William V. Judy, Ph.D. (April 16, 1938 – October 30, 2022) was an American author, clinical researcher, clinical trial consultant, and retired professor of physiology and biophysics. He was first introduced to the field of Coenzyme Q10 clinical research by Karl Folkers, the American bio-chemist who determined the structure of the Coenzyme Q10 molecule.
Judy managed randomized controlled trials into the safety and efficacy of Coenzyme Q10 supplementation for patients with heart failure, chronic fatigue syndrome, Parkinson's disease or prostate cancer. He was instrumental in the treating of children with Prader-Willi syndrome with Coenzyme Q10. He also did an extensive study of the absorption and bio-availability of various formulations of Coenzyme Q10 supplements.
In 1995, Judy founded the SIBR Research Institute, of which he was the president. The SIBR Research Institute helps develop clinical trial protocols to test the safety and efficacy of natural products. It is a full-service clinical research institute. Judy was the author of numerous scholarly journal articles, college textbooks, and the book The Substance That Powers Life: Coenzyme Q10, An Insider's Guide.
Judy died on October 30, 2022, at the age of 84.
Education and early career Judy did his undergraduate studies in Anatomy and Physiology at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, KY. He then did graduate study in bio-physics and physiology at the University of Kentucky from which he graduated with the successful defense of his MS degree thesis in 1963. The title of his thesis was Calorigenic Response of Warm and Cold-Adapted Rabbits to Intravenous Infusion of Epinephrine and Norepinephrine. He earned his Ph.D. at the West Virginia Medical School, Morgantown, West Virginia (1971) after defending his dissertation Sympathetic Nervous System Control of Renal Hemodynamics.
For a number of years, from 1963 to 1968, Judy worked in the field of bio-physics at the Manned Space Craft Center in Houston, Texas, and at Cape Canaveral in Florida. He conducted in-flight medical experiments on the Gemini and Apollo missions. He was the first to put an artificial gravitational force on the venous circulation in the prevention of orthostatic hypotension. He also monitored contracts with universities and space program industry corporations that were doing contract work for NASA.
Research into Coenzyme Q10 clinical applications In 1968, Judy met Karl Folkers, the chemist who had determined the structure of the Coenzyme Q10 molecule in 1958 while Folkers was working at the Merck Research Laboratories in New Jersey. By 1968, Folkers had established the Institute for Bio-Medical Research at the University of Texas in Austin. The purpose of the new institute was to increase the understanding of the importance of the substance Coenzyme Q10 to human health.
Folkers encouraged Judy to do, first, preclinical studies of Coenzyme Q10 absorption and bio-availability using live dogs, which were not put to sleep during the experiments and were not sacrificed after the experiments.
In the 1980s, Judy began to administer clinical studies of the safety and health effects of Coenzyme Q10 supplementation in humans.
Heart failure patients In 1984, Judy published clinical trial results showing that 28 of 34 patients diagnosed with congestive heart failure (NYHA class IV) had responded well to Coenzyme Q10 treatment with improved cardiac hemodynamics and kinetics. In 1985, Judy conducted a successful five-year study in Class IV congestive heart failure patients.
In 1986, Judy published the first report of the long-term management of end stage heart failure with Coenzyme Q10.
This study has developed into a 30-year study of the management of congestive heart failure with the ubiquinone form of Coenzyme Q10. It has shown that heart failure patients who received Coenzyme Q10 supplementation together with their conventional medications have a significantly better survival than patients who receive placebo supplementation together with their conventional medications.
Moreover, in 1986, Judy published the results of a double-blind, crossover study of the effect of Coenzyme Q10 on patients with cardiac disease. The study data showed that improvement in cardiac pumping and contractibility came, typically, within 30 to 60 days of daily supplementation with 100 milligrams of Coenzyme Q10. Peak response came, generally, with 90 days of supplementation. Coenzyme Q10 supplementation did not improve heart function quickly but did result in significantly increased long-term improvement. Furthermore, if the Coenzyme Q10 treatment was discontinued, then the patients' heart function gradually decreased.
In 1991, Judy reported the subsequent findings from the long-term management of heart failure patients with adjunctive Coenzyme Q10 treatment. He reported that Coenzyme Q10 is a safe and naturally occurring mediator of the process of cellular bio-energetics well-suited for long-term use. Coenzyme Q10 is not a fast-acting substance in heart failure. If the patient's condition is so severe that he or she does not have 40 – 60 to respond, then the CoQ10 treatment is likely to be ineffective. Once the patient responds to the Coenzyme Q10 treatment, however, and his or her heart function begins to improve, then the clinical course becomes more stable and the patient's condition is easier to manage. Improvement of one or two NYHA functional classes is likely. Coenzyme Q10 adjunctive treatment of heart failure patients is a long-term therapy because patients whose Coenzyme Q10 treatment is discontinued will have a clinical relapse.
Clinical relapse after discontinuation of long-term Coenzyme Q10 therapy did not follow the same course as clinical relapse after discontinuation of short-term Coenzyme Q10 therapy. The relapse after the withdrawal of short-term Coenzyme Q10 therapy tended to be a rapid relapse followed by deterioration of heart function; the relapse after the withdrawal of long-term Coenzyme Q10 therapy was delayed and reduced by comparison.
