Peyronie's by shutting down our CoQ10? Well, add this together with the Iranian study! I think it gets rather interesting. - George
Thanks for the additional information George. At present I'm keeping an open mind about Coenzyme Q10 rather than getting too excited about it. That said, I'd love to get hold of the full study to see if we can gleam any insights from it. Ideally we'll see another similiar study carried out using 300mg of Q10 or thereabouts in peyronie's patients, to see if we see something similiar takes place. Then I feel that it would start to look like we have a new and very useful supplement at our disposal. We're not exactly awash with information on successful peyronie's treatments, so I certainly wouldn't blame anyone for trying this alongside pentox and the like. I would think that if another positive study comes along Levine and co will take note.
Statins are known for depleting CoQ10 (PMID 15942122 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15942122)), and doctors are known for not suggesting that they do anything about it.
I like the ubiquinol form of CoQ10 as it's much more bioavailable (PMID 16919858 (http://pubmed.gov/16919858), wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubiquinol))
I've long suspected that Metoprolol was somehow involved in both my plantar faciitis AND my Peyronie's problems. I have sort of attributed the whole thing to effect on blood flow. NOW I suspect the real link may be CoQ10 depletion or obstruction. CoQ10 is a basic essential nutrient. If it gets compromised, the effects are non-specific and all over the map similar to what happens with Vitamin D insufficiency. And like with Vitamin D and Peyronie's itself, doctors like to ignore it. Just don't worry about it and everything will be OK.
Interesting, I developed my Peyronies about a year after I began taking Lipitor. I always suspected the satins I am taking had something to do with this condition. I read a interesting article by Melchior Meijer on this very issue, he states that Satins deplete CO-Q10 which in some case can cause heart failure and a cascade of other health issues. www.thincs.org/melchior1.htm. I will try to get a link to the article, several pages long involving studies by Dr. Peter Langsjoen. He stated satins block enzyme HMG CoA-reductase.
This emzyme is responsible for the production of a substance called 'Mevalonate' which it turns out is the precursor of both cholesterol and co-enzyme10. Anyway some interesting stuff.
Jayhawk
jayhawk:
In your post number 7 below, do you mean to say "statins" in lieu of satins?? I have been taking statins for over 6 years now and need to know if I am at risk for any further heart damage.
Old Man
Sorry
Old Man,
"statins" is correct! You might want to do some research on this drug, the effects according to this article are even more pronounced as you age.
jayhawk
I did some research on statins when I was having problems with them. Vytoirn got my total cholesterol level down to 89. This reeks havoc on your hormone system. For testosterone to flow properly in your system your cholesterol level should not drop below 150. 99% of doctors do not know this, I had to educate my heart doctor at the time.
I can not take any statins because of the side effects, I do take 1000 mg of Niacin at night with a baby aspirin 30 minutes before. My total is now 159.
Hope this helps.
Jackp
JackP:
WOW! Below 150 is low, huh? I must be in the "danger zone" as mine runs about 125 all the time and my heart doc says he wants it to be around 100. Is it time for me to get another cardiologist that is more up to date??
Old Man
The people at Life Extension are pretty much the pros on things like cholesterol levels. Their recommendations as to ideal levels are:
Total Cholesterol: 160-180mg/dL
LDL: 50-99mg/dL
HDL: 50-60mg/dL
Contrary to the belief of many in the medical profession, cholesterol is NOT toxic waste. Cholesterol is an important substance that the body uses for all sorts of essential bodily functions. The slash and burn approach to heart health has all sorts of very negative unintended consequences that can reek havoc with a persons general health.
CoQ10 is essential for mitochondrial health. Mitochondria are the cellular components that provide energy to the cells through the burning of fat and carbohydrates. You REALLY DON'T want to mess with this process by interfering with CoQ10 metabolism. And yet that is EXACTLY what a whole string of widely used medications do. And few patients who take these medications supplement with CoQ10 to avoid these problems and most doctors prefer to ignore the issue. Those patients who do take CoQ10 and are aware of the problem are probably not taking enough of it due to its high cost. It was the Japanese who did the initial research on CoQ10 and to this day most if not all CoQ10 is produced by Japanese pharmaceutical companies. It is significantly expensive, but the health effects of not having enough of it can be insidious. Attached is the article that Jay was referring to.
It certainly seems like this has provoked a healthy debate. There are lots of posts at the ImmInst which question the logic of taking statins without COQ10 (http://www.imminst.org/forum/topic/19828-the-hidden-dangers-of-statin-drugs/). Perhaps there is an alarmist element to some of the input, so that might need to be factored in. Still, it's important to look at all angles and thought concerning statins. Even statin like supplements (containing red yeast rice) tend to contain COQ10 too (http://www.iherb.com/Now-Foods-Red-Yeast-Rice-600-mg-With-CoQ10-30-mg-120-Vcaps/3336?at=0), so you'd think that for people on prescription treatrments they would get to here about the COQ10 depleting side of statins. A few studies link COQ10 deficiency to chronic fatigue and heart problems: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20010505
Positive effects of COQ10: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19932599
COQ10 Levels pre before and after statin use: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19649137
Management strategies for statin intolerant patients: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20628837
I think that CoQ10 has been neglected around here in the past because it has been very much off topic. However, now, with the Iranian study connecting Peyronie's to CoQ10 (something I would have never guessed), things are different. But then when you take a second look, tissue that can not adequately supply itself with a source of energy will simply atrophy. And that sounds a lot like what happens with Peyronie's. One thing I can tell you for sure is that a little over a week into 400mg of CoQ10 a day, I am seeing the improvement in my erections. There is more girth and less bend. The improvement has been noticeable. So I am looking forward to continuing the CoQ10 along with Pentoxifylline, of course. I really do believe that this discovery may bring the cure for some guys. I think it is that much of a breakthrough. Lets hope. There have been so many disappointments in the past. CoQ10, who would have guessed? Obviously somebody did, because the Iranians put it to the test.
Very interesting George,
As I stated a couple of weeks ago, I've been taking CoQ10 for years and was taking it before I got Peyronies Disease, so I didn't give it much validity as a treatment for Peyronies Disease. Your post makes me think I will up my dosage and see if I see any improvement.
Obviously, stranger things have happened and maybe some obscure drug or vitamin will end up saving all of us.
GS
What about someone at my age of 22? Is it possible that Coenzyme Q10 can be deficient due to a poor an unvaried diet or that it's possible to be genetically susceptible to low CoQ10 levels? At my age I am not taking any medication, much less any medication that would suppress my Q10 levels. Obviously everyone is different and I may fit in another category, but I am curious if that this could be an issue for someone like me and that it may help if I was to explore the issue.
Is there anyway to test such levels? My Urologist appointment is finally here, I got to go in tomorrow at 3. I doubt he will know anything of Q10, but I may ask him to see what response I get.
Also would there be any possible adverse effects for me trying Q10 in the future?
Zariche - As Tim previously stated in a different thread, it may be that "this disease is really a collection of varying diseases with different etiologies and probably different treatments". Factoring that in, it's important to try to cover all angles until we know more. Personally, I think treatments should be given a good few months to decide whether or not they are useful. I've stuck with pentox for quite some time, and I feel that I benefited from that. Perhaps coq10 deficiency plays a role in some and not other. Perhaps the study is flawed and it's not useful for peyronie's at all. It's hard to know what to think as the study is out of leftfield and not something I'd previously considered. It's hard to argue against people giving it a try though, at the doses stated. Those newly diagnosed especially. If we begin to feel that they are benefiting, then it may be that we've stumbled upon something very useful, and it will strengthen the existing arsenal of treatments.
CoQ10 is currently being used as part of a Phase 3 Parkinsons trial (at doses of 1200mg, and 2400mg), so I would think that 300mg a day isn't harmful. In iherb right now you can buy 600mg capsules, so although high 300mg seems to be a much less than some are taking.
I want to make it clear that I really agree with what newguy is saying here. I believe that there are most likely multiple metabolic routes to Peyronie's, multiple factors that combine to result in the disease. And like Tim, I believe that not all factors are present in any one individual. While it is possible that someone like zariche, for example, has a CoQ10 deficiency, I really think it is not very likely and I do not think that it is necessary to have a CoQ10 deficiency in order to contract Peyronie's. In such a case additional CoQ10 would NOT be harmful, but there is no guarantee that it would be helpful although it might be. Everything about Peyronie's is full of unknowns. What is known is that CoQ10 helped some, BUT NOT ALL, participants in the Iranian study. I am attaching a PDF of that abstract in case anyone would like an easy way to save it and print it out. I think taking CoQ10 ESPECIALLY makes sense for those of us with cardiovascular issues that might also benefit from CoQ10 OR increasing the amount of CoQ10 we currently taking. The older we get the more suppressed our CoQ10 levels become until they get depressed to almost nothing. Additionally, it would especially make sense for those of us at any age who are on long term medication. And we must not forget that in terms of evidence and consensus, Pentoxifylline is THE number one front line ORAL TREATMENT for Peyronie's. In other words, start there first if at all possible. After that there is Acetyl L Carnitine and, now, CoQ10. ADDITIONALLY, we need to keep in mind that there are very effective alternatives/adjuncts to oral treatments such as traction, VED, etc. So, while I really want the word to get out about CoQ10, as newguy points out, we need to keep things in perspective. - George
I'm going to send off for some towards the end of the week, just to give it a trial. I'd rather be at the frontline or anything vaguely positive. I can understand some people sitting this one out though until more in known, or perhpas even thinking that it might not be useful. Now that the study is out there though, we can at least think that others will eventually follow. If they are positive too, then we will have to sit up and take notice. If they aren't, then it's back to the drawing board. I agree with George that for those taking statins and certain other drugs, which deplete CoQ10, there is good reasoning to suggest that it may be a good idea to take CoQ10.
My CoQ10 still hasn't arrived, but really it should be here any day now (unless it's been lost in the post). Anymore updates from those currently taking it, or is it a bit soon to even start thinking along those lines?
Its definitely making a difference for me. Before I started to take it along with the Pentox, I would get sore if I did certain things. Now, I don't any more. To me, that demonstrates a lower susceptibility to inflammation. I am currently taking 400mg of ubiquinone. I am going to upgrade that to 400mg of ubiquinol (= 3200mg of ubiquinone) in a few days. I am also noting that the scarred tissue is slowly becoming softer and the remaining nodules are softening and shrinking a bit. But I think that is significant for only using CoQ10 for a few weeks. The best part of all is no side effects. The down side, of course, is that the stuff is expensive. For me, an additional benefit is that it has helped lower my blood pressure significantly as well. Double benefit. - George
I´m currently taking L-Arginine (2 mg/day) is possible to add Q10 without any side effect??
Thanks
The WebMD overviews of CoQ10 is here -> http://www.webmd.com/drugs/drug-149662-Q-Sorb+Co+Q-10+Oral.aspx?drugid=149662&drugname=Q-Sorb+Co+Q-10+Oral (http://www.webmd.com/drugs/drug-149662-Q-Sorb+Co+Q-10+Oral.aspx?drugid=149662&drugname=Q-Sorb+Co+Q-10+Oral) and here -> http://www.webmd.com/vitamins-supplements/ingredientmono-938-Coenzyme%20Q10%20%28COENZYME%20Q-10%29.aspx?activeIngredientId=938&activeIngredientName=Coenzyme%20Q10%20%28COENZYME%20Q-10%29 (http://www.webmd.com/vitamins-supplements/ingredientmono-938-Coenzyme%20Q10%20%28COENZYME%20Q-10%29.aspx?activeIngredientId=938&activeIngredientName=Coenzyme%20Q10%20%28COENZYME%20Q-10%29)
The Mayo Clinic overview is here -> http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/coenzyme-q10/NS_patient-coenzymeq10 (http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/coenzyme-q10/NS_patient-coenzymeq10)
Many are also interested in CoQ10 due to its cardiovascular benefits. Here is a recent study regarding that -> http://nutritionandmetabolism.com/content/7/1/55 (http://nutritionandmetabolism.com/content/7/1/55)
How about this one, George? Scroll down to the ubiquinol. Looks like a pretty good deal. Is the PP OK?
http://www.puritan.com/pages/iq.asp?SearchText=ubiquinol+co+q10&x=13&y=22
Here are the 200 mg ubiquinol (http://www.iherb.com/Ubiquinol-CoQ10-200-mg) offerings at iherb.
name | cost | quantity | cost per capsule |
Healthy Origins, Ubiquinol, 200 mg, 150 Softgels | 126.85 | 150 | 0.85 |
Healthy Origins, Ubiquinol, 200 mg, 60 Softgels | 52.85 | 60 | 0.88 |
Now Foods, Ubiquinol, Extra Strengtd, 200 mg, 60 Softgels | 57.36 | 60 | 0.96 |
Jarrow Formulas, QH-absorb, 200 mg, 30 Softgels | 34.97 | 30 | 1.17 |
Bluebonnet Nutrition, Ubiquinol, 200 mg, 60 Softgels | 71.96 | 60 | 1.20 |
Yeah, a bit pricey. Cheap though, if it works. ;)
s&s
Quote from: slowandsteady on September 09, 2010, 04:20:05 PM
Here are the 200 mg ubiquinol (http://www.iherb.com/Ubiquinol-CoQ10-200-mg) offerings at iherb.
name | cost | quantity | cost per capsule |
Healthy Origins, Ubiquinol, 200 mg, 150 Softgels | 126.85 | 150 | 0.85 |
Healthy Origins, Ubiquinol, 200 mg, 60 Softgels | 52.85 | 60 | 0.88 |
Now Foods, Ubiquinol, Extra Strengtd, 200 mg, 60 Softgels | 57.36 | 60 | 0.96 |
Jarrow Formulas, QH-absorb, 200 mg, 30 Softgels | 34.97 | 30 | 1.17 |
Bluebonnet Nutrition, Ubiquinol, 200 mg, 60 Softgels | 71.96 | 60 | 1.20 |
Yeah, a bit pricey. Cheap though, if it works. ;)
s&s
Did you check any other vendors besides iHerb? I really wanted to get the 100 mg. because I was planning on taking 300 mg per day, but the 200 mg. options on iHerb are cheaper than the 100 mg buy 2 get 4 free deal on Puritan's Pride (if my math is correct...terrible at math).....Fred
Most, if not all, Ubiquinol is produced by ONE Japanese pharmaceutical company, Kaneka. See -> http://www.kanekaqh.com/ (http://www.kanekaqh.com/) for more info including a list of vendors. The vendors repackage the Kaneka product, sometimes adding their own proprietary synergists. So when you pay extra, you are either paying for nothing or you are paying for additional ingredients included to enhance the Ubiquinol product.
Kaneka is also the major producer of Ubiquinone. See -> http://www.kanekaq10.com/index.htm (http://www.kanekaq10.com/index.htm) for more info.
For the difference between Ubiquinol and the far less expensive Ubiquinone see -> http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/jan2007_report_coq10_01.htm (http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/jan2007_report_coq10_01.htm) Note that younger guys might be wasting their money on Ubiquinol since younger bodies are still able to convert Ubiquinone to Ubiquinol very effectively. For those of us who are older however (over 40), Ubiquinol is really the only way to go.
- George
Quote from: George999 on September 09, 2010, 09:11:11 PM
Most, if not all, Ubiquinol is produced by ONE Japanese pharmaceutical company, Kaneka. See -> http://www.kanekaqh.com/ (http://www.kanekaqh.com/) for more info including a list of vendors. The vendors repackage the Kaneka product, sometimes adding their own proprietary synergists. So when you pay extra, you are either paying for nothing or you are paying for additional ingredients included to enhance the Ubiquinol product.
Kaneka is also the major producer of Ubiquinone. See -> http://www.kanekaq10.com/index.htm (http://www.kanekaq10.com/index.htm) for more info.
For the difference between Ubiquinol and the far less expensive Ubiquinone see -> http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/jan2007_report_coq10_01.htm (http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/jan2007_report_coq10_01.htm) Note that younger guys might be wasting their money on Ubiquinol since younger bodies are still able to convert Ubiquinone to Ubiquinol very effectively. For those of us who are older however (over 40), Ubiquinol is really the only way to go.
- George
So it's OK to just go with the best deal you can find on the ubiquinol? I was looking at the list that S&S posted below. Are those all OK or would you recommend one over the other? I know you're taking the Life Extension brand, but if I can get by for a bit less than that and still get a good quality product, that's what I'm looking for.....Fred
Healthy Origins has the cheapest 100 mg on iHerb too. All of the ubiquinol comes from the same source, as George wrote. I have started taking mine with d-limonene that I get separately.
The Puritan's pride deal you mentioned comes out slightly ahead of the Heathy Origins on iHerb. If you in the iHerb VIP program though, you get an additional 10% off (12% for orders over $120, etc), tipping the scales to iHerb for me.
Quote from: slowandsteady on September 10, 2010, 01:27:16 PM
Healthy Origins has the cheapest 100 mg on iHerb too. All of the ubiquinol comes from the same source, as George wrote. I have started taking mine with d-limonene that I get separately.
The Puritan's pride deal you mentioned comes out slightly ahead of the Heathy Origins on iHerb. If you in the iHerb VIP program though, you get an additional 10% off (12% for orders over $120, etc), tipping the scales to iHerb for me.
I went for the healthy origins option too. Unfortunately I opted for the International Airmail option (instead of DHL, which I normally use), as the site suggests that it might reduce customs and VAT charges. It still hasn't returned up after 2 weeks though. I'll give it another two and assume that if it hasn't turned up by then it must be lost in the mail :(. I reordered today using DHL and added Magnesium malate too. They'll hopefully arrive in a few days and I can add these to my current regimen.
Another source of Ubiquinol is here -> http://www.swansonvitamins.com/SWU377/ItemDetail?n=160 (http://www.swansonvitamins.com/SWU377/ItemDetail?n=160)
Quote from: George999 on September 18, 2010, 06:34:34 PM
Another source of Ubiquinol is here -> http://www.swansonvitamins.com/SWU377/ItemDetail?n=160 (http://www.swansonvitamins.com/SWU377/ItemDetail?n=160)
This beats the Puritan's Pride price by a few bucks (although I haven't checked the shipping for either). Is the Swanson of equal quality? I expect it would be if it all supposedly comes from the same place?...Fred
George, any thought that, for whatever reason, coenzyme Q10 might be more effective than ubiquinol? I haven't had much in the way of improvements after a week at 200 mg ubiquinol.
Quote from: slowandsteady on September 23, 2010, 09:16:41 AM
George, any thought that, for whatever reason, coenzyme Q10 might be more effective than ubiquinol? I haven't had much in the way of improvements after a week at 200 mg ubiquinol.
Ubiquinol is the active component. When you take Ubiquinone instead, your body converts it into Ubiquinol. When you take Ubiquinol there is no need for conversion in the body. It is analogous to beta-carotene (plain old Q10) and Vitamin A (Ubiquinol). Younger people thus will do just as well with the less expensive Ubiquinone, older people are less able to perform the biologic conversion and do better with Ubiquinol. Each person will react differently. Some will be more helped by Ubiquinol than others. In my case it is worth it just because for me it has reliably reduced the risk of reinjury to near zero. Prior to taking Ubiquinol any little mishap left me inflamed. This is no longer the case. Additionally after some weeks now I am seeing just general improvement as well. As with Penox, I don't think you can expect too much from just a week or even a couple of weeks. I think you are looking at months and years to see significant benefit. - George
Quote from: George999 on September 09, 2010, 09:11:11 PM
For the difference between Ubiquinol and the far less expensive Ubiquinone see -> http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/jan2007_report_coq10_01.htm (http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/jan2007_report_coq10_01.htm) Note that younger guys might be wasting their money on Ubiquinol since younger bodies are still able to convert Ubiquinone to Ubiquinol very effectively. For those of us who are older however (over 40), Ubiquinol is really the only way to go.
- George
I started on Ubiquinone. hopefully due to my age (29) is will convert well, and as a result be useful/suitable. I've bought six months worth, so I will stick with it for that period of time, at which time I will draw a conclusion as to its effectiveness for me.
Quote from: newguy on September 24, 2010, 11:31:28 PM
I started on Ubiquinone. hopefully due to my age (29) is will convert well, and as a result be useful/suitable. I've bought six months worth, so I will stick with it for that period of time, at which time I will draw a conclusion as to its effectiveness for me.
I think that in your case that is probably a good choice. You should be able to get a lot more Ubiquinol in your body this way for a lot less money by letting your body do the work rather than the chemists. I wish you the best and hope you have a good results that I am experiencing or better. - George
Just got my ubiquinol from Swanson's...3 bottles, 60 softgels 100 mg. Do you take it with food or does it matter? I'm planning on taking 100 mg with each meal....Fred
For those taking CoQ10, be aware that CoQ10 DOES lower blood pressure. If you are already on blood pressure meds, that matters because adding CoQ10 will gradually drive down your blood pressure, which in some cases might end up going too low. So if you are on BP meds, just keep an eye on your BP and let your doc know if it is getting too low. There are research studies involving subjects who were actually taken off of their BP meds after being on CoQ10 for a while. Since CoQ10 has far fewer side effects than most BP meds, that would be a very good thing. - George
You guys keep mentioning Ubiquinone and Ubiquinol. Is the simple pills of CoQ10 (say from Whole Foods) the same thing? Or am I taking the wrong stuff?
Thanks,
SSmithe
CoQ10 comes in two forms. The older form is Ubiquinone. Ubiquinone is to CoQ10 as Beta Carotene is to Vitamin A. Its the raw form. When you take Ubiquinone, your body has to break it down into Ubiquinol in order to use it. What has been discovered is that people over about 40 years old or so lose much of their ability to convert Ubiquinone into Ubiquinol. So in 2006 Ubiquinol, the refined or "reduced" version of Ubiquinone was introduced. It is already reduced to the active form so there is no longer any need for the body to do any work. This is the more expensive form that is recommended for those of us over 40. If you are a younger guy, the less expensive Ubiquinone will work just fine as your body will convert it into the active form. The label on your CoQ10 container will state if it is Ubiquinol. If it does not say what form the CoQ10 is, you can be assured that it is Ubiquinone. OK for younger guys, but less effective the older you get. - George
George999,
Thanks for the explanation. The pills I have been taking only say CoQ10 and nothing else, so I guess that would be the Ubiquinone. And I am 31 so that should be OK then... Lets hope it does something.
Thanks,
SSmithe
I ordered some nattokinase to help with circulation as I have problems with cold extremeties and thought I'd try this, plus I have hyper tension. Would nattokinase and Ubiquinol together possibly lower my blood pressure too much? I also got some Serrapeptase. Would these 3 supplements be ok together? Or maybe overkill?
I was not aware that Natto lowers blood pressure although I really think it is a great supplement. I have used it in the past myself. And now you come along and tell us that it lowers blood pressure. And, you know what, I did some checking ... and ... you are RIGHT! Hallelujah! This is great. As for whether CoQ10 and Natto together can lower blood pressure too much. The answer to that is IF you are ALSO taking prescription meds for your blood pressure, YES. People on prescription meds for BP should be careful with a wide range of sups that can lower BP. And especially with sups like CoQ10 and Natto that can be significantly effective in lowering BP. The solution is to watch your BP very carefully while taking these sups and to go to the doc to get your prescription meds adjusted if your BP is drifting too low. Thanks for posting this! - George
This post won't be relevant to others unless you have a condition called mitral valve prolapse, a (usually) benign heart condition in which the mitral valve is "floppy" and doesn't seat properly between beats. Some with the condition have no symptoms...some have chest pains, panic attacks, anxiety, palpitations, fatigue, heart "flutters" and other symptoms. I was diagnosed with mvp about 14 years ago and the symptoms will go away, sometimes for months or even years then just randomly reappear.
I'm mentioning this on the Co Q10 thread because Co Q10 (as well as magnesium) are said by some to help relieve mvp symptoms. So here's what happened in my recent experience with ubiquinol.
I started taking it on September 29 and took it without any problem until October 7 and 8, 100mg 3X per day. On both of those days, out of nowhere I began to feel the flutters and dizziness so familiar to those who have this condition. I also experienced skipped beats which I had never noticed before. Since ubiquinol was the only new thing I'd added, I stopped taking it until today. During the days I was off the ubiquinol, I had no significant mvp symptoms (except the occassional flutter when lying on my left side...just minor little symptoms).
Today I took 100 mg with breakfast and right after lunch, the symptoms started again. Now this is rather odd as Co Q10 is supposed to be good for mvp. Now this could be purely coincidental and I may try another 100 mg tomorow and see what happens. Right now as I write this post, I have that uncomfortable "flutterly" feeling in my chest and I'm a little dizzy. Earlier the symptoms were more severe. I took my pulse a few times and didn't find any skipped beats.
As I said...unrelated to Peyronie's but just thought it might be of interest to someone.....Fred
Fred,
I have had MVP since I was a child and due to a lot of stress in my life, my condition got progressively worse about 6 years ago. It was so bad that I had to have open heart surgery to correct it. Since the surgery, everything has been fine with my mitral valve.
I was taking CoQ10 before the surgery and have been taking it since without any complications.
My suggestion would be to have your MVP checked out again by your cardiologist. It may have worsened over time and you may now be a candidate for a valve job. If so, they are now doing the repair roboticly and you may not have to have your chest opened up.
Better safe than sorry.
GS
Quote from: GS on October 14, 2010, 09:56:36 AM
Fred,
I have had MVP since I was a child and due to a lot of stress in my life, my condition got progressively worse about 6 years ago. It was so bad that I had to have open heart surgery to correct it. Since the surgery, everything has been fine with my mitral valve.
I was taking CoQ10 before the surgery and have been taking it since without any complications.
My suggestion would be to have your MVP checked out again by your cardiologist. It may have worsened over time and you may now be a candidate for a valve job. If so, they are now doing the repair roboticly and you may not have to have your chest opened up.
Better safe than sorry.
GS
GS...Thanks for the info. I've been meaning to see a cardiologist anyway. Last year at my annual checkup they couldn't get an ekg reading because of some kind of "blockage" and they told me I should see a cardiologist. When I told them I had mvp they said that was probably the reason for the ekg problem. Just been putting it off for over a year now.....Fred
george has mentioned this as an alternative that seems to enhance the effect of pentox - has anyone added this to their regime - im thinking of buying it so i am curios as to anyones thoughts???
I ve recently started to take Ubiquinol. I learned about it through Georges post and he also recommended I mite try it for pain so I did. I ve been taking it for about a week or so and it really has been great for me. It has reduced my pain a lot and is allowing me to move forward with the VED protocal. In my three years of Peyronies Disease its the only supplement that I ve ever had any luck with that I could tell that actually works. I am not taking Pentox but just taking it alone along with L-Argine, ALC, Vit. E.
I am thankful that George posted it on the forum and recommended to me. Thanks George!!!
well thats amazing why isnt this MORE talked about here if its such a good thing - why can I buy it from - I generally buy from iherb as i am not in the states - is this the best place to get it??
my concern as well is why havnt more people discussed this or made reference to it here on this forum.mmmmm????
Well, I dont think its been discussed here on the forum for that long. I ve only seen it for the past few weeks. I am sure you can purchase it from iherb. I am not sure who has the best pricing I bought mine from a store locally.
so is it called ubiquinol COQ 10??
I have just had a chance to review the full copy of the recently completed Iranian CoQ10 study. I have found it to be pretty impressive. I have forwarded a copy directly to Tim and am eagerly awaiting his comments. One of the major questions I had about this study was whether they used Ubiquinone or the more effective and newer Ubiquinol. The answer certainly *seems* that they in fact used Ubiquinone. This was a three year study with nearly 200 participants with the actual period of treatment lasting six months. The positive results reported are profound considering how difficult Peyronie's is to treat. And I am convinced that the more potent Ubiquinol should produce even more impressive results since Ubiquinone is known not to work well for older people. Additionally continued treatment beyond the six month period should have added benefits as Ubiquinol is a safe and generally well tolerated substance. I was hoping to be able to attach a copy of the study to this post, but the size of the file is too large. Hopefully Tim will get it posted in the resource library quickly. In the mean time I have included the link. There is MUCH hope for all of us. The combination of Ubiquinol and Pentox is working extremely well for me and after reading this study, it becomes clear to me as to why that is the case.
Iranian CoQ10 Study (http://www.nature.com/ijir/journal/v22/n5/pdf/ijir201020a.pdf)
Makes me wonder if I should switch to the plain Q10 since I'm not seeing any results with the Ubiquinol. It's cheaper too!
Hornman
George
This is great news for anyone in early Peyronie's and I would encourage anyone in that position to take matters into their own hands and start on this stuff.
However a lot of us here are in the stable phase having had this for several years and I believe you are one of those.
From the study
"The role of oral medication to modify the course
of Peyronies Disease may be limited to the 12–18 months of
plaque maturation during which time penile pain
and induration is gradually resolving. Once nonpainful
penile curvature has been ensued, the
probability of significant success with oral therapy
appears limited"
How do you see this of benefit outside of prevention to repair/reverse/restore previous function? I don't see how it could be helpful especially if one believes Peyronies is a result of trauma verus spontaneous inflammation of which mine is hte former.
Remember, this was a six month study. The results were achieved over six months on Ubiquinone. If Ubiquinol doesn't work, Ubiquinone certainly won't work as it has to go through conversion in the body to Ubiquinol. - George
Quote from: hornman on October 31, 2010, 12:28:31 PM
Makes me wonder if I should switch to the plain Q10 since I'm not seeing any results with the Ubiquinol. It's cheaper too!
Hornman
Quote from: hornman on October 31, 2010, 12:28:31 PM
Makes me wonder if I should switch to the plain Q10 since I'm not seeing any results with the Ubiquinol. It's cheaper too!
Hornman
If your over 40, I'd say stick with the ubiquinol. ubiquinone is the exact same as ubiquinol but just harder for older people to process in their bodies. I'm thinking, since I'm 30, I'll switch to Q10 300mg and get way more out of it then my ubiquinol 100mg?
By the looks of this study, as an acute Peyronies Disease sufferer, ubiquinol combo'd with pentox is going to give me one hell of a chance (<10%) to recover from my penis pain.
UK,
First of all the whole "phase" thing is something of an oversimplification. Without Pentox and Ubiquinol, I STILL have pain issues after over six years. This hardly indicates "stable". The same cautionary note has been used in evaluating Pentoxifylline. All I know is that both have proven helpful for me in spite of my advanced state. Additionally I would make the following points:
1) One should EXPECT that anyone in an advanced state would take longer to achieve a discernible benefit. Six months is a rather short time frame.
2) This study apparently employed Ubiquinone. The results may very well be skewed to some degree by the lack of ability of some in the study to successfully convert Ubiquinone.
3) This study employed CoQ10 in isolation. It does not take into account what might very well be achievable with a combination of Pentoxifylline AND Ubiquinol.
4) In the case of heart disease, Ubiquinol has been shown to work in cases of LATE STAGE heart failure. Why should it be any different in the case of Peyronie's? Ubiquinol protects and even restores ALL tissues, not just the TA. If we can totally wipe out inflammation and oxidative stress, all tissues in question *should* heal, albeit slowly.
So what I see in that study gives me a whole lot of hope as to the potential value of Ubiquinol. But, as always, I tend to see the glass half full when everyone around me is seeing it half empty.
- George
Iceman, I really suggest you carefully read through the CoQ10 thread, especially my posts. There you will learn all about Ubiquinol and where you can get it. Its ALL under the CoQ10 thread under the Oral Treatments topic. - George
George999
Hi - as I mentioned earlier to you , I switched over to Ubiquinol last week . Taking 1 /2 caps of 100 mg daily. I have been reading your sources for product , and understanding that all have the same base source for product , see a huge difference in cost , just between 2 of the mentioned vendors.
Using 60 caps 100 mg shipped to Canada = .95 per cap from Puritan's Pride and .59 from Swanson.
The Puritan product I priced is Reserveage Active Ubiquinol. This is the same one I bought locally. Works out to $1.26 per cap.
Obviously I will repeat from a USA source - but how come the huge difference just using these 2 vendors when the contents are essentially the same? Are they?
Thanks
Mike
Hi
Could someone suggest how much Ubiquinol is best on a daily basis, and when it should be taken, with or without meals etc. ?
Tertius
Mike, All the products DO contain the same basic ingredient since there is ONLY ONE manufacturer, the Japanese pharmaceutical company, Kaneka. The Kaneka website http://www.kanekaqh.com/kanekaqh-products.html (http://www.kanekaqh.com/kanekaqh-products.html) lists all of the authorized distributors of their product. Each of these independent distributors formulates their own version of the end product and determines what sort of profit they want to make on the end product. This is why the prices are all over the map. I suppose their is the possibility that some of these vendors might be misrepresenting the amount of active ingredient in their product and thus undercutting their competitor's pricing. I really don't know how someone could spot something like that or even guarantee that a high priced vendor is not committing the same fraud. We live in an age where it happens even with supposedly well regulated prescription drugs. For sure Puritan's Pride has a very good reputation and I would be very confident that you would be getting the real deal from them.
Tertius, The amount of Ubiquinone used in the successful Peyronie's study was 300mg per day. Based on that, I am using 300mg of the Ubiquinol per day and finding it highly effective. Woodman has also posted on other threads that he is getting results from this amount. The best way to take it is 100mg with meals three times per day. Ubiquinol is simply reduced Ubiquinone. If you consume Ubiquinone, your body tries to convert it to Ubiquinol. It may or may not succeed depending on age and health etc. If you take Ubiquinol, the conversion is already done and it can go right to work in your body without any intervening processing by your body.
- George
Mike, Also, I am getting significant beneficial results using the Life Extension formula which is one of the most expensive, but I know from experience it works. Woodman is also getting results and perhaps you can ask him directly via PM or perhaps he can share with us all as to what brand he is using. By sharing this kind of info on this forum we can probably sort out very quickly which ones work and which ones don't. - George
bought a whole lot from iherb - wish me luck
George - Thanks for posting. I agree that the "phases" classification is a bit fuzzy. In these cases, it's those with the condition for a year+ (but under 18 months, I think) and with pain. While I agree that, as far as surgery goes and many mens conditions there is a cut off point where stability, or therebaouts, is reaches, some do not fit into these groupings. I would be interested to see how apparently painless and stable conditions react to these treatments (coq10 and pentox), and those with conditions seemingly active for years. There seems to be a thought in these studies, that treatment outside of the parameters chosen would be totally useless. I'd rather they test that, rather than assume it.
As I mentioned in a previous post, I have mitral valve prolapse for which ubiquinol is supposed to be beneficial. I started at 300 mg. per day on September 29 and, as I said before. after around 10 days began to experience mvp symptoms. I stopped for a few days and started again at 100 mg. which I seemed to tolerate better, but still had some minor mvp symptoms (which I have from time to time anyway). Yesterday (Wednesday, Nov. 3) I increased to 200 mg. and the mvp symptoms came back. This morning I had 100 mg. with breakfast (around 8 AM) and the mvp started acting up. I stil plan on taking my other 100 at lunch and see how it goes. I've heard from at least one other person who has mvp and said they had been taking CO Q10 for years with no problem. I'm still not convinced that it's the ubiquinol that is causing my symptoms...just reporting what I've experienced. It's now 10:45 and the symptoms are still with me.
