WD-40™ For Your Joints!

Cetyl Myristoleate

by: Charles Cochran, D.C.

I’ve read in several articles that over 40 million Americans presently suffer from some form of arthritis. I would imagine that these numbers are quite conservative since there are many of us, including myself, who do not use traditional medicine for the treatment of arthritis and are not counted and included in the 40 million. Regardless, this staggering number is supposed to increase to over 60 million during the next 20 years! The cost of traditional treatment of arthritis in 1992 was over $65 billion with most of this being spent for disability payments and lost time at work. Now, factor in the cost of over 20,000 deaths and 2 million hospitalizations each and every year for those taking non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS) for the treatment of arthritis, and you start to see what a terrific problem we have. I don’t have any statistics as to the cost of treating the side effects of other medications used to treat arthritis, but I’m sure that the above numbers would double. These other medications include the corticosteriod drugs (prednizone and cortisone), the immune suppressive drugs (methotrexate and cyclosporin), and the new cox-2 inhibitors.

I’m sure that most of you have either heard of or have even tried many of the joint rebuilding nutrients. These substances are also known as chondroprotective nutrients, and include glucosamine, chondroitin sulfate, methyl sulfonylmethane (MSM), hydrolyzed cartilage, and collagen type II. To understand some of the differences in the topic of our discussion, Cetyl Myristoleate, and all of these chondroprotective nutrients, we need to take somewhat of a closer look at how they work and some very basic joint anatomy.

There are three basic joint types described in most anatomy texts. The joints most likely to develop arthritis are the freely moving joints known as synovial diarthroses. These joints include the hip, knee, ankle, elbow, wrist, shoulder, fingers, and thumb. The basic parts of these kinds of these joints include the bone, articular cartilage, joint capsule, synovial tissue or synovium, and the joint cavity filled with synovial fluid. Depending on what type of arthritis we’re discussing and how advanced the condition is, any one of these tissues, or all of them, may be involved in the degenerative inflammatory process.

The most common form of arthritis, osteoarthritis, also known as degenerative joint disease (DJD), involves first and foremost the cartilage. If allowed to continue, the ends of the bones can become affected. The causes of DJD are quite involved. During my time in school, I was taught that this form of arthritis was caused by a wearing away of the cartilage due to mechanical stresses on the joint eventually leading to "bone on bone" and extreme pain. However, more recent research has shown that much of the damage to these tissues is caused by our own immune system. Whenever, an injury to a joint occurs, the body answers by orchestrating an immune response. These immune cells, known as macrophages and neutrophils, have been found to release joint-corroding substances, such as protein-digesting (proteolytic) enzymes and free radicals, that do further damage to the joint tissues.

Articular cartilage is composed of collagen, proteoglycans, water, and cartilage cells, known as chondrocytes. Collagen is the most abundant protein in the body, making up 30% of total proteins, and up to 90% of all connective tissues. It provides strength and structure to all tissues. There are 12 basic types of collagen found in the body with type II comprising 50% of the collagen found in the cartilage. Also found in cartilage are types IX, X, XI, and XII. Types I and III are found in skin, bone, ligaments, and tendons. Research has shown that using collagen type II extracted from bovine trachea and chicken sternal cartilage can be very beneficial in treating both osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis. MSM is a wonderful source of sulfur, and sulfur is used to create to disulfide bonds that connect these proteins together.

Proteoglycans are very large molecules made up of proteins and smaller molecules known as glycosaminoglycans (GAGs). They make up around 10% of articular cartilage, but because of their structure, they take up a tremendous amount of space. There are six types of glycosaminoglycans with four of them being found in cartilage. The one that you are probably most familiar with is known as chondroitin sulfate. The other GAGs found in articular cartilage are hyaluronan (also found in synovial fluid), keratan sulfate, and dermatan sulfate. Chondroitin sulfate is made up of smaller subunits known as galactosamine and glucuronic acid. For those of you taking glucosamine, you might be interested in knowing that there are enzymes (epimerases) that convert glucosamine into galactosamine, which is then converted into chondroitin sulfate. Glucosamine also enhances the incorporation of sulfur into the cartilage. Much of the research has shown that chondroitin sulfate might be difficult to digest and absorb because of the size of the molecule. Perhaps taking larger doses of glucosamine might be more beneficial since it is much smaller and more bioavailable. I often recommend much higher daily doses of glucosamine, up to 3 or 4 grams per day, for shorter periods of time with better results. As you are starting to see, all of these nutrients provide the building blocks for new tissue growth, but are we really addressing the causes of these conditions? Although, these nutrients have been used for many years with wonderful results, their effects are limited. I’m sure many of you have experienced all of your joint pain returning within weeks after discontinuing glucosamine or chondroitin sulfate treatments. The one thing common to all arthritic conditions is the involvement of the immune system. Whether it is rheumatoid arthritis and the immune system thinks that the joint capsule is a foreign invader and starts an all-out attack or in the case of osteoarthritis when the damage is done through the release of enzymes and free radicals into the joint, comprehensive treatment should include the involvement of the immune system. Enter one of the most important nutritional discoveries of the 20^th century — Cetyl Myristoleate.

Cetyl Myristoleate (CM) works quite differently than the joint-rebuilding nutrients.

It has been clinically observed to function in, at least, four different ways. It has been found to work as a lubricant (WD-40™), a painkiller, an anti-inflammatory, and, what I think is most important, an immune system regulator. Although the exact mechanisms are not known at this time, there are some very strong indications that CM, a fatty acid ester, is incorporated into the lipid layers of cell membranes. Some fairly recent research has shown that the analog (similar molecule) of Cetyl Myristoleate, known as Myristate, is bound to a protein within the nucleus of the cell and then incorporated into the cell membrane. These myristoylated proteins have diverse biological functions on the cellular level such as signal transduction (how cells communicate), cell growth, and regulation. For instance, CAR, a gene implicated in suppression of tumor invasion, is responsible for creating myristoylated proteins. And, myristoylated proteins have been located in enterokinase, an enzyme involved in converting trypsinogen from the pancreas into trypsin. Trypsin is an enzyme that helps to digest proteins in the small intestine. Other myristoylated proteins are involved in creating calcium-binding proteins and acidic brain proteins. Are you beginning to see how Myristoleate and Myristate might function to alter how cells communicate? And if the method which immune cells communicate is altered by reprogramming cell membrane receptor sites, it wouldn’t be too difficult to imagine how these fatty acid esters could redirect a misdirected immune response. Another theory is that this group of fatty acid esters reprograms immune cells that have lived long beyond their normal life span. All cells in the body are programmed to die within a certain range of time. This preprogrammed cell death is called apoptosis. If this program has been has been modified in any way, these immune cells can produce a tremendous amount of damage and anything that would help to reprogram apoptosis would have immense benefit in treating all forms of arthritis.