L-Tyrosine Supplementation in Patients With Fibromyalgia

Mount Sinai Health System

Status: Terminated

Conditions: Fibromyalgia

Treatments: Drug: Placebo; Drug: Tyrosine

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT01219049

09-1144

Details and patient eligibility

About

Patients in the study, who have a diagnosis of fibromyalgia, will be randomly assigned to take the amino acid L-tyrosine or placebo (blank pill) for 3 weeks. They will fill out questionnaires about their symptoms and see if they have any improvement. The investigators hypothesis is that taking tyrosine will help alleviate the symptoms of fibromyalgia.

Full description

Fibromyalgia is a chronic pain syndrome with few treatment options available. The amino-acid L-tyrosine is the precursor for norepinephrine in the central nervous system (CNS). Norepinephrine in the CNS has important roles in pain and mood modulation and descending inhibition of pain pathways. By giving the precursor L-tyrosine in high doses we believe that we can increase levels of norepinephrine in the CNS. To study this question we designed a randomized blinded pilot study of 30 patients. Patients are randomly assigned to one of 3 groups (placebo, tyrosine 1000mg/day, and tyrosine 2000mg/day.) for 3 weeks. Patients then complete the Brief Pain Inventory (BPI) daily and the Fibromyalgia impact questionnaire (FIQ) on day 1 and day 21. Patients also complete a drug diary. They are monitored weekly for progress during the study.

Enrollment: 15 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Diagnosis of fibromyalgia
• Pain greater than 4/10
• Age greater than 18

Exclusion criteria

• Pregnant
• Age less than 18

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: Double Blind

---

15 participants in 3 patient groups, including a placebo group

Tyrosine 1000 mg / day

Experimental group

Description:

Patients receive 1000 mg tyrosine per day.

Treatment:

Drug: Tyrosine

Drug: Tyrosine

Tyrosine 2000 mg / day

Experimental group

Description:

Patients receive 2000 mg tyrosine per day.

Treatment:

Drug: Tyrosine

Drug: Tyrosine

Placebo

Placebo Comparator group

Description:

Patients receive placebo daily.

Treatment:

Drug: Placebo