Posts Tagged ‘Autoimmune Disease’
Monday, February 22nd, 2010
Researchers have discovered that a cocktail of ingredients obtained from common food supplements effectively forestalls major aspects of the aging process in mice.
The study found that a complex mix of supplement-derived ingredients offset the decline in physical activity of aging mice by increasing the activity of the mitochondria – the cellular furnaces that supply energy – and reduced harmful free radical emissions.
As many illnesses, including inflammatory and autoimmune conditions as well as heart disease, stroke, Type 2 diabetes, many cancers and neurodegenerative diseases, are strongly correlated with free radical processes, using an approach like the one employed in this study to intervene in free radical production could beneficially impact these conditions.
Tags: Autoimmune Disease, Cancer, Food Supplements, Free Radicals, Heart Disease, Inflammatory Disease, Mitochondria, Neurodegenerative Disease, Stroke, Type-2 Diabetes
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Tuesday, February 9th, 2010
The treatment of Crohn’s disease usually involves the use of anti-inflammatory drugs, but these are frequently only partially effective and are also associated with serious side effects. Many patients eventually require surgery in spite of the use of these medicines.
The serious risks associated with Crohn’s medications have again been highlighted recently by a study which found that the immunosuppressant thiopurine drugs – one of the cornerstones of Crohn’s treatment – can increase the risk of cancers linked to viral infections.
Patients receiving thiopurines – such as azathioprine and Imuran – were found to have a more than five-fold increase in the risk of lymphoma compared with those who had never received these drugs. Older male patients with a longer history of inflammatory bowel disease also have an increased risk of lymphoma.
Another recent study indicated that patients with inflammatory bowel disease, especially those receiving thiopurine medications, may also be at increased risk of developing non-melanoma skin cancers.
Only in the last few days, a new warning has been issued about the drug Tysabri (Natalizumab), the multiple sclerosis medication that was approved for use in moderate to severe Crohn’s disease in early 2008.
Tysabri, which had previously been linked with a rare but deadly brain disease called progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML), has now been confirmed to increase the risk of this disease. Whilst there have been no reports of PML in patients taking Tysabri for less than 12 months, the rate in patients who use the drug for two to three years is estimated to be one case per 1,000 patients.
The search for a better treatment alternative continues with a new multi-centre trial, funded to the tune of $4.7 million, which is about to compare the use of the conventional management strategy featuring gradual escalation of drug therapy with a newer approach combining immunosuppression with a tumor necrosis factor alpha blocking drug and an anti-metabolite.
Turning to studies that are already bearing fruit, potential sources of relief for Crohn’s are being revealed by research looking at the effects of certain nutrients on the activity of this disease. For example, it appears that it may be advantageous for Crohn’s patients to vary the types of fat that they consume, especially to increase the amount of Omega-3 fatty acids and decrease the Omega-6 fats that are now found in extremely high quantities in the average Western diet.
Several studies have suggested that Omega-3 fats – available from oily fish, and fish oil supplements – exert a protective effect by modulating intestinal inflammation, and a new study has found that a high intake of total, saturated and monounsaturated fats, and a higher ratio of Omega-6 to Omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids, is associated with higher disease activity.
Another new study has identified a further novel treatment avenue for people with Crohn’s or other inflammatory bowel diseases, in the readily available vitamin D. The study shows, for the first time, that vitamin D deficiency can contribute to Crohn’s disease, and that supplementing with this nutrient can counter the effects of the disease.
Vitamin D impacts the immune system, specifically the innate immune system that acts as the body’s first defense against microbial invaders, and it appears that the inflammatory response, which is thought to underlie autoimmune conditions, is probably the result of a defect in the handling of intestinal bacteria by the innate immune system.
Another potentially hopeful recent study, has found that two compounds extracted from cannabis – the cannabinoids THC and cannabidiol – appear to be able to restore the gut membrane barrier by allowing epithelial cells to form tighter bonds.
