Protandim, the Ohio Study, American Heart Association (AHA) and National Institute of Health (NIH) Funding

Protandim distributors are intent on spreading a rumor that the American Heart Association (AHA) and the National Institute of Health (NIH) have supplied funding for research on Protandim. It turns out that neither organization approved any funds to be used to research Protandim. Today, I'd like to address about how such a rumor got started and finally put it to bed. As best I can tell, it started on January 4th, 2011 in a press release from LifeVantage: LifeVantage Corporation (OTC Bulletin Board: LFVN), the maker of science-based solutions to oxidative stress, announced today that a new peer-reviewed study involving its flagship product, Protandim, sponsored by the American Heart Association and the National Institutes of Health, was published in the scientific journal Free Radical Biology and Medicine. On the surface it sure looks like the AHA and the NIH gave money for the purpose of researching Protandim, right? That's what LifeVantage wants you to think. It turns out that this is once again an example of how they mislead distributors, customers, and investors. That's a bold claim I know. Bold claims require lots of evidence. Here goes... The study is question is the one titled: "Protandim attenuates intimal hyperplasia in human saphenous veins cultured ex vivo via a catalase-dependent pathway." This is commonly referred to as the Ohio State study, yet such language is a misnomer since it is just a few people associated with the university. There is never a university decree to study such things. On Page 17 of the accepted manuscript for this research discloses the sources of funding: Sources of Funding: This work was supported by AHA 0555538U and 0655323B to K.J.G and HL63744, HL65608 and HL38324 to J.L.Z. When you search Google for the grant numbers, you'll see that the grants were used for other projects - completely unrelated to Protandim. However, I'll bring that research to you: There were two grants were listed for Keith Gooch (AHA 0555538U and AHA 0655323B). Both of these grants were received by Gooch to fund research unrelated to Protandim. He merely chose of his own accord to divert those funds for the Protandim study. The evidence is in this 2010 paper, "Arterial pO2 stimulates intimal hyperplasia and serum stimulates inward eutrophic remodeling in porcine saphenous veins cultured ex vivo." Gooch listed the identical grant numbers for research that was completely unrelated to Protandim.

There were three grants were listed for Jay Zwier (HL63744, HL65608 and HL38324). All 3 of these are old grants that Zwier received to fund research unrelated to Protandim. Like Keith Gooch, he merely chose of his own accord to divert those funds for the Protandim study. The evidence can be found in this 2009 JBC paper in which Zwier listed the identical grant numbers for research that was completely unrelated to Protandim. It is worth noting that the National Institute of Health gives us details on what the grants were intended to be used for.

5P01HL065608-10: OXIDANTS AND NITRIC OXIDE IN POST-ISCHEMIC HEART INJURY You can easily the associate the grant numbers and the product numbers together: Grant: HL65608 Protject: 5P01HL065608-10 The description asking for money has no mention of Protanim. This proves that the grants were not intended for the study of Protandim. A click on the RESULTS tab on this grant shows 25 studies that this money was used for. One of the 25 makes mention of Protandim.

1R29HL038324-01: MEASUREMENT OF FREE RADICAL GENERATION IN THE HEART You can easily the associate the grant numbers and the product numbers together: Grant: HL38324 Project: 5R01HL038324-20 A click on the RESULTS tab on this grant shows 13 studies that this money was used for. None of them makes any mention of Protandim. One has to wonder why this grant was listed when it seems like it wasn't used. It seems to be either an error.

5R01HL063744-09: OXYGEN RADICALS AND NITRIC OXIDE IN POSTISCHEMIC INJURY You can easily the associate the grant numbers and the product numbers together: Grant: HL63744: Project: 5R01HL063744-09 A click on the RESULTS tab on this grant shows 25 studies that this money was used for. One of the 25 makes mention of Protandim.

