HBOT vs Ozone

[Arius]

Does anybody have an opinion as to which of these treatments (hyperbaric oxygen therapy or ozone therapy) is better for CFS/ME?

I'm having trouble finding good information online about either of them, though I am hearing a LOT of inspiring / amazing success stories with ozone therapy, which also seems to be the cheaper option. I can't afford to do both, and I want to get the most bang for my buck.

Thoughts, opinions, experiences, data?

 

[Hip]

I am hearing a LOT of inspiring / amazing success stories with ozone therapy

Can you link to those, as I have not come across any accounts of ozone therapy making any significant improvements to ME/CFS.

I use ozone myself sometimes, using a cheap and simple home method described in this post, and find it helps with some of the mental health symptoms I experience from time to time (depression, anxiety, etc). However, it does not seem to improve my ME/CFS.

Ozone levels in the body during ozone therapy are considered far too low to have any direct pathogen-killing effect; but the transient oxidative stress that ozone places on the body are thought to ramp up the body's oxidative defenses, and that may be the basis of ozone's therapeutic benefit.

 

[Arius]

Can you link to those, as I have not come across any accounts of ozone therapy making any significant improvements to ME/CFS.

I use ozone myself sometimes, using a cheap and simple home method described in this post, and find it helps with some of the mental health symptoms I experience from time to time (depression, anxiety, etc). However, it does not seem to improve my ME/CFS.

Hello Hip!

I actually have your ozone method open in another tab already. I'm extremely grateful to you for creating and sharing that. You do amazing things for people on this forum.

I must confess I know little about the science, but I imagine (perhaps ignorantly) that skin absorption is not going to be nearly as effective as direct injection into a portal vein?

As for success stories, I did a lot of reading last night and went down numerous internet rabbit holes reading about ozone therapy late into the night. I don't think I could reconstruct that. It just seemed like the vast majority of people who tried it experienced, if not remission (and there were plenty of those stories) than at least significant improvement in symptoms such that they raved about the experience and were committed to doing it as often as necessary despite the financial cost. I've heard of a few people feeling drained afterwards or not getting any noticeable benefit out of it, but my overall impression is that this could really make a difference.

The impression I get is that a lot of people sort of give up after their first round because they have a negative reaction; but if you push through and keep going, it eventually starts to be incredibly helpful. I recognize that it's just an impression, but right now that's all I've got to go on.

I have so far heard zero stories about long-lasting negative effects of this treatment option. And it's not like I'm just looking for the positive stories, either. I want as much accurate information as I can get about the safety and effectiveness of ozone therapy so that I can make an informed decision.

I belong to a facebook group for people with C-EBV, and I asked if anybody had tried ozone therapy. So far 4 people have responded that they have tried it. Three of the four are overwhelmingly happy with their progress. One says it detoxed her too fast and she's switched to HBOT instead, which also seems to have some therapeutic benefit for her. I've included a quote from each person below.

I was actually surprised to read that you "have not come across any accounts of ozone therapy making any significant improvements to ME/CFS," Hip - some of the success stories I was referring to are from ozone therapy threads on PR that you've participated in, so I'm genuinely confused by that statement.

I do believe that in my case reactivated and/or chronic EBV plays a significant role in my illness, and that exposing this virus to oxygen could potentially heal me. I've been doing everything else I can think of - avoiding stress, proper diet, improving my sleep, pacing, meditation, Qigong, etc etc - and nothing has worked; I now believe a virus has a stranglehold on my immune system and that my body will heal itself if I can just find a way to help my immune system vanquish that virus.

I also think that it's crucial to have everything else in place, or you could very easily relapse even if you do recover. That means listening to your body and abandoning the stress-inducing lifestyles that helped make us sick in the first place. It means exercising. It means going to bed at a good time. It means eating a healthy diet low in sugar, glyphosate, hormones, etc, and high in nutrients.


Quotes from the facebook group:

"I did a smaller amount first, where I herxed for about a week (which was increased fatigue for me). And then a few months later I did a 10 pass, which is basically a small amount of blood that's ozonated and then it's repeated 10 times so lots of ozone gets in your system and it's very effective. I felt ok afterwards but still had periods of fatigue up to a month. Then I did another 10 pass a few weeks ago and I have felt amazing ever since...I'm so excited with these results, this is the best I've felt in 6 years!!!"

"Did Autohemotherapy form of ozone with great results! More energy after 2 treatments, no more tongue burning or cold sores."

"CD57 (a measure of effectiveness at killing lyme disease) has gone up and EBV numbers improved... It really kills the Lyme quick."

