Trial reportPloS one2013
Effects of oral L-carnitine administration in narcolepsy patients: a randomized, double-blind, cross-over and placebo-controlled trial.
Trial report in PloS one, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
21 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 50 citations in OpenAlex.
- Treatment of central disorders of hypersomnolence: an American Academy of Sleep Medicine systematic review, meta-analysis, and GRADE assessment.Journal of clinical sleep medicine : JCSM : official publication of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine · 2021Pooled it
- Does L-carnitine supplementation affect serum levels of enzymes mainly produced by liver? A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled clinical trials.European journal of nutrition · 2020Pooled it
- A variant at 9q34.11 is associated with HLA-DQB1*06:02 negative essential hypersomnia.Journal of human genetics · 2018Trial
- Effect of sleep deprivation on the human metabolome.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2014Trial
- Recent Advances and Emerging Pharmacotherapeutic Approaches for Central Hypersomnolence Disorders.Clinical pharmacology : advances and applications · 2026Review
- A carnitine transporter at the blood-brain barrier modulates sleep via glial lipid metabolism inProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Narcolepsy: an interface among neurology, immunology, sleep, and genetics.Arquivos de neuro-psiquiatria · 2024Article
- Serum metabolic alterations in peritoneal dialysis patients with excessive daytime sleepiness.Renal failure · 2023Article
- A case of Kleine-Levin syndrome arising during chemotherapy: efficacy of oral L-carnitine.Sleep and biological rhythms · 2023Article
- Alterations in Gut Microbiota Are Correlated With Serum Metabolites in Patients With Insomnia Disorder.Frontiers in cellular and infection microbiology · 2022Article
- An Unusual Case of Type 1 Narcolepsy in an Ethiopian Patient.Ethiopian journal of health sciences · 2021Article
- Genetics of narcolepsy.Human genome variation · 2019Review
- Cerebral Metabolic Changes During Sleep.Current neurology and neuroscience reports · 2018Review
- Beta-amyloid and phosphorylated tau metabolism changes in narcolepsy over time.Sleep & breathing = Schlaf & Atmung · 2016Article
- Current experience in testing mitochondrial nutrients in disorders featuring oxidative stress and mitochondrial dysfunction: rational design of chemoprevention trials.International journal of molecular sciences · 2014Review
- Article
- Article
- Impact of L-carnitine in narcolepsy treatment: a systematic review on the effectiveness and safety.Sleep science (Sao Paulo, Brazil)Review
- Oral L-carnitine and pregnancy: real opportunity for narcoleptic women?Sleep science (Sao Paulo, Brazil)Article
- Oral L-Carnitine used to treat narcoleptic type 1 patient during pregnancy - A case report.Sleep science (Sao Paulo, Brazil)Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
unlabelledNarcolepsy is a sleep disorder characterized by excessive daytime sleepiness, cataplexy, and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep abnormalities. A genome-wide association study (GWAS) identified a novel narcolepsy-related single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP), which is located adjacent to the carnitine palmitoyltransferase 1B (CPT1B) gene encoding an enzyme involved in β-oxidation of long-chain fatty acids. The mRNA expression levels of CPT1B were associated with this SNP. In addition, we recently reported that acylcarnitine levels were abnormally low in narcolepsy patients. To assess the efficacy of oral L-carnitine for the treatment of narcolepsy, we performed a clinical trial administering L-carnitine (510 mg/day) to patients with the disease. The study design was a randomized, double-blind, cross-over and placebo-controlled trial. Thirty narcolepsy patients were enrolled in our study. Two patients were withdrawn and 28 patients were included in the statistical analysis (15 males and 13 females, all with HLA-DQB1*06:02). L-carnitine treatment significantly improved the total time for dozing off during the daytime, calculated from the sleep logs, compared with that of placebo-treated periods. L-carnitine efficiently increased serum acylcarnitine levels, and reduced serum triglycerides concentration. Differences in the Japanese version of the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS) and the Medical Outcomes Study 36-Item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36) vitality and mental health subscales did not reach statistical significance between L-carnitine and placebo. This study suggests that oral L-carnitine can be effective in reducing excessive daytime sleepiness in narcolepsy patients.
trial registrationUniversity hospital Medical Information Network (UMIN) UMIN000003760.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.