Parkinson’s Disease and Protein Deficiency

Dr. Brice E. Vickery
©2007 SuperNutrient Corporation

Parkinson’s Disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disorder that is characterized by two things:

  1. an abnormal number of the dopaminergic neurons (cells that produce the chemical dopamine undergoing cell death in the substantia nigra of the basal ganglia
  2. the presence of Lewy Bodies, eosinophilic inclusions in the cytoplasm of these neurons. It is unclear as to the relationship of these two occurrences or what causes either one of them.

Several proteins are under investigation as to thier role in PD:

  1. Alpha synuclein, parkin, and ubiquitin have a particular relationship in the normal brain inn which the enzyme parkin binds the other two proteins signaling the destruction of the compound. The gene parkin is a type of enzyme called ubiquitin ligase, which helps to mark proteins in the body that need to be broken down and recycled. With out the proper levels of parkin in the body there will be a buildup of proteins.1
  2. The mitochondrial enzyme known as Complex 1 seems to be low as much as 30% to 40% in Parkinson’s patients.2 The low levels of this enzyme are thought to make the nerve cells vulnerable to oxidation by free radicals. Studies show that oxidative stress is increased in PD patients.3
  3. Glutathione levels seem to be low in PD patients. The essential amino acid cysteine is the limiting amino acid in this protein.4

Platinum Essential Amino Acids Plus are a balanced blend of essential amino acids that are designed to allow the digestive system to fully break down dietary protein into amino acids thus enabling people to obtain the essential amino acids they need to properly create systemic proteins. During his work as a chiropractor in the 1980s Dr. Brice Vickery discovered that 9 out of 10 people did not fully digest their protein leaving them protein deficient and prone to the diseases that follow from this condition. He developed the amino acid blend in order to heal the degenerative disk disease that seemed to show up consistently in these patients. Not only did the DDD clear up from the use of Vickery’s program but other diseases as well such as fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome. It seems from Vickery’s work that protein deficiency may be an underlying cause in diseases that involve low levels of certain proteins due to low levels of essential amino acids from diet This could be an important question to investigate in the research on Parkinson's Disease. Vickery’s work indicates that this particular blend of amino acids indeed does increase the levels of systemic proteins available to the system and that this increase enables the system to rebalance itself.

References

1
Parkinson’s Disease, Well-Connected Reports, Nidus Information Services, 2002.
Haywood, Annika and Staveley, Brian “Parkin counteracts symptoms in a Drosophila model of Parkinson’s disease,” BMC Neuroscience, 2004, 5:14, April, 2004
2
Human protein: Q86SL2 — Ubiquitin ligase, Bioinformatic Harvester, Stanford University, June 2003.
3
Parkinson’s Disease, Well–Connected Reports, Nidus Information Services, 2002.
Power, Shannon, Blumbergs and Gai, “Non–Selenium Glutathione peroxidase in the Human Body: Elevated levels in Parkinson’s Disease and Dementia with Lewy Bodies,” American Journal of Pathology 2002; 161: 885–894.
4
Matthew Maureen, BSW (Parkinson Program Coordinator) “Parkinson’s Research Update The Transmitter: Newsletter of the Parkinson’s program” Vol. 20, Jan. and April, 2003.