IBD Research: Where We Are Today

All mumbo jumbo...WHERE'S MAH CURE! ;)

pb4 said...
Fixing the altered immune system, fixes the disease...sounds so simple.

how do you fix it?...tell me please.

Don't know somedude....maybe stem cell treatment, although, there are risks with everything.

Just because it's explained in certain terms....not all believe it. Why is it a problem exactly? The hype is just that...same with any other concepts to control UC.

Finding the balance is difficult if you're trying to fit into all the beliefs.

Eventually you'll find what works for you.

q

Well if anything, the studies support the need for mass amts of probiotics. My younger son has autism. I can tell you that there's not one cause of autism and theres not one treatment method that helps. I think its the same for those of us with colitis. Thats why some have success with certain diets while others do not. In general, I think many diseases are brought on through environmental factors over the course of the last few decades. Pesticides, fast food, factory farming, chemicals in the air, water, more stress and demands on people have all helped to alter some of our genetics. But thats just my two cents. Everyone has their own theories and we should all keep an open mind to all of them.

The problem is they don't know exactly what bacteria should be in the colon to make it healthy and what proportion of bacteria is needed. I don't think you will ever get the same potency using probiotic enemas as you do with FT. Science just dosn't understand the gut bacteria well enough. FT works for a lot of people because it is the best probiotic and antibiotic there is.

There are even some who believe FT can help with other conditions. Even autism has been linked to a gut flora imbalance of some kind.

@quincy - It's a problem for me because if I'm going to give up sugar I want to know why I'm doing it. I've noticed that medical science has failed to explain why the elemental diet works; they just know it does and that it's not to do with resting the gut as was once thought. I cannot help wondering why medical researchers for the last 30 years have failed to find the answers, but the creator of the SCD can explain it all. Yeah, right.

In one sense it doesn't matter, obviously. If something works, then it works - no need to know why it works. But for me, I don't have the patience to try the SCD for up to a year to see if it works or not. Fair enough to all those who are on it and happy with it, but for me it doesn't come across as practical to follow. I'm searching for something more viable.

@chrissy72 - I need to start looking into probiotics. In a nutshell, I think I'm reaching a stage where my consultant is going to say there is nothing more he can do. He won't put it like that of course, but I can read between lines. If it's going to come down to that, then I will consider changing my diet and trying a probiotic.

Edit: Too slow as normal >_>. I'm gonna look into FT as well. I'm just not that squeamish anymore, although my family will be.

Wow, over 100 FTs.... Already shows how little I know about it; thought it was a one-off thing! :-/

I foresee having major difficulty getting any of my family members to sign up... :\

Let's not forget about the "old friends" (bacteria, parasites, and who knows maybe even certain viruses) and hygiene hypotheses. While they probably are not a complete answer to the puzzle- it's patently obvious how diverse our responses are to different therapies, diets, etc- and are not yet iffering anything like a magic bullet, the science behind them does show that lack of exposure in infancy and childhood to old friends results in one having a stunted, untrained, incompletely regulated immune system for the remainder of ones life.

The reason that worm therapies, to name one therapy based on the "old friends" hypothesis, may not work on everyone (I tried three- TSO= pig whipworm eggs, human hookworms, and human
whipworms, and only the TSO turned out in my case to have some modest but definite damlening effect on my UC) is because the horse is out if the barn- our immune systems were largely formed in infancy. Granted, that doesnt explain how people from countries where they we exposed to old friends, migrate to the West, lose the old friends and get IBD - though one can speculate that they might respond better to such therapies. In any case, while for the forseeable future I am not looking into worm therapies again any time soon, I think that intestinal parasites must be viewed in the same frame if mind as intestinal bacteria.

Another thought, in light of the Attachment Parenting trend (and controversy)- Attachment parenting includes an emphasis on breast feeding, when practical, up to a few years of age. This was common in traditional hunter gatherer (i e paleo) societies - many even shared nursing of infants, further diversifying probiotic diversity- and would surely have primed a child's immune system massively compared to what is common in the West today.

A year may not be enough- cave women may have kept it up for a few years. In my case, I do know that my mom breastfed my older, IBD-free bro for much longer than my relatively short spurt. science seems to be showing more and more astounding things that happen in the first few years of the body's development based on inputs- or lack of them- in that period.

Of course, if we are all scrxwed by our childhoods, that doesnt tell us how to fix things now as adults. But it may explain why its so difficult to just throw probiotics, or parasites, or some special diet and get results.

My standard response is that IBD ( UC, CD ) are catchall names for the end symptoms with untold number of causes.

Biology is very complex and so much of this goes around in circles that its a question of the chicken or the egg many times when looking at a couple components and their interplay.

Finding root cause is difficult and very challenging.

I know lots of kids who were never breastfed that have absolutely NO health problems. I know lots of kids who were only breastfed that have tons of health problems.

NCoT....ah, got it. I don't see why one would have to totally give up sugar...but common sense should rule with any food intake...making healthier choices is a good plan, and one can always consume less. What's one person's healthy can be another's extreme discomfort. I don't stick to any diets...patience for the strictness would be slim.

lookforcures....5aSA isn't in the steroid or immunosuppressant category. It's still one of the best viable meds with the least side effects over long, long term...and it can be increased for flares and tapered to maintenance. Not bad as well for patient self-administering. Of course...there are some who cannot and never should use it once that's discovered.



Chrissy72..colitis isn't really coined for the term UC. There are many absolute reasons for "colitis" depending on its specific diagnosis. Just for clarity and impact of statement.




I do believe probiotics should be taken by everyone...they are certainly one way to protect the digestive immune system...it's easy to consume all sorts of yucky stuff daily. We have no idea how many things our digestive tract actually keeps under control for our maintained health. Probiotics definitely are a good addition. Now...which ones exactly is truly a mystery, and I think it's a great scientific discovery that we all do carry different digestive/gut bacteria (or seem to fit in the different gut flora categories).

q