However, last night I noticed a reduction in my penile pain. And this AM I had erections but not the usual pain associated with hese erections. I've been experiencing painful early AM erections for several months now (since around the time I started to take ALC). So it seems that maybe the ubiquinol is beginning to help with the pain. Hope so!...Fred
Fred, Have you ever tried Aloe Vera softgels before for the MVP? - George
Quote from: Woodman on October 30, 2010, 02:58:27 AM
Well, I dont think its been discussed here on the forum for that long. I ve only seen it for the past few weeks. I am sure you can purchase it from iherb. I am not sure who has the best pricing I bought mine from a store locally.
Swanson and Puritan's Pride have it at a reasonable price...at least reasonable for something so outrageously expensive. However, if it helps it's worth the money. I've been taking it off and on since the end of September and last night I noticed a reduction in pain. Also I've been having painful AM erections for several months....this AM I had erections but not the pain...could be the ubiquinol....Fred
Quote from: George999 on November 04, 2010, 12:24:05 PM
Fred, Have you ever tried Aloe Vera softgels before for the MVP? - George
George,
No I haven't. I've never heard of Aloe Vera being used as a treatment fro mvp. Where can I find some info on the subject? Thanks for the suggestion.....Fred
Quote from: Fred22 on November 04, 2010, 02:44:34 PM
Quote from: George999 on November 04, 2010, 12:24:05 PM
Fred, Have you ever tried Aloe Vera softgels before for the MVP? - George
George,
No I haven't. I've never heard of Aloe Vera being used as a treatment fro mvp. Where can I find some info on the subject? Thanks for the suggestion.....Fred
I obtained relief from palpitations with Aloe softgels, there is also a large study indicating it to be effective for angina. Of course neither of these are related to what you have other than they all have to do with the heart. My thinking is that, who knows, it might be worth a try. It is something I would try if I were in your shoes. Like just a little bit at first and see what effect it has. - George
Quote from: George999 on August 26, 2010, 11:04:46 AM
The people at Life Extension are pretty much the pros on things like cholesterol levels. Their recommendations as to ideal levels are:
Total Cholesterol: 160-180mg/dL
LDL: 50-99mg/dL
HDL: 50-60mg/dL
Contrary to the belief of many in the medical profession, cholesterol is NOT toxic waste. Cholesterol is an important substance that the body uses for all sorts of essential bodily functions. The slash and burn approach to heart health has all sorts of very negative unintended consequences that can reek havoc with a persons general health.
Isn't the ideal hdl/ldl ratio above .4?
Quote from: skunkworks on November 06, 2010, 12:02:10 PM
Isn't the ideal hdl/ldl ratio above .4?
I think that is pretty subjective. Life Extension is very conservative on this issue, but some docs are even more aggressive at shutting down LDL. In my opinion, too aggressive. They are also NOT checking for other important factors like lp(a) way out of range. Then they try to make up for that by being overaggressive against generic LDL. - George
I have never seen any recommended LDL to HDL ratio, only recommended upper limits. Are you thinking of the Total Cholesterol ratio (Total / HDL)? If so, the goal for this ratio is less than 4.
160 / 50 = 3.2
Low HDL is a constant battle of mine.
Time release niacin (250 mg 4x daily, and ALWAYS WITH MEALS!) is the only thing I have found to be effective in raising it out of the high 20s. My most recent labs:
Total 127
Tri 51
LDL 65
HDL 45
Total/HDL ratio = 2.82
Quote from: skunkworks on November 06, 2010, 12:02:10 PM
Quote from: George999 on August 26, 2010, 11:04:46 AM
The people at Life Extension are pretty much the pros on things like cholesterol levels. Their recommendations as to ideal levels are:
Total Cholesterol: 160-180mg/dL
LDL: 50-99mg/dL
HDL: 50-60mg/dL
Contrary to the belief of many in the medical profession, cholesterol is NOT toxic waste. Cholesterol is an important substance that the body uses for all sorts of essential bodily functions. The slash and burn approach to heart health has all sorts of very negative unintended consequences that can reek havoc with a persons general health.
Isn't the ideal hdl/ldl ratio above .4?
Well...painful erections are back, so I guess the ubiquinol isn't helping yet. This morning I had multiple very painful erections...had to apply ice packs. I know the erections are supposed to be good for your penis, but for my money I'd rather they went away. All "experts" say this is highly unusual after having Peyronie's for 4 1/2 years...just lucky I guess....Fred
Quote from: George999 on November 05, 2010, 10:13:54 PM
Quote from: Fred22 on November 04, 2010, 02:44:34 PM
Quote from: George999 on November 04, 2010, 12:24:05 PM
Fred, Have you ever tried Aloe Vera softgels before for the MVP? - George
George,
No I haven't. I've never heard of Aloe Vera being used as a treatment fro mvp. Where can I find some info on the subject? Thanks for the suggestion.....Fred
I obtained relief from palpitations with Aloe softgels, there is also a large study indicating it to be effective for angina. Of course neither of these are related to what you have other than they all have to do with the heart. My thinking is that, who knows, it might be worth a try. It is something I would try if I were in your shoes. Like just a little bit at first and see what effect it has. - George
I'll give them a try..thanks...Fred
Quote from: Fred22 on November 07, 2010, 12:18:04 PM
Quote from: George999 on November 05, 2010, 10:13:54 PM
Quote from: Fred22 on November 04, 2010, 02:44:34 PM
Quote from: George999 on November 04, 2010, 12:24:05 PM
Fred, Have you ever tried Aloe Vera softgels before for the MVP? - George
George,
No I haven't. I've never heard of Aloe Vera being used as a treatment fro mvp. Where can I find some info on the subject? Thanks for the suggestion.....Fred
I obtained relief from palpitations with Aloe softgels, there is also a large study indicating it to be effective for angina. Of course neither of these are related to what you have other than they all have to do with the heart. My thinking is that, who knows, it might be worth a try. It is something I would try if I were in your shoes. Like just a little bit at first and see what effect it has. - George
I'll give them a try..thanks...Fred
Just make sure you get the ones that have a yellowish liquid gel inside a softgel capsule, NOT the ones with dry material inside. They are a hard laxative and would really mess you up! - George
Fred22,
Have you tried applying heat rather then ice? Just the thought of adding ice to my package scares me, as I always add heat to myself.
Well...I suffer from chronic constipation, so would you recommend the ones with the laxatie effect?
Fred
The ones with the laxative effect will NOT help your heart in any way and could even damage it further. There are much better solutions to constipation than aloe laxative. I don't recommend it under any circumstances. - George
OK...thanks..Fred
Fred,
there is a published study showing that injections of corticosteroids (kenalog) into the penis (not the plaque) helps with pain.
i talked w/ another doc about this and he said kenalog is idiotic to inject into the penis bc it causes calcificaiton in all tissues - and celestone should be used... but this doc was not a urologist.
so, that's something that might help.
Quote from: MikeSmith0 on November 12, 2010, 03:24:25 AM
Fred,
there is a published study showing that injections of corticosteroids (kenalog) into the penis (not the plaque) helps with pain.
i talked w/ another doc about this and he said kenalog is idiotic to inject into the penis bc it causes calcificaiton in all tissues - and celestone should be used... but this doc was not a urologist.
so, that's something that might help.
It's just my take on it, but I do think that injections or anything less that something that has an amazing track record, is risky territory.
So
I was reading up on this CoQ10 and I would like to add something here, dunno if it means anything. Anyways a year ago I started being a vegetarian because my gf is a vegetarian. Anyways a year later I get this peyronie's after what seemed two massive infections. I read that coQ10 is found in meat. I wonder if there is a link here. Could my body be lacking this thing? I see the local Trader JOe's has some, where would u guys get urs? Thanks-Clark
this is my third day on ubiquinol and it really does take my pain away - lets see how it progresses - will keep you posted
If you had massive infections, I would get my Vitamin D levels checked if I were you. - George
Iceman, what doses of ubiquinol are you taking and how many times a day?
100 mg x 1 per day - day 4 now and no pain
It wouldn't surprise me if vegetarians have a lower level of coq10 than meat eaters. However, I certainly wouldn't go as far as saying that is relating to your development of COQ10. I'm not sure at this time if a COQ10 deficiency has or will ever be related to peyronie's disease. There does seem to be some evidence that COQ10 supplementation at fairly high levels may help men with peyronie's though. Hopefully in a year or so we'll start to see more studies, and more experiences from those on the forum.
Starting to see a few combinations being used as treatments involving COQ10. Not peyronie's specific but encouraging.
COQ10 + Pycnogenol : http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20657530 (in heart failure patients)
COQ10 + Resveratrol : http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21036052 (in muscular dystrophy)
Wow, just once per day and that good of results. That's awesome! I was taking the 100mg twice a day with the pentox and fish oil. Then I switched to Ubiquinone (CoQ10) 300mg to hopefully get more out of it. But since I started the CoQ10 I have noticed horrible gas and diarrhea. Anyone else notice this with Ubiquinone? I might have to go back to ubiquinol.
I recently stopped ubiquinol 100mg twice daily and switched to CoQ10 300mg twice a day, hopign I would get more benifit out of the Ubiquinone. But I have noticed very bad gas and diarrhea. Anyone else notice this with CoQ10?
day 6 - no pain
Quote from: crashbandit on November 07, 2010, 11:10:52 PM
Fred22,
Have you tried applying heat rather then ice? Just the thought of adding ice to my package scares me, as I always add heat to myself.
I've tried both...the ice seems to work better for this pain. What scares you about ice?....Fred
Quote from: MikeSmith0 on November 12, 2010, 03:24:25 AM
Fred,
there is a published study showing that injections of corticosteroids (kenalog) into the penis (not the plaque) helps with pain.
i talked w/ another doc about this and he said kenalog is idiotic to inject into the penis bc it causes calcificaiton in all tissues - and celestone should be used... but this doc was not a urologist.
so, that's something that might help.
I had ear surgery about 4 years ago. They did a perfusion of dexamethsone and xylocaine in the ear and put me on an IV of dexamethasone for about 6 hours 2 days in a row. I was having penile pain at the time but had not developed curvature and didn't know it was Peyronie's. A day or so after the surgery I noticed that the pain was gone. It came back of course, but I had, as I recall now, maybe a week of no pain. I attribute it to the dexamethasone IV...don't know if that was it. I do know that I was pain free for one of the few times in the last 4 1/2 years.
Sorry that message posted twice....
Fred, From your last post, I can't help but wonder if LDN might help you. Bottom line is that sometimes people, especially older people, have a shortage of endogenous opioids in their bloodstream which makes them vulnerable to idiopathic pain of various sorts. LDN treats this problem by stimulating the increased release of opioids, thus alleviating much or all of that pain. - George
Quote from: George999 on November 15, 2010, 09:21:31 PM
Fred, From your last post, I can't help but wonder if Low Dose Naltrexone might help you. Bottom line is that sometimes people, especially older people, have a shortage of endogenous opioids in their bloodstream which makes them vulnerable to idiopathic pain of various sorts. Low Dose Naltrexone treats this problem by stimulating the increased release of opioids, thus alleviating much or all of that pain. - George
I'd give it a try, but how would I get a prescription?...Fred
Yup, Its like trying to get a prescription for Pentox, you have to look around for a doc willing to prescribe. - George
Hi George,
Thanks for this:
Tertius, The amount of Ubiquinone used in the successful Peyronie's study was 300mg per day. Based on that, I am using 300mg of the Ubiquinol per day and finding it highly effective. Woodman has also posted on other threads that he is getting results from this amount. The best way to take it is 100mg with meals three times per day. Ubiquinol is simply reduced Ubiquinone. If you consume Ubiquinone, your body tries to convert it to Ubiquinol. It may or may not succeed depending on age and health etc. If you take Ubiquinol, the conversion is already done and it can go right to work in your body without any intervening processing by your body.
The Ubiquinone has now come through to UK from Puritan's Pride, ordered carriage free on their UK site, and without UK import duties (just over two weeks in total from time of order).
Fingers crossed.
Tertius
im liking this ubiquinol - its doing the trick for me
Iceman I'm so happy things are looking better for you but do you really think its the Ubiquinol that's making the difference? Oral meds usually take many months before improvement is seen. Maybe Ubiquinol will be different and results will be seen sooner. Are you on Pentox as well?
I was amazed. The Ubiquinol kicked in immediately for me. Perhaps even faster than Pentox. But these are pain benefits. The benefits in terms of easing deformity are a much slower process. The pain benefits happened rather rapidly for me with both AND both seem to stop the PROGRESSION of deformity rather quickly. - George
im on pentox as well as ubiquinol - guys out there TRUST ME!!! - ive done everything BUT NOTHING and I MEAN nothing has stopped the pain like ubiquinol - ive tried everything but nothing is like this stuff - get on it even to give it a go - i just hope it keeps doing what its doing - this also leads me to ask the question - was i deficient in ubiquinol?? why was that and how did it occur and what does it do???
Hmmmm It hasn't done a damn thing for me. Last night the pain radiated from the base of my penise and all through my groin. This sucks. I'm beginning to think life sucks.
Quote from: Iceman on November 23, 2010, 04:25:58 AM
im on pentox as well as ubiquinol - guys out there TRUST ME!!! - ive done everything BUT NOTHING and I MEAN nothing has stopped the pain like ubiquinol - ive tried everything but nothing is like this stuff - get on it even to give it a go - i just hope it keeps doing what its doing - this also leads me to ask the question - was i deficient in ubiquinol?? why was that and how did it occur and what does it do???
Ubiquinol is essential to the health of the mitochondria that power to cells of the body. As people age, their bodies produce less Ubiquinol. Dietary Ubiquinol comes primarily from animal sources, and even then dietary sources don't provide much. Additionally, a wide range of medications are either known to deplete Ubiquinol or suspected of depleting it. In many cases these are among the same medications as are associated with Peyronie's. The Iranian trials demonstrated that it does not work for all guys suffering from Peyronie's, but is does work to at least some degree for a majority of them. More information about Ubiquinol and its mitochondrial connection can be found here -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coenzyme_Q10 and here -> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coenzyme_Q10 - George
Quote from: hornman on November 23, 2010, 08:23:23 AM
Hmmmm It hasn't done a damn thing for me. Last night the pain radiated from the base of my penise and all through my groin. This sucks. I'm beginning to think life sucks.
Hornman, how long have you had Peyronies Disease? After about 9 months the pain seemed to finally stop for me. They say it tends to stop around a year post-onset for most guys. Pentox has helped some w/ pain...I think it helped me too at one point. I did have a steroid injection (into the base) of kenalog. I know people aren't a fan of injections here... Dr. Ricardo Munarriz published a paper on this injection helping pain in all men in his study - so I tried it. My doc just put in a small amount, since steroids cause problems themselves. I was having verapamil at the time anyway - so another shot was not a big deal.
I posted earlier that a doctor in my family disagrees w/ kenalog injections (they cause calcification), however...and says celestone should've been used. I have not run this by any urologists, though this doc (in my family) has been in practice 30 years and knows his stuff beyond any doctor I've ever met.
I think the VED helped with pain also actually...but it's hard to say bc I have been on and off so many drugs and supplements. Hope you feel better. And yes, I share your feeling that life pretty much sucks with this. I deleted my 10 page long psych post about my feelings on this issue - but I've got them in spades.
hornman: forgot to tell you im on tribulus as well.....why do you have pain still - how long have you had Peyronies Disease for??? are you on pentox
I have had Peyronies for about 2 yrs. At 1st I just had the pain without any deformity and my incompetent urologist was treating me for an inflammed prostrate which it turns out I did not have. Then the dents, hourglassing and bend showed up. We knew it was Peyronies. I got the wait and see story and maybe take some vitamin E. My urologist refused me Pentox saying he used it in the past with not very good results. I finally got some Pentox on line and have been on it for 30 days. Ubiquinol for 2 months. I usually have pain at night in the flaccid state. Erections hurt and sex is not pleasurable. My penis is pathetic at this point. I'm 53 yrs.old. My wife does not say much but I can tell she is much less interested in making sexual love.
Hornman, I certainly would not get discouraged at this point. You are doing all of the right things and a disease like Peyronie's can be very tenacious when it gets advanced. You just have to keep pounding away at it. You also have to be assertive with your doctors which is something I think you are learning. Some things I would recommend:
1) I would really check thoroughly my general health, especially in terms of inflammatory markers. These include, but are not limited to things like Vitamin D levels, Homocysteine levels, high sensitivity CRP levels, etc.
2) I would pay great attention to diet and exercise. You are approaching the age where diet and exercise are more important than genetics in terms of maintaining general health.
3) I would look at other anti-inflammatory supplements like high quality fish oil and pay special attention to inflammatory foods v anti-inflammatory foods.
You are just going to have to dig deeper in order to get a handle on this. Many of us who are having success with Ubiquinol and Pentoxifylline are also deep into the above items as well. It really takes a tour de force effort to deal with serious inflammatory issues.
- George
Thanks George, I appreciate your input. I have been exercising and taking fish oil and vitamin D. Diet could use some improvements. I,m about 20lbs overweight. I'm a heavy salt user with borderline hypertension. It's easy to pop supplements but much harder to change eating habits. It's time to get serious. Inflammation has been causing other problems for me as well. I was making a good living as a horn player for years until unexplained lip swelling and facial weakness ended my career. I have bouts of IBS and hemorrhoid problems as well. Lots of stress.
Again thanks for your advice.
Hornman, I've been there myself. I was losing control of my hypertension and having all sorts of peripheral issues popping up. I began following Dr Oz and lost forty pounds and my hypertension actually disappeared completely for over a year when I had no need anymore for my BP pills. Then I contracted the nasty peripheral neuropathy and in the process the blood pressure problem returned. But my weigh regain from the bottom is still less than ten pounds and stable so that monster is tamed. And now, with perseverance the neuropathy is gone as well and I am able to work at the BP again. We just can't give up on these issues. We have the tools, they are out there. We just have to find them and make the most of them. One of the things that helped me beat the neuropathy was chelation. Chelation used to be a big deal, but now they have chelating fiber out there with none of the nasty side effects of the old treatments. So unloading my bod from some of its decades long accumulation of lead, mercury and who knows what else was a huge help for me as well. So you just have to pull out all the stops and work your way from one goal post to another until you conquer all the insults that time and bad choices have inflicted on you. That is what worked (and continues to work) for me. I wish you the best! - George
guys - Ubiquinol is really doing the trick - no joke - its really making a big difference to pain levels and flaccid state...
Is anyone using Coenzyme Q10 with Warfarin. I take 7.5mg of the blood thinner everyday and am wondering if it will have a pronounced interaction with 300mgs of Q10. Reports say that I should be under doctors supervision; however, my internist doesn't believe in taking any supplements.
It seems like a good thing for me but would like some feedback on this. I have a home monitor to test my INR. Appreciate any help.
YMN
YMENOW, Warfarin (Coumadin) has to be one of the trickiest drugs to deal with. I would be VERY cautious. If you are going to use something like CoQ10, you are going to need to find a physician who will work with you on it. It requires EXTREMELY CAREFUL monitoring of your clotting factors. Any missteps could result in bleeding issues including stroke. Word is that there is *finally* a new and far better drug on the way to replace coumadin. If I were you I would rant and rail for an alternative as soon as one is available. Currently, some people use Nattokinase, which is an exceptionally powerful clot inhibiting supplement, instead of coumadin. But, there again, you would need to find a physician who would work with you on this. A do it yourself project could easily be deadly either from a clot or from bleeding. It requires professional expert guidance and testing to make it work. Sorry we can't be more help. We (at least most of us) around here are not physicians and we simply can not give guidance on how to mix supplements and prescription drugs. That is where you need assistance from physicians and pharmacists who are trained in these areas and pretty much know how to keep us patients alive. If you really would like to explore alternatives, you might look into seeing a doctor (an MD NOT a chiropractor!) trained in functional medicine ( http://www.functionalmedicine.org/ (http://www.functionalmedicine.org/) ). If you use the provider search feature on that site, you will find several cardiologists in NYC listed. - George
Quote from: Iceman on November 25, 2010, 10:15:17 PM
guys - Ubiquinol is really doing the trick - no joke - its really making a big difference to pain levels and flaccid state...
Hi IM: can you detail actual pain level; flaccid or erect state?
Thanks
There hasn't exactly been a great plethora of responces about peoples reactions to Ubiquinol. A few guys have communicated some benefit. I'm sure many of you must be taking it after reading of the study. Please post your results so far.
Hornman
I've been taking it for about 2 weeks. I haven't really noticed anything yet, but it's probably too early to tell
Well, it is certainly working for me. I just posted in the improvements section. - George
Wow I just read it, that's excellent George,
Do you attribute this happening to the ubiquinol? How long have you been taking it?
Casey, I started taking the Ubiquinol at 100mg 3X per day in September. Previously, I had been taking Pentox which took care of all my acute pain. Before Pentox I had intermittent bouts of pain for no apparent reason. Pentox fixed that problem. But I would still get pain with even the most minor of injuries which in and of itself kind of knocked out my sex life. Immediately, upon starting the Ubiquinol, I discovered that no amount of injury seemed to cause pain. This was the ONLY initial change upon starting Ubiquinol, but I saw it as a really good sign that Ubiquinol was ADDING to Pentox's suppression of inflammation. Until last night that was the ONLY evidence I had in favor of Ubiquinol. But last night changed the whole equation. And, yes, given the results of the Iranian study, I am convinced that Ubiquinol (along with Pentox, of course) played a key role in what happened last night. So at this point I am looking forward to adding PQQ to the equation, since PQQ is really reputed to multiply the effects of Ubiquinol significantly. - George
Your improvement post is great news George. An improvement like that after four years really does give hope to others. What's your current regimen: pentox, coq10 and vitamin D? PQQ does sound like another angle of interest. I look forward to hearing how you and S&S get on with that. I've been on COQ10 for a few weeks now, and posts like yours give me hope that I was right to add it!
LEF is claiming increased bioavailability of ubiquinol when taken with shilajit (http://search.lef.org/cgi-src-bin/MsmGo.exe?grab_id=0&page_id=4843&query=Shilajit&hiword=SHILAJITS%20Shilajit).
Quote from: slowandsteady on December 04, 2010, 10:31:27 AM
LEF is claiming increased bioavailability of ubiquinol when taken with shilajit (http://search.lef.org/cgi-src-bin/MsmGo.exe?grab_id=0&page_id=4843&query=Shilajit&hiword=SHILAJITS%20Shilajit).
Thanks for that. This recent review might be good to get hold of: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20863275 It put me in the mindset of the curcumin episode before, where ways were used to quite significantly increase bioavailability. Currently with Coq10 I'm taking 2 300mg capsules with food. I read that taking it in multiple doses is more useful than all in one go. Beyond that I haven't tried to increase its bioavailability via any other method.
For sure that one would be a fun read. Unfortunately $100 plus is a little steep for me to afford for one article. For sure there are a plethora of methods for enhanced CoQ10 transport. All I know at this point is that the LEF formula is working for me quite obviously. I am sure that there are likely other approaches out there that work just as well. I believe that it is Iceman that is also getting good pain relief which is an indication that the CoQ10 he is taking is doing its stuff. You might want to ask him what brand and formula he is using. What we really need here at this point is for more guys who are trying CoQ10 to provide feedback so we can all get a better idea of what is working and what isn't. - George
George,
Congrats on the improvement posting. I wanted to weigh in as you have requested to hear from more people who are using Ubiquinol.
I have had pain after sex for probably 8 years now and (I hate to jinx it, but... ) the pain is 90% gone and it corresponds with starting on the Ubiquinol. I too started around September at 3 x 100mg daily. Im trying not to let myself get too excited as this is a small step in the big picture, but less pain is great!
I have been on Pentox for about 6 months and can't honestly say whether or not it has done anything.
SSmithe
Quote from: SSmithe on December 07, 2010, 09:32:08 PM
George,
Congrats on the improvement posting. I wanted to weigh in as you have requested to hear from more people who are using Ubiquinol.
I have had pain after sex for probably 8 years now and (I hate to jinx it, but... ) the pain is 90% gone and it corresponds with starting on the Ubiquinol. I too started around September at 3 x 100mg daily. Im trying not to let myself get too excited as this is a small step in the big picture, but less pain is great!
I have been on Pentox for about 6 months and can't honestly say whether or not it has done anything.
SSmithe
Thanks so much for sharing this! I have just started with PQQ in addition to Pentox and Ubiquinol. S&S is also taking PQQ. We will update all as we go along. The key here for all of us is that just a few years ago, there was NOTHING, absolutely nothing that one could take that would provide Peyronie's relief. Now we have Pentox and Ubiquinol and I assure you there is more in the pipeline. Hang in there. We are going to beat this disease! - George
Well it's been a week since I can say that I don't have pain anymore. I used to get it periodically, but always when i ejaculated, since my pc muscle would tighten and push against the scar tissue, it would hurt like hell. Now this week I have ejaculated almost every day and there is no pain.
I can't say for sure if it was the ubiquinol, I've been taking it for about a month now. I've also upped my dosage of alc from 1g-2gs a day, so it's hard to say. No change in deformity yet, but no pain is definitely a plus.
So was it the Ubiquinol ... or was it the ALC ... or was it a combination of both that did the job? The way I see it is that it really isn't important. What IS important is that the pain is gone. And THAT is PROGRESS. And progress on one front opens the door for progress on other fronts. In my case, the first effect of Ubiquinol was that the pain disappeared. Later on other good things have come along and I am expecting more. I am currently adding Peak ATP (http://www.peakatp.com/faq.php (http://www.peakatp.com/faq.php)) to the mix (it is reputed to give a huge kick to blood flow), so we will see how that goes. - George
I'm willing to bet it was a combination of both. Both have studies producing similar results, although I think the ubiquinine study was more reliable. I'm always looking at new supplements to help combat this thing, the big thing is adding pentox, which hopefully dr. Levine will prescribe me when I see him in 3 weeks. I'd be interested to see what the combination of all 3 can do. All 3 have proven efficacy in Peyronies Disease sufferers right? So I think the odds are pretty good I'll see some good benefit. :)
I noticed that some of you have added pqq to the mix, as it's supposed to amplify the effects of ubiquinol, I might try that as well. Wow, it actually feels good to have some options with this disease.
Quote from: Iceman on November 13, 2010, 01:13:16 AM
100 mg x 1 per day - day 4 now and no pain
Hey Iceman, I realize that is a way old post, but 100Mg a day, why?
Looks like the Iranian study used 300mg. Just curious how you came to 100.
Tnx.
Jim, The Iranian study began in 2006. In 2006 there Ubiquinol was not yet on the market. The Iranian researchers most likely used the then current standard, Ubiquinone, instead. But the newer Ubiquinol is, at least for older guys, far more potent than Ubiquinone. Thus Iceman may well be getting good action out of only 100mg. Personally, I am taking the full 300mg and getting VERY good action from it in combination from Pentoxifylline. But Ubiquinol very likely will far outperform the older Ubiquinone probably used in the Iranian study. - George
Gentlemen,
Do any of you think using CO Q 10 as a topical ointment would help with our scar tissue? According to my limited research on the web, it is a tiny molecule and will penetrate the skin. How deeply it will penetrate would be the question.
Please let me know what you think.
GS
Why so little interest or comments from the so called top peyronies urologist about ubiquinol? I haven't seen any updates on any of their sites. Are the biggies like Levine and Lue recommending Ubiquinol?
Hornman
Quote from: hornman on December 24, 2010, 09:03:17 AM
Why so little interest or comments from the so called top peyronies urologist about ubiquinol? I haven't seen any updates on any of their sites. Are the biggies like Levine and Lue recommending Ubiquinol?
Hornman
I think it will take time. The first indication of CoQ10 derivatives being useful for Peyronie's was the Iranian study which really just became known this year although it was actually published last year. On the other hand, Pentoxifylline has been used for Peyronie's for a number of years now. Who knows what Peyonie's experts are doing with CoQ10? But they are NOT going to recommend it publically until they have been using it successfully on a small scale for a period of years. Thats just the way medicine works. Doctors are very risk averse when it comes to these things. And that is way I follow the research all the time. If I make a mistake and buy something that turns out not to work in the long run, I am not going to be worried about it too much. I will just write it off and move on to something else. However, if a doctor does that, there are patients out there who will sue the doctor. That is why doctors like to stick with stuff the drug companies push. That way if anything goes wrong, the drug companies take the heat and they have lots of money to absorb heat. That is sort of the deal. So I am sure they are watching it and doing who knows what with it, but they are not going to commit to its effectiveness publicly until they can fully justify such a commitment with hard data.
Having said that, I really confident in Ubiquinol myself, since I have seen its effect for myself in my own case. And I will continue to personally recommend it, with, of course, the disclaimer that I am not a doctor. And I am really hopeful that someone will do a research study on the effectiveness of treatment with Pentox and Ubiquinol combined, because I think the results of such a study would be very interesting. - George
Some Co Q10 should make it through the skin (it has a molecular weight of 865, so it's fairly small). You can buy it as cream (here's one (http://www.iherb.com/Now-Foods-CoQ10-Antioxidant-Serum-1-fl-oz-30-ml/7429?at=0)). It couldn't hurt, but I don't know if it would help.
hello all,
I'm new diagnosticated with this disease.
I have a small angulation and a small plaque and no pain.I didn't noticed any modification since the onset of the disease(about 2 months)
I read that in my case the "watch and wait" technique should be applied.
I went to my uro and he sent me home and told me to come back every month
for observations.
I don't want to wait and do nothing . After a lot of reading on this forum
I thought I should try the CoQ10 and pentox.
I need your opinion please.
Thanks a lot.
Michael, The ONLY reason the docs say "wait and see" is because they don't know how to treat Peyronie's with anything other than surgery. So what they really mean is wait and hope it gets better, otherwise you will need to have surgery. The reality is that Pentox and CoQ10 work. The sooner you get started with them the better. CoQ10 comes in two forms, Ubiquinone (cheap) and Ubiquinol (expensive). If you are under 40, you can probably get alone with the Ubiquinone type (if it is just labeled "CoQ10", it is Ubiquinone). If you are over 40, you will need the Ubiquinol form (always labeled as "Ubiquinol"). The body has to convert Ubiquinone to Ubiquinol to be effective, older bodies have a hard time with that. Ubiquinol is widely available over the counter and there is no insurance coverage for it. Pentoxifylline (Trental) is a prescription med. Its use for Peyronie's is "off label". Most urologists will refuse to prescribe if for that reason although there are a growing number of enlightened uros around who are prescribing it. You should carefully download the Pentoxifylline related PDFs from the resource section of this forum and read them and attempt to share them with your doctor. If your doc still refuses you a prescription you will need to find a Peyroinie's specialist and request a second opinion referral from your current doctor. Most Peryonie's specialists will request a referral to verify your Peyronie's diagnosis. Pentoxifylline is generic and dirt cheap as prescription meds go and once you get a prescription, if you have the insurance coverage for prescription meds, it will likely be covered. The typical dosage for CoQ10 is 100mg 3X per day, Pentoxifylline ER is 400mg 3X per day. - George
I seem to be getting some positive results from the ubiquinol. Still some pain, but much better than before (and I've had pain for over 4 years)....nighttime erections were painful and now there's no pain with erections. I'm up to 300 mg. per day....started with 300 per day back around the beginning of October then backed off when my mvp symptoms started to act up (turns out the ubiqionol was not the problem). I'll probably stay at 300 per day for a couple of months then cut back....I'm also back on 2g ALCAR per day, but I believe it's the ubiquinol that is making the difference...Fred
Fred:
I'm taking both ubiquinol and ALC too. I can't really tell which is bringing the pain down, but I bet it's ubiquinol too. I was on ALC a couple months ago but stopped because I really didn't notice anything and at 2gs a day, the stuff is expensive. However when I read the study on it, showing good statistical results, I gave it another shot.
Just some comments about ALC and Ubiquinol:
Both work via the antioxidant pathway. They both protect cellular mitochondria from damaging oxidation. Mitochondria are especially vulnerable to oxidation because their function is to produce energy within the human cells. When mitchondria die, they are discarded by the host cell. And once disgarded, they trigger an immune system response. This is where Pentoxifylline comes in by blocking further damage caused by the immune response. The key difference between ALC and Ubiquinol is that Ubiquinol is endogenous and ALC is not. Endogenous means that the body produces Ubiquinol internally specifically for this antioxidant function. So Ubiquinol is the body's solution of choice to prevent oxidation. This would likely make it a better choice than ALC. But I did use ALC successfully for a long time, so it does work, at least it did for me. But it provided nowhere near the relief that Ubiquinol has. - George
I'm fairly new to this site, and can't seem to maneuver so well! I contracted Peyronie's coincidentally 2 months after being radiated for prostate cancer! It is my conclusion that this isn't a coincidence at all, but yet another result of the dreaded disease! Besides losing over 2"s in length after radiation and developing ED, as well as low testosterone - I feel now that I would have rather never treated the cancer! - But one thing at a time!
I'm 64 - got the cancer at 59 - haven't had sex since - but developed a "bottle-neck" variety of Peyronie's, increasing in severity, and wondered if anyone out there has experienced a similar situation, and/or if he has had success in treating this problem - it doesn't interfere with anything but aesthetics -
At this point I'm an angry embittered man - who isn't pleasant being around - before the cancer it was a different story - so I'm sure, not only would I have preferred death by cancer, but so would several others who have come into contact with me!
My urologist(s) "quacks" in NYC don't seem to offer advice on this particular area - they don't seem to think it's important - since it isn't a threatening condition! - so before putting a bullet through my head - does anyone have treatment suggestions?
Quote from: semirade on January 05, 2011, 01:06:46 PM
I'm fairly new to this site, and can't seem to maneuver so well! I contracted Peyronie's coincidentally 2 months after being radiated for prostate cancer! It is my conclusion that this isn't a coincidence at all, but yet another result of the dreaded disease! Besides losing over 2"s in length after radiation and developing ED, as well as low testosterone - I feel now that I would have rather never treated the cancer! - But one thing at a time!
I'm 64 - got the cancer at 59 - haven't had sex since - but developed a "bottle-neck" variety of Peyronie's, increasing in severity, and wondered if anyone out there has experienced a similar situation, and/or if he has had success in treating this problem - it doesn't interfere with anything but aesthetics -
At this point I'm an angry embittered man - who isn't pleasant being around - before the cancer it was a different story - so I'm sure, not only would I have preferred death by cancer, but so would several others who have come into contact with me!
My urologist(s) "quacks" in NYC don't seem to offer advice on this particular area - they don't seem to think it's important - since it isn't a threatening condition! - so before putting a bullet through my head - does anyone have treatment suggestions?
Try to get in to see a male sexual function specialist... most urologists are clueless about peyronies. I'm not sure who is in NYC. Levine in Chicago is who many of us have seen and he has done a lot of research on this. His office might be able to even give you a name in NYC possibly if you can't travel - can't hurt to ask (just google levine urology chicago & you'll get their site).
For your situation, you need to get a RX for pentoxifiline and cialis or viagra... then get the following supplements: l-arginine 1-2 grams per day, acetyl-l-carnitine 1-2 grams per day, ubiquinol - 300 mg per day (anyone please correct me if I am wrong on these doses -- I know there are some study doses & then other posters here have used various amounts...plus some can upset your stomach in very high amounts). All of these have theoretical and demonstrated clinical benefits in peyronie's disease. E.g. penoxifyline inhibits TGFB1 which is inflammatory and present in penile tissue with men w/ Peyronies Disease - not in men without Peyronies Disease. Cialis / viagra / etc... are important for normal erections and they also produce nitric oxide which can help reverse some of this.
