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http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/may/07/antibiotics-cure-back-pain-patients
“The Danish team describe their work in two papers published in the European Spine Journal. In the first report, they explain how bacterial infections inside slipped discs can cause painful inflammation and tiny fractures in the surrounding vertebrae.
Working with doctors in Birmingham, the Danish team examined tissue removed from patients for signs of infection. Nearly half tested positive, and of these, more than 80% carried bugs called Propionibacterium acnes.
The microbes are better known for causing acne. They lurk around hair roots and in the crevices in our teeth, but can get into the bloodstream during tooth brushing. Normally they cause no harm, but the situation may change when a person suffers a slipped disc. To heal the damage, the body grows small blood vessels into the disc. Rather than helping, though, they ferry bacteria inside, where they grow and cause serious inflammation and damage to neighbouring vertebrae that shows up on an MRI scan.
In the second paper, the scientists proved they could cure chronic back pain with a 100-day course of antibiotics. In a randomised trial, the drugs reduced pain in 80% of patients who had suffered for more than six months and had signs of damaged vertebra under MRI scans.
Albert stressed that antibiotics would not work for all back pain. Over-use of the drugs could lead to more antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which are already a major problem in hospitals. But she also warned that many patients will be having ineffective surgery instead of antibiotics that could alleviate their pain.”
Mom of teen daughter with Poly JIA since age 2. Current med: azithromycin 250 mg MWF.
Abstract:
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs00586-013-2675-yBioclavid = Augmentin
Mom of teen daughter with Poly JIA since age 2. Current med: azithromycin 250 mg MWF.
Thanks for sharing these links. Amazing how many chronic, degenerative conditions could be helped by antibiotic therapy. Much more research should be done in this area…as we all know that are successfully on AP!
MaryHi Suzanne,
It’s kind of interesting that another UK paper, The Telegraph, reported on these same findings 12 years ago!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1334054 … -cure.html
Could this kind of thing be why it takes several generations of physicians for medical texts to reflect these kinds of findings? I just find it all so bizarre…what about you?
@Maz wrote:
Hi Suzanne,
It’s kind of interesting that another UK paper, The Telegraph, reported on these same findings 12 years ago!
Could this kind of thing be why it takes several generations of physicians for medical texts to reflect these kinds of findings? I just find it all so bizarre…what about you?
I guess the news is that someone finally did a trial? The earlier article just mentions they found the infection, so I guess it just took this long before someone decided to do something about it! Not very encouraging.
Interesting from your link:
“Professor Elliot and four colleagues from Aston University and the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital in Birmingham stumbled across the answer when trying out a blood test for deep-seated infections in patients, intended to identify infections of the heart or bone.
They applied the test to sciatica sufferers as a “control” group expecting negative results in these individuals – only to find that in a third of them it was positive.”I’d like whatever test that is for my daughter!
Mom of teen daughter with Poly JIA since age 2. Current med: azithromycin 250 mg MWF.
@Suzanne wrote:
I guess the news is that someone finally did a trial? The earlier article just mentions they found the infection, so I guess it just took this long before someone decided to do something about it! Not very encouraging.
Yup…original “association” with P. acnes and sciatica was reported in the Lancet in 2001:
Association between sciatica and Propionibacterium acnes (June 2001)
http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/ article/PIIS0140-6736(00)05109-6/abstract
Geez – Louise, Suzanne….the article in The Telegraph mentioned,
“A clinical trial involving hundreds of patients is being set up to test the hypothesis and the results should be known in 18 months’ time.”
Whatever could have taken 12 years to do an 18 month study? This really sucks that such a study took that long. Hmmm…maybe no one wanted to fund a cheap, generic abx? 🙄
PS. Darn…system didn’t like the link from the Lancet and had to paste in two parts…if anyone wants to see it, you’ll need to cut and paste both parts without the space (between: lancet/ and article…) into your brower.
Nobody has to convince me of the value of antibiotics. High dose antibiotic combos cured my son. I just posted his story in the personal progress threads, yesterday. It’s called “My Son’s Story.”
The news is great. I’m sending it to my family.
Mary
@Suzanne wrote:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/may/07/antibiotics-cure-back-pain-patients
“The Danish team describe their work in two papers published in the European Spine Journal. In the first report, they explain how bacterial infections inside slipped discs can cause painful inflammation and tiny fractures in the surrounding vertebrae.
Working with doctors in Birmingham, the Danish team examined tissue removed from patients for signs of infection. Nearly half tested positive, and of these, more than 80% carried bugs called Propionibacterium acnes.
The microbes are better known for causing acne. They lurk around hair roots and in the crevices in our teeth, but can get into the bloodstream during tooth brushing. Normally they cause no harm, but the situation may change when a person suffers a slipped disc. To heal the damage, the body grows small blood vessels into the disc. Rather than helping, though, they ferry bacteria inside, where they grow and cause serious inflammation and damage to neighbouring vertebrae that shows up on an MRI scan.
In the second paper, the scientists proved they could cure chronic back pain with a 100-day course of antibiotics. In a randomised trial, the drugs reduced pain in 80% of patients who had suffered for more than six months and had signs of damaged vertebra under MRI scans.
