Posts in the Medicine category

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So I heard about this on the BBC World Service today:

“Based on a series of studies in mice, they said cytomegalovirus or CMV -- a herpes virus that affects some 60 to 99 percent of adults globally -- appears to increase inflammation in blood vessels, causing high blood pressure.

And when combined with a fatty diet, CMV may also cause hardening of the arteries, a major risk factor for heart attacks, strokes, and kidney disease, they said.” - (Reuters)

Which is AWESOME! And comes 17 years after this study in people:

Herpesvirus antibodies and vascular complications in essential hypertension.

Antibodies against herpes simplex virus (HSV) and cytomegalovirus (CMV) were examined in sera from 132 patients with essential hypertension and 54 normotensive healthy subjects of the same age and sex. Prevalences of HSV and CMV antibodies (titre greater than or equal to 4) were equal in patients and controls. A HSV antibody tire greater than or equal to 64 was found in 39.5% (17/53) of patients with WHO stage III hypertension, in 26.2% (22/85) of patients with stage I-II hypertension, and in only 9.4% (5/54) of normotensive subjects (p less than 0.0005). The HSV antibodies were mainly of type 1. No association between CMV antibodies and vascular complications could be demonstrated.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6297261

Which is great news – now we know that CMV AND HSV cause hypertension. Which should be no surprise – because other studies show connections between HSV and atherosclerosis/arteriosclerosis. And that’s in studies from 1982. http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=442386

So let’s look at the mechanism behind this.

We know that herpesviridae require arginine to replicate.

We also know that they scavage lysine (because the replication mechanism mistakes lysine for arginine).

This paper: http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/content/full/95/2/311 – shows that arginine is required for NO pathway synthesis. Like most smooth tissue, arteries and veins require NO (nitric oxide) to relax.

Arterial and venous tissue is endothelial tissue, a specialized form of epithelial tissue.

Where does CMV like to hang out, and HSV like to replicate?

Yep, that’s right – epithelial tissue.

HSV, by the way, is known to promote blood clots too – as this paper shows:  http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/content/full/95/2/311.

Ultimately, what we seem to be seeing here is that the herpesviridae strip-mine the arterial wall for arginine and lysine. Inflammation is promoted. Coagulation occurs. Adding arginine will help a little; but long term, the arginine is required for the viral replication to occur.

And this, by the way, is a repeating cycle. TNF-alpha is released by the body to signal that it is under attack in that area (by macrophages). The virus sees this as a signal to go from dormancy (latent infection, which in the case of HSV, the primary site is nerve tissue; whereas in CMV, it’s epithelial tissue, and epithelial tissue and endothelial tissue are very closely related), to full on replication. (http://www.springerlink.com/content/u6u8735318u7lw42).

Which scavenges more arginine. And causes more replication.

It’d be pretty simple at this point to come to the conclusion that a large preponderance of heart disease is caused by herpesviridae. Now, there’s other causes too – fungal infection, and bacterial infection – but I’d say that the most common cause are these viruses, which nearly everyone has.

(You’ve heard of the French Paradox, right? That drinking red wine, rich in resveratrol, reduces your risk of heart disease? Resveratrol inhibits herpes virus replication at a very early stage in its reproductive cycle. It also has other benefits – mainly by allowing sirtuins to spend more time switching off erroneously expressed genes, and less time fixing up damage, but that’s secondary to the heart disease issue).

So, going back to part 1 of this series, I stated that herpesviridae can cause the following:

• Alzheimer's Disease
• Type-II Diabetes
• High Cholesterol, including high HDL and high triglyceride levels
• Heart disease, including atherosclerosis (aka arteriosclerosis)
• Cancer of the gallbladder (cholangiocarcinoma)
• Colon cancer
• Crohn's disease
• Multiple sclerosis
• Rheumatoid arthritis
• Arthritis
• Osteoporosis
• Multiple myeloma
• Glioblastoma multiforme
• Bipolar disorder
• Schizophrenia
• Hodkin's Disease
• Lymphoma
• Breast Cancer
• Kaposi's Sarcoma

We can now add Hypertension to this list.

The common factor to all of these? Well, there’s actually two. We’re talking about diseases of epithelial tissue, and nerve tissue.

For example, take osteoporosis. Herpesviridae (specifically in this study, HSV-1), upregulates expression of Interleukin-6. Osteoblast and osteoclast differentiation are regulated by IL-6. Osteoclasts are also very similar in nature to epithelial cells.

A similar line of argument applies to arthritis.

Ultimately, we need more virion assay testing. Take tissue samples. Test for viruses. We have the technology. We should be able to generate lots of evidence FAST for the involvement of herpesviriade in these diseases.

We also need to start taking medical histories that include people who are in close contact with you. I’ll try to write about that next – it’s all about histocompatibility complexes, and how especially one spouse may have one disease, and the other spouse may have another, but it’s all the same root cause.

One of these theories is an out-there what-if? And I don't have anything to back it up right now. But I'm going to try to piece together a mechanism that explains eczema and peanut allergies as a fungal battle going on inside your body. I can't find much research to back up this position, but I'll explain my logic.

Here's the bigger one. I've rediscovered some old studies from the 1950s that give a way to massively reduce nicotine and other withdrawal symptoms. I came across this through a happy accident mainly; I was looking for a way to reverse the side-effects of smoking on skin healing while I was still waiting for a good way to quit that didn't involve taking mind-altering drugs, as I appear to be particularly sensitive to them. That, and I've heard enough worrying things about Chantix, and I've got issues with Wellbutrin (I get visual side effects).

So a happy accident, and it's cheap, easy to get a hold of, has minimal side effects (or rather, minimizable side-effects.. they're actually not all that bad), and rumor has it, it will help with the weight-gain issues of stopping smoking as well.