In addition to oral drugs and supplements, you need to do some form of "exercise" which can include a pump and an extension device (google "male edge" or "phallosan" or "sizegenetics" and see which one you want - these are not bogus devices...they have helped many people here including me.) The pump you can get at fitzz.com but it is expensive and some have done ok with a cheaper product called bathmate...but most use the fitzz product and follow the protocol on the VED (vacum erection device) part of the board. VEDs require 20-30 mins of daily use (pumping / stretching). Extenders require 4+ hours of daily wearing (but not active "use" - you just leave it on)
Most importantly, there is no quick solution to this...so whatever you do has to be done for 3-6 months just to see anything...and you're not alone with the misery. I dont think anyone is happy seeing their dick shrink and start looking deformed. I wrote a 10 page page diatribe (which i deleted since it was insane) about how it was ruining my life. The only way to let it NOT ruin your life is to take active steps to undo it.
semirade,
Mike has given you some really good advice. I don't have prostate cancer, but I do have BPH...trust me,it is no fun either. I got Peyronies for my 58th birthday and thought my sex life was over. I bought a bunch of worthless stuff via different internet sites and then I found this site and the forum.
Now, 21/2 years later, I'm sexually active again, my Peyronies seems to be stable and may even be improving. So, my advice is to do your research, try your best to be positive, get a VED and the recommended supplements and be patient. It will take some time and work on your part, but there is a good chance you can see major improvements. Good luck.
GS
semirade -
hey, you'll find a lot of inspiration and motivation here.
read all of Old Man's posts....he is a true inspiration.
CF
I agree wholeheartedly with all the advice given so far. And I think you should also send a PM to Old Man specifically outlining your situation. I think you will find him to be a great friend and also extremely helpful. - George
Back to ubiquinol. ;) I've been taking 100 mg of CoQ10 2 or 3 times a day lately, and it seems like I'm getting more benefit from that than from gelcaps of 200 mg ubiquinol twice daily. Just putting out there that there might be a U-shaped response where too little or too much can give suboptimal results.
Another possibility is that lower but more consistent levels throughout the course of the day are of more benefit than large doses spaced out.
S&S - what brands were you on for ubiquinol and coq10? Sometimes I wonder about how much we can trust supplement companies to have what they claim to have in their pills... consumerlab.com is sometimes useful but they don't cover a lot of the major brands.
semirade-
As far as finding a Peyronies Disease specialist in NYC, I believe Dr. John Mulhall is the best, located right in the city.
Quote from: MikeSmith0 on January 08, 2011, 02:24:23 PM
S&S - what brands were you on for ubiquinol and coq10? Sometimes I wonder about how much we can trust supplement companies to have what they claim to have in their pills... consumerlab.com is sometimes useful but they don't cover a lot of the major brands.
It looks like I'll have to drop CoQ10 -- I'm breaking out in a rash from it (at least it wasn't bed bugs -- sheesh). I've never noticed the same effect from ubiquinol, but I'll keep a close watch on it once the CoQ10 is out of my system and I can switch.
I had most recently been taking the LEF ubiquinol (http://www.lef.org/Vitamins-Supplements/Item01425/Super-Ubiquinol-CoQ10-with-Enhanced-Mitochondrial-Support.html) before I gave CoQ10 a trial.
If you're getting a rash from CoQ10, it has to be from some adulteration or additive. CoQ10 is endogenous. The body produces it, so if you are actually allergic to CoQ10, you are in major trouble. - George
hello all,
I read on a site that the absorbiton of CoQ10 is increased up to 60% if it is combined with Bioperine .
Is this true? Should we take this substance then to increase the absorbtion of CoQ10?
Thanks
Michael.
Gentlemen,
I'm 60 years old, so I made the switch from CO Q 10 to Ubiquinol a few weeks ago. Basically, I'm using the PAV cocktail along with Vitamins D,E and a bunch of others along with the VED.
I don't know if it's a coincidence or not, but once I started using Ubiquinol, my erections and orgasms have been much improved. The Ubiquinol is the only thing I've changed, so my opinion is that it does work and is better than CO Q 10 for older men.
GS
You will find that various CoQ10 vendors use various additional additives to increase CoQ10 absorption and bioavailability. The problem with doing your own combinations is in finding the ratios. In other words how much bioperine are you going to take with a given amount of CoQ10. On the other hand, if you look around, you will probably find a CoQ10 product out there with bioperine already in it. - George
Quote from: George999 on January 09, 2011, 11:40:06 AM
If you're getting a rash from CoQ10, it has to be from some adulteration or additive. CoQ10 is endogenous. The body produces it, so if you are actually allergic to CoQ10, you are in major trouble. - George
Rashes are listed as a common side effect (ref (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/natural/938.html)). We generally get it via endogenous production; it looks like taking large oral doses can cause issues for some, like me unfortunately.
Well ... I stand corrected. Thanks for the reference! - George
George999, how much CoQ10 and pentox do you take daily and how do you take it? Noticed any side effects? Has the full abstract of the study been posted on the forum?
The typical dosage of Pentoxifylline for Peyronie's is 400mg 3X per day. The typical dosage of Ubiquinol is 100mg 3X per day. If one is taking the Ubiquinone form of CoQ10, one can take more. Side effects are generally rare and mild, but some on the forum are affected by side effects that preclude using one or more of the above. The full Pentox study is available in the resource section. The full CoQ10 study is available on the web and, I believe, costs $100 or something like that. (they sell it :-\) - George
Hi guys.. thought it was time for a post! I've been taking 3x100mg of Ubiquinol for about 6 weeks now. I can not for sure know that's what's taking the pain level down (my pain is when flacid, when sitting, or if there's movement.. not noticeable when erect) but this is the only improvement I've had in the last year.. at times I don't even notice to pain.. which has been fairly constant for about 2 years 2 months. I'm also taking 2x Pentox, ALC and Vit E. I intend to keep going with the Ubiquinol and will report back in a couple of months.
how long does one have to take coq10 before noticeable signs of improvement? In the published study it looks as though they were on 300mg daily for about half a year
The study indicates that treatment period was "24 months". In my case I noticed improvement in terms of pain right away. How long it takes before improvement is noted probably varies by individual. One must note that in the study some individuals never showed improvement. What is unknown is whether or not they would have had more disease progression if it were not for the CoQ10. This is what makes these kind of evaluations difficult. - George
I too noticed pain reduction while combining ubiquinol and ALC. I was on ALC first, with no noticable results, until I added ubiquinol. I stopped taking ALC and the pain slowly came back, so I was under the impression that it was the both of them combined that worked. However, one of them has been giving me diarhea, which isn't good I guess if you want them to be absorbed. I started pentox about a month ago too, so I want to try to see which one is causing the diarhea and adjust my intake.
I think others must find them to work well together, and that's why there's so many ALC,ALA, Coq10 combination supplements out there, but I've yet to come across ones with the right dosage as suggested for Peyronies Disease
I don't know if anyone else has seen this brand of coq10 : https://www.qunol.com/
They now carry it at walmart and it is relatively cheap. I picked some up for $11 at 100mg x30. It doesn't say whether or not it is ubiquinol, only that it is a "much more absorbable" version of coq10, so that 100mgs = 300mgs of coq10. let me know what you guys think.
Ubiquinol will be labeled as such. CoQ10 absorbability is not meaningful for older guys because their bodies are not able to convert it into Ubiquinol even if they absorb it OK. It is still CoQ10 and not Ubiquinol. - George
hi guys - been on the ubiquinol for about 3-4 months and i still think that its the best for pain - its REALLY HELPED me
Quote from: Iceman on February 11, 2011, 04:57:46 AM
hi guys - been on the ubiquinol for about 3-4 months and i still think that its the best for pain - its REALLY HELPED me
That's great Iceman. I'm on a few treatments, so it's always hard for me to say what results in any improvements I experience. I do think I've benefited though, so will be reordering.
I have to agree.. I've been on it for 2 months 3x a day.. and in the 2 years I've been dealing with this pain its the only thing that has worked for pain... I've stopped taking everything else to be sure.. not 100% gone but a MASSIVE improvement.
Quote from: elysianfields on February 12, 2011, 09:54:31 AM
I have to agree.. I've been on it for 2 months 3x a day.. and in the 2 years I've been dealing with this pain its the only thing that has worked for pain... I've stopped taking everything else to be sure.. not 100% gone but a MASSIVE improvement.
It's heartening to here these comments from multiple people. Hopefully those new to the condition will start to treat coq10 as a supplement to put pretty high up the list. That way if we start to see significant and prompt improvements in pain in those people, it might put coq10 in an even more positive light.
I just send off for another lot of coq10 from iherb, as my previous supply is running low. For referenece I take 2 x 300mg pills a day. I am going to up that to 3 x 400mg for 3 months and see how that goes. It might seem like a lot, but it does appear to be very well tolerated: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16344537
I believe COQ10 to be fairly expensive. I'm currently taking 2x100g soft shells a day and would like to increase the does a little. Do you know a good supplier in the UK of a quality product which does not cost an arm and a leg? I cant be sure but I seem to have less pain over the last 2 weeks and this could be helping.
I agree that it's certainly not cheap. However for young guys, the avaialble information appears to suggest that Ubiquinone is preferable to Ubiquinol. As ubiquinone is cheaper, that is something you have in your favour. You can get 300 100mg CoQ10 capsules at iherb for around $50 (http://www.iherb.com/Healthy-Origins-CoQ10-Gels-Kaneka-Q10-100-mg-300-Softgels/24092?at=0). Granted postage will be $15-$25 and there may be a small custom payment, so it might be worth buying a years supply. Either way, it's much, much cheaper than going to Holland and Barrett for instance. They charge around £30 for THIRTY 200mg capsules. It's extortionate.
Taking 300 mg. ubiquinol daily since arond Christmas...started with 200 mg. back around October. Have noticed a reduction in night time and AM erection pain. Sometimes they are a little painful, but not like before and go away pretty fast....sometimes no pain at all. I do have some other urological issues that are probably causing penile pain unrelated to Peyronie's. Went to the urologist last week and he said some of my problems are probably prostate related...maybe some sort of prostatitis. Found blood in my urine so he's scheduling me for a cystoscopy and a CT scan (to rule out bladder cancer, liver cancer or kidney stones). No BPH, but he put me on Flomax anyway because I've been having pretty bad urinary retention, especially when getting up at night. He also put me on Septra, an antibiotic that combats a wide range of bacteria. He also palpatated the Peyronie's plaques and said that I didn't have that much...mostly at base. Bottom line is I think the uqiquinol is helping with the Peyronie's pain. I'm also taking ALCAR off and on, but having trouble remembering that small window when my stomach is empty...I eat several small meals a day. I'm going to start back taking at least 1g midmorning when my stomach is usually empty.....Anyway put me down for one more Peyronie's sufferer who seems to be getting benefit from ubiquinol.....Fred
Thanks for the report Fred. That must be 5-6 positive COQ10 reviews I've read in the past few days!
can anyone tell me if this coq10 pills are good? I saw that they are really cheap.
http://www.swansonvitamins.com/SWU561/ItemDetail
and if anyone know how much does it cost the transport of these pills to Europe?
thanks
That is very cheap! I just ordered their brand of L-arginine from amazon and I think it is the same as the stuff I was taking from Holland and Barrett. These guys ship to the UK and they have buy 1 get 1 free on loads of stuff. Thanks for the site. It says $4.99 international.
I believe if this stuff is proven to be good then this link should get posted on the new supplements page! They have really great prices.
I use some of their stuff and haven't had a problem so far. They just seem to be really efficient and really reasonable on their prices. - George
Looks to be very reasonably prices. Let me know if you get hit by customs charges though. I do everytime I order from iherb, but it still works out much cheaper than if I bought in the UK.
I just ordered l-arginie, acetyl-l carnitine. vitamin d3, and coq10.
At the end they add some "Additional Shipping: $27.73 " + $4.99. For me this is ok, because if I have to buy the same products from a shop from here I have to pay 3 times the price. I hope they will really send me the pills.
Does anybody know if they inform you about the status of your command ? I don't want to wait and never get the pills...
I had another browse of the swanson site and I'm definitley going to order my COQ10 from there in future. Like for like it's about half price compared to the iherb option I bought, which is itself quite reasonable. It seems that there might not be a need to break the bank after all :).
I don't see why they would not send them. They are a legit company and have been trading since 1969. I'm using some of their stuff at the moment as it was the cheapest on offer from Amazon. Gonna order a batch from them now.
Quote from: George999 on February 16, 2011, 09:38:55 PM
I use some of their stuff and haven't had a problem so far. They just seem to be really efficient and really reasonable on their prices. - George
Same here...good products and great service....Fred
Quote from: michael1001 on February 17, 2011, 03:34:34 AM
I just ordered l-arginie, acetyl-l carnitine. vitamin d3, and coq10.
At the end they add some "Additional Shipping: $27.73 " + $4.99. For me this is ok, because if I have to buy the same products from a shop from here I have to pay 3 times the price. I hope they will really send me the pills.
Does anybody know if they inform you about the status of your command ? I don't want to wait and never get the pills...
You'll get them...they're a very reputable company. I believe you'll get a tracking number when your order ships. they also ship very quickly...sometimes the same day...Fred
Just to let everyone know, there is the qunol brand of coq10 at walmart. I switched to that after ubiquinol was upsetting my stomach and it is much easier on my digestive system.
Quote from: Fred22 on February 17, 2011, 01:39:37 PM
You'll get them...they're a very reputable company. I believe you'll get a tracking number when your order ships. they also ship very quickly...sometimes the same day...Fred
What I'm afraid of is that the pills will get lost on their way to me ... I'm just worried how can they found an address that is located at thousands of miles distance.
Quote from: michael1001 on February 18, 2011, 01:41:33 PM
What I'm afraid of is that the pills will get lost on their way to me ... I'm just worried how can they found an address that is located at thousands of miles distance.
I've ordered supplements online a great many times and have never had any problem with them getting lost in the post.
I am noticing that a number of guys here are moving to Qunol CoQ10 instead of the Kaneka products due to cost issues. Most current CoQ10 products on the market from various vendors make use of CoQ10 and Ubiquinol produced by the Japanese Kaneka pharmaceutical company. Up to this point in time they have been the only reliable source for high quality CoQ10 products. At this point I would stay clear of CoQ10 products from places like China and India. However Qunol appears to be a different animal. It appears that Qunol is produced in Texas right here in the USA although their website is really not clear on this. Qunol itself appears to be sited in New Jersey and associated with someone by the name of Ashraf Boutros. In any case, it is important to note that their are TWO TYPES OF QUNOL. One type is the conventional CoQ10, albeit in a formulation they claim is more absorbable. The other type is the Ubiquinol form. If you are over 40, you probably should be taking the Ubiquinol form because your body will have difficulty converting the CoQ10 to Ubiquinol no matter how absorbable the CoQ10 is. So if plain old CoQ10 work OK for you, no problem, but if you don't get the results you did from Ubiquinol, you should go back to Ubiquinol unless, of course, you can't tolerate it. Qunol may indeed have an excellent product. What turns me off regarding their marketing is that they are not clear on some things. For example, they state the difference between conventional CoQ10 and Ubiquinol, but they don't make it clear in their FAQ that they produce both. Additionally they state that CoQ10 products are made in Japan, China, India, USA etc, but they don't state up front where Qunol is made. It may be on their website somewhere, but as yet I haven't found it. Another thing that turns me off is that when I go to the National Institutes of Health site and type in "Kaneka", I get immediate research hits. When I type in "Qunol", I get nothing even though their website makes research claims. Too bad. It looks like it might be a good product, but with all the fury surrounding CoQ10 and its benefits, I am really leery of marketing hype. - George
George:
That's very true about qunol. I switched to it purely for digestive reasons. I discoverd that taking ubiquinol was upsetting my stomach and giving me bad gas etc. I switched to generic brand coq10 at first and that seemed to stop it. When I discoverd qunol, it was priced at only about 2 dollars more than the generic stuff, so I tried it and it's just as easy on my stomach as the other coq10. The kind I have is the "enhanced" coq10, so I certainly don't expect it to be like the kaneka brand ubiquinol, although it's better than the generic coq10 and suits my stomach fine, so in that regard it's the right choice for me.
IF you find it effective for Peyronie's, then for sure, go for it. However, from the research stuff I have read, I have my doubts as to the effectiveness of any form of conventional CoQ10 for men over 40. - George
George= How old were the participants in the Iranian study? They supposedly benefited from conventional Q10.
I also would wonder why Iran of all places would be conducting peyronies studies especially when peyronies is mainly a condition of men of European descent. I'm leary of a lot of things also.
Quote from: hornman on February 19, 2011, 05:42:57 PM
George= How old were the participants in the Iranian study? They supposedly benefited from conventional Q10.
I also would wonder why Iran of all places would be conducting peyronies studies especially when peyronies is mainly a condition of men of European descent. I'm leary of a lot of things also.
1) If you really look at the Iranian study you will find that some men did NOT benefit from CoQ10. One demographic in particular that did not benefit, at least not as much, were men over 50 years old. But also, according to the study, men between 40 and 50 actually benefited most, so you are asking a good question here to which I don't have the answer. If you look at the literature on CoQ10 you will find that conversion to the active Ubiquinol form dwindles with advancing age and that is what concerns me. So I think from that that Ubiquinol is the safe route. I think that if anything, it will work better than CoQ10 for older guys. Note that in my response to Casey I said "if it works, go for it". So I see no problem with shifting to CoQ10 IF there is an awareness that it might not work as well as Ubiquinol. Perhaps I wasn't clear on that in my original post so I will modify it to make it clearer.
2) There are a lot of myths about Peyronie's that are perpetuated by the medical establishment. "Vitamin E works in treating Peyronie's." "Most guys with Peyronie's get better without treatment." "No oral medication helps Peyronie's patients." "The acute phase lasts 12 months." I could go on and on. And I think the idea that Peyronie's is a disease of men of European descent is just another one of those myths.
Thanks for your thoughts George. This treatment does seem to be a burgeoning one among forum members, so the more knowledge out there about the best approach to take, the better. I'm love for another study to emerge in this area.
Quote from: chefcasey on February 17, 2011, 01:47:54 PM
Just to let everyone know, there is the qunol brand of coq10 at walmart. I switched to that after ubiquinol was upsetting my stomach and it is much easier on my digestive system.
I had the opposite problem. CoQ10 caused much digestive problems for myself, as Ubiquinol was much easier on my stomach.
Hi There - does any one know the difference between plain old Ubiquinol and Ubiquinol - CF - they are both on iherb but the latter one is a lot cheaper - is there a reason for this as I was just about to buy a whole lot of them as I reckon its awesome for pain relief.
Ubiquinol price is generally based on number of pills in the bottle X amount of ubiquinol in each pill. Ubiqinol thus must be compared by cost per mg of ubiquinol. Take each product and multiply number of pill by mg per pill, then divide the total price by that number. Then compare products. - George
hi george - thx for the reply - but the question was is ' ubiquinol CF' a new different brand to just plain ol ubiquinol - there seems to be 2 different products under the same name
I have no idea. I can find absolutely no information on it from a manufacturer. Since that is the case, I can only assume that it is mostly marketing, ie branding. Most products carrying the CF designation also carry the QH designation that is a Kaneka trademark. So for sure it is derived from Kaneka QH. I would just compare price based on cost per milligram and go from there. Understanding of course that vendors could be cutting corners to achieve super competitive pricing. - George
heads up,
puritan's pride is having another "buy 1 get 1 free, or buy 2 get 3 free" sales.
http://www.puritan.com/
I believe many of us have noticed the high price of ubiquinol, but this sale drops the price of 60 100mg ubiquinol soft-gels to $23.50 if you go the buy 1 get 1 free route; even less if you buy more.
http://www.puritan.com/ubiquinol-639
- CF
Dam I wish I would have known this yesterday. I just bought a bunch of stuff from Iherb and this is a much better deal. What's the rapid release mean anyway? Is this product better then Healthy Origins?
Compared to the prices I see at Vitacost, I don't see any bargains being offered by either Puritan or iHerb.
http://www.vitacost.com/productResults.aspx?ntk=products&ss=1&Ntt=ubiquinol%20100mg
Puritan's Pride, iHerb, and Swanson all have good deals on CoQ10 products. VitaCost also has good prices, but I am not sure I trust their products. There are some chancy CoQ10 products out there with ingredients sourced out of China and India that I would avoid. You want your CoQ10/Ubiquinol ingredients to come either from Kaneka in Japan or Quten in Texas. If you can get stuff from VitaCost containing Japan or USA sourced ingredients, go for it. The other stuff is garbage. Avoid! - George
Hello
As I live in Austria, buying ubiquinol is quite expensive ...
I tried the one available in pharmacies and its like 50mg x 60 for 52,- euros (~$70.-)
(its by "pure encapsulations" and says its "active CoQ10")
so after my 2nd bottle I have decided to buy online.
I looked at the different stores, but I found that there at least 10 or more brands out there with different pricing.
My question:
if for example I look at : http://www.iherb.com/Ubiquinol-CoQ10-100-mg
is there one brand there that is better than the others?
or is there one brand that I absolutely should not order?
(iherb is an example store as they show all the brands they have on one page, I do not meen the store, but the brand of ubiquinol)
And I do not meen the pricing, (anything i get online will be cheaper than in a pharmacy here..) as I am willing to pay a bit more to get better quality product (without being ripped off)
Thanks for any advice
Luc
PS: I read George's post on better buying japanese or us ubiquinol than others... but still there might be some brands better than others.
Luciano, The Japanese manufacturer, Kaneka, is currently the leading CoQ10 manufacturer in the world. They have a product page which lists the supplement manufacturers licensed to use their Ubiquinol product. That page is here -> http://www.kanekaqh.com/kanekaqh-products.html (http://www.kanekaqh.com/kanekaqh-products.html) The only difference between these products will be the additional additives they contain. Their Ubiquinol content will all be the same Kaneka product. That is the important part. Any quality variations between these products will be marginal. In other words, you may pay a considerable premium just to get a small increase in overall effectiveness. How to measure those quality differences is difficult if not impossible. Personally I use the Life Extension brand mainly because I am a member of Life Extension. It is probably one of the better formulations out there, but also is one of the most expensive. On the other hand, the least expensive brands out there containing the Kaneka product will probably be at least 90% as effective as the most expensive brands. Others here have had good results from less expensive brands and they can add their comments. But if I were you, I would just choose one of the Kaneka licensed brands and get started as soon as possible. - George
well what I had a look, and those labeled with CF have somewhere the mention of CoQSol-CF (TM)
It seems that CoQSol-CF is a trademark of an american LA based company called Soft-Gel
Their capsules contain additionally some form of vitamin E and d-Limonene
http://www.soft-gel.com/coqsolcfbanner.htm
There is an interesting page (sponsored by Soft Gel) that explains how different companies (Kaneka, Ashahi etc..) manufacture Q10 and how the absorbtion works. (Of course they say their method is the best..) but it was some interesting reading.
Commercial Production of CoQ10 Supplements
QuoteThere are currently two different manufacturing techniques being used to commercially produce coenzyme Q10. Soft Gel Technologies, Inc.® has access to material from three different Japanese manufacturers. One manufacturer, Nisshin Pharma, uses the solanesol method and the other two manufacturers, Kaneka and Asahi, use the microbiological fermentation method. The following is a brief summary of the two manufacturing methods:
http://www.nutrilearn.com/softgel/coqsol.html
I dont know:- If the mention of CF is really in relation with CoQsol-CF
- If their Capsules are better than others
but the reading was interesting.
Luc
PS: just found s a customers review on iherb
QuoteNote: iHerb does not imply any medical claims from this review.Disclaimer
Best value for moderate dosing September 07, 2009
From California
If you're taking 100 mg or less, a CF formulation of CoQ10 is just as good as ubiquinol. Ubiquinol, however, is much better absorbed if you're taking 200 mg or more.
http://www.iherb.com/Doctor-s-Best-CoQsol-CF-100-mg-120-Softgels-Discontinued-Item/15480?at=0
dunno if its true or not.
The most trusted process at this point is the fermentation method and the manufacturers to be avoided are the non-Japanese Asian ones mainly Chinese and Indian. But thanks Luciano for all that good information. It certainly includes information that I was unaware of. - George
Yes - thanks Luciano.
George 999 has long advocated using Ubiquinol. I am presently buying it from Puritan's Pride , a brand called Reserveage @ $39.99 100 mg / 60 soft gels caps. Ingredient is Kaneka plus some other grape ingredients. Cost is high.
They also have their in house Puritan's Pride Ubiquinol soft gel ( Kaneka) for 2/$46.99 & 5/93.98
Do you think , George , that I am paying too much for the Reserveage and would get the same results from the House Brand? It is hard to judge results as they are at best too subtle to notice at this stage.
Mike67
The reality is that the study was done with plain jane CoQ10, so that IS the proven active ingredient. Many of the supplement vendors do tweak it here and there and, of course, Ubiquinol IS known to be a step up from CoQ10. But vendor tweaks in form and formulation are unproven. They may be helpful, but who really knows? I use LEF's formulation because I trust LEF to get these things right, but, in the end, who can really know? So the main point is to get the CoQ10/Ubiquinol part down with confidence that it is very likely to work since the research is the evidence. Its benefits are slow and subtle, but they are real. If you can afford the additives, go for it. If not, just make sure you get the main course because that is where the real action is. Thats how I feel about it. - George
Trader Joe's has started carrying Ubquinol 100mg 60 count from Keneka corporation for $19.99. Haven't tried it yet but will when my current supply runs out. Just wanted to pass it on for anyone who has access to a Trader Joe's. Don't know if all the stores throughout the U.S. will carry it as stores have somewhat different items from region to region. I can only account for the Southern California region at this time.
Trader Joes has some great deals. I only wish we had one here where I live! I'm envious! - George
I started ordering online at Puritan's Pride after paying through the nose here in Ontario.
I recently stocked up on their house brand 100 mg Ubiquinol. Cost is $25.45 tax in per 60 caps.
I buy the Spring Valley Brand CoQ10 from Walmart 100mg 120 count. Its $ 25.47. I think there is a difference between the CoQ10 and Ubquinol but thought I would mention it for people who us it.
I ordered online from Swanson which would be cheap for you guys in the USA but cost me as I got stung with import tax.
Been thinking about grabbing some of this, which would be the best stuff to get from Iherb, has anyone checked there?
Is ubiquinol useful only to decrease pain?
Quote from: dioporcolorisolvo on May 13, 2011, 11:50:08 PM
Is ubiquinol useful only to decrease pain?
In the study it also reduced curvature. There has only been one study so far though, further studies should help to further clarify the role ubiquinol holds in peyronie's disease treatment.
Can one take a higher dosage of CQ10 such as 150, 200, or 400 mg and does it interact with Pentox? How long should it be taken for? Does it have any major side effects?
I'm taking 400g per day with 3 x pentox. It's not doing me any harm. I've had no side effects from anything i've taken so far.
If i'm young, can i assume Ubiquinone and not Ubiquinol? I read that Ubiquinone is less expensive than Ubiquinol. Is it true?
Which is it the dose daily of Ubiquinone?
Now i'm assuming L-arginina, Propionil Carnitina and VitE.
Can i add also Ubiquinone?
My Urologist prescribed Pentox, L-Arginine and Vitamin E and told me that he has seen improvement in patients with Peyronie's but that it was incurable and would never go away completely. He stated that the goal was to minimize the disease as much as possible. I've read about spontaneous and gradual resolution, but he insists that it is incurable. After a follow-up exam after 6 weeks, he made my next appointment in 6 MONTHS! I did not have any ill effects with the products he prescribed exept when taking Pentox before bedtime or with spicy foods. I decided to add Acetyl L-Carnitine and Ubiquinol after reading so many favorable reviews. On the very first day of taking them, I experienced some lightheadedness by midday and then extreme sleepiness hours before my normal bedtime and woke up at 4:30AM experiencing a repeated sense of spinning in my head. With my eyes open, the ceiling seemed to move from right to left repeatedly and these symptoms continued on and off for awhile. Since I've taken Co-Q-10 before with no ill effects, I have to think that the Acetyl L-Carnitine 500MG taken twice yesterday on an empty stomach with L-Arginine was responsible. I take the NSAID Relafen as well, but never had any side effects. I must discontinue the L-Carnitine to see if that was the cause. I have never had any problems with seizures and I do not drink alcohol. My Peyronie's after nine weeks continues to change from signs of improvement to signs of worsening. I discovered that the lump in my hand (palm) that I was told was a ganglion cyst by a PA and my uro is actually Dupuytren's Disease, although there is yet no sign of contracture. Has anyone else experienced any side effects from taking Acetyl L-Carnitine? The combination of Pentox and Relafen has stopped most of the burning sensation over the plaque scar area on my flaccid penis. I have occasional slight waisting, an indentation that relocates and a slight upward bend during full erections. My uro told me to have all the sex possible and that it would not hurt a thing, but I think it would be difficult without a strong erection and possibly cause more damage during the inflammatory stage. I have limited self induced erections to twice weekly and I don't know if having more or less would be better. Any thoughts?
My Urologist prescribed Pentox, L-Arginine and Vitamin E and told me that he has seen improvement in patients with Peyronie's but that it was incurable and would never go away completely. He stated that the goal was to minimize the disease as much as possible. I've read about spontaneous and gradual resolution, but he insists that it is incurable. After a follow-up exam after 6 weeks, he made my next appointment in 6 MONTHS! I did not have any ill effects with the products he prescribed exept when taking Pentox before bedtime or with spicy foods. I decided to add Acetyl L-Carnitine and Ubiquinol after reading so many favorable reviews. On the very first day of taking them, I experienced some lightheadedness by midday and then extreme sleepiness hours before my normal bedtime and woke up at 4:30AM experiencing a repeated sense of spinning in my head. With my eyes open, the ceiling seemed to move from right to left repeatedly and these symptoms continued on and off for awhile. Since I've taken Co-Q-10 before with no ill effects, I have to think that the Acetyl L-Carnitine 500MG taken twice yesterday on an empty stomach with L-Arginine was responsible. I take the NSAID Relafen as well, but never had any side effects. I must discontinue the L-Carnitine to see if that was the cause. I have never had any problems with seizures and I do not drink alcohol. My Peyronie's after nine weeks continues to change from signs of improvement to signs of worsening. I discovered that the lump in my hand (palm) that I was told was a ganglion cyst by a PA and my uro is actually Dupuytren's Disease, although there is yet no sign of contracture. Has anyone else experienced any side effects from taking Acetyl L-Carnitine? The combination of Pentox and Relafen has stopped most of the burning sensation over the plaque scar area on my flaccid penis. I have occasional slight waisting, an indentation that relocates and a slight upward bend during full erections. My uro told me to have all the sex possible and that it would not hurt a thing, but I think it would be difficult without a strong erection and possibly cause more damage during the inflammatory stage. I have limited self induced erections to twice weekly and I don't know if having more or less would be better. Any thoughts?
I really get annoyed when physicians use the term "incurable". I really don't think there is anything out there that is really incurable. There are things, of course, that medical science doesn't know how to cure, Peyronie's being one of them, but that does not mean that it is impossible to cure. Medical science DOES know how to make it "better" and making it "better" is a major step on the way to a cure.
The first part of the process involves treatments KNOWN to work. These include oral treatments like Pentox, Ubiquinol and ALC along with physical therapies like VED. Vitamin E is pretty useless from the experience of most of us around here. L-Arginine is more useful for ED than for Peyronie's. While NSAID's can be helpful with pain, they can also result in some pretty nasty long term side effects (read the labels).
The second part in dealing with a problem like Peyronie's involves mitigating the root causes. Root causes include issues like sub-optimal vitamin D levels (below 50ng/ml). Vitamin D is a major genetic regulator and anti-inflammatory factor. Serum glucose levels along with serum insulin levels also drive inflammation and degenerative disease. Peyronie's is common among diabetics, but its all relative. You don't have to have diabetes, elevated blood sugar can cause the same problems. Viseral fat is inflammatory. The more of it you get rid of, the easier it will be to deal with your Peyronie's. Omega 6 fats are inflammatory as opposed to Omega 3's which are anti-inflammatory, especially the EPA/DHA type. I could go on and on. Once you start attacking the root, it gets easier to put out the fire.
Is end stage kidney disease curable? Any doctor would tell you no. But a recent rodent study succeeded for the first time in actually curing kidney failure in rodents simply be dramatically lowering their blood sugar levels, and suddenly their kidneys proceeded to heal normally. Can diseased hearts heal? Just a few years ago the unanimous answer from the medical community was no. Now we know that is not the case at all because some heart patients with implanted heart assist devices have experienced recovery with their own organ. Doctors should know better than to use arbitrary terms like "incurable".
I appreciate your input. The Doctor and head of the Peyronie's Institute wrote me and stated that Peyronie's is curable because 50% of the time the body's immune system heals it, but he is selling books, telephone consultations and supplements. He is a chiropractor by trade. He answered a few e-mails and then wouldn't. My Urologist that told me that Peyronie's was incurable also told me that the lump in my palm wasn't Dupuytren's Disease even though it appeared suddenly a few weeks before the sudden appearance of fibrous plaque in my penis. My Ortho physician and his PA confirmed that it is indeed Dupuytrens and that I probably have a genetic predisposition to both of these connective tissue disorders. I am otherwise a very healthy 52 year old man and only take Lipitor 20MG for borderline hyperlipidemia. I just got complete lab work done and all my numbers were within normal range. I didn't get much information from the Urologist in the few minutes he saw me and he did not even mention the name of this condition. I found it on the Internet when I searched Fibrous Plaque. I am not married and not in a relationship, so it is not a major problem for me compared to some who are and those who are much younger than me, but I was not ready to deal with this condition for the rest of my life. I appreciate having a forum of others who actually can share their experiences good or bad to help others.
I ordered some bottles of CoQ10 capsules which were delivered to my porch yesterday but accidentally left outside overnight. I'm worried that this will have lessened their effectiveness. Is there any way to check for that? Or do I have nothing to worry about?
Quote from: retiredinGA on May 20, 2011, 11:30:30 AM
I appreciate your input. The Doctor and head of the Peyronie's Institute wrote me and stated that Peyronie's is curable because 50% of the time the body's immune system heals it, but he is selling books, telephone consultations and supplements. He is a chiropractor by trade. He answered a few e-mails and then wouldn't.
I don't have a whole lot of confidence in Dr Herazy. He is a chiropractor who is pushing Peyronie's treatments that are really pretty useless (ie Neprinol etc) while ignoring treatments that really work (ie Pentoxifylline). He is a waste of time in my opinion.
Quote from: retiredinGA on May 20, 2011, 11:30:30 AM
My Urologist that told me that Peyronie's was incurable also told me that the lump in my palm wasn't Dupuytren's Disease even though it appeared suddenly a few weeks before the sudden appearance of fibrous plaque in my penis.
Like Herazy the chiropractor, your urologist is making the mistake of trying to diagnose a disease that is outside of the scope of his training. I have seen this over and over and patients are often not careful to consider whether their doctor really has the training to make the assertion that he or she is trying to make. Your urologist is also NOT a Peyronie's specialist, thus he is suggesting to you vitamin E which true Peyronie's experts KNOW is useless in treating Peyronie's. A really good doctor is one who will tell you point blank, "This is what it is, it is not my specialty, but I will be glad to refer you to someone who is an expert." But most doctors just try to pacify you and impress you with there "knowledge" and get you out of the office *feeling* more informed if not better.
