Welcome to the Vitamin B12 Patch blog! Find information on topics related to vitamin B12. This blog is dedicated to providing up to date research, news and resources pertaining to vitamin B12 supplements, symptoms of vitamin B12 deficiency and general health information surrounding the benefits of vitamin B12. Learn from, and contribute to information on B12, conditions caused by vitamin B12 deficiency and other connected subjects. This blog also provides B12 Patch product information and discusses some of the science behind the transdermal absorption method. Feel free to participate in blog discussions and contribute your opinion on the related topics covered in the Vitamin B12 Patch blog.
Usage of proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) is linked with B12 deficiency and other adverse effects, like osteoporosis. Your body produces stomach acids for good reason- to absorb vitamin B12 (cobalamin), iron and other essential nutrients. While heartburn is a painful symptom of acid reflux, having too few stomach acids can also cause debilitating symptoms.
What are PPIs?
Proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) are drugs that lower the amount of stomach acid your body produces. It’s a popular treatment for preventing acid reflux symptoms like chronic heartburn, and it’s more effective than other acid secretion inhibitors like H2 blockers (Tagamet, Zantac). Hospitals use PPIs to prevent stomach ulcers in 40%-70% of inpatients. Examples of proton pump inhibitors are Prilosec, Prevacid, Nexium, Aciphex, and Protonix.
The following illnesses and conditions are treated with PPIs:
Long-term PPI usage has been linked with nutritional malabsorption of vitamin B12 (cobalamin) and iron. Your body needs gastric acid in order to digest vitamin B12 foods sources like beef, chicken, fish, and eggs. Without stomach acids, vitamin B12 remains bonded to the food you eat and never enters the bloodstream, eventually resulting in vitamin B12 deficiency. Similarly, insufficient stomach acids also result in iron deficiency.
Because stomach acid production reduces with age, senior citizens, in addition to PPI users, are advised to check their vitamin B12 levels periodically. Other people at risk for B12 deficiency are vegans, people who suffer from autoimmune and gastrointestinaldisorders and anybody who has had gastricbypass or other gastrointestinal surgery.
Long-term PPI usage has been linked with increased risk of hip, spine, or wrist fractures resulting from severe osteoporosis. Researchers believe that PPIs inhibit calcium absorption and bone growth. In studies, high doses of PPIs were directly linked with osteoporosis, and that risk increased over time.
It should be noted that osteoporosis is also a vitamin B12 deficiency side effect from PPIs, as vitamin B12 benefits include sustained bone mass.
Increased chances of intestinal infection
Long-term and short-term PPI usage can lead to clostridium difficile infection (diarrhea), according to scientific studies published by the Archives of Internal Medicine.
If you stay at a hospital and are given proton pump inhibitors, your chances of acquiring pneumonia during your visit is increased by 30%, according to studies. While the use of PPIs for preventing stress-related ulcers is a valuable life-saving procedure, a significant amount of hospital patients who receive PPIs are not at risk for suffering from ulcers.
Rebound acid hypersecretion
If you try to wean off proton pump inhibitors, you’re likely to experience severe withdrawal effects, including sudden overproduction of stomach acids- hypergastrinemia. For this reason, PPI users become dependent on the heartburn drugs, and may suffer from adverse effects such as diarrhea, stomach tumors, and neoplasia. Dependence on PPIs happens quickly, as early as one month into prescription.
Heart disease
Studies have linked PPI usage with decreased effectiveness of clopidogrel (Plavix), a medication prescribed for heart disease. Also, decreased vitamin B12 is linked with increased risk for heart disease and stroke through elevated levels of homocysteine.
Have you been diagnosed with GERD, or one of the other illnesses treated with PPIs? If so, have you noticed vitamin B12 deficiency symptoms like chronic fatigue, “pins and needles” in hands and feet, memory loss, and anxiety?
As always, we welcome your comments, inquiries, and suggestions!
Read more about vitamin B12 deficiency and your gut:
Everybody knows about Alzheimer’s disease; did you know that dementia from vitamin B12 deficiency can happen before you hit old age? Vitamin B12 deficiency and pernicious anemia are common causes of dementia. And so do many other diseases and conditions.
What is dementia?
