We tested the hypothesis that mood, clinical manifestations and cognitive impairment of levodopa-treated Parkinson's disease (PD) patients are associated with vitamin B12 and folate deficiency. To this end, we performed this cross-sectional study by measuring serum folate and vitamin B12 blood levels in 111 consecutive PD patients. Levodopa-treated PD patients showed significantly lower serum l...

Folate is important for cell division and thus for growth and physical development. Serum folate concentrations can be used to assess a population’s folate status. In Germany, the median serum folate level of adults aged 18 to 79 is 7.5 ng/ml (women: 7.9 ng/ml, and men: 7.2 ng/ml). Approximately 86% of the adult population in Germany has adequate folate levels. Higher folate concentrations are ...

OBJECTIVE Antiepileptic drugs (AEDs) are important for the treatment of epilepsy, psychiatric diseases, and pain syndromes. Small studies have suggested that AED treatment reduces serum levels of folate and vitamin B12. METHODS This prospective monocenter study aimed at testing the hypothesis that AED treatment is associated with folate and vitamin B12 serum levels in a large population. A to...

The ability to hydrolyse and absorb pteroylpolyglutamates (PteGlun) included in a standard meal in mothers who had given birth to an infant with a neural tube defect was tested by comparing them with mothers who had not had any infants with this defect. When compared with control mothers working in the research unit in which the study was performed, case mothers had significantly lower baseline...

To the Editor:-Folate deficiency is well established as a cause of megaloblastic anemia, but its relationship to dementia is less certain. In 1967, Strachan and Henderson' reported on two patients with dementia who were found to have megaloblastic anemias due to folate deficiency. Treatment with folic acid cured both the anemia and the dementia in one patient and resulted in marked improvement ...

BACKGROUND The United States implemented mandatory folic acid fortification of enriched cereal grains in 1998. Although several studies have documented the resulting decrease in anemia and folate deficiency, to our knowledge, no one has determined the prevalence of folate-deficiency anemia after fortification. OBJECTIVE We determined the prevalence of folate deficiency and folate-deficiency a...

BACKGROUND Preconceptional folate and vitamin B-12 have been linked to beneficial reproductive outcomes in both natural pregnancies and those after assisted reproductive technology (ART) treatment. OBJECTIVE The objective of the study was to evaluate the associations of serum folate and vitamin B-12 with ART outcomes. DESIGN This analysis included a random sample of 100 women (154 ART cycle...

BACKGROUND Observational studies and clinical trials have shown conclusive evidence that periconceptional folic acid supplementation prevents up to 70 % of neural tube defects (NTD). The Honduran government wanted to implement a supplementation programme of folic acid but needed to assess the relative effects of two dosages of folic acid. OBJECTIVE To determine the effect of two dosages of fo...

We assessed folate nutritional status from birth to 12 months in fifty-one infants who were fed human milk (HM; n 20), casein-based formula (CBF; n 12) or soya-based formula (SBF; n 19). Folate contents in ninety-five HM samples obtained from twenty mothers for the first 6-month period and twelve CBF and nineteen SBF samples were measured by bioassay after trienzyme extraction. Folate intake wa...