Just reposting this here as it seems we've moved to a new home
Quote from: daveman on 21/06/2012 19:55:04
The following post
http://poiscenter.com/forums/index.php?topic=423.msg4803#msg4803
is about something I?ve noticed before, that a full and complete ?O? seems to produce less symptoms than a partial or restricted one. In part it could be to do with retro-ejaculation (during a bad ?O?), which for me causes much worse POIS, or it could be to do with the PGD2 and PGE2 cycles. Not being to up on the biology, could somebody check out the referenced post and comment.
It seems that niacin for instance feeds the creation cycle of these prostaglandins, and if we orgasm too early the bad PGs are bolstered, whereas if we wait, the good ones are bolstered. Do I have this right?
In the post above, the dreamy state he mentions is associated with what I have felt when I ?O? early with too much niacin. However the benefit of the niacin is not as strong when that happens.
However like him, if my ?O?s? are complete (in a non-niacin scenario) the dreamy state is more prevalent yet my symptoms are less.
Can anyone decipher this?
Good versus bad seems to a complicated determination to make in relation to prostaglandins. I found an interesting article at
http://www.pensgard.com/nutrition/4_Prostaglandins.htmI don't have access to the original article but I did find some references on pubmed to support their description.
We know niacin releases pgd2 into the skin to produce flushing.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1373750Some of our symptoms like gastrointestinal issues could be explained by an overproduction of PGE1. However cognitive impairments from a prostaglandin imbalance may come from a deficiency of PGE1 (perhaps causing schizophrenia) or an increase in TXA2 causing depression.
There have been a few articles published which hypothesise that schizophrenia could be related to prostaglandin synthesis. Some of which hypothesise that some "successful" anti-schizophrenic drugs work by increasing prolactin levels and encouraging prostaglandin synthesis. However, medical science knows more about the different flavours of prostaglandin now so it's not merely a case of raising levels of all prostaglandins.
The schizophrenia and prostaglandin connection doesn't seem to have gone away. Here are some articles from pubmed.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/67391http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3520252http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20446881http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21334179Mice too
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19416671The article about PGE2 receptors in mice is very interesting as it appears medical researchers are figuring out that low levels of PGE2 may be implicated in diseases like ALS and alzheimers.
Niacin stimulates the synthesis of... You guessed it.. PGE2.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22442634So why would this be related to POIS? Simply because during an O we produce prolactin. Too much or too little would be a problem and would likely indicate a problem with balancing PGE2 levels.
A diet with too much trans fatty acids will inhibit prostaglandin production while a diet with enough b vitamins, protein, zinc, vitamin E and essential fatty acids (from fish oil for most people) could regulate production. What the right amount is and whether some unknown disease could affect the levels of synthesis is a mystery to me. It seems that any b vitamin deficiency, nutrient absorption problem or b vitamin deficiency could produce symptoms of cognitive impairment.
Another problem may be a mutant delta-6-desaturase gene as hypothesised in
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/3520252 or
some variant of a d-6-d malfunction.
(I have no idea whether any conclusive research has been done on the mutant d6d hypothesis but I do know that some research exists showing that arachidonic acid given to early stage alzheimer patients can lead to some improvement on cognitive tests).
If this was the case then there wouldn't be enough omega 6 fatty acids in the diet for prostaglandin synthesis. This seems unlikely given our diets are generally omega-6 rich but I've read some anecdotal reports of people who believe they're suffering from pyroluria (not getting into a discussion about whether this exists) that claim substantial improvements in concentration, anxiety levels and sleeping patterns when they supplement with zinc, b6 and arachidonic acid.
There could be an insufficient amount of ALA in the diet to produce Arachidonic acid or an inability to synthesise AA from ALA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linoleic_acidIt's worth noting (after reading
http://poiscenter.com/forums/index.php?topic=423.msg4803#msg4803) that liver was used to treat pernicious anaemia in the days before b12 injections and is also high in arachidonic acid.
