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Immune restoration

Lillybelle

Senior Member
Messages
110
Location
Australia
There are a LOT of positive studies on DHEA use as well in the literature. Wikipedia is highly biased against DHEA in my opinion. I would not base my decision whether or not to use it based on that source.

DHEA has been shown unequivocally to have benefit for patients with adrenal insufficiency and low levels of DHEA.

Hi Ema,
Wikepedia references over 54 different studies which is a fair literature review. But I can see that one could view it that way. I'm sure Justy's doctor is extremely competent . And was just providing the evidence as I found it.
However here are some further analysis on research studie(s) by other independent sources including a "Natural Medicine Database" analysis.

The Mayoclinic gives this opinion on DHEA
http://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements/dhea/evidence/hrb-20059173
Good evidence for DHEA helping some conditions and not necessarily others.
Key to grades
A
Strong scientific evidence for this use
B
Good scientific evidence for this use
C
Unclear scientific evidence for this use
D
Fair scientific evidence against this use (it may not work)
F
Strong scientific evidence against this use (it likely does not work)
CFS gets a C for DHEA. Saying further research is needed but it "may" help.
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Similarly:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/natural/331.html

Natural Medicines Comprehensive Database rates effectiveness based on scientific evidence according to the following scale: Effective, Likely Effective, Possibly Effective, Possibly Ineffective, Likely Ineffective, Ineffective, and Insufficient Evidence to Rate.

The effectiveness ratings for DHEA are as follows:
Insufficient Evidence to Rate.
Adrenal insufficiency. There is contradictory information about whether taking DHEA can improve feelings of well-being, sexuality, depression, anxiety, and other symptoms in people with this hormone deficiency. Some research suggests that DHEA might improve these symptoms, while other research suggests that DHEA provides no benefit.

Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). There is some evidence that DHEA might improve CFS symptoms.
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And Medscape provides a summary of 10 clinical trials and says:
http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/406925_5

To date, clinical studies of DHEA in patients with specific diseases have yielded generally inconclusive results. Most of the studies were open label or had very small samples. Most of the studies discussed below were randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trials in which the oral dosage was gt_300 mg/day. Tummala and Svec [37] demonstrated that incremental increases in serum DHEA and DHEAS levels appear to plateau at an oral DHEA dosage of 300 mg/day and inferred that doses greater than this have little additional therapeutic value.
 

heapsreal

iherb 10% discount code OPA989,
Messages
10,089
Location
australia (brisbane)
I guess if we took a healthy person and we could stop them producing dhea, then we could see the consequences of low dhea.

If the adrenal glands produce dhea, then there must be a good reason for it even if the medical world dont understand its functions fully.

If production of DHEA decreases under stress(infections etc) and is not rectified a hormonal cascade effect could occur resulting with a deficiency of other sex hormones such as estrogen, progesterone and testosterone. If these hormones get too low then a whole range of other systems and problems can also occur such as PMS, Menopause, andropause and hypothyroidism. Just these issues further increase our risks of multiple health issues.

I guess there are many other functions, neurotransmitters, hormones etc in the human body that occur that arent understood, but it doesnt mean they arent important for good health?

Its something that needs more research, until then i am going to try and keep my dhea levels within their normal range.