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Motor Neuron Disease
Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), also
known as Lou Gehrig's Disease in the United States, is a
progressive degenerative disease of the upper and lower motor
neurons. Motor neurons are nerve cells located in the brainstem,
brain and spinal cord. They are what allows the brain to
communicate to the voluntary muscles in the body. In ALS, the
motor neurons degenerate or die, and the muscles no longer receive
messages from the brain. Unable to function, the muscles gradually
weaken and atrophy, and complete paralysis results.
Other forms of motor neuron disease usually
involve only upper or only lower motor neurons and progress more
slowly.
Although it can affect anyone, ALS is most
often found in the 40 to 70 year age group and more often in men
than women. Once thought rare, it
actually has about the same incidence as Multiple
Sclerosis. The reason that there appear to be many more cases of
Multiple Sclerosis than ALS in our society is that MS patients
tend to live much longer - some MS patients have the disease for
30 years or more - whereas only 10% of ALS patients survive beyond
5 years of their diagnosis. Conventional medicine has no
idea of the cause nor can offer any effective therapy to slow or
stop progression.
However...
There are persons with MND who live much
longer than their counterparts, and there are more and more of
them each day. Despite the dire predictions of the medical
establishment, hope still remains, as the survival statistics are
generally based upon typical medical patients who have not have
tried any other alternative health supports.
If you would like to read about Eric Edney, a
man who has had ALS for 14 years and who has stopped the
progression of his illness and reversed many of his symptoms,
click this link. Steve
Shakel, an Australian living with ALS for more than 12 years, has
carefully researched and compiled a good and
comprehensive web
site offering the most information available in one location.
Consensus of those who have beaten the odds
and their care givers is that MND is most likely caused by a
cascade of events including, genetic predisposition, past trauma,
excessive motor neuron excitation and environmental stressors.
Possibly, at some total threshold point, a forward failing action
is started and the trauma of the degeneration produces even more
glutamate which additionally aggravates the situation.
Given that your genes are fixed
and past trauma is history, the logical avenue of treatment is
cleansing the body of all toxins and other stressors in hopes of
reducing the stress to the point that progression stops.
When the contributing events have been
minimized as much as possible, it may still be necessary to do
something more to stop the forward failing action of neuron death.
This may be similar to a falling line of dominos where once
started, one domino will knock over the next until something
intercedes and stops the forward failing action.
There are a number of possibilities but none
are proven. Mount Sinai School of Medicine has completed a
mouse
study on a
ketogenic diet with results that are more positive than most
other published work.
Hanau Holistic offers many possible
therapies that may help.
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