Quote from: retiredinGA on May 20, 2011, 11:30:30 AM
My Ortho physician and his PA confirmed that it is indeed Dupuytrens and that I probably have a genetic predisposition to both of these connective tissue disorders.
Your orthopedist knows what he is talking about. Genetic predisposition means that you have some bad genes that can assert themselves without proper regulation. Vitamin D is essential in healthy gene expression. That is why getting vitamin D levels right is essential to halting these sorts of issues.
Quote from: retiredinGA on May 20, 2011, 11:30:30 AM
I am otherwise a very healthy 52 year old man and only take Lipitor 20MG for borderline hyperlipidemia. I just got complete lab work done and all my numbers were within normal range.
"Normal" when it comes to lab work is very subjective. What are normal fasting blood sugar levels? A recent lab report I have in my possession indicates that "normal" is 70-126mg/dL. Dr. Oz and other cardiac experts say that anything above 100mg/dL is dangerous. Life Extension says that anything above 86mg/dL is a problem. It is truly amazing how sick people are these days and how many prescription meds they are taking, but most of them have "normal" lab reports. That tells me that docs love to tell people that they are "normal" even though those "normal" levels are wreaking havoc with their bodies. So everyone has to make a decision as to whether to let the doctor stick a pacifier in their mouth or whether to be proactive and get their numbers to as healthy a level as possible so as not to face crushing medical bills in the future along with devastating health consequences. Right now many people are being kept alive by billions of dollars of high tech medicine, but the money is rapidly running out and I, personally, do not want to be left high and dry when that happens. These are the sort of issues that everyone should be thinking about, but few are, since most believe that unlimited expensive medical care is an entitlement that is going to be around for eternity. (end of rant ;D )
Quote from: retiredinGA on May 20, 2011, 11:30:30 AM
I didn't get much information from the Urologist in the few minutes he saw me and he did not even mention the name of this condition. I found it on the Internet when I searched Fibrous Plaque. I am not married and not in a relationship, so it is not a major problem for me compared to some who are and those who are much younger than me, but I was not ready to deal with this condition for the rest of my life. I appreciate having a forum of others who actually can share their experiences good or bad to help others.
He *should* have offered to refer you to a Peyronie's specialist, but he probably doesn't even know they exist. Oh well ...
- George
How cold or hot was it? They must be sealed? I'm sure they are fine. They have probably been on a cargo ship for weeks or even on a plane.
I don't understand one thing:
in the published study on the Co10 the daily dose is 300mg.
But this dose is related to Ubiquinol or to Ubiquinone??
It depends what you mean by incurable!? Peyronies is a pretty simple disease. It is just scar tissue. If you had scar tissue on your arm or leg it may not bother you. Peyronies is scar tissue in the worst place possible. When he says it is incurable he is right to a certain extent. If you had a scar on your leg from a cut and went to the doctor and asked for an oral treatment to help he would be stuck to find something. It may fade in time and you may not notice it but there will always be a scar. Some people's scars fade more quickly than others. Pentox and supplements are not cures for peyronie's but they can help. For most people they will help a little and they may stop it getting worse. VED can stretch a scar but the scar is still there. Xiaflex can dissolve a scar but the tissue will not be exactly the same as it once was. We have to face facts that things will never be the same but they can be better.
I have lost faith in most doctors because they don't spend enough time with a paient to determine their problem. I knew a man who went to an emergency room here and told the physcians that he thought that he had tentanus (lockjaw). The physican argued with him that he only had a sinus infection and sent him home. The next day he was rushed to a hospital 100 miles away after a foreign doctor finally diagnosed that he indeed did have tentanus. They did a tracheotomy before transporting him and he spent a few months in a coma. He survived after a terrible ordeal and eventually returned to a somewhat normal life before dying two years later of Encephalitis, which it took days to diagnose. They first thought he had Meningitis.
My family doctor did not even know what Peyronie's Disease was and he is over 50 years old. He thought that I had a blood clot in my penis. The Uro's PA told me that it was fibrous plague that causes some curvation in advanced cases but he added that I caught mine early and he expected a good outcome with the oral medications (Pentox, L-Arginine and Vitamin E). The Urologist just spent two minutes verifying the PA's conclusion and he looked at me and smiled and said that it's not curable. He charged $375 and wanted to see me in 6 weeks. When I returned, this 50 + year old Chinese doctor walked into the room and he told me that I was taking meds that I don't take and I had to tell him what I was taking and I think that he realized that he was looking at someone else's file. He had 30 patients waiting in his waiting room and they were bringing them back two at a time. He told me on that follow-up visit that I will improve taking what he prescribed and that he has had other patients that have improved but he repeated that it would never go away completely. He set up my next appointement for 6 months away and that surprised me. I guess that he has done all he can do.
As far as the Dupuytren's, I asked him about it and told him that another PA told me it was a ganglion cyst. I had one before on my wrist and I know it is possible to get one on the palm below a knuckle joint, but I read that 30% of men with Peyronie's also have Dupuytren's. He felt of it and agreed that he thought it was a ganglion and that he had never seen any of his Peyronie's patients with Dupuytren's Disease or contracture. I still had my doubts and the orthopedic doctor and his PA knew it was a knot nodule from Dupuytren's as soon as they felt it and there are two tiny cords in that hand that aren't even attached to that lump. He stated that it was usually slow to develop and that I may or may not live long enough to need hand surgery from contracture. He said that it can come back again even after surgery. The Ortho thought it was weird that the Uro has never had a Peyronie's patient with Dupuytren's but had I not shown him my hand, that Uro still wouldn't know that there was a lump there. There are only 3 Urologists in my area and this area includes most of South Georgia and North Florida. I would probably have to travel to Atlanta or Jacksonville to find someone more qualified to treat Peyronie's. My Urologist mentioned that oral treaments could be followed by injections if necessary, but I may just give up having erections while I am awake before having injections or surgery. I guess I've used it enough to retire it if necessary. I don't have a problem yet with achieving an erection, but I am early in the inflammatory stage and worry about the indention which seems to change positions and sometimes it seems like my erections are not affected at all. I get encouraged that it is improving only to be disappointed later when it seems worse.
I appreciate your input because there are not many people to confide in about these delicate issues.
I believe that the study was in fact done with Ubiquinone, since Ubiquinol was not yet widely available at the time the study was done and the study does not specify Ubiquinol which would likely be the case if that is what they used. I believe that it is better to be on the safe side though and use Ubiquinol at 300mg per day as the study did with Ubiquinone. - George
Similar stories have been posted here many times. And it is unfortunate that many doctors don't seem to stay up on new techniques. They continue to give the old response that "this is not treatable" or that "there is nothing you can do"... or to me the worst of all I was told "you'll learn to live with it".
You need to find a male sexual specialist that also specializes in the treatment of Peyronies. We have several forum members who have been happy with a doctor in Atlanta. I can't recall his name off the top of head.
Les
Well, I'm new to this forum as my Peyronie's Disease only began two months ago. It came on seemily overnight when I felt an unusual firmness near the base. I have no memory of any trauma that preceeded this because I have not been in a sexual relationship in a long while. Actually, I was sick with a cold virus for weeks prior to finding this, so I actually had not even had any self induced erections in a couple weeks before suddenly finding this (fibrous plaque) nodule. My ortho told me that I did not do anything to cause it since I also have Dupuytren's Disease of the hand and that it was genetic. Why both diseases manifested themselves within a month of one another is odd unless it is an auto immune issue when I got my resistence low from being sick. I am not qualified to answer that with any certainty.
My family doctor told me to discontinue taking the Aceytl L-Carnitine since I experienced the lightheadedness and nighttime sense of the room spinning. The bottle states that it should be taken on an empty stomach, so I took one capsule twice on an empty stomach along with my L-Arginine. I had been taking L-Arginine on an empty stomach already with no adverse effects. I've read on numerous websites though that L-Carnitine should be taken with food. I was hoping to get the benefits some claim from L-Carnitine for Peyronie's and lowering triglycerides but I am fearful of these side effects returning. Perhaps taking both L-Arginine and Aceytl L-Carnitine on an empty stomach along with coffee with caffeine and then later adding the Pentox with food caused the problem. I have so many things to take now, there are not enough hours in the day to spread them all out. I started Ubiquinol the same day as the L-Carnitine but since I have tolerated Co-Q-10 with no adverse side affects, I wouldn't suppose it played any role in this problem. I laid off all my meds and supplements yesterday to try and clear my system from whatever caused it.
I have not had time to read many of the statements on this forum, but from what I have read, I don't seem to find anyone who has had any total resolution or remission from Peyronie's Disease. Are the some/many? Are the vacuum devices only needed by those who are unable to achieve a full erection otherwise? How do traction devices work unless you are able to use them for an extended period while erect? Why would a Urologist suggest to have all the sex you can and that it would not hurt anything when I've also read that additional trauma can make the scarring worse? I have not read much as to whether it would be best to stretch the penis daily with self induced erections or to leave it alone completely while it is trying to heal the scar tissue. There is an abundance of information online about Peyronie's but most of it doesn't answer these questions. My Uro asked me if I needed anything (drugs) to achieve an erection and I told him that I didn't. While he was telling me that it would improve using the Pentox, I was delighted because it isn't anywhere near that stage where there is permanent curvation, but the reality is that he doesn't really know for sure how it will progress. With the few minutes that doctors spend with patients, you really don't have time to ask all the questions that are on your mind. One thing the Urologist's assistant told me was that I should stay off the Internet (referring to searching for additional information about this condition). Like so many others with Peyronie's, I never heard of it and certainly never expected to get it, so certainly I want as much information I can gather to combat it.
lwillisjr:
I just noticed your profile shows that you are 2 years Peyronie's free. That is encouraging. I am in the early stages of the disease and only experienced minor difficulties so far like burning sensation that has diminshed lately, indentation (weak spot) where the plaque scar ends, slight waisting at times that can be corrected and sometimes minor upward curving with full erections. I have not had total ED yet, although it seems like my libido is not what it was prior to Peyronie's, perhaps because it is not as pleasureable anymore, it is worrisome to see things worsen and the meds I am taking now. I've been on Pentox, L-Arginine and Vitamin E within the first week of discovering the fibrous plaque.
My questions to you would be how long did you have it, how bad did it get, what oral treatments did you take, did you have injections, surgery or any other course of treatment?
Thank you for taking the time to help others.
I'm happy to share my story. Instead of me taking up space here you can either:
1. Click on the link below in my signature block that says "My History"
or
2. Click on the globe symbol to the left under my sign on ID and that will take you to my own web site where I have posted my information.
My pain was greatly reduced after I'd been on the ubiquinol for a couple of months and I was virtually pain free until recently. I've started to get painful AM erections again. Today It's now 1:17 and I'm still in pain. I've also added ALCAR to the mix (2G per day for about 2 weeks now). I'm still taking 300 mg. ubiquinol daily. Now I'm wondering if the pain relief was just a fluke or maybe the Peyronie's is progressing to a point where the ubiquinol is no longer effective. This is very disappointing as I've had pain for over 5 years now. Granted it's not as bad as it was at its peak, but still pretty significant pain....Fred
My pain was greatly reduced after I'd been on the ubiquinol for a couple of months and I was virtually pain free until recently. I've started to get painful AM erections again. Today It's now 1:17 and I'm still in pain. I've also added ALCAR to the mix (2G per day for about 2 weeks now). I'm still taking 300 mg. ubiquinol daily. Now I'm wondering if the pain relief was just a fluke or maybe the Peyronie's is progressing to a point where the ubiquinol is no longer effective. This is very disappointing as I've had pain for over 5 years now. Granted it's not as bad as it was at its peak, but still pretty significant pain....Fred
Hey Fred,
Have you tried astaxanthin? I'm beginning to think that astaxanthin has been much more effective for myself then ubiquinol. I was taking 300mg ubiquinol. I suggest taking 12mg of astaxanthin daily, 3x4mg with fatty food.
Fred - Maybe this is a flare up that will be short lived? When there is pain for such a long time, maybe there are occasional bumps in the road and in sticking with the treatment it might minimise the lnegth of time this lasts for. Please keep us informed. I really hope the pain starts to reduce soon!
Quote from: crashbandit on June 16, 2011, 09:52:37 PM
Hey Fred,
Have you tried astaxanthin? I'm beginning to think that astaxanthin has been much more effective for myself then ubiquinol. I was taking 300mg ubiquinol. I suggest taking 12mg of astaxanthin daily, 3x4mg with fatty food.
What is astaxanthin and are there any studies supporting it's use for Peyronies? Thanks for the suggestion....Fred
Quote from: newguy on June 17, 2011, 11:02:36 AM
Fred - Maybe this is a flare up that will be short lived? When there is pain for such a long time, maybe there are occasional bumps in the road and in sticking with the treatment it might minimise the lnegth of time this lasts for. Please keep us informed. I really hope the pain starts to reduce soon!
Thanks. I was diagnosed with prostate cancer in April and some of my symptoms could be due to this condition. Today I'm feling some irritation in the prostate area....different from the pain I was expweriencing yesterday. I'm planning on contacting a surgeon who specializes in robotic radical prostatectomy next week and if we have a "meeting of the minds" I'll schedule the surgery. Maybe after that I can sort out whats what.
Didn't know about your diagnosis Fred - I am so sorry to hear that. Best of luck in dealing with this new challenge.
Tim
I didn't know either, so orry to hear about that Fred. Here's wishing you all the best in dealing with this challenge.
Hello all,
I was wondering if any of you have heard of Coq-10 cream and if it would be helpful treating Peyronies Disease ?? My situation isnt that horrible compared to some, had the Peyronies Disease for almost 6 months seen it progress from slight curvature to slight curvature w/2 indentations and a bump in-between (the plaque?) I take ALC, Coq10, L- Argnine, Vit E.
Another question.. Is it possible to get the insurance company to pay for a VED or traction device??
How do you know if you have the "end stage Peyronies Disease"??
Thanks for the support guys. I've pretty much decided on the radical robotic prostatectomy. I'm currently searching for the most experienced team to do the job. I've found one doctor who does about 5 a week and has done over 700 (he's also a graduate of Emory University Med School), and another who's done about 800 and instructs other physicians in the procedure. I'll go with one of these doctors and hopefully be able to make a decision in the next week or so....Fred
Quote from: Woodman on May 12, 2011, 02:35:27 PM
I buy the Spring Valley Brand CoQ10 from Walmart 100mg 120 count. Its $ 25.47. I think there is a difference between the CoQ10 and Ubquinol but thought I would mention it for people who us it.
I'd be worried about quality with anything herbal from Walley world (Walmart)
I buy Swanson ubiquinol from Amazon, good quality and good price.
Right now I'm buying Ubiquinol from Swanson.
$18.79 100mg 60 softgels.
Free shipping and 10% off if you buy $49 or more.
I don't know if I can post the promo code here.
I've bought ubiquinol Swanson (Kaneka) but i've some gastrointestinal problem after i swallow it.
In your opinion it can result from brand?
Should i try to buy another brand of ubiquinol?
Quote from: dioporcolorisolvo on June 29, 2011, 12:08:01 PM
I've bought ubiquinol Swanson (Kaneka) but i've some gastrointestinal problem after i swallow it.
You might want to try taking it with a meal if you are currently taking it on an empty stomach.
I've peyronie since 7 months.
In these weeks pain is increasing and girth is worsening.
I'm assuming Ubiquinol since 2 weeks but i haven't noticing any improvment.
How much time is necessary to have benefits with Ubiquinol?
dio............
It could take a long while, two weeks is not very much time to determine if it will help you. Some people get no relief from anything. I tried everything for 3 years and got no relief (so I got implanted). Some men get immediate relief, it appears. One thing Peyronies Disease will teach you is patience! You probably need to try everything that you read about here, provided you have no adverse reaction.
Are you taking Pentox, L-Arginine, are you doing VED therapy? Try anything that is safe and within acceptable medical practice. Also, try to read new postings everyday. I have been reading for three years and have had no adverse reactions from what I cleared with my doctor.
Remember: No two men are exactly the same, what works for you may not be what someone else needs. This disease is BAD, however, there is a solution for YOU.
Good luck, and God speed.
I agree completely with Nick. It takes a LOT of time to really be able to tell whether something is going to work or not. Months not weeks and probably more than two. And, unfortunately for some, nothing works. You have to be patient, methodical, willing to learn and keep learning and tenacious. You have to be very determined, follow the science and have extreme patience when trying those things like Ubiquinol and Pentox that have been shown effective to various degrees in multiple patients. - George
What is the recomended dose of ubiquinol to be effective? I hear it is more efficient that CoQ10 to in therory you don't need to take as much.
How long before any reduction in symptoms would be noticed. in other words, how long should i give it to tell if it will work for me.
There's another thread in this section with the exact same header, "Ubiquinol".
All the info you will need about doses and much more.
OK, thanks. It looks like most feel that on 300mg a day it reduces pain. I assume that it is sustained if you stopped or cut back.
Interesting that some said they added PQQ which is suppose to help with rebuilding the mitochondria.
It has been about 6 months since some folks said they were taking it. Anything to report about the PQQ?
The 300mg (100mg 3x per day) comes from what was used in the successful study. As with anything else, if you cut that back, you will see the beneficial effect diminished. By how much will be different for each individual. How much benefit you get will be different for each individual. But I wouldn't necessarily expect any benefit until you have used it religiously for at least 6 months. Some of us have been using PQQ to varying degrees. PQQ, although certainly interesting, has NO research showing any benefit for Peyronie's and therefore, I would not waste time and money on it UNLESS I was already using and planning to continue to use Pentoxifylline AND Ubiquinol/CoQ10, the two oral treatments WITH research evidence behind them. - George
I hope another study comes out sometime. It would be great to contrast two studies on Ubiquinol. If it was successful once again, hopefully urologists will start to take note.
Indeed! What I would like to see at this point as well is a well designed study looking at a combination of Pentox and Ubiquinol. That really worked like gangbusters for me and I think the results of a study would be doubly impressive. - George
I am all new to this so I may be asking some dumb questions.
I was wondering if all the gains obtained from taking oral treatments such as Ubiquinol, pentox et al. would be sustained if you stopped taking or reduced dosage..... if would seem to reason that if the scare tissue is reduced, stretched and soften it may stay that way. But I don't know. What, if any, experience do folks have if they cut back or stop oral treatments. Do they regress backwards?
Hi George999
I have been on these meds , including Pentox & L'Arginine, and VED ( since June 2010)since last November but so far I have seen no improvement at all in my bend. I have no pain but still the bend. I realize it is hard to say on an individual basis when to expect something positive .When you say that they have really worked for you , I don't doubt it. Can you state exactly what they did for you?
What can we , should we , expect from taking these meds on a daily basis? Do you think there is an outside timeline where one should give it up and start preparing for Verapamil injections or worse - surgery?
Hard to say I realize. Just interested in how they have worked for you.
Mike67
Mike, all I can tell you is that the improvements I have seen, which include significant improvements in girth which would imply scar tissue regression, have occurred slowly over a period of years. I think that anyone who demands short term gains will end up flitting from one useless treatment to another and *never* see improvement. So it is a matter of staying the course. Even the VED takes time to do the job for many guys. And some guys do all of this and never see improvement. But its something you have to throw every proven concept at. Certain stuff has been shown to work for some guys. You have to stick with those things. Diabetes has been shown to greatly increase the chances of ending up with Peyronie's. So you have to fight to get your blood glucose levels as far away from the diabetic area as possible. If diabetes provokes it, you want to be as far from that as possible. Whoever is serious enough about Peyronie's *will* *eventually* see results. Of that I am confident. Over the last three months I have been working on the whole blood sugar issue. I struggled to get my fasting levels down to 103. Over the last few months I have discovered some new strategies that have allowed me to get that down in a short time to 95 while still consuming a lot of fruit which I am loath to give up for nutritional reasons. I am now working to extend that further since I really want my fasting blood sugar levels no higher than 87. I am determined and confident that I will make that happen and that I will see significant further results in terms of Peyronie's as well as overall health as a result. - George
Thanks George. Very encouraging. I guess having been on the meds for just 5 or 6 months I am showing too much impatience.
I admire you for your perseverance in pursuit of improvement and the wealth of knowledge you have gained. Fortunately blood sugar levels don't happen to be an immediate concern of mine. Heart health - well that is another story. I know they are intertwined but mine has more to do with specifics , i.e. blocked arteries.
In the words of Chief Dan George ( in The Outlaw Josie Wales) "I will endeavor to persevere ".
Mike
Just as long as you are aware that serum glucose is inflammatory and the more of it you have, the more inflammation you have. It also tends to elevate serum insulin which is also inflammatory, so double whammy. - George
Still on the ubiquinol and ALCAR and still in pain. I saw my surgeon yesterday and I'm scheduled for robotic prostatectomy on September 22. He said that I should not be experiencing any symptoms with PCa at the stage I have it. My biopsy indicated a Gleason 6, T1c tumor (basically a stage 1 cancer). However, the whole prostate gland can't be biopsied so they won't know exactly how advanced it is until they get it out. Just wish I could resolve this pain before surgery because that's going to pile pain on pain. I'll also have to wear a Foley catheter for about a week or so.
Fred: I wish you all the best. Keep strong and faithfull.
Regards
Fred 22 I have followed your post sense before I joined the forum. I know your battles with stress and depression. I know your struggle with pentox.
With all that is going on with you I am sure they will help you with the pain.
If they do not demand what you need.Suffering is not going to help your situation.You need to be advised that after surgery poses alot of other therapy. I have heard that they clamp the penis back during surgery.
Not a good idea for a Guy having Peyronies disease and having prostate surgery.I have read alot of guys get Peyronie's from the clamping.I wish you the best Fred be aware of all that they do.
Fubar
Quote from: Farinthesouth on July 26, 2011, 01:36:59 PM
Fred: I wish you all the best. Keep strong and faithfull.
Regards
Thanks...Greatly appreciated.
To clarify, is the CoQ10 just for the pain, or does it have other benefits in relation to the Peyronies? Thank you.
Quote from: George999 on July 24, 2011, 10:03:56 AM
Indeed! What I would like to see at this point as well is a well designed study looking at a combination of Pentox and Ubiquinol. That really worked like gangbusters for me and I think the results of a study would be doubly impressive. - George
Yes, i've been taking that combo for months now (and cialis). I also take vitamin E with the pentox, which I didn't do before. That's pretty much the extent of my oral regimen right now though.
Quote from: gap2117 on August 12, 2011, 04:25:52 PM
To clarify, is the CoQ10 just for the pain, or does it have other benefits in relation to the Peyronies? Thank you.
The study indicated reduction in curvature too etc. Its effectiveness in the study went well beyond improvements in pain. It was only a single study though.
At this point in time, does anyone know the theory(ies) as to why Ubiquinol works?
It works because it is an anti-oxidant that protects cellular mitochondria. Mitochondria provide energy for human cells. When enough mitochondria become damaged, the cells become senescent or prematurely aged. That is, they become dysfunctional due to lack of energy. One of the results of this is tissue fibrosis. Ubiquinol is able to at least partially reverse this process by protecting cellular mitochondria. There is accumulating evidence that mitochondrial dysfunction is behind multiple degenerative diseases.
First paragraph addresses mitochondrial anti-oxidant capabilities of Ubiquinol: http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/f-w02/coenzymeq10.html (http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/f-w02/coenzymeq10.html)
This paper ties Cystic Fibrosis to mitochondrial dysfunction due to over oxidation of a Ubiquinol related protein: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21518732 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21518732)
This study ties anti-mitochondrial antibodies to fibrosis: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21374662 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21374662)
This study ties Ubiquinol (CoQ10) to inhibition of liver fibrosis, note the link to TGF-beta1: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19647758 (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19647758)
I could continue on with a long list, but you should be getting the picture. While Pentox blocks TGF-beta1, Ubiquinol also blocks TGF-beta1 indirectly by its anti-oxidant effects on mitochondria. Mitochondrial dysfunction and resulting cellular dysfunction could be a trigger for immune system response involving over expression of TGF-beta1. Thus Ubiquinol deficiency appears closely tied to this sort of syndrome.
Quote from: goodluck on August 28, 2011, 02:17:10 PM
At this point in time, does anyone know the theory(ies) as to why Ubiquinol works?
George,
Thanks for the info. I have not read it all yet, but I will.
Seems it maybe the same or similar mechanism as to why ALC works too.
Using the same thought process the PQQ products by LEF may also help as they help support damaged mitochondria. .....At least in theory.
Good Luck
I believe that it is similar to ALC, but far more effective. I, too, find PQQ interesting, but not interesting enough to pay for it when there is no objective research supporting its effectiveness. That is the HUGE problem about stuff that is likely to be effective. You could exhaust your bank account and take pills 24hrs a day based on what *might* be helpful. I really prefer to concentrate as much as possible on those things with some degree of legitimate evidence of their effectiveness. - George
I understand your feelings. The PQQ products are priced rather high.
I would hope PQQ would be near the top of the list for Peyronies reasearchers to test based on the results of Ubiquinol and ALC. It seems like it may nicely complement the other two supplements.
Interesting that these are the same supplements that are recommended to Fibromyalgia and Chronic fatigue sufferers to help with mental/physical stamina. The relationships here may not be not obvious but it strikes me both conditions have to do with how the body heals and regenerates itself.
Not to get off topic, but has anyone looked at items that help generate ATP (Adenosine Triphosphate) in the mitochondria. Like B2(riboflavin) and B3(no flush niacin). Also, people with mitochondia disfunction have trouble making D-ribose and supplement with it.
Has anyone tried supplementing with it?
If there is interest to discuss, and folks have experiences to share, lets start a new topic.
I'm having no luck in the pain department with either ubiquinol or ALC...I've completely stopped the ALC but still continue to take 300 mg. ubiquinol per day. Today my pain is pure hell!! Good luck to everyone who is suffering. I wouldn't wish what I'm going through on my worst enemy!!.... Fred
Fred,
Have you tried Celebrex? Your pain sounds alot worse then mine but I've seen near complete resolution of my pain since starting Celebrex full-time (every morning 200mg) 2 weeks ago. One big problem I'm having is stomach pains and constipation so I had to stop today:(
Highly recommend Celebrex for pain.
Fred, I agree. I would give Celebrex a try. I think it has a lot more potential than hypnosis. - George
ive been on ubiquinol for about a year now and i think its fantastic at getting rid of the pain - in combination with pentox i firmly believe that i have got the pain side of things under control.
That's great news Iceman. Let's hope that more men start taking it so we can get further reports on how effective people feel that it is!
Quote from: George999 on August 30, 2011, 09:28:14 PM
Fred, I agree. I would give Celebrex a try. I think it has a lot more potential than hypnosis. - George
George...I was NEVER seriously considering hypnosis...just saw the post where the guy was hawking his website and was seeing what reaction I'd get if I asked if anyone was considering it. I'd love to try celebrex but already battle severe chronic constipation due to Klonopin and Remeron. I'm afraid adding celebrex would jam me up beyond belief. I'm not even taking ibuprofen, which has helped me with my pain, due to constipation. I've done enemas, milk of magnesia, I'm now trying Miralax (Walmart generic Clearlax...same thing) but it doesn't work very well and I think drawing all that water into my colon may very well be contributing to my pain. I know that often a good BM will relieve my pain...However, sometimes it increases the pain...just no rhyme or reason. This along with the upcoming surgery is about to drive me over the edge. I often really question if my life is worth living which is not my nature at all.
Any suggestions in the constipation relief department.
Quote from: Fred22 on September 02, 2011, 08:07:47 PM
Any suggestions in the constipation relief department.
Fred, So so sorry you halving all these problems going on at once. I have found that fiber works well for me. But the one that has never failed me is prune juice. - George
Fred,
And also bacteria. I used to make my own kefir which seemed to do wonders for my digestive tract. It's not hard to do--I just ordered the grains from some place in Ohio--but it takes work to keep making it every day. (I originally did it for my wife who has autoimmune problems, but she didn't like the taste and I did, and I felt really good during that time.) Now I just eat yogurt and sometimes make my own (and let it sit for 24 hours).
Sorry about what you're going through.
Fred,
It is likely you are not making enough HCl to digest properly and your natural intesatinal flora is wrecked.
I have started to take a product called Zypan from Standard Process. It helps with HCl production and has some enzymes to help you absorb your food better. I have also been told it can help those with high blood sugar over time lower it. I don't know, but I thought I would pass this along.
I have also started taking 1 table spoon of apple cider vinegar after breakfast and dinner. After about 2 weeks It has helped my digestion. But it works slowly so don't expect immediate results.
If you don't like the taste of Kiefer you can take a good probiotic.
If you can't get the Zypan take digestive enzymes with each meal. You can find them at any health food store.
For pain related to inflamaiton you can take Tumeric, 400mg 3x a day. Make sure it is standardized to 95%. I have found this excellent for tendonitis and some say it helps the digestive track. It certainly won't harm it like Ibuprofin.
Good Luck.
Without doubt, good quality probiotics and digestive enzymes can work wonders. - George
Oh, and what has REALLY helped me with my pooping is Konjac noodles. They are marketed under the name "Miracle Noodles" at http://www.miraclenoodle.com (http://www.miraclenoodle.com). - George
I've tried the Phillips Probiotics Colon Health, but maybe not regularly enough. The first time I took it it seemed to bloat me, so I laid off for a while. Then started back, but still not regularly. I still have some left. Anybody know if this is a good product? RE the prune juice. It used to work for me but since I've taken laxatives and enemas so much I'm afraid my "natural intestinal flora" may be wrecked as Gooluck said. The Miralax is strange....I may get several BMs a day from it, but they're very small amounts. It also gives me severe gas. I do eat prunes with breakfast and a few after lunch, but the juice may work better. Haven't tried it in a long time. I used to drink one of those tiny little cans and head straight to the john. Really need something that works. I get so much gas and pressure from (I assume) poop that needs to be passed that I think it may be putting pressure on my prostate or bladderneck and actually exacerbating the Peyronie's pain.
Oh...one more thing. RE yogurt. I read conflicting info on whether it's good for constipation. George or Goodluck, I'm sure you know the answer to this one. I get the Kroger plain non-fat certified by the National Yogurt Ass. for Live and active cultures. I sweeten it with stevia. Should I be eating this and taking the Phillips Probiotics? It contains1.5 billion cells Lactobacillus gasseri, Bifidobacterium bifidum and Bifidobacterium longum (the one that's supposed to make you poop).
I certainly cannot see how yogurt could make anything worse. - George
Quote from: George999 on September 05, 2011, 09:01:21 PM
I certainly cannot see how yogurt could make anything worse. - George
How about the Phillips Probiotics?
Fred,
I would not bank on the yogurt doing much for your situation. It is typically recommened as maintenance or for those with a mild issue. Personally I, would stay away from all cow dairy for now as it may cause digestion issues that you don't need. You could try organic goat yogurt, if you really want yogurt.
As far as the probiotic you mentioned. I put it in the same class as One A Day Vitamins. Good marketing but a weak product. It won't hurt but it is under powered. I took a quick glance at some products advertised in a handy issue of Better Nutrition magazine and the two Probiotics advertized had nearly 10x or more the cultures than the Philips product you referenced.
This is what I found:
Natures Way Primadouphilus: 14 strains and 35 Billion CFU (I assume per gram)
Body Dynamics Total Digestion Pro Biotic: 50 billion CFU/gram
You may want to up the dose of the Philips for now but I would get something else per the recomendation of your local Health food store. You need professional strength.
You may also want to consider colonics. It is a good way to clean out any intestinal plaque. A good practioner will implant a probiotic at the end of the session depending on your particualr need.
I am far from an expert here so I hope others will chime in who have specific knowledge.
Good Luck
Quote from: goodluck on September 05, 2011, 09:51:39 PM
Fred,
I would not bank on the yogurt doing much for your situation. It is typically recommened as maintenance or for those with a mild issue. Personally I, would stay away from all cow dairy for now as it may cause digestion issues that you don't need. You could try organic goat yogurt, if you really want yogurt.
As far as the probiotic you mentioned. I put it in the same class as One A Day Vitamins. Good marketing but a weak product. It won't hurt but it is under powered. I took a quick glance at some products advertised in a handy issue of Better Nutrition magazine and the two Probiotics advertized had nearly 10x or more the cultures than the Philips product you referenced.
This is what I found:
Natures Way Primadouphilus: 14 strains and 35 Billion CFU (I assume per gram)
Body Dynamics Total Digestion Pro Biotic: 50 billion CFU/gram
You may want to up the dose of the Philips for now but I would get something else per the recomendation of your local Health food store. You need professional strength.
You may also want to consider colonics. It is a good way to clean out any intestinal plaque. A good practioner will implant a probiotic at the end of the session depending on your particualr need.
I am far from an expert here so I hope others will chime in who have specific knowledge.
Good Luck
Sounds like good advice to me. I had thought the Phillips to be a commercial underpowered over hyped product (check out their stupid commercials on TV)...I'll check out iHerb or Swanson's or maybe a health food store. Thanks. Fred
Of Course ... part of the problem here is that if your gut is full of BAD bacteria, no amount of good bacteria you throw at it will do much good. There are products out there that aggressively kill off undesirable intestinal flora, but that requires some stool testing to find out what your personal population entails. Its a job for a good naturopath. Our naturopath got my wife cleaned up in a way that revolutionized her life. A year later or so we got invited out to one of those cheap chain restaurants and she ended up having to go through the whole thing all over again. These products are a whole lot easier than colonics and a lot safer also. - George
Quote from: George999 on September 06, 2011, 10:59:05 AM
Of Course ... part of the problem here is that if your gut is full of BAD bacteria, no amount of good bacteria you throw at it will do much good. There are products out there that aggressively kill off undesirable intestinal flora, but that requires some stool testing to find out what your personal population entails. Its a job for a good naturopath. Our naturopath got my wife cleaned up in a way that revolutionized her life. A year later or so we got invited out to one of those cheap chain restaurants and she ended up having to go through the whole thing all over again. These products are a whole lot easier than colonics and a lot safer also. - George
Guess I'm out of luck in that department....no naturopaths in Memphis area. What's the next best solution? Thanks to all for your help..I really believe that some if not most of my pain is related to the constipation issue...as a good BM often alleviates the pain...
Hey Fred,
I'm surprised there are no Naturapaths in all Memphis?? Are you sure? I live in a city of 1 million and there are tons of them... how many are good is another question...
To avoid internal NSAIDS, you should use the topical NSAIDS. I have been using Diclofenac 10%, which is a topical aniti inflammatory since Celebrex burnt my stomach up bad! BEWARE with those NSAIDS!!! They work but at a great sacrifice to your gut. I'm having really good results with pain with this topical stuff, the same results the Celebrex gave me! Most people tolerate this stuff very well too.
Alas, amazingly it looks like Memphis is a wasteland when it comes to innovative doctors. In the state of Tennessee, all of the innovative doctors and Tennessee's lone naturopath are located in Nashville nearly four hours away. But Fred, you might want to think about trying to get a consult with one of these Nashville docs. I will send you a list via PM. - George
Fred,
Do a google search on "Functional Medacine" doctors. They are typically MD's that are sick of allopathic medecine treating symptoms only and not helping people heal. They try to use the best practices from all disciplines. There are not a lot of them around but you may get lucky and find one within a drivable radius of Memphis. Unfortunately most don't take insurance but any testing maybe covered.
