Hi, I'm trying to figure out if I should take a little folinic acid or not, along with a little methylfolate.
I have not tried either form of folate yet, as I'm just starting a methylation protocol and I have spent a week only taking what would be in a multivitamin/multimineral (which I am attempting to replicate with a lot of individual supplements because none of the pre-formulated multis seemed to be a good fit for me).
I have read this thread a couple of times and it seems that the thinking is:
-Taking folinic acid at the same time as methylfolate can be a help to people because it gives the body a form of folate that the body can use instantly for certain things that the body cannot use the methylfolate form of folate for, at least not instantly. Because of that, when overall methylation is poor, giving methylfolate only, at first, can starve the body of some of the benefits of folate in general. (When overall methylation is good, then this is not so much of a concern.)
-Most people, perhaps around 80% or more of people (even those who have some problematic methylation mutations, such as children with autism do), probably can tolerate and process folinic acid. Some people cannot though, and it makes them worse.
-Rich did well with folinic acid, Nandixon did not do well with folinic acid.
-The MTHFS set of genes determine whether or not a person does well with folinic acid.
-The SHMT1 snp also plays a role: a +/+ or +/- result might indicate that the person will not do well with folinic acid.
-If the people who do well and do not do well with folinic acid compare their MTHFS mutations and their SHMT1 mutation, maybe the resulting patterns can point to the most likely MTHFS snps that would indicate that a person would probably not do well with folinic acid and should take only methylfolate.
I have a couple of questions:
1. If the person has a "normal" -/- for SHMT1, then should the person be completely fine with taking folinic acid (no matter what the person's MTHFS mutations are)? Or does one have to look at both SHMT1 and MTHFS genes, in combination?
2. Are there any preliminary conclusions from this thread's MTHFS alleles chart about which SNPs might be involved in folinic acid tolerance?
Not that I am volunteering to reorganize the chart myself
, but maybe the alleles of the people who have no problem with taking and processing folinic acid can be placed to the left of the rs number along with Rich's alleles, and the alleles of the people who did have trouble with folinic acid could be placed to the right of the rs number, because at the moment that important piece of the puzzle is not included in the chart.
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Basis of thread
-Rich in post 4: "In order to use folinic acid a person must have a normally functioning MTHFS enzyme (not the same as MTHFR). If this enzyme is slow for genetic reasons, folinic acid can build up. and that will inhibit the SHMT reaction, which in turn will inhibit the normal production of MTHF, which in turn will hinder formation of DNA and formation of methylfolate."
-Nandixon in post 5: "if your MTHFS is not working well, i.e., not doing a good job converting folinic acid to methenyl THF (different than methylene THF) then you might be pretty sensitive to supplementing with folinic acid - because an excess will inhibit SHMT (folinic acid is both a product of SHMT and an inhibitor of that same enzyme).
Perhaps people are mostly only going to be sensitive to folinic acid when they have defects in both SHMT1 and MTHFS, but folinic acid also inhibits other enzymes, including the mitochondrial version of SHMT, which is encoded by the SHMT2 gene. (SHMT1, which Yasko tests for, is the cytoplasmic version.)
So if, for example, you're not sensitive to folinic acid, then perhaps your MTHFS SNPs will be more closely aligned with Rich's, or with mine if you are."
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My results (below) are on the left side, Rich's are on the right.
Of the ones where mine are different from Rich's, my alleles appear to agree with most of the others' on the chart. If most of those folks do have trouble with folinic acid (though I'm not sure if they do), then maybe I would have trouble with it, too?
Because I haven't tried folinic acid yet, I didn't think adding my results to the main chart would provide any useable information to anyone, so I didn't go to the trouble to do that.
I am -/- for SHMT1, so I don't know if I shouldn't even worry about this. ??
mine...............Rich's
TT rs8923 CT
CC rs2733103 CC
AA rs16971427 AA
AA rs655473 AA
CT rs17284990 TT
AA rs16971450 AA
CC rs6495446 CT
AC rs7177659 CC
GG rs6495449 GG
AA rs17285431 AC
CT rs6495451 CT
GG rs2586154 GG
TT rs12899781 GT
AA rs16971478 AA
CC rs2586153 CC
NO CALL rs2562744 AA
AA rs2733106 AA
AC rs12438477 CC
CT rs12898642 CT
AA rs2586182 AA
AG rs2733088 AG
CT rs12440798 CC
AG rs685487
CC rs8033649
Because Nandixon said that SHMT2 also affects folinic acid processing, my SHMT2 results on 23andMe (although I don't know what they mean - does anyone know?) are:
GG rs12319666
AG rs34095989