Dementia is a brain disorder that causes you to lose thinking skills like memory, reasoning, language, and social awareness. Dementia is a progressive condition- the symptoms of dementia only worsen with time. Degenerative dementia is permanent, meaning that the brain damage that caused dementia is irreversible. Some kinds of dementia can be reversed if the cause is caught in time; such is the case with a brain tumor. Alzheimer’s disease is one of the most notable types of degenerative dementia.
Short-term memory loss: While dementia patients don’t usually have difficulty remembering things from their childhood with crystal-clear vision, they are likely to forget messages, conversations, or doctor’s appointments from the previous day…or hour.
Moodiness: Alzheimer’s disease patients may shift through moods in the blink of an eye- one minute content, the next minute expressing deep anger, and rage. Paranoia and depression are common traits of elderly individuals suffering from dementia. Often, people with dementia lose interest in things like hobbies and social clubs that they used to enjoy. In some cases, they may become antisocial and exhibit bad behavior in public.
Difficulty communicating: People with dementia tend to have circular conversations, immediately forgetting what they spoke of a moment ago, and returning to the same topic. They also have trouble recalling everyday words, as their vocabulary skills have decreased significantly.
Decreased perception skills: Dementia patients have great difficulty understanding new or foreign concepts.
Inability to multi-task
Cognitive decline: Senior citizens with dementia have trouble thinking abstractly, figuring amounts, and using logic.
Dementia is caused by various illnesses and injuries, including:
Alzheimer’s disease
Stroke (Vascular dementia)
Dementia with Lewy bodies
Huntington’s disease
Multiple sclerosis
Parkinson’s disease
Pick’s disease
Progressive supranuclear palsy
Brain tumor
Head injury
Chronic alcoholism
Vitamin B12 deficiency (Pernicious anemia)
Certain cholesterol-lowering medications
How do doctors diagnose dementia?
If your doctor suspects dementia, he will have to review the patient’s medical history and order various physical exams before he diagnoses dementia. Additionally, any underlying medical conditions that may contribute to dementia symptoms will be reviewed, such as low levels of vitamin B12 or history of depression.
The most common tests used to diagnose dementia are:
Neurological exam (mental status examination)
MRI brain scan
Vitamin B12 blood test
Ammonia blood test
Blood chemistry test
Thyroid test
Toxicology screening for alcohol
Cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) analysis
Electroencephalograph (EEG)
Head CT
Urinalysis
Treatments for dementia
Depending on the cause of dementia, your physician might prescribe one of the following treatments for dementia:
Vitamin B12 supplements, if vitamin B12 deficiency symptoms are the cause of dementia.
Acetyl cholinesterase inhibitor, for dementia with Lewy bodies
Do you or a family member suffer from short-term memory loss, chronic fatigue, or depression and anxiety? You could be suffering from B12 deficiency. Other symptoms of low B12levels include painful tingling or numbness in hands and feet, sore red tongue, unusual clumsiness, and tinnitus ear ringing.
Please share your experiences with our community, and let us know if you found this article helpful.
The immune system is a complex network of cells, and when things go wrong- as with autoimmune diseases, allergies, or immunodeficiencydisorders- the results can be debilitating at best…or deadly, at worst. Sometimes, telling the difference between various immune disorders can be confusing. Like, what’s the difference between gluten hypersensitivity and celiac disease? Find the answer below…
The immune system
Your immune system is a busy place- it’s made up of your lymph nodes, tonsils, thymus, bone marrow, and parts of your digestive system. The immune system’s main purpose in life is to protect your body from dangerous antigens, which could be anything from bacteria or cancer cells to viruses and toxic chemicals. (Sometimes, even somebody else’s blood or saliva can be labeled by your immune system as an antigen.)
Once your immune system picks up the scent of an antigen, it goes into attack mode, producing antibodies to destroy the “alien invader.” Not only that, but your immune system also sends white blood cells to gobble up the offending flu virus, germ, contaminant, or mutant cell.
Except when it doesn’t. Because sometimes, the immune system doesn’t react the way it’s expected to. When that happens, it’s called an immune system disorder.
There are many types of immune disorders, including allergies, autoimmune diseases, and immunodeficiency disorders.
Allergy and Hypersensitivity
When your immune system has an inappropriate response to a perfectly safe substance, then that is called an allergic reaction, or hypersensitivity. An example of an inappropriate reaction can be an overreaction to laundry detergent. With chronic allergies, your immune system is trigger-happy, reacting to numerous stimuli by producing histamines, causing uncomfortable and sometimes fatal allergic reactions like swelling, hives, congestion, diarrhea, vomiting, and headache.
