Okay, I finished my 23rd pulse on Friday and then just did the regular daily medications over the weekend.  Perhaps I should say regular weekend medications as my last dose of azithromycin was Friday.  In any case, I thought I would recap some things I noticed during the pulse and things I've noticed over the weekend.

What I've noticed is not any improvements in my symptoms...unless you consider having more pain and discomfort an improvement.  Pain...that's a relative term.  It's more like inflamation and soreness then pain per se.  Hard to describe how it feels but I think many of you know what I'm referring to - a hotness in one's extremities (my legs mostly). 

Yes, it has been seven months since I began taking Rifampin although it seems more like eight.  It's entirely possible my count is off, it's not terribly important that it would be off by one.  In any case, I'm now on the most intensive CAPi I've ever been on.  I'm now taking Doxyi, Azi, INHi, Flagyli, and Rifampin, along with NACi all at the same time this week.  I started my 23rd pulse on Sunday night, a day and a half later then I generally try to schedule the start day/time (Saturday mornings).

I'm into my fourth day of a 5 day pulse. I forget what count this is, maybe the 22nd or 23rd? I know that April signified my official 2 year anniversary since starting the CAPi with NACi and Doxyi, way back when.  And here I still am, no better then when I began and sometimes worse.

Now, that being said, I haven't given up on anything.  I think that maybe I'm just starting to really figure things out about the CAP and how it can work for me.  What I mean by that is this...

Up until recently, I've been going through the motions, being very diligent to take NAC and abxi on a set schedule.  I still am; however, now I think I've found something in myself that I wasn't aware of before, a reaction I wasn't noticing.

Yes, I broke into my stash of INHi from last fall and took my very first dose of INH tonight with my second dose of Rifampin for the day, hence the Rifampinianaut. Isoniazid is the full name of INH and I just couldn't bring myself to label myself the Rifampiniazid. Of course, if one want's to be completely accurate, I would have to also work in Doxycycline, Azithromyocin, N-Acetyl Cysteine, and Metronidazolei. Hmmm....the Metroxyzithricetylfampiniazid, lol!!! O-kee, D'O-kee, I think not, lol

I'm considering using INHi in short pulses, generally over weekends, and wanted to post something and get other people's opinions, insights, warnings, or anything else related to the use of INH that I should be aware of.  I've had a prescription since August which has never been used and I'm considering using it and implementing it into what I've been doing.

One thing that makes me wonder about INH has to do with recent discussions about the calcium blocker therapy that the Dr. in Canada (I forget his name at the moment) came up with to use in conjunction with antibiotices, and how it works on monocytes.  Why does INH work on monocytes?  Does it have a caclium channel blocking mechanism?

Anyway, just my current ponderings, thanks.

Antibioticsi, referenced from the following website.

 http://www.peacehealth.org/kbase/cam/hn-1081002.htm 

Antibiotics

Alternative Medicine The following information is specific for alternative and complementary medicine. For additional evidence-based information on diseasesi, conditions, symptoms, diagnosis, treatment and wellness issues, continue searching the Healthwise Knowledgebase.

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We’ve had a big influx of members with CFSi/ME in the past year, especially with my article appearing in a web CFS newsletter. Getting on the CAPi is confusing enough, and difficult enough for this group, so I have been reluctant to report my own particular experiments and treatment results so as not to add more confusion. My story on the Patient Stories pages is accurate and honest: I report a 60-68% improvement using the CAP for Cpni, and that some particular symptoms have not improved as much as I would like. But it begs the question about what can someone with CFS/ME expect from Cpn CAP treatment?

My question primarily is from a user perspective, regarding the cost/vs side effects  of purchasing brand name capsules vs tablet forms when there is a choice. 

Cost seems to often be in favor of the tablet form. 

For those with no stomach distress with the capsules, seems either might be fine. 

For those with stomach respsonse to the capsules (such as myself) I have now realized that I do have a choice of the tablet form,

as well as a higher priced choice of another brand name Doryx that is reported to have less stomach response symptoms. Reported to be newer and more costly than either the tablet generic or the capsule generic.

I was reading recently that INHi is a compound of Niacini.  If that is the case, might that explain the reason why INH is useful in that it may have the same sort of activity against CPni as Niacin?  Further, I'm wondering whether Niacin has the same sort of affect as INH.  I know many take mega doeses of Niacin and get a reaction out of it.  I have before, though I didn't keep it up. 

I guess I wonder if I should think about Niacin in the same way I think about NACi.  NAC is a substitute for amoxicillini/penicillin basically, could not Niacin substitute for INH in the same manner?  It certainly would be safer from a liver standpoint...

Some patients are prescribed Isoniazid (INHi) in their CAPi. I thought it would be helpful to have an extract from the patent materials which explains this "novel class of antichlamydial agents." INH has the potential for liver toxicity, so should always be used with regular blood tests for liver function.

Some things of note:

I've upped my INHi to full dose now, which engendered more sacroilliac and lumbar back ache, but seemed otherwise manageable. But I've decided to take a break on the continuous tinii which I've been doing for a couple months. I'm on vacation and noticed with the increase in sunshine (Vit D?) and increase in INH that I have felt continually cruddy. Not smart on vacation! So I'm interested to see what the pattern is just on the regular antibioticsi. I'm particularly curious about post-pulse type symptoms (apoptosisi and cleanup) and cycling, which have been impossible to discern on a continous protocol. Always the fine balance between killing the buggers and having time to actually feel better!

I am still trying to get a grasp on Chlamydia Pneumoniae, I just found out on 4-11-07.  But I have been sick for awhile  .  I am just starting Antibioticsi again......eeeeek .  My symptoms have been sinus infectionsi and uppper respitory infections , Phlaringitis, Broncotitis, Asthmai.  In and out of the Dr. office the month of April, and my throat swelled shut I could go on and on.  I ended up at an Infetious disease Dr.

I haven't blogged my treatment for a while, as I've been waiting to see if I would stick with a shift in protocol. So far, still with it, so thought it might be time to report in and get other's thoughts. New folks, please read this as informational only. It does help clarify Dr. Stratton's use of the continuous rather than pulsed protocol, but the rest of the hypotheses here are presented as my own speculations, not scientific fact.

Well, I have been on AP (doxyi) for almost a month. Have definitely been herxing, mostly in my hands, which makes sense, since that is where my disease has been the longest (Raynaud's for 25 yrs). Strange, because my hands have never been really painful, just extremely sensitive to the cold. Now I feel like I have RA in them, they start hurting during the night, waking me up, and are so bad in the mornings that I can't lift, twist or turn anything. But I think they have been better the last 3 days, so maybe I am over the hump.

I went into pulse 21 with some trepidation, having been slammed by pulse 20. Pulse 20 was the first one I had done with the addition of Rifampin (still only up to one capsuye a day). I mentioned in my last blog that Dr. Stratton told me that the addition of Rifampin  created a 'physiological conflict' for the Cpni ie leaving it no pathway of escape, so I had more die off. I also had more post-pulse effects, a lot of apoptosisi and inflammationi. I finally figured out that I also had a build up of porphyrins as my anti-porphyriai efforts had been lax. I hadn't seemed to need them the prior couple pulses, but with bigger die off, bigger porphyria. So just before I began the pulse I did a Vitamin C flush and felt much better after. My body soaked up a lot of Vit C before gut clearance, at least 15 grams, so I was probably depleted in this as well. Really brings down inflammation and brain fog!