Studies being carried out at Nottingham into the use of live hookworm as a therapeutic agent in Crohn’s and other autoimmune diseases is still a very long way from demonstrating efficacy, mainly due to the low numbers of worms having been used in these trials to date, and the inadequately short period that the worms have been left in place.
Nevertheless, existing research, already suggests a high degree of success from the use of hookworm, and the efficacy of this treatment is regularly confirmed by patients who have chosen not to wait for further trials, and have obtained a supply of helminths elsewhere.
Helminthic therapy is therefore arguably the current treatment of choice for Crohn’s disease, especially as it provides freedom from the long-term side effects associated with so many of the available drug treatments. Unfortunately, the FDA has recently banned the supply of helminths to anyone within the US, so American citizens who are too ill to travel are now effectively denied access to this treatment, which is available everywhere else in the world, via the internet, from Autoimmune Therapies.
Tags: Anti-metabolite, Autoimmune Disease, Autoimmune Therapies, Azathioprine, Cancer, Cannabidiol, Cannabis, Crohn's Disease, FDA, Hookworm, Imuran, Lymphoma, Multiple Sclerosis, Natalizumab, Omega-3, Omega-6, Progressive Multifocal Leukoencephalopathy (PML), THC, Thiopurine, Tumour Necrosis Factor, Tysabri, Vitamin D, Worms
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Thursday, January 21st, 2010
Some people diagnosed with lupus, MS, diabetes and other diseases have found that their symptoms have disappeared when they stopped consuming products containing the artificial sweetener aspartame.
However, avoiding aspartame may be difficult, as this sweetener can be found in approximately 6,000 products worldwide, including soft drinks, chewing gum, confections, gelatins, dessert mixes, puddings and fillings, frozen desserts, yogurt, tabletop sweeteners, pharmaceuticals and vitamin products.
Those who promote aspartame claim that it helps people achieve a more healthy diet by reducing or replacing the calories in foods and beverages while maintaining great taste. Its advocates point to the fact that simply substituting a can of diet soft drink for a regular soft drink can save 150 calories, and that substituting a packet of low-calorie tabletop sweetener for two teaspoons of sugar three times each day – in coffee and tea, and on cereal etc. – can save 100 calories a day.
But all this hype covers up a quite different reality and a very sorry tale of deliberate deception on the part of big business and government in both the US and Europe. The truth is that aspartame is an addictive, excitoneurotoxic, genetically engineered carcinogen that interacts with virtually all medications!
The story of aspartame is laid bare in the movie ‘Sweet Misery’ – the film that Pepsi and Coca Cola didn’t want us to see, but which is now available, in entirety, on the internet.
Those who decide to avoid aspartame after watching this film need to be aware that a new derivative of this sweetener has been introduced by NutraSweet. Called Neotame, the new product is already availiable in the US and has recently been approved for sale in Europe.
The makers of Neotame are promoting their product to manufacturers by pointing to such attributes as its great taste, zero calories and the fact that it’s 8,000 times sweeter than sucrose. They also draw attention to reduced handling charges, shipping and storage costs that will, they say, deliver commercial users significant savings on sweetener formulations. So Neotame is clearly going to sweeten the profits of Europe’s as well as America’s food and drink manufacturing companies, but what will it do you you and me?
Well, it may allow manufacturers to reduce the amount of high-fructose corn syrup in their products, which could be good news but, as Neotame is a modified version of aspartame, and has a very close chemical relationship to the original, this new, ‘improved’ version is likely to carry similar health risks.
Anyone wondering if there is an artificial sweetener which doesn’t carry the risks attached to aspartame and similar compounds should look at stevia, a completely natural, sweet substance that is grown in soil rather than being concocted in a laboratory.
Tags: Aspartame, Autoimmune Disease, Carcinogen, Coca Cola, Diabetes, High-fructose Corn Syrup, Lupus, MS, Neotame, Pepsi, Stevia, Sweet Misery, Sweetener
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Friday, December 18th, 2009
Appearing at the same time as the United Nations climate change conference is meeting in Copenhagen to try to avert impending global catastrophe, this cogent essay considers the peril that threatens each individual from within, as the human microbiome reacts to changes in sanitation, lifestyle and medicine that have taken place during the last century and are continuing apace.