You may also be able to find a holistic nurse practioner or a nutrition councilor.
Be advised that some Chiropractors are calling themselves "Funtional Medacine doctors". Not that I don't like chiropractors, but many are using this wording in their business title to bring in more patients. Some DC's are good at giving nutional advice but they are typically selling products which they make more money on than the consult fees. So be carefull who you work with.
I agree with George that doing the right oral colon cleans is better than a colonic, in general. It is more gentle and non invasive. But is can take weeks to work. If you have a serious problem constipation including toxins and plaque in your colon. A colonic may be a better immediate choice to give you some relief of symptoms. Google on colonics and educate yourself and decide which approch is best for you. I know a MD who does a colonic once a year just as maintance. I personally agree that is good for most people who eat a SAD diet or those who have a tendency to constipation. It is a good way to rid your self of yeast or toxins that have build up.
Quote from: crashbandit on September 06, 2011, 05:04:50 PM
Hey Fred,
I'm surprised there are no Naturapaths in all Memphis?? Are you sure? I live in a city of 1 million and there are tons of them... how many are good is another question...
To avoid internal NSAIDS, you should use the topical NSAIDS. I have been using Diclofenac 10%, which is a topical aniti inflammatory since Celebrex burnt my stomach up bad! BEWARE with those NSAIDS!!! They work but at a great sacrifice to your gut. I'm having really good results with pain with this topical stuff, the same results the Celebrex gave me! Most people tolerate this stuff very well too.
I'm well aware of the NSAIDS side effects. Since I already have chronic constipation they really jam me up...also heartburn, etc. Haven't heard of Diclofenac...will check it out. Thanks
Quote from: George999 on September 06, 2011, 07:49:50 PM
Alas, amazingly it looks like Memphis is a wasteland when it comes to innovative doctors. In the state of Tennessee, all of the innovative doctors and Tennessee's lone naturopath are located in Nashville nearly four hours away. But Fred, you might want to think about trying to get a consult with one of these Nashville docs. I will send you a list via PM. - George
Got your PM...Thanks so much....I had already done a Google search and came up with basically the same list the last time we were discussing functional medicine. I just don't understand why Memphis has no one in this field, but Memphis is a wasteland in many ways...Bible belt mentality, etc...Fred
Quote from: Fred22 on September 07, 2011, 12:13:14 PM
Quote from: crashbandit on September 06, 2011, 05:04:50 PM
Hey Fred,
I'm surprised there are no Naturapaths in all Memphis?? Are you sure? I live in a city of 1 million and there are tons of them... how many are good is another question...
To avoid internal NSAIDS, you should use the topical NSAIDS. I have been using Diclofenac 10%, which is a topical aniti inflammatory since Celebrex burnt my stomach up bad! BEWARE with those NSAIDS!!! They work but at a great sacrifice to your gut. I'm having really good results with pain with this topical stuff, the same results the Celebrex gave me! Most people tolerate this stuff very well too.
I'm well aware of the NSAIDS side effects. Since I already have chronic constipation they really jam me up...also heartburn, etc. Haven't heard of Diclofenac...will check it out. Thanks
I have the Diclofenec 10% in plo kit (exactly what it says on container). My insurance covered it no problem. This stuff works fast. You should notice an immediate relief. If you have an inflammatory problem, this will work, no doubt. I have also noticed that It has made a huge improvment with my flaccid twisting after ejaculation. Once you try it, you will be writing me back to tell me thank you (not to jinx it).
Fred,
I hope you have found relief with your constipation. As an after thought, I remembered a Fermented Drink called G.T.'s Synergy enlightened. It comes in a variety of flavors. It is in Whole foods and other health food stores. It is a fermented raw Kombucha and loaded with probiotics. in the past I have drank 3 or 4 ounces and felt a big difference in my next BM. If anyone tries it, start out slowly by only drinking 2 or 3 ounces and see how your body reacts. Build up accordingly.
It should be very good maintenance for anyone trying to maintain a healty flora.
GoodLuck
I am hugely impressed with this stuff!!
Just finished my second bottle of it, so maybe 2 months in and the results have been amazing!
I no longer need a pde5 inhibitor to gain or maintain an erection. Ever.
Of course I am on pentox and ALC but had been on them for a year, the only recent addition has been the coq10.
Quote from: skunkworks on September 17, 2011, 01:40:38 AM
I am hugely impressed with this stuff!!
Just finished my second bottle of it, so maybe 2 months in and the results have been amazing!
I no longer need a pde5 inhibitor to gain or maintain an erection. Ever.
Of course I am on pentox and ALC but had been on them for a year, the only recent addition has been the coq10.
That's great but are pde5 inhibitors bad?
Skunkworks - It's great to hear with have another convert :). Hopefully a new study will come out sometime in the near future. If that's positive too, I can see COQ10 becoming much more recognised as a useful treatment.
Quote from: crashbandit on September 17, 2011, 04:19:06 AM
Quote from: skunkworks on September 17, 2011, 01:40:38 AM
I no longer need a pde5 inhibitor to gain or maintain an erection. Ever.
That's great but are pde5 inhibitors bad?
No they are actually beneficial for a whole host of reasons, but not being able to get an erection without them is not good. I'll still be taking a pde5 inhibitor regularly, but can be far more spontaneous about shagging now.
The Iranian paper on coenzyme Q10 has already been posted on this strand. See the link under George999's post of October 30, 2010. But I don't think anyone has mentioned that one year earlier its author Dr. M.R. Safarinejad was the lead author of "A double-blind placebo-controlled study of the efficacy and safety of pentoxifylline in early chronic Peyronies disease", perhaps the most thorough pentox study to date. CoQ10 was found slightly more effective, statistically, than pentox. Maybe both therapies work on nearly the same subset of cases. Or maybe one therapy works on the cases that the other doesn't. We should expect that Dr. Safarinejad is brewing a compound study. He wrote elsewhere that there isn't any negative interaction between the two medications.
Concerning ubiquinone vs. ubiquinol Dr. Safarinejad is silent. The study's dates June 2006 to May 2009 are a weak indicator for ubiquinone. "... the patients were randomly assigned to take 300mg of CoQ10 (Kaneka, Osaka, Japan) orally daily ... or a similar regimen of placebo ... during the 24-week treatment period. The placebo was a starch compound with the same color and size of CoQ10." If Kaneka's ubiquinol is always an oil capsule then the placebo being made from starch implies the study used a Kaneka ubiquinone.
Why isn't age a parameter in evaluating therapies? If Dr. Safarinejad had analyzed both experiments for correlations of efficacy with age, and if he had indeed used ubiquinone, then if ubiquinone's bioavailability is low for old patients, pentox have worked better than ubiquinone for these patients, but worse for younger patients. But the data analysis could also go the other way.
I'm not convinced that ubiquinol works differently from ubiquinone in the young or old body. The contrary expressed in a note by Dr. Cuomo on the Usana website, "dont-be-fooled-by-bad-science", is plausible. Try to remember how life was before Peyronie's caused us to obsess on our penises, and our pills.
Quote from: ppain on September 19, 2011, 06:16:55 PM
We should expect that Dr. Safarinejad is brewing a compound study. He wrote elsewhere that there isn't any negative interaction between the two medications.
A compound study would certainly be welcome. My personal experience was that adding Ubiquinol to Pentoxifylline really supercharged the treatment for me with considerable added efficacy.
PS - Thanks ppain for an excellent post. VERY informative and thoughtful and much appreciated. - George
I've been on ubiquinol for maybe 9 months now. All my meds are just too expensive and I'm thinking of cutting a few out--(I'm also on L-Arginine, ACL, SAM-e, pentox)--Ubiquinol at 300 mg per day is a lot. Does anyone (George?) know if that's a bad idea? Or could I cut down on it a bit without adverse consequences? Or would it be better to cut something out. The SAM-e is for mood as a way to avoid too many anti-depressents, but I'm lowering that one as well (also expensive).
I do feel the ubiquinol helped with pain, possibly with curvature.
KAC
All the stuff you are on is good stuff, but only Pentox, Ubiquinol and ALC have research demonstrating Peyronie's effectiveness. That is the bottom line. - George
Quote from: George999 on November 22, 2011, 12:11:34 AM
All the stuff you are on is good stuff, but only Pentox, Ubiquinol and ALC have research demonstrating Peyronie's effectiveness. That is the bottom line.
It depends on what you mean by "effectiveness". The 2005 placebo controlled study of Potaba (http://www.europeanurology.com/article/S0302-2838%2805%2900002-3/pdf/Potassium+Paraaminobenzoate+%28POTABA%29+in+the+Treatment+of+Peyronie%26%2339;s+Disease:+A+Prospective,+Placebo-Controlled,+Randomized+Study) found it to definitely prevent further Peyronie's deformity while failing to reverse deformity. Some men would be satisfied with a treatment that stabilized the deformation process without reversing it. (All the placebo controlled studies, whether of Pentox, Coenzyme Q10, or Potaba, agree that pain reduction occurs almost always with placebo alone.)
It should be pointed out that the 2005 study actually found 63% of curvature cases improved with Potaba. However it found 59% of curvature cases improved with Placebo. Why did the 2009 major study of Pentox and the 2010 major study of CoQ10 (both of similar methodology) find only 12% of cases improved with Placebo? Different patient selection; different change criteria. All in all, are we sure that the research has demonstrated Pentox's and CoQ10's effectiveness and not demonstrated Potaba's?
You are right. I should have said "independent research" instead of simply "research". Potaba has pharmaceutical company funded research. Personally I put far more stock in the product of researchers who don't make or lose money depending on a product's success. I also distrust this study precisely because it finds 59% of cases improving on placebo. In all the time being around here and chatting with patients, I find that statistic nothing short of bizarre. It makes you wonder what they were using for a placebo. In any case a 4% improvement margin certainly doesn't sound impressive for Potaba. On the other hand, if you look at the comparison of cases that got worse, Potaba really looks very good in comparison to the placebo. But, again, Potaba is a patent medication that makes money for the owner of the patent if they can sell it, and, as far as I know, its only approved use is for the treatment of Peyronie's. I have a whole lot more confidence in studies done with generics were there is not a lot of money to be made or lost that can bias the study in one direction or another. - George
George999, Potaba can't be a "patent medicine" since the chemical has been in medical use since at least the 1950's and any patent would have expired. Why is Glenwood the sole source for potassium para-aminobenzoate?
I don't fault the 2005 paper for finding curvature decrease in 59% of the placebo group. I can't tell what their criterion for curvature decrease was.
Two of the authors of the 2005 study with two others published a literature survey in 2006 (http://www.europeanurology.com/article/S0302-2838(06)00304-6/pdf/A+Critical+Analysis+of+Nonsurgical+Treatment+of+Peyronie%26%2339%3Bs+Disease) again concluding with a guarded recommendation of Potaba. This work was not funded by Glenwood.
Quote from: George999 on November 25, 2011, 11:00:24 PM
It makes you wonder what they were using for a placebo.
Funny thought. "The placebo powder was a mixture of potassium citrate, lactose, hydrous, and potassium chloride identical in color and appearance to the active drug." 8% of each group dropped out prematurely due to GI disorders, which would be due to the load of potassium. Another 6% of the Potaba group dropped out for other reasons. Another 18% of the Potaba group and 15% of the placebo group were excluded because they skipped too many doses. Thus it was a pretty well-designed, awful placebo.
What kind of men with Peyronie's would volunteer for such a study in around 2003? They had not yet had any treatment. The prevailing wisdom was that Potaba had at least a chance of efficacy and that one year on placebo would leave them with worse Peyronie's. Were they men with little use for their penises? Were they men with exceptional healing capacities? Was it a special set of men? Certainly not the men populating this forum.
It would be easier for Dr. Safarinejad et al. to recruit for the placebo-controlled Pentox study. "Patients for the present study had been treated and had one or more previous treatments for Peyronies Disease that had failed, including oral therapy with Potaba (78.3%), ..." The subjects in the Pentox study were on average 20 months into Peyronie's versus those in the Potaba study just 6 months. It is understandable that the Potaba study found many more curvature improvements in the placebo arm than the Pentox study did.
Its just amazing what you learn when you actually *read* these studies. The methodology employed often goes a long way toward explaining the outcomes observed. - George
I've stayed on the Ubiquinol in spite of the return of pain. My prostatectomy was on Sept. 22, 2011 and I'n now presumably cancer free. However, I had some severe urinary retention for a while bladder function getting much better now). On November 21, had a cystoscopy and the Dr. says everything is healing just the way he likes to see it. The cysto was a little painful (not excruciating) presumably due to the fact that the urethra is still healing. The same day I was taught to catheterize myself, which I did 2 to 3 times a day for amost 3 weeks. I've only cathed myself once since then, when I went in to give a urine specimen due to penile pain....urine culture was negative and within normal range for everything...no infection. I continue to have almost constant penile pain. It sometimes feels like Peyrone's and other times different. I'm still on the ubiquinol...300 mg. per day and astaxanthin, which I think I'm going to drop...also dropped the ALC as the pain seemed to increase when I added it (I've taken it off and on for a few years and it never seemed to help. For the firs few months I was on the ubiquinol I really thought it was helping...still have some faith in it for some reason. I've been taking the Swanson brand and I'm getting ready to reorder. Is there anyone who would suggest a different brand or is the Swanson ok? I know they have a good reputation and good prices. If you have any suggestions, please post. Thanks....Fred
Fred22
You asked so I will mention that I have been using Ubiquinol 100 mg from Puritan's Pride. Just re-ordered for the third time yesterday. I went for the 100 mg 120 cap - buy 1 get 1 free. So that came to $92
before frt & taxes. I am pleased with this product. Have been taking CoQ10 for years prior to switching to Ubiquinol after reading posts here , particularly by George999.
Mike
I do not know the swanson, I get mine from a british company through the net.
I get the pharma nord ubiquinol (kaneka)
its usually €107 for 150 100mg caps.
At the moment they have a special offer :
€76,- for 150 100mg caps. (thats $103.22)
Here in europe thats a good price for ubiquinol.
http://www.dolphinfitness.co.uk/en/pharma-nord-bio-active-q10-ubiquinol-100mg-150-capsules/23497
Luc
PS:
In pharmacies they only have ubiquinol from pure encapsulations.
its really expensive, around $70 for 60x50mg caps (and they dont have 100mg caps here)
Luciano, thanks for your good find of the cheapest Ubiquinol source for Europe. (It's cheaper in the US, but US companies such as Swanson won't ship to much of Europe.)
However, greatest savings of money would come from settling the Ubiquinone vs. Ubiquinol question in favor of Ubiquinone. It's still an open question. Regardless of which form is taken orally, the ratio of Ubiquinone to Ubiquinol in the blood is fixed for each individual. Ubiquinone in the blood does some good things and Ubiquinol in the blood does some other good things. The fact that we especially want the Ubiquinol good things in no way implies that we should take Ubiquinol orally. All that matters is how much total Coenzyme Q10 gets into the blood. That's the appropriately debated question. (The Wikipedia article on Coenzyme Q10 is admirably clear about this and doesn't even mention taking Ubiquinol. There is a separate Wikipedia article on Ubiquinol which blurs the beneficial functions of Ubiquinol with the benefits of taking Ubiquinol orally. Thus the two camps battle in the Wikipedia microcosm.)
It's about €1,52 per day for Ubiquinol versus about €0,60 per day for Ubiquinone. Having just one penis, and lacking the certainty that they are equivalent, or nearly equivalent, I too buy Ubiquinol. (But I take 1/3 of the daily dose as Ubiquinone, dissolved in ghee, to remind myself of the open question.) All our belief in Coenzyme Q10 therapy for Peyronie's is based on one solid study by Dr. Safarinejad in 2010. He administered Ubiquinone, even as solid pills. It is conceivable that his success rates would have been even higher had he administered Ubiquinol. We don't know.
The two are really one in the same. They are both CoQ10. Ubiquinol is the reduced active form that the body can use. Ubiquinone is the oxidized form that the body must first convert to the active form before it can use it. The ONLY reason you need Ubiquinone in your blood is so that your body can convert it into Ubiquinol as needed. It is the stored form of Ubiqunol. ONLY Ubiquinol can be used by the body directly. Younger people can effectively convert Ubiquinone to Ubiquinol. Older people not as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oO08zLpbo14 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oO08zLpbo14)
http://www.kanekaqh.com/ubiquinone-vs-ubiquinol.html (http://www.kanekaqh.com/ubiquinone-vs-ubiquinol.html)
George999, that's the received opinion around here and in parts of the internet but the truth is different. In each person a redox equilibrium, giving the ratio of Ubiquinol to Ubiquinone in the blood, is determined by the person's blood composition. If an old person has a lower ratio of Ubiquinol to Ubiquinone than a young person you don't change this ratio by feeding the old person Ubiquinol. You could even instill Ubiquinol directly into his blood and most of it would simply change to Ubiquinone, to restore the person's Ubiquinol:Ubiquinone ratio. To increase the Ubiquinol in his blood you need to increase the total amount of Coenzyme Q10, regardless of its oxidation state, in his blood. Thus the problem of bioavailability for CoQ10 has nothing to do with conversion of Ubiquinone to Ubiquinol and everything to do with how to get the CoQ10 from the stomach into the blood. The Wikipedia article on Coenzyme Q10 understands this while the Wikipedia article on Ubiquinol obfuscates it. Reports like http://blog.usana.com/2011/03/28/dont-be-fooled-by-bad-science/ and http://www.totalhealthmagazine.com/IngredientSpotlight/Ubiquinol/isubiquinolallit.html may be written with commercial biases, but they are not confused.
The absorbability (bioavailability) question is not yet definitively answered. Papers are still being written in 2011, for example: Takeda R, Sawabe A, Nakano R, et al. Effect of various food additives and soy constituents on high CoQ10 absorption, Japanese Journal of Medicine and Pharmaceutical Science 2011;64(4):614-20.
Ubiquinol in Kaneka's formulation does have high absorption. A Ubiquinone formulation needs only to come near to that absorption rate to be a bargain.
All I can say is that I would disagree with you on that. I prefer the explanation of organizations like Life Extension Foundation who have put a huge amount of money into research of this very issue. In any medical question you will always find those who disagree. I have found great relief with Ubiquinol that Ubiquinone has not provided me. Everyone here is free to make their own choice between the two. My suggestion would be that if Ubiquinone is not working for you, try Ubiquinol before giving up completely. The testing done by LEF and others has found a difference in therapeutic value. - George
George999: as I mentioned a few posts ago I am taking Kaneka Ubiquinol. But for some of the members of this forum the hundreds of dollars of extra expense for Ubiquinol vs. Ubiquinone is a serious matter deserving serious investigation. LEF's published information is always a mixture of truth with fantasy. I doubt that LEF "put a huge amount of money into research of this very issue". They put a huge amount of hack editorial work into writing blurbs that cite up to 105 papers. Peeking into some of those scientific papers reveals embarrassing level of confusion in LEF's blurbs. It's a short step from confusion to deception.
The LEF blurb (http://www.lef.org/Vitamins-Supplements/Item01425/Super-Ubiquinol-CoQ10-with-Enhanced-Mitochondrial-Support.html) agrees with my description: "CoQ10 is notoriously difficult to absorb. When it comes to choosing a CoQ10 supplement, the primary factor is how many swallowed milligrams actually make it into your bloodstream." But in the very next sentence, "A recent study showed that in seriously ill patients, conventional ubiquinone CoQ10 was hardly detectable in the blood whereas ubiquinol resulted in significant blood level increases and subsequent clinical improvements" it is muddled. That sentence should say: "A recent study showed that in seriously ill patients, after taking ubiquinone CoQ10 was hardly detectable in the blood whereas taking ubiquinol resulted in significant CoQ10 blood levels and subsequent clinical improvements." Curiously the blurb includes no citation for this.
Mr. Faloon, the well-meaning head of LEF, wrote another blurb (http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/jan2007_report_coq10_01.htm). It too is partly clear and partly muddled. Consider these two sentences:
"Today's commercial CoQ10 supplements contain ubiquinone because it remains stable longer in the capsule. However, it is the reduced form of CoQ10 (ubiquinol) that has the ability to scavenge free radicals in mitochondria and in cell membranes, sites where free radicals inflict significant damage."
The first sentence is true. The second sentence, minus its first word, is also true. But that word "however" is what sows the false idea that the CoQ10 bioavailability problem is one of conversion. Just two sentences later he states:
"CoQ10's ability to cycle back and forth between ubiquinone and ubiquinol accounts for many of its unique properties."
If you don't feel pain from reading garbled science, maybe you're lucky. It's like penis pain to me.
Faloon's Figure 1 (http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/images/jan2007_report_coq10_02_big.jpg)shows the superior absorbability of ubiquinol vs. ubiquinone. It shows that taking 300 mg of ubiquinol daily for 4 weeks gives the same blood levels of CoQ10 as taking 2400 mg of ubiquinone daily. This is important because it shows that taking ubiquinone can do everything that taking ubiquinol can do, albeit less efficiently. If ubiquinol is really 8x more efficiently absorbed, then it's the bargain. We need to know how the ubiquinone was taken. Faloon says "conventional CoQ10 in enhanced delivery systems". Fortunately the key paper, Hosoe et al., "Study on safety and bioavailability of ubiquinol (Kaneka QH™) after single and 4-week multiple oral administration to healthy volunteers" is available online (http://www.kanekatexas.com/KanekaQH/pdf/RegulToxicolPharmacol_2007.pdf). Reading this paper will clear everyone's head. It says, for example:
"...following dietary supplementation with coenzyme Q10, efficient reduction of coenzyme Q10 to ubiquinol occurs either during absorption or rapidly after the appearance of coenzyme Q10 in the blood."
"...we found that when rats were orally administered a [HUGE!] single-dose (100mg/kg) of ubiquinol or ubiquinone dissolved in olive oil, there was an approximately 2-fold difference in area under the plasma total coenzyme Q10 concentration curve between the two agents, indicating that ubiquinol has higher bioavailability than ubiquinone"
"ubiquinol has approximately twice the bioavailability of ubiquinone"
This study is the source of Faloon's 300 mg of ubiquinol daily for 4 weeks data. The study did not include ubiquinone. Faloon's Figure 1 compares ubiquinol and ubiquinone bioavailability from different studies! Good luck trying that. His factor of 8 is therefore BS. Hosoe et al. estimate a factor of 2 and include this warning about comparisons:
"Although many published papers are available regarding the bioavailability of ubiquinone in humans, ..., comparison of the bioavailability of ubiquinol determined in this study with those of ubiquinone reported with different formulations in these papers is difficult, since it has been reported that the bioavailability of ubiquinone strongly depends on the formulation used .... Furthermore, since there is also significant inter-individual variability in absorption of ubiquinone from supplements ... crossover studies with the same formulation and the same subjects will be needed to accurately compare the bioavailabilities of ubiquinol and ubiquinone in human."
Faloon's commentary on his Figure 4 (http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/images/jan2007_report_coq10_06_big.jpg) is a mess. The pictures of the 12 month old mice do not accord with the graphical data at 12 months. In this experiment mice were fed equal amounts of ubiquinol or ubiquinone. Even if the ubiquinol-fed mice at 12 months were the finest this would not show that absorption of ubiquinone worsens with age relative to absorption of ubiquinol. The need for blood ubiquinol might simply be greater at age. Also the ubiquinol:ubiquinone ratio in blood might simply be less at age.
The pat line that ubiquinone is fine for young patients and ubiquinol is preferrable for old patients is based on such rotten interpretation. Surely more CoQ10 is needed for older patients. That the absorption factor for either ubiquinone or ubiquinol changes for older patients has never been shown.
Faloon makes one claim that seems to contradict my simple ratio model:
"Supplementation with the ubiquinol form of CoQ10 not only elevates blood levels of ubiquinol, but also increases the ratio of ubiquinol to total CoQ10 concentration. For example, when ubiquinol is supplemented, the ubiquinol to total CoQ10 ratio increases to 96-98.5%, compared to approximately 80-85% when ubiquinone is supplemented. Moreover, the ratio remained unchanged during administration of ubiquinone."
First, supposing this is true, it's no biggie that 96% vs. 80% of blood CoQ10 is ubiquinol, since this can be gotten around by simply taking 20% more CoQ10. But look at the articles Faloon cites for his claim. They are from 1989 and 1992, long before Kaneka figured out how to stabilize ubiquinol for oral use. The 1992 article is titled "Dietary supplementation with coenzyme Q10 ...". What interpretations is Faloon offering here?
All the authors of Hosoe et al. worked for Kaneka. They estimated a factor of 2 of absorption efficiency for Ubiquinol over Ubiquinone. I am unable to find any US patent for Kaneka QH. It seems Kaneka itself is less excited about their Ubiquinol formulation than its internet cheerleaders are. Kaneka knows that with the factor of 2 comes extra manufacturing and packaging expense. What has double efficiency and costs double doesn't sell much. The internet cheerleaders find it necessary to falsely embellish Kaneka's accomplishment.
Kaneka has been the dominant CoQ10 company. Mitsubishi Gas Chemical Company is a similarly large company which wasn't intimidated by the Ubiquinol stabilization and has introduced a new Ubiquinone formulation (http://www.mgc.co.jp/eng/products/abc/bio10/sa.html) with double the absorbability of Ubiquinone in oil.
I urge my fellows with endangered penises not be panicked into buying the most hyped drugs. The sole basis for CoQ10 therapy for Peyronie's is Dr. Safarinejad's 2010 paper. He used the simplest packaging of Ubiquinone: pressed powder tablets. Perhaps he had the men chew the tablets with an fatty meal, as has been recommended for years. Some people might have poorer blood CoQ10 absorption than other people. We should choose a CoQ10 supplement of a good type well-tested for absorbability (bioavailability). Hosoe et al. tested only Ubiquinol (Kaneka QH) on 78 people (mostly in their 30's) for four weeks. USANA tested their "CoQuinone 100" Ubiquinone-in-oil versus Ubiquinol (http://www.usana.com/media/File/dotCom/company/science/crb/UbiquinoneVersusUbiquinol.pdf). They found them equally bioavailable. They tested just 4 people for just single doses. It's just an in-house report but it contains no BS. "CoQuinone 100" seems not to be available in Europe or I'd use it. Mitsubishi Gas's Ubiquinone product, "BioQ10 SA", also seems not to be available in Europe or I'd use it. If I could, I'd take one of each which is the safest course of all.
I'm not trying to be counterproductive but 1 thing:
Our secretary has breast cancer, and her doc told her to take ubiquinol for the 4 weeks until operation.
he prescribed her to use a liquid form, a sort of pump spray which allows it to be absorbed on the tongue and in the mouse through some osmotic thing.
its called "Q10 Gerimed Ubiquinol flüssig" and sells at € 126,-
she so takes about 50mg/day... but does it go immediately in the blood? I found a table saying 45mg liquid = 360mg in caps.
Second question I have:
I am taking 3x100mg kaneka ubiquinol a day - from Pharma Nord.. should i switch to something else? or should I take a higher dose?
Luc
Luciano, www.gerimed.de lists mostly women's beauty chemicals.
Artikel-Nr. 5: 50 ml Q10 Ubiquinol Flüssig ohne Alkohol 126,80 €*
but it nowhere says how much Ubiquinol is contained in the 50 ml bottle (and also doesn't explain the asterisk).
What table of equivalences did you find?
Are you wondering why a doctor prescribed sprayed liquid rather than swallowed pills (or swallowed liquid)? Maybe the woman's stomach is in poor condition now for absorbing Ubiquinol.
Are you wondering whether 50 ml of Q10 Ubiquinol Flüssig at 126,80 € is a bargain compared to our purchases of the Pharma Nord capsules? I'm wondering too. It's a bargain if the 50 ml bottle contains more than 25 g of Ubiquinol. It's the same Kaneka QH Ubiquinol in each. Kaneka's US Patent 7897169 (http://www.google.com/patents/US7897169?dq=intitle:ubiquinol+inassignee:kaneka&ei=TnfeTrK0J-Lf4QSV5a2dBw) contains much information about food preparation with Ubiquinol.
Your 3x100mg Kaneka Ubiquinol a day is, I'd estimate, 2 to 4 times the effective treatment amount used in Dr. Safarinejad's study. CoQ10 has been used in a wide variety of dosages for different treatments over the years and Dr. Safarinejad took a stab in the middle. You're taking a somewhat higher stab. Yet higher dosages are still safe. This is discussed in Hosoe et al. (2007) where interestingly they deduce the safety of high dose Ubiquinol from the established safety of very high dose Ubiquinone.
Well the equivalent to caps and "powder" I found in a german pdf
http://peter-weck.de/Umrechnungstabelle_Q_10pdf.pdf
The reason why she is taking it (the liquid form), is the doc told her its better absorbed by the mouth & tongue.
but I think I will stick to what I am taking.
thx for the info.
Luc
liquid coq10? I HATE taking pills and getting them down is a chore. I would love to just take my pentox and switch to liquid coq10. Anyone know if will effect me any different? i'm 28 and already taking coq10 twice daily with 2 pentox (3 made me sick) and powder l-arginine before bed and powder ALC in the morning. I would love to switch to liquid coq10 if possible?
http://www.amazon.com/Qunol-Absorption-Natural-Liquid-60-Servings/dp/B001TOTSIQ%3FSubscriptionId%3DAKIAJASE6HSSVXTNREYQ%26tag%3Dfstchrm-20%26linkCode%3Dxm2%26camp%3D2025%26creative%3D165953%26creativeASIN%3DB001TOTSIQ?afsrc=fstfx
Luciano: the peter-weck.de page uses the extreme 8:1 efficiency ratio for Ubiquinol (Kaneka QH) vs. Ubiquinone powder. Just taking the powder in a fatty meal might make the ratio to 2:1. Also not all Ubiquinone powders are equal. The advanced powder of Mitsubishi Gas Chemical Company claims 1:1 vs. Ubiquinol.
Assuming the peter-weck.de page pertains to Q10 Gerimed Ubiquinol flüssig, it reveals how little Ubiquinol is contained in that Gerimed product: 50 ml bottle = about 270 doses of 15 mg. This means the whole bottle is worth about € 20.
To corvette2010: I guess you can slice the end off a Ubiquinol capsule and squeeze (most of) the material into your food. It is nearly tasteless. Note that exposure to air oxidizes the Ubiquinol to Ubiquinone. Kaneka's US Patent 7897169 (http://www.google.com/patents/US7897169?) describes how to prepare foods enhanced with Ubiquinol. Tischcon Sugar-Free Liquid QHTM Liposomal Ubiquinol (170ml bottle 100mg CoQ10 per 1ml) sold by Amazon.com is better value than the Gerimed product but still more expensive than squeezing capsules.
So with my pills i have left (coq10 not ubiquinol) i can cut them open and eat them with food? Also what about the liquid coq10 from amazon? it says it is more soluble than the pills and is more effective. Says 2 tsp = 6 pills.
corvette: pills or capsules with Ubiquinone can always be added to food. Taking Ubiquinone with a little oil rather than with lots of water probably doubles its absorbability (bioavailability).
Amazon's $30 Qunol Ultra High Absorption All Natural Liquid CoQ10 100mg 60-Servings is not a bargain. Since it's in oil we can be sure it's bioavailability is somewhere in the range from 50% to 100% of Ubiquinol's, but we can't know exactly where it is in this range without solid test information. In the USA you can buy 100mg x 60 Ubiquinol for $22 from Swanson. That is definitely a better deal than Amazon's Qunol. If you don't want to touch capsules, not just not swallow them, then I can't help you.
Kaneka Ubiquinol prices are so low in the USA (such as at Swanson) that the competing, equally bioavailable preparations of Ubiquinone might not be bargains. USANA's CoQuinone 100 costs much more than Swanson Ubiquinol (although CoQuinone 100 does contains a second ingredient which might interest someone). Mitsubishi Gas Chemical claims "BioQ10 SA is priced 40 percent lower than ubiquinol, so it provides the best of both worlds: increased absorption at a cost-effective price." I can find no USA prices for BioQ10 SA yet. I hope Mitsubishi comes through with such price advantage because I trust their product does what it says.
There's a maze of hype in the CoQ10 marketplace. You must proceed carefully. Names like "Qunol" seem designed to be deceptive, and it's hard to take the Qunol brand seriously. What is the "Quten Research Institute"? If Quten has pharmaceutical competence it should be able to achieve in their oil based formulation of Ubiquinone approximately what USANA achieved theirs. USANA states they used "lecithin and vegetable-derived glycerin monooleate in a base of medium chain triglycerides". Let Quten state what they used so we can have some confidence in them. Saying this many spoons of this is worth that many caps of that doesn't fly. And they must lower their prices too.
ppain, thanks for the info. I have the coq10 100 mg capsules from GNC. It's fine to cut them open and swallow the contents with any food? If so then I would rather do that then struggle swallowing the whole capsule.
Eat it with fat-containing food, to get more benefit from the Ubiquinone. That way it will have about 50% of Ubiquinol's bioavailability.
You can even cook food with Ubiquinone. There is "no detectable destruction by boiling" but "14-32% destruction ...by frying" as reported here (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/9129255).
You can't cook food with Ubiquinol because it can't endure the heat.
I'm italian and i didn't understand very well all the discussion.
What the thesis is?
Ubiquionol is not usuful?
Or Ubiquinone is more usuful of Ubiquinol?
I can say that after 6 month that i take ubiquinol i don't see any benefit.
Ppain
Can you share any links or literature on your findings?Very interesting to me.
Fubar
Fubar, there are very many informative links in my past 6 or 7 posts.
Ubiquinone vs. Ubiquinol is an abused topic, and we are abused consumers.
Quote from: dioporcolorisolvo on December 07, 2011, 11:32:50 PM
I'm italian and i didn't understand very well all the discussion.
What the thesis is?
Ubiquionol is not usuful?
Or Ubiquinone is more usuful of Ubiquinol?
I can say that after 6 month that i take ubiquinol i don't see any benefit.
Ubiquinol is more
efficient than
most formulations of Ubiquinone, but if either one works so will the other (with quantity adjusted for efficiency).
So far as I know there has been just one published study of Peyronie's treated by Coenzyme Q10, by Dr. Safarinejad in 2010. Men in early chronic (pre-calcification) stage received 300 mg / day for 24 weeks. 54% saw reduction in curvature vs. 12% of the men receiving placebo. Maybe you'd be in the 46% who didn't see reduction in curvature, but if your curvature stayed the same
that could be a benefit of Coenzyme Q10 treatment. In the study 31% of the treated men saw their curvature stay (about) the same vs. 18% of the men receiving placebo. Untreated early chronic Peyronie's curvature tends to get worse. 100%-12%-18%=70% of the men receiving placebo got worse over the 24 weeks. If zero-side effect Coenzyme Q10 accomplishes
anything for Peyronie's sufferers it's a great discovery. (Note that most men whether receiving the treatment or not saw reduction in erection pain.)
Quote from: ppain on December 06, 2011, 03:18:11 AMI am unable to find any US patent for Kaneka QH.
