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View Full Version : "cutting edge" caffeine gum for SOF....


willbrink
01-21-2006, 06:59 AM
This is the best they can come up for SOF?! Caffeine gum??! The supplement I designed for SOF- which was covered in a SOTECH article recently (see below) is a far a better product, which NavySeals.com already carries here BTW:

http://www.navyseals.com/store/detail.aspx?ID=808&Name=Full-Force-Performance-Supplement

Clearly, I need to get the formula into the supply channels, but that's far easier said then done!

SOTECH article:

http://www.special-operations-techno...cfm?DocID=1176

Article on caffeine gum follows:

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FORT DETRICK, Md. (Army News Service, Jan. 17, 2006) – The Army recently finished testing “Stay Alert” caffeine gum as a countermeasure for fatigue and the new product is now available through military supply channels.
The Walter Reed Army Institute of Research, known as WRAIR, tested the new gum in its Silver Spring, Md., facilities.
“We wanted to show that the gum is a quick and safe method of maintaining or improving alertness and physical and mental performance, and our tests did that,” said Dr. Gary Kamimori of the Department of Behavioral Biology at WRAIR. Each piece of Stay Alert chewing gum contains 100 mg of caffeine, which is about the amount found in a six-ounce cup of coffee.
“Because it’s chewed, it delivers caffeine to the body four to five times faster than a liquid or pill because it’s absorbed through tissues in the mouth -- not the gut, like in traditional formulations,” Kamimori said. A sleep researcher, he learned of the idea of delivering caffeine through gum in 1998. Congress funded the first study on the gum a year later.
When the study validated how fast the caffeine was absorbed in the body, the U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command, the parent command of WRAIR, began developing and testing Stay Alert for use in sustained or continuous military operations when Soldiers typically don’t get enough sleep.
A report from the Committee on Military Nutrition Research of the National Academy of Sciences on “Caffeine for the sustainment of mental task performance” published in 2001 also lent more support for the product. Included in the report was a review of the detrimental effects of sleep restriction and sleep deprivation on mental and physical performance.
The report concluded that caffeine was safe and effective and supported developing the caffeinated chewing gum.
Kamimori’s staff has validated the gum’s physiological effects in both single and multiple doses. The staff was also able to determine the best dosing regimens for Soldiers who, because of their mission, aren’t able to go to sleep.
“We’ve also evaluated the effects of habitual use of the gum and determined the effects of caffeine administration on the subsequent ability to sleep in Soldiers who were kept awake for 36 to 77 hours straight,” Kamimori said. “They were able to sleep just as well as the groups that received placebos.”
WRAIR researchers have also conducted studies with colleagues from Defence Research and Development Canada–Toronto and the New Zealand Defense Forces, with promising results, Kamimori said.
“In three studies, using multiple administrations of caffeine with Stay Alert gum, they (Soldiers) reported that alertness, marksmanship -- both simulated and live fire -- vigilance on observation and reconnaissance tasks and physical performance during simulated operations were either maintained or improved as compared to those Soldiers who received a placebo chewing gum,” he said.
Gum part of SOF rations
The Department of Defense Combat Feeding Program of the Natick Soldier Center in Massachusetts also tested and approved the gum to become a component of the experimental “First Strike Ration.” The lightweight ration is designed for Special Operations Forces.
Three hundred cases of the Stay Alert gum went to Soldiers in the field in 2004. “What we’ve heard from troops using the product both in the U.S. and in the Middle East has been positive,” Kamimori said.
Stay Alert has a National Stock Number (NSN #8925-01-530-1219) and is available to all military personnel.