This piece looks not only at the implications of losses already being sustained by sections of the human microbiome, but also considers new and hopeful developments in the drive to address this trend, such as the borrowing of models from outside medical science – taking the concept of extinction from the field of ecology, for example – and the possibility of one day screening infants for native microbiota and giving ‘immunizations’ to fill in important missing niches, in much the same way that users of helminthic therapy are already doing by reintroducing lost helminths in order to treat the allergy or autoimmune disease that has developed as a result of their absence.
Tags: Allergy, Autoimmune Disease, Helminthic Therapy, Helminths, Immunisation, Microbiome, Microbiota, Sanitation
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Thursday, December 3rd, 2009
Taking part in the Hookworms for Crohn’s Disease trial at Nottingham University in 2007 had provided me with a brief but tantalising glimpse of how my health might be improved by hosting a small colony of benign intestinal worms, and I was determined to acquire a long-term infection as soon as possible.
To this end, I had secured the agreement of my gastroenterologist, who referred me back to the trial team for reinfection. However, in spite of an earlier indication that they would be willing to provide me with a further dose of hookworm, the trial coordinator then told me that this would not be possible until the study was complete.
This was a considerable disappointment because the trial was taking an inordinately long time – probably due to difficulty finding sufficient volunteers willing to host a small worm colony – and it became clear that the trial would not be complete until the middle of 2009.
In the meantime, I had required further bowel surgery, to repair yet more Crohn’s-related intestinal strictures, and I was still unable to eat any normal foods due to multiple allergies and overwhelming food intolerance, not to mention having a number of other long-term health problems, including M.E., a subgroup of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome characterised by inordinately exaggerated exhaustion following any activity, either physical or mental.
I was becoming impatient… (continued)
Tags: 'Old Friends', Allergy, Annabel Senior, Autoimmune Disease, Autoimmune Therapies, Benedryl, Catarrh, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), Constipation, Cramps, Crohn's Disease, Dairrhoea, Eczema, Exhaustion, Fatigue, Food Allergy, Food Intolerance, Headache, Helminthic Therapy, Hookworm, Hypoallergenic Formula Feed, Immune System, Intestinal Gas, Jasper Lawrence, Larvae, M.E., Migraine, Nasal Congestion, Nausea, Necator Americanus, Nottingham, Osteopath, Ovamed, Restless leg Syndrome, Steroid, Strictures, Surgery, Temperature Control, Worms
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Monday, November 23rd, 2009
The worm is already transforming lives previously blighted by asthma, allergies and autoimmune disorders (Which diseases have responded well to helminthic therapy?).
Now, unfolding research suggests that the worm might also be effective against a diverse range of conditions that were not previously considered to have inflammatory components, including obsessive-compulsive disorder, gastric reflux, schizophrenia and aortic dissection.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder
Recently announced research indicates that the origins of pediatric obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), Tourette syndrome and/or tic disorder may lie in an inappropriate immune response to bacteria which cause common throat infections.
The team involved have been able to demonstrate an association between the appearance of antibodies directed against Group A beta-hemolytic streptoccoccus (GABHS) in peripheral blood and the onset of repetitive behaviors and deficits in attention, learning, and social interaction.
The revelation that antibodies alone are sufficient to trigger the onset of this behavioral syndrome will undoubtedly have medics reaching for sophisticated solutions such as intravenous immunoglobulin, or plasma exchange to remove the antibodies, in order to attenuate the autoimmune response, but the humble helminth may well do the job as effectively as any drug, and without any long term side effects.
This work may also suggest a role for helminths in treating and preventing other disorders potentially linked to autoimmunity, including mood, attentional, learning, and eating disorders, as well as autism spectrum disorders.
Schizophrenia
The provocative conclusion that a mental disorder can result from a lingering immune response inevitably makes one wonder about schizophrenia, and a Swedish study has already found that patients with recent-onset schizophrenia do in fact have higher levels of inflammatory substances in their brains.