I found these three US patents which seem to cover Kaneka's QH Ubiquinol and/or preclude competitors from making an equivalent:
8003828 (http://www.google.com/patents/US8003828) Method of producing reduced coenzyme q10 crystals with excellent handling properties
7358402 (http://www.google.com/patents/US7358402) Reduced coenzyme Q10 crystal with excellent stability and composition containing said reduced coenzyme Q10 crystal
7829080 (http://www.google.com/patents/US7829080) Stabilization method of reduced coenzyme Q10
During the past 5 years have been many Ubiquinone formulations for improved bioavailability.
For example NanoSolve from Germany. The 2007 paper by Wajda et al. (http://www.liebertonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/jmf.2006.254) shows that during the 14 hours following injestion the NanoSolve version provides 5.1x as high average blood level of CoQ10 as a simple powder Ubiquinone. The testing ended at 14 hours when the simple version was back near zero and NanoSolve version was still quite high so the ratio could have been even higher! Longer single dose testing is better. Testing daily blood levels while taking CoQ10 daily for weeks is best. At around the same time BASF (also in Germany) made another nanoparticle solubilizer for Ubiquinone. It actually made two versions: Coenzyme Q10 10% DC, a fast-acting powder for direct compression, and Solu Q10 5%, a solubilizate for soft gel capsules. A 2006 paper by Schulz et al. compared Solu Q10 with four other Ubiquinone formulations:
1. simple CoQ10 powder.
2. Swanson Ultra Q-Gel (made by Tishcon)
3. Nature Made CoQ10 (made by Pharmavite)
4. CoQsol (made by Soft Gel Technologies)
Unfortunately this paper is not available free on line, and the on line abstract (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17162333) is scant, but I found some results in a BASF press release (http://www.nutraingredients.com/Research/BASF-builds-bioavailability-data-behind-Solu-Q10). Bioavailability as measured by the average blood level for 12 hours after taking was as follows:
0. Solu Q10: 142
1. simple powder: 100
2. Swanson Ultra Q-Gel: 107
3. Nature Made CoQ10: 131
4. CoQsol: 89
These are
very undramatic differences. Unless NanoSolve's nanoparticle trick was sensationally better than BASF's, there is something amiss in one or the other tests. Schulz et al., also included a 14 day trial which would be more relevant. I'm trying to get the paper.
Quote from: George999 on December 05, 2011, 11:18:27 AMI prefer the explanation of organizations like Life Extension Foundation ...
To illustrate the absolute rot of Life Extension Foundation reporting read this sentence from here (http://www.lef.org/Vitamins-Supplements/Item01425/Super-Ubiquinol-CoQ10-with-Enhanced-Mitochondrial-Support.html):
"Life Extension offers the highly bioavailable
ubiquinol form of CoQ10 in a patented delivery system with a superior absorption level.
25"
Footnote 25: J Food Sci Nutr. 2006 Aug 17; 57(7-8):546-55.
J Food Sci Nutr is a Korean journal that has no such pages. If you make it "Int J Food Sci Nutr" the pages are exactly those of the Schulz et al. paper about NanoSolve. But NanoSolve has nothing to do with Ubiquinol, and no Ubiquinol products were included in the Schulz et al. comparison.
I buy several LEF products but not their BS.
--------------------------------------------
Finally, SourceOne.
SourceOne makes the most extraordinary claims about CoQ10 bioavailability of all. They've licensed a new delivery system from the Swiss company Vesifact. It's another nanoparticle trick, for which Vesifact holds US Patent 7081253 (http://www.google.com/patents/US7081253). As with NanoSolve and the BASF trick, there had to be a CoQ10 bioavailability study. The 2009 paper by Liu et al. (http://www.source-1-global.com/files/downloads/PRODUCT_PORTFOLIO_COQSOURCE_COENZYME_Q10/CoQsource_ATHM_Study.pdf) was published in ALTERNATIVE THERAPIES and posted by Source One.
It is interesting to compare the title of this paper to the title of the 2006 Schulz et al. paper.
"Relative bioavailability comparison of different coenzyme Q10 formulations with a novel delivery system"
"Comparison of the relative bioavailability of different coenzyme Q10 formulations with a novel solubilizate (Solu Q10)"
They don't agree about semantics. Also unlike Schulz et al., and like Wajda et al., Liu et al. finds whopping big bioavailability advantage for the nanoparticle coated Ubiquinone. "CoQsource" is 5x more efficient than Product B, 6.2x more efficient than Product C, 2.9x more efficient than Product D. Efficiency is figured as 10 hour average. Product C is described as an oil-based formulation. Products B and D are just described as "solubilizates".
Vesifact's nanoparticle trick called VESIsorb is usable for many different medicines.
Now the shocker.SourceOne makes CoQsource, Ubiquinone enhanced with VESIsorb, which was tested by Liu et al. It also makes "CoQsource QH", which is Kaneka Ubiquinol QH enhanced with VESIsorb. This flies against all our and Kaneka's understanding of Ubiquinol being itself highly bioavailable. Source One (http://www.source-1-global.com/q10.php) claims that
"A pharmacokinetic pilot study (single oral dose, crossover) in humans comparing ubiquinol-QH to the same ubiquinol-QH in the VESIsorb delivery system ... demonstrated an increase of 696% in peak blood levels (cmax) of ubiquinol. The relative bioavailability calculated using the area under the curve (AUC0-24h) was also increased by 485%."
If the 24 hour average effect of Ubiquinol QH + VESIsorb is 5.85x as high as that of Ubiquinol QH alone then "CoQsource QH" is worth much more than the $1 per 100mg capsule now charged for it. Is this absorbability improvement possible? Could Kaneka have been naive to think that Ubiquinol in oil maximized CoQ10 bioavailability and only the stability problem needed solving? Yes, it is possible. So far as I know, all studies of CoQ10 bioavailability have been
relative studies measuring blood levels after taking various formulations. The methodologically best study of all, Hosoe et al. 2007, included nothing but Kaneka QH Ubiquinol. No one compared the amount of CoQ10 in the body's total blood (5 liters) to what went into the stomach. No one measured the amount of CoQ10 excreted during and after the experiment. So there is the possibility that what was presumed maximal could be exceeded 5.85x.
A statement in Hosoe et al. 2007 gives some credibility to this.
"After single doses of 150mg and 300mg of ubiquinol, mean plasma levels reached peaks associated with 2.3- and 4.7-fold increases over baseline plasma levels of ubiquinol after 6 h, respectively, indicating that significant amounts of
ubiquinol were absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract." They say "significant amounts" as if 5.85x greater amounts weren't unthinkable.
Is 5.85x plausible? VESIsorb treatment should make Ubiquinone equal to Ubiquinol because they're the same size molecule. VESIsorb treated Ubiquinone was found by Liu et al. to be 6.2x more absorbable than Sample C Ubiquinone in oil. Kaneka patent US6184255 demonstrated that Ubiquinol in olive oil was 2x more absorbable than Ubiquinone in olive oil. Proprietary Sample C must be at least as efficient as Ubiquinone in olive oil. Thus VESIsorb treated Ubiquinol should be
no more than 3.1x more efficient than Ubiquinol in olive oil (which Kaneka believes equivalent to their later QH Ubiquinol). But even 2x would change the whole game.
If VESIsorb treated Kaneka QH is really 5.85x more absorbed than simple Kaneka QH then why is SourceOne selling it in a 100mg size? The OSI (observed safe limit) for plain Ubiquinone is 1200 mg/day. The corresponding OSI for Ubiquinol QH would be about 600 mg/day. Then the corresponding OSI for "CoQsource QH" is about 100 mg/day.
The Figure 1 curves in Hosoe et al. 2007 showing Ubiquinol blood levels through the first 48 hours after taking 150 mg Kaneka QH have quite different shape (and scale) from the Figure 2 curves in Liu et al. showing total CoQ10 levels through the first 24 hours after taking 120 mg of VESIsorb treated Ubiquinone. The former is about 160% over base at 24 hours. The latter is just 30% over base at 24 hours. The kinetics are way slower in Hosoe, implying larger time integrals.
SourceOne's pharmacokinetic "pilot study" was at least 6 months ago. We have not seen results from a proper study. A proper study now would have to compare VESIsorb treated Ubiquinone with VESIsorb treated Ubiquinol QH with other formulations including Kaneka QH and plain Ubiquinone power as baseline. The study should have a 4 week component like Hosoe et al. 2007 did, since they found blood level not quite fully up at 4 weeks. The efficacy of a delivery system changes as the concentration in the destination medium changes.
NanoSolve CoQ10 can be bought in Poland. I don't know if BASF's brainchild Solu Q10 is sold anywhere.
One after another. One sillier sounding product name than the last. Serious claims intermixed with frivolous ones. In any normal market the discovery of a new product 5.85x more efficient than the previously thought optimum product would end the game, but in this market it just adds to the noise. No ordinary shopper stands a chance.
Both SourceOne and Vesifact carry a whiff of gamer. Their symbiosis and their choice to publish in ALTERNATIVE THERAPIES are not confidence inspiring. But the Liu et al. 2009 paper isn't shoddy, and the "pilot study" might be of similar quality. At this time, with SourceOne's huge 5.85x factor in the air, and no rejoinders yet from the competent competition, we can't make a rational choice among CoQ10 formulations.
Quote from: ppain on December 11, 2011, 08:20:38 AM
To illustrate the absolute rot of Life Extension Foundation reporting read this sentence from here (http://www.lef.org/Vitamins-Supplements/Item01425/Super-Ubiquinol-CoQ10-with-Enhanced-Mitochondrial-Support.html):
"Life Extension offers the highly bioavailable ubiquinol form of CoQ10 in a patented delivery system with a superior absorption level.25"
Footnote 25: J Food Sci Nutr. 2006 Aug 17; 57(7-8):546-55.
J Food Sci Nutr is a Korean journal that has no such pages. If you make it "Int J Food Sci Nutr" the pages are exactly those of the Schulz et al. paper about NanoSolve. But NanoSolve has nothing to do with Ubiquinol, and no Ubiquinol products were included in the Schulz et al. comparison.
I buy several LEF products but not their BS.
Here IS the retrieval from the LEF reference noted above:
QuoteThe relative bioavailability of coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10) is markedly influenced by its delivery systems. The aim of this study was to compare four standard CoQ10 supplements available on the market with a novel solubilizate formulation of CoQ10 (Solu™ Q10). Pharmacokinetic parameters were assessed in 54 healthy volunteers after single and multiple intakes of 60 mg CoQ10 over a time period of 14 days. Solubilizates showed earlier flooding compared with oily dispersions and crystalline CoQ10, resulting in significantly elevated area under the curve between 0 and 4 h (P<0.01 solubilizates versus crystalline). The difference in the pharmacokinetic parameters of maximum plasma concentration, time to reach the peak plasma concentration and area under the curve between 0 and 12 h was not statistically significant between formulations. Long-term supplementation resulted in significantly higher plasma levels (P<0.01) for all formulations, with Solu™ Q10 performing best. Intracellular CoQ10 levels measured in buccal mucosa cells were increased (P<0.05) in response to supplementation when starting within the physiological range. In summary, solubilizates were clearly superior to oily dispersions and crystalline CoQ10 in their overall bioavailability, with the best absorption characteristics seen for the novel Solu™ Q10 solubilizate.
Thus the reference DOES exist and DOES have relevance to the LEF claim. "J Food Sci Nutr" IS the standard industry notation used for the International Journal of Food Sciences and Nutrition. The reference makes a broad assertion about CoQ10 delivery systems mattering. Ubiquinol IS CoQ10 and LEF obviously believes that even with Ubiquinol delivery systems make a difference. That is their point and what they are trying to validate via the reference. You may believe it is "rot", that is your privilege. The fact is that LEF was the organization that introduced CoQ10 to the US and popularized it before anyone else had hardly even heard of it here. Thus I believe they know more about it than they are given credit for. That is my opinion and remains my opinion. 300mg of Ubiquinol a day may well be overkill. I would readily concede that point. But the fact is, it works for me and that is what is important to me. If anyone here can get good results from a less expensive Ubiquinone solution, then I'm all for that. But don't make claims based on information you don't have. You state boldly that "NanoSolve has nothing to do with Ubiquinol". Where is your reference for that assertion? I have no idea how you could know that to be the case. You may be correct, who knows? NanoSolve is a proprietary product. Who knows who is using it for what? LEF could in fact very well be using it for there Ubiquinol product. I don't think their reference directly infers that, but it could be the case. - George
One confusing factor in this discussion is bioavailability. Bioavailability has to do with the amount of CoQ10 that makes it into the bloodstream. CoQ10 is notoriously difficult for the body to absorb. That is why various strategies are used to increase absorption rate from the digestive tract to the bloodstream. This problem of absorbability affects both Ubiquinone AND Ubiquinol. It is fairly easy to measure. The following is an example:
Bioavailability assessment of oral coenzyme Q10 formulations in dogs (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12476865)
A TOTALLY SEPARATE factor is the differing levels of EFFECTIVENESS between ubiquinone and ubiquinol. The is a pharmacological issue that is discussed here:
Antioxidant action of ubiquinol homologues with different isoprenoid chain length in biomembranes (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/2227528)
Note the statement in the above discussion: "Ubiquinols, the reduced forms of CoQn, possess much greater antioxidant activity than the oxidized ubiquinone forms."
The potential downside of Ubiquinol at this level is that it wants to oxidate back to the Ubiquinone form and must be stabilized in order to retain its superior ubiquinol form. While Kaneka does this out the door at the production level, various sub-vendors use additional methods to maintain ubiquinol in its more effective form until it can be consumed.
That leaves the key question of whether or not conversion of Ubiquinone to Ubiquinol within the body declines with age. Kaneka openly states that it does. An endless number of docs and pharmacists say that it does on their web sites. So that process is generally assumed to be true. However there are those who vehemently dispute this theory. For example: CoQ10 Facts or Fabrications (http://www.zmc-usa.com/docs/CoQ10_Facts_or_Fabrications.pdf) They, in fact, say that any ubiquinol consumed in oral form is converted to ubiquinol in the stomach anyway. That brings their whole point of view into question, since there are clinical studies that indicate ubiquinol is superior to ubiquinone when used orally. I refer to: Supplementation with the reduced form of Coenzyme Q10 decelerates phenotypic characteristics of senescence and induces a peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor-alpha gene expression signature in SAMP1 mice. (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19960455) This study indicates greater effectiveness of Ubiquinol as compared to ubiquinone. The study attributes this to Ubiquinol's "superior bioavailability". If Ubiquinol is converted to ubiquinone in the stomach anyway, how can it retain a higher bioavailability? There has to be something intrinsically superior about the ubiquinol form. There is no doubt that Kaneka is using how powered marketing in order to sell their ubiquinol product. But there is also no doubt that conventional ubiqunone marketers are out there spewing disinformation as well in an effort to compete against an obviously superior product. To date the research on ubiquinol is scant compared to what is available on ubiquinone. But there is ongoing research and I am confident that it will eventually reveal ubiquinol to be the superior product. None of this, of course, gives us a final answer to the question of whether there is an issue with CoQ10 conversion as a result of aging. But until there is proof to the contrary, the opinion of the majority of docs and pharmacists weighing in should not be taken lightly.
On the positive side I appreciate all of the information that ppain has shared on this thread and the lively discussion that has fostered. On the other hand there is a point where advocacy can turn into a rant and I think we are approaching that point.
- George
George999: I'm not advocating any CoQ10 version. I'm a scientist, though not a bioscientist, trying to clarify some confusions about CoQ10 for myself and others.
You have not retrieved the LEF reference No. 25 but just the PubMed provided abstract. I thought I'd linked to that abstract but see that I messed up the bbc code there. Schulz et al. 2006 describes only the bioavailability differences for different formulations of Ubiquinone so it has no evident relevance to LEF's statement. The paper describes a BASF delivery system (Solu Q10) applied to Ubiquinone. (Incidentally the paper finds it not working remarkably well versus other commercially available delivery systems for Ubiquinone.) From my reading of the literature, there was no suspicion in 2006 that Ubiquinol would benefit from a sophisticated delivery system. Look at the main Kaneka paper, Hosoe et al. 2007. They say "it has been reported that the bioavailability of ubiquinone strongly depends on the formulation used". They say no such thing about Ubiquinol. They blythely dissolve their Ubiquinol in olive oil for all their measurements of its bioavailability.
You found an excellent reference, "Bioavailability assessment of oral coenzyme Q10 formulations in dogs", to support Hosoe et al.'s statement. But again this does not support your statement that "this problem of absorbability affects both Ubiquinone AND Ubiquinol." The dog experiment studied three formulations:
A. simple Ubiquinone powder
B. Q-Gel water-miscible Ubiquinone
C. Q-Nol water-miscible Ubiquinol
The experiment found B 3.6x more efficient than A. It found C 6.2x more efficient than A.
So there is only the finding here that Ubiquinone's bioavailability depends on the delivery system. To find this for Ubiquinol would require a comparison of Ubiquinol delivered two different ways.
I have never seen a published study of Ubiquinol delivered two different ways. I have only seen the two recent sentences from SourceOne about a "pharmacokinetic pilot study" that found Ubiquinol QH in VESIsorb being 5.85x as bioavailable as Ubiquinol QH alone. That's an amazing number if true. I discussed its plausibilty in my last post.
Next to this, LEF's citing Schulz et al. 2006 as support for their statement that they offer "the highly bioavailable ubiquinol form of CoQ10 in a patented delivery system with a superior absorption level" is empty. Conceivably LEF is using the BASF nanoparticle delivery system described in Schulz et al. 2006, and conceivably it worked well for Ubiquinol after not working well for Ubiquinone. But a citation for a superior absorption level for a version of Ubiquinol must say what superior absorption level was achieved. LEF isn't saying.
Sorry to be picky about this but "Int J Food Sci Nutr" is the standard industry notation (http://journalseek.net/cgi-bin/journalseek/journalsearch.cgi?field=issn&query=0963-7486) for the "International Journal of Food Sciences and Nutrition" in which the Schulz et al. 2006 was published. Omitting the "Int" points you to another journal (http://www.kfn.or.kr/publication/search02.php?ifv=2). If you google on "Schulz+Q10" you find a lot of both journal abbreviations. Those without the "Int" all are cribbed from LEF's boo-boo.
If LEF were using NanoSolv as you speculated, then they should have referenced Wajda et al. 2007 rather than Schulz et al. 2006. But again, Wajda et al. makes no reference to Ubiquinol either. If LEF is using
any patented delivery system for its Ubiquinol, then let them refer to the patent and the study which shows that system enhancing Ubiquinol absorption.
QuoteIf Ubiquinol is converted to ubiquinone in the stomach anyway, how can it retain a higher bioavailability? There has to be something intrinsically superior about the ubiquinol form.
We must disentangle four questions:
1. What Ubiquinol<->Ubiquinone oxidations or reductions can occur in the digestive system?
2. How well does Ubiquinol vs. Ubiquinone pass into the blood?
3. How does the "delivery system" influence 1 and 2?
4. Once in the blood can remnants of the delivery system influence the Ubiquinol:Ubiquinone redox equilibrium ratio?
We can be pretty sure that the answer to question 4 is: little or not. For one thing, the ratio is at least 80:20 with no delivery system. Now one of Kaneka's stabilization methods (described in their US patent 7829080) is to add some reduced Q9 or reduced Q11 to the reduced Q10 (Ubiquinol). This is to slow the oxidation of the Qbiquinol pre-ingestion, but maybe it slows it after ingestion, and maybe the Q9 or Q11 get into the blood and modify the Ubiquinol:Ubiquinone equilibrium. Still there's little room for increase of the ratio over 80:20.
Thus the only questions of interest are 1-3.
All that matters for comparing formulations is how much of the CoQ10 gets into the blood. It is an open question whether X mg of Ubiquinone in its best delivery system gets less, equal, or more CoQ10 into the blood than X mg of Ubiquinol in its best delivery system. In around 1997, Kaneka's scientists made the delivery system olive oil for each and found Ubiquinone getting approximately half as much CoQ10 into the blood as Ubiquinol did. But better delivery systems seem to have been found for Ubiquinone since then. Maybe better delivery systems have been found for Ubiquinol too -- where's published data? If the
best delivery systems turn out to be the same one for each, and if they are nanoparticle coatings, then "equal" might well be the answer to the open question.
Quote from: ppain on December 11, 2011, 08:08:34 PM
Sorry to be picky about this but "Int J Food Sci Nutr" is the standard industry notation (http://journalseek.net/cgi-bin/journalseek/journalsearch.cgi?field=issn&query=0963-7486) for the "International Journal of Food Sciences and Nutrition" in which the Schulz et al. 2006 was published. Omitting the "Int" points you to another journal (http://www.kfn.or.kr/publication/search02.php?ifv=2). If you google on "Schulz+Q10" you find a lot of both journal abbreviations. Those without the "Int" all are cribbed from LEF's boo-boo.
Interesting. I entered "J Food Sci Nutr" along with "CoQ10" in an NIH medical journal search engine and it actually took me directly to the LEF citation on the first hit. I was aware it is an abstract, I wasn't about to copy the whole article on this forum thread.
George999: have you a way to get the whole article? I wrote to the lead author for a copy but have not heard back.
I misdescribed BASF's Solu Q10 delivery system, which the article was evaluating, as nanoparticle based. It's something else.
I wish I did. I looks like they have a $43 pay wall standing guard over the full text paper. - George
So far I'm 3 for 3 on article requests about Peyronie's treatments. I guess the authors feel sorry for us.
What promises to be interesting in Schulz et al. is the multiple intakes data over 14 days.
I got Schulz et al. 2006. It is not suitable for OCR and the Peyronie's Disease Resource Library unfortunately doesn't accept uploads, so I'll try to summarize the paper here. It compared 5 ubiquinone formulations:
C. simple powder
S1. Solu Q10
S2. Swanson Ultra Q-Gel
OD1. CoQsol
OD2. Nature Made CoQ10
(Please ignore my December 11 reporting on Schulz et al 2006 done before seeing the full paper.)
Available CoQ10 products have changed since 2006 but the detailed chemical descriptions this paper gives for these formulations are nevertheless interesting.
C. 30 mg crystalline CoQ10 (ubidecarenone) and cornstarch
S1. 30 mg CoQ10 in medium-chain triglycerides and polysorbate 80
S2. 30 mg CoQ10 and 6 IU vitamin E in gelatin, purified water, glycerin, water, titanium dioxide, annatto seed extract, polysorbate 80, medium-chain triglycerides, sorbitol and sorbitan monooleate
OD1. 30 mg CoQ10, 1295 IU Vitamin A (100% as betacarotene) and 30 IU vitamin E in rice bran oil, yellow beeswax, gelatin, glycerin, water and annatto extract
OD2. 30 mg CoQ10 and 1500 IU vitamin A (100% as betacarotene) in soybean oil, gelatin, glycerin and water
BASF's proud formulation S1 seems to be a simplified version of Tishcon's formulation S2. Formulations S1 and S2 are described as "solubilizates" while formulations OD2 and OD1 are described as "oily dispersions". All those four are in soft gel capsules.
The study found that the average plasma CoQ10 levels through 12 hours after taking were as follows:
C. simple powder: 0.055
S1. Solu Q10: 0.079
S2. Swanson Ultra Q-Gel: 0.085
OD1. CoQsol: 0.064
OD2. Nature Made CoQ10: 0.090
These values, and all values given below, are for micromolls plasma CoQ10 (over baseline) per millimoll of plasma cholestrol.
A second study fed the formulations to the subjects every day and there is a graph showing the results after 1, 7, and 14 days. The 14 day value is the most important for us.
C. simple powder: 0.180
S1. Solu Q10: 0.236
S2. Swanson Ultra Q-Gel: 0.174
OD1. CoQsol: 0.154
OD2. Nature Made CoQ10: 0.224
Notice how C which had the worst bioavailability in the single dose 12 hour test has median bioavailability in the more relevant 14 day test. S1 which has the median bioavailability in the single dose 12 hour test has the best bioavailability in the more relevant 14 day test. However the graph shows that plasma levels for S1 leveled off at just 7 days while those for OD2 kept rising. Possibly S1 would not have been best in a longer trial.
The study goes on to integrate (find the average value for) the curves for the 14 day study.
C. simple powder: 0.136
S1. Solu Q10: 0.192
S2. Swanson Ultra Q-Gel: 0.145
OD1. CoQsol: 0.120
OD2. Nature Made CoQ10: 0.178
These values are the basis of the press release values. However it is ridiculous to integrate the time curve over a study of daily taking.
In short, Schulz et al. 2006 shows that no conclusions about CoQ10 bioavailability should be based on single dose studies. Daily dose studies are required and 14 days isn't long enough. All that should matter for the regular taker of CoQ10 is the final, steady-state plasma level after approximately 30 days. The one fully adequate study of CoQ10 bioavailability is still Hosoe et al. 2007. It ran for 28 days at 300 mg per day. But Hosoe et al. 2007 studied just one formulation.
Recent comparison studies involving SourceOne's VESIsorb formulations are single does studies and therefore can't be trusted to indicate bioavailability.
I take Ubiquinol of Swanson brand.
Is this brand good?
Can you gather form the study if they collected all else what the participats were eating or taking.?
Shouldn't Co-Q10 be taken with food and best if some fat is consumed at the time?
Many people talk about Kanaka(sp?) from Janpan as a very reliable source for Co Q10. It is listed as the source on many common Brands today. Is that source mentioned in the study?
Good Luck
started this treatment 2 weeks ago with the VED, it seems to be helping, bend is a lot less and dent area is stronger. Jim
I am on 300 mg of Ubiguinol now got it from puratins pride, seems to be helping.
Kaneka is the world's largest producer of CoQ10 products. They are almost certainly the supplier of the CoQ10 used in the Iranian study. - George
Has anyone experienced a increase in Acid Reflux symptoms while taking CoQ10? Ive noticed since I ran out about a week ago and I haven't been taking it my reflux has decreased alot. This is the first time in about 6 months or more that I have stopped taking CoQ10. I usually take it continuously. I googled it and it seems to me that it does have the side effect of reflux.....still not entirely sure though.
Same here, but I thought it came from pentox...
as i'm taking both I actually dont know...
(Actually it occurs when i take my medicine on empty stomach)
as i heard pentox can give you stomach probs on empty stomach.. I thought it came from that.
Luc
I was taking Pentox along with the CoQ10. I have heard that Pentox will cause reflux and stomach issues for some too. I ve also heard it should be taken with food to try and avoid it.
I guess the easiest way to figure it out is to quit taking the CoQ10 for a little while and see if the symptoms improve. If it was happening on an empty stomach only I would probably start first taking the pentox and CoQ10 with food and see if that resolves the problem.
Pentox can make the stomach upset, try taking it with food, unfortunately this is just a side effect that can happen, but not always. Right now I"ve been on pentox since October and am seeing very good results from it, its the 3rd time I"m on it, and every time the side effects have been mostly the same, but some have been slightly different.
Comebackid
I am taking the Pentox twice a day in the middle of the meal as I was advised by the forum and have no any stomach upset.
Not latest than 6 pm.
James
I know this is an older post but very relevant and important. I thought I would share my experience with a variety of Ubiquinol products and maybe some other folks can weigh in. I have used Dr's Best, Jarrow, and the house brands from Vita Cost and Vitamin Shoppe.
All use Kanekas QH as their source. Other ingredients may vary.
I have never had any negative effects from any of them. I always take with food.
Is one more effective or made better than an other? Who knows????
If anyone subscribes to Consumer Lab please comment on what they may have found about such products.
Good Luck
Consumer Labs does not tell you which products are "better". They only identify issues of purity and contaminants which usually do not apply to products like CoQ10 and Ubiquinol since they are simply repackaging a common pharmaceutical ingredient. - George
I believe you are right that consumer labs does not test for effectiveness of any product. They only check for quality.
My understanding is they will confirm the info on the lable actually agrees with what they find in the bottle. For example is the product really 100mg of Co- Q10 and not something more or less. As you pointed out contaminants are also looked for. I am not sure if they check only a few samples or multiple samples from different lot numbers. This can be a good indication of a companies concern and commitment for overall quality. Quality can be an issue in OTC supplements as there is little oversight.
In the context below a quality product is made better.
OK, a quick look at the CL page suggests that they tested something around 33 products and everyone of them passed, probably because they ALL contain the key Kaneka product in the correct amount. There were a handful of them that failed, but only because C L had a beef with health claims on their label, NOT because of any defect in the quality of their product. - George
Hi,
Since ubiquinol seems to be effective, I was wondering if there is research or tests about idebenone ? I heard it was used with Dupuytren.
Tom.
Quote from: TomPeyronies on May 28, 2012, 01:31:56 PM
Hi,
Since ubiquinol seems to be effective, I was wondering if there is research or tests about idebenone ? I heard it was used with Dupuytren.
Tom.
NOTE: My comment below is in error as pointed out by Luciano's post that follows this one.Tom, I think the question is: how would you get access to this drug. This is an experimental/investigative prescription drug. It likely costs a lot of money even though it is still unproven. It is nearly impossible to get most docs to prescribe pentoxifylline, a proven, safe, and reliable drug with a long track record of use. And you would ask those docs for idenbenone? Good luck! - George
Well not really George.. its not a drug, its a supplement so there is no prescription.
As far as I know - (but I am not sure) its synthetic Q10. Now is it good or bad. I have no idea. I only remember that there was a hype many years ago on cheap synthetic vitamin E. As far as I remember it was not as good as the real natural stuff.
To get it, like any supplement, my first source would be amazon.com, to get an idea about pricing. then checkout the different supplement providers (swanson, puritan pride etc..) to see if you can get it cheaper.
Actually the best price i could find on amazon:
idebenone (80 caps - 180mg each) for $34.99
http://www.amazon.com/Primaforce-Idebenone-180-Milligrams-Capsules/dp/B002SSUQOC
but you also find it in other dosage:
idebenone (50 caps - 45mg each) for $13.23
http://www.amazon.com/WORLD-ORGANICS-Idebenone-45mg-CAPS/dp/B001QRV91K
At least here in Europe it seems a little cheaper than ubiquinol. (but maybe thats due to marketing strategies by the manufacturing companies)
Luc
Actually there is an overview over effects on http://www.idebenone.org/ . (it seems though this is a commercial site, although it has the .org ending.). But they have really lots of studies on idebenone with all possible diseases, from alzheimer to Friedreich's ataxia.
:-[ :-[ :-[
Oops! Thanks Luc! I was completely unaware of this product being sold as a supplement. Thanks for the Amazon links. Hopefully there will be some brave souls here who will give this a try so we can see if it is effective. - George
Thanks Luc,
I don't need to give more information !
What I read is that's more efficient than ubiquinol, but I am not an MD. I looked for information in Google about peyronie and idebenone with no success. Since we talk a lot about coq10, ubiquinone, ubiquinol, I thought it could be a promising supplement.
Tom.
Idebenone treatment is being studied for Duchenne muscular dystrophy. That's D-U-C-H-E-N-N-E not D-U-P-U-Y-T-R-E-N.
Idebenone is definitely not synthetic CoQ10. Idebenone's a much smaller molecule. CoQ10 is so big because of its chain of 10 C5H8 groups. That's the 10 of CoQ10; it makes it what it is. Kaneka has studied CoQ9, which functions in mice somewhat as CoQ10 functions in humans. Idebenone is a much smaller molecule than CoQ9 too. Idebenone is what it is.
Remember that the usefulness of CoQ10 with Peyronies is based on a single scientific study (Safarinejad, 2010). Dr. Safarinejad had reasons for suspecting CoQ10's usefulness:
"CoQ10 is one of the most potent antioxidants, which is used to regenerate other antioxidants (tocopheryl and ascorbate), and may serve important roles in protection against oxidative stress and free radical oxygen damage.15 TGF-b1 is a key fibrogenic mediator. It has been reported that solubilized CoQ10 suppresses the expression of TGF-b1 induced by dimethylnitrosamine in mouse liver and mouse embryonic fibroblast cells.16 In addition, CoQ10 activates NF-E2-related factor-2 (Nrf2).16 Nrf2 overexpression itself reduces the basal expression of a-smooth muscle actin and TGF-b1.16 Therefore, CoQ10-induced Nrf2 activation may suppress TGF-b1 expression."
Is there any reason to suspect Idebenone is useful with Peyronies?
Regarding usefulness of CoQ10 and Ubiquinol have a topic with a very deep professional discussion, much over my capability under the "Oral Treatments for Peyronies Disease" board.
If CoQ10 and Ubiquinol helps Peyronies, I suppose the "Super Ubiquinol" Idebenone may help also. No one try it yet for Peyronies, not from the active forum members.
James
james1947:if Idebenone were being investigated for treating Dupuytren syndrome, with its known relation to Peyronies, that should excite curiosity about treating Peyronies with Idebenone. Tom P's first post about Idenbenone sprang from that connection, but he unfortunately confused two diseases.
The only other ground for hoping Idebenone is more useful for treating Peyronies than any other randomly chosen supplement, or foodstuff, or edible toy or whatever, is that someone called it "Super Ubiquinol". Let's be real. Who said it? Some marketer of supplements. Marketers of supplements, unlike marketers of prescription drugs, can call them whatever they want. Idebenone is not Super Ubiquinol. Idebenone is very distantly chemically related to CoQ10. CoQ10 has many confirmed treatment functions and Idebenone is not even being investigated for replacing CoQ10 in those functions.
Most of us in this forum feel desperate about our Peyronies, but we we must remain rational and not waste money and hope on pure nonsense. Also the idea that if one guy in the forum tries Idebenone, his experience could be suggestive for the rest of us is too, too unscientific. All the medical reports we're sharing show that you need a much bigger sample group, and you need good controls, to glean any worthwhile suggestions.
Conventional wisdom is that the oral treatments for Peyronies are primarily useful in the early stages of the disease. Conventional wisdom might be wrong. Without knowing that, it's unreasonable to play longshots during the brief game-time.
Thanks for all replies. I agree we do not have to test by ourselves products where there are no medical report saying that there is something good to do about peyronie. That's why i asked the forum to get eventually evidence. And there is no evidence about idebenone !
To tell you the truth, since I am new on peyronie (2 months ago), I was looking for more information about coq10. I read things about ubiquinone vs ubiquinol, then I found things about ubiquinol vs idebedone. For example : "Idebenone is closely related to CoQ10 in its structure. It can replace CoQ10 in the process of cellular energy production and, just as CoQ10, idebenone is also an antioxidant".Dr. G. Todorov - Ph.D. in Biology. Plus many articles (commercial) such as "Why Idebenone is superior to CoQ10" : http://idebenone.org/idebenone-article.htm.
Forget idebedone...
Tom
Pless
I am not pretending to understand in supplements, medications etc. I was far from all this subject until Peyronies struck.
My knowledge (still limited) is based on my own experience regarding some medications/supplements, VED, what I have learned on this forum and searching the Internet.
The point with all the medications, supplements and other treatments we are using to try to fight this disease is that non have enough research behind regarding Peyronies (maybe except Xiaflex).
We are using them because forum members have tried and it helped to some degree. Any one specifically may react different to the different treatments so if it helped someone it not means it will help the other one but we are giving a try.
For example we have a member that made and is continuing a treatment with injection of stem cells in the penis. He is the first one, reporting to the forum and if will be successfull, others will follow, I am sure.
