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    Created in 2008, Phoenix Rising is the largest and oldest forum dedicated to furthering the understanding of and finding treatments for complex chronic illnesses such as chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), fibromyalgia (FM), long COVID, postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS), mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and allied diseases.

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  1. Vitalic

    Discussion about Armin labs (Split Thread).

    Regarding the above, which admittedly I only skim-read, I think it's perhaps interesting to note that personally I had a negative response on Armin's LTT, and then retested after a couple of weeks of Doxycycline and was positive. I recall others detailing similar experiences to the point of it...
  2. Vitalic

    Documentary: Undercover in German Lyme Clinics

    I'm always hesitant to draw definitive and far-reaching conclusions from my own experiences (i.e. the entire enterprise is a scam), but I went through Lyme and co-infections treatment with KDM after a "positive" LTT and it only made me far worse. Thankfully my gut has just about recovered and I...
  3. Vitalic

    Over Activation of Farnesoid X Receptor In the Ilium Driving Liver and Gut Disharmony

    Great effort. Things are beginning to get interesting.
  4. Vitalic

    Low Dose Antigens / Immunotherapy (LDA/LDI) Lyme

    Thanks, I saw that before, it was what initially peaked my interest. It is however based on the presumption that it could be having the claimed effect, which as I described above would require a mechanism completely unknown to science. I thought he said that sometimes he could not get an effect...
  5. Vitalic

    Low Dose Antigens / Immunotherapy (LDA/LDI) Lyme

    In the latest video he talks about using dilutions of 10^40, even up to 10^50. There are roughly 10^54 atoms in the solar system, which means you'd have to imbibe every single atom in our solar system to ingest a single molecule of active ingredient. He then says the enzyme basically has no...
  6. Vitalic

    People's experiences of Bartonella

    That's the problem, without any evidence of causation you are always hitting something that might be having a negligible influence, that the immune system would deal with if it were not impacted by the actual disease mechanism, whatever it is. I imagine that people in 50 years time will look...
  7. Vitalic

    Feeling helpless

    Well, no, it's a terrible analogy as the article I linked pointed out: You provide an interesting anecdote but unfortunately preface it with an advertisement for the willingness to believe absolutely anything on no evidence at all (like bogus and discredited muscle testing that is explained...
  8. Vitalic

    People's experiences of Bartonella

    That is exactly what I assumed was happening, it was only recently I decided to have a closer look and noticed there was no breach of the skin surface, the redness appears to come from what looks like clusters of inflamed capillaries under the skin, not only that but it seems to be very...
  9. Vitalic

    People's experiences of Bartonella

    I've been noticing scratch marks and rashes for a while now (usually a blotchy red bloodshot looking pattern over entire chest area). Do excuse the neck beard hadn't shaved in a couple of days but this is the kind of thing I get, usually on the chest, upper arms or back. No idea what is causing...
  10. Vitalic

    Borrelia Biofilms Found In Vivo

    If they used internet lingo for study titles this study would be called: "shit just got real".
  11. Vitalic

    Autophagy suppresses host adaptive immune responses toward Borrelia burgdorferi

    Thanks for the summary. I updated the post with an actual link to the study by the way. This study was talking about autophagy and that if it is diminished it can increase IL-17 production, they propose modulation of autophagy which I presume means trying to increase it with the aim of reducing...
  12. Vitalic

    Autophagy suppresses host adaptive immune responses toward Borrelia burgdorferi

    J Leukoc Biol. 2016 Apr 21. pii: jlb.4A0715-331R. [Epub ahead of print] Autophagy suppresses host adaptive immune responses toward Borrelia burgdorferi. Buffen K1, Oosting M1, Li Y2, Kanneganti TD3, Netea MG1, Joosten LA4. Abstract We have previously demonstrated that inhibition of autophagy...
  13. Vitalic

    Do I have Lyme? Do 90% of people with fibro really have Lyme?