While previous studies had analysed inflammatory factors in the blood of patients with schizophrenia, the Swedish researchers were able to examine inflammatory substances in the patients’ spinal fluid, and found raised levels of interleukin-1beta, a signal substance released in the presence of inflammation, which is not seen in anywhere near the same quantities in healthy control patients.
Interleukin-1beta is known to be able to upset the dopamine system in rats, which may explain the overactive dopamine system which has, until now, been the main focus of attention in schizophrenia in humans.
This development will inevitably raise hopes that schizophrenia may be treatable using immunotherapy, and perhaps that it might even be possible to interrupt the course of the disease at an early stage of its development.
Immunotherapy using helminths is unlikely to be considered by researchers, but these organisms would seem to be ideal candidates for the role, in view of their proven track record against inflammation and their freedom from adverse events.
Acid Reflux
According to newly released information, the common condition referred to as gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) might not be due to burning by stomach acid backing up into the oesophagus, as has long been thought to be the case, but by inflammation caused by immune cells in response to exposure to bile salts.
The study has shown that gastroesophageal reflux causes tissue in the oesophagus to release immune chemicals called cytokines, which, in turn attract inflammatory cells, resulting in the heartburn and chest pain that characterise GERD.
As helminths are past masters of inflammation control, their presence could potentially bring relief from GERD.
Aortic Dissection
Aortic dissection, the condition that develops when a bulge in the aorta gives way and leaks (leading to nearly 16,000 deaths annually in the US alone), was formerly thought to be the result of a simple structural failure. However, researchers appear to have uncovered biochemical processes that chip away at the aorta from within, until it finally tears, and inflammation has been revealed as the central player in this process.
Once again, one wonders whether this condition might be prevented from developing at all in someone who is hosting helminths.
Tags: Acid Reflux, Allergy, Antibodies, Aorta, Aortic Dissection, Asthma, Autism, Autoimmune Disease, Bacteria, Bile Salts, Cytokines, Dopamine, Eating Disorder, GABHS, Gastric Reflux, GERD, Heartburn, Helminths, Immunotherapy, Inflammation, Interleukin-1 beta, Intravenous Immunoglobulin, Learning Disorder, Mood, Obsessive-compulsive Disorder, Plasma Exchange, Schizophrenia, Throat Infection, Tic Disorder, Tourette Syndrome
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Wednesday, September 30th, 2009
The use of antidepressants in the US has nearly doubled since 1996, and over ten percent of the US population aged six and above now take an antidepressant – twenty seven million Americans using pharmaceutical drugs to help them get through the day, with very little, if any attempt to address or even consider possible underlying causes.
This pharmaceutical approach invariably produces additional problems ranging from increased depression and suicide to weight gain, insomnia, nausea, chest pain, stroke, congenital defects, and more. Thirty percent of those on antidepressants experience sexual dysfunction, and a recent report found that antidepressants blunt the ability to express and experience love.
It may be, however, that there is another form of treatment that might prove to be effective without any of the long-term side effects attached to pharmaceutical products.
It is known that the administration of neutralizing anti-TNF antibody to patients with Crohn’s disease not only alleviates the symptoms of their Crohn’s but also reduces any depressive symptoms, and treatment with anti-TNF and other anti-inflammatory drugs has also been shown to relieve symptoms of depression in other patient groups.
This may suggest that the immunoregulatory failure that is now known to be implicated in the increased incidence of chronic inflammatory disorders such as Crohn’s disease, as well as other autoimmune disorders and allergies, could also be involved in depression, and it might be that the effectiveness of some of the currently available antidepressant medications is actually due to inflammation-reducing properties.
New research in mice has in fact recently found a biological link between inflammation and depression, identifying an enzyme which appears to be connected with both chronic inflammation and depressive symptoms.
This research has therefore revealed both a new target for drug manufacturers to aim for, and also pointed to the possibility that depression – and perhaps other stress-related psychiatric disorders – may, like allergies and autoimmune diseases, be the result of a lack of the organisms now referred to as our ‘old friends’.
