“And so I think it’s important too, because you’ve been open in other podcasts, mainly with Matt, on how you take rapamycin, but even though you take it, and with all you said on why you think it is promising, that doesn’t mean you necessarily think everyone should just go out and blindly take it. Not all of your patients are taking it as well, correct?
Very few of my patients are taking it. I would say, I don’t think 10% of our patients are taking rapamycin. And the reason for that quite simply is unless a patient is willing to go down the rabbit hole with me on understanding this and understanding the risks and probabilities and the uncertainty, I just don’t view this as something that is responsible.
And of course, I know that there are many physicians out there who are giving out rapamycin, like it’s tic tacs and chiclets. And the truth of it is, we’re not seeing a lot of horrible things happening. So clearly in the short run, that doesn’t appear to be a problem.”
The Peter Attia Drive: Special episode: Peter on exercise, fasting, nutrition, stem cells, geroprotective drugs, and more — promising interventions or just noise?, may 6, 2024
It makes sense, it requires a lot of research to understand the drug well enough to take it responsibly, but at the same time a lot of horrible things doesn’t seem to be happening with rapamycin users.
I find that quite odd. I would think people that sought him out would know about Rapa and be ready to try it. It’s certainly something he’s well associated with.
I think from a regulatory position that is sensible. The regulatory system requires more certainty than is currently available, but if people do their own research and make the decision for themselves then it is a reasonable decision.
That’s very responsible approach. As with any medicine, there is a normal distribution curve of those who will benefit long term and those who may not including shorter lifespan. We just don’t know for sure.
Doctors are conservative by culture (“first do no harm”) and by incentive (a lot more downside to malpractice accusations than upside to extending a healthy person’s life by a decade).
I’m still surprised given it’s Attia. I think it’s easy to safely take rapa and not much education is required. Stop taking while sick, don’t take while having kids, combine with acarbose or metformin for blood sugar control.
“Handing it out like tic tacs” seems like the most promising way to increase human wellbeing across the population than anything else.
Not taking rapamycin is a greater risk than taking it for most healthy people in my opinion.
Thank God for Dr. Alan Green. He had me do required bloodwork before my visit and then spent over 2 hours in consultation with me before finally providing a prescription. IF you are younger, it might well make sense to wait for more research, but for ancient ones (like me): Carpe Diem
We don’t really know what what percentage of Attia clients take rapa. We only know what was said in public. He could have many reasons to not be forthright about it.
With his clientele (very high net worth individuals (e.g. billionaires) like Michael Dell, of Dell Computers) there is a lot of downside to “encouraging” rapamycin to his client base if anything goes wrong. Massive lawsuits could erupt. So I’m sure he’s very cautious with prescribing rapamycin to his clients.
Taking rapamycin is an active effort. You have to think about avoiding exposure to pathogens as your serum levels are high, remember to stop taking it if you’re doing off-label if you get an infection or is sick, look out for side effects, blood marker abnormalities, etc. But it could be very good if someone has a lot of knowledge about it, his clients probably don’t have time or motivation to look into this. They probably want help with and measuring stuff they already are interested in like exercise, if I would guess.
I wonder if this is a bad idea. I mean how many has the motivation or the time to research whether to take rapamycin or not?
I think the most important is the minimum essential knowledge, like that above and more, and that you trust the expert, in this case Peter Attia, based on if he uses the same methodology as you and you believe it is good. So you need to know how to determine what drug or supplement is good, and then find the experts that do the same.
The end result otherwise is not many are going to take rapamycin, or anything else. It’s a good idea to try to research your own things, only so far so you understand the correct methodology I think.
For example, if you started investing and you listened to the bank’s financial advisor (salesman), you would be conned on fees and lower performance, most likely.
However, if you learned about the proper methodology for figuring out how to invest, you would know they were salespeople and you could find the right person. You would also avoid the bozos that are so common in the investing world.
The same is true for health. If you need to know everything yourself, well you are probably not going to do anything as it takes way too much time and motivation. It’s better if a few people do this and teach others. People just need to connect with the right experts…
Now I understand that these experts don’t give medical advice, but I can still listen to them and know the bare minimum (like rapamycin and infections, ulcers, lipid abnormalities…).
Plenty of research in animals. But is there any good research results in humans coming in the next decade? If you are middle aged and you are rapamycin inclined, what is the point in waiting? Because it could be a long wait.
Start with small doses. Monitor any side effects. Take breaks. Take blood tests if you can and combine with blood sugar control meds if needed.
Then, with any luck, we might be a little less older by the time the proper research is done or something even better comes along. Those months or years we save might mean the difference of a whole lifetime. So for me it’s worth the risk.