A pharmaceutical composition administerable either orally or parenterally, comprising a therapeutically effective amount of an acyl-carnitine, or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt, ester or amide thereof, wherein the acyl radical is selected from the group formed by acetyl, propionyl, butyryl, hydroxybutyryl and acetoacetyl is useful in the therapeutical treatment of patients with impaired cerebral metabolism, as for instance in the states of senile and presenile psychomotor involution and in senile and presenile dementia.
A therapeutical method for the treatment of Attention-Deficit/Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD) is disclosed which comprises administering to a child in need thereof L-carnitine or an alkanoyl L-carnitine or a pharmacologically acceptable salt thereof.
Based on the discovery that carnitine and some lower acyl-carnitines act on the phospholipids in the wall of erythrocytes restoring the elasticity of the erythrocytic membrane, a new therapeutic use of the compounds mentioned above in the treatment of the pathology of the veins, typically venous stasis, is disclosed.
We describe the use of phospholipidic carnitine derivatives of general formula ##STR1## in their racemic or optically active form, wherein R.sub.1 and R.sub.2, equal or different, are radicals of linear or branched, saturated or monoor poly-unsaturated, aliphatic acids with 1 to 20 C for the preparation of pharmaceutical compositions having an activity as reproductive agent of the nerve fibers in the therapy of human pathologies associated with neuronal damages, more particularly in the therapy of peripheral neuropathies, of cerebrovascular diseases, of cerebral level traumas and of chronic neurodegenerative diseases.
A novel therapeutical use of some alkanoyl L-carnitines, e.g. acetyl L-carnitine, is disclosed which, orally or parenterally administered, are effective in the treatment of secondary and congenital muscular dystrophies and myopathies.
A combination can be of L-carnitine and acetyl-L-carnitine administered orally or as parenteral injection in domesticated animals, especially pet animals, and humans for prevention or treatment of syndromes or diseases arising from dysfunctional energy metabolism. Syndromes involving skeletal and cardiac muscle benefited from L-carnitine, syndromes related to the central nervous system improved with acetyl-L-carnitine. Although the two cofactors do not substitute metabolically for each other effects of the combination are found to be synergistic.
