Placebo!

It is now one year into the insulin trial.  We are in Seattle again to end the first phase and begin the next.  The trial is called The SNIFF Study. 

I had an MRI yesterday, and they were to give me a lumbar puncture today.  The MRI went OK, but I have no results.  They had trouble with my bloodwork results -- clotting factor slightly weak -- so I will not have a lumber puncture at all.  I'm ok not going through that, but it's still very valuable to their research.  Not vital, but valuable.  I had a lumbar puncture at the outset, and my clotting factor was barely in at that time.

So -- with the final MRI done and the lumbar puncture settled, they could unmask the drug.  The study coordinator brought in an envelope with the answer inside.  Just like the Oscars.  And the answer was:  The Placebo.  I've been snorting saline solution twice a day for a whole year.

This is good news.  It means that the spectacular improvements I've been experiencing are due solely to the lifestyle changes I've made, not to their insulin.  They will now have me on real insulin for 6 months.  I'm hoping that the insulin will be as effective as the early studies promised, and this will accelerate my progress.

There is a fear.  As I discuss in Beating the Dementia Monster, one of the characteristics of AD is disruption in the metabolism of glucose in the brain.  A risk factor for AD is Type 2 Diabetes, which begins with insulin resistance.  And this begins with overwhelming the cells with too much insulin.  This usually occurs when there is too much intake of carbohydrates, which stimulates excessive insulin production.  So it's possible that an increase of insulin being sent to the brain through snorting may cause insulin resistance and then Type 2 Diabetes.

Will this happen?  We do drug trials to find this stuff out.  Being a guinea pig has it's risks.