Albert stressed that antibiotics would not work for all back pain. Over-use of the drugs could lead to more antibiotic-resistant bacteria, which are already a major problem in hospitals. But she also warned that many patients will be having ineffective surgery instead of antibiotics that could alleviate their pain.”
Susanne,
Thanks for posting the interesting paper. For those of us who have been involved in AP as patients for a long time and the history of Dr. Brown’s work, etc., this may sound like “same song, another verse.”It’s always great to find something that stops the pain and progression, but then other important work on our part (I believe) really begins. And my belief is that we really need to take a look at why our immune system was/is depressed enough that this problem became chronic, and progressed to a painful, chronic, debilitating illness.
The relief we get needs to be (in my opinion) a time when we review lots of things — and not be lulled into a false sense of security. The AP is our friend, but if it is possible to repair/replace, then my belief is that’s an option to look at. I think we need to be addressing anything/everything we need to change and do to enable our body to keep itself healthy. In other words, a program/list about what our own body needs that is missing that allowed it not to be able to defend itself and to become chronically ill. [If you haven’t looked at the recently posted new topic showing research that high-dose B vitamins and others can actually replace missing enzymes that some patients can’t make because of our body’s genetic makeup. This is huge. We’ve seen papers related to such as this before on RBFBB where carpal tunnel was addressed this way (high dose B vitamins) in research a number of years ago by Folkers & Ellis.]
In the paper about stopping the back pain posted. I believe the immune system was reacting to the organisms in the bone, but will just show up some other place if the patient just keeps on with the abx and doesn’t address other things that need to be addressed on an ongoing basis. One further gross thought is something I found — even when I thought I had the bases covered several years ago, problems still persisted. I didn’t think I needed to get involved in my pH balance, because my diet and supplements looked like everything was “covered.” What I didn’t know was that my body was so acidic (apparently because of the unfriendly organisms hiding (and multiplying in that acidic environment) and all the excrement they were creating (acidic wastes). It was during this period of time that damage was being done: and, I was only alerted when the pain began and became very bad. It was then an ND acquaintance asked me if I’d checked my pH. I hadn’t. And it was as acidic as the pH strips could measure. (Unfortunately, by this time, much damage had been done to my bones. And just a few years before this time, my bone density was in the high range of normal. Hope this experience of mine will be a warning to all you wise patients.
Has anyone in full remission made a laundry list of the things they found necessary to change ?
AF
@marypart wrote:
Nobody has to convince me of the value of antibiotics. High dose antibiotic combos cured my son. I just posted his story in the personal progress threads, yesterday. It’s called “My Son’s Story.”
The news is great. I’m sending it to my family.
Mary
Mary,
Just read your son’s story. Thanks so much for posting/sharing it. Wish they could clone that doctor you mentioned outside D.C. We need all of them to be like her. Learning everything we need to know to even help ourselves is a daunting task… and seems impossible unless we find the kind of help you did for your son. Thankfully, the day I was first diagnosed, I called a local bookstore, and a lady there said she had three books on arthritis, but one of them was her favorite. Want to guess which one that was??? Yes, “Arthritis Breakthrough.” She only had one, and I went immediately to get it.No online RBF in those days; they had an office in the east, and mailed information to me. From their booklet I found Dr. S in Iowa, along with a recommendation from a lady who posted her story in the booklet I received. How lucky I was! It turned things around, and allowed me to function normally, except for various periods of time since then, when I would again have to figure out “what the heck was going on.”
I’m so happy for you and your son,
AFWell, isn’t this interesting research! When aged 40 I had a serious back injury and was unable to walk because of bulging spinal disks. After months in bed unable to walk doctors offered me spinal surgery that I refused. I then diagnosed myself as having a nasty infection but was refused sufficient antibiotics to treat it effectively. I obtained free samples of bacterial fighting antibiotics from a drug rep who took pity on me and provided me with supplies that I took for a year. I slowly improved and eventually walked again. From that time I have been plagued with dental infections and spinal lumbar pain. Xrays show severe osteoarthritis throughout my spine that has continued to deteriorate and spread throughout my spine over many years. This has gone on for almost 30 years.
I have spent the last few days reading all this spinal research and checking out appropriate antibiotics. I saw it on the news and then looked for references to it here and found this thread.
I am so tired of begging for the right kind of help from medical people so have taken matters into my own hands and ordered antibiotics from overseas. I intend to do the 100 days of treatment that was applied in the research and see what happens. I’m going to be my own doctor. I stopped the minocycline on 14 April as I decided it wasn’t the correct antibiotic for me after 6 months on it so the publication of this research is timely for me. If only I had spotted it 12 years ago!
@enzed wrote:
I am so tired of begging for the right kind of help from medical people so have taken matters into my own hands and ordered antibiotics from overseas. I intend to do the 100 days of treatment that was applied in the research and see what happens. I’m going to be my own doctor.
Enzed, I understand your frustration, but I hope you will try to do this with a doctor. Abx you can order without an rx might not be 100% real or safe, so even if this the answer for you, you might not end up with the right outcome.