People don’t usually inherit specific allergies. Still, if your parents (or at least, your mother) suffer from allergies, then you are likely prone to allergic reactions, as well.
Autoimmune diseases occur when your body attacks healthy cells in your body, mistaking them for antigens. There are over 80 kinds of autoimmune diseases, and they can affect any part of your body. Symptoms of autoimmune diseases often come and go; flare-ups cause debilitating chronic pain, and brief periods of remission offer some respite. While the disease itself can’t always be cured, the symptoms can be treated.
Common autoimmune diseases:
Pernicious anemia (vitamin B12 deficiency)
Crohn’s disease
Celiac disease
Fibromyalgia
Type 2 diabetes
Rheumatoid arthritis
Immunodeficiency disorders
Unlike autoimmune diseases or allergies, where the immune system is intact (albeit malfunctioning), immunodeficiency disorders occur when certain parts of the immune system are missing or deficient. Usually, an immunodeficiency disorder involves insufficient or malfunctioning white blood cells, or not enough antibodies.
AIDS (acquired immunodeficiency syndrome) is an example of an immune deficiency disorder caused by a human immunodeficiency virus- HIV. Some immunodeficiency disorders are inherited, as well.
What’s the difference between an allergy, and autoimmune disorder, and an immune deficiency?
When you have allergies, it is because your body overreacts to otherwise harmless stimuli, causing uncomfortable and sometimes harmful symptoms.
When you have an autoimmune disease, your body essentially attacks itself, causing damage to your digestive system, respiratory system, or muscles, for example.
An immunodeficiency disorder is when your body stops protecting you from foreign stimuli like viruses, toxins, bacteria, or tumors.
Did you figure out the difference between gluten sensitivity and celiac disease? With celiac disease, gluten triggers an autoimmune response that causes serious harm to your digestive system. People who have celiac disease must cut all gluten products from their diet. If eating starchy bread, cakes, or crackers gives you a stomachache, that doesn’t mean you have celiac. You might have gluten intolerance, which means that your body produces histamines whenever it detects gluten in your system.
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Vitamin B12 deficiency causes pernicious anemia, which creates horrible symptoms like painful tingling in your hands and feet, numbness, chronic fatigue, memory loss, depression, and even chronic clumsiness. What’s really behind all these debilitating symptoms, you wonder? Deranged DNA…
You’re mad, I tell you- Mad!
Pernicious anemia (PA) tends to creep up on you, like a scary monster in a B movie. You might not even realize you have B12 deficiency until you start noticing weird symptoms. Your hands and feet fall asleep on you while you sit at your computer. It feels like thousands of fire ants are crawling up your legs. Sometimes, you could swear that your mouth was on fire, like you ate a red chili pepper.
Only you didn’t…
Then PA attacks your brain, causing brain fog. You struggle to find the right words in conversation, left hanging while you awkwardly try to remember what you were trying to say. You walk into a room and immediately forget what you came in for. You forget to buy things on your mental shopping list. You wake up feeling drugged, exhausted, even though you had plenty of sleep the night before.
If you didn’t have your name printed clearly for you on your driver’s license, you just might forget it…
Pernicious anemia is an autoimmune disorder in which your body interferes with production of a very necessary protein- intrinsic factor. Intrinsic factor is produced in your stomach, and you need it to digest vitamin B12 (cobalamin). Without intrinsic factor, your body cannot extract vitamin B12 from food sources like beef, chicken, fish, and eggs. Instead, the vitamin B12 just passes through your intestines, without ever entering the blood stream.
Say goodbye to B12…
DNA production goes awry
If pernicious anemia sounds frightening, it’s because it does wicked things to your body. You need vitamin B12 for many important bodily functions, like protecting the nervous system, enhancing cognitive development, and maintaining adequate supplies of energy.
Most importantly, your red blood cells need vitamin B12 for DNA synthesis. With pernicious anemia, DNA synthesis in the red blood cells comes to a standstill, while RNA synthesis keeps chugging along.
