A patient of mine who has a decidedly avant-garde approach to life has been taking methylene blue for its purported anti-ageing benefits. He’s imported it from the USA as you won’t find it in any health food shop in this country. It’s been around for over a hundred years and it has been used as an antiseptic, to treat cyanide poisoning and to manage a condition called methemoglobinemia, a rare condition that alters the capacity of haemoglobin to deliver oxygen to our tissues, which is reversed once this substance is administered.
It’s also a very potent antioxidant and there is some evidence that it can enhance memory and slow down brain ageing. It has even been used to successfully treat covid infestation, an outcome that has not been widely publicized. There is clinical research indicating that it has the power to diminish the rate of cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s sufferers. Compared with vitamin C and retinol skin cells treated with methylene blue demonstrated a greater capacity to proliferate and had reduced signs of ageing, but this hasn’t yet translated to methylene blue being incorporated in topical anti-ageing formulations.
It’s considered safe when taken in low doses at <2mg/kg per day. What we do need is more main stream research to substantiate its advantages but because it has been around for so long and has yet to be embraced by the wider scientific community this initiative appears doubtful.