What can we conclude from the above? We can conclude that AHA and the NIH are not funding studies on Protandim. They are funding studies on the things in the grant titles and descriptions -

none of which include a word about Protandim. The researchers are the ones who use the grant money as they see fit. Paul Myhill, inventor of Protandim, said: "I believe LifeVantages current science program to encourage or promote issue-specific studies is a sound strategy indeed. Since Big Pharma (through its proxy, the FDA) doesnt allow supplements to make any disease claims, I think its important for the scientific literature to make those claims for us." The question the consumer should be asking here is, "How is LifeVantage 'encouraging' researchers like Jay Zwier to use their product?" It isn't like Jay Zwier is a fan of Protandim using it in any of his other research. Protandim's been around for more than 5 years, clearly Jay Zwier could have used it in all of his studies if his intent was to study Protandim. Or he could have applied for a grant to actually study Protandim. The key point is that LifeVantage and its distributors are trying to make it seem like reputable organizations like the AHA and the NIH actually care about Protandim... and care enough to put their funding dollars into it. It seems true on the surface, but you dig underneath and find out that it is all meant to mislead distributors, customers, and investors. The other key point is that neither the American Heart Association (AHA) nor the National Institute of Health (NIH) are directing any their funding dollars towards Protandim.
Originally posted 2011-05-29 02:03:58.

Dr. Joe McCords Financial Interest In LifeVantage/Protandim

Update: According to the June 30, 2011 LifeVantage 10-K filing, McCord now gets a majority of his money not from salary or by stock performance (since that has been poor), but based on sales of the product: "Monthly Compensation. Dr. McCords monthly compensation for his services under his employment agreement is $10,000 per month. In addition, Dr. McCord is eligible to receive a monthly commission equal to the product of fifty cents multiplied by the total net bottles sales of Protandim (or substantially equivalent new products) during the preceding month. Dr. McCord was not awarded any additional stock options in fiscal year 2011 in connection with his hire." He gets 50 cents for every bottle sold. According to the latest quarterly numbers, LifeVantage's revenue (product sold) is $10 Million dollars. At $50 a bottle he gets roughly 1 percent of that. Quick math shows that to be $100,000 for the quarter - or $400,000 for the year. For a guy that perpetuated the lie that he invented Protandim for years, a wise consumer should be very

skeptical of anything he says - Joe McCord's compensation is directly tied to his role of marketing the product. Now back to the original article about the millions he has in stock options. A commenter here named Fred tried to make a claim that there was no way that chance that Dr. Joe McCord "sold his soul for the almighty dollar." The crux of his argument was this page on Forbes that shows Dr. Joe McCord's compensation A review of this information shows that Dr. Joe McCord had earned a total of $115,766 in the four years from 2007-2010. All but $12,000 of that was in the form of stock options. The argument was made that this compensation is modest especially over a four year period. It would be a fair argument if it was the full story. This is a case where a LifeVantage supporter is only giving a small part of the story. The Forbes data doesn't tell the complete story of Dr. Joe McCord's financial interest in LifeVantage. It is much more than it appears here. The most important thing to note is that McCord's history with LifeVantage goes back to when the company was still called Lifeline. According to SEC filings on 10/26/2004 he declared he was a 10% owner with 1,928,160 shares of stock. He later amended this 1,606,800 shares. At the time he declared it 10/26/2004, LifeVantage was trading around $3.60 a share. That amended amount is worth $5.75 million dollars. However, the interesting thing is that it using today stock price and market capitalization, it appears that LifeVantage at the time had a value of around $285 million dollars. A 10% owner would therefore have a vested interest worth $28.5 Million. Either of those numbers may be enough for for Joe McCord to let LifeVantage lie about the creation of Protandim. That's quite a good sum for using McCord as marketing as the company admits. However, there's a lot more McCord's compensation. Here are the SEC filings of stock options that Joe McCord have been granted from 2007-2011 1/16/2007 - 20,408 shares - $0.49 strike price 1/18/2007 - 240,000 shares - $0.49 strike price 11/13/2007 - 120,000 shares - $0.21 strike price 1/7/2009 - 120,000 shares - $0.21 strike price 11/30/2009 - 120,000 shares - $0.25 strike price 1/20/2011 - 120,000 shares - $0.80 strike price 5/25/2011 - 374,625 shares - $0.20 strike price The last of these is probably the most interesting. On May 25, 2011, LifeVantage was trading at $1.66, so being issued shares at a $0.20 equates to a instant profit of $1.46 a share multiplied by 374,625 shares. This was instantly worth seeming worth $546,952.50.

With LifeVantage's stock price at $1.39 as of this writing, McCord's stock options are worth $1.1 Million (this is in addition to the other stock he was given that was discussed above). If he can manipulate the stock to $2.50 those options become worth $2.4 million. As for McCord's financial motivation, there can be little doubt that he's paid well for being a spokesman. It is up to the reader to decide how much integrity millions of dollars can buy. I presume it varies from person to person.
Originally posted 2011-08-13 23:07:18.