And then, things get really weird…
Franken-DNA is born
The result is microcytic anemia, a type of megaloblastic anemia causing enlarged red blood cells. Not only are your blood cells too big to function normally, but they are also deformed. Your poor large red blood cells remain trapped inside your bone marrow, unable to leave because they have grown enormous in size.
Remember Alice, trapped in the White Rabbit’s house? Yeah, it’s kind of like that.
Hey, where’re all the red blood cells at?
Trapped in your bone marrow! And your body needs red blood cells to transport oxygen throughout the body. But with vitamin B12 deficiency, very few red blood cells manage to escape their “prison” in your bones, because they are too big to exit. Your red blood cell levels go way down, and you start to feel tired, anxious, and wiry.
Managing macrocytic anemia is simple enough if you know what’s causing it. Pernicious anemia from low B12 levels is just one cause. Other causes of enlarged red blood cells are alcoholism and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), among others. With alcoholism, B12 deficiency symptoms can still be the underlying cause of macrocytic anemia.
Vitamin B12 deficiency can be treated with vitamin B12 supplements. However, if your body can’t digest vitamin B12 because of lack of intrinsic factor, then you will have to use vitamin B12 supplements that bypass the digestive system and go directly into the bloodstream.
Examples of vitamin B12 supplementation used for pernicious anemia are routine B12 shots, sublingual B12 pills, and vitamin B12 patches. The B12 shots require a doctor’s prescription, and can be painful, as they have to be inserted into thick muscular tissue. B12 pills and vitamin B12 patches are readily available over-the-counter (OTC). Many patients have reported a burning sensation while using sublingual B12 tablets that dissolve under the tongue. No discomfort or irritation is reported with usage of the vitamin B12 patch.
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Read more about pernicious anemia and vitamin B12 deficiency
Frequent numbness in your hands and wrists, accompanied by painful tingling sensations can be annoying. It makes it hard to get your job done- if you sit at a computer or cash register, then you’ve probably experienced sore hands and wrists. Find out what causes hand numbness, and which exercises can relieve the pain.
Conditions that cause numbness and tingling in your hands
A number of health conditions may contribute to hand pain, tingling, and numbness. Below are some of the most common causes:
Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune disorder that causes chronic pain your joints, making it difficult to write, carry a plate, or button your clothes. While RA can strike any of the bones in your body, it is most common in the joints in your hands and feet. Symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis are stiffness, swelling, redness, and pain that come and go often.
Carpal tunnel syndrome is caused by pinched nerves in the wrist. It is caused by repetitive hand movements used in sports, knitting, typing, writing, painting, and playing musical instruments. Symptoms of carpal tunnel syndrome are painful tingling, weakness, and numbness in the hand, wrist, and fingers.
Diabetes often destroys small blood vessels, causing damage to your nerves. The result is neuropathic pain that usually strikes the hands and feet first, referred to as “stocking and glove” pain because it makes it difficult for diabetics to wear gloves and socks comfortably.
Vitamin B12 deficiency causes nerve pain that occurs in the hands, feet, and tongue. This is because vitamin B12 is essential for protecting the nervous system. A deficiency in vitamin B12 causes symptoms like painful tingling, numbness, and soreness in the hands and feet. Other kinds of pernicious anemia neuropathy include gait ataxia, sore, red tongue, altered taste perception, and burning mouth syndrome.
Here are some hand and wrist exercises that are used to relieve pain, improve range of motion, and strengthen muscles.
Prayer stretch: Put your palms together and elbows out, as in a yoga prayer pose. Lower your writs until you feel a gentle stretch, holding it for 5 seconds before returning to starting position.
Wrist flex: Extend your arm. Gently bend your wrists downwards, flexing your wrist muscles gently, holding for 5 seconds before returning to starting position. This may also be done with a tight fist.
Make a fist: Alternate between splaying out your fingers as wide as possible, holding for 5 seconds, and making a tight fist with your hand.
Bend your fingers: Put your hand up with your fingers together, as if motioning someone to stop. Slowly bend the top two knuckles of your fingers down, excluding the thumb.
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Read more about painful tingling in the hands and feet symptoms
If you’re following a heart-healthy diet, you can have your fries and eat them, too. Say heart health experts, eating fried foods won’t give you a heart attack, as long as you use the right kind of cooking oil. Whether you choose to sauté, pan fry, or deep-fry your potatoes, it’s all good. But before you go ahead and splurge on a deep fryer, find out what doctors say is “the catch” in enjoying oily snacks while avoiding heart disease.
