Monthly Archives: August 2014

LSJL Update 8-7-14-How to Obtain a Hand X-ray?

Summary:

* LSJL increased right finger to be longer than the left.  Need X-ray to see if there are growth plates.  Easiest way to do this?

* LSJL increased left thumb over right thumb.  Thus LSJL can be reproduced.

* There are indications that LSJL is effective at increasing leg height.

* Clamping at the knee may be more effective than clamping at the ankle due to structural differences.

As you know, I’ve proven that due to LSJL my right index finger is now longer than my left.  The issue is that people are “So what?”  They don’t understand that the finger is made up of long bones(albeit with slightly different properties than the leg bones) and if you can induce length increase there it follows that you can increase bone length in the legs as well.

Originally, I ruled out getting an x-ray because people wouldn’t care about an increase in finger length but if I have successfully recreated a growth plate then that would successfully prove LSJL for the masses.  The problem is actually getting an x-ray of ideally both hands without having to get a doctors appointment first (and paying out of pocket for that).  I just want to go in, get an X-ray and then pick it up.  I can afford it for the $200ish I’ve seen especially since it’ll prove LSJL.  There’s a risk that there won’t be a growth plate but I am absolutely positive that my finger has grown longer by some mechanism and that it’s not due to bone thickening.  It is possible that it grew by some mechanism relating to articular cartilage endochondral ossification but people with osteoarthritis have endochondral ossification and I have not found any reports of bone lengthening.

So how can I get a hand X-ray with as little medical red tape as possible?  I want to walk in, get the x-ray, pay, and pick it up.

I’ve also been loading my left thumb and there’s a small but significant and noticeable difference between my left and right thumb.  I’m working on finding the best way to photograph it.  It does establish that the finger lengthening is not a fluke and is reproducible.

Another good sign is my legs.  My epiphysis has been changing in shape to become more hammerhead in appearance like my fingers dead.  Even if LSJL induces such “deformities” it would certainly be worth it to some people to grow taller.

And it seems as though my left leg is now longer than my right. The renewed growth can be explained by the following: I used to load my leg with a C-class clamp but now am using an Irwin Quick Grip to reduce slippage.  Now I am focusing much more on intensity of clamping but with shorter duration

(Note:  Since I cannot yet specify an ideal intensity I cannot guarantee against injury!).

Now I always used the Irwin Quick Grip on my ankle but didn’t really get good results there and haven’t seen a lot ankle changes despite clamping harder.  I think the reason for this could be that the knee is different structurally than the ankle and it makes LSJL more effective on that area.

So the reason why this routine could lengthen my left leg more than my right is that I load my left leg first as it is my weaker leg.  If I can get up to say a count of 130 on clamping my left leg(starting over at 0 if the clamp slips) then I clamp to 130 on my right leg.  So my left leg is guaranteed to get maximal clampage whereas the right leg is not.

Now there are other explanations as to why I feel my left leg has grown longer than my right:

1) Placebo effect.  I want my left leg to be longer to prove LSJL.  Although when I extend my legs my left leg is longer than my right and if I stand on my left leg I’m taller then if I stand on my right leg.

2)  Hip Rotation.  Which would explain the symptoms of the left leg extending longer without any actual lengthening.  But what would be the stimulus?

3)  My left leg has always been longer than my left.  I think I would’ve noticed it before.

So this effect isn’t perfect proof of LSJL but I think with the devolpment of more hammerhead-esque bones it is a good sign of LSJL’s effectiveness in increasing leg height.

——————–

Michael: One could go to Urgent Care, which is a type of walk-in facility which would let one get their bodies X-rayed. You’d still have to pay the costs though, but it would be faster. When I was looking at how deer antlers grow, I noted that the antlers where able to grow in length only because there was no physical constraint against the upper horn part from getting longer. Human legs have that constraint since we have to constantly be putting loadings on the feet from walking. if we could put our bodies into some bed for months on end while clamping, maybe there would be much bigger results. The effects on fingers, which are just jutted out and not being pushed down consistently on a flat surface would see much more noticeable effects.