In summary, long-term management of severe heart failure patients with 100 milligrams of Coenzyme Q10 per day in conjunction with conventional therapy showed that 70% responded to the Coenzyme Q10 treatment albeit fairly slowly. Peak improvements came, typically, within 8–12 months. Survival (1–8 years) in the Coenzyme Q10 group was greater than in a matched control group (n=90) treated with conventional drugs only. The results of this early study showed that long-term Coenzyme Q10 therapy is safe, is effective in chronic heart failure patients with measurable CoQ10 deficiency, and is associated with improved long-term survival compared to conventionally treated patients.
Judy's clinical studies of Coenzyme Q10 supplementation of heart failure patients are the forerunners of the international multi-center Q-Symbio Study of the Effect of Coenzyme Q10 on Morbidity and Mortality in Chronic Heart Failure. In that study, 106 weeks of adjunctive treatment of chronic heart failure patients with 3 times 100 milligrams of a daily ubiquinone Coenzyme Q10 supplement in addition to conventional heart failure medicine was associated with significant reductions in major adverse cardiovascular events, cardiovascular mortality, all-cause mortality, and hospitalizations as compared to placebo. In the European segment of the Q-Symbio Study, the active Coenzyme Q10 treatment also increased the patients' left ventricular ejection fraction significantly.
Heart surgery patients In 1993, Judy reported the results of a clinical trial of the efficacy of Coenzyme Q10 supplementation of heart surgery patients. One group of patients received 100 milligrams of Coenzyme Q10 per day for 14 days prior to the surgery and for 30 days following the surgery. The other group of patients received a placebo for the same periods.
Patients in both groups had a documented blood Coenzyme Q10 deficiency (< 0.6 micrograms per milliliter), low cardiac index (< 2.4 L/m2 per minute), and low left ventricular ejection fraction (< 35%) prior to the Coenzyme Q10 treatment.
Pre-surgery supplementation improved blood Coenzyme Q10 and heart muscle tissue Coenzyme Q10 levels and heart muscle tissue ATP significantly compared to the placebo supplementation. Cardiac index and ejection fraction also improved but not to the level of statistical significance.
Post-surgery supplementation was positively associated with the maintenance of normal blood and heart muscle tissue Coenzyme Q10 levels and normal heart muscle tissue ATP levels and with significantly improved cardiac index and ejection fraction.
The course of recovery in the Coenzyme Q10 supplemented group was short (3–5 days) and uncomplicated. By contrast, the course of recovery in the placebo group was longer (15–30 days) and more complicated. There was a positive relationship between blood and heart muscle Coenzyme Q10 levels, heart muscle ATP levels, and indicators of heart function, on the one hand, and post-operative recovery time, on the other hand.
Chronic fatigue syndrome In 1998, Judy reported the results of a study of Coenzyme Q10 supplementation of chronic fatigue syndrome patients. Two groups of patients, similar in age, exercise tolerance, and duration of illness were given 100 milligrams and 300 milligrams of Coenzyme Q10, respectively. 60% of the patients in the 100-milligram group responded to the treatment; 91% of the patients in the 300-milligram group responded. In the non-responders, the blood and tissue CoQ10 levels did increase with the supplementation but not to the extent that they increased in the responders.
The average time to a discernible change in exercise tolerance and recovery time was 30 days in the group of patients who took 300 milligrams of Coenzyme Q10 daily and 60 days in the group of patients that took 100 milligrams of Coenzyme Q10 daily. The increased dosage of Coenzyme Q10 yielded greater effectiveness. By 180 days, patients in both groups had experienced significant improvements in exercise tolerance and recovery time. Interestingly, despite the statistically significant increases, the chronic fatigue syndrome patients supplemented with Coenzyme Q10 could not reach the exercise tolerance levels of normal individuals, at least not within 180 days of supplementation.
When the patients taking the Coenzyme Q10 were switched over to placebo, they reverted to the pre-Coenzyme Q10 treatment levels with 60 days (the 100-milligram group) and 90 days (the 300-milligam group).
In addition to chronic fatigue syndrome and chronic heart failure, there are numerous low-energy conditions to which the bio-energetic effects of Coenzyme Q10 can plausibly be extended: fibromyalgia, Huntington's chorea, muscular dystrophy, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, Prader-Willi syndrome, and some forms of cancers.
Once humans reach adulthood, Coenzyme Q10 bio-synthesis begins to decrease with increasing age, resulting in less energy. The KiSel-10 Study of combined Coenzyme Q10 and selenium supplementation of senior citizens for years has shown that daily supplementation with 2 times 100 milligrams of Coenzyme Q10 and 200 micrograms of selenium is associated with significant reduction of cardiovascular mortality, significant improvement of heart function, and significant improvement of health-related quality of life.
Cancer Folkers and Judy did case studies of the effects of Coenzyme Q10 on various cancers in patients with congestive heart failure. Coenzyme Q10 put the cancers into remission, improved heart function, and reduced the degree of heart failure.