Spanish scientists wanted to know if fried foods like French fries, doughnuts, or chicken nuggets are any less healthy for your heart than foods cooked without the frying method. So, they conducted a study that was later published by the British Medical Journal. Researchers focused their 11-year study of coronary heart disease on 40,757 Spanish test subjects, recording their eating habits and heart health. Here are some details of that study:
Two-thirds of the test subjects were female.
All of the subjects used in this study were deemed free of heart disease.
Participants were divided into 4 categories, from people who don’t often indulge in fried foods to individuals who ate the most fried food.
Scientists also recorded incidents relating to heart disease, such as heart attacks, angina, or heart surgeries.
By the end of the study, scientists recorded 606 hospital visits and events resulting from coronary heart disease.
However, when scientists linked each of the heart disease cases with one of the four categories, they found that test subjects from one group weren’t any more likely to suffer from coronary heart disease than were individuals from another group.
So, even if you order a side of onion rings with your veggie burger, your chances of dying from heart disease aren’t any worse than they would be if you proclaimed all fried foods a banned substance.
First off, the typical Mediterranean chef uses only healthy oils that are low in saturated fats in his cooking. Olive oils and sunflower oils both hold up well in high-heat cooking and both are exceptionally heart-healthy.
Also, it’s worth noting that the typical American fast-food franchise cooks its French fries in reused cooking oil that is high in trans fatty acids.
This doesn’t mean that fried foods are just as healthy, overall, as low-fat meal options. Oily foods are higher in calories, more likely to contain too much sodium, and most likely lead to morbid obesity.
Heart health tips that still ring true
As far as treating yourself to a fried concoction every now and then, it all boils down to portion control. You can have the home fries, as long as you log it into your food diary, and account for the calories and fat consumption. A fat calorie is a fat calorie, any way you cook it.
*Choose heart-healthy oils like olive oil, canola oil, and sunflower oil over artery-clogging palm oil and hydrogenated fats.
*Keep your weight down by tracking calories and keeping your daily fat consumption to a minimum.
*Exercise at least ½ hour per day.
*Avoid eating salty foods.
*Take all your vitamins and minerals, especially vitamin B12, which helps to prevent heart disease by lowering homocysteine levels.
Tell us what you think! Can switching to a Mediterranean diet reduce the rate of heart disease in America?
Know anybody who struggles with heart disease? Don’t forget to send a link to this article!
In a recent video that’s sure to change your perception of autism, Carly Fleischmann, a not-so-typical autistic teenager tell us what it’s like inside her head, explaining why other autistic children act the way they do- bizarre behaviors that continue to puzzle autism experts, like head banging, swaying, and refusal to make eye contact with other people. Only instead of using verbal communication, of which she is incapable, Carly has learned how to communicate using iPadappsfor autism.
Branded “autistic” from birth
Born autistic, Carly started showing the first signs of autism as an infant; developmental delays like her inability to start crawling, sitting upright, walking, or talking at the same age as her twin sister Taryn told her parents that something was amiss. Experts said that she was mentally retarded, and close friends recommended sending Carly to an institution, but her parents refused.
“I could never do it,” admitted her father. “How can you give up your kid?”
Instead, they introduced Applied Behavioral Analysis (ABA), a popular therapy for autism, which also helped her with her severe verbal apraxia. With ABA, autistic children learn small tasks, one at a time, at their own rate of learning, using positive reinforcement. From the age of four, Carly started receiving 40-60 hours of one-to-one ABA per week.
“I am autistic, but that’s not who I am. Take time to know me, before you judge me.”
Still, Carly suffered severe autism, and progress was slow; she would rock back-and-forth incessantly for hours, lash out, break furniture, have sudden angry outbursts, and didn’t seem to comprehend anything that was going on around her, or understand what family members would say in front of her.
But looks can be deceiving…
“You know, I can hear you.”
At the age of 11, Carly was working with a therapist, and she was not happy about it. She was in one of her “off moods,” and didn’t feel like sitting still to learn her vocabulary. Sitting in front of a touch-screen device, she communicated her first word- “No.”
That one word opened up the floodgates for her; she started typing more words like “hurt” and “help.”
“People look at me and assume I am dumb because I can’t talk.”