Take This Easy To Obtain Supplement To Gain Lean Muscle, Stay Young Longer and Maybe Grow Taller

Take This Easy To Obtain Supplement To Gain Lean Muscle, Stay Young Longer and Maybe Grow Taller

For the longest time, the online community which are searching for way to grow taller have been orally consuming supplements of amino acid types for over a decade, ever since people started to get together and form discussion groups. I have never found any type of evidence to believe them on the amino acids, but a recent find has made me reconsider. On the Dr. Oz website, there was one article entitled “Natural Growth Hormone Boosters” which claimed that there are at least two things you can eat or take which is supposed to help increase the amount of HGH that is naturally produced and released into the body. They are…

  1. Fenugreek
  2. L-Arginine – Dosage: 2 grams, 3 times a day

There is a 3rd suggested idea which the Dr. Oz website mentioned, which is to use a Sleep Mask when sleeping. the reasoning is that when you wear a sleep mask, there will be less light that will reach your eyes, which will help with triggering melatonin for a much deeper, better, more restful sleep.

FenugreekFirst, let’s talk a little about Fenugreek. This compound is most often associated with increased milk production in new mothers who are breastfeeding. It seems that if the mothers consume fenugreek, they will produce more milk for the babies. You can google for the relationship between increased lactation and taking fenugreek. That issue, I won’t be going into. If I tried to really extend that thought process, maybe taking Fenugreek would be for the growth of the baby since the mother will be able to product more milk for consumption and maybe be able to breastfeed their baby for slightly longer.

There is also some anedoctal evidence that taking fenugreek is good for looking weight, can combat diabetes, increase estrogen levels, and even increase male libido levels. It is sold in bottles as a compounds which has similar effects to testosterone, but that doesn’t seem to be based on the real science. So that marketing is lying about that part.

It is the other supplement which I wanted to focus on, which has been talked about extensively before. L-Arginine. Apparently this amino acid when taken at about 6 grams a day does have some type of beneficial effect on HGH production and release. I am not a person who is always willing to accept medical physician’s suggestions at face value, but the fact that it was stated on the Dr. Oz’s website for increasing GH production does give it a little more credibility.

When I did only a slight Google Search on the connection between Arginine oral consumption with increased HGH production, I did find this study “Growth hormone, arginine and exercise.” The dosage there was 5-9 grams of Arginine.

What is really interesting here is that if you are at rest and take L-Arginine, the GH levels increase 2-fold, 2X. Compare it to exercise, and the increase would be maybe 4-5 fold. However, when you combine the amino acid with exercise, the GH production dropped to being just 3 fold. The conclusion in that article was that arginine might have some GH production inhibition effect when it is used in combination with exercise. Exercise alone seems to be much better than using it with this amino acid supplement.

I propose then that if an adolescent or teenager who is still growing should only take this supplement if they are too busy to have an active lifestyle where they are getting a lot of exercise. If they are already in some sports team and running around taking this supplement would do more harm than good in terms of increasing height.

What is probably the insane anecdotal story ever, in one thread on the BodyBuilding forum “Boosting HGH w/ L-Arginine & L-Glutamine” which referenced an article written by a guy named Jerry Emanuelson entitled “Arginine”

I clipped and pasted the sections of biggest interest below.

1 2 3

It is the last passage which is most interesting, as one girl supposedly grew 1 more inch in height at the age of 19 after taking 10 grams of the Arginine for a whole week. Of course, she became nauseous from the high dosage. Is this type of weak anecdotal stories based on real events, where people did grow taller? I don’t know, but there seems to be some unusual things going on.

New Chemicals and Cytokines For Physeal Chondrocyte Stimulation Discovered

New Chemicals and Cytokines For Physeal Chondrocyte Stimulation Discovered

In our most recent post on the possibility on using the chemical Parathyroid Hormone (PTH) to modulate and control the amount of growth that the vertebrate bones will go through in a developing adolescent, some new chemicals and cytokines were revealed to us which I had previously guessed has many stimulating effects on chondrocytes and the physeal layer.

The patent that we reference is entitled “Method of treating scoliosis using a biological implant (Patent #:US 8123787 B2)“. Under the section titled “Detailed Description of the Invention” the inventors write the following passage, which I clipped and pasted below. I will be going into detail to list and check the validity of the claims of each compound that they mention.

