Butydoc
Senior Member
- Messages
- 790
Just finished see Dr Montoya this morning. A very interesting visit. It is note worthy that I was treated by him in 2007 with Valcyte. He began with the usual loading dose of 1800 mg/day for three weeks followed by the therapeutic dose of 900 mg/day. Like many who reported their experience with Valcyte, I was very ill from the side effects of the drug for the 7 months of treatment. Recently my symptoms have worsened and I began another round of Valcyte. Dr Montoya has changed his protocol for all patients and no longer uses the loading dose protocol. He starts on a low dose and works up to the therapeutic dose. He claims patients tolerate this schedule much better without compromising the results.
His present belief is that cfids is caused by a genetic predisposition to immune dysfunction that is triggered by a viral infection. He also believes that herpe viruses are responsible for the subset of patients with mostly cns symptoms.
He strongly believes that inflammation (probable cytokines) are responsible for the subjective symptoms. He claims Valcyte or other antivirals are part of the puzzle and anti-inflammatory drugs is probable the other piece.
This is why he believes Retuximab improves some patients. He is now adding colchicine to his antiviral regimen with good success. He feels that he may need to use other drugs like methotrexate or Retuximab if the lesser dangerous drug colchicine is not effective.
He is working with Dr Lipkin on deep sequencing to look for HHV6,7,8 and other novel viruses.
Starting next year, cfids will be taught to the medical students at Stanford as a medical disease. In his experence 85% of doctors still consider cfids a psychiatric disorder. He hopes to dispel this myth.
Gary
His present belief is that cfids is caused by a genetic predisposition to immune dysfunction that is triggered by a viral infection. He also believes that herpe viruses are responsible for the subset of patients with mostly cns symptoms.
He strongly believes that inflammation (probable cytokines) are responsible for the subjective symptoms. He claims Valcyte or other antivirals are part of the puzzle and anti-inflammatory drugs is probable the other piece.
This is why he believes Retuximab improves some patients. He is now adding colchicine to his antiviral regimen with good success. He feels that he may need to use other drugs like methotrexate or Retuximab if the lesser dangerous drug colchicine is not effective.
He is working with Dr Lipkin on deep sequencing to look for HHV6,7,8 and other novel viruses.
Starting next year, cfids will be taught to the medical students at Stanford as a medical disease. In his experence 85% of doctors still consider cfids a psychiatric disorder. He hopes to dispel this myth.
Gary