What is NAD+?
NAD+ is an enzyme that essentially helps cells create the energy they need to carry out a range of different functions, including regulating multiple cellular processes like DNA repair and gene expression, making it a vital component of our body’s normal functioning. It’s also something that we have less of as we age, which research indicates could be a cause of many age-related illnesses.
As we age, levels of NAD+ in our cells decline, largely due to chronic age-related inflammation also known as “inflammaging”, but also because we become less efficient at making it and demand increases. Over the last two decades or so, several studies on both animals and humans have shown that boosting NAD+ to youthful levels can be very beneficial – like in this recent study where NAD enhanced aerobic capacity in amateur runners quite significantly.
Promising studies like this are why so many people are starting to include NAD+ injections as part of their healthy routine.
Mental Clarity
How Does NAD+ Boost Mental Clarity?
We’ve all experienced that afternoon lag. It’s three in the afternoon, and we’ve got that fogginess that no amount of caffeine can cut through. We’re not as sharp, focused, or alert as we may have been earlier in the day.
But when it comes to mental clarity and, actually, overall brain health, NAD+ supplementation may offer both short-term reprieve and long-term benefits to support brain health.
How Does NAD+ Boost Mental Clarity?
In addition to many other health benefits (such as reducing inflammation and supporting muscle health), NAD+ has been shown to help combat “brain fog.”
But what is “brain fog?”
It doesn’t sound like the most technical term, but brain fog simply refers to a feeling of “haziness” that affects our mental clarity and ability to focus. Brain fog can be caused by a number of things, including stress, lack of sleep, or vitamin deficiency. Think about those afternoon slumps and how difficult it can be to get things done!
NAD+ works by giving cells a boost, improving the function of neurotransmitters that help facilitate communication between cells, helping you break through that mid-day slump.
How Does NAD+ Support Overall Brain Health?
In addition to treating short-term issues with focus and mental clarity, NAD+’s ability to help revitalize many neurological processes in the brain also helps support overall, long-term brain health. For example, NAD+ plays a role in maintaining healthy synapses, which help cells communicate with one another in the brain.
Research has also shown that NAD+ supplementation could also be beneficial for counteracting some neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s and Huntington’s disease, by helping manage neuroinflammation (basically, inflammation in the brain). While inflammation is a vital biological function, too much can also be damaging; NAD+ has proved helpful in managing too much inflammation.
Muscle Function & Recovery
As you can imagine, muscles require a lot of energy. They do a lot, after all! That’s why there are often high levels of NAD+ in healthy muscle cells to help them function (and recover from damage) correctly. On the flip side, low NAD+ levels—which can happen when we get older—have a negative effect on muscle health and can cause muscles to deteriorate.
NAD+ and Muscle Recovery
So, NAD+ helps muscle cells create the energy they need to function. But when it comes to muscle recovery, NAD+ plays a bit of a more expanded role.
Strenuous workouts for example often cause microscopic damage to muscles that need to be repaired. To repair themselves, muscle cells need nutrients—that’s why it’s always recommended to eat after a workout so nutrients are present in your body for use. When muscles need repair, NAD+ plays a two-part role: it helps turn these nutrients into energy and sends signals to the body letting it know when and where nutrients are needed, boosting workout recovery.
What’s more, NAD+ doesn’t just help boost muscle recovery after exercise—it has also been shown to help reduce muscle deterioration due to age. That’s because proteins sometimes build up in cells and prevent the mitochondria from producing energy; NAD+, which works with the mitochondria, has proved helpful in reversing this deterioration!
Inflammation
Even though inflammation sounds like a scary word, it’s actually a very normal (and important) process that happens in our bodies. But when inflammation is chronic, or happens regularly over a long period of time, it can cause health problems. That’s why it’s important to keep inflammation from getting out of control.
Why is Too Much Inflammation Bad?
Inflammation is a very important biological function. It helps the immune system fight back and destroy cells infected by bacteria and viruses (that’s why we get sore throats when we’re sick, for example). Inflammation is also how the body heals itself (that’s why skin around a cut gets red). And sometimes, inflammation affects areas we can’t see, such as the gut (which can cause symptoms like diarrhea).
However, too much inflammation can be a problem and can lead to a number of health complications, including heart disease and arthritis. Some chronic conditions, such as arthritis, Alzheimer’s disease, autoimmune conditions, and some cancers are characterized by excessive and unhealthy levels of inflammation.
