<<Disclaimer: Verify this information before applying it to your situation.>> Listmates, Ok, I received 4 responses to a query I posted about papain on the autism list. There were no negative reports. Here is why I asked: Please take this is for what it is, only one data point. You should not draw any conclusions from a single anectodal report. Perhaps this might draw out some other experiences. The other day my sister-in-law called to tell me that her son had been moved to another room in the hospital. (He is the hospital for an acute bout of ulcerative colitis.) I mentioned to her that there was an abstract I had just read in which it was noted that hydrocortisone inhibited proteoglycan synthesis. Her daughter came down with arthritis in one knee and has been getting hydrocortisone shots for it. In describing the paper I explained that the experiments began with the injection of papain to induce injury and thus allow the scientists to watch the proteoglycans/GAGs being rebuilt. This rang a bell for her. She explained that she had been racking her brain over the past 6 months trying to figure out why two of her kids had gotten ill (arthritis and ulcerative colitis) at around the same time. She had already concluded that the only thing new she had introduced into the family diet last year was a meat tenderizer whose main ingredient was papain. Arthritis and ulcerative colitis followed. Coincidence? I did a very quick look at my enzyme books. Papain, as you know comes from papaya. It is used as a digestive aid in Celiac Disease, as a meat tenderizer and in herniated lumbar disk surgery to selectively destroy cartlidge. It is claimed that it has an ability to select dead tissue and leave living tissue alone. I don't know how it could it do that. Perhaps GAGs that are unsulfated are viewed as dead tissue while well sulfated GAGs are protected against this protease. However, I believe they used heathy rabbits in the experiments referred to in the attached paper, so you wouldn't expect them to have a sulfation issue. Perhaps, in the long run, papain is not such a good thing for people with gut problems and/or arthritis or even a genetic (HLA) predisposition to these? Bromelain (from pineapple) and perhaps other digestive enzymes would be suspect as wel.l Perhaps even our own digestive enzymes are an issue under poor sulfation conditions. Note: I did some searching on the web and found vritually no negative reports except for one comment that suggested that at some level proteases such as papain would begin to eat away at your own tissue, but that the level of safety was not known. Regards, John Dankowych Altered chondrocytic oxidative metabolism during the restoration of depleted intercellular matrix. Boussidan F, Nahir AM J Exp Pathol (Oxford) 1990 Jun 71:3 395-402 Abstract The depletion of proteoglycans (PGs), induced by a single intravenous injection of papain, is a useful model for studying the response of chondrocytes in vivo to injury. The present study concentrated on the activity of enzymes related to the synthesis of PGs, either directly, with uridine diphosphoglucose dehydrogenase (UDPGD), or indirectly, through the general oxidative metabolism of the chondrocytes. Most of the enzymes showed diminished activity on day 2; in some, there was little change in activity, whereas in others there was marked increase in activity over the following days. Thus, on day 9 the activities of glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase and of glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase were twice the original (day 0) values, and those of succinate dehydrogenase and of UDPGD were one and a half times greater than the original activities. Such increased enzymatic activity preceded the increase in PG content, which by day 14 reached up to 80% of the initial value. Both the increased activity and the replenishment of the PG content were inhibited when hydrocortisone (10 mg/kg) was injected. MeSH Animal, Cartilage, Extracellular Matrix, Glucosephosphate Dehydrogenase, Glyceraldehyde-3-Phosphate Dehydrogenases, Hydrocortisone, Lactate Dehydrogenase, Papain, Proteoglycans, Rabbits, Succinate Dehydrogenase, Uridine Diphosphate Glucose Dehydrogenase, 3-Hydroxyacyl CoA Dehydrogenases Author Address H. Schussheim Rheumatology Research Laboratory, Faculty of Medicine, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa.