Table of Contents[Hide][Show]
Mary Newport has much reason to celebrate these days.
After helplessly watching her 58 year old husband rapidly degenerate into severe dementia only 5 years after MRI diagnosis with Alzheimer’s, Dr. Newport decided to pursue unorthodox treatment of his condition with virgin coconut oil (not refined!) instead of the expensive drug Axena which has the drawback of producing intestinal distress in some patients and wears off within just a few hours of ingestion.
Mary Newport, a neonatal pediatrician at Spring Hill Regional Hospital in Florida, learned through research that the active ingredient in Axona is MCT, also known as Medium Chain Triglycerides, a saturated fat used to treat epilepsy as well as in neonatal feeding programs.
Since Virgin Coconut Oil (VCO) is loaded with MCTs, Dr. Newport began an intensive feeding program for her husband that consisted of a mixture of 2 TBL virgin coconut oil and the MCT pharmaceutical isolate with every meal. Interestingly, this regimen also assists with sensible and steady weight loss.
Within 35 days, Steve Newport’s rapid neurological decline was arrested and 18 months later he had recovered enough brain function and normal behavior to test as only a mild case of Alzheimer’s – the same tests which before starting the VCO feeding program had indicated that he was borderline severe dementia.
As a bonus, Steve Newport’s cholesterol profile has improved significantly by adding this healthy saturated fat to his diet with good cholesterol (HDL) going up and bad cholesterol (LDL) going down.
Dr. Newport now travels all over the United States relaying the remarkable story of her husband’s recovery from borderline severe dementia using VCO to essentially rebuild his brain.
She is a strong advocate for continued research into the use of MCTs as a therapy for those with Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, multiple sclerosis and other debilitating neurological diseases.
Coconut Oil Provides SuperFuel to the Brain
Dr. Bruce Fife, author of Stop Alzheimer’s Now, recommends VCO instead of MCT drugs such as Axona because the drugs become ineffective over time, wear off quickly, have side effects and cause free radical damage to the cells.
When the MCTs in virgin coconut oil are converted into ketones they act as a super fuel for the brain. This super fuel provides energy to the brain as well as stimulates healing and repair.
It is the chemical structure of the MCTs in coconut oil that allows them to pass the blood-brain barrier which ordinary food or oils cannot.
How to Source Quality Virgin Coconut Oil
If someone you love is suffering from a neurodegenerative illness, help them by adding virgin coconut oil to their diet! The research is showing what Traditional Cultures such as those in the Pacific Islands have known for centuries – coconut oil helps keep you healthy!
To source, please refer to my healthy shopping list page which identifies companies that offer only the finest organic Virgin Coconut Oil from sustainable sources available in convenient coconut oil capsules too!
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
Source: The Philippine Inquirer, A Cure for Alzheimer’s
LOOOVE that you posted this! HAVE to share!
I put it in my kefir smoothie every morning, too, but I don’t heat it. It blends in just fine, which I have to admit did surprise me.
Wow, that’s amazing, thanks for posting! It’s amazing what real foods can do…
Virgin Coconut Oil Halts Severe Dementia in 35 Days – The Healthy Home Economist http://t.co/BvHuJQtd
I heat it and pour it in my morning smoothie….yum!
So do I! It’s a fabulous way to ensure I can put lots of fruit in my smoothie and not spike my blood sugar. Of course, it also tastes fantastic, especially with some banana!
Sarah,
I get so confused when I start looking at buying coconut oil. I have recently had Nutiva and the taste is great. Is there a reason you don’t reccomend it. (I have not tried the Wilderness family brand) There is so much info out there, that I just get so mind boggled. Some say don’t use the heat process ex. expreller pressed. Etc, etc. I did also try the tropical traditions brand and I thought it was piecey. not smooth but that is one of the most reccommended brands on alot of the real food blogs. PLease help us confused women out!!!!
I’m sure there are other brands besides the ones I recommend on my Resources page that are excellent .. I just don’t have the time to vett them all and the ones on my page are already vetted and confirmed to be quality and sustainable.
Wildnerness Family Naturals shouldn’t really be on this list of Sarah’s because if you read the fine print, it’s refined. I was under the impression we are only supposed to look for unrefined oils, as much as possible. I am having NO luck finding an unrefined olive oil. I have yet to find olive oil which looks “cloudy” either. I did find one site a while ago with unrefined olive oil but it had to come from overseas and the shipping was outrageous and it wasn’t listed as coming from an organic source – and I was supposed to buy a whole gallon. Cripes, I wouldn’t use a whole gallon in five years! I mostly use avocado oil, coconut oil, real butter, ghee, lard, tallow, bacon grease from our milkfed pork, etc. Guess I can live without olive oil, although I used to like to use it for my homemade mayonnaise. Most of the olive oil on store shelves is rancid from the get-go and smells/tastes just awful. It was NOT complementary to my homemade foods. But I’ve never tried coconut oil in mayo either. Think that would work??