If this is so, then reintroducing some of these organisms by means of Helminthic Therapy – a practice which is highly effective against inflammation – may also relieve depression.
Unlike drugs, the helminthic therapy approach, which uses low doses of carefully selected, benign intestinal worms, has no lasting side effects and is readily available from Autoimmune Therapies. This company offers a ‘no benefit, no fee’ program for those with illnesses previously not treated using Helminthic Therapy, which currently include depression. This program provides treatment free for a year, after which time the clients themselves decide whether the treatment has been successful or not. If they feel they have benefited, they pay for the treatment at that point but, if they are not satisfied with the results, the treatment is terminated and they owe nothing.
Tags: 'Old Friends', Allergy, Anti-inflammatory, Anti-TNF Antibody, Antidepressant, Autoimmune Disease, Autoimmune Therapies, Chest Pain, Congenital Defects, Crohn's Disease, Depression, Helminthic Therapy, Insomnia, Intestinal Worms, Nausea, Psychiatric Disorder, Sexual Dysfunction, Stress, Stroke, Suicide, Weight Gain, Worms
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Friday, September 25th, 2009
People who need, or wish, to undergo screening for gastrointestinal cancer, but are hesitant about having a colonoscopy, may soon be able to have a simple blood test instead.
Two new non-invasive screening tests have been developed which are able to identify the genetic fingerprints of tumor growth circulating in the blood.
These new tests will be ideal for anyone who is who hosting human whipworm to treat ulcerative colitis or one of the other autoimmune diseases, because they will offer a way to check cancer status without the possibility of disturbing the helminthic helpers living in their colon.
Tags: Autoimmune Disease, Blood Test, Colon, Colonoscopy, Gastrointestinal Cancer, Helminths, Tumour, Ulcerative Colitis, Whipworm
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Wednesday, September 9th, 2009
In the past few days, media representatives have flocked around the carcass of the hygiene hypothesis, apparently believing that they were witnessing the passing of this decades-old idea.
Following the release of details about a single new study, an unprecedented number of news outlets ran articles declaring the demise of the hypothesis which had proposed that the increasingly germ-free surroundings of modern life are actually contributing to the recent increase in allergies, asthma and autoimmune diseases.
The study in question has found that, contrary to what some previous studies have suggested, children who enter the bacteria-rich environment of daycare at an early age may not have a reduced risk of allergies and asthma in later childhood.
The most objective comment on the new research has been provided by NHS Choices. Other media reports of the research include: Reuters, EurekAlert, BBC News, The Daily Telegraph, Science Daily, Medical News Today, The Nursing Times, The National Examiner, The Los Angeles Times, Press TV, ABC News, and The Australian.
What none of the reporters involved seem to have realised is that the hygiene hypothesis was already dead, having been superseded by a new ‘old friends hypothesis’ which emphasizes the need for exposure not just to infectious bacteria, but to a particular range of organisms with which our species has coexisted throughout much of its evolutionary history – notably harmless microorganisms from soil, untreated water and fermenting vegetable matter and, critically, parasitic worms.
Not a single one of the above media reports mentions the old friends hypothesis!
Tags: 'Old Friends' Hypothesis, Allergy, Asthma, Autoimmune Disease, Daycare, Hygiene Hypothesis, Microorganisms, Worms
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Thursday, August 20th, 2009
The FDA has announced that it is to demand stronger warnings on TNF blockers – the drugs taken by many with Crohn’s disease and other inflammatory diseases – to reflect new information about the increased risk of cancer in children and adolescent patients.
TNF blockers in common use include Remicade (infliximab), Enbrel (etancercept), Humira (adalimumab), Cimzia (certolizumab pegol) and Simponi (golimumab).
This provides yet another reason to try Helminthic Therapy. There is compelling evidence for this treatment, in Crohn’s as well as other autoimmune diseases, and patients continue to report stunning improvement.
