Cold Water on Lorenzo's Oil

By Christine Gorman

The popular movie Lorenzo's Oil did more than tout a possible cure for a rare and fatal hereditary disease. Based on a true story, the 1992 film also vilified the medical establishment for being slow to accept the possibility that a combination of vegetable oils developed by Augusto and Michaela Odone might have improved the condition of their son Lorenzo, 14, who suffers from a degenerative nerve illness called adrenoleukodystrophy. Now a two-year study from France concludes that the remedy, named for the Odones' son, is worthless -- at least for the milder, adult form of the ailment. Writing in the New England Journal of Medicine, Dr. Patrick Aubourg and his colleagues from the St. Vincent de Paul Hospital in Paris report that they could find no improvement in 24 patients who had taken Lorenzo's oil for up to 48 months.

Everyone agrees that Lorenzo's oil cuts down on the level of toxic compounds in the blood that are understood to cause the disease. But the oil cannot reverse nerve damage, often resulting in blindness and paralysis, that has already taken place. Nonetheless, Dr. Hugo Moser of the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, believes Lorenzo's oil may delay the onset of symptoms. "We know that it's not 100% preventive," says Moser, who is conducting a five-year study of 80 boys who have inherited the gene for the disease but started taking Lorenzo's oil while they are still healthy. "The question that still needs to be answered is whether it's partially preventive."