Wilderness Family Naturals MOST DEFINITELY has organic virgin coconut oil!
I don’t know what fine print you are referring to. Please click to their website and see for yourself.
What do you think of their expeller pressed ultra clean supreme kind? Or do you only recommend the raw oil? Or do you use raw for some and the expeller pressed for others? I tried tropical traditions and didn’t really like it. I haven’t tried Nutiva.
Thanks –
Here’s what I do … no magic to it but it works for us: I use expeller low temp pressed for cooking as it eliminates that coconut-y flavor and we use organic virgin coconut oil off the spoon for therapeutic reasons (as described in this post) or for application directly to the skin.
Hi D, Wilderness does sell the low temp expeller pressed but they also sell the organic virgin coconut oil. I use both in my home as well. Your comment made it sound like they only sell the refined. Sounds like you accidentally purchased the wrong type of coconut oil by mistake.
Sarah, the last gallon I bought from Wilderness Family Natural said, in very small print on the side of the label on the gallon plastic container, “refined”. I was very surprised to see it but there it was. I bought it on sale for $30/gal right directly from their web site. Maybe the reason it was so cheap at that time is because they were culling their stock and then going to totally unrefined, I don’t know. All I know is we saved the container and my granddaughter plays with it. I just looked again at the label and it says refined coconut oil in small print on the left-hand side of the label, towards the top.
Here’s exactly what the label says, verbatim: “Wilderness Family Naturals Expeller Pressed Coconut Oil is a high quality refined coconut oil. It is made by mechanical pressing and contains no solvents or chemicals. This oil is not hydrogenated and contains no trans fats. It is also analyzed for and contains no aflatoxins. In addition, because this oil is expeller pressed and refined, it does not contain a coconut taste, but has a neutral flavor. Lauric acid and other medium chain fatty acids naturally occur in this quality cooking oil”.
I guess the main difference I can see is that some are cold pressed, some are expeller pressed, and some are centrifuged.
I have a jar of the same refined coconut oil, but I purchased that jar deliberately because I know that refined coconut oil has no flavor or coconut scent and I wanted a healthy, safe fat for high heat cooking that didn’t add coconut flavor to foods (some things are enhanced by the coconut flavor, but it doesn’t go well with everything). I also have extra virgin coconut oil that does have the coconut flavor and scent, which I use for those foods that are complemented by the flavor. It makes sense to have BOTH in your kitchen so that you have a healthy fat for high heat cooking of a variety of dishes. The other flavorless and odorless oils out there for cooking are mostly unsafe polyunsaturated (unstable and easily damaged by heat) oils, which is why it is a great idea to have some refined coconut oil on hand (that is unless EVERYTHING you cook is enhanced by coconut flavor/scent).
Dr Bruce Fife in his newest book Stop Alzheimer’s Now says that raw/virgin and expeller pressed coconut oil are both beneficial. I highly recommend his book, released since this post was written.
I have used the Wilderness Family refined coconut oil and Chaffin Family Orchards Extra Virgin Olive Oil in proportions of approx 2/3 coconut to 1/3 olive oil. (I grew up on Best Foods and the flavor of full olive oil is too much). That does not become hard in the fridge and tastes pretty decent to us. I’ve read the Wilderness Family refined is still good to use. Hope that helps.
I sometimes mix coconut oil with my real homemade buter for something different. I also sometimes mix small amounts of coconut oil and Kerrygold Butter together because lately the Kerrygold is terribly salty. The label does not say if it’s plain ol’ salt of if it’s sea salt or celtic salt or what, so I have to assume it’s just regular salt. I wish Kerrygold made an unsalted version – I’d love to use it for making ghee sometime.
I tried the oil mixture from Mary Enig (WAPF) with sesame oil, olive oil and coconut oil mixed together but I hated it, and my DH REALLY hated it. I do not care for sesame oil (too strongly flavored) and until I find a quality, good tasting, good smelling olive oil, I won’t be trying it again anytime soon. (Sorry Mary!).
Kerrygold does make unsalted butter–the one I have in my freezer is unsalted, cultured butter in a silver, rather than gold, wrapping. It probably is just less commonly sold. Maybe try a different store?
D. what type of sesame oil were you using? Toasted or just plain expeller pressed? The plain, expeller pressed has NO flavor and is very mild. It can be used in mayonnaise and salad dressings with no noticeable flavor. The toasted sesame oil is very strong tasting and should be used in small amounts for flavoring. It is great in stir frys etc. Maybe that is why you didn’t like the flavor of the oil blend….