Tags: Autoimmune Disease, Cancer, Crohn's Disease, Helminthic Therapy, Inflammation, TNF Blockers
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Saturday, August 15th, 2009
As each new piece of technology appears on the horizon, we embrace it without question and add it to the ever-growing collection of ‘must have’ gizmos that adorn our lives. Perhaps, however, we should be a little more circumspect about what we adopt.
When I first moved into a house with an inside loo, I was overcome with joy that I would no longer have to empty my chamber pot each morning into the tippler at the far end of the yard. And our tippler was quite a posh affair – a fully enclosed, brick-built ‘thunder box’, unlike the more usual, ramshackle wooden structures. Users of the latter would relate stories about how they had had their posteriors pecked by hens while answering the call of nature, or prodded with sticks by local miscreants looking for a quick giggle.
An indoor flush toilet was just the most amazing thing, and little did I realise, back then, that this technology might actually be involved in the causation of the eventual collapse of my health, of years of pain, and the loss of a job that I loved dearly. I knew nothing at that time about the effect on the parasitic worm cycle of sanitation and the wearing of shoes, and their consequent relationship with allergy and autoimmune disease.
I never even questioned why I didn’t have worms like those that my aunt had told me she had pulled from her anus on one occasion. I just thought that such things were, like chamber pots and tipplers, ‘of the past’, and good riddance to them! Only now, after reintroducing worms to my intestines and beginning to regain a degree of health that I had come to think impossible, have I realised the price that we in the West have paid for using flush toilets and wearing shoes.
Another contributor to the steep learning curve that I have experienced recently is a realisation about the effects on human health of the plethora of microwave-emitting electronic devices, on which many in the West have now come to rely.
Soon after I installed Wi-Fi in my home, and I began enjoying the freedom provided by this, I noticed that, whenever I used my laptop computer on my knee for any length of time, my legs began to tingle, and this was certainly not due to the weight of the laptop. I wondered if it might be the heat but, eventually, discovered that the tingling stopped when I disabled the Wi-Fi function on the laptop.
This led to a series of related discoveries, including the fact that my DECT telephone was bathing me and my family in microwave radiation 24/7!
The Wi-Fi went into the bin and I switched to a dLAN internet connection which works via the household power main. The DECT phone was replaced by an alternative which only emits radiation when it is actually being used, and I now use a wired land-line phone whenever I can.
Prompted by this experience, I began to research the whole issue of radio-frequency radiation, and was, frankly, astounded by what I discovered. This article looks at most of the many sources of microwave radiation to which we are now exposed, the effects which these can have on humans, and what we can do to protect ourselves.
It is now clear that we need to be constantly vigilant when assessing new technologies, whatever form they may take, and adopt a skeptical approach to protestations about safety from manufacturers and representatives of the UK and US governmental and medical establishments in particular, especially as the latter have yet to take any action at all on radio-frequency radiation… and still insist that mercury dental fillings and the fluoridation of public water supplies are both completely safe.
In spite of our obvious technological sophistication, we are still, physiologically, simple hunter-gatherers, biologically unadapted to many aspects of twenty-first century ‘civilization’, such as diet, sedentary working practices, the absence of parasites and exposure to ubiquitous industrial pollution. We ignore this reality at our peril.
Tags: Allergy, Autoimmune Disease, Bluetooth, DECT Phones, Electromagnetic Radiation, Fluoride, Hunter-gatherer, Mercury, Microwave, Mobile Phones, Parasite, Sanitation, Shoes, Telephone, Toilets, Wi-Fi, Wimax, Worms
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Saturday, August 1st, 2009
While the causes of autoimmune disease are not yet known, it is thought that it develops after one or more environmental exposures in genetically susceptible people, with women being at greater risk than men.
This study, which was the first to evaluate a suspected link between ultraviolet radiation from sunlight and the development of particular autoimmune diseases, especially in women, has added UV radiation to the growing list of potential environmental triggers.
Tags: Autoimmune Disease, Environmental Exposure, Sunlight, Ultraviolet Radiation
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Friday, July 17th, 2009
Mouse studies have revealed that a derivative of a Chinese herb may be a superior alternative to existing drug treatments for autoimmune and inflammatory diseases.
