anciendaze
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Just want to tell anyone curious about the subject of my post on this thread (#12) that it spawned a topic elsewhere which grew beyond my control.
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Also, VSL#3 contains dairy and our bodies aren't designed to digest dairy. I
I'm now considering ME/CFS as an inherited vulnerability to a fairly small set of pathogens which modulate immune response. Once the response is disturbed, common infections found in the gut or respiratory tract can penetrate a little deeper into the body's defenses, though without necessarily causing septicemia or viremia, where they show up in the blood. This provokes a much larger immune response than the one to the original pathogen, masking the cause. The original pathogen infects immune cells which participate in clonal expansion to fight these later infections. The hidden pathogen benefits from the distorted immune response.
Treating a variety of infections found active in patients may benefit them -- even if this is not the original cause.
This is a bit of a tangent, but I thought it was interesting. NPR has been doing a series of programs on the effort to eradicate polio. There are currently two parts of the world where it still exists - Nigeria and Pakistan/India. India has had no new polio cases in 18 months. When they make it to three years they will be declared polio free.
I think it was in Nigeria that they were measuring the polio virus in the sewage water to get an idea of how much polio was present because many of the infected people are asymptomatic.
Even scarier, just like I had read from the work of Dr. Hyman, I was passing this CFS to girlfriends. They would come down with stomach problems and chronic fatigue. They would even say "I feel like I can't lift my body". These were girls that had extremely healthy immune systems before meeting me. Just like in the article of Dr. Hyman and his colleagues where patients would come in and the whole office would come down with CFS. .[/quote]
This is something that has made me suspicious. In my own case there's a curious link up between previously knowing friends with IBS and CFS, and then getting CFS myself. Though it may be a coincidence.
I've been toying with the idea of trying Rifaximin but as i'm 'relatively functional' at the moment i dont want to wipe out the gut flora that i have, and maybe end up in a worse situation.
This theory is not new but very interesting - there is another scientist in the Ukraine who makes similar claims, but with a lot more sophisticated testing and titrating of the right ABx. I am interested in this theory and there could be a lot to it as it would explain all the treatment failures so far - however a lot have tried ABx as well and while they have given some significant temporary relief it didn't stick either. Keep us updated about your long term progress. Also if this is true, natural antibiotics should be somewhat effective as well if taken in high enough dosages (with less risk of resistance and side effects). cheers
This is a known symptom of steatorrhea. Among other things, steatorrhea can be caused by bacterial overgrowth in the small intestine that deconjugate bile salts. As someone that was initially cured by nuking the gut with high-dose Xifaxan, I have no doubts in my mind that in many cases, addressing gut infections cures CFS.
@knackers323 Unfortunately we haven't heard from him in a while. He used to be on PR here on this forum but got banned because he was very direct and - some would say - opinionated. I think he posted under Ai-yai. IMO him and Elph have the most compelling theory. If I still needed treatment I'd rather seek his help than a "CFS specialist". I haven't even bothered getting my Montoya study test results from back then because I have come to the conclusion that serum studies are mostly useless. Tissue biopsies are needed. If I ever hear back from him I will send you a PM if you are interested. cheers@mellster do you have any more info on the dr from Ukraine?
@mellster do you have any more info on the dr from Ukraine?
Isn't there a theory that inappropriate use of antibiotics can be a cause of dysbiosis? I have no doubt that for some people fixing the gut could be curative, but I would weigh up the risks before taking antibiotics, it's not always a "free lunch", as they say.
I've had CFS for 3 years. I've spent probably one hundred thousand dollars on treatments. I'm on every hormone you can possibly replace. I've ran multiple treatment protocols. I recommend you guys try double the dose of doxycycline standardly prescribed. 200mg 2 times a day.
The reason I got interested in this bacterial theory is because I had constant symptoms of bacterial infection. Burning/very foul smelling stool, acne, etc. I even had symptoms that Dr. Hyman (who is now dead) said were related to bacteria infection like joint inflammation and high blood pressure. I had gotten on high blood pressure meds and still it was out of control.
Even scarier, just like I had read from the work of Dr. Hyman, I was passing this CFS to girlfriends. They would come down with stomach problems and chronic fatigue. They would even say "I feel like I can't lift my body". These were girls that had extremely healthy immune systems before meeting me. Just like in the article of Dr. Hyman and his colleagues where patients would come in and the whole office would come down with CFS. He would treat them with IV or higher dose oral antibiotics and their CFS would disappear. Google dr. hyman and all the results. His first name is on the link below which may help.
Naturally we don't come across people who claim to have been cured of CFS.
I stumbled upon links to this guy http://articles.cnn.com/1997-02-19/...ions-sick-veterans-chemical-exposure?_s=PM:US
200mg doxycycline twice a day is helping me unlike nothing else really. And I have had stool tests done from regular labs which show no out of place bacteria. All my problems started when I went to Mexico.