"I just finished 10hrs of hyperbaric. It has helped in some ways but I need more time in it. I did ozone sauna back in Feb/Mar it was awful!!! Each treatment laid me up for a week. I think it detoxes you way too fast. I have zero intentions of ever doing it again."

 

[Hip]

I must confess I know little about the science, but I imagine (perhaps ignorantly) that skin absorption is not going to be nearly as effective as direct injection into a portal vein?

It's hard to say without performing a study, but ozone administration techniques include body bag application, where a plastic body suit is worn, and ozone gas is pumped into the suit, and the gas then diffuses through the skin. My method is similar, except easier: I first dissolve the gas into water to make ozonated water, and then apply this water to my skin from head to toe. This method is very cheap, costing only around $30, which is the price of a cheap ozone machine bough from China on eBay.

When you look at the cost of medical ozone machine setups sold to people (usually the same people that share their "amazing" stories on closed Facebook groups), they spend many thousands of dollars on their equipment. I wonder if they are not just being ripped off by manufacturers who hype the equipment they sell. I don't know enough about it to come to a definite conclusion.

was actually surprised to read that you "have not come across any accounts of ozone therapy making any significant improvements to ME/CFS," Hip - some of the success stories I was referring to are from ozone therapy threads on PR that you've participated in, so I'm genuinely confused by that statement.

My memory is terrible, so I might have forgotten, but the only stories I remember come from patients with fluoroquinolone toxicity syndrome, where a few substantially benefitted from ozone. But not ME/CFS patients.


As far as HBOT is concerned, I've heard that some Lyme patients may derive major benefit after a years of daily mild HBOT (which makes sense, since high levels of oxygen are toxic to Borrelia).

Though @Jesse2233 said that daily mild HBOT greatly helped his ME/CFS, and his ME/CFS is linked to enterovirus infection.

Then I did another 10 pass a few weeks ago and I have felt amazing ever since...I'm so excited with these results, this is the best I've felt in 6 years!

If you go back on these Facebook groups, you might like to ask the people there to quantify the improvements they are reporting.

When someone says "I felt amazing" that does not really mean that much. When I hear reports from ME/CFS patients about any treatment that has helped their ME/CFS, I usually ask them where they were on the ME/CFS scale of very severe, severe, moderate, mild, remission before treatment, and where they moved up to as a result of treatment.

If the treatment moves a patient up by even 1 level on this scale (eg, from moderate to mild), then that is a major improvement.

 

[Arius]

Thanks, Hip. I will ask them to quantify. I also found last night helpful colour-coded definitions of mild, severe, etc based on the NICE guidelines that you had posted... though it might not fit neatly into a FB comment. But I might be able to get some of them to post numbers from the Karnofsky scale at least. Of course, people with positive results are more likely to be invested emotionally in posting numbers and sharing their experiences.

Someone (not me) asked the following question on an Ozone Therapy group I joined yesterday:

"...has anyone successfully "cured" ebv and cmv using ozone?"

And here are all the relevant responses so far, both positive and negative:

“I had excellent results with EBV... Richard M Barnes MAH with UBI mostly. I didn’t have a home unit then, so I only had it once a week for 10 weeks. I bought a home unit afterwards and continued use with rectal insufflation for maintenance... ozone is known to kill bacteria, viruses, parasites and fungus. No virus or bacteria can become resistant to it either. The thought would be which application would be best for what someone has. I have seen many patients at my doctor’s office cured with ozone from things no one else can fix. Rectal insufflation is about 85% as effective as MAH with ozone. It may take a bit longer, but you can also do it every day, killing off viruses quicker. With EBV, you never totally get rid of it, but the idea is that you decrease your viral load very significantly all the while boosting your own immune system (ozone accomplishes both) so your body can keep the virus from becoming active again. Ozone is absolutely miraculous.”

“There is a man in a EBV group that is in remission after doing a combination of ozone and ultraviolet blood irradiation.I believe he did three weeks of treatment and he was sick for 15 years beforehand,now playing basketball again.”

“Yes...high dose Ozone.”

“Yes ... Ozone and more.”

“Not sure but ozone and Meyers has me walking and living a normal life again. I do this monthly now to maintain.”

“Yes. DIV and 10 pass. Dr Robins in NYC. A cure however is defined as sero-conversion of all your antibodies. Most people are in severe severe remission which often means it never reimurges but your IgG never sero- converted but your IgM's have.”

Now, obviously people who had negative experiences aren't likely to join an ozone group, so this has to be taken with a grain of salt. Still, I do think this is a treatment worth exploring (if you can afford it [which i presently can't... but I may be able to get money from my family eventually]), given that so many people are having positive outcomes.