Halofuginone selectively targets Th17 cells to interfere with autoimmune pathology without causing generalized immune suppression.
Tags: Autoimmune Disease, Halofuginone, Immune Suppression, Inflammatory Disease, Th17
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Friday, July 17th, 2009
AHFMR research
I recently came across an interesting series of reports on research being carried out at the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research.
Eat your worms
Derek McKay and his group are working with tapeworms to try to understand how treatment with a parasite can block inflammation, with the ultimate aim of identifying molecules that could be used as drugs to treat IBD.
Interestingly, McKay suggests the possibility that, if IBD patients were given a helminth infection to deliberately trigger the interleukin-10 response, and these worms were then eradicated, the patients’ immune systems might ‘remember’ the infection, and respond to treatment with a worm antigen, if their IBD were to flare in the future.
Eat your bacteria
Karen Madsen, who is working on how intestinal bacteria influence the development and progression of IBD, has found that both adult and pediatric patients with ulcerative colitis experienced significantly increased remission rates when given probiotic supplements, although the treatment was not as effective in Crohn’s disease.
Turning off inflammation, rebooting the immune system
Paul Beck is looking at the possibility that, in IBD, there may be no switch to turn off inflammation, with the result that T cells continue to make the inflammation steadily worse. He considers it possible that, one day, stem-cell transplants might be used to restore the normal, pre-disease state by rebooting the immune system.
Challenging the idea of autoimmunity
Controversially, Andrew Mason is challenging the widely held belief that many gastrointestinal diseases are caused by the body turning against its own cells, and suggests that at least some of these diseases may actually be of viral origin. He has already identified a virus associated with primary biliary cirrhosis (PBC), an autoimmune disease which gradually destroys the bile ducts, resulting in scarring of liver tissue, but clinical trials using antiviral therapy to treat PBC have not been conclusive.
Tags: Autoimmune Disease, Bacteria, Bile Duct, Crohn's Disease, Helminths, IBD, Immune System, Inflammation, Interleukin-10, Primary Biliary Cirrhosis (PBC), Stem-cell Transplants, T-cells, Tapeworm, Ulcerative Colitis, Worms
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Tuesday, July 14th, 2009
Replacing lost worms to regain health
(This article first appeared at foodsmatter.com)
Helminthic therapy is an experimental approach to the treatment of asthma, allergies and inflammatory and autoimmune diseases, which involves the administration of controlled quantities of selected, benign intestinal parasites such as hookworm and whipworm.
The treatment developed out of understanding gained from scientific studies which showed that, while these illnesses have escalated in developed countries during the past 50-100 years, they remain much less common in parts of the world where intestinal parasites are still prevalent.
The aim of the treatment is to rebalance the host’s immune system by replacing one or more of the harmless organisms which have been lost in recent decades due to improved hygiene, sanitation and lifestyle changes.
The organisms used have become masters of the human immune system during millions of years of coexistence with man and are adept at regulating their host’s immune response. In fact, the codependent relationship between worm and man is so close that the human genome is now arguably incomplete without the genes contributed by these organisms.
Tags: 'Old Friends' Hypothesis, Allergy, Anti-inflammatory Drugs, Arthritis, Asthma, Atherosclerosis, Autism, Autoimmune Disease, Bacteria, Cholera, Coeliac Disease, Colon, Crohn's Disease, Depression, Diphtheria, Eczema, Enema, Faecal Bacteriotherapy, Fibromyalgia, Foods Matter, Genes, Genome, Heart Disease, Helminthic Therapy, Helminths, Hookworm, Hygiene, Immune System, Inflammation, Inflammatory Disease, Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), Larvae, Lupus, Microorganisms, Migraine, Multiple Sclerosis (MS), Non-ulcer Dyspepsia, Nottingham, Parasites, Probiotics, Psoriasis, Psychiatric Disorders, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Sanitation, Superbugs, Type 1 Diabetes, Ulcerative Colitis, Whipworm, Worms
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