People jump on olive oil bandwagon all. the. time. I don’t think the olive oil we get in the states is healthy. But the, apparently, good stuff is expensive. I like to make homemade caesar dressing with raw egg yolks so I do buy the expensive yet crappy olive oil from the health food store but after reading your post, I’m going to figure something else out.
I don’t think the olive oil we get in the States is *olive oil*, half the time. I’ve been hearing weird things about that.
Love Nutiva coconut oil! The company’s own website has an awesome sale right now on coconut oil too! And if you google it, you can find an additional $10 off coupon code (I can’t recall the code off hand).
Get the cheapest you can find…it’s ALL good!
This is just another advertisement for an expensive supplement. It is old news. I resent the websites that lure you into thinking that you can treat something with natural foods, but instead want to sell you a pricy supplement. Then you are sent to another site to buy a video or newsletter. I just want to know how to eat right. BTW, I have purchased the coconut oil for baking and use olive oil for savory dishes and cooking. I am not opposed to buying whole foods and do buy some supplements, but the list seems to on and on.
Yes, I do think there are too many supplements out there today, but appropriate, good quality supplements may be a great way to improve a certain disease or problem. Eating well might not be enough if someone’s body has been abused by the wrong foods over the years, or before they were born (mom’s health/diet in pregnancy). Carefully selected supplements may help kick start the journey toward wellness. 🙂
Coconut oil is not considered a supplement, it’s a food which consequently has supplement advantages. You can buy coconut oil capsules if that’s what you mean, but that’s not what this article is all about. I use 3 TBSP coconut oil (right off the spoon) and let it melt in my mouth every day for health reasons and for assistance in maintaining a healthy weight. I use Nutiva which I buy from Amazon or Vitacost.
This is not an ad for an expensive supplement. It’s a vital new (to many) piece of information that could be life-changing for someone on a quick downhill slide into Alzheimer’s. MCT oil is the part of raw coconut oil that will make a difference for those people and is very economical in price. Compare that to the pricey new Axona or any of the standard (and not very effective) pharmaceuticals for Alzheimer’s. Please read Dr.Newport’s story.
For the rest of us, this is one more reason for us to incorporate VCO into our diet as a way of “eating right”. Not complicated at all.
Just to balance this thought out…what about the pharmaceutical industry? Wow, if we want an example of expensive products advertised to treat various conditions, nothing compares! Currently there are new mental conditions invented all the time in order to create a market for new drugs–drugs whose advertisements fill the pages of most every magazine you pick up and fill commercial space on television every 15 minutes. Remember these drugs would never occur in the form they are in in nature, all of them have side effects, the vast majority of them do not cure disease, but merely help to manage them and their symptoms, AND Big Pharm makes billions upon billions off of them. The more we seek out ways to truly cure diseases and conditions with healthy foods and lifestyle, the better off we will be in the long run–and we won’t need expensive, unnatural drugs either!
Jane – really? Do you know what you’re talking about? Coconut oil is not a supplement. It’s a food. And BTW, you shouldn’t be cooking with olive oil. Once heated, it destroys the healthy properties. That’s why you buy it cold-pressed. I don’t find your post offensive; I just find you uneducated.
You don’t have to get fancy organic virgin coconut oil to get MCTs. I can’t afford fancy organic virgin coconut oil. Instead of whining about people who dare to need things like groceries and rent money even though they blog for free, I go to Kroger and pick up a jar of LouAna coconut oil. Nice and cheap and it still does me good. So does the CAFO butter I also buy at Kroger. The only reason I don’t also buy milk and cream at Kroger is because Kroger adulterates their heavy whipping cream with skim milk (wth???) and I have found a brand that is cheaper per gallon and is grass-fed. Pure accident, and not everyone can be lucky like me, I recognize. But we all do what we can, and I don’t care what anybody says, eating the right foods but getting them from less than premium sources is better than, say, going low-fat raw vegan.
You do what you can do. And by the way, blogging’s work. I keep one and while I’ve got almost 500 fans on Facebook now, I recognize I could be a lot better at it–if I had a couple hours a day to write and do research, and I have five cats and a homeschooled six-year-old and a man in the house who doesn’t know how to clean, so that’s out of the question. I completely understand why some bloggers sell ebooks. Every little bit helps. Otherwise you are typing your fingers off getting nothing but good feelings and the occasional irate person yelling at you for all your trouble.
What is the heavy cream brand? I can’t always get it from my raw milk dairy, so I would appreciate being able to find the next best thing.
Thanks for this information Sarah. My son has a benign type of epilepsy and I’m thinking the Virgin Coconut Oil might be helpful if MCT is used to treat epilepsy.
YES!!!! I’m feel sure it would prove helpful to his condition!
@Kay – yes he is a mild case now. He has recovered from borderline severe dementia and his progression halted. I imagine there was possibly some permanent damage since he didn’t get on the VCO until he was pretty bad off.
Wow, I’m sold!