  1. Physeal Chondrocyte StimulationParathyroid Hormone (PTH)
  2. Fibroblast Growth Factors
  3. TGF-Beta
  4. FGF18
  5. FGFR3.

Out of all of these, it is probably the FGF18 that is the compound that I have found to be the most interesting, and that is mainly because I have never heard about this receptor or cytokine signalling factor before being associated with chondrocyte stimulation.

I remember that when it comes with FGFR3, inhibiting of that receptor is supposed to be able to treat children with achondroplasia like the chemical compounds NF449 and BMN-111 by BIomarin.

What I wanted to do is find at least 2 studies which validates the idea that FGF18 is beneficial on physeal activity.

I will not be focusing that much on the other cytokines but this compound FGF18 is the one which is most interesting to me. There has been maybe just 2-3 published papers on the efficacy of intra-articular injections of FGF18 to treat osteoarthritis is so the area and possibility of the growth factor/cytokine is still potentially huge.

I suspect that FGF18 when injected into the bone under the articular cartilage may cause cartilage repair.

Increasing Vertebral Bone Growth Using Minimally Invasive Intervertebral Disc Implants

Increasing Vertebral Bone Growth Using Minimally Invasive Intervertebral Disc Implants

Intervertebral Disc ImplantsThere has always been a lot of talk amount the online grow taller community where people would consider the idea of someone making the overall body bigger by somehow manipulating the vertebrate bones and/or the intervertebral discs. Almost all the talk have been focused on the discs, since the discs are not hard and difficult to remodel unlike the vertebrate bones. Discussions on disc decompression, traction machines, stem cell implants, and growth factor injections have been all been speculated before, but I recently found a new proposed idea which seems to make much more sense than all of them combined.

I agree that stem cell, scaffold, growth factor injections are all quite minimally invasive, so they are all somewhat good. This new idea is probably just as reasonable and attractive as any of the other ones I have suggested before in the past.

I refer the reader to the patent entitled “Method of treating scoliosis using a biological implant” (Patent # US 8123787 B) by Inventor James W. Ogilvie, Kenneth Ward, Lesa M. Nelson.

(The same idea is also available by the patent #s US20090105822,  US20110295369,  WO2009155159A2, WO2009155159A9.)

The method is for treating scoliosis, which is something most American Elementary School nurses check for to make sure children are growing properly and symmetrically but I wonder whether we can use the same type of minimally invasive slow release type of growth factor implants to increase the rate at which maybe adults can increase in their disc height.

From past articles I’ve read, it seems that scoliosis is something that mainly children who are still growing have. When one side of their vertebral growth plates become too active, their vertebrate column starts to become lopsided.

Vertebral Bone GrowthHowever, we do have the medical condition where adults suffer from scoliosis too. The last we checked on WedMD, there is no way to actually easily realign adult scoliosis. The most conservative treatment has been to make sure that the person with adult scoliosis does not suffer from great pain. Treatments has been almost always been for pain management. The other way is the drastic approach, which is to get surgery to correct for the curvature.

From the abstract of the patent we quote below…

“The present invention is a bone growth stimulating and promoting cytokine type biological implant preferably comprising PTH coated with a controlled release biodegradable coating that is implanted preferably in the concave side of a scoliotically curved spine in combination with a bone growth inhibiting type biological implant preferably comprising methotrexate or like anti-metabolite coated with a controlled release biodegradable coating that is implanted preferably in the convex side of a scoliotically curved spine. The insertion of the biological implant is highly non-invasion, especially as compared to more conventional spine surgical methods, and the biological implant does not decrease spinal mobility or spinal range of motion”

First, lets forget trying to use any type of bone growth inhibiting implant, but focus exclusively on getting the bone growth increasing cytokine to work. We are aware that Parathyroid Hormone aka PTH has bone growth beneficial effects.

From the other section in the patent….

