Hi all,
I've been following Dr. B's recommendations for the past month. Have actually gone off of my insulin pump after 12 years and back to MDI's. I'm still smoothing out the wrinkles, but I feel confident that over time, I'll get everything going in the right direction. After 12 years of pumping my A1c was climbing into the 7%'s no matter what I was doing, and after reading Dr. B's book, I'm assuming my tissue had reached it's breaking point for pumping.
Anyway, my question is, who has used the R-ALA that he suggests in the book? And if you've used it have you noticed a difference in your readings? I ordered the Insulow that Dr. B suggested and am starting to take it. I just wanted to get some feed back from fellow diabetics on their experiences.
Thanks!
I take the jarrows sustain formula and it will lower your a1c. As dr. B says though it isn’t knon whether the lower a1c reduces your complications–the difference between correlation versus causation. It has also been used in neuropathy treatments. For both reasons I have taken it for years.
Dr. B has recommended Insulow primarily because it contains (R+) ALA. The other form of ALA, (S-) is considered to be useless. Unfortunately, the vast majority of the other ALA supplements on the market contains a mixture of (S-) and (R+) ALA, and hence are less effective. The Jarrows sustain formula Phishery mentions is one of the few on the market that actually are all (R+) ALA. Both forms contain Biotin which is needed since ALA inteferes with Biotin absorption. Unfortunately, both Jarrow and Insul are fairly expensive.
I take R-ALA principally for its beneficial effect vs. neuropathy, since as Phishery points out, its role in preventing or neutralizing complications is at best unclear. I use Insulow for the reasons stated by Brian.