Hello MoreLife Members:

My name is Scott Brown, you can find my pic on Yahoo! as
scottflyery. I'm new to the group. I want to thank Paul and Kitty
for their tireless work and thoughtfulness over many years. I found
out and knew about Paul from his past work on the LEF Forum, where
I've read several of his posts.

As far as I go, I'm 59, have been working with nutrition and life
extension as a pastime off and on since age 18 or so. I live in
Santa Cruz CA. I work in high tech. My hobbies in addition to
alternative health and life extension are exercise, flying (I'm a
pilot), skiing, science and technology. I've been involved in
medical research with both NASA and several fortune 500 companies -
developing diagnostic electronic equipment.

I'm an avid reader in the area of life extension and have now read
most of the initial material on MoreLife with great interest and for
the most part, total agreement. I'm one who has demonstrated,
written letters and was once hauled in by the DA via FDA for
promoting health freedom (advocating herbal remedies).

I look forward to learning more on this infinite and often
controversial subject from this group and have already learned a
great deal from my reading of MoreLife and initial email
conversations with Paul. I will also endeavor to contribute to this
forum in a way that is meant to be useful to everyone.

As an initial small contribution, I wanted to report that I've had
enormous success recently controlling blood glucose so that it almost
never goes over 100, and with lower resting glucose, and this resting
level is now reached at about 1 hour or 2 max, after a meal and is in
the 75-85 mg/dl range. Before this, it was higher and took longer to
drop to that level. I constantly measure the level with a blood
glucose meter, noting what preceded each reading.

I have found that Gymnema Sylvestre with Cinnulin, both standardized,
taken at least 1/2 hour and up to 2+ hours before meals is the secret
for this transformation in my blood glucose levels.

[That is very interesting. Which brands of Gymnema Sylvestre and Cinnulin do you
take? Also since Cinnulin is an extract from the spice cinnamon, another way to
get it's benefits is to simply eat a little cinnamon every day, as I do.
Cinnamon in doses from 1g up to 6g daily for those with impaired glucose
tolerance has been shown to be effective at improving insulin sensitivity
(PMID: 14633804). -°Olafur]


There are
several clinical trials and studies that support this with Gymnema
Sylvestre, but I was skeptical of them until it worked so very
dramatically for me as Cinnulin alone was not very dramatic. One of
many available references follows:

----------
"1: J Ethnopharmacol. 1990 Oct;30(3):281-94.
Use of Gymnema sylvestre leaf extract in the control of blood glucose
in insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus.

Shanmugasundaram ER, Rajeswari G, Baskaran K, Rajesh Kumar BR, Radha
Shanmugasundaram K, Kizar Ahmath B.
Department of Biochemistry, University of Madras, India.

GS4, a water-soluble extract of the leaves of Gymnema sylvestre, was
administered (400 mg/day) to 27 patients with insulin-dependent
diabetes mellitus (IDDM) on insulin therapy. Insulin requirements
came down together with fasting blood glucose and glycosylated
haemoglobin (HbA1c) and glycosylated plasma protein levels. While
serum lipids returned to near normal levels with GS4 therapy,
glycosylated haemoglobin and glycosylated plasma protein levels
remained higher than controls. IDDM patients on insulin therapy only
showed no significant reduction in serum lipids, HbA1c or
glycosylated plasma proteins when followed up after 10-12
months. GS4 therapy appears to enhance endogenous insulin, possibly
by regeneration/revitalisation of the residual beta cells in
insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus."

----------
If GS is taken with a meal, the results are not so immediate, but
will take time (days) to manifest themselves as dramatically. I've
noticed that after taking this combination regularly for several
weeks, I can miss it for a meal and still have (most of) the
effect. Of course I also limit bad index carbohydrates like potatoes
and I tend to eat carbohydrates after a bit of protein, as the
protein stimulates an insulin response and helps limit the uptick
level in BG after carb. I have repeatedly tested the same (quantized
1st meal of day) meal with and without these herbs and with GS+C
taken at differing intervals before and with the meals. I found that
if taken at least ˝ hour prior to a meal, which would have caused an
uptick to 150 mg/dl, the uptick is instead limited to 95 from my
resting state, which was about 90 and is now about 70-75 with no
symptoms of hypoglycemia whatsoever. On many occasions the BG does
not rise at all and often declines after a meal.

[The fact that the blood glucose often declines after a meal when you take these
herbs prior to the meal suggests that the mechanism by which these herbs are
lowering your blood glucose is by increasing your insulin response to meals.
This is inline with evidence that Gymnema Sylvestre increases insulin output.
But as Paul states below this has both positive and negative effects on ones
health. -°Olafur]

To give you discrete example of its effectiveness, I was tempted to
stray from my low index carb discipline and ate a big sweet ice cream
and cake dessert last night and it gave we an unusually high BG peak
of 105 mg/dl at ˝ hour and 88 mg/dl at a little over 1
hour. Previously, I would have had a peak of 175 or more, returning
to normal at 2 or 3 hours and obviously lots more glycosylation. I
take sufficient GS to have ingested 300 mg standardized gymnemic acid
and 150 mg of Cinnulin.

[Is that the amount you ingest before each meal or the amount you ingest daily?
If it is the amount you ingest before each meal, then how many meals do you eat
per day? -°Olafur]


Thanks to Paul and Kitty for their work. I am grateful to be part of
this group.

Scott Brown

[Your remarkable results are certainly very interesting. I took Gymnema
Sylvestre (GS) several years ago without much effect, but I have not tried it
with respect to my recent problems with elevated fasting glucose even though my
insulin remains very low and my glycation as shown by HbA1c is adequately low.
Now that your post has reminded me of this product, I will be sure to get some
to try it again as soon as I get back to the US (end of October). I already use
cinnulin, many other chemicals/herbals and even prescription drugs (metformin
and acarbose) for which there is some evidence for glucose lowering effects.
However, I expect that you are aware that while blood glucose is one of the
drivers of glycation (there are several other important ones - fructose and
glycine being two), unless levels are very high, blood glucose per se is not
that harmful. Therefore, it is also important to get both your fasting insulin
and HbA1c levels tested (at the least). High insulin levels are very negative
with respect to life extension (insulin reverses the benefits of calorie
restriction - PMID: 15044112, PMID: 12969875. It also inhibits autophagy and
therefore turnover of dysfunctional proteins and organelles PMID: 16859482,
PMID: 14610086, PMID: 9184851) and HbA1c is a direct measure of the rate of
glycation within one's body. My concern with using GS will be that it works by
raising insulin levels rather than by increasing cellular uptake of glucose with
the same insulin level (as do insulin mimetics and other nutrients with some
evidence of increasing insulin sensitivity - same as reducing insulin
resistance). The last sentence of the abstract that you quote above supports
this concern, which is also supported by PMID: 11249615 and PMID: 10556769.

Have you had your fasting insulin tested? There is also available a
glucose/insulin challenge test, 5 readings of each including 4 after a 75 grams
dose of glucose after a 12 hour fast. I plan to get this test after I return to
AZ in late October. --Paul]

[Thanks very much for this information Scott. It comes at a great timing as I
just recently purchased Gymnema Sylvestre extract and was about to do some
experiments to see if it would lower my blood glucose. The one I purchased is
the GS4 extract (which is standardised to 25% Gymnemic Acid) the same kind that
was used in the study you posted. Since you have found it to be most effective
when taken at least half an hour prior to meals I will be taking it that way,
which means I will be taking it twice daily as I only eat twice daily. I will
report back to the MoreLife group the results of my experiments whether positive
or negative. -°Olafur]