“A method of treating a scoliotically curved spine in a patient being determined to be at risk of scoliosis curve progression comprising placing at least one of a growth stimulant, a medication, and a biological therapy on a concave side of said curve formed in said spine, wherein said biological therapy defines a dissolvable bone growth stimulant biological implant coated with a dissolvable coating, wherein determining said patient is at risk of scoliosis curve progression further defines a determination of genetic predisposition wherein DNA of said patient includes a plurality of genetic markers having an association with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis contained therein and wherein said risk is determined by performing logistic regression on said plurality of adolescent idiopathic scoliosis associated genetic markers“

So in the patent, there is more than just the growth stimulant added, but also a type of medication and the patient also should go through a type of biological therapy? Or does it mean that the dissolvable bone growth stimulant do all three parts?

While I am quite sure that this type of method to modulate vertebrate bone growth is going to be quite effective on developing children with functional growth plates, the big question to ask is whether this technique will work on adults.

First, after studying the diagrams and pictures of the structure and setup of the vertebrate bone column, we can say that there is a slight chance that the right type of cytokine might be better for making the discs more robust and tougher to compressive forces.

Now, we are fully aware that even in adults, there is still a very thin layer of hyaline cartilage, between the actual disc and the bone, which is really used as a connective tissue. It is just maybe 2-3 cells thick but it is there after the growth plates are gone. We wonder whether it is possible to get the PTH implants to dissolve slowly to get the few chondrocytes in the hyaline cartilage layer to proliferate and increase the thickness of the layer. If proliferation is possible, then we might be able to slowly, and I am talking very slowly, increase the height of the person with the embedded implants by millimeters over time.

However, like so many of our discoveries, the effects of this idea on young adolescent kids will always be much more effective and noticeable.

Prolotherapy Indicates Increased Disc Height and Reduced Lower Back Pain From Weight Loss

Prolotherapy Indicates Increased Disc Height and Reduced Lower Back Pain From Weight Loss

On the prolotherapy website there was an article that was written back in April of this year (2014) “Obesity, Disc Height Changes and Low Back Pain“. They referenced a study “Intervertebral disc height changes after weight reduction in morbidly obese patients and its effect on quality of life and radicular and low back pain.” (Lidar Z, Behrbalk E, Regev G, Salame K, Keynan O, et al., Spine. 2012;37(23):1947-1952) The study was published in 2012.

It would seem like mostly common sense from many people who are overweight or even obese complain of lower back pain. It is also somewhat around assumed that extra weight would compress the intervertebral discs to a thinner space, making the obese and overweight people slightly shorter than they had to be.

In the study, the test subjects decided to go with a weight reduction surgery known as bariatric surgery. I am not a specialist on the intestinal system but it seems that bariatric surgery means that a large portion of the intestinal system is cut out to restrict the amount of food that the obese person can take in before feeling full.

After the surgery was done, there was on average about a 25-27 kg loss in weight. When the L4-L5 IVD space was measured, the increase in disc height was about 2 mm on average. Maybe the more important thing was that lower back pain was reduced greatly.

This is a very good sign for the people who are readers of the website and are on the heavy side to first try to loss the extra weight on their body before trying to increase in height. That is something which I sort of realized myself, where it is important to first work on weight loss before trying for height gain.

Using Autologous Mesenchymal Stem Cells To Treat Hip and Knee Joint Pain from Osteoarthritis

Using Autologous Mesenchymal Stem Cells To Treat Hip and Knee Joint Pain from Osteoarthritis

I stated about 2 months ago that I wanted to expand the scope of the research that is done on this website, to include other subjects like the biochemistry of cancer, orthopaedic conditions, and similar issues. These next few posts will be dealing with this subjects. Some of the information will be related to what I’ve been researching before.

There was a very recent article (came out on August 3, 2014) that came out in the Australian news website The Age entitled “Stem cell trial hope for osteoarthritis sufferers” which showed that MSCs are being used to treat people who are suffering from knee pain associated with Osteoarthritis. While it may not seem too revolutionary and profoundly new to us who are so used to reading up on Patents and University backed cutting edge research on stem cells, this method would still be very interesting to a large group of the population who are suffering from joint pain from cartilage degeneration.

As the article says, a middle aged female underwent liposuction so that her fat can be sucked and then filtered to get the little bit of stem cells in her fat tissue. Those stem cells will be then be packed together in pure stem cell and high density form, which are injected into her hip joint region to relieve pain.