If you will read:
"Alternative Treatments of Peyronie's Disease board" > "UNUSUAL Treatments & Experiments" topic you will be surprised what people have done to try to find a solution for this disease ;D
TomP
Don't forget Idebenone. Maybe someone, one day will try it for Peyronies and he will have so big success that all of us will run to use it. :)
Any new idea of a new possible treatment is welcome on the forum, we can discuss the subject and understand (or not) if have some usefulness for Peyronies. :) ;D >:( :(
James
Who's the user injecting stem cells?
The forum member who is injecting stem cells is rd
You can read all his posts and people questions on:
"Developmental Drugs & Treatments" board
"Stem Cells & Adult stem cell injections for Peyronies" topic
rd is updating the forum periodically regarding his progress, cost etc'
James
What is the difference between CoQ10 and Ubiqinol? I am on Puritan's Pride and both are offered. I'm wondering if one or the other if better for Peyronie's. Thanks!
Our body processing the CoQ10 to become Ubiquinol, our body uses Ubiquinol.
If one is less than 40 year old his body make easy processing so one can use CoQ10, much cheaper than Ubiquinol.
I am 65, so taking Ubiquinol.
James
I am 47, guess I better spring for Ubiquinol. :'(
Just a heads up on a very good deal for Co-Q10. I was just placing an order at Iherb.com and I saw a good special:
Healthy Origins, CoQ10 Gels ( Kaneka Q10 ), 100 mg, 60 Softgels, a $39.99 value, for only $6.00.
The sale is good till 10am PST next wed and they are only allowing one per customer. This seems to be an item that may be discountinued as they say they can only honor it as supplys last.
In the continental US you can get free shipping for orders over $20.
For orders over $40 you can get free international shipping and if you are a new customer you can save an additional $10 with code KAB400.
I am not trying to pimp anything, I just think this offers members a very good savings which is time sensitive.
I hope this helps.
Goodluck
Thank you for the information. Not for me, I am taking Ubiquinol (old people, you know)
I am copy/past you sentence to make it bold:
CoQ10 Gels ( Kaneka Q10 ), 100 mg, 60 Softgels, a $39.99 value, for only $6.00.
If interested, see Reply #362 bellow
James
Again, I've no ulterior motive in saying this. If you want a regular supplier of Kaneka Q10, I buy from Wholehealth in Colorado. If you use their plan, 60x300mg costs around $27 that is guaranteed, apparently to be genuine Kaneka Q10
Jonbinspain.
Thanks for sharing. Just a few observations. Being a bit of a supplement and herb geek I checked out the whole health brand you recommended.
1. It includes Magnesium Stearate which interferes with absorbtion. The higher quality vendors have recognized this and are begining to remove it from formulations.
2. No mention of being free of GMO ingredients or common allergens such as wheat, egg, soy, nuts, dairy, etc.
3. I know it is easier to take one 300mg pill a day but I think you will get better overall absorbtion by keeping the blood levels up by multi dosing through the day. 150mg 2x or 100mg 3x. This may be subtle. If there is a study that says otherwise regarding CoQ-10 I am happy to be corrected.
The Healthy Origins lable says this:
Pure olive oil (fruit), gelatin, glycerin, natural bees wax, purified water.
Scientifically formulated with all natural ingredients that do not contain any genetically modified organisms.
Free of sugar, salt, starch, yeast, wheat, gluten, corn, soy, barley, fish, shellfish, nuts, tree nuts, egg and dairy products. No preservatives, artificial colors, or artificial flavors.
James: you are right about Ubiquinol. But the conventional Co Q-10 work the same you just need to take more.
I'll bow to your superior knowledge on this. However, I always thought that Kaneka were an acknowledged market leader of this product. It would seem strange of them to fall behind in their technology.
Kaneka is a Japanese company that manufactures the raw Co-Q10. They do have the reputaiton for being an industry leader in this area. But you need to understand they don't have anything to do with making the final end product inside the bottle you buy.
In otherwords, they just supply one component to many Co-Q10 capsule manufacturers.
Ok, just looked at the bottle. It does contain Mag Stearate ( veg source) however it states: does not contain milk, eggs, fish, crustacean shellfish, tree nuts, peanuts, wheat, soya beans, GMO's, artificial colours or preservatives.
Yup, Kaneka just makes the raw material. They leave to the end manufacturers to optimize it. That is what differentiates the brands. - George
Just been reading this also. There are various articles on the net saying that Mag Stearate, in the quantities used my reputable suppliers, are so small as to make virtually no difference to absorption.
Does stearic acid (magnesium stearate, mag stearate) interfere with vitmain/mineral absorption? | manufacturing and quality | Metagenics | Answers to Common Questions (http://www.metagenics.com/faqs/manufacturing-and-quality-faq/does-stearic-acid-interfere-with-the-absorption-of-vitamins-and-minerals-faq)
Goodluck
Regarding:
Quotethe conventional Co Q-10 work the same you just need to take more
May be right, may be wrong. Have people that they body converting CoQ10 even when they are old, some not converting it even when young.
To be sure that the conversion works for an individual, maybe need to make some test. I don't know how :(
Maybe somebody on the forum can give an answer on the subject (how to test the conversion efficiency) and I can change to Coq10 that is much cheaper :)
James
Quote from: goodluck on October 12, 2012, 11:05:13 AM
I know it is easier to take one 300mg pill a day but I think you will get better overall absorbtion by keeping the blood levels up by multi dosing through the day. 150mg 2x or 100mg 3x. This may be subtle. If there is a study that says otherwise regarding CoQ-10 I am happy to be corrected.
The most relevant study I've seen for us regular ubiquinol (or ubiquinone) takers is Hosoe et al., "Study on safety and bioavailability of ubiquinol (Kaneka QH) after single and 4-week multiple oral administration to healthy volunteers" (2007). The paper estimates the plasma half-life of ubiquinol to be about 48 h. Figs. 1 and 2 together strongly suggest that daily dosing is frequent enough. (After 2 weeks of slow ascent to the peak level how much decline could occur in less than a day?) Since the goal of the study was to test safety at high plasma levels, the study's choice of daily dosing should be our choice too.
Quote from: pless on October 14, 2012, 09:11:57 AM
The most relevant study I've seen for us regular ubiquinol (or ubiquinone) takers is Hosoe et al., "Study on safety and bioavailability of ubiquinol (Kaneka QH) after single and 4-week multiple oral administration to healthy volunteers" (2007).
This study is for
UBIQUINOL NOT UBIQUINONE. Do NOT confuse the two.
UBIQUINOL is ALWAYS sold as
UBIQUINOL.
UBIQUINONE is ALWAYS sold as
CoQ10. - George
Quote from: George999 on October 14, 2012, 11:55:57 AMThis study is for UBIQUINOL NOT UBIQUINONE. Do NOT confuse the two.
I am well aware that it was a study of the bioavailability of ubiquinol, as its title says. But if you read the report you find valuable information about ubiquinone taking too. The report had to be such because the medical field had long used ubiquinone, so the most meaningful descriptions of ubiquinol would be
in terms of ubiquinone. On page 20 we learn:
QuoteFurthermore, we found that when rats were orally administered a single-dose (100mg/kg) of ubiquinol or ubiquinone dissolved in olive oil, there was an approximately 2-fold difference in area under the plasma total coenzyme Q10 concentration curve between the two agents, indicating that ubiquinol has higher bioavailability than ubiquinone.
On page 25:
QuoteSince ubiquinol has approximately twice the bioavailability of ubiquinone, the results of the clinical studies conducted with ubiquinone at relatively high-doses ranging from 600 to 3000mg/day for at least 2 weeks and up to 16 months ... are especially important in confirming the safety of ubiquinol.
Bioavailability measures the amount of CoQ10 (total for both forms) in the blood versus the amount of CoQ10 eaten. All the valuable pharmacokinetic findings of Hosoe, especially his Fig. 2, have implications for ubiquinone taking as well as for ubiquinol taking. Sure there is a difference in how much of each gets into the blood. For ubiquinone it depends strongly on the vehicle, and the paper says that a suspension of ubiquinone in olive oil is about half as efficient as ubiquinol (in olive oil). (There are dry ubiquinone powders even less efficient, and there are claims of higher efficiency ubiquinone preparations). The pharmacokinetic findings should be interpreted in conjunction with the bioavailability factor. I stand by my statement:
Quote from: pless on October 14, 2012, 09:11:57 AM
The most relevant study I've seen for us regular ubiquinol (or ubiquinone) takers is Hosoe et al.
pless, My apologies. I found the title of the study, itself, confusing, which is not your fault. The title seemed to be equating the two, but actually meant to convey that it was comparing the two. Thanks for correcting me on this AND elaborating on the study itself at the same time. Again, my apologies, your response more than answers my concerns. - George
Many people in this forum believe that for older takers ubiquinone has reduced value and ubiquinol should be taken instead. For example:
Quote from: james1947 on July 25, 2012, 06:08:19 PM
Our body processing the CoQ10 to become Ubiquinol, our body uses Ubiquinol. If one is less than 40 year old his body make easy processing so one can use CoQ10, much cheaper than Ubiquinol. I am 65, so taking Ubiquinol.
I think this belief arose from advertising claims, not from science, and is false.
We take CoQ10 as either ubiquinol or ubiquinone to raise the ubiquinol level in our blood. Scientifically there are two factors determining how much we raise that level. First there is the bioavailability of the CoQ10 we take. Bioavailability measures how much
total CoQ10 (ubiquinone + ubiquinol) gets into the blood from each unit of CoQ10 we take. Second there is the ubiquinone <--> ubiquinol chemical equilibrium in the blood. This determines how much ubiquinol there is from each unit of total ubiquinone + ubiquinol in the blood.
How might age fit into this? There are three distinct old-young differences possible:
1. Old people need more ubiquinol in their blood than young people do.
2. Relative bioavailability of ubiquinone to ubiquinol decreases with age.
3. The ubiquinone <--> ubiquinol equilibrium in the blood tilts toward ubiquinone with age.
#1 is true. but this does not justify the the belief in question.
I don't know if #3 is true, but even so it wouldn't justify the belief in question. If the equilibrium disfavors the old then the old must take more CoQ10, regardless of its form. That redox reaction comes
after the CoQ10 we take gets into the blood.
So only #2 is relevant for the belief in question What scientific information points to the relative bioavailability changing with age. Hosoe et al. (2007) estimated the relative bioavailability at about 1:2 without any mention of age. What other scientifc study of ubiquinol availability has there been?
Sloppy thinking can confuse factors #1 & #3 with relevant factor #2. Advertisement writers love sloppy thinking.
The decision between ubiquinone and ubiquinol has nothing to do with age but simply with how much they cost and how much total CoQ10 gets into the blood. If the Hosoe estimate of 1:2 were firm then we should buy ubiquinone when it costs 1/2 as much as ubiquinol. But Hosoe's estimate is somewhat off-the-cuff, and various delivery systems for ubiquinone result in various bioavailabilities.
The one published paper on CoQ10 treatment for Peyronies is Safarinejad (2010) and he gave his subjects with
average age 52.7 ubiquinone 300 mg/day.
Knowing all this i chose ubiquinol over ubiquinone. It's a matter of shopping and certainty. Swanson ubiquinol is well-priced and it was a nuisance mixing the very cheap ubiquinone powder I initially bought with oil. The fancy ubiquinones make unbelievable claims about their bioavailability, never including longterm studies like Hosoe's. My choice was not influenced by my age.
I have long been an advocate of Ubiquinol over Ubiquinone for guys older than 40. HOWEVER, I think the bottom line has to be whether or not it is working for the person in question. If someone 65 feels they are getting just as much benefit from Ubiquinone as from Ubiquinol, then it obviously pays to choose the less expensive product. So I would say try both, each for a few months, and see how they compare in terms of perceived benefit. Personally, I have chosen to play it safe and use Ubiquinol, but I have to admit that choice is costing me a significant amount of money. - George
Pless
Your assessment of Ubiquinol/Ubiquinone is impressing and professional!!!
I just have some small, maybe irrelevant remarks. You have stated:
Quote1. Old people need more ubiquinol in their blood than young people do.
2. Relative bioavailability of ubiquinone to ubiquinol decreases with age.
Those are the reasons I am taking Ubiquinol.You have quoted my sentence:
QuoteOur body processing the CoQ10 to become Ubiquinol, our body uses Ubiquinol. If one is less than 40 year old his body make easy processing so one can use CoQ10, much cheaper than Ubiquinol. I am 65, so taking Ubiquinol.
And you have stated:
QuoteI think this belief arose from advertising claims, not from science, and is false.
Sounds like I am giving false information to people :(
I would like to know what is the false part of my sentence for learning purposes, to stop missleading people.Our body processing the CoQ10 to become Ubiquinol, our body uses Ubiquinol.
False or true?If one is less than 40 year old his body make easy processing. Your answer:
QuoteRelative bioavailability of ubiquinone to ubiquinol decreases with age.
False or true?CoQ10, much cheaper than Ubiquinol.
False or true? I am not an expert in chemistry and not a doctor, just learning from what I am reading :)
James
Quote from: james1947 on October 14, 2012, 05:06:47 PM
Pless
You have stated:
Quote1. Old people need more ubiquinol in their blood than young people do.
2. Relative bioavailability of ubiquinone to ubiquinol decreases with age.
Those are the reasons I am taking Ubiquinol.
Oh no. I didn't
state 1 and 2. I said "There are three distinct old-young differences possible:" and then listed 1, 2, and 3 and went on to discuss whether they were true. I explained that we have no grounds for believing 2 is true.
Quote from: james1947 on October 14, 2012, 05:06:47 PMI would like to know what is the false part of my sentence for learning purposes, not to misslead people.
Please look carefully at what you wrote:
Quote from: james1947 on July 25, 2012, 06:08:19 PM
Our body processing the CoQ10 to become Ubiquinol, our body uses Ubiquinol. If one is less than 40 year old his body make easy processing so one can use CoQ10, much cheaper than Ubiquinol. I am 65, so taking Ubiquinol.
Processing the CoQ10 to become ubiquinol is what I called the ubiquinone <--> ubiquinol chemical equilibrium. This corresponds to the third possible old-young difference:
Quote from: pless on October 14, 2012, 04:35:07 PM
3. The ubiquinone <--> ubiquinol equilibrium in the blood tilts toward ubiquinone with age
I said this about #3:
Quote from: pless on October 14, 2012, 04:35:07 PM
I don't know if #3 is true, but even so it wouldn't justify the belief in question. If the equilibrium disfavors the old then the old must take more CoQ10, regardless of its form. That redox reaction comes after the CoQ10 we take gets into the blood.
What you wrote is false because even if in old people's blood ubiquinone is converted to ubiquinol with less efficiency than in young people's blood, swallowing ubiquinol capsules instead ubiquinone capsules won't change this disadvantage in the blood. You have confused that disadvantage of age with the bioavailability disadvantage of ubiquinone. You maintain that confusion in your final question, where you ask me whether my #2 is true or false. It is false. My #3 is true. My post sought to disentangle the factors of bioavailability and conversion efficiency. I warned that sloppy thinking can confuse factor #2 with factor #3. Perhaps re-read my post.
Pless
Now I understand that I get everything wrong, including that CoQ10 is cheaper than Ubiquinol. :(
An other thing I understand that Ubiquinol is just a good marketing product so everyone should stop taking it and taking CoQ10. It will really help my budget :)
Thank you for the enlightenment.
James
Some sources to enforce my theory regarding Ubiquinol/Coq10:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubiquinol
QuoteNot only do aged subjects have reduced CoQ10 biosynthesis, their ability to convert ubiquinone to ubiquinol is also diminished.[
and much more
KANEKA QH™ UBIQUINOL: Frequently Asked Questions (http://www.kanekaqh.com/faqs.html)
QuoteFor individuals who are 40+, KanekaQHä (ubiquinol) is likely more beneficial since the body's ability to produce CoQ10 and convert it into ubiquinol is diminished
and much more
Taking Q10 for a Test Drive – Is Ubiquinol Better? | Health Tips (http://www.wellnessresources.com/tips/articles/taking_q10_for_a_test_drive_is_ubiquinol_better/)
QuoteThe antioxidant-Q10 product I used was more than twice as helpful to me as plain powder energy-Q10, and costs three times as much.
and much more
Bodybuilding.com - CoQ10 - Ubiquinone Vs Ubiquinol: What's The Difference? (http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/coq10-ubiquinone-ubiquinol-whats-the-difference.htm)
QuoteThe problem arises with aging in many people; the ability for the body to metabolize is reduced significantly over time and many people will find that it's difficult for the body to break down Ubiquinone into Ubiquinol. There-in lies the difference between the two supplements. Though it will come at a greater cost, taking Ubiquinol after the age of 40 is a good idea.
Has Your CoQ10 Become Obsolete? - Life Extension (http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2007/jan2007_report_coq10_01.htm)
February 2008 - CoQ10-- Ubiquinol vs. Ubiquinone - Vitamin Express (http://www.vitaminexpress.com/ve_newsletter.php/nID/12)
QuoteUbiquinone is converted within our body into ubiquinol, the potent anti-oxidant portion of CoQ10. However, as we age, our ability to make this conversion reduces significantly. Therein lies the major difference between the two products. Ubiquinol is already in its reduced form as a potent anti-oxidant.
After investing time in reading the above (and other) links, I get to the conclusion that my statement bellow is not false:QuoteOur body processing the CoQ10 to become Ubiquinol, our body uses Ubiquinol. If one is less than 40 year old his body make easy processing so one can use CoQ10, much cheaper than Ubiquinol. I am 65, so taking Ubiquinol.
Everyone can read the articles also and to get to his own conclussions!!!
James
Personally, I continue to believe that Ubiquinol is the better choice for older guys. BUT, IF anyone has doubts about that, the solution is to try both and observe the results. On the other hand, if one is not getting results from CoQ10 after a few months, they should certainly give Ubiquinol a shot. - George
James,
Checking Swanson's website today:
.....Swanson Ultra Ubiquinol, 60 caps 100 mg ... $18.69
.....Swanson Ultra CoQ10, 90 caps 200 mg ... $12.99
The second product must be ubiquinone. There's a large 4.3× price difference per mg.
If the second product is a formulation in oil (unlike the very cheap ubiquinone I bought in Germany), then Hosoe et al. estimate it is ½ as bioavailable as the first product, making it a buy. Age has nothing to do with this choice because that difference in bioavailability has nothing to do with age.
If you read Hosoi et al. (2007) you'll sense Kaneka's pride at having found a way to stabilize ubiquinol while claiming just 2× increase in bioavailability. Kaneka, as maker of both ubiquinone and ubiquinol, knows that if ubiquinol were to cost more than double ubiquinone it wouldn't sell, or rather shouldn't sell. While ubiquinol is novel marketing hype will distort the pricing. Marketing hype includes the false claim that men over 40 should choose ubiquinol.
The science does not support that claim. The science describes a two step process where either the ubiquinone or the ubiquinol gets into the blood and then enters into a redox equilibrium with its other. The science has never stated or hinted that the first step is age dependent. The second step might be age dependent so old people have a higher ubiquinone:ubiquinol ratio in the blood. But it is the first step, not the second step, where there is an advantage of ubiquinol over ubiquinone.
Quote from: james1947 on October 14, 2012, 06:56:03 PM
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubiquinol
QuoteNot only do aged subjects have reduced CoQ10 biosynthesis, their ability to convert ubiquinone to ubiquinol is also diminished.
This quote DOES NOT support your thesis. Biosynthesis means making CoQ10 without having to eat CoQ10. That old people do this less simply means they need to get more CoQ10 from food and supplements than young people do. This was rolled into the
#1 in my first post and is irrelevant to the age factor re. ubiquinol vs ubiquinone taking. Diminshed ability to convert simply means the ubiquinone <--> ubiquinol equilibrium in the blood tilts toward ubiquinone with age. This was the
#3 in my first post, again irrelevant to the age factor re. ubiquinol vs ubiquinone taking.
Your next quote is advertising hype from Kaneka-USA based the exact same lines you quoted from Wikipedia. The same illogic reverberates through the internet. None of your quotes are from scientifically respectable sources.
Quote from: james1947 on October 14, 2012, 06:56:03 PM
Everyone can read the articles also and to get to his own conclussions!!!
I sincerely hope that not everyone in this forum is so uncritical about informing himself.
Pless
I see that can't conduct with you a civilised conversation without going to phrases like:
QuoteI think this belief arose from advertising claims, not from science, and is false
QuoteI sincerely hope that not everyone in this forum is so uncritical about informing himself
I have not insulted you by even one word, but you are doing that, so for me this conversation is over because is getting personally and not related to the subject in discussion.
Have a nice day
James
I think that if one is going to make decisions based exclusively on science, one has to consider ALL of the research on the subject in question. The Iranian CoQ10 study found Ubiquinone effective in treating Peyronie's. This is NOT to assume with certainty that Ubiquinol is not more effective. There are no studies thus far comparing the relative effectiveness of the two forms in treating Peyronie's. That may change soon because Dr Safarinejad is currently using Ubiquinol in his urological research in place of Ubiquinone. But there ARE data for comparison of the two in the case of heart failure. And that data shows Ubiquinol to be DRAMATICALLY more effective than Ubiquinone. I think that speaks far more than any study comparing mere blood concentrations and ratios etc. The important thing is how effective the product is in healing damaged tissue under adverse metabolic conditions and this study speaks directly to that issue.
Thus I REPEAT ... if plain old CoQ10 does not work, Ubiquinol might. And if one wants to avoid potential risk of failure, Ubiquinol is the best bet. - George
Quote from: PubMed
Biofactors. 2008;32(1-4):119-28.
Supplemental ubiquinol in patients with advanced congestive heart failure.
Langsjoen PH, Langsjoen AM.
Source
East Texas Medical Center and Trinity Mother Francis Hospital, TX, USA. alilangsjoen@cs.com
Abstract
Patients with CHF, NYHA class IV, often fail to achieve adequate plasma CoQ10 levels on supplemental ubiquinone at dosages up to 900 mg/day. These patients often have plasma total CoQ10 levels of less than 2.5 microg/ml and have limited clinical improvement. It is postulated that the intestinal edema in these critically ill patients may impair CoQ10 absorption. We identified seven patients with advanced CHF (mean EF 22%) with sub-therapeutic plasma CoQ10 levels with mean level of 1.6 microg/ml on an average dose of 450 mg of ubiquinone daily (150-600 mg/day). All seven of these patients were changed to an average of 580 mg/day of ubiquinol (450-900 mg/day) with follow-up plasma CoQ10 levels, clinical status, and EF measurements by echocardiography. Mean plasma CoQ10 levels increased from 1.6 microg/ml (0.9-2.0 microg/ml) up to 6.5 microg/ml (2.6-9.3 microg/ml). Mean EF improved from 22% (10-35%) up to 39% (10-60%) and clinical improvement has been remarkable with NYHA class improving from a mean of IV to a mean of II (I to III). Ubiquinol has dramatically improved absorption in patients with severe heart failure and the improvement in plasma CoQ10 levels is correlated with both clinical improvement and improvement in measurement of left ventricular function.
PMID:
19096107
[PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
George999, The report involves rather high doses and very sick people -- "It is postulated that the intestinal edema in these critically ill patients may impair CoQ10 absorption" -- and the results are not so surprising. Look what happened with the 7 patients. Initially they were taking ubiquinone average 450 mg/day and their average plasma CoQ10 was 1.6 microg/ml. Then they were changed to ubiquinol average 580 mg/day and their average plasma CoQ10 rose to 6.5 microg/ml. How surprising is this 4.1× increase? Since we already know from Hosoe that the bioavailability of ubiquinol is about twice that of ubiquinone, and we also know from Hosoe's Fig. 2 that the long term plasma level is nearly proportional to daily dose level (a surprising result), increasing the intake 1.3× is expected to increase the plasma CoQ10 2.6×. (And we don't know what vehicle was used for the ubiquinone, Hosoe's factor assumes it is in oil.) 2.6× is not dramatically shy of 4.1× considering the special situation.
Where ubiquinol taking and ubiquinone taking differ is in each respective molecule's ability to get from the stomach to the blood. Sure enough, for an unusual condition of the stomach lining, the usual (Hosoe) factor of 2× difference might not apply. Maybe for these 7 patients there is a factor of 3.2× instead. This is no biggie, and it implies nothing for this strand's topic, which is the age factor in the difference.
I don't think Safarinejad explains why he chose 300 mg/day for his CoQ10 study; he refers to various other uses of CoQ10 in the medical literature. Those studies presumably experimented with dosage. For extremely large doses, like thousands of mg/day, my simple picture of the mechanism probably breaks down, but that's not our case. 300 mg/day is well within the range studied by Hosoe. When we take 300 mg/day of ubiquinol we're already effectively doubling Safarinejad's ubiquinone dose.
The arithmetic in my last post was oversimplified. For computing the various ratios, individual values rather than average values should be used. But the data in the abstract doesn't allow doing the proper arithmetic.
Hosoe et al. (2007) is a goldmine of information -- it's required reading for anyone involved in the ubiquinone-ubiquinol debate.
Every study has its quirks. Hosoe's volunteers were all young and healthy, in their early 30's. The bioavailability results are therefore for young and healthy people. You might believe the relative bioavailability of ubiquinone vs. ubiquinol varies with age, but you won't find any scientific support for this since Hosoe et al. (2007) is the only solid study of ubiquinol bioavailability.
Hosoe measures bioavailability as the amount of serum ubiquinol resulting from an amount of ubiquinol taken. I think a more standard measure would be the amount of serum total CoQ10 resulting from an amount of ubiquinol taken. Hosoe's measure combines two steps: the absorption and the redox. But for Hosoe's subjects "at all time points, the ratios of ubiquinol concentration to total coenzyme Q10 concentration ranged from 96.0% to 98.5%." These subjects' redox equilibria were so tilted toward ubiquinol that Hosoe's measure is a near match to the more standard measure.
The primary good done by CoQ10 is from ubiquinol in the blood. For Hosoe's subjects the ubiquinol:ubiquinone ratio varied from 24:1 to 66:1, but at both extremes the CoQ10 is almost all ubiquinol. In some ill people the ratio is smaller, but it would have to be very much smaller to significantly impact the amount of ubiquinol.
It is good to know there is no real benefit in multi dosing.
I'm wondering what makes CoQ10 so special for Peyronies. I read the study about CoQ10 and Peyronie's and they concluded it was probably so effective because it's a lipid soluble antioxidant. Why haven't the same results been seen with high dose vitamin E or other lipid soluble antioxidants?
I'm just thinking maybe dosing (or even megadosing within a safe range) other, even more powerful lipid soluble antioxidants, like astaxanthin, could be beneficial. Any thoughts?
Upon searching, I did see that crashbandit reported greater pain reduction using astaxanthin over ubiquinol.
Different antioxidants are effective for different biological issues. They are NOT all the same and are not interchangable. You have to have the right substance for the exact situation at hand. And just because Astaxanthin is effective, which does not surprise me, does not mean it is interchangable with CoQ10. CoQ10 has a unique antioxidant benefit to cellular mitochondria which is very likely what makes it effective. - George
Iherb sent me the wrong stuff, it is a dry powder capsule rather than the soft gels with coq10 in extra virgin olive oil.
Can I just take more tablets to make up for the lack of absorption?
If they did not send you what you ordered, you should let them know about it. They very likely would send the correct product. If you made a mistake in the ordering, you are out of luck on that level. For sure you can take any number of tablets, I don't know of any toxicity issues with CoQ10. But I am not sure that would make up for the inferior dry formulation. - George
Was just thinking that if it is absorbed half as well, I could take twice as much. I have no idea about that kind of absorption though to be honest, managed to forget everything I may have learned about that in my biology degree.
Thanks George, that makes sense.
As for the powdered CoQ10, I accidentally ordered that last time. I did just what you proposed, and started taking 2 200mg pills per day instead of 1. I can't really say if it particularly helped, but it made sense.
What's the recommended amount of Ubiquinol per day please?
The peer-reviewed study that showed CoQ10 as an effective treatment for Peyronies used 300mg/day.
Thanks.
I know this has come up in the past but things like this change.
Where do people see good values today in buying Ubiquinol?
It is expensive and to be on 300mg per day it is costing me about $40 a month. When I throw in all of my other supplements it is becoming a financial drag.
I know internet retailers will have specials from time to time. I recently saw a special on Jarrow Ubiquinol QH absorb (Kaneka) 200mg tablets on Total Health for around $40.
I would appreciate others sharing any good values they know of on purchasing Kaneka Ubiquinol.
Thanks.
Good Luck
I have always used the top of the line Life Extension product, but now I am trying to save some money with this one:
http://www.iherb.com/Healthy-Origins-Ubiquinol-New-Soy-Free-Non-GMO-Formula-100-mg-150-Softgels/12109 (http://www.iherb.com/Healthy-Origins-Ubiquinol-New-Soy-Free-Non-GMO-Formula-100-mg-150-Softgels/12109)
These always seem to have offers on. Just ordered some from the UK site.
Ubiquinol Supplements | Ubiquinol Products | at Puritan's Pride (http://www.puritan.com/ubiquinol-639?searchterm=ubiquinol&rdcnt=1&sortorder=2&Page=1#tab=tab-1)
Hey guys, late to the party as ushz. BioQ10 SA is the name of a superior, so they say, ubiquinone made by Mitsubishi, who lays it all out, and I'm sure this ain't new info around here. But I don't see that there should be such either/or worries about the CoQ10 issue. Take both, ubiqunol, and ubiqunone. Why not?The trur value of these chemicals, IMO, is if they can "rejuvenate" the single most important antioxidant we ingest--Vitamin C--in the so-called "redox" cycle. Alpha lipoic acid supposedly can, as well as forms of Vit E. There may be another thread on C, but the serious claims made at the Linus Pauling Instititue about reversing clogged arteries, taken along with Lysine, seems to be more relevant to Peyronies than anything claimed by the CoQ10ers. !
Hi, can someone please tell me (or even offer a specific product recommendation) what form of Ubiquinol I should be taking? I see there are two different forms, and I just want to order whatever would be more effective. I'm 25 if that factors in to the decision (I saw someone say the one form is better for older people because of the way it is metabolized).
If someone would even be so kind as to offer a link to a trustworthy product on Amazon.com, I'd appreciate it.
Also, I've had Peyronie's for almost three years. It has seemed to remain fairly stable with no real improvement or worsening. I'm wondering if there's actually any benefit to me taking this now, or is it something that would only have helped early on while the plaque was forming?
Rags
In your age CoQ10 is just fine and much cheaper than Ubiquinol.
For better understanding:
Coenzyme Q10/Ubiquinone - Ubiquinol - Peyronies Society Forums (https://www.peyroniesforum.net/index.php/topic,1299.0.html)
James
Hey guys, I was thinking back to when my peyronies had recovered the best. And that was when I was taking grapeseed extract. I also think coq10 helped, but grapeseed extract helped the most. So I'm going for an experiment, and I'm going to megadose both of these.
Now usually I buy most of my stuff from iherb.com. Then I remembered I always find it cheaper of ebay, or if I look around.
And I found these: CoQ-10 600mg 900 Capsules Coq10 Co Q10 Coenzyme Anti Aging Cardiovascular | eBay (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/CoQ-10-600mg-900-Capsules-Coq10-Co-Q10-Coenzyme-Anti-Aging-Cardiovascular-/290921797845)
Much cheaper than buying the 100mg Doctors best from iherb.
Also grapeseed extract has always been cheap for me because I buy it in powder form and cap it myself. And I found out bulkpowders are now selling 250g for £19.99! While before I was paying £9.99 for 100g on myprotein.com. Grape Seed Extract | Grape Seed Powder | BulkPowders (http://www.bulkpowders.co.uk/grape-seed-extract.html)
So I've bought 1000g of grapeseed extract £73.96 (you get a further 8% discount for buying 4), when usually this would cost me around £100 (10 x 100g). I also bought 2000 capsules (£22.98), though with this much grapeseed extract I should be able to make 3000-4000 capsules.
Anyway the best purchase I've seen though is the 600mg coq10 from ebay. I'm not trying to promote these sellers, and if you're on a budget it's still costly (£200+) for what I'm doing, but it should last me about 5 months of megadosing (so around £40 a month).
Anyway my regime will be:
2x 600mg Coq10
2x Grapeseed Extract (i think rought 500-600mg in 00 capsules)
2x Gotu Kola (can't remember dose, 500mg I think)
1x 500mg vitamin c
3 times a day with meals.
So I will be getting 3600mg of Coq10, 3600mg of Grapeseed extract, and 1500mg of Vitamin C a day.
I will also take 1 vitamin D 2000ui with a meal, and b complex in the morning. I could take 3 x vitamin d since it's dirt cheap, but too much vitamin d constipates me.
Anyway 900/6 = 150 days, or 5 months. So my regime will last me 5 months before I have to restock on coq10. The other supplements I have an excess or, and vitamin c and d are dirt cheap anyways.
So I thought I'd tell you guys this. I'm waiting for my orders to come through, I live in the UK, so it will take awhile to recieve the coq10. I'll get the grape seed extract in 2 days, but then I have to spend about 5+ hours capping it, but once it's done, it will last me 8+ months of high dose grape seed extract.
From what I remember grape seed extract had the most pronounced effect at reducing my peyronies, but I stopped taking it because I ran out of capsules. Coq10 I've been taking 300mg a day, but because it's expensive, I can't megadose it. Luckily I found that seller on ebay, which makes megadosing possible at a resonable price. The only concern is, is this stuff really coq10, and is it really 600mg. With supplements you never really know, and that's why you stick to brands. But this is the risk I'm going to take. I will know the grape seed extract is legit, because I've taken it before and know what it looks and taste like.
Also this could potentially last me 10 months (costing me £20 a month), if I can implement my alternate day fasting (I'm trying to lose weight as well).
Also vitamin c has a synergenic effect when it comes to blood vessles, and a healthy heart. So it can only benefit my peyronies I believe.
Lastly I'm dropping the pentox! Pentox is great and everything, but if I take it during the day I lose focus and short term memory. And if I take it before bed, I don't get a good night sleep.
Also the curiosity that a megadose of Coq10 and Grapeseed Extract working alone might work, is another reason why I want to drop the pentox.
So I'll be you're guinne pig on megadosing these 2 supplements for you, and hopefully have some positive feedback to give you in 5 months time. Though if I find any improvement after a couple of months I'll be sure to report it.
Just remember I have to wait for my packages to arrive (one from america), and I have to cap all that grape seed extract.
Lastly lastly! If it costs me roughly £200-300 for a 5 months supply to cure my peyronie's, then I'm not bothered. It's always worth investing in something that works. But as we know with peyronie's, nothing is certain, there is no cure as of yet, only hints and somethings work, other things don't. So if it doesn't work, I guess I'll be a bit sad, but at least I know my heart health will have increased immensly.
Hope this is of interest to you guys. If you want to discourage me trying this or become immensly critical of this plan, well I'm still going to do it, plus I've bought all the stuff now. Also I'm not saying it's going to work, I have doubts as much as you do, and will reserve my thoughts on it after the experiment is over. But hopefully something good will come out of this experiment, and help others. But like I said, I'm your guinnee pig, so sit back, relax, and don't waste your money, because I'm not recommending anything. But also, I do believe my peyronies was at it's best with grape seed extract. I always remember my penis being soft after taking grape seed extract when usually it would be hard flaccid.
Adios!
