Has anyone heard about/tried helminthic therapy?

by slimboyfat 22 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  slimboyfat

  I have been feeling very bad for the past few months with my health and I have been looking around for alternatives from what the doctors offer which is surgery or more dangerous drugs. I came across helminthic therapy, which I had read about before but had not given much consideration to. Interest in it must have grown because there is lot more information available now than a couple of years ago when I last looked. Basically it involves introducing parasites into your body. Claims are made for it helping a variety of illnesses apparently with some degree of support in the academic literature. The treatment is banned in the United States but I have read about Americans visiting other countries to get the treatment.

  I have contacted a company that offer the treatment in the United Kingdom for $2000 and I am seriously considering whether to give it a go.If anyone has any experience, information or views I would be interested in hearing them.

  http://www.spectator.co.uk/essays/all/6296648/gut-reaction.thtml
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  slimboyfat

  Bump, and I put this in the wrong section by mistake because I was reading another thread when I pressed the new thread button and forgot it would be posted in that category.
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  cantleave

  Mmmmm, innoculated with hook worm eggs. Interesting concept.
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  slimboyfat

  Hook worms are one of the helminths used but there are others too. The idea is that the rise in a number of diseases in rich countries can be explained on the basis that we have fewer parasites in our bodies today than people did centuries ago or than people in poor countries still do. It is suggested that the loss of these parasites has disrupted the way our immune system works and caused the rise of many diseases that are believed to have an immunological basis, from allergies and asthma to multiple sclerosis and bowel diseases. But even if that is true does that mean that reintroducing the parasites will cure such illnesses? Pharmaceutical companies do not stand to gain much from such therapies and the progress of research is slow. Does that amount to a conspiracy to hamper treatments that won't make drug companies a lot of money? Or are the therapies simply ineffective?

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helminthic_therapy
• 

  Terry

  I suppose you could cure dandruff by setting your hair on fire.

  The problem with invasive species is getting the equable balance and maintaining it.

  Leaches were once thought beneficial, after all.

  Testimonial driven medical treatment is, in the final analysis human OPINION.

  When we are desperate for solace we become more and more open to "other" treatments.

  Quack cure claims are always on the upswing. Why? People who cannot get what the want are driven to it by frustration, fear and misery.

  Research on varied sites (preferably research sites not connected to the PRO HELMINTHIC treatment) if for no other reason, just to acquaint yourself with the mainstream

  refutation or investigation results. Belief is not knowledge, after all.

  I wish you well, my friend. I don't want you to jeopardize the health you still have. Be cautious.

  Without our health we have nothing.

  One thing that always makes me feel better is drinking a whole lot more water.
• 

  james_woods

  The problem with invasive species is getting the equable balance and maintaining it.

  Another problem is that invasive species don't care about making you live longer or more comfortably - they just want to feed on you long enough to reproduce and then go invade somebody else.
• 

  blondie

  I have an autoimmune disease but had never heard of this. Here are some websites that might help.

  http://sackler.tufts.edu/Academics/Degree-Programs/PhD-Programs/Faculty-Research-Pages/Joel-Weinstock.aspx

  http://www.tufts.edu/central/research/ResearchNews/Affiliates/Weinstock.html

  --------------------------------

  Miracle? Coincidence? Luck? Maybe, but a group of doctors, including Dr. Joel Weinstock, professor and director of gastroenterology at Tufts Medical Center in Boston, lend credence to the hygiene hypothesis.

  Weinstock, who has been studying this concept since the early 1990s, has found that parasitic worms have a calming effect on their hosts' immune systems. He took what he had learned and applied it to the hygiene hypothesis and, several years later, he and his colleagues started testing helminthes in mice with asthma, Type 1 diabetes, MS and inflammatory bowel disease. Sure enough, the diseased mice got better.
  
  Weinstock started a round of human trials, which Michael was a part of, but this was a different kind of worm – Trichuris suis, or pig parasite, which can stay alive in a human’s body for only two weeks. This time, in order to consume the worm, Michael drank a glass of water teeming with the invisible, tasteless creatures.
  
  But here’s the catch: Because these worms stay alive for a few weeks – Michael felt better only for a short time, which ultimately led him to contact Lawrence for help.
  
  Weinstock published results from the helminth study in 2005, which said that 23 out of 29 Crohn's patients went into remission.
  
  Similar studies like Weinstock's are popping up around the globe, and he suspects a "worm-based" pill may one day -- and not too far off -- help patients like Michael.

  
  
  Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/health/2010/10/04/parasitic-worms-cure-autoimmune-diseases/#ixzz1U5Cksryu
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  botchtowersociety

  It is an interesting theory. Some of our autoimmune disorders may also be caused by a bad mix of bacteria in our bodies as well.

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fecal_bacteriotherapy

  By number, the human body contains 10x the nonhuman cells as it does human ones. To phrase it a different way, only 1/10th of the cells in your body, by number, are human.

  It seems to me that we have evolved something of a an immune system relationship with these organisms. Any radical change in number or composition could throw an immune system optimized for that environment off balance.
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  james_woods

  By number, the human body contains 10x the nonhuman cells as it does human ones. To phrase it a different way, only 1/10th of the cells in your body, by number, are human.

  Are you absolutely sure about this? For sure, there are outside bacteria in the digestive tract - but 10 times more nonhuman cells in total?

  Sets off my BS meter.
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  blondie

  The first 2 sites I put are by a reputable doctor of medicine, gasteronology at a reputable University, Dr. Joel Weinstock. That might be a good place to start since he is doing medical research, documented in the medical field.