When looking at the overall procedure from a higher level, I am reminded of a similar type of procedure that is being done by Dr. Peter Wehling at Dusseldorf which is now called the Regenokine/Orthokine method as well as the Platelet Rich Plasma therapy. In all of these methods, the entire thing is minimally invasive.

The hope for the researchers who took the women’s fat out is to get the filtered stem cells to slow down the rate of cartilage degeneration in the woman’s hip. If that is possible, then the need for the complicated and expensive hip prosthetic replacement surgery can be pushed back by more than a full decade. The primary researcher is a Dr Julien Freitag, who would reference a South Korean study. I took the time to track down that exact article and found it. It is suggested in that Korean study that instead of just a single injection of the person’s own adipose derived stem cells, multiple injections will have much better results. 

There will also be a 2nd study looking at how this autologous MSC method would work for cartilage lesions which are the result of trauma which often lead to the onset of osteoarthritis after maybe just 4-10 years after trauma.

The name of the article that is referenced is “Infrapatellar fat pad-derived mesenchymal stem cell therapy for knee osteoarthritis” which is associated with the Department of Orthopedic Surgery, Yonsei Sarang Hospital, Seoul, South Korea. The same group of authors had written also the paper “Mesenchymal stem cell injections improve symptoms of knee osteoarthritis.” which was published in April of 2013.

Infrapatellar Fat PadIn the referenced article, the researchers took the stem cells from the infrapatellar fat pad region (aka Hoffa’s Fat Pad). Refer to the picture to the right for reference to where the fat pad is.

The stem cells which are isolated are then injected percutaneously into knees that have been suffering from arthritis.

Note: I might have made a mistake on assumption before. It seems that the method of PRP is used in this technique. Quoted from the article…

“After the stem cells were isolated, a mean of 1.89×106 (range, 1.2–2.3 × 106) stem cells were prepared with approximately 3.0 mL of platelet-rich plasma (PRP) and injected in the selected knees of patients in the study group. ”

I made the mistake of assuming that the stem cells would be reinjected in the body percutaneously and intraarticularly by themselves. I forgot to realize that the platelet-rich plasma would be used as the semi-liquid transport medium since stem cells by themselves with no medium would just shrivel up and dry out. This method is a type of PRP therapy.

After the first injection with stem cells and PRP, 3 mL of PRP was administered every 7 days as the second and third rounds of treatment. The results from the control group and the actual tested group were statistically significant.

Implications

From my search throughout the hundreds of patents for application of stem cells, I’ve already seen at least 2 groups which have put a patent on the technique on using MSCs to treat osteoarthritis or arthritis in some way, whether by the PRP method or some other idea. I quote was is said in the paper “With regard to in vivo studies, the transplantation of MSCs into full thickness articular cartilage defects has been attempted under various conditions.” so there has been many attempts already, and the results have come in have been very fruitful and promising.

Quoted further…

“In 2 reports, experiments on humans [16,17] involving the intraarticular injection of autologous MSCs yielded good results after 6 months. In 2008, Centeno and colleagues reported the use of autologous culture-expanded bone marrow- derived stem cells for knee cartilage regeneration in humans [17]. In their study, the patients’ pain, as determined by the VAS, and range of motion improved, and MRI showed significant articular cartilage growth and meniscus regeneration. “

What I personally got out of it…

I learned that the source of where you get the MSCs is quite important. While it is well known that MSCs can be filtered from bone marrow, bone marrow extractions are often very painful and have a high chance for infections and complications. In addition, as a person ages, the density of MSCs decrease. That seems to be why the researchers here used the infrapatellar fat pad as the source of the stem cells. They were able to get 9.4 g of infrapatellar fat pad which gave out on average about 1.89×10^6 stem cells, which is a nice cell to overall fat density. For future references, instead of asking that we get stem cells from bone marrow biospys, it would be much easier and simpler to use the source of fat from under the patella.

The last important thing that the researchers stated in the study was this ….

“the paracrine effects of the cytokines and growth factors released by the grafted cells, which favorably influence the microenvironment by triggering host-associated signaling pathways and lead to increased angiogenesis, decreased apoptosis, and possibly, induction of endogenous generation”

I am still trying to understand what this part means and what the implications are.