Over the course of months, and after much coaxing from therapists, Carly learned how to type every time she wanted to say something. She learned how to say things to her parents that she was never able to express verbally, things like “I love when you read to me, and I love that you believe in me. I love you.”
For the first time, Carly, a teenager with autism, had control over her environment. For the first time, Carly was able to have conversations with her parents.
“I stopped looking her as a disabled person, and started looking at her as a sassy, mischievous teenaged girl,” says her dad. “She sees herself as a normal child locked in a body that does things that she has no control over.”
Carly describes her symptoms of autism
In her writing, Carly conveys a deep understanding of the world around her. Likewise, she struggles to get others to understand what her world is like…
On chronic pain:“You don’t know what it feels like to be me, when you can’t sit still because your legs feel like they are on fire, or it feels like a hundred ants are crawling up your arms…I want something that will put out the fire.”
On head banging:“Because if I don’t, it feels like my body is going to explode. It’s just like when you shake a can of Coke. If I could stop it, I would, but it’s not like turning a switch off. I know what is right and wrong, but it’s like I have a fight with my brain over it.”
On covering her ears, moaning, and rocking:“It’s a way for us to drown out all sensory input that overloads us all at once. We create output to block out input.”
On refusing eye contact: “People say that we have a hard time processing information. It’s not really true, our brains are wired differently. We take in many sounds and conversations at once. I take over a thousand pictures of a person’s face when I look at them. That’s why we have a hard time looking at people.”
On autism experts: “How can you explain something you have not lived or if you don’t know what it’s like to have it? If a horse is sick, you don’t ask a fish what’s wrong with the horse. You go right to the horse’s mouth.”
Carly becomes a delegate for autistic kids everywhere
Today, Carly communicates with other nonverbal autistic kids on the internet. She Twitters like any other teen, and she has a large fan base on Facebook and her blog, Carly’s Voice.
Carly has been the subject of many television talk shows and news segments, like Larry King Live, 20/20, and Ellen, to whom she donated over $500.00 to the Make it Right Foundation.
“Everyone has an inner voice waiting to come out.”
She has also interviewed celebrities like autism advocate Holly Robinson Peete and Joe Mantegna, who has a daughter with autism. She is also working on her first novel.
Here is her story:
Why post this story on a vitamin B12 blog?
If it seems strange that a site containing information on vitamin B12 deficiency and the vitamin B12 patch would also focus in autism, then know this:
Vitamin B12 is brain food. In a study focusing on 50 autistic children who were given vitamin B12 supplements, nine of the children saw improvement in language and socialization, in addition changes in biomarkers for oxidative stress.
Vitamin B12 is good for the nerves. By supporting the myelin sheathe that insulates your nerve cells, vitamin B12 protects you from severe nerve damagelike apraxia and paresthesia
Vitamin B12 deficiency occurs with autism. Many children with autism also have vitamin B12 deficiency. By supplementing with extra B12, parents of autistic children note a marked decrease in their child’s autistic behaviors.
Gastric bypass surgery offers the morbidly obese a new lease on life, according to research. Recent studies confirm that people who undergo Roux-en-Y weight loss surgery lose the most weight and keep it off, more so than with gastric banding. But while gastric surgery promises a high success rate, the risk for serious complications is significantly higher than with other kinds of bariatric surgery.
What is gastric bypass surgery?
The Roux-en-Y gastric bypass changes the size of your stomach and reroutes food past certain parts of the digestive system. People who undergo gastric bypass surgery achieve a feeling of fullness much quicker than before the surgery, and are thus able to eat less and lose a considerable amount of weight. However, because gastric bypass is a complicated procedure, many problems may arise during or after the surgery.
With the Roux-en-Y gastric bypass, a small egg-sized stomach sack is created and attached to the middle part of the small intestine.
The rest of the stomach, as well as the upper section of the small intestine, are completely avoided, or “bypassed.”
A common side effect of gastric bypass is gastric bypass dumpingin which food travels through the stomach and empties into the small intestine too quickly, causing symptoms like diarrhea, nausea, and stomach cramps.
Another common side effect is nutritional deficiency, including vitamin B12 deficiency and many other vitamin, calcium, iron, and magnesium deficiencies.
