Hi Gina, In my opinion, taking the cocktail would not hurt.(usually it is vitamins and supplements, right?) Not to be blunt, but how is blood work time consuming? Usually they can run a bunch of tests at once, can't they? I know with my son he only went twice for blood tests. I would strongly recommend the muscle and skin biopsy as well. My son was diagnosed with the skin biopsy. They identified the exact gene that is affected in his cells. Do you have any children or are planning on having children? If you do, or are plan on having them, you could pass the disease on to them and it could be a very severe form of the disease, so it is important to know if you have it by doing these tests. I don't want to scare you, but My 3 year old son is dying of Mitochondrial disease complex 1. You don't want to put a child through that if you have the gene and you pass it on. FYI, you may have a less severe form of the disease with a better prognosis then my son, so don't loose hope. Anyway if you have anymore questions let me know. Take Care, Beth Eppley

Hi Gina,
It seems to me that from my experience with my wife, that the biopsy is the only conclusive way of nailing this thing. Blood tests etc can only give an indication and its not until that they get to the muscle/tissue that the docs will be able to say yes or no. Take care, Elmo

I think you should do the blood work and get all the tests done. The unknown is sometimes harder to deal with than the truth. Plus you may not have the disease-I would get an MRI and blood work done. My grand daughter had muscle biopsy's done-took 6 months to get them all back and only the last one had a difinative answer. But she was dianoised when they did the MRI. The unknown is scary. There is help but you want the proper help.