And! as an extra bonus benefit, if you're an alcoholic? Apparently, according to the studies, it works for that too. Suffer from anxiety or a broken heart? It'll help. Crave sweets/starchy foods all the time? Yep, it should help with that. High HDL cholesterol? Check. Serotonin deficient? Hell yes.

What's more, it's probably already in your cupboard. All you need to do is up the dose. Carefully. And preferably under medical supervision (hey, I'm not a doctor. I don't claim to be one. Anything you do with this advice is your own look-out; tread carefully).

Sounds magical, no? Well, I'll lead into my next article (coming in a couple of days - I'm still experimenting on dosing patterns) by telling you what this magical substance is.

It's plain old Vitamin B3, a.k.a. Niacin. And from my own personal experience, it's already working 100x better than the Nicotine Patch that I used to quit smoking last time.

Who'da thought it?

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/12/081207134109.htm

The team discovered that the HSV1 DNA is located very specifically in amyloid plaques: 90% of plaques in Alzheimer's disease sufferers' brains contain HSV1 DNA, and most of the viral DNA is located within amyloid plaques. The team had previously shown that HSV1 infection of nerve-type cells induces deposition of the main component, beta amyloid, of amyloid plaques. Together, these findings strongly implicate HSV1 as a major factor in the formation of amyloid deposits and plaques, abnormalities thought by many in the field to be major contributors to Alzheimer's disease. 

Why does medicine move so slowly in these areas? I've been saying this for a year and a half now - based in part on this team's earlier research. :)

Glad to see we're making headway though!

Next step: We need to officially tie herpes viruses to all of the other diseases that they cause. My list is here: http://www.accidentalscientist.com/2008/01/public-enemy-1-herpes-viruses-as.html

Meanwhile, if you are at risk for Alzheimer's, do the following:

• Ask your doctor to prescribe valcyclovir as an off-label treatment. If necessary, lie and say that you have genital herpes and need it for suppression.
• Avoid foods rich in L-Arginine, especially chocolate and peanuts. L-Arginine rich foods encourage the virus to replicate.
• Supplement your diet with at least 5mg L-Lysine daily - the virus mistakes this for L-Arginine, and produces inert viral particles as a result.
• Take Omega-3 fatty acids. I've found the Eskimo brand to be the most effective - the krill version doesn't seem to work as well, and is more expensive. Omega 3 fatty acids change the structure of the cell membrane, making it harder for viruses to enter and exit the cytosome through the lipid raft.
• Take Resveratrol supplements. Studies in rats have shown that Resveratrol interferes with the replication of the virus, and may destroy it.
• Take Curcumin supplements (or eat lots of foods containing Turmeric). Curcuminoids also interfere with replication of the virus.
• Make sure you're taking a good B-complex vitamin, particularly one with the non-cyanocobalmin form of B12. B12 in particular attacks the virus as it replicates.

The most effective of these is, of course, valcyclovir. The others just slow the virus down.

So one of the upshots of the medical research that I've been doing recently is that I'm slowly figuring out how a lot of things work - especially for myself.

Normally, I'll wake up feeling like I have a hangover. Dry eyes, slight headache, very groggy. This tiredness doesn't stop during the day - and it doesn't go away no matter how much I sleep.

I think I've figured out how to fix that though. And the results are surprising. I've been borderline for type II diabetes for a while, with high cholesterol. And I do get coldsores. Those symptoms (high blood sugar, high cholesterol) are something that can be caused by a subclinical herpesviridae infection (if the papers I'm reading are correct). Add in the fact that I get some scintillating scotoma, and it looks like I've had a subclinical migraine for quite a while that was getting ready to rear its ugly head.

So a little research online, and I arrived at this solution (I take this morning and night):

• Curcumin (Turmeric extract)
• Resveratrol (Red Wine phenols)
• A good MultiVitamin
• Omega 3 fatty acids
• Lecithin
• L-Lysine
• Vitamin C

... and hey presto, I wake up feeling absolutely fantastic. Which is a nice change for me.

Still in the "is this a placebo or is it real?" phase, but the results are promising.

How does it work?

Well, assuming that herpesviridae are the cause of my symptoms (by the way, we can add migraines and cluster headaches to the list of potential herpesviridae-caused symptoms now after spying a few papers on this), it works something like this:

Curcumin - interferes with herpesviridae reproduction, also tones down TNF inflammatory response (kind of like a natural Enbrel/Etanercept).

Resveratrol - interferes with herpesviridae reproduction, turns down TNF inflammatory response, and inhibits reactivation (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10551373)

Multivitamin - to replenish Vitamin B stores (I use one high in the cyanocobalamin form of B12). Mainly to help repair nerves, but also to act synergistically with interferon in the body to increase its efficacy (http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6908611.html); adding high doses of B12 massively reduces the amount of interferon-beta necessary to hold an infection in check by about half.

Omega 3 fatty acids - modulates the structure of cell lipid rafts, making it harder for the herpesviridae (and rhinoviruses, adenoviruses) to enter or exit the cell membranes.

L-Lysine - interferes with herpesviridae replication by masquerading as L-Arginine (the virus can't tell the difference, and L-Lysine substitution produces faulty viruses).

Vitamin C - for healing (used by the body with Lysine to create collagen). This is really a buffer for the high levels of Lysine, allowing it to be effectively used, and to ensure that Vitamin C stores don't run low as a result.

Theoretically, this mix could also act as a good weight-loss treatment too; if you think about it, if this can shift the balance away from type-II diabetes and high cholesterol (which Omega 3, resveratrol and curcumin are shown to help with in some studies), weight loss should come as a natural consequence.

Anyway, it's all theory at this point. But the papers I'm using to do this research are pretty promising.

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