    More and more of late I have experienced people in the "Lyme community" casually asserting that CFS is just Lyme, some of these people have the intellectual rigour of a 5 year old. The only sense in which they are the same in my view is that they are both useless diagnoses exploited by...
  14. Vitalic

    Low Dose Antigens / Immunotherapy (LDA/LDI) Lyme

    I may be wrong but I thought in an interview I heard with Dr. Vincent he said they tried this if the regular treatments didn't work (the Lyme one for example), is that true and if so does it imply the improvement you reported has not been sustained?
  15. Vitalic

    Chronic Lyme Disease Summit - Free On-line

    I hereby propose a new variant of Godwin's Law but for alternative medicine, something along the lines of: "as you travel further into the world of alternative medicine the probability of a reference or appeal to quantum mechanics approaches 1". It does aggravate me though, I mean it's just...
  16. Vitalic

    Low Dose Antigens / Immunotherapy (LDA/LDI) Lyme

    I was listening to an interview with Ty Vincent and one question that arose in my mind is why they don't test the central thesis, if the treatments are working by reducing inflammation should that not be testable? Most of us probably have an array of elevated cytokines and so I would expect to...
  17. Vitalic

    Another celebrity: Hugh Hefner's wife reveals Lyme disease diagnosis

    They don't say they know, they say there is up until now no credible evidence. It seems obvious to me which of the two statements (the CDC's and Hefner's wife's casual assertion that it can be sexually transmitted) is the more intellectually honest, and that is a problem I see all the time...
  18. Vitalic

    In Belgium to see KDM

    I asked at one point if he could speculate as to what treatment he would propose based on the current data, with the view that I could at least ask any questions that spring immediately to mind, but he said he couldn't. It is understandable given he needs time to think about it but it does point...
  19. Vitalic

    appointment with Dr. Bela Chheda from the Open Medicine Institute

    Binge drinking and crack cocaine is also strongly discouraged.
  20. Vitalic

    In Belgium to see KDM

    I have great respect for KDM don't get me wrong, but one issue I can't seem to overlook is that there seems to be a missing step in the process, it's like you get test results, speak about them, then receive a suggested treatment plan, and to begin with that is fine (especially since it tends to...
  21. Vitalic

    James Coyne standing up for pts with ME like no one else

    I guess no one follows Richard Dawkins? This barely registers on the controversy scale yet! Totally support this guy, linking it to the civil rights movement is a super smart idea, because to frame it in that way means anyone opposing it is also opposing the civil rights movement and no one...
  22. Vitalic

    Australian Dr finds 95% of his 300 M.E patients have evidence of Lyme.

    I believe this should answer your question: http://www.lymediseaseaction.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/PHE-LD-conference-2013-Jackie-Duggan.pdf I did read somewhere in the literature on it that it had the potential to detect undiscovered strains/pathogens as well, so it would be interesting...
  23. Vitalic

    Discussion about Armin labs (Split Thread).

    Yes, I did four weeks of Doxycycline in between. The reason for that was that I had tested positive for Mycoplasma + Tularemia (via RED Labs). Are you suggesting that the treatment was significant? I should add, the report on the initial test said the following: Perhaps the combination of...
  24. Vitalic

    Australian Dr finds 95% of his 300 M.E patients have evidence of Lyme.

    Have you heard of Plex ID? http://www.aphl.org/conferences/proceedings/Documents/2011/2011_APHL_Annual_Meeting/034McDermott.pdf http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0039928 I believe it is still awaiting FDA approval and so even though they have this technology in...
  25. Vitalic

    Discussion about Armin labs (Split Thread).

    That presentation underlines the difficulties Lyme/Chronic Lyme patients are faced with. There seems to be enough evidence to assert beyond any reasonable doubt that it is possible to be a seronegative Lyme patient, and so at what point do you turn your back on it as the potential root cause...
  26. Vitalic

    Possible CFS success story. Got much better after 4-5 years. Here's what has helped.

    Please log out of this forum, turn off your computer, disable your internet connection, and I hope you don't ever fly in a plane or drive a car. It's always amusing to see people denigrating science while using the tools it has produced to do it. Think about it for a second, does anything...
  27. Vitalic

    Discussion about Armin labs (Split Thread).

    Prof. Edwards would you care to expound on the reasons you suspect Armin's test(s) to be unreliable? I do recall you made a generalised post about the pitfalls of LTT as a testing methodology but I do not recall seeing anything specific to Lyme or Armin. I am particularly interested since I...
  28. Vitalic

    Lyme and exercise

    if you can go to the gym twice a week it would seem the Lyme is something of a triviality...
  29. Vitalic

    Low Dose Antigens / Immunotherapy (LDA/LDI) Lyme

    This post is so true it hurts haha. Mentioned LDI to KDM when I saw him yesterday and he said he was about to read a 150 page study on it, stupidly I did not ask which study but it sounded like it was in pre-publication, he seems interested.
  30. Vitalic

    Elevated IL-12 + IL-17?

    Hey, just got latest blood work back and one observation is that IL-12 and IL-17 are both significantly elevated, I know both of these cytokines are associated with autoimmunity but not much more than that. Since it is not something I have seen discussed much before I wondered if anyone could...