Patients of gastric bypass surgery must supplement with extra vitamins and minerals, with a special emphasis on vitamin B12 supplements, in order to avoid osteoporosis, nerve damage, and other severe illnesses.
Laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding surgery is the second-most popular form of bariatric surgery after the gastric bypass procedure. Banding is a good alternative for gastric bypass surgery because it is less invasive.
In gastric banding, the surgeon places an adjustable silicon band around the upper part of your stomach, effectively cinching it to a smaller size.
After banding, your stomach can hold only about 1 ounce of food at one time.
The gastric band is adjusted through a saline solution that may be injected through a small device under the skin.
Most people who undergo gastric banding lose approximately 40% of their body weight.
Gastric banding surgery is completely reversible.
The mortality rate due to gastric banding surgery is 1/2000.
Since the small intestine remains intact, gastric banding surgery does not disrupt your digestive system, and there is no risk of vitamin deficiency, such as vitamin B12 deficiency.
Is gastric banding surgery safer than gastric bypass?
In a recent study comparing success rates between gastric bypass surgery and gastric banding, scientists had this to say:
About 17% of gastric bypass patients had complications like infections following surgery, compared to only 5% of gastric banding patients.
Six years post-surgery, 12% of gastric bypass patients were back to being morbidly obese, with a BMI over 35, while about a third of gastric banding patients were once again overweight.
Thirteen percent of bypass patients required a follow-up operation, while approximately 27% of gastric banding patients needed to return for more surgeries.
Complications involved with gastric banding include band erosion, stretched esophagus, or food-related issues.
Complications involved with gastric bypass can be much more severe; possibly fatal complications include bowel blockage and leakage of waste material into the body.
With gastric bypass surgery, food rushes through the digestive system, and essential minerals and vitamins pass through without ever being absorbed into the bloodstream. So while you feed your stomach, you are not feeding the rest of the body the nutrients that it needs to survive. Life-long supplementation of vitamins- vitamin A, vitamin C, vitamin E, and B vitamins-, and minerals is a commitment that gastric bypass patients much make.
Your chances of losing weight following gastric banding are 50/50, and there is a fair chance that you will have complications that require a return trip to the operating room. However, banding-related complications are less severe than bypass-related complications, which can be fatal. Then again, if obesity poses a serious life risk, then you might be better off with the most successful weight loss surgery- gastric bypass.
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Were you called “clumsy child” a lot growing up? It’s probably not your fault. Dyspraxia (or apraxia) is a neurological disorder that makes it difficult for people to make their bodies behave. Clumsiness, frequent stumbling, having a hard time focusing or remembering instructions- these are all symptoms that people with dyspraxia have to cope with all their lives.
What is Dyspraxia?
“Clumsy child syndrome” or dyspraxia is a mild form of apraxia, a neurological disorder that makes it difficult for people to plan and execute physical actions like jumping, carrying items, or standing in line without stumbling or dropping.
Dyspraxia is also called motor learning disability and development co-ordination disorder (DCD). People with dyspraxia might have difficulty walking without stumbling, catching a ball, or learning new skills, but that does not mean they are less smart than others are; they are able to learn the same things as other people, only at a slower rate.
What causes dyspraxia?
There are two main kinds of dyspraxia- dyspraxia that occurred because of a stroke or other illness, and developmental dyspraxia, which is inherited from birth. Scientists don’t know what causes developmental dyspraxia, and there is no cure.
Approximately 10% of all people have some basic level of dyspraxia, although only 2% have severe dyspraxia. About 75% of all dyspraxia sufferers are male.
What are the symptoms of dyspraxia?
Children and adults with developmental dyspraxia may exhibit the following symptoms:
Poor coordination
Disorganized
Slow reflexes
Difficulty dressing himself and tying his shoes
Tripping while going up and down stairs
Frequently bumping into furniture
Dropping things
Inability to compete in sport-like activities, like jumping, playing hopscotch, and catching, throwing or kicking a ball
Difficulty processing thoughts
Poor concentration
Overly affected by stimuli like scents, noise, and tactile sensations
Inability to filter out stimuli
Difficulty in learning new skills- low learning curve
Finds being in a classroom overwhelming, but is able to learn with a personal tutor
Difficulty learning math skills
Difficulty following instructions and remembering them later
Famous successful people with dyspraxia
Developmental dyspraxia is not a form of brain damage, and it does not reflect one’s intelligence. In fact, many of the world’s greatest thinkers have suffered from dyspraxia. Below are some famous people who have learning disorders like dyspraxia , and some who are rumored to be among the many sufferers of this disorder.