Research has shown that NAD+ plays a key role in helping reduce inflammation. The natural process of aging inevitably increases inflammation, which in turn reduces NAD+ levels. This happens because as we get older, some cells stop replicating due to DNA damage as a result of reduced NAD+ levels, but these cells don’t die like they should. Instead, they release signals to the body that trigger inflammation, one of the body’s natural attempts to prevent the growth of cancer cells. Supplementing NAD+ could help with DNA repair and reduce the number of cells releasing these inflammatory signals.
For example, a recent study in mice also showed favorable results for using NAD+ to treat brain inflammation that causes Alzheimer’s disease.
Sleep & Circadian Rhythm
Have you ever stayed awake for over 24 hours? If you have, you’ll know it feels pretty terrible, and that’s because it’s something our bodies just aren’t designed for.
But we’re not alone – in fact, almost all living things, including cyanobacteria, insects, fish, and other mammals have developed their own internal clock systems to help them rest, recover and reproduce.
These sleep-wake cycles are referred to as ‘circadian clocks’, and the term ‘circadian’ comes from the Latin circa, meaning ‘around’ (or ‘approximately’), and diēm, meaning ‘day’. Our circadian rhythms are why we tend to get tired at the same time every night, and why jetlag can take a couple of days to get over, because it sends our circadian rhythms out of rhythm.
A recent study found that NAD in the drinking water of old mice “countered the decline in night-time locomotor activity rhythms” (so the mice moved around less at night, suggesting they rested more) and restored youthful patterns of gene expression in mouse livers.
This is an ongoing area of research, and scientists are still learning about this very complex (and fascinating) topic. While human clinical trials are thus far lacking, there is plenty of anecdotal evidence of people experiencing better sleep thanks to boosting their NAD+.
Autoimmune conditions
Type 1 diabetes. Multiple sclerosis. Celiac disease. Rheumatoid arthritis. Hashimoto’s thyroiditis. These are all common autoimmune conditions. If you’re living with one, you know it can be challenging to manage, even with standard treatments.
Broadly speaking, an autoimmune condition occurs when the immune system attacks the body, mistaking healthy cells in the body for intruders, like bacteria or viruses. These attacks often cause inflammation, pain, and damage to internal tissue—for example, multiple sclerosis is caused by damage to nerve cells, which cause symptoms like poor balance and mobility.
Unfortunately, no one knows exactly why autoimmune conditions form—though there are plenty of theories, such as the hygiene hypothesis!
There is mounting exciting research that has shown NAD+ can help with autoimmune conditions in two ways:
Facilitating cellular regeneration, and
Helping stop certain cells in the immune system from attacking the body
We know autoimmune conditions attack and destroy cells in the body, causing many of the symptoms associated with that condition. And while the body has processes for repairing and creating new cells, there’s a key enzyme involved in this process - NAD+!. Several studies have shown that NAD+ can reverse or ameliorate the symptoms of many autoimmune conditions by helping the body repair tissue damaged by inflammation. For example, people with irritable bowel disease (IBD) experience inflammation that can erode the gut’s protective lining. NAD+ has been shown to improve the quality of this cell lining.
NAD+ also plays a vital role in the immune system. A study published a few years ago found that NAD+ can help regulate the activity of certain types of T-cells, the same kind of immune system cell that attacks the body. This process could potentially reduce inflammation and other symptoms of autoimmune conditions.
How to increase NAD+
The best way to supplement declining NAD+ is through NAD+ Injection Therapy. NAD+ Injections help to ensure that it’s absorbed by the bloodstream, rather than being broken down in the digestive system, thereby delivering maximum benefits to your body. You get the benefits of NAD more quickly than you might with other delivery systems, such as the oral route, so you experience a faster, more effective treatment outcome.
ABOUT THE CENTER FOR INTEGRATIVE HEALING & WELLNESS
Dr. Fabio Almeida M.D. ABOIM, ABNM, ABOM is the founder and director of the Center for Integrative Healing & Wellness at the CIVANA Carefree Resort. Dr. Fabio is a triple board-certified physician with expertise in Integrative & Functional Medicine/Oncology, Molecular Imaging and Obesity. He served as an Assistant Professor of Radiology & Radiation Oncology, and subsequently as the Director of Molecular Imaging for the University of Arizona Medical Center in Tucson Arizona. Dr. Fabio is a fellow of the Integrative Medicine Program at the University of Arizona, and is an expert in integrative medicine, herbal medicine, nutrition, fitness, and stress management. He is published in several peer-reviewed journals and book chapters in radiology, oncology, cardiology, nutrition, and information science.
At the Center, Dr. Fabio and his team offer concierge adult primary care and a wide variety of personalized integrative, holistic and anti-aging therapies (traditional medicine, nutrition, culinary medicine, herbal/botanical, lifestyle, weight loss, hormone balance, fitness, energy medicine) to address all our client’s longevity and health care needs.