The results with MCTs in subgroups of Alzheimer's patients appears to be persuasive.
For medical fraud to be successful, claims of efficacy must be guarded and the testing
of these claims must be difficult. With the extraordinary claims made for MCTs and the
ease in which these claims could be verified, it is very unlikely such a misrepresentation
could be sustained. In the pharmacogenetic article for MCTs, a claim is made that a certain
subgroup of patients improved by almost 8 ADAS cog points over baseline within 90 days of
treatment. This is a very substantial claim. Current Alzheimer drugs might only provide
a point or two of benefit. If an Alzheimer patient were to have all three genotypes noted in
the article that confer benefit, such a patient would be expected to improve by over 13 points
versus baseline and have an almost 19 point advantage relative to placebo at day 90. I am
not aware of any Alzheimer medication that has made such an overwhelming claim of efficacy.
The claims made in the article could be readily tested in almost any memory clinic. It would only require
a few patients with very favourable (or unfavourable) genotypes to conclusively verify the efficacy of MCTs
in Alzheimer's disease. This is the age of pharmacogenetics.
It is also interesting to note that there isn't a substantial hidden financial motivation behind the MCT
research. It would cost me more to buy MCT on the internet than to buy the patented product.
There is a growing awareness of the importance of insulin pathways in Alzheimer's dementia. One
of the SNPs in the recent pharmacogenetic study was near the IDE gene. In certain haplotypes,
IDE rivals APOE in explaining ALzheimer disease risk. There are several other drugs in the neuronal
metabolism class that have also generated strong results in Alzheimer's dementia.
Edited by mag1, 07 April 2012 - 03:47 PM.