Daniel Radcliffe
David Bailey (An English photographer whose subjects included The Beatles and The Rolling Stones)
Richard Branson (the billionaire who owns the Virgin Group
Bill Gates
Robin Williams
Einstein (although many rumor that he had Asperger’s disorder)
Marilyn Monroe
Stephen Fry
Isaac Newton
Emily Bronte
Picasso
Mozart
Ernest Hemingway
George Orwell
How does this relate to vitamin B12 deficiency?
Vitamin B12 deficiencyand apraxia symptoms both include similar neurological disorders; gait disorders like difficulty walking, jumping, and running, decreased hand-motor coordination, and frequent clumsiness are some common indicators of vitamin B12 deficiency and dyspraxia/apraxia. But unlike the latter, vitamin B12 deficiency has a cure; routine vitamin B12 supplements quickly cure any neurological impairment caused by low B12 levels.
Question: What do you think of the statistic that boys are 75% more likely to suffer from apraxia than girls are?Do you think that’s a true statement, or is it more likely that girls are better able to disguise their disability and adapt to social norms, and that deficiencies in physical performance are more noticeable in boys than in girls?
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It’s mortifying when you can’t remember people’s names, especially when other people always seem to remember yours. “Brain fog” caused by chronic fatigue, vitamin B12 deficiency, fibromyalgia, or other chronic illnesses makes it difficult to remember people’s names.
Name forgetfulness can be socially awkward, especially if that person works in your office, or goes to the same daily aerobics class as you. Here are some helpful tips for remember names and boosting your memory, even when you’re in the middle of a brain drain.
Use it or lose it
As soon as somebody introduces himself, make a concentrated effort to remember his name the first time. Turn your attention to the person, repeat his name back, and make sure that you heard correctly. Repeat the name (quietly) to yourself several times. Take every opportunity to introduce your new friend to other people, and use her name while conversing. Your earliest attempts to remember a name are always the most successful.
Look for distinguishing characteristics in every person you meet, and link them with the person’s name. It’s okay to let your imagination run wild this this one- Lenny from Human Resources need never know that you think he looks like a lion cub. Another good association is connecting names with hobbies or occupations, like Arthur the Attorney, or Daphne who likes dolphins.
Put it in the dictionary
Sometimes, it’s easier to remember somebody’s name if you associate it with a real word that’s in the dictionary. For example, Justin’s name will be easier to remember if you think of justice, or “just in time.”
Play the spelling bee
Some people are visual learners- they need to see something in their mind in order to absorb its meaning. When you are introduced to somebody new, spell her name out (to yourself). This will further establish her name in your memory.
Rhymes have been used for centuries to remember things like instructions, moral codes, and historical facts. Today, they’re effective for remembering names, which is helpful if your job requires you to meet new people every day. Some good rhymes are “Tracy shops at Macy’s,” or “Ellen eats melon.” It doesn’t have to be a perfect rhyme, just as long as it sticks in your memory.
Forget remembering
Have you ever written a “cheat sheet” before a test in high school, only to find out during class that you didn’t even need it? Writing down important details cements them in your mind. So, why not follow a scaled-down version of that practice? Keep a small notepad in your purse or messenger bag, and jot down people’s names before you can forget them. Not only will you be more likely to remember their names the next time your meet, but you’ll have a handy book of names to refer to later.
Despite your best efforts to seal somebody’s name in your memory, you will still have moments when you just can’t remember somebody’s name. Instead of calling them “Hey you” or “What’s-your-name,” just come out and ask. People would rather be asked to repeat their names- it tells them that they are important and worthy of your attention.
Think fast!
“Oh no, here she comes, and I don’t remember her name!” Don’t panic. If you’re standing next to somebody you know, casually initiate an introduction. “Hey Dan, have you two met?” More often than not, she will probably pipe up with her name in introduction, and you’re home free.
This isn’t just a good pick-up line; it’s also a great way to remember somebody’s name. Sometimes, we associate names of people with places. You may not recall Shawn’s name, but you probably remember that you spent three hours with him while waiting in line at the DMV.
Osteoporosis