There has been some talk in this forum about the negative effects vitamin C has on peyronies. Perhaps some other guys can chime in because I can't remember the thread. But you may want to look into it before adding that to your regimen.
But good luck!
Have you looked at your diet carefully ? Really the supplements are not bad, but without a good diet, exercise, adequate sleep ect, I don't think you will get the optimum effect. I am not sure these are really a megadose, but it is generally believed that the lowest dose of the highest quality brand will yield the highest efficacy and least side effects. Do not be afraid to experiment with different suppliers and dosages, and most importantly be patient.
Quote from: RoyHobbs on June 25, 2013, 02:41:10 PM
There has been some talk in this forum about the negative effects vitamin C has on peyronies. Perhaps some other guys can chime in because I can't remember the thread. But you may want to look into it before adding that to your regimen.
But good luck!
I had heard in past from some medical sources & nutritionists that high dose vitamin C may be good for reducing inflammation. I've never heard anything good or bad about it in relation to peyronies but would assume it wouldn't hurt. I had an ex GF who took high doses of vitamin C to treat her asthma and swore it worked for her and got her off asthma meds.
Muffslayer, what makes you think the grape seed extract will help with peyronies? What does it do in your system?
-Thanks
I just remember my penis feeling softer after taking it. To me peyronie's and hard flaccid go hand in hand. If my hard flaccid improves by a supplement, I believe my peyronie's is improving too, or at least it's good for my penis. Hard flaccid improves a lot by massaging trigger points in the pelvis, not sure about peyronie's. I don't have any evidence, that's why I need to try this out, though I won't be able to distinguish between coq10 and grape seed extract on what worked.
One thing I'm trying to gain back is girth. I went from 5" to 4.5". And it has mainly affected the whole of the right side of my penis, and partly the left side. My penis is mostly straight with pentox, but can bend to the right without it. But girth is the main thing I need to regain. My penis has ridges in it as well, a few bumps up and down both sides.
BTW I initially got peyronies by taking oral anabolic steroids and ballooning when trying to enlarge me penis. Then I recovered, then I damaged it again doing penis exercises like jelqing and taking steroids while ballooning again (This was like 3 years after, but it seems like I didn't learn). Now I'm just trying to recover and forget about PE at all. Yes I would love a 5.5 or 6" girth, but I would settle for my original straight 5" girth now.
Steroids + Ballooning = Bigger Penis (http://www.pegym.com/forums/chemical-pe/37099-steroids-ballooning-%3D-bigger-penis.html)
Also it seems anything can aggrivate my peyronie's now. T3 thyroid medication made it worse, 20mg of cialis or normal viagra makes it worse, if I smoke I feel some pain (I quit smoking). I don't really take jack crap now when it comes to artificial stuff, but I'm currently in a phase where it seems like anything will aggrevate it. Even certain foods aggrevate it, like bacon, gammon, or cheese.
So I've recovered before to the point where food or cialis never aggrevated it, then I screwed up again trying to get my dick larger, now everything seems to aggrevate it. And I look back at my recovery, and even though I took 300mg of coq10 back then as I do now, my peyronie's is not recovering greatly. Then i remembered I also took grape seed extract. I didn't take gotu kola back then either, so I'm hoping grape seed extract is the key. Anyway my grape seed extract is coming today. I'll take me 6 hours + to cap them all. I might try and cap only 1000, and maybe 1000 next time.
But I'll start taking it tomorrow while I wait for my coq10 to come.
Muffslayer:
I am sure that many guys on the forum would like to have a better description of the ballooning you mention in your post below. Also, they might like to know more about the ''trigger points'' in the pelvis area as well. Any good information you can post about this would greatly enhance knowledge to guys who exhibit the same symptoms you have.
Old Man
Well ballooning is pretty much a mystery among PE forums, so I doubt I'd be any better at describing it. Neither do I think I completely mastered it either. But basically it's just a new type of masturbation. You use lubricant, for example baby oil, and then you rub the glans and shaft of the penis that is facing you, completely forget about stimulating the other side. That's it. You're then meant to do this for 30m to 2 hours without ejaculating, by bringing you to the point of no return, then stopping while lightly clenching your butt cheeks/tailbone to help dissapate the urgency (don't clench the PC muscle, your penis should not move up and down). Clenching the butt cheek/tailbone is harder to master, but just feel like your clenching, without moving the dick up and down, practice and you'll get there. Ballooning is also not the so called edging where you masturbate normally to the point of no return, then stop. Rather all you stimulation is on the glans and shaft of the penis facing you, but avoid the neck of the glans i.e just below the glans.
Secondly trigger points are some sort of muscle tension. Basically go round with 2-3 fingers pressing on your pelvis hard and massaging it in a circular motion. If you feel a sharp pain or dull pain/numbness, then massage that area, and come back to it the next day, or a weeks time, depending on how sore it is afterward. For example I've found pain right next to both sides of the penis in my pelvis, so not the actualy penis, but the ligaments connecting to it. Also where my lowerabs meet the pelvis. Just go down to your pelvis with 2 fingers, and anywhere it hurts, massage it. You might think obviously poking your muscles like this is going to hurt, but trust me, it's not meant to. After you massage that trigger point, depending on how bad it is, it will eventually go away. When you first massage it, you might be bruised or tender the next day, so rest from that point, let it recover, and do it again. Eventually you will massage, and there will be no pain there at all.
Also if you people want to do your back, get a foam roller. And for any other body part, those rollers with a ball in it that spins round.
Not sure if massaging trigger points will help peyronie's, but it will help hard flaccid.
Ok, so I underestimated the time it would take to cap 2000 capsules. It took me 10 hours of continuous capping, no breaks, except going to the toilet, but they are all now done thankfully; but next time I will be buying a new capping device that caps 100 at a time rather than 24, and you don't have to put each cap in the hole individually, but can pour them on and rattle the tray and they go in the holes automatically (saw this off ebay for £64). Anyway 2000/6 = 333 days. So 6 capsules a day should last me 11 months, and thats if I always take 6 capsules every day without breaks. But I will be giving my mum 1 a day to help her with her blood pressure (she doesn't know I'm taking it for peyronie's), and I might cut down to 4 capsules a day since 4 is already a lot of GSE. Still haven't got my coq10 yet.
I found these:
Health and longevity benefits of plant polyphenols – focus grape seed extract | AGING SCIENCES – Anti-Aging Firewalls (http://www.anti-agingfirewalls.com/2011/07/19/health-and-longevity-benefits-of-plant-polyphenols-%E2%80%93-focus-grape-seed-extract-2/)
Grape Seed Extract Offers Many Benefits (http://www.naturalnews.com/029223_grape_seed_extract_health.html)
Grape seed extract news, articles and information: (http://www.naturalnews.com/grape_seed_extract.html)
Grape seed extract enhances eNOS expression an... [Cell Biol Int. 2010] - PubMed - NCBI (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20513234)
It seems like GSE has a range of benefits, but one in particular which is also coq10's strong point, is it helps improve mitochondria function. Could you imagine improving mitochondria function was the answer for peyronie's (just making a casual link because coq10 does this, and is proven to help peyronies), I'd be cured with this combination in high doses, but who knows, things are never that simple.
The other things GSE help with is lowering blood pressure, antioxident protection (also these antioxidants pass the blood brain barrier easily for neuroprotection), enchances nitric oxide production (maybe a cheaper and safer way than taking low dose cialis/viagra?), reduce heart disease and cancers (lung, skin, prostate), protects liver, better wound healing, skin and blood vessles improvement, helps demntia and alzheimers, and probably several other things.
I've taken 100's of different supplements over the years, most of them you won't notice too much of anything, just a hope that they're doing something good. So I don't expect anything extraordinary with GSE, I'll just assume it's doing it's job, and probably doing it slowly. Whatever the case, I'm come not to pin my hopes on many supplements or one magic supplement, they are great for maintenance and helping with stuff, but most super supplements or foods aren't the solution to all your health problems, especially something as complex as peyronies. For example pentox for peyronie's is really helpful, but comes with the side effects of disturbed sleep and loss of focus, and seems to be ineffective at long term low doses, for example 1 tablet a day which I and others were taking, thinking we could minimize the side effects and still heal.
Anyway I don't know why I'm blabbing on. I think GSE will help with my general health a lot, but whether it will help with a problem as complex with peyronie's we'll have to find out. Also I've got a load of supplements already prepared in my pill boxes, and since I'm not just going to chuck them, it's going to take 20 days or so before they're all empty and I can fill them up with my new supplement regime; but from tomorrow I will start taking 1 GSE a day until I can fill these pill boxes with the new regime making it easy to take, if that makes sense.
Bye.
Why not just add a teaspoon of the coq10 to meals or shakes for each dose ?
If you read the first post, I bought the coq10 in 600mg capsule form, it's not a powder.
But the GSE is a powder, and if you've ever tried to take GSE as a power, you will know it is some of the foulest stuff in the world! Even worse is it doesn't mix well but stays at the top of the glass and then sticks to your throat when you try an drink or shot it. Trust me, I will be able to stick to a regime 100% more if GSE is in the form of capsules. And no I'm not a p~$$% when it comes to powders, I can take several not great tasting powders (citrulline, alcar), but for GSE I'll stick to making capsules.
Thanks for correcting me. The only other things I could recommend would be making an infusion (tea) and see if it dissolves. If it does not then you could make an alcohol tincture (ie mix with vodka) and then take a teaspoon as the dose, however they will not taste good, but you can add glycerine to improve the flavor.
Wow I typed in mitochondria and peyronies in Google, and the ALCAR study comes up! Seems as though they think ALCAR may have helped peyronies by increasing mitochondria. And we know coq10 has been proven to help peyronies, and it's biggest function is increasing mitochondria in the cells. And we also know GSE increase mitochondria, and my anecdotal experience feels as though it helped with my hard flaccid.
I think we should be looking into supplements that ramp up, help, or increase the efficiency of mitochondria, and see if this has a postive effect on peyronies. I'm writting these thoughts down now so I don't forget them.
One thing I noticed with the GSE (Grape Seed Extract), is that my veins become very vascular. This was before my coq10 arrived, I took a few GSE. And now I've been on a couple of days coq10 and GSE, I've noticed I'm getting erections a lot when I think of erotic thoughts.
If I had to say anything, it would definitely be the GSE, just because I observed the vascular veins a few days prior when I didn't have my coq10 yet. Also the stufy I posted below saying GSE increases Nitric Oxide expression.
The reason I'm bringing this up is because I'm amazed it has such a significant effect. I just assumed yes it enhances it, but it can't be that much. You find out things like a certain vitamin does so many different effects, but are weak, and generally good for, rather than noticable.
Also you have to remember my doses are huge, so this observation is probably biased. You could buy standard GSE capsules which are lower dose, and it has no effect on your veins or erections at all.
Also I'm not following a strict 3 times a day. Sometimes it's 2, maybe 1. But I think as long as I'm consistent it will be alright. For example if I took only 1 of my premade selection of pills, I'll still be getting 1200mg of CoQ10 and 800-1000mg roughly of GSE, plus the gotu, vitamin c, and other stuff.
Also I forgot to say but I have currently been successful at fasting every other day since the 1/07/2013. So I've only taken my formula on 2 days (the 2nd, and today 4th), because on the 1st, and 3rd I didn't eat or take any supplements. So fasting has loads of benefits as well to my health and could be contributing to the responsive erections. Plus if i keep this up as a lifestyle, I'll loose the 30lbs I need to loose, and double how long my supplements will last (Coq10 would last for a year, and GSE would last for 2 years!).
Also my penis does feel softer, less inflammed or hurting.
Anyway that's all I've got for you.
I forgot to mention GSE has research to say it may inhibit aromatase, i.e. the thing that converts testosterone into estrogen in your body. So I may have an increase in testoserone, and lowered my estrogen, which could contribute partly to the erections.
Grape Seed Extract inhibits aromatase (http://www.ergo-log.com/aromatasegse.html)
I was looking for peoples reviews on GSE and it's effects on them, and found this brand.
Amazon.com: Olympian Labs Grape Seed Extract 400mg, 100 capsules bottle: Health & Personal Care (http://www.amazon.com/Olympian-Labs-Extract-capsules-bottle/dp/B000UZUAFA/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top)
According to the reviews, and myself, it does seem to be much cheaper than other brands for the dosage (400mg).
Just take an example of the NOW Brand, it's only 250mg, with 90 capsules, and only 4$ cheaper.
Amazon.com: NOW Foods Grape Seed Extract 250mg, 90 Vcaps: Health & Personal Care (http://www.amazon.com/Foods-Grape-Extract-250mg-Vcaps/dp/B000NL8XTQ/ref=sr_1_2?s=hpc&ie=UTF8&qid=1372971407&sr=1-2&keywords=grape+seed+extract)
Obviously the Olympian brand is much higher value to money, and near my dosages.
I just posted that here just incase anyone was thinking of trying GSE for a decent price, and didn't want to cap it themselves (which is a huge pain in the ass).
Also there are some amazing experinces in the reviews. But one that caught my eye, which I think might help our problem a bit, is someone said it helped him with hi broken capillaries. I'll paste the review below, it's from the olymbian brand amazon product page (the first link).
Quote
Appears to be helping heal broken capillaries!
Unfortunately, most of my life I never found results in holistic treatment... until lately, and as I've gotten older. I'm adding this product to my list of things that actually worked for their intended purpose, which in my case recently was an outbreak of noticeable broken capillaries on my inner ankles near the ankle bone and heels, also on my face which in the past my dermatologist had no lasting or reasonable treatment for.
Since taking grape seed extract only a short time I am seeing capillaries heal! I sought information through Google to see if by chance there was improvement in cures for this unattractive and embarrassing condition, only to find people claiming Grape Seed healed them. Naturally I was skeptical, but having no other solutions decided to give this a try. To my amazement I am already seeing a difference. It appears to be working on red veins in the upper thighs, but I have yet to see radical change in larger and darker veins. It's still early and I now have hope.
So far I'm using four natural remedies that have been working surprisingly well, and they are:
1) Glucosamine chondroitin complex (1500mg Glucosamine, 1200mg Chondroitin for cartilage injured knee)
2) Valerian Extract (6000mg for severe muscle spasm, Occipital Neuralgia/migraine) This high dose I've only found in Botanic Choice Liquid Extract, and use Planitary Herbals Easy Sleep 900mg time release for continuous relief.
3) Culturelle Probiotic (for digestive health/IBS)
4) Grape Seed Extract (400mg for capillary damage)
I'm finally becoming a believer that not everything we need to treat ourselves must come from a prescription or through advice of a doctor at a premium cost of office visits and chemical pharmaceuticals. Only one thing I found useful years ago was Golden Seal Root which we can no longer purchase OTC thanks to our concerned and caring medical experts proclaiming it a prescription level blood purifier. Your results may vary, but it's worth taking a shot, and this time not from the doctor's office! It's funny how I started out in life working for a health food store only to discover in later life what actually helps and isn't yet another fad or trend, or way for some to make money off the ill for large amounts of money. Good luck to you all, and na zdrowie (good health)!
I'm just thinking anything that helps with veins or capillaries is helping peyronies or my penis in general, just my belief, probably true, but obviously the complexity with peyronie's, scars, and what not, I'm not going to say for sure, but I believe it might help our condition.
So if any of your guys wanted to try a megadose of GSE for a month, take 3 a day of the olympian brand (1200mg of GSE), 1 with each meal, and you might be getting some of the erection and vasularity effects I'm getting with GSE.
I heard that Dr. Lue sometimes prescribes coQ10 to help with pain. I'm trying to figure out how to properly add coQ10 to the pentox and L-arginine that I am already taking. Should I take 300 mg just once per day? Or should I split the dose throughout the day? Does the brand of coQ10 matter? What are the recommended brands? Can anyone confirm that Dr. Lue does indeed prescribe coQ10 to some of his patients? Does anyone have a link that details his treatment plan?
Thisismyusername
We have a debate regarding CoQ10
Coenzyme Q10/Ubiquinone - Ubiquinol - Peyronies Society Forums (https://www.peyroniesforum.net/index.php/topic,1299.0.html)
Take your time and read it, you will find all the answers.
James
To save you some time, you should probably take the cheaper CoQ10/Ubiquinone if you're under 40, and the much more expensive Ubiquinol if you're over 40. I too just restarted taking CoQ10 (I'm under 40) and am interested in what brands you should take. I know a lot of retailers like Walmart sell a special CoQ10 in a big black box that claims to be better than other CoQ10s in a lot of different ways, and am wondering if the extra cost is worth it. It's $28 for 120 100mg pills at Walmart.
Hi,
I am 30 years old and think I have slight Peyronies. I want to treat this with Ubiquinol as I heard this works. Any success here and how much should I take? Is this safe and it will not make it worse right? Thanks :)
Hopefully george99 will chime in here as he has read a lot about it and used it for quite a while now. But the below study and huge discussion thread on this forum should get you started:
Coenzyme Q10/Ubiquinone - Ubiquinol - Peyronies Society Forums (https://www.peyroniesforum.net/index.php?topic=1299.0)
Safety and efficacy of coenzyme Q10 ... [Int J Impot Res. 2010 Sep-Oct] - PubMed - NCBI (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20720560)
Ubiquinol certainly worked for me. It afforded me very obvious benefit on top of what I was already achieving with Pentoxifylline. I have since discontinued Pentoxifylline, but continue taking 300mg per day of Ubiquinol. The two operated by different pathways and I found them to be complementary. Neither are a cure, but both offer significant benefit. The sooner one starts taking them, the better. That's my opinion after close to a decade experience with Peyronie's. - George
Thanks guys. George how did it help you? I have a slight dented area on the left side of penis. Been that way for nearly 7 years. Think it could help? I think my erection is 80% of what it use to be before this all started. Thanks
Guys Ubiquinol cannot make you taller can it? I have read this can make you taller. I am already nearly 6'6 so I cannot get any taller lol. I am 30 years old and I know some say its impossible to grow taller at this age but I disagree. I think I grew an inch in the last 1-2 years some how. But I am worried this could increase my height. Am I being paranoid?
howcan:
My advice is to get into pro basketball if your are growing taller! My wife taught a basketball player from Europe in a local college piano lessons to help with his coordination when playing in competition games. He was told to do this by his coach.
Just kidding about the pro thing, but don't worry about how tall you get if you see success from any therapy for Peyronies Disease.
Old Man
Ubiquinol helped me by dramatically reducing pain, and in the past pain had always been followed by physical changes like bending, shrinking, dents, etc. Once the pain stopped, the physical deterioration stopped. This was enough evidence for me that the research showing benefit from CoQ10 is accurate and that CoQ10 is, indeed, effective in treating Peyronie's. People make all sorts of claims about CoQ10 and other things, mainly because they want to sell them. I don't pay any attention to ANYTHING but actual academic research. And academic research ONLY supports the use of a few treatments and CoQ10/Ubiquinol is one of those. All the stuff about enzymes and herbs is just marketing and has no evidence whatsoever to support it. I don't have either money or time to waste on that stuff. I only use stuff that works. - George
George, ubiquinol helped me with pain WITH the addition of ALA (alpha lipoic acid) together...that was the magic combo for me. What's your thoughts on ALA? Are there any other supplements or pharmaceuticals you are taking these days? I remember you had done the best research into all of this in the past & I followed a lot of it. After a while, my stomach started getting irritated & I was spending too much money & not sure what I was doing to myself. I had way too much in my medicine cabinet & would like to just take what actually is anti-fibrotic, anti-inflammatory, helps pain & circulation, lowers oxidative stress, and promotes wound healing. I'm thinking the best cocktail these days would be:
- Ubiquinol
- ALA
- Vit D, E
- Arginine
- L-acetyl-carnitine
- Calcium / magnesium
- zinc / copper
- Fish oil
Rx
- Pentox
- Cialis or viagra - low dose
- Accolate if tolerable w/ LFTs periodically (not recommended for anyone else - totally theoretical & has liver risks)
Throw out
- Bromelain
- Milk Thistle
Not for Peyronies Disease but taking for eye health anyway
- Lutein
- Bilberry
Other
- Wheat free (see the book "wheat belly" about how wheat promotes inflammation and screws up many body processes)
- Low glycemic diet
- Soy free
- Not sure where you stand on dairy
Is there anything new about Ubiquinol / Coq10? I have read this thread a little and have noticed that not many have reported success alone from coq10. Probably due to the fact that many take in combination with other stuff so they can't know the specific effect it may or may not have. Anyone wish to comment who thinks this specifically has helped him?
QuoteCoQ10...Probably due to the fact that many take in combination with other stuff so they can't know the specific effect
This is the point.
It will help you regarding your lost of energy:
Ubiquinol - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubiquinol)
And a lot of information on the forum.
James
I just had a look at the wiki page: Coenzyme Q10 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coenzyme_Q10#Supplementation_effects)
All the evidence for the listed conditions seems to point strongly to the fact that coq10 is pretty useless in these cases.
And there were some cases where studies where pushed that are flawed in methodology and suspected to be financed by manufacturers. I wonder how reliable in the light of this is the Safarinejad study.
The Safarinejad study is about Pentox.
How it connects to CoQ10?
James
Safety and efficacy of coenzyme Q10 ... [Int J Impot Res. 2010 Sep-Oct] - PubMed - NCBI (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20720560)
I mean this one
I didn't know about it, I posted it on the library board
James
Quote from: emasculated on April 15, 2014, 03:52:49 PM
Quote modified by moderator.
melting - it come the time you read the forum rules regarding quote!!!
Not complying to the forum rules will result in a warning attached to your name.
James
If there is one guy that sems to check everything available to treat peyronies then Mohammad Reza Safarinejad .
Mohammad Reza Safarinejad - Iran | LinkedIn (http://ir.linkedin.com/pub/mohammad-reza-safarinejad/40/2bb/438)
Safarinejad MR - PubMed - NCBI (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=Safarinejad%20MR)[Author]&cauthor=true&cauthor_uid=20720560
I trust him..
His study was also over a long period of time.
And Q10 helped several people here with at least pain.
Now there is much talk about absorption issues. The problem with peyronies is that the tissue affected is in the worst spot possible. If you have already ED problems for example the tissue will get even less blood supply and thus less supplements/vitamins.
It was only shortly suggested in this thread but I will bring it up again.
DMSO might help with adminestering Q10 to where it should be.
Did anyone ever try q10 topicly/transdermally with DMSO?I will try it as soon as I get q10.
After one week on coq10 I noticed 3 things.
1. My plaque feels HUGE, much bigger than before. Bad thing.
2. Pain is improved.
3. My mood is better and I'm generally more energetic.
1. is a deal breaker though.. I hope it's only temporary and this does not actually increase plaque size.
Your increase in plaque size is unlikely related to coq10.
I will second Roy.
Not logic that CoQ10 will cause the plaque to increase.
James
The famous Iranian study has something interesting contained in it regarding a crossover to vascular disease, in which nearly 30% of those with Peyronie's were found to have vascular problems. It was pointed out that it was that 30% that improved the most, going on to describe the change in penile artery health following CoQ10 supplementation. This may mean that, it's CoQ10's ability to heal those issues that makes it so potent in treating Peyronies Disease. I think this is very cool, the issue then is that it's possible that it would not help those without vascularily induced Peyronies Disease or vascular problems as the study mentions.
After taking the supplement at 200, now 300mg a day for just a few weeks along with pycnogenol, my penis hangs better than I've had it hang in my life. Now this could easily be due to the more recent manual stretching I've been doing, but the improvement is very significant to me. My erections are very very solid, which could be from the pycnogenol's effect on nitric oxide production, but I think overall the combination of very potent antioxidants are doing their work!
Yesterday was the first day I really read that Iranian study, and I really am impressed. I figure I'll be taking this long term with results like that!
-V
My money is on the vascular issues being caused by the same thing that causes a penis to heal improperly, rather than being the cause of the Peyronie's itself. Very possible it would exacerbate Peyronie's though.
Quote from: emasculated on April 15, 2014, 03:52:49 PM
Quote changed by moderator!!! Please read the forum rules!!!Yeah, right--the CoQ10 manufacturers want to make a lot of money by selling huge volumes of CoQ10. So their evil genius plot is to:
1) Study a disease that is so obscure almost no one recognizes its name, and
2) Pay off a respected Peyronie's specialist in Iran to bias his results, because everybody automatically trusts research coming out of Iran, and any research that is done in Iran immediately makes it into the peer-reviewed journals without any serious criticism, because the Iranian Peyronie's research cabal is so powerful.
--------------------------
I don't think supplement manufacturers are any more honest than pharmaceutical companies--though they have only a tiny fraction as much money. (And pharmaceutical companies have already been shown to have deliberately withheld negative results; there is legislation pending on this in the US.) In any case, your criticism that manufacturers may have sponsored and therefore biased the results are quite valid--and they are far more valid in the case of most published studies of pharmaceuticals. Therefore following your logic, we can't believe anything...
...but, after your deep research on the topic (i.e. you read a Wikipedia entry--and those are never biased or incorrect) you choose to seriously question only one clinical, peer-reviewed study.
And you pick one where the financial stakes for the producers are so low that they would have to be idiots to spend any money on deception. Hey, that makes sense!
---------------------
By the way, Safarinejad's study on Pentox is considered to be the pioneering study on Pentox and Peyronie's. It was published a year before his CoQ10 study. If I am to doubt his CoQ10 study, then I really have to question his earlier Pentox study, because I assure you, Sanofi/Aventis Pharmaceuticals have a lot more cash than all the vitamin manufacturers in the world put together--and far greater profit margins, since they are behind a wall of patents.
I'm a little baffled. According to the Library, you provided the link to the CoQ10 study you are questioning--though only to the abstract.
I've read both of the full studies. Point by point, the studies were conducted in an almost-identical fashion; even the layout of the tables is similar.
Overall, the results of the CoQ10 study were more positive than the results of the Pentox study.
So, if you are going to throw away one of these two oral treatments, I'd throw away the Pentox first.
So why are you focusing on the CoQ10?
Well, I have not said it is suspect. I have simply given some examples of other studies with bad methodology. And I've also not mentioned any conspiracy theory. And btw, the Pentox Study is not accepted by the European Urology association, they find it suspect and therefore do not recommend Pentox for the treatment of Peyronies. Does that mean I find the study suspect as well? No, not necessarily.
The European medicine is far back than the US and the Asian regarding Peyronies because Europe want to show independence ;)
Expressing my private opinion.
James
I would add to this discussion the known fact that CoQ10 IS an ESSENTIAL nutrient and that too little of it can lead to mitochondrial damage which manifests itself as tissue damage. And a known depleter of CoQ10 is beta blockers AND beta blockers just happen to be associated with Peyronie's. Thus, beyond the "suspect" Iranian study, there is plenty of peripheral evidence that supplementation can only be helpful. And if it reduces pain, it will most likely reduce future scarring. Plaques come and go, enlarge and shrink. Scar tissue and resulting deformity are long term and are what you want to avoid. So don't waste too much time obsessing over lumps. Whether it is Pentox or CoQ10 or VED or whatever else. It is likely going to work better for some than others. For some it might not seem to work at all. But all of these known Peyronie's treatments are VERY UNLIKELY to actually make Peyronie's worse ever. There is such a thing as unrelated coincidence. "I was taking CoQ10 and my Peyronie's got worse, therefore CoQ10 obviously caused it." Well it could actually be that you might have gotten even worse without the CoQ10. There is no way aside from controlled trials to indicate whether something actually works. And the ONLY controlled trials we have show that CoQ10 works. Aside from that there are the peripheral known facts like those I mentioned above. AND aside from that, there are multiple people here who have experienced benefit. I would be very careful before writing ANY of these treatments off based on brief personal experience that can be very subjective and very misleading.
George:
Please give us your take on the differences between Qunol for us older guys versus CoQ10 for younger guys. I have started on Qunol Ultra for over 50 guys (soon to be 85 in September).
I have noticed a decrease in my belly fat and feel much better than before starting the supplement. Your comments would be greatly appreciated by and maybe other older guys on the main forum. I am on some beta blockers too.
Old Man
Old Man, I really can believe that Qunol could be helping you significantly. With various types of CoQ10, it is all about absorption since CoQ10 is notoriously difficult for the body to absorb. I really do believe that the Ubiquinol forms are better absorbed than Ubiquinone, but there is significant disagreement on that. So I would say to try both and to try various formulations and when you find what works best for you, BINGO! CoQ10 IS a very potent supplement for those who are in any way deficient, so I would say not to give up. If you try plain old Ubiquinone (ordinary CoQ10) and find it unhelpful, for sure consider trying the Ubiquinol forms even though they are quite expensive. Qunol itself is available both as Ubiquinol AND as Ubiquinone. But Qunol has a unique formulation that might be superior for certain people in addition to the Ubiquinol advantage.
George:
Thanks for the insight on these products. I am taking a brand of Qunol Ultra. It was recommended by my pharmacist friend who says it would work best for an old goat of 85 like me!
I have noticed one good side effect or it already. I have lost a good bit of belly fat without losing any inches in waist size of 38. That is good since I have a good wardrobe of 38 size pants and I don't need to replace them just yet!
My dosage is one large capsule per day after breakfast (as recommended by my friend). Based on my med list she says that I have to be careful of taking on supplements that might interfere with the RXd meds.
Thanks again, and hope this might help any members who are considering using CoQu10 of related supplements.
Old Man
Quote from: emasculated on July 10, 2014, 06:28:15 PM
...I have not said it is suspect...I've also not mentioned any conspiracy theory.
I don't know how else to interpret your original post. Quoting a Wikipedia page on CoQ10, you said that supplement manufacturers often pay for studies, and the studies often display flawed methodologies. Paying researchers to deliberately bias results is certainly what I would call a conspiracy.
And then you say that in light of all that, you question how reliable the Safarinejad CoQ10 study is.
To me, 'questioning the reliability" of something and "considering it suspect" are pretty much the same thing.
The wikipedia page on CoQ10 cited by emasculated is uncharacteristically biased in its analysis of CoQ10 as a treatment for various maladies. Remember, while usually a good source of information, specific topics on wikipedia are only as reliable as are their contributors. In this case, whoever edited this particular section of the CoQ10 page is obviously very biased against CoQ10, or more likely against supplements in general. There are actually lots of CoQ10 studies out there and it is easy to cherry pick those studies to come up with a given preferred result. Meta studies are particularly vulnerable to manipulation. If anyone is interested in just how biased this information from wikipedia is, I suggest they check this page out:
http://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements/coenzyme-q10/evidence/hrb-20059019 (http://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements/coenzyme-q10/evidence/hrb-20059019)
I find the opinions of Mayo Clinic to be of far more weight than an anonymously edited wikipedia page.
And Ursa, I understand your concern about the quote. But it is fairly easy to bring it up with the link James inserted. In the past, brief quotes have been allowed here, so I am not sure what James' concern is about your particular post, but I do know that long quotes can be a problem.
George
Different question: I'm using the soft-gel Coq10 capsules. I used to store them in cupboard. But since it's been hot these past weeks they're now totally soft and half melted. I think I have to throw them away... They are freakin expensive. :-(
Hence question: Can I store them henceforth in the fridge without problems?
That's a tough one. The manufacturers suggest a minimum storage temp of 59-86 F (15-30 C). One of them says exposures to freezing temperatures for less than a week doesn't affect potency, but that 'refrigeration is neither necessary nor recommended.'
My guess is that you'd probably be fine with storing them in a refrigerator as long as it isn't set too low. It's certainly a better bet than having the capsules melt together.
(I agree that they are far from cheap, but they seem to be cheaper in the US than in many places.)
I'm buying the cheapest veggie caps available, and loving them.
Maybe it's a bad choice but I prefer quantity over quality being as poor as I am right now.
With Peyronies Disease you better have no long stretches of not using anything to attack the tissue as it will harden again.
Isnt Qoq10 not always fro mthe same manufacturer in japan kaneka? Or was that only with the ubiquinol.
Quote from: UrsusMinor on July 31, 2014, 03:37:25 AM
(I agree that they are far from cheap, but they seem to be cheaper in the US than in many places.)
How much do you pay there in the US, Ursus?
I buy the NOW Foods Ubiquinol (100mg, 60 softgels) for 35.45€ which is around 47.61$
Caesar, I also use the NOW brand, but I use the 200 mg Ubiquinol softgels, 60 count (I take 400 mg/day). That usually costs $45.50 from Amazon US, shipping included, but sometimes they have discounts if you buy 2-packs or 3-packs, so I'd guess I'm paying about $40 per 60X, 200 mg. To get onto a comparable footing, that's about 33 cents US per 100 mg softgel.
The 100 mg, 60 count softgels are $24.70 from Amazon US, which is 41 cents per 100 mg softgel.
If you're paying $47.61 per 60X, 100 mg, then that's 126 cents ($1.26) per softgel, which is 3-3.8 times as much as I am paying, which is even worse than I thought.
But the prices, even on Amazon US, are all over the board. I can find prices here that are almost as high as you quoted, for the same NOW, 100 mg, 60-count bottles.
An economist would say this is an inefficient market. I'm not an economist, so I will simply say that this is totally screwed up.
I've been using Jarrow Formulas brand Ubiquinol (also from Amazon), 100 mg x 120 capsules for $31.50, which is markedly less expensive than the Now brands $45.50 for the same volume of Ubiquinol (200 mg x 60 = 100 mg x 120).
The Jarrow brand also currently has a 4.5 star rating from over 300 purchasers, so most people seem to be very happy with it - me included.
I am using the Jarrow brand now, as well. I source it from either iHerb or Amazon. Lately I have been getting it from Amazon as part of my Amazon Prime package.
I think mixing different brands is a good thing. Worst would be to be using one brand that is low quality.
Its so hard to determine what is good and what not.. Using 3 different brands will heighten the odds that you will get something good.
Regarding COQ10 / Ubiquinol.........."Jarrow" is an Excellent Brand of just about everything. That is what I have been using. It's not cheap, but you get what you pay for. Just FYI...dplookin
Jarrow is a great company. Life Extension is also great. Doctor's Best and NOW are also usually quite reliable.
I tend to buy two-month supplies, and follow whatever deal is available. It's surprising how the prices bounce around.
Melting has a good point, though--mixing it up might have advantages.
I would not lump CoQ10 into the category of a simple antioxidant.
" It has been reported that solubilized CoQ10 suppresses the expression of TGF-β1 induced by dimethylnitrosamine in mouse liver and mouse embryonic fibroblast cells.16 In addition, CoQ10 activates NF-E2-related factor-2 (Nrf2).16 Nrf2 overexpression itself reduces the basal expression of α-smooth muscle actin and TGF-β1.16 Therefore, CoQ10-induced Nrf2 activation may suppress TGF-β1 expression. This study is the first prospective, double-blind, placebo-controlled randomized study on the effects of CoQ10 supplementation in men with early chronic Peyronies Disease."
- Also "According to intergroup analysis, penile artery spectral traces were significantly improved in the CoQ10"
I have to say, since stopping CoQ10 2 weeks ago due to my credit card not going through my inflammation is back and I've even had some kind of progression. Of course it could be due to having too much alcohol recently but either way I can't foresee myself not taking this supplement for now. Good news is I ordered up a long supply.
I think if you are over 35 years old, CoQ10 is worth taking even if you don't have Peyronie's. As far as I can see, it's a no-regrets policy--it's good for you anyhow.
I agree with Neo that the antioxidant effects are probably irrelevant. It enhances mitochondrial function.