If you tell the dr. who prescribed the mino what you are planning to do, maybe he/she will let you try a month at time and monitor you. If things go well, I’m sure they would give you the full 100 days.
My daughter has taken Augmentin for osteomyelitis. It’s a tough one, especially once you get a few days in. Take plenty of probiotics.
Mom of teen daughter with Poly JIA since age 2. Current med: azithromycin 250 mg MWF.
@Suzanne wrote:
@enzed wrote:
I am so tired of begging for the right kind of help from medical people so have taken matters into my own hands and ordered antibiotics from overseas. I intend to do the 100 days of treatment that was applied in the research and see what happens. I’m going to be my own doctor.
Enzed, I understand your frustration, but I hope you will try to do this with a doctor. Abx you can order without an rx might not be 100% real or safe, so even if this the answer for you, you might not end up with the right outcome.
If you tell the dr. who prescribed the mino what you are planning to do, maybe he/she will let you try a month at time and monitor you. If things go well, I’m sure they would give you the full 100 days.
My daughter has taken Augmentin for osteomyelitis. It’s a tough one, especially once you get a few days in. Take plenty of probiotics.
Thanks Suzanne. It sounds like your daughter has had a hard time. I have ordered Amoxicillan from Canadian Pharmacy. It’s the same as Augmentin according to my comparisons. I’ve downloaded dose information from Drugs.com – it has extensive information about Amoxicillan, and interesting to find Amoxicillan is also a drug used for Arthritis, Lyme as well as for sinus and dental infections, and ‘other’ bacteria as well as the lumbar issue. Don’t know if I have Lyme but I have all the others. All the recommended doses are listed there. They do seem high.
Interesting that it says people with Lyme should expect a major herx the first few days. It doesn’t say that for any of the other bacteria it’s used for though. So if I get a big herx I would then have reason to suspect Lyme.
My doctor was skittish about having prescribed me mino when I saw him last week – I suspected he’d been contacted by the rheumy warning him not to give me mino – I saw the rheumy the following day and got a lecture about it too. I don’t want to put my doctor in a difficult position with the rheumy so I decided not to ask him for Amoxicillan but I may tell him I’m taking it when I see him next. He did say I am the only patient at the practice with SD / Raynauds, and he didn’t want to prescribe anything else without the rheumy’s agreement. So I’m pretty sure he’d had a good old telling off! However, I am not so easily cowed.
The rheumy is in complete denial that my collective issues could be bacteria based. He’s a nice guy but we
are on different pages when it comes to cause. But I still need to continue seeing him because of the Raynauds.Hmmm – well maybe besides asking how many have Lyme with or before their Rheumatic disease – perhaps we should be also asking how many have had back problems ahead of their Rheumatic disease?
I have had 2 back surgeries – but part of mine started with a car wreck but I was having bad back problems at L4 L5 ahead of this wreck. Of course I also went on to have Lyme & Scleroderma too.
I waited 10 yr’s before the 1st surgery suffering due to concerns of what surgery could mess up – but when i could no longer walk anymore i was left with no other choice at the time – then the 2nnd surgery was to correct the 1st – i have a artificial disc in there now as there was no disc left & I had a resulting progressive spondlythesis after the 1st surgery I waited 18 mo’s after the 1st surgery & was over 90% slipped off before doing this in 04. I then got a MRSA infection about 9 months later.
Interesting.Jill SD, Lyme Candida CPn
@enzed wrote:
I have ordered Amoxicillan from Canadian Pharmacy. It’s the same as Augmentin according to my comparisons. I’ve downloaded dose information from Drugs.com – it has extensive information about Amoxicillan, and interesting to find Amoxicillan is also a drug used for Arthritis, Lyme as well as for sinus and dental infections, and ‘other’ bacteria as well as the lumbar issue. Don’t know if I have Lyme but I have all the others. All the recommended doses are listed there. They do seem high.
Augmentin: “Amoxicillin/clavulanic acid (INN) or co-amoxiclav (BAN) is a combination antibiotic consisting of amoxicillin trihydrate, a ?-lactam antibiotic, and potassium clavulanate, a ?-lactamase inhibitor. This combination results in an antibiotic with an increased spectrum of action and restored efficacy against amoxicillin-resistant bacteria that produce ?-lactamase.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amoxicillin/clavulanic_acid
Plain amoxicillin is first-line stuff. The pink suspension they give kids goes down like candy. Augmentin, in our experience, is more of the real deal. 100 days would be hard on the gut.
Mom of teen daughter with Poly JIA since age 2. Current med: azithromycin 250 mg MWF.
years ago I was prescript Biaxin and within four weeks I noticed that my sciatica had disappeared. I did some research on it and found that a doctor in England had been treating sciatica patients with Biaxin. That was in 2008. I went off Biaxin last year in January and by September I had to ask Dr, K. to call in a prescrition for it. I was in a lot of pain, could hardly function, within a week I started to do a lot better. I only stayed on it for a month then went back to clindy. Now when my back starts to hurt a little I will take Biaxin for a week or two. It works. Mine was just by accident that I started to take this antibiotic and now I have no more sciatic nerve problem.
Eva 😮Eva Holloway
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